Of course, Indians and soldiers weren’t the only ones becoming legends in the Old West. It was a time of outlaws, gunfighters, and lawmen like Billy the Kid, Jesse James, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, and Wyatt Earp. Sure Hollywood has made movies about these legends time after time and we just can’t get enough of them. You can say they were the rock stars of their day and have somehow made it into the American folklore. Many of us have even grew up with these movies. However, in westerns, we seem to get the impression that the Old West was more crime ridden and violent than it really was. We think that banks were prime targets for robbers and that outlaws tend to terrorize towns on daily basis. We think that the local sheriff was either the muscle of law and order or just an incompetent prick. Still, the reality wasn’t so simple and sometimes lawmen and criminals weren’t the people you’d think they be. And while there was violence, it tends to be greatly exaggerated in westerns even in the Old Hollywood times (From the Waco Kid in Blazing Saddles: “I must’ve killed more men than Cecil B. de Mille.”) and it’s sometimes really exaggerated in Sam Peckinpah films (very few movie characters are known to survive his films). Nevertheless, these movies have plenty of inaccuracies which I shall list accordingly.

Outlaws:

Outlaws ruled the West and those who came to Arizona via South would have been shot on sight.

Bank robberies were common in Western towns. (Though most of them usually got caught since banks were usually not too far from the sheriff’s office. Actually stagecoaches and trains were more common targets while outlaws would consider robbing a bank a suicide mission. Butch Cassidy and his gang were among the very few successful bank robbers in the Old West but they only robbed two.)

Train robberies happened all the time and they were awesome. (They only happened for a short period of time and more often in the East than in the West. Oh, and they’d rarely get away with the crime. From History Banter: “When outlaws robbed trains in the West, they would most often board the train like any other passenger and when the train reached a designated point, they pulled out guns, demanded that passengers hand over all their valuables, and then they rode horses that their accomplices had stashed by the side of the train tracks. Outlaws would also rob trains by simply ripping up train tracks. When the train screeched to a halt, the bandits would board and go about their thieving business. There were no instances of outlaws leaping off their horses to board moving trains. It just didn’t happen.” However, soon railroad companies Pinkertons to protect train shipments which were people you didn’t want to mess with since they tend to kill train robbers in the Old West 99% of the time.)

Jack McCall:

Jack McCall worked as a hired gunman. (He worked alone. Also, his reason for killing Wild Bill Hickock is thought to be either being embarrassed by his victim paying for breakfast that morning or being paid to do it by the gamblers frightened that Hickock might become Deadwood’s sheriff.)

Jesse James:

Jesse James was the Robin Hood of the West. (All the booty he took was mostly for himself and his gang. Also, he was racist, mentally unstable, sadistic, and brutal and was said to kill seventeen men without remorse. However, as an ex-Confederate, he seems to have a Freudian excuse since many of them weren’t accepted back in American society during Reconstruction. Still, he should’ve quit when his brother thought it was a good idea. From American Experience: “A teenager when he rode off to join Confederate guerrillas in 1864, Jesse James never really stopped fighting the Civil War. Unable to accept the defeat of the secessionist cause, Jesse trained his fury on banks, trains and stagecoaches. He fancied himself a modern Robin Hood, robbing from Radical Republicans and giving to the poor. But the myth hid the darker reality of a repeat murderer whose need for attention kept him committing crimes long after the cause he championed was gone.”)

Zerelda James was killed by a bomb from federal agents. (Jesse’s younger half-brother was but she lost an arm. However, she outlived Jesse by decades and died at 92.)

Jesse James was a gunfighter. (His victims were almost always unarmed.)

Frank and Jesse James waited four years to go on a crime spree after the Civil War. (Their first crime happened on February 1866, less than a year after the war.)

Jesse James was a Wild West outlaw. (His operations usually took place in Missouri and he never really went west.)

The expansion of railroads caused Frank and Jesse James to become outlaws. (There were never plans for railroads to come any place close to the James farm or any other neighboring farm. Also, we kind of know that their reason to turn to crime was more out of vengeance for Confederate defeat in the Civil War.)

Jesse James had a relatively peaceful childhood. (From the LA Times: “The truth is that at 15 years of age he was beaten by ropes and horsewhips by the Kansas Jayhawker federal militia and watched as his stepfather was hung on the James farm, in part because they were Southern sympathizers.”)

