Except by Continuous Bloodshed: A Second Tale of Old Tombstone

By B. A. Braxton

For connoisseurs of American West history, questions still remain about Wyatt Earp’s vendetta ride and how it started. Who ambushed Morgan and Virgil Earp? What did Morgan whisper to Wyatt before he died? Did Wyatt kill everybody he was after during his vendetta ride, or did some of the perpetrators get away? Did Johnny Ringo commit suicide or was he murdered? These are just a few of the many questions B. A. Braxton has tried to find the answers to over the last five years.

Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday, Bat Masterson, Johnny Ringo, Curly Bill Brocius, Virgil Earp, the McLaurys, the Clantons, and a host of others come to life in this epic tale. So hang up your Peacemaker and your slouch hat for a few hours and sit down to a mighty interesting read.

• Language: English
• Publisher: B. A. Braxton
• Release date: Dec 18, 2018
• ISBN: 9780463967478

B. A. Braxton

B. A. was born in Bridgeton, New Jersey and on a Friday the thirteenth for those who spook easily. She graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 1981 with a bachelor’s degree in Natural Science, and with clusters in sociology, writing, and advanced writing courses. In 1987 she graduated from Fairleigh S. Dickinson Jr. College of Dental Medicine with a doctorate in general dentistry.Regardless of the paths that she has taken academically, B. A. has always continued to write. Her first books were written while she was in the seventh grade. Using classmates as characters seemed to put the books in high demand, and even as adults, those friends still ask to read them. By the ninth grade, she’d completed her first novel and although it was pretty bad, she was—and still is—extremely proud of that accomplishment. B. A. writes general fiction, mysteries, and historical fiction. Regardless of what else she has done in her life or how much the practice has been discouraged, writing has always been and always will be the center of her life.B.A. has been married since 1983 and has two children, a son and a daughter, and an aging cat named Salem. She first moved to Michigan in 1988. Her hobbies include hiking, kayaking, exercising on her beloved elliptical trainer, painting with oils, healthy cooking and baking, researching topics for stories, and being proud of her children’s many and varied accomplishments. She loves listening to any kind of music, especially if the lyrics are terrific, and learning as much as she can about people—their mannerisms, the way they speak, what they do, and why they do it. And she also loves watching western television series, especially those from the fifties and sixties. Her favorites are the early Gunsmoke episodes with Chester Goode in them, and that special father-son bond found in The Rifleman. Another favorite is the series The Virginian. The pilot for Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman is one of the most credible depictions of the nineteenth century American west that she has ever seen on celluloid, and several grimly realistic episodes from the first and second seasons are favorites of hers. And lately, Hell on Wheels is more than enough to satisfy her taste for the wild west.

Book preview

CHAPTER ONE: Six-Shooters an’ Shotguns

Wednesday, November 30, 1881

Billy Claiborne—Clanton-McLaury ally

I had been in that alley when all the shootin’ commenced. I bore witness to the deafening repeat of gunfire, the shrieks in agony, the curses and the cries for mercy. As men fell, their panicked faces stayed with me as did the fierce determination in the eyes of those who cut them down. Thick, gray smoke expelled from hot gun barrels choked me ’cause it hovered for so long and so thick in the air. The bloody ground and the flecks of red on the blowing dust have haunted me ever since that day back on October the twenty-sixth. I also remembered the tears that fell in the dirt, tears of inevitability, helplessness, and death. When it was over, I considered that I must’ve been in God’s good graces to have walked away from that hallowed ground shaken, but unscathed.

The day after, I’d never seen a sendoff as grand as the one Billy Clanton and Tom and Frank McLaury got. The Tombstone brass band had played as it had never played before while leading two hearses plus a parade of mourners trailing behind the caskets. I reckon close to twenty-five hundred people had been there to watch the proceedings. Men and women followed on horseback, in fine carriages, on foot, and even in a stagecoach. When that dutiful and much respected Marshal Fred White had passed on, he didn’t have a showing nearly as grand as what Clanton and the McLaurys had, and that’s a fact.

