Cochise County in the Old West Cochise County feud or the Earp–Clanton feud, which included the historic Gunfight at the O.K. Corral in the town of Tombstone and Wyatt Earp's Vendetta Ride in the early 1880s. Dr. George E. Goodfellow famously described Tombstone, the capital of Cochise County, as the "condensation of wickedness." The land that now comprises Cochise County, along with the rest of modern Arizona south of the Gila River and a small part of southwestern New Mexico, was Mexican territory until 1853, when it was purchased by the United States in the Gadsden Purchase. Cochise County was created on February 1, 1881 from
Gunfight at the O.K. Corral were killed. Ike Clanton subsequently filed murder charges against the Earps and Doc Holliday. The lawmen were exonerated by a local justice of the peace after a 30-day preliminary hearing and then by a local grand jury. The gunfight was not the end of the conflict. On December 28, 1881, Virgil Earp was ambushed and maimed in a murder attempt by the Cowboys. On March 18, 1882, a Cowboy fired from a dark alley through the glass door of a Campbell & Hatch’s saloon and billiard parlor, killing Morgan Earp. The suspects in both incidents furnished alibis supplied by other