Wyatt Earp: The Life Behind the Legend

by Casey Tefertiller

  The Earps were gaining esteem in the community, along with personal wealth and some local power as lawmen, when something went very wrong. Apparently after a fight with Doc, Big-Nose Kate got drunk and swore out a warrant implicating him in the stage robbery and the killing of Philpott. On July 5, Holliday was arrested by Behan, with part of his bail being provided by Wyatt Earp. Kate got herself arrested the next day for drunk and disorderly behavior. As the Nugget phrased it: "Miss Kate Elder sought 'surcease of sorrow' in the flowing bowl." She was fined $12.50 and released. A day later Kate faced further charges for making threats against life, although whom she threatened is unknown. After spending a night in jail, she was discharged on a writ of habeas corpus. The Nugget wrote: "Such is the result of a warrant sworn out by an enraged and intoxicated woman."

  Kate made her complaint against Holliday at a time when the district attorney's office was in chaos. Lyttleton Price and John Miller had been contesting the position since Governor Fremont made the audacious move to appoint Republican Price. The board of supervisors had refused Price's appointment and installed Democrat Miller, who appointed Deputy James Bennett Southard to handle the day-to-day operation. The situation had become so absurd that at one point both Southard and Price appeared in court to prosecute the same case. Price had charge of Holliday's case and conducted an investigation. It did not take long. When the D.A.'s report came to Judge Wells Spicer, it said he had "examined all the witnesses summoned for the prosecution and from their statements he was satisfied that there was not the slightest evidence to show the guilt of the defendant; and not even amount to a suspicion of the guilt of the defendant." The D.A. requested the complaint be withdrawn, and it was dismissed. The Nugget commented: "Thus ended what at the time was supposed to be an important case."26

  While the court completely disregarded Kate's claims, the charge would be enough to begin gossip in a community where Holliday had already made more than his share of enemies ready to believe the worst of him. Doc had been a friend of Billy Leonard, jeweler turned stage robber, and Wyatt Earp would write that Holliday had visited Leonard's shack two miles out of Tombstone on the day of the holdup but had returned to town before the robbery, apparently the impetus to give Kate some grounds for her accusation.27 Kate's comments marked the beginning of a rumor campaign that would long taint the memory of the Earps in Arizona history. Pioneer James Hancock later said, "Nearly all the old-timers believed it was Williams who tipped off the Earps as to shipments.... I have heard it stated that the money was not put in the box, but was held out in the office and the stage holdup pulled off as a blind. They were afraid that if the outlaws got the box they would pull out for Mexico and leave the Earp crowd to make the best of it. A smooth scheme-the money could be kept in the office and the Earps stay in town."28 This absurd rumor began after the attempt on the Benson stage and obviously had no basis in fact. The strongbox was not stolen, and no money was missing. The shipment arrived safely when Paul pulled up in Benson. Over the next few months someone in the rustler camp created such a remarkable campaign of misinformation that it is likely many cowboys themselves believed Doc Holliday and the Earps had some role in the holdup.

  John Pleasant Gray ran into Leonard, Head, and Crane on the range before they split up, and Crane told him a most unusual story. The outlaw said Paul drove the stage and Philpott held the shotgun, and the whole robbery had been planned by the Earps. Morgan Earp was to serve as shotgun messenger and had tipped the robbers that the strongbox would hold $20,000, according to Crane's story. However, Paul took over as messenger at the last minute and fouled up the plans. According to Gray, Crane said the Earps made a big show of hunting the robbers but never had any intention of finding them.

  It defies logic that the cowboys expected Morgan Earp to be sitting on the box as part of the robbery plot. The bandits shot immediately at dark silhouettes, and killing Morgan would have stirred the wrath of the Earps, who were supposedly part of the scheme. This would have been a particularly dumb move, even for the most foolish cowboys, and even more absurd if Holliday had done the shooting as the cowboys claimed.