James-Younger Gang:

Archie Clement was a member of the James-Younger Gang. (It’s alleged he was but he wasn’t. However, he never stopped raiding after the Civil War and was gunned down in 1866 by militia in Lexington, Missouri.)

Bob Younger died in the Northfield raid. (He and his brothers Cole and Jim were captured and given a life sentence. Bob died of TB in prison.)

The James and Youngers were cousins. (They weren’t related to each other. They just served in the Quantrill’s Raiders’ regiment together in the Civil War.)

The James Gang hid out in caves. (As Frank James put it, “Jesse and I never went into any place that didn’t have a back door.”)

The James Gang didn’t have a hideout in Texas. (From the L. A. Times: “In truth they did have such a hideout which they called “Peace Ranch,” known by the Texans as “James Hollow.””)

The Wild Bunch:

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid were involved in the Wilcox Train Robbery of 1899 and the Tipton Train Robbery of 1900. (It’s unclear whether they were involved in either.)

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid went to Bolivia straight from the US, where they continued to rob banks as before. (Actually they went to Argentina and had a ranch there before going to Bolivia where they went straight and led respectable lives. But the Pinkertons caught up with them so they went to Bolivia. They may have robbed a bank there, but we’re not sure. Still, it would’ve been more accurate in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid if the two leads discussed going to Argentina, instead of Bolivia. But their lives at Argentina would be boring so Bolivia it is.)

We’re not sure what happened to Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid after San Vicente. (They actually opened fire from a house and were surrounded by the Bolivian army cavalry. However, it’s very likely that Butch and Sundance actually ended up killing themselves, according to a PBS documentary.)

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid were members of the Hole-in-the-Wall Gang. (They were called the Wild Bunch and the Hole-in-the-Wall was a meeting place. However, The Wild Bunch is actually a title of a Sam Peckinpah kill em’ all western so we’ll let it slide.)

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid killed a lot of people during their life of crime. (Butch had only killed a few people in his entire life while Sundance didn’t kill anyone.)

Charles Woodcock tried to resist the Wild Bunch twice. (Yes, he was a real guy and actually did run afoul of Butch Cassidy’s Wild Bunch. However, the second time, he just let the robbers in and abandoned his capitalist heroics.)

Marshal Joe Lefors and an Indian scout named Lord Baltimore were charged with hunting down Butch Cassidy’s Wild Bunch Gang with a long, inescapable pursuit across the west. (E. H. Harriman actually hired the Pinkerton Detective Agency to hunt down the Wild Bunch. Also, Lord Baltimore didn’t exist though Lefors was part of a posse. However, Butch Cassidy easily evaded the posse.)

Etta Place was a school teacher. (She may be Sundance’s girlfriend {or wife} who accompanied him and Butch to South America, but we’re not sure who she actually was. She may have been a school teacher, but she could’ve been a prostitute for all we know. Her name was probably Etta but Place is probably not her real surname. Still, we don’t know what happened to her since she vanishes after 1909.)

Billy the Kid:

Billy the Kid committed his first murder at 12 and went on to kill over twenty people before turning 21. (He committed his first murder at 18 and he only killed 8 men in his entire life {well, he at least killed four [mostly while escaping from jail and in self-defense] and was involved in four others}. Not to mention, Billy didn’t become an outlaw until he was in his late teens after he was arrested on charges that may have been botched. Also, he was willing to go straight whenever given the chance, was loyal to people who’ve been good to him, and only led a life of crime due to mitigating circumstances beyond his control.)

Billy the Kid’s girlfriend was white. (She was Mexican. Her name was Paulita Maxwell.)

Billy the Kid was a young raging psychopath. (Unlike many outlaws in the West or in history, he was anything but. But, yes he was violent, but most of his victims were armed. Still, he was more of a cattle rustler and horse thief when he absolutely needed to and wouldn’t really rob banks or trains.)

Billy the Kid lived in Tombstone in 1881. (He spent the last years of his life in New Mexico. Actually he spent a lot of his life in New Mexico.)

Billy the Kid was from Texas. (We’re not sure where he’s from though it said he was born in New York.)

Billy the Kid was born William Bonney. (He was born Henry McCarty yet he used William Bonny as an alias as well as Kid Antrim.)