Billy, Tom, and Frank didn’t hafta die; those Earp bastards and Doc Holliday murdered ’em just as sure as the sun rises and sets every day. Shot down like a buncha stray dogs they were, with only their friends and family left to mourn ’em and see to it that their killers paid for what they did. First came the farce they called a coroner’s inquest, which served no purpose other than to declare Frank, Tom an’ Billy dead. Anybody with eyes could see that we didn’t need no lawyer man to make that official. Next came the preliminary hearing, which wasn’t much more than a circus put on for the town’s entertainment and not to see to it that justice was served.

While all of this make-believe punishment for the Earps was goin’ on, Curly Bill, Johnny Ringo, and the rest of us cowboys got together and made up a list of those men who’d pay for the murders of our fallen comrades. To date this list had eight names on it, and they weren’t written out in any particular order: Virgil, Wyatt, and Morgan Earp were included; Doc Holliday, that maniacal, hair-triggered dentist was on there, too; Tombstone Mayor John Clum was accounted for ’cause there was no underhanded thing he wouldn’t do to get his cronies outta trouble; Judge Wells Spicer was penciled in for the same reason; shady Wells, Fargo Agent Marshall Williams couldn’t be left out; and lastly, the Earps’ defense attorney Tom Fitch was added for tryin’ so hard to set scum like them free.

I was just as eager as the next cowboy to be in on the killin’ of these men, but the boys were makin’ it known that they didn’t want me around ’em anymore; most felt that I shoulda done more to help out the Clantons and the McLaurys back on October the twenty-sixth when three of ’em got gunned down. Nobody rode Ike about runnin’ like a jackrabbit, but that was because his brother got killed. Now I didn’t know what they thought I coulda done to help out; all I had on me was a knife and a five-cent novel, which sure as hell wouldn’t stand up to fellers totin’ six-shooters an’ shotguns.

Billy Allen and West Fuller had witnessed the street fight and hadn’t done a thing to help those boys either, but nobody found it necessary to ride them about it. Only way I coulda helped the Clantons and the McLaurys woulda been by hurlin’ myself in front of the hail of bullets, and I wasn’t gonna do that for anybody. Makin’ fun of me at every opportunity started becomin’ my former companions’ favorite pastime, sayin’ that somebody as yellow as mustard without the bite like me didn’t deserve such a respected moniker as Billy the Kid Claiborne. The only one, it seemed like, who didn’t ride me was Johnny Ringo, and for respecting me that much, I’d always be grateful.

To compound my troubles, though, the Tombstone grand jury decided to indict me for the murder of whiskey-pushin’ James Hickey over in Charleston, but I didn’t much mind that ’cause I was sure the jury would see the right of my actions and acquit me. I hadn’t wanted any damn whiskey, and meant it. Besides, based on the Earps’ example, this was a good time to get a murder charge thrown outta court, whether you were guilty or not. To tell you the truth, I could use some time behind bars to rest up from those fellas always tryin’ to tell me what I shoulda done to help out Billy, Tom, and Frank. Bail be damned; I couldn’t afford to pay it anyways. But for the exception of a precious few, all the rest of the cowboys I knew woulda run just like I did.

On my first full day in jail, I was alone in my cell but was far from bein’ lonely. Johnny Ringo came by to see me, and acting police chief Jim Flynn let him in. The son of a gun even brought a recently published newspaper for me to read. You just couldn’t put a price on consideration like that.

As Johnny stepped into the back of the sheriff’s office where the cells were, he held up the Arizona Star and gave me a wide smile. I remember one rainy day not so long ago when I was in a barbershop to have my mane roached and you came to my rescue with a newspaper not unlike the one I’m holding here. He shook his head. I remember it feeling pretty damn good in my hands.

Yes, sir, I said, and I was happy to pass it on to you.

I feel the same, Johnny said of the newspaper as he offered it to me through the bars.

Anything good to read about in here?

Surely. Back on November the ninth, in Shakespeare, New Mexico, a couple of rustlers got lynched, if that’s the kind of thing that interests you.

Lynching is never a good subject for a man who’s in jail and waitin’ on a murder trial.

Understandable, so try this: it says that a meteorite landed near a village in Ukraine.

What’s a meteorite?

It’s like a rock that falls from the sky.

Falls? From where?

Nobody knows for sure. Could have come from lots of places. Sometimes people call it a shooting star.

