Results: The True Story and Legends of Famous Outlaws in the Wild, Wild West ** Part Six ** Tombstone, Arizona. was founded in 1877 by a prospector named Ed Schieffelin.

It wasn't long before word spread about Ed Schieffelin's southern Arizona silver strike. Soon prospectors, cowboys, homesteaders, lawyers, speculators, gunmen, soiled doves and business people flocked to the area in droves. In 1879 a town site was laid out on the nearest level spot to the mines, known at that time as Goose Flats, and was appropriately named "Tombstone" after Ed Schieffelin's first mining claim. Have you ever been to Tombstone, Arizona?

Doc Holliday left Las Vegas for Arizona Territory in the fall of 1879. In Prescott, he had a fantastic run of luck at the poker tables. Big Nose Kate joined him. Under those circumstances, they got along just fine. When they finally left for Tombstone sometime after June 3, 1880, Holliday had his pockets full of the Prescott gamblers' money. In Tombstone, Holliday found living quarters for Kate and himself sandwiched between a funeral parlor and the Soma Winery, on the north side of Allen Street at Sixth Street. His friend Wyatt Earp had arrived in the boom town the previous December.The so-called Cowboy faction had had things its way in Tombstone for quite some time. The Cowboys resented the presence of the Earp brothers and Doc Holliday — men who weren't afraid to stand up to them. Newton Haynes ('Old Man') Clanton; his sons Phin, Ike and Billy; the McLaury brothers, Frank and Tom; Curly Bill Brocius; John Ringo; and other Cowboys lost no time in expressing their displeasure. Cochise County Sheriff John Behan usually saw things their way. Does it surprise you that the Sheriff would go along with this criminal gang of cowboys?

Old Man Clanton was driving a herd of cattle to the Tombstone market, where he expected to make a quick sale and profit. The drive did not turn out exactly as he had planned. Clanton made camp the first night, August 12, most likely in Guadalupe Canyon, about one mile south of the international border. Violence and bloodshed occurring on both sides of the southern border had been straining relations between the American and Mexican governments. Both governments feared that the border might explode in gunfire if the situation was not soon corrected. These fears were not unfounded. On August 13, 1881, the international border near where the territories of New Mexico and Arizona meet did explode. Early the morning of August 13, the Clanton party was attacked by riflemen. The Mexican government was emphatic about the Cowboy rustling problem — either the Americans would have to stop the Cowboys from coming across the border to steal or the Mexicans would. So there may have been Mexicans present in the canyon, too, Several historians, believe that an Earp federal posse was involved in the deaths of these men. Records show that Marshal Crawley Dake was ordered to send a posse down to the border to quell the disturbances caused by the Cowboys. Marshal Dake trusted Wyatt Earp and likely had Earp head the posse. Do you think it was a federal posse with the Earps or Mexicans?

Both Doc Holliday and Warren Earp were wounded in that border gun battle, and they did not reappear in Tombstone until they had recovered. That explains why Holliday had a cane on October 26, 1881, and why Warren missed the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral. Tombstone was more divided than ever, with the Cowboys on one side and the Earps and Holliday on the other. Cowboys threatened to kill Wyatt, Virgil, Morgan and Doc if they didn't get out of town. But running was not Holliday's or the Earps' style. On the night of October 25, 1881, Ike Clanton and Holliday drank heavily and then began hurling obscenities at each other. Doc finally ended the cursing match by inviting Ike to use his gun. Clanton claimed that he was unarmed, so Holliday told him to go get heeled. Then, to goad him ever further, he told Ike that his big mouth had caused his old man to be killed and that he (Holliday) had had the pleasure of pulling the trigger. Furthermore, he would take much enjoyment in doing the same to Ike! In shock, Ike Clanton left and went to the Grand Hotel. Holliday went to his room at Fly's Boardinghouse. The next day, the 26th, Ike appeared at Fly's, looking for Holliday. The doctor wasn't in. When informed of this, Doc replied, 'If God will let me live long enough, he will see me!' Have you ever known someone that was always ready for a fight?

Word was conveyed to the Earps that the Cowboys were gathered in the wagon lot next to Fly's Photo Gallery and were wearing guns in violation of city law. Holliday met the Earps near Hafford's Saloon, at the corner of Allen and Fourth streets, and demanded that he be allowed to join them in their little walk. Five men, potential killers, lay in wait just down Fremont — Ike and Billy Clanton, Frank and Tom McLaury, and Billy Claibourne. When the Earps and Holliday confronted four Cowboys (Claibourne fled before the shooting) in that narrow, 15-foot space between Fly's and the Harwood house, guns flamed and roared for less than half a minute, then ceased abruptly. Plenty of damage was done in that short time. The McLaurys and Billy Clanton were dead, and Morgan and Virgil Earp were both wounded. Holliday killed Tom McLaury and fired one of the bullets that struck Frank McLaury; he may have hit Billy Clanton as well. Did you know this one event has kept Tombstone alive for all these years?

In May 1887, Holliday went to Glenwood Spring, Colo., to try the sulphur vapors, since his health was worsening. He stayed at the Hotel Glenwood, not a sanitarium, although the hotel catered to those who hoped to be 'healed' by the Yampah Hot Springs. Nothing could be done for him; his tuberculosis was more relentless than any human enemy. He spent his last 57 days in bed and was delirious for 14 of them. On November 8, 1887, John Henry 'Doc' Holliday awoke, clear-eyed, and asked for a glass of whiskey. It was given to him, and he drank it down with obvious enjoyment. Then he said, 'This is funny,' and died. Perhaps he found it strange to meet a peaceful end rather than die in a gunfight Doc Holliday will not be forgotten. His deeds, his dentistry, his disease, his death and that name 'Doc' have brought the Southern boy named John Henry a secure place among the immortals of the Old West. After Doc Holliday died, Doctor Crook sent Wyatt a photograph of Doc that had been taken in Glenwood Springs before he had become bedridden. There's also a story that Doc's gun was also sent to Wyatt. Josie said that Wyatt cried afterwards. Doc was only 36, have you had a friend die very young?

After leaving Tombstone, Wyatt Earp moved around the West, eventually settling in California with Josephine Marcus, with whom he would spend the next 40 years. Over the years, he made a living by gambling, saloon-keeping, mining and real estate speculation. He and his third wife, in their later years, moved between Los Angeles and the Mojave Desert, where the town of Earp, California was named after him. Unlike his brothers and his ally Doc Holliday, who participated in several gun battles with him, Wyatt was never wounded by gunfire. In about 1910, when he was 62, the Los Angeles Police Department hired Wyatt and former Los Angeles detective Arthur Moore King at $10.00 per day to carry out various tasks "outside the law" such as retrieving criminals from Mexico, which he did very capably. Earp eventually moved to Hollywood and became an unpaid film consultant for several silent cowboy movies. In the early 1920s, Earp was given the honorary title of Deputy Sheriff in San Bernardino County, California. Wyatt Earp was the last surviving Earp brother and the last surviving participant of the gunfight at the O.K. Corral when he died at home in the Earps' small rented bungalow at 4004 W 17th Street, in Los Angeles, of chronic cystitis on January 13, 1929, at the age of 80. Do you consider a person like Wyatt Earp hardworking and adventurous?