Western Outlaw

Bob Martin: A Rustler in Paradise by Paul Cool copyright 2002

If he is remembered at all, it is as a footnote to the story of infamous badman Curly Bill Brocius. At this writing, his origins have not been revealed, nor his physical description, thoughts, manner of speech, and personality. Published old-timer recollections do not mention him, and at the height of his career he received little notice from newspapers. But in his heyday, the years 1879-1880, Robert Martin brought terror and near-ruin to northern Chihuahua. A two-year chain of letters at the highest levels of the U.S. and Mexican governments firmly establish his reputation as a successful and dangerous rustler chieftain.

Bob Martin’s early criminal career along the border appears to have been unremarkable, except in one respect. He associated with, learned his trade from, and perhaps served as “mentor” to a veritable “Who’s Who” of southwest outlaws, including Jesse Evans, John Kinney, Curly Bill Brocius, Dutch Joe Hubert, Jim McDaniels, Pony Deal, and, briefly, young Henry Antrim. He stole horses, robbed stagecoaches, shot it out with posses, and earned a generally bad reputation not much different than a hundred other border bad men. His participation in several crimes and as one of “the Boys” (the gang led by Evans) during 1876-77 has been mentioned in various secondary works, but these take little, if any, note of his later notoriety along the border.

Martin may have taken part in the El Paso Salt War. Ethnic tensions in that Texas county rose to a fever pitch when Charles Howard claimed the legal right to charge fees for salt extracted from dry lakes near the Guadalupe Mountains. When, in December 1877, a hastily formed Texas Ranger unit was besieged in the town of San Elizario by hundreds of Mexicanos from both sides of the Rio Grande, El Paso Sheriff Charles Kerber put the call out to New Mexico for help. About 30 so-called “Silver City Volunteers” responded to the plea, among them some of the worst gunmen in southern New Mexico. Although officially under the orders of Kerber, some took their cue from rustling kingpin John Kinney. For several weeks in late December 1877 and early January 1878, the “Kinney men” committed murder and mayhem against Mexicans, tejanos and anglos alike. Released from service on January 10, many “Volunteers” returned to New Mexico, but Kinney and some others remained in the area. According to a statement later made by local Texas Rangers commander Lieutenant James A. Tays, Martin was “part of the Kenny band who have been living in El Paso Mexico [modern Ciudad Juarez]….”

El Paso Fiasco

By May 1878, Bob Martin was riding with Curly Bill Bresnaham. Under the surname Brocius, Curly Bill would later receive considerable attention as “Arizona’s most famous outlaw.” Billy Breakenridge describes Brocius as a great travel companion.4

On 21 May 1878, Martin and Bresnaham attempted to rob a party of soldiers. The officer in charge was 2nd Lieutenant Benjamin I. Butler of the 8th Cavalry, son of Benjamin F. Butler, the Massachusetts politician and Civil War general.5 At about 4:00 p.m. on the 21st, Lt. Butler and two troopers of the 9th U.S. Cavalry, Charles Johnston and George Shakespear (no “e”), were en route from El Paso to Mesilla, when, according to the Mesilla Valley Independent (May 25, 1878), they were

“overtaken and passed near White’s Ranche, eight miles north of El Paso, by two mounted men, one of whom is said to be the notorious Bob Martin. About two miles further on, at a bend in the road, these same men, masked, sprang from the bushes near the road side and ordered the driver to halt, simultaneously with the demand they both opened fire on the men in the ambulance. The driver was struck in the shoulder the ball passing out near his spine inflicting a serious wound, the other soldier Johnson [sic] of Co. “G.” 9th cavalry was hit three times one ball penetrating his right lung, another entered his stomach and a third lodged in his right thigh, inflicting at least one mortal wound. As the wounded men fell back in the ambulance; Lieut. Butler grasped a carbine from the hands of one of them and sprang to the ground, whereupon the cowardly assassins fled through the brush and made their escape. Corporal Mathews with four men of the Texas Rangers came up shortly afterwards and followed the trail of the murderers to the River and discovered that they had crossed into Mexico. The wounded men were taken back to El Paso Texas where they now lie in critical condition. The object of the attack was undoubtedly robbery, it being supposed that Lieut. Butler had a considerable sum of money about his person. Lieutenant Butler reached this place about noon to-day (Wednesday.) The ambulance is riddled with bullets and stained with the blood of the wounded men.”

According to Lieutenant Tays, Butler and his men were met by Ranger First Sergeant Asberry C. Ryall a few minutes after the attack. Ryall detailed one man to help the wounded, while he and four rangers chased the bandits into Mexico, where authorities arrested them. Tays viewed the crime as fresh evidence that “The Lincoln Co. outlaws are coming down pretty plentifull [sic].”6

Within days, Mexican authorities turned the highwaymen over to the U.S. Army, whose officers paid a $75 reward out of their own pockets. Arrested with “Dutch Martin and Curly Bill” was a third man, Joe Haytema. He apparently was innocent of the crime, but as either Martin or Bresnaham had ridden his horse and carried his arms, he was swept up in the dragnet. It was just as well, as Buckskin Joe was wanted on a separate charge stemming from his attempt to kill Kinney in the latter’s own saloon.7

The arrest of Martin made news from Silver City to Santa Fe. In the Independent, Albert Fountain declared,

“There are several indictments against Martin in the U.S. and Territorial Courts of this county for stage robbing, larceny, & and should he escape the punishment he so richly merits in Texas we ask to have him sent up here where we will at least give him a through ticket to the Missouri penitentiary to join Dutch Joe, his old confederate in crime.”

8

Bob and Curly Bill sat in a makeshift jail in Ysleta all summer while they awaited trial. Indictments were handed down on September 2. The charge stated that Martin and Bresnaham did, on May 21st, assault with intent to kill troopers Johnston and Shakespear. The prisoners faced incarceration of two-to-seven years. The trial took place on the 11th. The details have not been found in surviving case files or newspapers, but the witnesses called included Johnston and Buckskin Joe. Lieutenant Butler was not called. That officer had taken a leave of absence on May 23rd, two days following the attack, and on June 1 resigned his commission. By September, the man who had foiled the robbery was far from Texas. The jury returned guilty verdicts on September 12, and District Judge Allen Blacker sentenced the prisoners to five years in the State Penitentiary at Huntsville.9

Defendants’ lawyers filed an immediate appeal on several grounds, including a verdict “too vague, uncertain and indefinite to support a Judgement or sentence.” They also claimed that a
material witness for the defendants had been prevented from attending the court by threats. According to the affidavit of Paul W. Keating, one Joseph Jerold had desired to attend the trial “but was afraid to do so because he had been three times notified by the Jeffe politica [chief government officer] and other Mexican authorities of El Paso Mexico that if he … did attend said trial as such that he would have to leave the country because he Jerold was only taking the part of the said defendants because they are Americans.” According to Keating, Jerold said he saw Martin at the time of the robbery attempt in El Paso, Mexico and conversed with him and that said Martin was at that time carrying horse feed on his horse.”10

T. A. Fahey, District Attorney pro tem for El Paso County, filed a motion to correct any defect in the legality of the verdict handed down. This still left the chance of reversal on the grounds of Jerold’s inability to testify. Unimpressed with their own arguments, the defendants escaped jail on November 2, 1878.