  The story of Paul taking the reins from Philpott became public for the first time in August shortly after Crane's death, when an unidentified informant gave details of the robbery to the Nugget:

  To many it has always seemed a mystery that the parties mentioned should have killed Philpot [sic] and spared Bob Paul, Wells, Fargo & Co.'s messenger. According to Crane, however, when the ambushed robbers fired at Philpot, they thought it was Paul, as the two had swapped places, Paul acting as driver, and poor Bud as messenger. They meant to kill Paul, thinking that his death would result in the stoppage of the stage, and the easy plunder of WE & Co.'s box and the passengers. The change from messenger to driver, so Crane says, was made somewhere between the change station and the place of ambush. This he claimed to know, as he was the party detailed to watch for the stage, and signal it to his comrades. Why the change was made will probably never be known until the great judgment. No one knowing Bob Paul will attribute it to fear or the possible consequences; his character for bravery is too well established to admit of question. Suffice it that poor Philpot now sleeps peacefully under the daisies, and the intended victim Paul, still lives, sheriff of Pima county, and dreaded terror to the class of whom his intended murderers formed a part.29

  This informant may well have been John Pleasant Gray. By the cowboy account, Paul had taken the seat on the right-hand side of the box, while Philpott sat to the left in the spot occupied by the shotgun messenger. Ike Clanton would repeat the story under oath in November, after more killing. Other than the statements of Gray and Clanton, there is little reason to suspect that Paul and Philpott made the fateful decision to change seats. Both Wyatt and Virgil Earp emphasized in later interviews that Philpott had been the driver. Both Earps rode with Paul, and he must have told them the story. All newspaper accounts at the time give Philpott as the driver and tell of shotgun messenger Paul reaching for the reins as the horses ran away.

  It is unlikely any such switch occurred. Paul ranked as a diligent and highly competent shotgun messenger, and he would not have given up his job of protecting the Wells, Fargo box except under the most extreme emergency. The stage had just passed through Contention, and an ailing driver would have been cause to stop, not to continue. All stories agree Paul fired almost immediately upon the command to halt, something he could not have done had he been driving the stage. This attempted robbery occurred only three weeks after another stage holdup, and Paul would have been extremely cautious. The story of the seating switch continued to circulate, the only substantiation coming from the cowboy camp. While it seemed to be given little credence by newspapers at the time, later generations would pick it up and repeat the gossip as gospel.

  The story also became the basis for the belief that the robbery had been more than just a gold-grab. A rumor circulated that the holdup had really been an assassination attempt on Paul, still awaiting the final decision in the Pima County sheriff's election. Months later James Reilly, the judge arrested by Wyatt Earp, would write to the Nugget charging the entire affair had been a plot to kill Paul. Reilly's claim was repeated for decades.30 This, too, defies logic. Most of the cowboys operated in newly formed Cochise County, not Pima, and eliminating Paul would have served no purpose and risked a hanging. Had the goal been to kill Paul, an ambush in an alley would have been more efficient. This was one of the more far-fetched of the frontier conspiracy theories.

  Tombstone must have been a little less pleasant for the Earps once the rumors of Holliday's involvement became public. Luke Short and Bat Masterson had already returned to Kansas, Bat going back after receiving a telegram that his brother Jim was in serious trouble. After Wyatt's ill-advised reward deal, the rift between the Earps and the Clantons had grown wider. Already the McLaurys disliked the Earps because they associated them with Lieutenant Hurst's accusation of stealing the army mules, and now the Clanton family had their
own little dispute with the Earps. It all happened in a strange setting of civility, where opposing sides would drink, gamble, and talk together before arguing, sometimes violently.

  There were other problems in Tombstone during mid-1881. Late in the afternoon of June 22, a worker at the Arcade Saloon dropped a cigarette into a whiskey barrel and set off a fire that burned four substantial blocks of the small town, including the Oriental Saloon, and caused an estimated quarter-million dollars in damage. Tombstone had no fire engine, and the volunteers battled to stop the blaze, tearing down burning buildings and throwing water in all directions. The conflagration burned the most valuable blocks of the town, from Fifth to Seventh and from Fremont through Toughnut Streets. Ironically, Mayor Clum returned home the evening of the fire, from a trip east to purchase a fire engine and two hose carriages.31

  Diarist George Parsons distinguished himself in the blaze, leaping on a burning verandah to try to prevent the fire from spreading into the building. The verandah fell, and a board shattered part of his face. Wyatt Earp probably also contributed his share of heroism, although the documentation is slim. Sadie Earp would later say that Wyatt rescued an invalid woman from the flames. While there is no substantiation, such deeds are often lost in the turmoil of a fire.32

