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| Wyatt Earp |
What were the causes of the Gunfight at the OK Corral, which took place in Tombstone. Cochise County, Arizona, on Wednesday October 26 1881?
It turns out that the answer at least in part was politics!
The story of the gunfight is an exciting one, but perhaps not quite as exciting as is portrayed in the several films that have featured it.
Although the Wild West was, of course, pretty wild, Tombstone, a mining boom town, was actually a relatively respectable place, and the gunning down in broad daylight of three ‘cowboys’ was an unusual occurrence.
Although the Wild West was, of course, pretty wild, Tombstone, a mining boom town, was actually a relatively respectable place, and the gunning down in broad daylight of three ‘cowboys’ was an unusual occurrence.
Events were driven in part by the rivalry between the Sheriff of Cochise County, Johnny Behan, and Wyatt Earp, the brother of Virgil Earp, the Federal Marshall. Having failed in the attempt once, Wyatt Earp aspired to win the lucrative role of Sheriff at an election due to be held the following year.
The two candidates adopted different policies towards the cowboys who came into town from time to time and indulged in what we might call today anti-social behaviour. (Men were obliged to check in their guns when in town so their activities were largely confined to gambling, whoring and drinking).
Behan pursued a policy of appeasement towards the cowboys and used reason rather than force when they crossed him. Earp, a less charismatic, but much more interesting man, was inclined to take a more robust approach, and indeed politically it suited him to do so.
When the McClaury brothers and their associates refused to disarm during a visit to town, Behan tried to reason with them but failed and the ensuing gunfight between the Earp Brothers, Doc Holliday and the cowboys resulted in 30 bullets being fired and three cowboy corpses in the dust.
Earp never did become Sheriff of Cochise County, but he did undertake other official law enforcement roles later in his long life.
America has a long history of holding elections for its law enforcement officers, and it is interesting in this case to see how much politics had an impact on events.
As the different political parties start to select their candidates for the role of County Police Commissioner it is interesting to ponder on what might be the outcome of different policy approaches here in the UK. As the Gunfight at the OK Corral shows introducing politics into law enforcement can make a difference!
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| Lord Prescott, The Sheriff of Humberside? |
A good account of the shootout in Tombstone can be found in The Last Gunfight by Jeff Guinn, 2011 (Published in the UK by the Robson Press).
In the 1980's I spent some time in California and got involved in electing s sheriff and the County Coroner. The joy of voting such people into office is that they can be voted out if they are not sensitive to local needs.In the coroner's case the incumbent was suspected of corruption and other dishonesty which was deemed to have got out of hand.
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