Billy the Kid was killed by Sheriff Pat Garrett as a suicide by cop scenario. (It wasn’t a suicide by cop scenario since Billy was shot in the back and had no idea Pat Garrett was in the same area. His last words were, “Quien es? Quien es?” {Spanish for “Who’s that?”}. Also, he was perfectly fine with fame and fortune.)

Billy the Kid was left handed. (He was right handed. Yet, he’s known as The Left-Handed Gun in the movie where Paul Newman plays him.)

Billy the Kid killed Buckshot Roberts in 1880. (Roberts was killed in 1878 by Charley Bowdre a member of his gang.)

Lawmen:

Western lawmen had shiny metal badges. (Not until 1874. They also didn’t wear uniforms either.)

Western sheriffs were honest and law abiding men who brought law and order into towns. (It wasn’t unusual for 19th century law men to be former criminals. Cue to the Western town scene in Django Unchained when King Shultz shoots the sheriff and then asks for the marshal. From Balladeer’s Blog: “Lawmen were often corrupt out west, behaving more like redneck sheriffs in the south do. Hickok was no different. Wearing a badge AND owning a saloon, as Wild Bill often did,  meant you could ruthlessly enforce the laws against your competitors but overlook your own establishment’s violations. However, in general that and acceptance of bribes marked the extent of his dishonesty.” The Earps weren’t that much different either.)

Tom Cotton was sheriff in Cochise County, AZ in 1881. (Johnny Behan was the Cochise County sheriff at the time. Wyatt Earp would later steal his girlfriend Josephine Marcus. Cotton is a fictional character and so is Jimmy Bryan.)

Allen Pinkerton was involved in shootouts by the James-Younger Gang and was robbed by them. (He was never personally involved in the James-Younger shootouts nor robbed by them.)

The Earp Brothers:

Wyatt Earp followed his dad as patriarch of his family as he built the west. (Virgil was more of the patriarch than Wyatt. Wyatt was just the one who tried to get revenge on his brothers being maimed and killed.)

Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday were the best of buds. (This is disputed since some say Doc was actually closer to Wyatt’s brother Morgan who was the same age as he was. Morgan’s death might’ve been a motivating factor for him to join Wyatt on a series of revenge killings and would explain of their separation not long after.)

Wyatt Earp first met Doc Holliday in Tombstone. (They met years earlier at Fort Griffin, Texas.)

Wyatt Earp was at the O. K. Corral gunfight all by himself. (He was with his brothers Virgil and Morgan as well as Doc Holliday. Unlike in Frontier Marshal which gets a lot of things wrong about Wyatt Earp most movies get right.)

Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday were getting up in years by 1878. (Wyatt was 30 at the time while Doc was 27. Also, Doc died at 36. At least they got the bit about them fooling with prostitutes in Cheyenne Autumn, though they were played by Jimmy Stewart and Arthur Kennedy who were way too old to play them.)

Wyatt Earp drank whiskey on a regular basis. (According to his wife Josephine, he rarely drank alcohol.)

James Earp was the youngest Earp brother who was killed in Tombstone. (He was the oldest {if you don’t count older half-brother Newton Earp} and he wasn’t involved in any of the events pertaining to the gunfight at the O. K. Corral. He was actually a saloon keeper minding his own business who died in 1926 at the young age of 84 of totally natural causes. However, in movies, he usually gets killed at a tender young age even though he was a middle aged bald guy with a mustache and goatee at the time and married to a former prostitute and madam. Still, the only Earp brother who was killed in Tombstone was Morgan and that was after the gunfight at the O. K. Corral, which sparked the Earp Vendetta Ride where Wyatt and Warren Earp along with Doc Holliday and others would seek vengeance on the Cowboys.)

Wyatt Earp was always fond of wholesome Christian women. (Maybe but he wasn’t too picky since his second wife was a prostitute {and they lived in a common law marriage for 8 years} who accompanied Wyatt to Tombstone whom he sent away to his family in order to get her away from opiates. His third wife was a showgirl {and maybe a former prostitute} who’d been living with the Cochise County sheriff when she met him. Oh, and did I say she was Jewish? Also, there’s no wonder why hostile ranchers called the Earp brothers, “fighting pimps.” However, in movies, only Doc Holliday gets to be with his real life love interest {or at least someone of her profession like a Mexican whore in My Darling Clementine}, while Wyatt has to settle for some wholesome school teacher.)

