Family feuds in the United States had occurred on October 26, 1881, and was itself the climax of the Earp–Clanton family feud, simmering since the summer of 1880. Tensions between the Earps and both the Clantons and McLaurys increased through 1881, culminating in the historic gunfight. At the O.K. Corral, three deputized Earp brothers, Wyatt, Morgan and Virgil, along with Doc Holliday, had killed Billy Clanton, Frank McLaury and Tom McLaury. The Clanton and McLaury families were aligned with the "Outlaw Cowboys", a loosely knit outlaw group of families, friends and acquaintances then living in surrounding Cochise and Pima counties. The Earp Vendetta ride was a
Wyatt Earp: Frontier Marshal records in Tombstone of a relationship between Josephine and Earp, but Behan and Earp both had offices above the Crystal Palace Saloon, competed for the same jobs, and were loyal to opposing social groups. Behan played a role in the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, telling the Earps that he had disarmed the Cowboys. (Behan testified afterward that he'd only said he'd gone down to the Cowboys "for the purpose of disarming them," not that he had actually done so.) Marcus told Earp's biographers and others that Earp never owned gambling saloons and that he never offered prostitutes upstairs, but