Officially, Martin and Bresnaham had been the prisoners of Sheriff Kerber. Unwilling to put them in the old county jail in San Elizario, and lacking a jail in Ysleta, the new county seat, Kerber had turned his prisoners over to Tays’ Rangers. The two bandits, as well as Buckskin Joe, a convicted rapist named Sam Kirkley, Hipoliter Talers, and several other prisoners, were kept in a one-room structure with one door and no windows. Families were allowed to visit their incarcerated relatives, and the lax security enabled someone to sneak the proverbial hacksaw inside the proverbial pie. In the darkened room, the prisoners were able to cut their shackles and dig their way out under the wall.

The prisoners may have been helped by a Texas Ranger. Tays’ unit, the Detachment of Company “C,” was plagued by such “inside men” during this period. The likeliest possibility is Sam Northcutt, who deserted the unit just a few days after the prisoners’ escape. Northcutt turned—or returned—to rustling, and was killed by the Rangers in January 1879.11

Martin and the others were gone only ten minutes before their absence was noticed, but the tracks led directly to the safety of Mexico. Authorities there promised Tays they would attempt to apprehend the escapees, but nothing came of it. Again Bob Martin escaped justice.12 Within days, he returned to his life of crime. Within a few months, he came to the attention of Mexican and American diplomats. Within two years, he was the subject of urgent correspondence throughout the United States Government.

“Martin… keeps the inhabitants in the greatest state of alarm”

Martin escaped from custody on November 2. Before the month was out he reportedly stole 68 head of cattle in northern Chihuahua. The rustler was later identified as “John Martin.” The description of him as “a noted robber on the Texas and New Mexico frontier, who escaped two or three months ago from the prison in Franklin” makes it clear that Bob was the culprit. Martin was said to be living in Silver City and a known associate of a D.K. Wardwell, whose Azcarati Ranche presumably was first way station for the beeves.13

That Martin had quickly organized a gang that ranged far and wide is apparent from this anxious letter from E. F. Walz, the Warm Springs Indian Contractor, to Colonel Hatch’s District of New Mexico headquarters in Santa Fe:

“I have a heard [sic] of Cattle on the road from Sullivan’s Ranch in the State of Chihuahua en route to the San Carlos Agency to be delivered to the Indians. The herd consists of 800 to 400 beef steers. I am just informed that there are some hostile Indians on the route which goes by the Hatchet Mountains and San Simon Also I am informed that quite a band of thieves under Bob Martin the man who shot Lt. Butler have threatened and are preparing to stampede my herd. I request that an escort or scout be sent to meet said herd at the Hatchet Mountains and escort them to the point of crossing the Arizona line. The herd is under the charge of John H. Riley.”

14

Initially, Bob Martin was one of several Americans accused by the Mexicans of rustling their livestock and bringing it north of the border, but his name quickly became the most prominent in their dispatches. From Chihuahua came a report that on February 9, 1879,

“an expedition of fourteen men left Janos (a major town in the northwest of that state) on account of the authorities having received information of a drove of stolen cattle passing in the vicinity, that in fact eighteen beeves were found hidden in the mountains without any herder, from which, on account of brands and other signs it was known that they had been left there by some Americans engaged in taking cattle from the ranche of Azcarate to be incorporated and crossed at the first opportunity to the United States, that the presence of Martin in that section and the frequency with which robberies have been committed in New Mexico and Texas near the dividing line keeps the inhabitants in the greatest alarm….”

15

In response to the first complaints forwarded by Mexican Foreign Minister Ruelas, the United States Government agreed to investigate the matter. There it ended.16
Martin’s activities were wide-ranging. The Las Cruces newspaper Thirty-Four reported on September 3, 1879, “Bob Martin, the highwayman, is again lurking around between here and Silver City.” Lt. George Baylor, the new Texas Ranger commander in El Paso, reported in late 1880 that,

“The man Martin… has been living in Mexico ever since [his escape], moving from one town to another in the northern part of Chihuahua, in Concepcion, Janos, & thereabouts, and I think with a mixed band of white men + Mexicans has been attacking cattle & horses in Corralitos, Casas Inandas, & that section and running them into Arizona + New Mexico.”

17

The greatest devastation was visited upon the town of Janos and the colony of Ascension in northern Chihuahua. In May 1879, the Administration of Frontier Justice at Janos reported the presence of bandits under the leadership of “a fugitive from the Franklin jail, where he was registered under the name of Bob Robert Martin.” In August 1880, Juan M. Navarro, the Mexican Chargé d’Affaires in New York passed along to the U.S. Secretary of State the Governor of Chihuahua’s report of June 9, 1880, that Martin,

“a bandit by profession who for some time past has been marauding on both frontiers, has succeeded in forming a gang of Texans and Mexicans who at present have taken refuge in the Sierra del Hache in American territory from whence they separate to commit their depredations, stealing large numbers of cattle, which pass on that side of the frontier.”

18

Martin hit Ascension twice within a few days. In reporting this fact, the Municipal President of Ascension advised the Governor of Chihuahua that Martin’s deeds were “attested by a person who had set out from San Simon and who knows the brands and saw the animals in the possession of the American Robert Martin.”19

In reporting Martin’s crimes to Secretary of State Evans, Navarro added,

“I do not think it essential to include in this letter further information concerning the existence of the gang of thieves under Robert Martin since they have public notoriety on both frontiers and this information will suffice, according to my judgment, to make the Department see the necessity of bringing before the Authorities of that part of the frontier the persecution of a gang of outlaws who have caused so much trouble, succeeding up to this time in eluding the vigilance of the authorities of both Republics.”

20

Even as Navarro drafted his August communiqué to Evarts, rustler attacks on Janos and Ascension threatened the very existence of those communities. On July 30, 1880, the Municipal President of Janos learned that cattle and horses were being stolen from Aqua Fria, about six miles distant, and that the thieves were driving the animals in the direction north. Fourteen volunteers were immediately dispatched, with sixteen more following “for the purpose of protecting those who had started first.”21

The first party overtook the rustlers at San Luis, to the south of the Sarampion mountains. Some of the bandits galloped ahead with eighteen stolen horses while others remained to defend their interest in 85 head of rustled cattle. The bandits

“made a stubborn resistance, opening fire upon their pursuers, so that the latter were obliged to assume a defensive attitude; a fight ensued, in which one horse was wounded in the foreleg; it being impossible to remove this animal, he was left in the field. It was observed that one of the thieves was severely wounded, and eighty- five head of cattle were abandoned [by the rustlers], together with a mule, a saddle and bridle, and some other articles of small value which had been abandoned by the wounded man above mentioned.”

Despite the measure of success, the Janos Municipal President begged his superiors to send a military force for their protection. “[F]or if this is not done the situation of our people is an utterly defenseless one.”22
Thwarted in their attempt to safely carry off the stolen beeves, Martin’s band was soon at it again. In early August, an American agent of Senor Ramon R. Lujan, owner of the “estate Corralitos” (located some 25 miles south of Janos), arrived at Janos with fifteen men in pursuit of American thieves believed to be a short distance away.

