• ARIZONA THE YOUNGEST S'fATE 459 , . Att roey Stephenson and Jailer Hi lVlcDonald, in pure self defense. killed by. 0 opulation chose to regard the kil. l'mg as murd er, an d on an A'ugust The MeXIcan P . 1 d ' d dl . k d d . Ir e number of "paisanos" began to dlSP ay eCI e y WIC?e ten- evenmg a a g d . 1 . f ... h eneles.. N early everyone seemed to be arme WIt 1 a pall' 0 prImltlve orse . All things pointed to trouble on the morrow. :Messengers were there- pIstols. 1 h "1 . dly disp·atched to all parts of the valley, to assemb e t e Vlgl antes . ~u~eh " • The week preceding this day had been rather a hvely one, eve? for a ~Ively CHAPTER XXXVIII There had been six killings, including two murders of especIal atrOCIty . town. f 'I' . f '1 t THE LAW OF THE FRONTIER Luke Monihan, brother of a later mayor, was a ar.mer lvmg a ew ml es 0 thewes. t He was driving home in the dusk of the. evemng,. when a wretch. named Kell/lr, with whom he had had trouble, shot h.lm m the back, from behmd the Popular Administration of Justice at Many Points Phcrnix as a "Wild West" T own­ Globe' s Hanging Tree The Bisbee M assacre Heath Lynching at T ombstone:­ screen of the roadside sagebrush. The steady farm horses tro~ted home, and the 'f as the team stopped at the door, came out to find the lIfeless body of her "Bad Men" and Frontier Sheriffs Commodore Owens Pete Gabriel and Joe WI e, . dId' b nd in the wagon bed. It dIdn't take long to run Keller own. n lan Phy. husa '1' • trailers followed his footsteps to the house where he lodged, and the htt e Iron cage of the county jail received him forthwith. ; In the early summer of 1879, Phrenix was the supply point for the whole of A stoutly-built, bluff, jovial man was Johnny LeBarr, who kept a saloon on the north-central territory, including rich mining districts which then were in Washington Street. On the evening of August 21 he was treating some friends a state of almost feverish activity, with hundreds of prospectors exploring the , in an adjoining saloon, but refused to provide liquor for a rough named Mc­ . hills. The Southern Pacific Railroad had stopped construction work at Casa Closkey. The latter left the. saloon, returning a few minutes later with a long Grande, and a large representation of its camp followers had gravitated to butcher knife, with which he slashed LeBarr across the body. His victim died Phamix. a few hours later. ' The town then had about 1,500 inhabitants, about half of them :Mexicans. Next morning, bright and early, the lVfex icans commenced to assemble around There was a semi-organized vigilance committee, composed principally of farmers. the Plaza, hundreds of their ponies tied to the huge cot tonwoods that then shaded This body had done some good work in the past, but seemed to sleep in the the block. A little later the fanners commenced to ride in. All were armed with period under view. rifles and revolvers. The gathering place was on Jefferson Street. Marion Men were wounded and killed till "a man for breakfast" no . longer was Slankard, since deceased, was the captain. Around Montezuma Street, into interesting. The Semi-Weekly Herald seldom gave more than a half-column to Washington swun'" the column of over a hundred determined men. All was a murder. Gilmer, Salisbury & Co.'s stage line furnished communication with , '" quiet in the ranks and on the cr owded sidewalks. Up to the little adobe court- the railroad, at old Maricopa station, twenty-eight miles distant. -The coaches • house the men marched and filed in. The officers knew what was coming and had were held up by "road agents" about twice a week; even" old man" Stewart discreetly found occupation elsewhere. The jailer was the only one on guard . and the famous messenger Gilson were obliged to throw up their hands on several He demurred to the suggestion of handing over his keys, but soon was convinced occasions. Billy Blankenship tried to hold down the "agents" once and had that he should do so. his hands filled full of duck shot for his pains. At least ten malefactors were imprisoned at the time, but the committee Race jealousy, too, ran high. One manifestation of it was rather dramatic. wanted only McCloskey and K eller. These men they took to the plaza. The Sunday horse races on the main street were an important feature. One May • fourth and fifth cottonwoods from Montezuma (First) Street, on Washington, Sabbath day, about half the population was stretched along Washington Street, , were chosen as gibbets. The condemned men, singly, were put into a wagon, in two long lines, pressing toward the street center, looking