Virgil Earp as a colonel during the Second Mexican War. Virgil Earp Virgil Walter Earp (July 18, 1843 – October 19, 1905) was both deputy U.S. Marshal and Tombstone, Arizona City Marshal when he led his brothers Morgan and Wyatt and Doc Holliday in a confrontation with outlaw Cowboys at the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral on October 26, 1881. They killed brothers Tom and Frank McLaury and Billy Clanton. All three Earp brothers had been the target of repeated death threats made by the Cowboys who were upset by the Earps' interference in their illegal activities. All four lawmen were charged
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