“Several persons volunteered to accompany him, and joined his party; after having been out two days, they came upon two or three Americans who were well fortified in a sort of stockade which they had built; these at once opened fire upon the pursuing party, who returned it, the result being a lively fight, in which Sabas Talamante and a Negro, who accompanied the man from Corralitos, were wounded; two horses were also wounded and one remained stuck in a mudhole. The American in charge of the party then resolved to return, finding that he would be obliged to expose the lives of some of the men who were with him if he persisted in capturing the outlaws….”

23

On this same rustling foray, the bandits ran into resistance from the colonists of Ascension. “It appears that several citizens of that town, who were in pursuit of thieves from the United States who had been stealing horses, overtook them, when a fight ensued, in the course of which several men and horses were wounded.” According to Luis Terrazas, the Governor of Chihuahua, who forwarded these reports, “the party referred to belongs to the band under the leadership of the notorious criminal Robert E. Martin.”24

While rustling Mexican livestock was certainly proving hard work with uncertain success, the reports indicate that the settlers were nearing the breaking point in the summer of 1880. On August 30th, the distressed colonists of Ascension authorized lawyer Juan M. Zuloaga to petition Governor Terrazas for help. It was impossible, wrote Zuloaga,

“to remain indifferent to the to the scandalous deeds which are constantly perpetuated by Texan outlaws, who, with entire impunity, and in considerable numbers, commit unheard of and premeditated outrages not only against the colony, but also the neighboring villages, to such an extent that, if the unblushing boldness of these bad men is not speedily checked, …the consequence will unquestionably be the absolute demoralization of these unhappy districts, or, what is still more probable, the total ruin of all inhabitants; for they have already lost all their horses, and the greater part of their meat cattle, and it may very easily happen that, being discouraged by their terrible situation, they may be forced to abandon their homes.”

25

Zuloaga then broke the heartbreaking news that Martin had been in Mexican custody, but had again escaped justice. “If the outlaw Martin, who is the leader of these Texans, had not been unjustly acquitted, we should now be at peace; though Martin was arrested by order of the Government, he was protected by the District Judge, and we, whose blood is now being shed, are today suffering the fatal consequences of that protection.”26

Rustlers’ Paradise

In moving his base of operations to the remote area marked by New Mexico’s Hatchet Mountains to the east and the Chiricahua Mountains to the west, Martin had found the perfect setup for rustling. Several factors are fundamental to the success of any livestock rustling operation. All were present in the area where New Mexico and Arizona Territories and the Mexican states of Chihuahua and Sonora came together.
The first factor is the availability of a valuable livestock in numbers sufficient to be worth the hardship and risk in stealing. The Mexican States of Chihuahua and Sonora were notable for their river valleys, excellent soil, and abundant, unfenced cattle, ripe for stealing.27 The second is a ready market for the stolen stock. The U.S. Army, Indian reservations, and growing miner populations in the southern tier of the American territories provided this.

Weak law enforcement was the third key to Martin’s success. In this regard, he had found a bandits’ paradise. Both the Mexican army and state militia were weak along the border during the years Martin operated here.28 Towns and large ranches could organize pursuit posses but could not halt the hemorrhage of livestock. The boundary itself was not just a complication to effective law enforcement. A half century of mistrust prevented any effective cooperation between the two nations, making that invisible line a barrier to pursuit. Mexican authorities could do little more than plead with their U.S. counterparts to take action.

North of the border, the rustlers were virtually home free. Unlike Texas, New Mexico and Arizona territories fielded no ranger companies to bring large gangs to justice. Even when stock was stolen from the U.S. Army or an Indian Reservation, neither the U.S. Marshal for Arizona nor New Mexico had the resources to cope with rustling on the scale taking place along the Mexican border. In fact, all U.S. Marshals operated without any authorized funding throughout 1879 and into 1880 due to Congress’ failure to appropriate.29 Sheriff Charles Shibell of Pima County could assign a deputy sheriff to Galeyville, but lacked sufficient funds to put posses forever in the field. The same was true in Grant County, New Mexico, where Sheriff Harvey Whitehill could do little more than put a man in Shakespeare.

The U.S. Army was the one force powerful enough to deal with border rustling. It was barred from going after criminals by the restrictions of the Posse Comitatus Law, passed in 1878 in reaction to the army’s Reconstruction-era activities in the South.30 In September 1879, Colonel Edward Hatch, commander of the U.S. Army’s District of New Mexico, reported to General John Pope in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas:

“Referring to the Robbers who infest the frontiers, there are undoubtedly a great many of the worst characters. The military are powerless however to do anything with them when on U.S. Territory they are under the jurisdiction of the local laws of the states and Territories.”

31

Hatch’s comments were echoed by a junior officer commanding at Camp Rucker, located in the Chiricahua Mountains, just west of the New Mexico line. In August, 1880, Captain MacGowan reported, “[T]here is a band of horse thieves (40-50 strong) who make that pass their route with stolen stock….” He expressed confidence “that much of raiding that is charged to Indians is committed by this band; Custom House officer and Sheriff should be stationed there, as under existing laws the Mil. can do nothing.” MacGowan’s report was passed along by Brigadier General Willcox, Commanding General of the Department of Arizona, to the
Territory’s Acting Governor, John J. Gosper, who forwarded it on to U.S. Marshal Crawley Dake for filing.32

The fourth requirement was topography conducive to ongoing, large-scale criminal operations. The San Simon and Animas valleys, north-south highways marked by sufficient grass and water, were perfect getaway routes. The mountains flanking these valleys were honeycombed with canyons needed to hide stolen Mexican stock en route to new owners north of the international line. (The path also worked for rustled herds headed south.)

Geography served Martin’s purposes in other ways. This particular area of the border was remote from large towns like Silver City and Tucson with their civilized trappings, such as peace officers and newspapers. The nearest towns, Shakespeare, New Mexico and Galeyville, Arizona, served as rustler hangouts, and were small enough to welcome the rustlers’ cash, whatever the inconvenience of rowdy behavior and gunplay. Neither town was big enough to produce the rustlers’ natural adversary, a local newspaper with a crusading editor bent on cleaning up endemic crime. While the Grant County Herald and various Tucson papers reported what they could, the rustlers’ operations by and large remained below the radar. Not until John Clum started up his Epitaph in Tombstone did the San Simon and Animas Valley Cowboys receive the attention that Albert J. Fountain accorded the “the Boys” of Dona Ana and Lincoln counties in the Mesilla Valley Independent back in 1877.

