SHOWDOWN AT THE O.K. CORRAL: THE TRIAL OF WYATT EARP
SCRIPT EXCERPT
| WYATT EARP: | I’m Wyatt Earp. What happened in Tombstone on October 26, 1881 was a simple case of lawmen enforcing the law against some of the most notorious outlaws of the times — “cowboys” as we called them. Tombstone was the Wild West. Cattle rustlers, horse thieves, and bandits – like the Clantons and McLaurys — roamed the towns. Shootings were common. Being a lawman meant having nerves of steel, and steel in the holster to back it up. At the O.K. Corral, Doc Holliday, my brothers, and me had no choice but to use our steel against the Clantons and McLaurys. If we didn’t act when we did, we would have been on the receiving end of them bullets. |
| IKE CLANTON: | I’m Ike Clanton. That’s not what happened that day. There was no gunfight at the O.K. Corral. Rather, it was murder, pure and simple. We weren’t looking for no fight, but the Earps and Doc Holliday were. They shot and killed Frank, Tom and my brother Billy because Wyatt was afraid we would squeal: he had admitted to us that he had been in on the robbery of a stage coach and he had asked me to help him kill his accomplices so that there would be no witnesses. That’s why they committed murder — to shut us up. |
| NARRATOR 2: | Who is telling the truth? The gunfight took place in broad daylight, in plain view of many witnesses, good citizens of Tombstone. Yet, Wyatt and Ike were not the only ones to disagree, as numerous witnesses gave conflicting reports. Who fired the first shot? Was it Doc Holliday, with a nickel-plated pistol? Or was it Frank McLaury who drew his revolver first? Were the Earp brothers and Doc Holliday heroic lawmen, justified in using deadly force? Or were they cold-blooded murderers, who shot down the Clanton and McLaury brothers as they were trying to surrender? |
| NARRATOR 1: | Just as we do today when we have disagreements, the citizens of Tombstone in 1881 turned to the courtroom to determine the truth. Soon after the gun battle, Wyatt Earp and his colleagues found themselves in another showdown — in a courtroom — as Ike Clanton filed murder charges against the Earps and Doc Holliday. Few people know that in this second showdown, Wyatt Earp’s fate was put into the hands of a New York City lawyer, Thomas Fitch. The Prosecution was led by Lyttleton Price.
On October 31, 1881, just five days after the gunfight, Judge Wells Spicer commenced a preliminary hearing to determine the truth, to decide whether any of the Earps or Doc Holliday would be tried for murder. The legal standard, under Arizona law, was whether “sufficient cause” existed to believe the defendants guilty of the crime. In Tombstone in the 1880s, it was not uncommon for criminal charges to be dismissed at the preliminary hearing stage, and thus prosecutors and defense attorneys often treated the preliminary hearing like a full-blown trial. Such was the case here. Judge Spicer heard from thirty witnesses. The hearing lasted nearly a month, becoming the longest preliminary hearing in Arizona history. |
| NARRATOR 2: | Ladies and gentlemen, this evening we are going to take you back to Tombstone, Arizona. We are going to take you back to Judge Spicer’s courtroom in 1881. The proceedings were transcribed, and the words you will hear are drawn principally from the transcripts.
Ladies and gentleman, the Trial of Wyatt Earp. |
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