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The Lawmen and Outlaws Who Built the Old West

Khalid Elhassan August 29, 2021 35 min

Statue at the Tucson Depot, where legendary Old West lawman Wyatt Earp, in the company of Doc Holiday, killed Frank Stilwell. Wikimedia

13. Frank Stillwell Discovered That Tangling With Wyatt Earp Was a Bad Idea

Witnesses saw Frank Stillwell fleeing the scene of Morgan Earp’s shooting, and Wyatt Earp formed a posse to hunt the suspects. Soon thereafter, Wyatt learned that Stillwell planned to murder his other brother, Virgil, in Tucson when the train carrying his and Morgan’s coffin to California stopped there. Wyatt formed an escort to accompany Virgil, and on March 20, 1882, he spotted Stillwell and two associates waiting in ambush near Tucson’s train station. Stillwell and his friends ran for their lives when they spotted Wyatt, but Stillwell stumbled.

By the time Stillwell got back on his feet, Wyatt Earp was upon him. “I ran straight for Stilwell,” he later recounted. “It was he who killed my brother. What a coward he was. He couldn’t shoot when I came near him. He stood there helpless and trembling for his life. As I rushed upon him he put out his hands and clutched at my shotgun. I let go both barrels, and he tumbled down dead and mangled at my feet.”

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.