All these factors, but especially the weakness of governmental authority in northern Mexico and the southwest United States, made it easy to construct a network of crime, corruption and dubious naïveté ranging from a stolen herd’s point of origin to its final destination. In addition to the “protection” of the occasional Mexican jurist, rustlers such as Martin could count on “foreigners and Mexicans in said villages, but principally in Ascension, who assist them in committing their robberies and in concealing the stolen animals.” From the valley of the Rio San Pedro or the Rio Casas Grande, thieves could drive their stolen property east and then north toward the border, located just 50 miles from Janos. Along the way, they took advantage of natural defensive terrain, as well as way stations like Wardwell’s Azcarati Ranche. Across the border, middlemen like “honest rancher” and rustler’s banker George Turner in the San Simon Valley found ranchers looking to build herds or contractors buying for the U.S. Government. One such beef contractor was Benjamin Shuster. Found to be in possession of 16 head of cattle stolen from Chihuahuan rancher Ramon Lujan, Shuster claimed that he bought the cattle from a San Simon rancher named Thompson, “without knowing that they were stolen.” Almost in the next breath, Shuster told Pima County Deputy Sheriff Howard C. Walker that Thompson was a cattle thief who sold the stolen beef “at exceedingly low prices” to contractors like himself from San Carlos to Silver City. With contractors allowing themselves to be “duped” by men they knew to be cattle thieves, it is no wonder that rustlers like Martin were able to stay in business.33

“I again invite your attention”

This then, was an enterprise seemingly everyone in the region knew about and no one did anything about. It did not hurt Martin that his base of operations was far from the concerns of politicians in Washington, Santa Fe, Prescott and Austin. Not only were outlaw gangs on the border relatively free from interference, but the area of Martin’s hideout was apparently not on anyone’s map. By concentrating his crimes in Mexico and basing his operations in the New Mexico boot heel, Martin was able, during the years 1879-80, to operate out of the U.S. Government’s sight.

The remoteness of Martin’s holdout in southwest New Mexico was illustrated by some unusual correspondence to and from Governor Oran Milo Roberts of Texas. On September 11, 1880, Secretary of State Evarts forwarded to Roberts the Mexican government’s complaint “that certain bandits headed by one Robert Martin have a haunt in the Sierra del Hacha, in American territory whence they enter Mexico and steal cattle there.” Evans reminded Roberts that, “The citizens of Texas have suffered so much from similar raids from Mexico [that Evans presumed] the authorities of that State will not tolerate or overlook similar raids from Texas on Mexico.” Evans then asked Roberts to use his authority to disperse Martin’s band or thwart his activities.34

Failing to get an answer, Evarts wrote to Roberts again on November 3, begging the governor to “exercise… the good offices of the State of Texas in suppressing these outlaws and bringing them to condign punishment, so far as they may be reached within its jurisdiction.” The secretary suggested that the bandits “could easily be broken up by the civil authorities.”35

With the receipt of this note, Governor Roberts sprang into action. He dispatched a letter through channels to Lt. Baylor in El Paso asking about Martin and his haunts in the “Sierra La Hacha.” In his reply dated November 20, Baylor advised Ranger commander Major John B. Jones, “There are no mountains named La Hacha in Texas between here + Presidio del Norte [southeast of El Paso] that I know of, except the Sierra del Capara is sometimes so called 25 or 30 miles south east of San Lucero in Mexico. But I was there with Gen’l Farasas in September last and there was no sign of any band of men being there. I am satisfied that this band of men are the same who stole cattle from Corralitas & were followed by men sent out by Major Geo. B. Zimpelman & 4 or 5 of them killed. I have written to the Sheriff of Pima Co. at Tucson Arizona about the matter and may hear something from him….”36 In short, Baylor did not know where the Hatchet Mountains were.

“The worst characters in the country”

Martin’s crimes did not go completely unnoticed on the American side. On December 2, 1880, the Silver City Mining Chronicle reported,

“There is a rendezvous of the worst characters in the country in the vicinity of the San Simon Valley. Murder, highway robbery and cattle stealing seems to be their profession, and it is about time they were hunted down and caged.”

The item added, for reasons explained later, that Bob Martin was ‘generally regarded as a bad character.”
While the following item from the Arizona Gazette of February 18, 1881 does not mention Martin by name, it accurately depicts the border crime wave and the climate of frustration and fear that he and his band fostered:

Cattle Thieves Scourging the Ranchers Across the Line Tucson, February 15.—Reliable information has been received from the San Pedro River
below the Sonora line that the San Simon cowboys are depredating fearfully upon the Mexican stock-raisers in Sonora. J[uan] M. Elias, whose lands extend some eighty miles along the line, is the greatest sufferer. The people are in arms. About 200 of these cattle thieves, mostly from Texas, are scattered along the border in bands from ten to twenty, and all cooperate. The Mexicans are arming themselves and say if the United States authorities will not interest themselves in punishing these invaders, they will not allow an American to cross the line along the locality of these ranches, as they are unable to distinguish between good and bad Americans. They claim the depredation of the Apaches were not half so destructive as the work of the cow boys. A prominent Mexican rancher arrived in this city to-day with a view of purchasing twenty
stands of arms to defend his property. He stated that if something was not done by the American Government to prevent these American marauders from invading their homes that serious complications must very soon arise. It appears that these cattle thieves are largely made up of the same bands who gave so much trouble on the Rio Grande [i.e., El Paso County, Texas and Dona Ana County, New Mexico] for years past. The cattle men of south-eastern Arizona are also loosing [sic] much stock from the same source….”

The terror instilled by the bandits’ activities were not soon forgotten, as this 1886 Silver City newspaper account makes clear:

“Along in ’79 and ’80 the rustler element had things pretty much their own way in the southwest. They were so numerous and had confederates in such high station that the honest cowman appeared powerless, for a time at least, to protect his own property. Men who were not molested by them were afraid to assist their neighbor, who had been robbed, lest they should be the next recipients of the rustler’s visit. The rustlers even went so far as to threaten assassination to those who opposed them or dared even to attempt to protect their own property.”

37

As 1880 drew to an end, Martin could look back on nearly two years of unfettered criminal activity. The evidence does not tell us how many crimes he committed, how many men he led, or in what manner he “led” them. But he was recognized as the leader of an outlaw band considered large by his contemporaries. How large? As with Jessie Evans’ “Boys,” the number probably varied. Don Elias’ estimate that border bandits operated in groups of 10-20 men may be conservative in Martin’s case. He certainly led enough men to be considered by Mexicans the greatest single American threat to law and order along their northwest border. Did he fall into this role because of recognized organizational skills? Was he the fastest with a gun or the edgiest sociopath? Was he simply there first to stake his claim? We only know that he was “generally regarded as a bad character,” bad enough to lead a feared band of criminals for two years.38

Who were the men who followed the outlaw Bob Martin or cooperated in his enterprise? One can only speculate, but candidates include Brocius, Pony Deal, and Sherman McMaster. All dropped out of sight during 1879, and the Hatchet Mountains were a good place to hide.39 We know much more about some of Martin’s associates than we do about Martin himself.

“and if the lurking place of said Martin be found”

Not until September 11, 1880, more than 18 months after the Mexican Government first complained of Martin, did the United States Government finally sit up and take notice. In response to the August 1880 communication from Juan Navarro, the Mexican charge d’affaires, Secretary of State Evarts wrote to Secretary of War Alexander Ramsay and Secretary of the Interior Carl Schurz, (as well as Texas Governor Roberts) about the nature and severity of the problem.

Secretary Ramsay was asked “for such action… as the War Department can properly take.”40 Ramsay wrote through generals William Tecumsah Sherman, Philip Sheridan, and John Pope to Colonel Hatch, Commander of the District of New Mexico. Hatch reported only that

“bands of thieves infest the entire South West and plunder citizens in both countries. In all probability they would select the Hatchet Mountains, sometimes occupied in smuggling, at others in stealing. When not so occupied, they usually can be found in the lower towns on the Rio Grande and about Silver City.”