None of the Earp brothers had mustaches. (All of the brothers had mustaches by the 1880s according to photographs. Doc Holliday had one, too. Yet, many movies the Earps and Doc are all clean shaven {well, Doc does get a mustache occasionally}.)

Wyatt Earp was the paragon of a Western lawman. (He was much shadier and self-interested than how he was mostly portrayed. He was a sometime lawman but a full time gambler, confidence man, and associate for prostitutes and pimps.)

Wyatt Earp’s wife Urilla Sutherland died of typhoid a year into their marriage during the middle stages in pregnancy. (She was ill but it’s suggested she might’ve died in childbirth.)

After losing his wife, Wyatt Earp drank up a bottle of booze on his front lawn and made the rest into a Molotov cocktail in which he threw into his own window burning his house. (He actually just sold the land he and Urilla had purchased. Also, who names their daughter Urilla?)

Wyatt Earp got the job of lawman in Wichita, Kansas by apprehending someone or in a shoot out. (It’s more likely he was recruited by the Witchita marshal who asked him nicely to join up.)

Wyatt Earp was a frontier marshal before the famous gunfight at the O. K. Corral. (In Tombstone, he had little, if any, legal authority and him and Morgan usually made their living riding shotgun in stagecoaches. Actually he was never a marshal in Tombstone period. However, his brother Virgil was the marshal though and he deputized Morgan and Wyatt minutes before the O. K. Corral gunfight.)

The Earps and Doc Holliday survived the O. K. Corral gunfight without a scratch. (Wyatt did. However, Virgil and Morgan were wounded while Doc Holliday was grazed with a bullet.)

Virgil Earp was a nice quiet family man during his time at Tombstone. (His genealogical profile states that he had a daughter in the 1860s who wasn’t in his life much until she was already married with kids in 1898 after she wrote a letter to him. His first wife had spent years thinking he was killed in the American Civil War until that time. In Tombstone, he was residing with his live-in girlfriend Allie Sullivan. He also had a legal wife but nothing is known about her. Only half-brother Newton Earp seems to be the family man of this bunch and he wasn’t even in Tombstone.)

Around the time of the O. K. Corral gunfight James Earp was a teenager, Virgil Earp was in his twenties, Wyatt Earp was thirty, and Morgan Earp was in his thirties. (Actually James was 40, Virgil was 38, Wyatt was 33, and Morgan was 30. Thus, what the hell My Darling Clementine?)

Virgil Earp was killed by being shot in the back by “Old Man” Clanton. (For one, “Old Man” Clanton was dead before the O. K. Corral gunfight. Second, while Virgil was shot in an ambush, he actually survived until 1905 but he never recovered from his wound in his left arm. Third, he died of pneumonia at 57.)

Virgil, Wyatt, and Morgan Earp all arrived in Tombstone together. (Wyatt, Virgil , and James Earp would arrive together. Morgan was on his way while youngest brother Warren would soon follow. In Tombstone, James and Warren weren’t there at all.)

Virgil and Morgan Earp were ambushed the same night. (Virgil was ambushed in December 1881 while Morgan was killed in March 1882. That’s a few month difference.)

Virgil Earp hit Ike Clanton over the head with the butt of his gun in a saloon after the latter made threats against the Earps. (This is mostly true except that it took place on a street outside and Wyatt struck Ike Clanton across the mouth with his Smith & Wesson leaving a small gouge on the lower left side of his gun barrel {presumably from one of Ike’s teeth}. Also, unlike what Tombstone says, there was no shooting in Fly’s photography studio or at a Mexican wedding. Not to mention, the Cowboys didn’t shoot up any of the Earp wives or anyone else’s.)

Doc Holliday and the Earp brothers cleaned up Tombstone. (From Baladeer’s Blog: “Doc and the Earps were also a crime faction running some gambling and prostitution in Tombstone. They were the upstarts to the established Clantons and McClaureys who also controlled rustling and political graft in the area. The Holliday- Earp faction DID win the gunfight at the OK Corral and made headlines with the gangland- style executions of several of their enemies after Morgan Earp was killed. However, the Clanton faction won in the end, with Doc and the Earps fleeing Arizona Territory. It’s fun watching how badly movies twist the facts to present Doc and company as the victors of that gang war.”)