  Marshal Virgil Earp drew the praise of the Epitaph: "He put on a large force of special police to protect life and property."33 According to Fred Dodge, the city marshal stepped in to stop lot-jumpers who were trying to take control of property. Dodge wrote:

  The next morning after the fire, Lot jumpers were much in Evidence and were squatted on many good business lots. The titles to all Tombstone lots were in dispute and were waiting the result in the Courts. The men who had lost all they had in the business that they were carrying on, had over night lost possession of the lot-the lot jumpers were now in possession. It looked to all of us that the man who was in possession when the fire wiped him out Should be put in possession and when the Courts adjusted the Controvverses over the title, the occupant would then have to abide by the Court decision. Virgil Earp and Wyatt Earp talked with Several of the leading business men and the head ones of the Safety Committee. And the above was the Consensus of opinion-

  So Virgil Earp Selected the Posse of which I was one. We Started on Allen Street-Many of these Lot Jumpers were supposed to be Gun Men and some of them were sure enough Gun Men-We proceeded up one side of Allen Street and Come down on the other side. On all lots that there was a Lot jumper on, we took him off and put back the man who had been on the lot before the fire. Fremont Street had not had the Damage that Allen Street had, and by the time we were through with Allen Street, the Lot jumpers on Fremont Street were quitting the lots on the Street. It was a fair and just proceeding.

  On the upper End of Allen and on 6th Street to 7th, there were Many Women of the Sporting Class that had their Houses and the best of these lots had a jumper on the lot. They put up little round Tents and the jumper was going to sleep in his Tent. That Night, there was a selected number of men on Horseback and when the night was far enough Advanced and all was as quiet as it was at anytime, these Horsemen rode arround and just dropped a Lasso Rope over a Tentpole and then on a Gallop, they jerked the tent free from its holding and left the Lot jumper lying there. There was also another Smaller Committee that started the Cry, "Lot jumper, you Git," and they did. The Names of these men who done the riding and roping, and the Committee who started the Cry of "Git" were not at the time given out and will not be given out now.34

  Optimism survived the fire, and Clara Brown told of Tombstone's rapid renovation: "The ruins uptown present a disheartening spectacle, but many of the people so suddenly burned out appear not to feel disheartened," Brown reported. "Buildings are going up as rapidly as possible, and most of them will be superior to the ones destroyed, being made of adobe instead of wood."35

  Tombstone showed signs of new growth. In July the city council tried to induce a phone company to bring those newfangled telephones into town, and in August a water company began laying pipes. The townsmen also expected the railroad line would be extended into Tombstone.

  Another rumor ran through Tombstone. It would only be a matter of time before Harry Woods would resign as undersheriff to devote full time to running the Nugget. The Star printed the rumor, and the Epitaph called for him to give up the public position. The job of undersheriff was designed as a full-time occupation. Other civic officials-the mayor and members of the town council-were to be businessmen working for the public good. Mayor/editor John Clum saw a distinct difference between his role and that of undersheriff/editor Woods, whose duties at the Nugget could only interfere with his position as No. 2 lawman in a county that demanded efficient law enforcement. Woods held a very partisan interest in supporting the Ten Per Cent Ring, since he took home a share of the profits. With Behan and Woods in the two top positions of the office, the Cochise County sheriff's department had, essentially, two politicians and no top-gun enforcers to protect the county. It was a formula for disaster in an area that would soon be identified as the most crime-riddled in the country. Deputy Dave Neagle earned praise for his work, though at 5-foot-8 he did not present an imposing figure. Another deputy seemed questionable from the outset - Frank Stilwell had been arraigned on murder charges a year earlier, which were later dropped. But Stilwell came from a well-known family, an important consideration in those times. He was the brother of Comanche Jack Stilwell, a heralded Indian fighter and later a lawman. From the start, the Behan-Woods sheriff's office seemed overmatched by the outlaw bands that stalked the county. The Arizona Star, the most outspoken foe of the criminal element, called for a solution by editorializing: "The common enemy to all of our law-abiding citizens and to our Mexican neighbors must be wiped out, root and branch. They should be hunted down like reptiles, and made to answer the penalty of their crimes, without the law's delay. If the business is not settled soon, it will cost the government much treasure and many lives to redeem lost time."36

  And standing between the encroaching lawlessness and the increasingly frightened citizens of Cochise County was Sheriff Johnny Behan and his little force. It was like trying to hold off a hurricane with a sheet of tissue paper.