41

Hatch’s reply fell far short of the military action Mexico needed. Meanwhile, on November 24, the governor of Chihuahua telegraphed Mexico City, advising that the bandits

“led by the outlaw Robert E. Martin continues to commit robberies at Janos and Ascension, … and it is to be feared that, being exasperated at the loss of their property, [the settlers] may themselves undertake to pursue and punish the outlaws, in doing which they may be obliged to cross the boundary line, which may give rise to a conflict.”

With an international incident brewing, Mexico City instructed its Chargé d’Affaires in New York to plead with Secretary of State Evarts for “combined action for the capture of this band of thieves, who… have become the terror of those districts…. I do not doubt that the combined action of the forces of the two countries will put an end to the evils in question.”42

At this time, with Mexican temperatures near the boiling point, their complaints about Martin finally reached the desk of Arizona Territorial Governor John C. Fremont in Prescott. On January 4th, Fremont received a package from Secretary Schurz, requesting Fremont to “make inquiry in regard to this matter, and if the lurking place of said Martin be found within the Territory of Arizona, that you will adopt such measures as may be within your power looking to the breaking up of his band and the preservation and maintenance of peace along the frontier between the two countries.”43

Martin’s name and criminal activity were news to the Governor. He replied to that effect on January 16: “I have not yet obtained any information of sufficient importance to communicate to the Department, or to enable me to take any action….”44

Ten days later, Fremont could offer more:

“So far as I have been able to learn that number of men in the band known as Robert Martin’s is about one hundred and twenty. The operations of this band are carried out in Sonora and Chihuahua, and also within our own territories. If the Posse Comitatus Act is repealed we could we then obtain from General Willcox, commanding the Department, to break up or capture the band forthwith. I am informed that the object of Governor Wallace’s” visit to Washington is to endeavor to affect the repeal of this Act and further peace of the Territory. I trust he may be successful. The immediate affect would be to terminate all such raids and tranquilize the frontier.”

45

The source of Fremont’s figure of

“about one hundred and twenty” men in “the band known as Robert Martin’s” is unknown, but this number was in the mid-range of estimates of stock thieves infesting the region made by persons in a position to make informed guesses. Did Martin “command” 120 men? Certainly not, but he appears to have been considered first among them.

“Murder in the San Simon Valley”

So the Governor of Arizona was finally on board concerning the existence and extent of Bob Martin’s criminal activity along the territorial and international borders. By this time, however, Martin was no longer in business. The first word came in this report from W. J. Crosby, carried by the Arizona Daily Star on November 27, 1880:

“Horse and Cattle Thieves” SHAKESPEARE, N.M. NOV. 25, 1880
EDITOR STAR: - During the past month a number of horses and mules have been stolen at intervals from various sections of this country, the latest being eight head from Leiterdorf, and several head from San Simon, in Pima County; fourteen head were also stolen from the Stage Company at Mason’s ranch last week. A posse of Messrs. Turner, Marten [sic], Colt, Raymond, and a Mexican named Dominguez, started in pursuit on Monday last following the trail to near Dowing’s ranch, and after a hard fight, lasting from daylight yesterday until three o’clock in the afternoon, they succeeded in killing one of the thieves whose name is given as King, and seriously wounding another named Bill Smith. King was a cripple and leader of the gang, which were four in number. The posse captured 22 head of stock and returned with these. They will be well rewarded for the courageous action. They propose capturing the two remaining desperadoes and some 14 head of stock known to have been stolen by the same gang.
This may be a useful lesson to horse and cattle thieves throughout this section. Ropes and trees are very convenient in the neighborhood.”

Two days later, the Daily Star reported a new turn of events: Martin was dead, “Shot by Stock Thieves,” as the headline put it. According to a telegraph to the Star from Shakespeare dated November 24, Turner, Martin and their companions had indeed recovered 22 head of stock, but had not succeeded in killing any of the rustlers in the battle at Downing’s ranch, Animas mountains. Then, said the Star,

“Turner and Martin, when returning to San Simon from Shakespeare on Friday evening last, were ambushed at Granite Gap by King and his gang. Martin was killed instantly, being shot in the head. Three head of stock were shot down and killed in the affray. Turner escaped. A regular vendetta has been commenced in the San Simon valley and the end is not yet.”

Additional details regarding Martin’s death were provided on December 7 by the rival Tucson paper, the Arizona Daily Citizen, in an item entitled

“Outlawry”:
Cattle Stealing and Murder in the San Simon Valley – The Ranchers Organizing for Self-Protection” For some time past the settlers and ranchmen in the San Simon Valley in the southeastern
portion of the Territory, have been subjected to a regular course of theft, which resulted a short time ago in the murder of a man named Martin. On the night of the 22nd of November seven head of horses and mules, belonging to Turner and Lindeman, were run off by a gang of four outlaws, whose headquarters were in a portion of the valley where, with a good field glass, they were enabled to survey an extensive section of the country. A party of six settlers immediately armed themselves and started in pursuit of the thieves, and after following them into Cloverdale District, about 60 miles distant in New Mexico, succeeded in recapturing the stock, together with eight head that had previously been stolen from parties near Shakespeare. The stock was brought back to the ranch of Turner & Lindeman, which is on the road from the San Simon Station to the new California Mining District. Mr. Turner and a man named Bob Martin then left for Shakespeare with four of the stolen stock belonging to Mr. Fitzgerald of that place.
At the time of the recovery of the stock from the thieves a number of shots were exchanged, but so far as known, no one was wounded. The outlaws evidently dogged the party back to the ranch, and from their eyrie (?) in the hills observed the return of the stock. As Messrs. Turner and Martin returned from Shakespeare, they were ambushed in Stein Peak Pass by the outlaws, who were concealed in the rocks. At the first fire the horses of the two men were killed under them, and at the second round Martin was killed by a bullet through the head. Mr. Turner then fled from the road and concealed himself, and observing the horses of the outlaws at some little distance where they had been picketed, he commenced firing at them, hoping to dismount his assailants and thus stand a better chance of escaping from what he conceived to be his last ditch. He succeeded in killing one of the horses, when the fight got too hot for him and he again made off. The broken formation of the country aided his escape, and waiting till night, under cover of the friendly darkness he succeeded in reaching home, some ten miles distant. It was a close call, as there were several bullet holes through his clothes.
In the morning an armed party of settlers visited the pass with a wagon and brought Martin’s body to the ranch and buried it. Later the outlaws again visited the ranch above for the purpose of stealing stock, but were driven away. The settlers then organized a party, and succeeded in finding a retreat of the gang in the hills, but the occupants were away. The ranchers are now organizing to better protect themselves, and we may expect to hear of some neck-tie parties soon in the valley, if the discretion of the outlaws does not get the better of their valor.”

The bandits who trailed Turner and Martin to Stein Pass were identified by the Grant County Herald and Southwest as “Stiles, Leonard and King; [with] the fourth being a stranger.” Leonard and King may have been Billy Leonard and Luther King, two of the four cowboys who attempted to rob the Benson stage in March 1881, setting in motion events that led to the street fight in Tombstone near the O.K. Corral.