Doc Holliday:

Doc Holliday was the only doctor in Tombstone, Arizona during the gunfight at the OK Corral. He was also from Boston. (For one, he was a Georgian dentist who had given up his practice mostly due to him having tuberculosis and a cough so bad that nobody would be his patient. And he was from Georgia not Boston. Also, he died six years after the gunfight of TB in Colorado which he had been suffering for years. Not to mention, Tombstone already had a full-time surgeon to tend to all gun-shot related needs. Too bad for the Clantons though.)

Doc Holliday was shot dead by Curly Bill Brocius right before the showdown at the O. K. Corral who in turn was killed by his girlfriend Jerry. (What the hell, Frontier Marshal? Kill a household legend just before the showdown that made him famous was about to take place? Still, Doc Holliday died in 1887 while Brocius would get gunned down by Wyatt Earp several days after the O. K. Corral gunfight. Not to mention, Brocius wasn’t at the gunfight. Also, Doc’s girlfriend was Big-Nosed Kate or Mary Katherine Horony. However, she did use Elder and Fisher as aliases.)

Doc Holliday killed Johnny Ringo. (Ringo more likely killed himself. If not, then Wyatt Earp probably did.)

Doc Holliday was a fine lawmen in the West. (According to Balladeer’s Blog: “Doc was more like a western gangster than a lawman. When Holliday was jailed for tampering with a horserace in Denver after fleeing Arizona, a newspaper war broke out over the controversial figure, who was in danger of being extradited to Arizona Territory where his old enemies could easily engineer his death in prison. Doc naturally cooperated with the anti- extradition newspapers pushing him as a heroic lawman figure against the pro- extradition newspapers depicting him as a criminal. Many myths about Doc Holliday, especially about him being a lawman, had their origin in this outrageous tabloid war. “)

Pat Garrett:

Pat Garrett was clean shaven and dressed in rags. (Photos show him as a dashing man in a mustache wearing a three piece suit.)

Pat Garrett’s middle name started with a J. (His middle name was Floyd.)

Wild Bill Hickock:

Wild Bill Hickock was killed before the Battle of Little Big Horn. (He was shot two months after the battle took place. I’m sure Dustin Hoffman seemed to have some memory problems as a 120 year old man in Little Big Man.)

Wild Bill Hickock and Calamity Jane were romantically involved. (There’s no evidence to this though Jane did claim they were married. Also, at the time of death Bill was married to a 50 year old circus proprietor.)

Wild Bill Hickock was a marshal of Dodge City. (Other Kansas locales, sure, but never Dodge City. However, Dodge City has always been the default western town for Kansas.)

Lincoln County War:

John Tunstall:

John Tunstall was a fatherly old man who was murdered in 1878. (He was killed at 25. Still, he wasn’t a father figure to his cowhands nor was he a better person than his rival Murphy. Also, it was Murphy’s partner James Dolan who probably ordered his assassination, not Murphy.)

Lawrence Murphy:

Lawrence Murphy was involved in the Lincoln County War. (He had already sold his interest in the company of his partners Dolan and Riley who renamed it as the Jas. J. Dolan & Co. Murphy and was based in Santa Fe. Murphy may have been the main instigator of the Lincoln County War but he was battling bowel cancer since 1877 and wasn’t involved in the day to day activities. He’d die in October of 1878.)

John Kinney and Lawrence Murphy died at McSween’s house. (Lawrence Murphy died of cancer in 1878 and would’ve never been present at the McSween house. John Kinney was shot in the face by Billy the Kid but he survived another 40 years after the incident. Thus, Billy the Kid could never have killed either.)

Doc Scurlock:

Doc Scurlock had a romance with Lawrence Murphy’s Chinese sex slave, Yen Sun around the time of the Lincoln County War. (He had been married for two years by this point to Maria Miguela Herrera. He’d later have 10 children with her.)

Buckshot Roberts:

Buckshot Roberts’ job was to hunt down the Regulators and boy, was he evil. (Unlike his portrayal in Young Guns, he didn’t try to hunt them down. Rather he was just in town trying to collect his dues and leave when the Regulators ambushed him. He died the day after the showdown from a gunshot wound to his chest.)