  ALMOST FROM THE TIME THE COWBOYS FIRST ARRIVED in southern Arizona, they hit hard against the Mexicans, with raids against the ranchers in the state of Sonora and attacks on Mexican traders coming north to buy goods in Tucson and Tombstone. By early 1881 more and more drifters had moved into Cochise County to prey on travelers. Rustling had increased on both sides of the border, and general rowdiness had grown tiresome for both Mexicans and Americans.

  By the early spring, Mexican ranchers were on the alert for raiding parties coming south. With pressure mounting, Galeyville butcher Alfred McAllister and George Turner, identified as "well-known cowboys," obtained the contract to furnish beef to Fort Bowie in the Chiricahua Mountains. Turner, McAllister, and two others went into Sonora to acquire stock. On May 13, a band of rustlers ran off between four hundred and five hundred head from the ranch of Jose Juan Vasquez, about three miles from Fronteras. Vasquez and his vaqueros rode off in pursuit and found Turner and his three friends camped for the night with a herd of cattle. Vasquez's men surrounded the Americans and demanded their surrender. When the Americans responded with a volley of gunshots, the Mexicans returned fire, killing three of the group and wounding the fourth. Vasquez approached the wounded man and offered to take him to his ranch. The American instead fired his revolver and killed Vasquez. The Mexicans quickly gunned down the American. The Nugget said that along with Turner and McAllister, two men identified only as Oliver and Garcia were killed. By one account, a body search revealed that Turner and McAllister still carried the funds they had brought to Mexico to purchase the cattle, which was considered proof that they had not paid for the herd they drove.37

  The Turner massacre stirred emotions on both sides of the border. The Nugget printed rumors that American cowboys would band together to "clean o
ut" Fronteras and avenge the killing. Military observers saw a horde of cowboys apparently preparing for battle. The Mexicans anticipated a frontal attack from the north, and Sonora Governor Luis Torres posted a force of two hundred men, cavalry and infantry, at the border under the command of Commandant Filipe Neri to try to keep the cowboys out of Mexico. Torres also began a letterwriting campaign to John Fremont before the governor left on an extended trip, then to Acting Governor John J. Gosper in Prescott, seeking help in stopping the cowboy raiders. But the governors were hamstrung by the laws, which left control to the local sheriff; and by the legislature, which refused to provide funds for any other intervention. Major General Orlando Willcox, head of the Arizona forces, secretly wired U.S. army headquarters in San Francisco to receive authorization to intervene. General J. C. Kelton, adjutant general of the Division of the Pacific, refused the request as illegal and ordered Willcox to leave cowboy herding to the civil authorities.38

  Smuggling had become a big business in northern Mexico in the late '70s. The Mexican government increased taxes on alcohol and tobacco to the point where a good profit could be made smuggling across the border. Mexican smugglers went north to Tucson or Tombstone loaded with diamonds and gold and silver coins and bullion, made their purchases of alcohol and tobacco, and returned to Sonora to sell their goods well below the government's tax-added price. The cowboys found easy pickings in the northern-bound smugglers, loaded with treasure. There is no record of how many pack trains were robbed or how much booty taken since both the robbers and victims were operating illegally. The cowboys apparently satisfied themselves with theft rather than murder, at least until one group of Mexicans decided to fight back.

  In late July, a rancher named Bob Clark came into Tombstone and told of encountering a pack train of about thirty mules in disarray, with their packs overturned and no one in charge as the animals bounded through Skeleton Canyon, part of the smuggling route to Mexico. Clark surmised rustlers had attacked the train and killed the owners.39 This would be the first indication of a raid that would shock citizens on both sides of the border. On the morning of July 27, a band of cowboys estimated at fifty in strength attacked a group of Mexican traders, robbing them of $2,500 in coin and silver bullion, plus another estimated $1,500 in mescal, merchandise, and livestock. Four Mexican bodies were left scattered on the canyon rocks. Joseph Bowyer, manager of the Texas Consolidated Mining and Smelting Company in Galeyville, listened to the cowboy raiders tell of their attack. "One of the cow-boys in relating to me the circumstances said that it was the damndest lot of truck he ever saw; he showed me a piece of bullion, I should judge it looked half gold. Upon my telling him that trouble would likely arise from this, he replied that it was a smuggling train and they would not dare say much."40