End of a “Bad Character”

One fact stands out from these Arizona reports. Death came to “a man named Martin,” and not to Martin “the highwayman,” “the thief Martin” or to “Martin, a bandit by profession.” There is no indication that he had been “lurking” about or “infesting” the region, and he is certainly not identified as the leader of a large band of stock thieves. This Bob Martin is clearly identified as allied with the ranchers in opposition to the outlaws. He is one of the good guys. Is this the same Bob Martin who preyed on Mexican ranches from Chihuahua to Sonora? Undoubtedly.

Evidence is found in a little-known New Mexico newspaper, the “Silver City Mining Chronicle”. On December 2, 1880, this paper reported that,

“The following telegram addressed to Sheriff Whitehill will give an insight into the condition of affairs in [the San Simon Valley].
Nov. 29, 80. Sheriff Whitehill: Myself and Bob Martin were waylaid on Friday by four horse thieves, and Martin killed. If possible send out four men to protect life and property. I will give $1,000 for the apprehension of these murderers. Geo. Turner

This little affair occurred somewhere between Shakespeare and San Simon. Bob Martin is well known in Southern New Mexico, and was generally regarded as a bad character. Deputy Sheriff [Dan] Tucker is now at the San Simon looking after these pests, and when the facts are collected we shall give the whole affair an airing.”

The reference to the deceased Bob Martin as a “bad character” is persuasive, but hardly conclusive. Additional circumstantial evidence points to the death of the outlaw Bob Martin in Stein Peak Pass. First, while cabinet level correspondence regarding Martin the outlaw continued for several months after the death of this “bad character.”—as late as April 1881, in fact—these letters were a continuation of the same thread that began with the Mexican complaints filed in the summer of 1880.46 I have been unable to locate any complaints of Martin operating inside Mexico after the date of his apparent death, and no reports north of the border. The outlaw leader who caused great tension along the international border simply disappears as an issue between the two governments. Although Mexican complaints regarding American bandits reached a peak in 1881, Martin himself was no longer mentioned.

Second, Martin’s companion in the fight at Stein Pass was George Turner, who was himself later killed while in the act of stealing Mexican cattle. Turner was one of those border rustlers who gained a veneer of respectability as a “rancher.” He made a living legally transferring cattle of dubious origin from south of the border to buyers north of the line happy enough with the cheap prices to ask few embarrassing questions, including the U.S. Army. It was Turner, says Breakenridge, who introduced the deputy sheriff to Martin’s old partner, Curly Bill Brocius. Breakenridge calls Turner the rustlers’ banker. While the exact nature of this relationship between Martin and Turner is unknown, it is apparent from their connection and from Martin’s continuing reputation “as a bad character” that Bob had not changed his line of work.47

The third piece of evidence pointing to the bandit Martin’s death is found in contemporary newspaper reports that clearly imply that the running battle was a squabble between men cut from the same cloth. The Arizona Daily Star reported on December 1 that “The combatants are largely composed of men who left Lincoln county some 12 or 14 months ago under warm pressure.” The Arizona Daily Citizen advised its readers on December 4 that the “dispute… over the ownership of some cattle” was a “war” among about “twenty of the Texas cowboys….”

One document points away from Martin’s violent death in November 1880. On December 19, Texas Ranger George Baylor reported to his superiors, “Bob Martin is the guest of a citizen of El Paso. I sent a man to aid Campbell round up the house but they did not get him. I am going with the American consul tomorrow and try and get him.” There is no further mention of Martin nor of any effort to round up the outlaw in Baylor’s correspondence with Austin.48 Baylor wrote his letter when the government’s interest in Martin was at its height. The lack of further correspondence seems to indicate that the sighting was an error.
The evidence strongly suggests that the outlaw Martin did die, and that his demise was the result of one set of rustlers stealing from another perhaps more “respectable” set. Internecine warfare over territory or spoils was a fact of life among the Cow-boys, as it is within any criminal population. Given the lack of honor among thieves, there was nothing unusual about Martin’s death at hands of Leonard, King and company.49

“At the mercy of cow-boys”

With the elimination of Martin, Curly Bill replaced his old jail-mate as the “most famous bad man” around. After Martin’s death, the Cowboys became more than bold in their crimes. They became arrogant. Traveling in packs, they committed murder in broad daylight, unafraid of witnesses.50 After Martin’s death, the level of conflict between the Cowboys and their adversaries escalated into bloody warfare. A series of skirmishes between rustlers and Mexican ranchers and smugglers in the summer of 1881 led the Mexican government to beef up its military presence along the border. Turner’s death was followed by that of Old Man Clanton and five other Americans ambushed and killed in Skeleton Canyon by a party thought to be Mexican soldiers. Their easy pickings denied, their paradise lost, the Cowboys turned their crimes north, bringing unwanted attention to themselves. Robbing from American ranchers and from Wells, Fargo & Co. put them in a spotlight that Martin had avoided, led them to clash with America’s most legendary lawman, and ultimately drew the attention of the President and the national press. All that was in the future.51

At the time of his death, Robert Martin had achieved the status of the most wanted American bandit in northern Mexico, a veritable bogeyman. The inevitable conclusion is that he was, by 1880, the most successful outlaw and the most successful leader of outlaws along this section of the border. No single rustler, not Old Man Clanton, not Brocius, not Ringo, completely inherited his mantle, as far as Mexican reports are concerned. Martin was not the whole problem in 1879- 80, but he was at the core of it.

His contemporaries understood what some writers have denied: the hydra-headed gang known as the Cowboys were organized crime. The colonists of Ascension and Sonoran rancher Don Jose Elias, both losing stock at an alarming rate to bands who worked in concert with one another, understood it well. So did the Earps, who, with their oaths and their lives on the line, swore to its existence and reach. And so did the Arizona Daily Citizen, which described the environment that Martin had done so much to create and foster:

THE COW-BOYS Depredations Committed by Organized Thieves Bad State of Affairs on the Border
[The] facts show a deplorable state of affairs near the border, where the ranchers are completely at the mercy of marauding parties of cow-boys, destitute of any protection from either the United States or Mexican Government. They are liable to lose all their stock at any time, and, in fact, they consider their present condition as far less safe than in former days, when Indians controlled that part of the country.
If this condition of matters continues long, many settlers will be compelled to abandon their homes and seek safety for their lives in the larger settlements.
Some steps ought certainly to be taken to rid the country of such elements of terror, else citizens may be forced to combine and offer a bounty for cowboy scalps as the people of New Mexico do for those of Indians.”

