Wyatt Earp and Van Buren, Arkansas

During April 1871, Wyatt Earp was accused of horse theft in the Indian Territory. The actual theft happened on March 28 when Wyatt Earp and Edward Kennedy got John Shown drunk and talked him into going with them to steal 2 horses James Keyes. The plan was for Shown to take the horses 50 miles north where Earp and Kennedy would meet him.

The plan appeared to go without fail until the owner of the horses caught up with them 3 days later. Keyes recovered his stock and filed charges against Earp, Kennedy and Shown in federal court, Van Buren, Arkansas. A "Bill of Information" was filed on April 1, 1871: "April 1, 1871, Bill Of Information. U. S. vs Wyatt S. Earp, Ed Kennedy, John Shown, white men and not Indians or members of any tribe of Indians by birth or marriage or adoption on the 28th day of March A. D. 1871 in the Indian Country in said District did feloniously willfully steal, take away, carry away two horses each of the value of one hundred dollars, the property goods and chattels of one William Keys and prey a writ [signed] J. G. Owens."

On April 6, 1871, Deputy U S Marshal J. G. Owens took Wyatt Earp into custody charging him with stealing horses. Commissioner James Churchill arraigned Earp on April 14, 1871, and bond was set at $500. To have a bail set at $500, in 1871, indicates the importance of the crime.

Earp was in Lamar, Missouri, in late 1870, a few months before and less than 100 miles away from Fort Gibson, where the theft allegedly took place. He left Lamar accused of having absconded with public funds.

Anna Shown contended that Earp and Kennedy had duped her husband into stealing the horses. She told Owens: “They got my husband drunk near Ft. Gibson, I.T., about the 28th of March 1871. They went and got Mr. Jim Keys horses, and put my husband on one and he lead [sic] the other, and told him to ride fifty miles toward Kansas…” where they would meet him.”

Her husband John had ridden the stolen horses to the appointed meeting place north of Fort Gibson; Anna accompanied Earp and Kennedy there in a hack. Once reunited, the 4 hitched the stolen horses to the hack and continued their flight toward Kansas, driving at night and resting by day to avoid detection. However, Keyes followed their trail and overtook them after 3 days.

A horse thief on the “middle border” where Missouri, Kansas, Arkansas and the Indian Territory converged had more to fear from vigilantes than from the authorities. Unable to make bail, Earp found himself in district jail in Van Buren and if convicted, he would have been sentenced to 5 years in the federal penitentiary in Little Rock.

A sentence of 5 years in prison was a sobering prospect for 23-year-old Earp. Though Earp may not have known, between his arraignment and his scheduled trial, the Western District of Arkansas court was scheduled to move from Van Buren across the Arkansas River to the abandoned Army post of Fort Smith. Two rooms in the basement of the new Fort Smith courthouse had been transformed into a jail. A Van Buren newspaper reporter described the Fort Smith jail as a “Hole in the Wall” that was “gloomy and dark and rank.” (Later referred to as Hell on the Border.)

Earp did not stay in Arkansas long enough to experience the basement at Fort Smith. He and 5 other men made a bold daylight escape on May 3, two weeks after his arraignment and only days before the court moved across the river.

Earp was one of 10 men confined to a cell in the upper story of the Van Buren jail. His cellmates included John Shown, two accused murderers who faced hanging; and the 2 Perry brothers charged with counterfeiting and the attempted murder of Benjamin Shoemaker, a Western District deputy marshal.

Earp, Shown, the Perry brothers and the two accused murderers pried off the rafters in one corner of the cell, hoisted themselves into the attic and crawled across the rafters to a small, grated window that provided ventilation. They enlarged the window opening by removing some stones from the exterior wall of the building. Tying blankets into a rope, they lowered themselves 20 feet to the ground. Then crawled under the fence to freedom.

On May 8, the court issued a writ ordering Western District Marshal William Britton to force Earp and Shown to appear for trial in November. A week later, Kennedy, Shown and Earp were indicted for horse theft in Fort Smith. Shown and Earp did not appear and were indicted in abstentia. Kennedy was tried on June 5; he was acquitted. Earp and Shown never appeared.