Tombstone:

Tombstone, Arizona was a rowdy cow town with a lot of new wooden buildings in 1879. (It was a mining boom town in the early stages of development with a few wooden buildings. However, these were outnumbered by many adobe ones which were outnumbered by tents.)

Tombstone was in Cochise County in 1879. (It was part of Prima County until it was gerrymandered in Cochise County in 1881.)

Gunfight at the O. K. Corral:

The gunfight at the O. K. Corral lasted for 6 minutes and a medium range, heavily armed shootout. (It was a 30 second face-to-face affair involving few firearms. It also took place at 3 in the afternoon, not at dawn.)

All six Clantons were killed in the gunfight at the O. K. Corral. (Only three people died which included Billy Clanton as well as Tom and Frank McLaury. At least one of them was killed by Doc Holliday. Ike Clanton and Billy Claiborne ran unarmed before the shooting started. Ike Clanton brought murder charges against the Earps and Doc Holliday. According to Wikipedia: “The Cowboys claimed the Earps had killed the outlaws as they attempted to surrender. During the Spicer hearing, the coroner and witnesses presented conflicting evidence about whether the Cowboys had their hands in the air or guns in their hands or were trying to draw their weapon when the fighting started.” Spicer ruled that the lawmen had acted within their authority. Ike Clanton would be killed by a detective in Springfield, AZ in 1887. )

The gunfight at the O. K. Corral took place inside the building and during a warm sunny day. (It actually took place on a vacant lot owned by CS Fly and on a cold overcast day with snow on the ground.)

Clanton Gang and Associates:

“Old Man” Clanton was killed at the O. K. Corral gunfight. (He died in August of 1881 which was before the gunfight.)

Billy Clanton was in his thirties when he participated in the O. K. Corral. (He was 19 at the time. In Tombstone, he’s played by 33 year old Thomas Haden Church. At least Dennis Hopper was a better choice in Gunfight at the O. K. Corral, though he may not have had a heart to heart conversation with Wyatt Earp.)

Fred White died the night he was shot. (He actually lived to testify against Curly Bill Boucis and died a couple days after the Iron Springs shootout. From Imdb: “it was his testimony that the shooting was accidental that led to the freeing of “Curly” Bill, not a “lack of witnesses” as Tombstone depicts.”)

Johnny Ringo was killed at the O. K. Corral gunfight. (He wasn’t. Also, it’s said he later killed himself.)

Johnny Ringo was a remorseless killer. (Contrary to his portrayal in Tombstone, historical research could only point to him committing one murder. At one point in his life, he even served as a town marshal and all accounts said he was a conscientious and efficient lawman.)

Ike and Billy Clanton had a brother named Sam. (There was never a Clanton brother named Sam. They did have a brother named Phin but he wasn’t at the O. K. Corral gunfight and died in 1905.)

Curly Bill Brocius and Johnny Ringo were the leaders of the Cowboys prior to the Earps’ arrival in Tombstone. (“Old Man” Clanton was until his death, during a rustling expedition into Mexico, about 1-1/2 years after the Earps arrived. Brocius and Ringo were just members of the Clanton gang and nothing more.)

Earp Vendetta Ride:

Texas Jack Vermillion was part of Wyatt Earp’s Vendetta Ride before Frank Stillwell was killed. (He joined up a day after.)

27 Cowboys were killed on Earp’s Vendetta Ride. (Only 4 Cowboy deaths were officially recorded with actual numbers being between 8-15 total. Still, it wasn’t a number to boast about in the newspapers.)

Big Nose Kate:

Big Nose Kate had an American accent. (She was Hungarian and didn’t come to the United States until she was ten.)

Big Nose Kate burned down a building so she could free her jailed boyfriend Doc Holliday. (This is just a legend but she does burn down something in Gunfight at the O. K. Corral.)

Other:

Billy Breckenridge was a young man in 1881. (He was 35 at the time unlike his depiction in Tombstone.)

The Iron Springs shootout between Wyatt’s posse and Curly Bill Boucis’ gang was an ambush by the latter. (Unlike Tombstone depicts, the two parties almost met by accident with Earp and his men looking for water where Bill and his guys were camping at the time.)

Mattie Blaycock Earp died shortly after leaving Tombstone. (She actually met up with Big Nose Kate and lived another eight years. Also, she was a brunette not a blonde like in Tombstone. Still, there’s no evidence whether she was addicted to opium while in Tombstone either.)