Oh, I’ve seen those, I said. Did it hit anybody on the way down?

Not this time, but it made a fair-sized crater in the ground where it hit, Johnny said, pullin’ a wooden-spindled chair up close to the bars before sitting. When he took his hat off and dangled it from one of his knees, I saw that his thinning hair was neatly combed back and his small ears rested close against the side of his head. I then took that opportunity to peruse the article titles on the front page slowly, in all of their black-and-white, neatly printed glory. That Charles Guiteau feller is on trial for the assassination of President Garfield.

I see that. Assassination, murder…. You mean I got somethin’ in common with famous folks? Well, I’ll be damned. Think that Frenchman’ll get off?

Guiteau was born in Freeport, Illinois, Kid, and not in France, Johnny Ringo said and when he shook his head again, every strand of his hair stayed neatly in place. But the answer to your question is no.

Hearing about a man not gettin’ away with murder these days made me queasy, since I was one of those so accused. Has Wells Spicer handed down his decision about the Earp street fight?

He will tomorrow, most likely.

How does it look for the prosecution, the side speakin’ up for the McLaurys and Billy Clanton?

Not good, he said. Looks as if another group of killers is about to get off again, but the good news is, you should be next. Johnny gave me a wry smile under that big, bushy mustache of his; I found it amazing that the hair on his face always looked thicker and more robust than the slight, thinning hair he had on top of his head.

I nodded. That would be one positive I could take away from all of the bad news we’ve been getting.

Surely.

Just then Dave Neagle, one of Sheriff Behan’s most respected deputy sheriffs, poked his head into the back room to join in on our conversation, only his reasons weren’t exactly clear at first. Even at about five-foot-eight, Dave was an imposing figure of a man mostly because of his actions rather than his stature. And he got on fairly well with everybody, but Johnny and I both knew he didn’t stop by just to pass the time of day. In the fashion from him that we had all grown to admire, it wasn’t long before Dave got down to why he was there.

Will you be stayin’ in town long, Johnny? Dave asked.

I plan on seeing the Kid here through the fix he’s in and to wait on Judge Spicer’s decision about the Earps. Why?

Sheriff Behan wants you to stay put for a few days ’til he has time to check on a charge that’s out against you.

What charge? Johnny asked, whippin’ around and giving Deputy Neagle his full attention. The fair-haired scalp that he always had tied to his belt was just dangling against his left hip.

Word is you may have robbed a poker game back in August.

Is that so? This is the first I’ve heard of it.

Sore losers should just walk away from the table, John, Dave advised him, albeit a little too late. Perhaps Dave was makin’ reference to the next game that Johnny was sure to partake in. Now you may face jail time and a stiff penalty over a measly few hundred dollars.

Ringo squinted. "That’s my worry," he said.

No, no, Dave retorted. "The action you took is now under the law’s jurisdiction, so therefore it’s my worry, too."

Nodding slowly, Ringo just had to ask, Where is John Behan, and why isn’t he here threatening me, Neagle, instead’ve you?

"He is here, through me, Dave said, resting his hands on his narrow hips and standing firm. Today, he and I are one and the same."

Right now Behan’s looking gun-shy and you’re looking an awful lot like the skirts his mamma wears that he hides behind. Ringo shrugged. I’m just saying.

You’ve got a right to see things anyway you like. Regardless, the job of hauling you off to jail if need be will get done. Just think of me as the long arm of the law that Behan represents. He paused to shake his head. No hard feelings, though.

None, Johnny agreed. With that, Neagle turned and walked out the door.

Me an’ Ringo knew that the deputy’s words were true, and he wouldn’t hesitate to throw even the most notorious of gunmen in jail if they had it coming. And if Ringo or anybody else put up a fight about it, Dave was man enough to meet that challenge, too.

With that in mind, Johnny Ringo just had to smile at me and say, Well, Kid. Looks like I’ll be joining you in that cage right soon.