52

Acknowledgements: Museum Director Susan Berry of the Silver City Museum and Tom Bryant, identified key newspaper items on Martin. Mark Boardman, Peter Brand, Gary L. Roberts and Casey Tefertiller gave useful suggestions and support. My thanks to them all.
Paul Cool writes on the subject of southwest lawmen and outlaws. This is his third article for WOLA.
1 The earliest references to the U.S. Government’s interest in Bob Martin are in Robert D. Gregg, The Influence of Border Troubles on Relations Between the United States and Mexico 1876-1910 , Johns Hopkins University Studies in Historical and Political Science, Series LV, Number 3 (Johns Hopkins Press, Baltimore, 1937); Larry D. Ball, The United States Marshals of New Mexico & Arizona Territories 1846-1912 (University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque, 1978; 2nd printing 1992), pp. 115-16.
2 In 1876 and 1877, Martin was a partner in highway robbery with “Dutch” Joe Hubert. Available accounts mention Martin’s participation in a stagecoach holdup at Cooke’s Canon, New Mexico Territory in May 1877, but court records also show that he was charged along with Hubert for a stickup at the same spot in January 1876. See Record Book A and Criminal Dockets, Cases 357, 359, 362 and 363, for Third Judicial District, New Mexico Territory, Record Group 21, National Archives and Records Service, Region 8, Denver, Colorado. Hubert’s trial and conviction were covered in the Mesilla Valley Independent on June 30, 1877. The story was picked up in the Silver City Herald on July 7, 1877. For a lengthy treatment of Hubert’s crimes and trial, see Howard Bryan, Robbers, Rogues and Ruffians (Clear Light Publishers, Santa Fe, 1991), pp. 41-53. For discussions of “the Boys,” see Grady E. McCright and James H. Powell, Jessie Evans: Lincoln County Badman (Creative Publishing Co., College Station, Texas, 1983) and Frederick Nolan, The West of Billy the Kid (Univ. of Oklahoma Press, Norman, 1998).
3 James A. Tays to John B. Jones, May 31, 1878, Texas Ranger Correspondence, Adjutant General Records (AGR), Record Group 401, Texas State Library and Archives Commission (TSLAC), Austin. All correspondence to and from Major Jones is from RG 401, unless otherwise noted.
4 George Whitwell Parsons, A Tenderfoot in Tombstone: The Private Journal of George Whitwell Parsons: The Turbulent Years 1880-82 (Westernlore Press, Tucson, Arizona, 1996), p. 182; William M. Breakenridge, Hellodrado (Houghton Mifflin Co., Boston and New York, 1928), p. 132.
5 Lt. Butler’s career had just begun. After graduating in 1877, ranking 54 out of 76 in his class, Butler spent seven months awaiting orders. These arrived in January 1878, posting him to San Elizario in the wake of the Salt War. Biographical Register of the Officers and Graduates of the United States Military Academy at West Point (1879m vol III Supplement), p 506, listing # 2694.
6 Tays to Jones, May 31, 1878; The source for the Mesilla Valley Independent’s report that it was Corporal Herbert Oliver Matthews, and not Ryall, who had chased Martin and Curly Bill into Mexico was probably Matthews himself. The corporal had been a regular correspondent to the Independent during the Salt War. Tays was in a position to know the truth.
7 Grant County Herald, June 1, 1878; Mesilla Valley Independent, May 18, 1878. 8 Mesilla Valley Independent, June 1, 1878. The federal case against Martin in New Mexico was continued on June
29, 1878. 9 El Paso County Archives, State of Texas vs. Robert Martin et al, Case #300; Grant County Herald, September 14,
10
11
12
13
14
15 16 17 18
19 20 21
22 23 24 25
26 27
28 29
1878. Keating was a private in the Texas Ranger unit holding the bandits. Was he south of the border securing the
affidavit as an “officer of the court,” or was he seeking evidence that would assist friends? The author has engaged in a lively discussion with historian Steve Gatto over whether Joseph Jerold or Joe Heytama might have been “Buckskin Joe.” I believe the jury is still out, but Mr. Gatto has given me a reasonable doubt that Heytama is the right man, as I asserted in the printed version of this article.
The prisoners’ incarceration and escape is more fully explored by Peter Brand in “The Escape of Curly Bill Brocius,” in the WOLA Journal, Vol. IX, No. 2, Summer 2000, pp. 21-24. The story of Northcutt’s death is found in Paul Cool, “El Paso’s First Real Lawman: Texas Ranger Mark Ludwick,” NOLA Quarterly, Vol. XXV, Nos. 3, pp. 42-55, and No. 4, pp. 33-45.
By now, Martin was now wanted for robbery of the U.S. Mails (4 counts), attempted murder, and even with federal violations on trafficking in liquor and tobacco without a license. As early as 1877, $5000 was posted for his capture.
Note from Senor Rueles, Minister of Foreign Affairs, Republic of Mexico to Mr. John W. Foster, Minister of USA to Mexico, April 22, 1879, enclosure to Dispatch #941, Foster to Department of State, 4/30/79 (National Archives Microfilm Publication M666, Roll 209); Letters Received by the Office of the Adjutant General 1871- 1880 (hereinafter “AGO”), RG94, NARA, Washington, D.C. Bresnaham (or Brocius) is not mentioned in any of these communications.
Walz to Loud, January 22, 1879 (NA Microfilm M1088, Roll 36); Letters Received by Headquarters, District of New Mexico, September 1865-August 1890, RG 393, NARA
Rueles to Foster, April 22, 1879. Foster to Rueles, April 30, 1879, Enclosure 2 to Dispatch 941 Baylor to Jones, November 20, 1880, TSLAC. Juan N. Navarro to William M. Evarts, August 28, 1880, Enclosure to Letter from Evarts to Alexander Ramsey,
Secretary of War, NA Microfilm M666, Roll 211, AGO, RG 94, NARA Ibid. Ibid. Municipal President of Janos to Political Chief of Galeana, August 1, 1880, copied and enclosed in Note from
Navarro to Evarts, October 18, 1880 (NA Microfilm M54, Roll 18); Notes from the Mexican Legation in the United States to the Department of State 1821-1906, RG 59, NARA.
Ibid. Municipal President of Janos to Political Chief of Galeana, Chihuahua, August 11, 1880, ibid. Luis Torrazas, Governor of Chihuahua, to Department of Foreign Relations, August 18, ibid. Juan M. Zuloaga to Governor of Chihuahua, August 30, 1880; copied and enclosed in Note from Navarro to
Evarts, November 15, 1880 (NA Microfilm M54, Roll 18). Ibid. Miguel Tinker Salas, In the Shadow of the Eagles: Sonora and the Transformation of the Border during the
Porfiriato (University of California Press, Berkeley, 1997), pp.49-52, 71-72. “In 1879,less than fifty [Mexican] soldiers patrolled a two-hundred-and-fifty-mile border.” The federal force in
Sonora was increased beginning in 1880. See Salas, In the Shadow of the Eagle, pp. 72, 116. Larry D. Ball, The United States Marshals of New Mexico & Arizona Territories 1846-1912 (Univ. of New
Mexico Press, Albuqueque, 1978; 2nd printing 1999) P. 97.
30 The Posse Comitatus Act (passed June 18, 1878) reads in part, “From and after the passage of this act it shall not be lawful to employ any part of the Army of the United States, as a posse comitatus, or otherwise, for the purpose of executing the laws, except in such cases and under such circumstances as such employment of said force may be expressly authorized by the Constitution or by act of Congress; and no money appropriated by this act shall be used to pay any of the expenses incurred in the employment of any troops in violation of this section. And any person willfully violating the provisions of this section shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor and on conviction thereof shall be punished by fine not exceeding ten thousand dollars or imprisonment not exceeding two years or by both such fine and imprisonment. U. S. Stat. at Large, Vol. 20:145, Chapter 263, Sec. 15.
