Arizona the Youngest State
McClintock, 1913, page 477
For a while train robbery had popularity in Ariozna, despite a
statute passed, though never enforced, making the crime one
punishable by death. One of the most daring train robberies
occurred about midnight, September 9, 1899. Express Messenger
Charles Adair, who had killed an overadventurous train robber
on the same run the year before, stepped to the door as a
westbound Southern Pacific express reached the small station
of Cochise. As he looked out it was into the muzzle of a
revolver and he and the train force soon were lined on the
platform with their hands in the air. The express car was
detached and run a couple of miles westward. The messenger
was known to be ignorant of the safe combination so the safe
was opened with dynamite. The loot ws rich, comprising a bag
full of gold and currency with value of at least $10,000.
The four men involved struck into the Chiricahuas,
unsuccessfully followed by posses headed by Sheriff Scott
White and George Scarborough.
The truth concerning the Cochise robbery came out a few months
later, February 21, 1900, following a supplemental train
robbery, that of the express car of a Benson-Nogales train,
which was held up at Fairbank. The hero of the affair was
Express Messenger Jeff D. Milton, who fought till
incapacitated by a bullet wound that terribly shattered
an arm. The wounded messenger who was given the highest
praise for his defense of his trust, in previous days had
been a cattle association detective, a customs inspector
and chief of police of El Paso. The bandits numbered five.
One of them was captured the next morning six miles from
Tombstone, where he had fallen from his horse and abandoned
by his companions. He was Jess Dunlap, alias Three-Fingered
Jack, a well known cowboy horse thief. He died a few days
later in the Tombstone hospital, having received in the body
a buckshot load from Milton's shotgun. In a pass of the
Dragoon Mountains Sheriff White captured three of the others,
who proved to be the leader, Bob Burns and John and Lewis
Owens. With them was the booty, which consisted of only
seventeen Mexican pesos. The robbers had expected that the
Fort Huachuca payroll would be in the express car safe.
Soon afterward the score was made complete by the arrest at
Cananea of Tom Yoes, alias "Bravo John" who had been shot
Before Dunlap died, he gave the officers the first information
concerning the Cochise robbery, implicating Burt Alvord,
Constable at Wilcox and William Downing, a well-to-do cattleman.
There was some humor in the situation owing to the fact that
Alvord had been one of the noisiest and most active pursuers
of the train robbers. Later, W.N. Stiles, Deputy Constable at
Pearce, confessed the details of the whole affair. He and
another cowboy, Matt Burts, did the work alone, but the job
was planned and supplies for it were furnished by Alvord and
Downing. Alvord had provided the dynamite, secured by
breaking into a Wilcox powder house. Immeditaetly after
the job was done, the spoil was taken to Alvord and Downing
at Wilcox for division. Stiles received only $480 for his
share and consequent dissatisfaction is said to have been
the reason for his confession. It is evident, however, that
Stiles suffered from remorse, though not for his crimes.
Considered merely a witness for the Government he was allowed
some liberty. He repaid confidence in Apirl 1900 by entering
the Tombstone jail and after shooting the jailer through the
leg, releasing Alvord and "Bravo John." Downing refused to
leave and Burts, who had been arrested in Wyoming, happened
to be outside at the time with a deputy sheriff. So the
trio hung upon them all the weapons they could find in the
sheriff's office and took to the hills on stolen horses.
They were next heard of at Alvord's ranch near Wilcox, where
they made announcement that they proposed to rob a few more
Southern Pacific trains. When the Tombstone Prospector
criticised the sheriff's office in connection with the
escape, the sheriff's brother replied by hammering Editor
Hattich over the head with a revolver. In addition to
various rewards offered by the sheriff and territorial
authorities, W.C. Greene offered $10,000 for the capture
of the two outlaws, who were understood to have especial
Alvord surrendered in 1902, tired of the free life of a roving
bandit and expressed himself well pleased at being back where
he would be sure of three square meals a day. He had been in
the bandit business three years since he laid the plans for
the train robbery at Cochise. He had spent most of the
intervening time in Sonora, where Captain Mossman of the
Rangers followed and secured expression of a wish to return
to the United States if assured of reasonable clemency. But
it was to his old friend Sheriff Del Lewis that the surrender
was made on the border near Naco. Alvord's way was made
easier by the fact that he had assisted in the capture of
Chacon, a notorious Mexican murderer. At Tombstone he was
discharged from custody, owing to the events of the
territorial statute that provided death as the only penalty
on conviction of train robbery, but he was rearrested and
taken to Tucson on the charge of interferring with United
States mails. Alvord and Billy Stiles came into the
limelight again in December 1903 when they dug out of the
Tombstone jail and for the second time escaped. A week
before Alvord had been convicted on the charge of robbery
of the mails. He had been held at Tombstone merely as a
witness in the case against Stiles. Alvord later was taken
at Naco but had only two years' imprisonment, managing to
evade arrest on other charges at the time of liberation at
Yuma. He is said to have made his way to Panama, where he
bossed Spanish speaking laborers for a while, thence
When Downing was tried on a charge of train robbery he was
acquitted for the reason that conviction would have meant
hanging, but on antoher charge he served a seven year term.
Downing was happily removed from necessity and used bad
judgment in defying Territorial Ranger Speed, after terrorizing
Wilcox for months. After his death it was learned that he had
been a member of the notorious Sam Bass gang of Texas and had
been driven out of that state by Texas Rangers. In Arizona he
had served two penitentiary sentences, one for train robbery
and one for shooting Robert Warren. Burts went to Yuma for
a term and was followed by Stiles, who surrendered in the
summer of 1900. The latter was reported killed in December
1908 while working in Nevada, where he was known under the
name of Larkin. The killing was said to have been
assassination, the man shot in the back while leading a
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