CHAPTER TWO: The Stink of October the Twenty-Sixth

Thursday, December 1, 1881

Warren Earp—Wyatt’s youngest brother

1881 was a year of firsts. A man named Alexander Graham Bell invented a device that was able to find metals you couldn’t see, like ones covered in a pile of sand or dropped in a sea of prairie grass. David Houston patented a thing called roll film for cameras, making the whole process a hell of a lot easier for picture strikers everywhere. Mr. Edward Leveaux made a piano that could play all by itself, something they referred to as automatic, and it operated by using a device called either a pneumatic or an electro-mechanical mechanism. These were just a few things I’d read about in passing, mind you, and not things I knew any details about.

Folks from all over the world had lots to be proud of. The aforementioned Alexander Graham Bell and a gentleman by the name of Thomas Alva Edison joined together to form the Oriental Telephone Company, and by mid-March a telephone company was established very close to us in Tucson. A woman by the name of Hubertine Auclert started publishing a newspaper called La Citoyenne in Paris, causing quite a stir at home among the Earp women. The French referred to the paper as féministe, and that word always seemed to get Allie Earp excited.

Spanning all the way from New Mexico to San Francisco, a second transcontinental railroad was completed. Two gentlemen named Barnum and Bailey, whose line seemed to be having a good ol’ time, started what they touted as The Greatest Show on Earth at Madison Square Garden in New York City. 1881 also saw an end to the three-month Boer War, a war that started between the United Kingdom and the Transvaal Republic over an inflated tax and a confiscated wagon, of all things.

On a happier note, the world’s first electric tram went into service this year in a borough called Lichterfelder in Berlin, Germany. And former slave, Booker T. Washington, established the Tuskegee Normal School for Colored Teachers in Alabama on July the fourth. Lewis Latimer invented and patented the electric lamp housing what was called a carbon filament. In Surrey, England, a borough called Godalming became the first to have its streets illuminated by lights using electricity generated by flowing water. The Savoy Theatre in London became the world’s first public building to be fully lit by electricity, using incandescent light bulbs. And the U. S. ambassador to France, Levi P. Morton, made us all proud when he drove the first rivet into our gift from the French, the Statue of Liberty.

Sadly, 1881 also saw the deaths of Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoyevsky and Russia’s Alexander II; after those two, the United Kingdom’s Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli passed on. Many others bucked out, too, including American mountain man Jim Bridger. And of course our own President Garfield died from a shot in the back on September the nineteenth. He was just forty-nine years old. You’d think that everything that was going on would’ve rocked the world enough to keep the rest of us preoccupied by the doings of others. But Tombstone, Arizona, was being talked about by folks all over the world, too, and for all the wrong reasons.

On December first my brother, Wyatt, was released from custody on Judge Wells Spicer’s say-so. And while many regarded this as the perfect opportunity for him and the rest of us to pack up our things and get the hell out of Tombstone once and for all, Wyatt took it as a chance to make a statement about not relinquishing his resident status here anytime soon by marching over to the registrar’s office and registering to vote in the newly formed Cochise County. The good news was that my brothers and Doc Holliday had been exonerated in the killing of Frank, Tom, and Billy. The bad news was that the stink of October the twenty-sixth seemed to be following us around, and one by one the folks we used to call allies were starting to desert us in numbers even greater than before it happened. How the rest of the world viewed the way we did things here in Arizona meant a lot to many prominent Tombstone residents, and if friendships had to suffer as a result, then that was the way it had to be. All of that didn’t make much difference to me because I didn’t have very many friends to speak of anyway.

What few confidants Wyatt had, the number was slowly dwindling down to nothing as well. The editorial section of that rag the Nugget wasn’t helping his popularity any either, what with folks writing in and telling lies as facts about my brothers and me and Doc Holliday. Over and over people wrote that they believed we were robbing stages and keeping all of that silver and gold glance for our own benefit. No question about it, the cowboys who’d been making themselves to home in Tombstone were responsible for the negative editorials. Virgil kept saying that maybe if the cases against him and the rest had gone to a full trial, then the rumors would’ve been proven false in court. But Judge Wells Spicer didn’t allow it to go that far. So all the doubts that people had about us seemed to fester in their minds with cowboy encouragement, of course, and consequently to the detriment of our already fragile reputations.

As usual, Wyatt acted as if he didn’t even notice the animus our neighbors seemed to have for us now. I met up with him after he’d registered to vote, and he asked if I’d done the same. I’ll think on it some, brother, I told him, and that seemed to satisfy him; after all, the next election was still a ways off.