31 Hatch to Pope, September 6, 1879, M666, Roll 210, AGO, RG 94, NARA. 32 MacGowan to A.G., Department of Arizona, August 25, 1880, Records of the Department of Arizona, Register of
Letters Received, LR 1880 #2745, RG 393, NARA 33 Deposition of Mariano Samaniego, January 11, 1880; enclosure to Note from Navarro to Evarts, September 22,
1880, regarding claim for damages against the United States filed by Ramon R. Lujan (NA Microfilm M54, Roll
18). Senor Lujan claimed the loss to American thieves of 1500 cattle valued at $27,000. 34 Evarts to Roberts, September 11, 1880, Records of Governor Oran Milo Roberts, Series 301-114, TSLAC. 35 Evarts to Roberts, November 3, 1880, Records of Gov. Roberts, TSLAC. 36 Baylor to Jones, November 20, 1880, AGR, TSLAC. Major Zimpelman might have been the American agent of
the “estate Corralitas “ mentioned in the earlier report from Janos. Zimpelman was in turns a Texas Ranger (Terry’s Rangers), Travis County Sheriff and Austin banker. It was Zimpelman’s purchase of the mineral rights to the Guadalupe Salt Lakes that triggered the El Paso Salt War of 1877. At some point in the 1880s, he was engaged in mining and surveying in Chihuahua. While it seems doubtful that an entrepreneur of his stature would have hired himself out as a rancher’s agent, the ex-Ranger and ex-Sheriff would have been an ideal man to pursue rustlers.
37 Silver City Enterprise, October 1, 1886. 38 This item appeared in the Arizona Daily Star on October 17, 1880: “Homicide at San Simon: Yesterday morning
as the train for Tucson was leaving San Simon, a number of Chinamen came on board without passes and offered no money but demanded passage. The conductor, Bob Martin, asked for fare and, upon being refused, commenced ejecting them, when they turned on him with clubs forcing him to use his revolver in self defense, and at the first fire he killed one of the Chinamen. Three is no arrest so far, and it is generally believed there is no necessity for any.” The shooter is described as a train conductor, not a passenger, but the coincidence of two gun-wielding, death-dealing Bob Martins in the San Simon area is intriguing.
39 Curly Bill Brocius has not surfaced in any reports for the period between his escape (November 1878) and the theft of some army mules from Camp Rucker in July 1880. It is probable that he was operating “below the radar” in the same remote turf as Martin. Charles Ray, alias Pony Deal (or Diehl) was a member of the same “fraternity house” as Martin (and Brocius) from the old days in Lincoln, Dona Ana or El Paso County. There are no reports of him throughout 1879. At some point in 1880 he was a bartender in Globe, Arizona, but he surfaced next in July 1880, as one of the Cow-boys wanted for the theft of those Camp Rucker mules. McMaster, the future Earp Vendetta rider was a Texas Ranger in the El Paso unit that incarcerated Brocius. The two men certainly knew each other, and Sherman first surfaces in the chronicles of Tombstone as an associate of Pony Deal.
40 Evarts to Ramsay, September 11, 1880, M666, Roll 211, AGO, RG94, NARA. 41 Pope to Adjutant General, United States Army, January 15, 1881, citing communication from Col. Hatch in
October 1880; M666, Roll 211, AGO, RG94, NARA. 42 Navarro to Evarts, December 27, 1880 (NA Microfilm M54, Roll 18). 43 Carl Schurz, Secretary of the Interior to Hon John C. Fremont, December 24th 1880 44 Fremont to Schurz, January 16, 1881 (M429, Roll 3) Interior Department Territorial papers: Arizona; RG 48,
NARA 45 Fremont to Schurz, January 26, 1881 (M429, Roll 3), RG 48, NARA 46 See Pope to Adjutant General, United States Army, January 15, 1881, citing communication from Col. Hatch in
October 1880; M666, Roll 211, AGO, RG94, NARA; Secretary of State Evarts to Secretary of War Ramsay, February 2, 1881; Mr. M Letter of April 13, 1881 M. de Zamacona, Ambassador of Mexico to the United States, to James G. Blaine, Secretary of State, April 13, 1881 (M429, Roll 3); Blaine to Sec. Interior Samuel J. Kirkwood, April 19, 1881 (M429, Roll 3).
47 Six months after Martin’s death, Turner and Galeyville butcher Alfred McAllister rode south of the border with two other men to obtain cattle for delivery to the U.S. Army. On the return route, near Fronteras, Sonora, Turner and his party were attacked and killed by Mexican citizens. According to Joseph Bowyer, a Galeyville mining
manager, “Upon the bodies of Turner and McAllister was found the money which they ostensibly took to purchase cattle; which amount, compared with what they were known to have started here with, proved that the cattle they were driving had not been paid for.” Bowyer was just one of several contemporary sources reporting that the death of Turner angered the “Cow-boys,” as the rustling element in the San Simon and Animas valleys was known by 1881. It was widely reported that the “Cow Boys” talked of raiding Fronteras in retaliation. In fact, Turner’s death was the first in a series of bloody border battles in the summer of 1881. See Bowyer to Gosper, September 17, 1881 (M689, Roll 21: Cowboy Depredations File); Letters Received by the Office of the Adjutant General 1881- 1889, RG94, NARA.
48 Baylor to Jones, December 19, 1880, AGR, TSLAC. A search of State Department, War Department, and Customs Service records also failed to reveal any subsequent federal records on the matter.
49 Only a few months after Martin was killed by Leonard and company, Leonard and Harry Head announced their intention to kill the Haslett brothers, whose Animas Valley ranch Leonard and Head wanted. The unlucky pair were themselves ambushed by the Hasletts. In retaliation, the Hasletts were killed by other Cow-boys. To gain Leonard’s ranch near Cloverdale (located in the Animas Valley just north of the Mexican line), Ike Clanton had been willing to betray Leonard, Head and Jim Crane for their part in the March 1881 Benson stage robbery.
50 An episode that took place at the same station eight months after Martin’s death provides an example. On June 17, 1881, a Cowboy shot and killed a Yuma Indian who had ridden up on the train to San Simon. In the altercation, the “Cow Boy shot and wounded [the Indian] first, then shot him through the heart [and] afterwards dragged him off.” The Indian did not die without a fight, as he “bit the cowboy’s finger nearly off.” The train’s conductor, W. L. Dickey, and brakesman, S.W. Merritt, witnessed the whole affair, but, with “17 or 18 Cow Boys present,” they and the few passengers were “afraid to do anything.” The murder was called “without provocation [and] a most cold- blooded affair.” See telegram from Major Arnold, Acting Assistant Adjutant General, Department of Arizona, to HQ, DA, June 30, 1881; Register of Letters Received 1881, Records of the Military Department of Arizona, Military Division of the Pacific, Record Group 393, NARA. This was the same station at which “conductor Bob Martin” killed the Chinese passenger.
51 See Casey Tefertiller, Wyatt Earp: The Life Behind the Legend (John Wiley & Sons, New York, 1997) and Allen Barra, Inventing Wyatt Earp (Carroll & Graf, New York, 1998) for discussions of the post-Martin “Cowboys.”
52 Arizona Daily Citizen, February 13, 1881.