Arizona The Youngest State
McClintock, 1913, page 480
Wyatt Earp in 1881 was a Deputy U.S. Marshall and Virgil was
City Marshal, offices that afforded legal standing in the
affairs in which they were engaged. They were very much at
outs with Sheriff Johnny Behan with whom they divided the
influence of the gamblers, who had much to say in those days
concerning the administration of affairs. All the Earps had
been professional gamblers. They were charged, first and
last, with about half of the robberies that were of such
frequent occurrence on the roads leading out from camp.
It is told that, while not actively participating they were
parties to a notable robbery of the Bisbee stage, that the
actual work was done by Frank Stillwell and that the primary
cause of trouble between Stillwell and the Earp gang arose
out of his refusal to divide up the spoils. Bud Philpot, a
well-known stage driver, was killed on the box of the Benson
stage near Contention. Bob Paul, later U.S. Marshal for
Arizona was riding with him at the time, as guard and it
is possible that the bullet that hit the driver was intended
for the messenger. The Earps and Doc Holliday were absent
from the town at the time of this particular episode, but
returned soon after from a jaunt in the country. They were
not arrested. The shooting of Philpot generally was charged
to Holliday. John Dunbar remembers that that particular day
he had let Holliday have a horse. If it was from stage
robberies that the Earps derived the major part of their
income, the money only served for the purpose of
Undoubtedly, the most notorious episode of Tombstone's early
history occurred October 26, 1881. The Clanton gang of cowboys
had refused to recognize the local supremacy of the Earps and
there as bad blood between the factions.
On the night of October 25, Ike Clanton, a prominent though
decidedly not plucky, member of the cowboy faction, had been
arrested by City Marshal Virgil Earp and had been fined $50
for disorderly conduct which appears to have been merely in
objecting to the marshal's abuse. On the morning of the 26th
of the Clanton gang in Tombstone were Tom McLowery, Frank
McLowery, Billy Clanton and Ike Clanton. They had appreciated
the intimation that Tombstone was unhealthy for them and had
saddled their horses to leave for their home ranch in the
Babacomari Mountains. The horses were in the O.K. Corral,
which fronted on two streets. Fearing trouble they planned
to leave by the rear gate, on Fremont Street. Ike Clanton
and Tom McLowery were not armed for both the evening before
had had their pistols taken from them by the city authorities.
The other two had revolvers.
The men were leading their horses out of the gate when they
were confronted, almost from ambush, by four of the Earps,
Virgil, Wyatt, Morgan and Jim and Doc Holliday. Virgil Earp,
armed with a sawed-off express shotgun and accompanying his
demand with profanity, yelled, "Throw up your hands." but
he didn't wait for action and shot almost as soon as he spoke.
Tom McLowery showed his empty hands and cried, "Gentlemen I
am unarmed." Holliday answered with the discharge of his
shotgun. Billy Clanton fell at the first fire, mortally
wounded, but rolled over and fired two shots from his pistol
between his bent knees. One shot creased Morgan Earp across
the shoulder and he fell to the ground. Ike Clanton ran into
a vacant lot and escaped. Frank McLowery remained, fighting
bravely, and holding his horse by the bridle, fired four
shots at the three Earps in front of him. One bullet hit
Virgil Earp in the calf of the leg. McLowery became aware
that Holliday was shooting at him from the rear and had
turned to answer the fire when his pistol hand was hit.
He then raised his revolver with both hands and shot,
striking Holliday's pistol holster. At the same moment
Morgan Earp rolled over and shot from the ground, his
bullet striking McLowery on the temple, killing him
instantly. The Earps and Holliday then marched back
to the main part of town and surrendered themselves.
They were examined behind closed doors by Justice of the
Peace Spicer, who discharged them as having acted as
peace officers in the performance of duty.
Thereafter Virgil Earp received a bad wound in the arm, shot
one night by some unknown person concealed in a building.
Soon after, Morgan Earp was killed in an Allen Street saloon,
about 9 p.m. while playing billiards, his assassin shooting
through a rear glass door. The murderer was supposed to have
been Frank Stillwell, a cowboy of the outlaw stripe. If it
were Stillwell who did the shooting, he established a
reasonable alibi by being in Tucson early the next morning.
Ike Clanton already was in Tucson, under arrest for a stage
robbery on the road between Tucson and Bisbee. A few days
later, the Earps, Holliday and John Johnson started for
California in charge of Morgan Earp's body. The train,
taken at Benson, arrived in Tucson about dusk. Ike
Clanton, out on bail, learning of the presence of his
enemies, secreted himself, but Stillwell, possibly to
maintain his attitude of innocence, went to the depot
and walked slowly along the train as it was drawing out.