Wyatt then beat it over to Sol Israel’s newsstand, the Union News Depot, and personally picked up a stack of papers before one of the boys had the chance to deliver them. What’s the word today, Sol? Wyatt asked as he lit up a fine, Cuban cigar to smoke as he walked home to a cup of Mattie’s Arbuckles’ Ariosa.

Sol smiled and the curly, black ringlets on his head bounced when he nodded so vigorously. It’s good to see you as a free man again, Wyatt, he said. Congratulations to you and your brothers for weathering the storm. I know it hasn’t been easy.

Thanks, Sol. That means a lot.

Have you heard from Sadie today? Sol asked and for the first time since he’d been released, Wyatt looked heavy-hearted.

I haven’t. Have you?

Yes, I have, he said. She’s been coming in here almost every day. She’s anxious to read the local papers to keep up on the details of your preliminary hearing.

I saw her sitting in the courtroom a few times, Wyatt said, and then paused to inhale some smoke from the cigar in his mouth. She doesn’t like being in courtrooms, though. They generally aren’t happy places, so she avoids them. Especially when the proceedings have a circus atmosphere like mine did. He paused. And speaking of circuses and clowns, remind me to thank Ike Clanton for lying so zealously during his testimony; it was obvious what he was doing, even to the prosecution.

Sol agreed. Ike was the best witness the defense had, he said, nodding slowly. The lord works in mysterious ways. Anyway, you should stop by and see Sadie, Wyatt. I’m sure she’s just dying to hear that the charges against you have been dropped.

Yes sir, I reckon.

When you see her, would you do me a favor?

Sure, if I can.

"I’ve got a couple of books she’s been waiting for. One is The Scouts of the Plains by Ned Buntline."

Ned Buntline? Wyatt said, wrinkling up his nose. Never heard of him.

"She’s also been waiting for the Prentiss Ingraham’s Buffalo Bill serialization in Beadle’s Half-Dime Library books. Both books are for Albert Behan. I was wondering if you’d take them to her so that she can give them to Albert."

Wyatt paused, taking them out of Sol’s hands and staring at the cover of the one on top while chewing on the end of his smoke. "Gold Plume, the Boy Bandit, or The Kid-Glove Sport, he said, reading the title. She still spends time with Johnny’s son?"

Sol smiled. Yes, he said, but hardly any time at all with Johnny. Wyatt looked at him closely. In my humble opinion, Sadie is your worry now. The way she frets over you, she’s a sight to see. With that revelation, my brother couldn’t help but smile a little, enhancing those sharp cheekbones of his and making that square chin appear almost as wide as his grin.

Wyatt raised the books up along with the stack of newspapers in his hand. Much obliged, he said, and I wasn’t sure if he was thanking Sol for the papers or for the observation that Sadie was only interested in Wyatt now.

The moment Wyatt stepped out on the porch, he paused to close his eyes and draw in a deep, smoky breath; he seemed relieved and grateful to be able to put the hearing behind him after nearly a month of testimony. So it was easy to understand how disturbed he was to see Ike and Phin Clanton standing with Will McLaury in front of the New Orleans Restaurant and beside a hoisted black bear carcass while making a point of staring Wyatt down from across the street. The intensity of the moment made me feel so cold that I shuddered, and those boys weren’t even looking at me. Regardless, Wyatt just stood there taking long, contemplative drags on his cigar and seemed determined to be the last man to look away.

This ain’t over, Wyatt, Ike called. Not by a damn sight. You boys’ll be hung for murder in due course. Now that you’ve paid Spicer off to drop the charges, we’ll just see what the grand jury has to say about your murderous ways.

Wyatt spread out his arms to emphasize his point even though he was still holding the newspapers and the books. For now I’m as free as a whore who’s past her prime, he said with a smirk. Taking the cigar out of his mouth as more ashes dropped, he added, And thanks to your testimony, I’ll most likely stay that way.

My ass! Ike said, and then glanced nervously at Will McLaury, an attorney who also happened to be a brother of two of the deceased men, Tom and Frank.