westward to see the allowed a few parting words, and then the wagon was driven from under them. start of two racing ponies. Down the course a horseman came galloping, appar­ Keller confessed his guilt. H e had plenty of drop and appeared to die easily. ently to clear the way. But the fellow was running" amuck." In his hand was McCloskey made quite a sensible and really manly talk said he deserved his a long cavalry saber, with which he was savagely slashing right and left, as he fate and warned the spectators to profit by the spectacle of his punishment. He yelled, "Muerte a los Gringos!" ("Death to the Americans!") bitterly spoke of liquor as the .source of all his many misdeeds. Just as the He dashed down the line and escaped before the crowd had fully compre­ wagon commenced to move, McQloskey mounted to the' endboard and voluntarily hended his murderous mission. A half dozen people were wounded, two of them ~ade the leap into eternity. H e was a heavy man and the elastic limb bent till seriously. The" Saber-Slasher," as he 'was thenceforth termed, was followed his toes touched the ground; and so he died, a dreadful sight, death drawing far down into Sonora by a courageous officer, captured and brought back and but slOWly across the uncovered face. 10dO'ed in jail in Phrenix, to await the results of the wounds he had inflicted. McCloskey's spirit had hardly' flown ere there were two cowering figures , He "'made a break for liberty, with the assistance of a mesquite club, and was m~' . III the dreadful wagon. They were those of two MeXIcan merchants who 458 • • • • • \ • • • 460 ARIZONA THE YOUNGEST STATE • • had for several days been preaching a crusade against the "Gringos." They had been captured by a clever flank movement from among their demoralized partisans. Slankard spoke good Spanish and made himself quite plain. Point­ ing to the swinging bodies, he warned the shrinking men that such would be their fate if another incendiary word were to.cross their lips. They were then released; • and the Mexican insurrection was a thing of the past. The vigilantes then turned their efforts towards cleansing the town of its undesirable element. Everyone suspected of being a rough or a crook was given a canteen and a warning. Departure was forthwith, many finding an appro­ priate field of operations in the newly-opened camp of Tombstone. For years thereafter Phrenix was as quiet a town as one could find in staid New England. This gratifying result was directly due to the vigilantes. That they accomplished a work of good is incontestable. They presented the law a peacful city and , neighborhood, and peaceful has it remained. The first ynching in Phamix occurred July 3, 1873, when Mariano Tisnado was hanged on a cross beam of the Monihan corral. On the face of things it • would appear that he had been hanged for stealing a widow's cow, but there seems little doubt that he was guilty also of the murder of B. F. Griffin, a highly­ respected pioneer who had lived south of the village. In 1877 was the execution of another popular decree in the hanging of a soldier who had shot Lew Bailey . through the window of a hall in which the better element of the population had met to dance. This hall was the old stage station on the east side of Center Street, half a block north of Washington. The lynching was on a cottonwood on the site of the present waterworks. Bailey later died of his wounds. • • PEARL HART, ARIZONA'S FEMALE BA~DlT GLOBE'S .MOST EXCITING EPISODE On August 23, 1882, Frank Porter, packer on the mail route across the Pinal Mountains, dashed wildly into Globe, shouting that the Apaches had taken in the mail train and that the express messenger, Andy Hall, was dead. The • • . '. mules of the pack train were found dead on the trail. The mai.l, untouched, • still was strapped to the back of one, but the express box, with $10,000 in gold, intended for the Mack Morris payroll, was gone. Two sets of tracks showed that w.hite men had done the deed, rather than Indians, and other footprints showed that Andy Hall had followed the robbers, in the line of his duty. Across a hill, dying, was found Dr. Vail of Globe, who, with his last breath, told what he could of two rObUers, whom he had accidentally come across as they were dividing the gold. Further on the trail, miles away, at dusk, was found the body of Andy Hall, who, ambushed, had fought to the end, his body stiffening in a stunted shrub in which he had crouched, the last cartridge unfired in a magnificent revolver that had been presented him by the Wells-Fargo Company for faithful service.