Earp Vendetta Ride Behan and his men). The federal posse ultimately killed four men, started with Stilwell and ending with Brocius. About April 15 the Earps and some of their associates rode out of Arizona Territory, headed for New Mexico Territory. After a long-simmering feud and increasing animosity and threats, Tombstone town Marshal Virgil Earp, Assistant Town Marshal Morgan Earp, and temporary deputy marshals Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday confronted outlaw Cowboys Billy Claiborne, Ike and Billy Clanton, and Tom and Frank McLaury in the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral on October 26, 1881. The 30-second gunfight is generally regarded as the most
Gunfight at the O.K. Corral he broke his promise to appoint Earp because Wyatt Earp used Behan's name to threaten Ike Clanton when Wyatt recovered his stolen horse from Clanton. Tensions between the Earp family and both the Clanton and McLaury clans increased through 1881. On July 25, 1880, Captain Joseph H. Hurst, of Company A, 12th Infantry, and Commanding Officer of Fort Bennett, asked Deputy U.S. Marshal Virgil Earp to help him track Cowboys who had stolen six U.S. Army mules from Camp Rucker. This was a federal matter because the animals were U.S. property. Hurst brought four soldiers, and Virgil invited Wyatt and