My brothers are dead, Earp, Will said, and no one could argue that fact. Young men who had their whole lives ahead of them, and they’re both dead because of trigger-happy trash like you and yours. I’ll see to it that you get what’s coming to you someday.

Wyatt shook his head with a loud snicker until he realized that the street was starting to fill up, and not with Earp allies, either. Ever since Spicer’s preliminary hearing had commenced a month ago, cowboys from miles around Arizona and New Mexico Territory had crowded into Tombstone to attend the proceedings, and most had either taken up residence by camping just outside of town, or staying at various boarding houses like Fly’s, or had gotten rooms at the Grand Hotel. Not a one of them saw fit to patronize the Earp-loving Cosmopolitan Hotel, however. And over at the Grand, there was a room on the first floor, the one registered to Johnny Ringo, with a street-facing, shuttered window that was missing a slat. I always felt like somebody was watching me from it whenever I passed by; I guess it had been Ringo’s intention to keep us all on edge, wondering whether a .30-.30 or the like was pointing at us at any given time through that peephole.

As near as I could count, fifteen to twenty cowboys were standing on Fourth Street just staring at us with mean looks on their faces. And based on the courtroom attendance during the entire month of November, there had to have been at least thirty more of those boys close at hand. For the first time since Wyatt’s release, I started feeling anxious and scared, and I looked to Wyatt to show me how to deal with such a lopsided, imposing threat.

After looking the crowd over once, brother Wyatt smiled big and bright. One by one his polished boots tapped against the boardwalk steps as he descended slowly, like a cat about to pounce on unsuspecting prey. Wyatt always did have more nerve than good sense. All emotions had a purpose and in a case like this, I could see the purpose of fear: it was a way of inspiring a body to try and live through impossible odds to earn the privilege of having just one more day to enjoy.

Even after the hearing had been dismissed, most of the cowboys stayed in town and made a point of walking around with weapons in plain sight. And there were far too many of those boys for us to approach and then force to give up their guns. As a matter of fact, I think that’s what they were hoping Wyatt would try to do now, disarm them the way he’d wanted to take away Billy Clanton and Frank McLaury’s weapons back on October the twenty-sixth. In this way, I guess the boys were showing their disappointment in Judge Spicer’s ruling as well as their support for the deceased. It was touching, I suppose, but no amount of parading around while armed to the teeth was ever gonna bring Billy, Frank or Tom back again. I only hoped that no Earps would be dying as a consequence of that fateful day.

My heart nearly stopped beating for a second or two when Wyatt ambled down the steps in front of the Union News Depot and walked right over to where Ike, Phin, and Will were standing across the roadway. As he advanced, Wyatt never stopped taking long, substantive drags on the cigar in his mouth; he almost resembled a steam locomotive chugging down the tracks. And if Wyatt was at all concerned about the two of us being so vastly outnumbered, he never let on. I certainly couldn’t lay claim to that much nerve. Even Will McLaury started squirming a little because he obviously didn’t know what to make of Wyatt’s audacity. Me, I just followed my brother because I just didn’t have the sense to back away.

When Wyatt got to within a few feet of Ike, he stopped and said, Here’s the four feet of ground you asked for, Ike, so go on and put me in my place. I ain’t armed, so a coward like you shouldn’t have any excuse at all for not getting the revenge you’re after. When Wyatt glanced around, his craggy, blond brows were furrowed deep. And you’ve got plenty of boys here to help you out. Besides Phin and Will, you’ve got George Turner standin’ there, and I see Pony Diehl lolling beside Indian Charlie and Hank Swilling. Billy Allen and West Fuller are right handy, too. And those are just the boys I know by name. Probably dozens more are here and willing to help out a nice, little girl like you. Wyatt paused just to stare Ike down. Now, don’t that make you feel special?

I could tell that Ike was thinking about reaching for his Colt, but lawyer-man Will McLaury put a hand against his arm as a way of telling him to forget it, at least for now. The deck was stacked against Wyatt, sure, but it certainly wouldn’t help the cowboy cause to make him a martyr.

In Wyatt’s typical fashion, he exaggerated the motion of turning on his heels as he headed for home. And the cowboys there, collectively grimacing from the pain of not being able to shoot my brother and