The next morning his body, riddled with buckshot, was
found at the head of Pennington Street, a hundred yards
from the tracks, back of the railroad hotel. It was
assumed that one of the Earps had jumped off, shot
Stillwell and then regained the train.
At Rillito station, a few miles westward all but Virgil
Earp left the train. They walked back to Tucson and a
short distance east of town, flagged a freight train and
on it went to Benson where they got horses and returned to
Tombstone. There Sheriff Behan received a telegram to arrest
them. When the Sheriff notified them that they were under
arrest, they directed him to a torrid region, secured fresh
horses and rode out of town. They were next heard from in
the Dragoon Mountains where they shot and killed a Mexican
who was chopping wood for Pete Spence, one of their mortal
enemies. Thence they rode to Hooker's Sierra Bonita Ranch
where the owner gave them fresh mounts. They rode back
across the country to Silver City New Mexico where they
disposed of the horses and took a train for Colorado.
On hearing of the refuge of the Earp gang, Governor Tritle
on May 16, 1882, issued a requisition on Governor Pitkin of
Colorado, asking the return of Wyatt and Warren Earp, Doc
Holliday, Sherman McMasters and John Johnson all charged
with murder. The requisition was refused on the grounds
that the papers were defective in form and because Holliday
already was under indictment for a crime committed in
Virgil Earp died of pneumonia in Goldfield, Nevada, October
19, 1905, aged 63 and was buried in Portland Oregon where a
daughter lived. He had been married twice. Of the flood of
reminiscences brought up at the time of his death, much was
made public beyond the more notable episode of his Tombstone
career. He came to Arizona in 1876 in company with his
brothers, Wyatt and Morgan and Doc Holliday. While Ed
Bowers was Sheriff, Prescott was visited by two cowboys
from Bradshaw Basin, who enjoyed themselves in true
cowboy fashion, shooting up saloons, finally riding out
of town firing their pistols. They camped at the Brooks
Ranch, and sent back word that they would remain in case
the sheriff wanted them bad enough. Bowers organized a
posse, of which Virgil Earp was a member. In a pitched
battle, Earp found one of the cowboys crouched under an
oak tree, reloading his gun, and shot him twice, one
bullet passing through his heart and the other only about
two inches from the first. It was remarked when the body
was taken away that between the man's teeth was still a
cigarette, he had been smoking when shot. The other
cowboy also was brought in prostrate, dying two days
later. Virgil Earp came back to Arizona, to the scene
of his old exploits in Yavapai County and engaged in
mining in the Hassayampa district. In 1900 he was
nominated for sheriff but failed to make the race.
He had seen service in the Civil War in an Indiana
Wyatt Earp went to Colton California where relatives lived,
and where he later was elected Chief of Police. He was given
much publicity in his capacity of referee at the
Sharkey-Fitzsimmons fight in San Francisco, in which
his decision, awarding the battle to the former, was
sustained by his reputation as a handy man with a gun.
He was in Nome in its boom period.
Holliday died of consumption at Glenwood Springs Colorado.
Warren Earp, the youngest brother, a stage driver, in the
summer of 1900 met his end at Wilcox, where he was killed
by John Boyett in a way that a coroner's jury considered
Doc Holliday, the right bower of the Earp clan, possibly
best was described by Bat Masterson, who was interviewed
on the subject and is quoted:
"I never liked him and few persons did. He had a mean
disposition and differed from most of the big gun fighters
in that he would seek a fight. He was a consumptive and
physically weak, which probably had something to do with
his unfortunate disposition. He was of a fine Georgia
family and was educated as a dentist. He went west after
shooting down several defenseless Negro boys in a quarrel
as to who should occupy a certain swimming hole. He made
Dallas in the early seventies and hung out his shingle but
he soon quit for gambling. His shooting of the Negroes
became known and so he got a reputation as a bad man from
the start. He finally killed a man in Jacksboro and
fled. Then he killed a soldier, and to avoid being
caught by the military authorities, made a desperate
flight to Denver, across 800 miles of waterless,
Indian-infested desert. He made Denver in 1876.
The law forbade him to carry a gun there, so he slipped
a knife into his boot leg and presently carved up the
fact of one Bud Ryan who bears the mark to this day.
He then fed to Dodge City where I first met him. He
kept out of trouble in Dodge somehow but presently
wandered to Trinidad Colorado where the first thing
he did was to shoot and seriously wound Kid Colton.
Then he escaped to Las Vegas, a boom town, where he
disagreed with Mike Gordon and shot him dead in a
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