1. John Harris Behan was an American law enforcement officer and politician who served as Sheriff of Cochise County in the Arizona Territory, during the gunfight at the OK.
78 Facts About Johnny Behan
1. 2.
Johnny Behan was sheriff of Yavapai County from 1871 to 1873.
3.
Johnny Behan was married and had two children, but his wife divorced him, accusing him of consorting with prostitutes.
4.
Johnny Behan was elected to the Seventh Arizona Legislative Assembly, representing Yavapai County.
5.
When Wyatt resigned, Johnny Behan was appointed to fill his place, which included the mining boomtown Tombstone.
6.
When Cochise County was formed in February 1881, Johnny Behan was appointed as its first sheriff.
7.
Johnny Behan supported the Cowboys' statements that they had raised their hands and offered no resistance, and that the Earps and Doc Holliday had murdered three cowboys.
8.
Johnny Behan was arrested for graft and later failed to win re-election as sheriff.
9.
Johnny Behan later was appointed as the warden of the Yuma Territorial Prison and had various other government jobs until his death in 1912.
10.
Johnny Behan was born on October 24,1844, in Westport, Missouri, in what is Kansas City, the third of nine children.
11.
Johnny Behan's parents, who had wed on March 16,1837, in Jackson County, Missouri, were Peter Behan, a carpenter from County Kildare, Ireland, and Sarah Ann Harris, a native of Madison County, Kentucky.
12.
John Harris Johnny Behan was named for his mother's family and his maternal grandfather, although the 1900 Federal census reports an 1845 date of birth for him.
13.
Johnny Behan moved west to San Francisco, working as a miner and a freighter.
14.
Johnny Behan helped fight them off and gained a reputation as a brave man.
15.
Johnny Behan had four children from her two prior marriages: Benjamin, Catherine, Victoria, and Louisa.
16.
Whenever he was not holding office, Johnny Behan worked in various saloons or mines.
17.
In March 1869, Johnny Behan married Bourke's step-daughter Victoria Zaff in San Francisco, Bourke's home town.
18.
Johnny Behan succeeded his father-in-law in office as the Yavapai County sheriff from January 1871 to December 1873.
19.
Johnny Behan took a chance at a more important position and in 1873 successfully ran for office as Yavapai County's representative to the Seventh Arizona Legislative Assembly.
20.
The Territorial Legislature met in Tucson or Prescott for a six- to eight-week legislative session, and Johnny Behan attended his first session in January 1874 in Tucson.
21.
On September 28,1874, Johnny Behan was nominated as sheriff at the Democratic convention in Yavapai County.
22.
Johnny Behan was gone for 35 days campaigning for the sheriff's office.
23.
Johnny Behan returned to Prescott on November 11,1874, but lost the election.
24.
Johnny Behan apparently spent considerable time away from home, either at saloons along Prescott's Whisky Row or at nearby brothels.
25.
On May 22,1875, Johnny Behan's fortunes took a turn for the worse when Victoria filed for divorce.
26.
Johnny Behan claimed their daughter Henrietta was not his, and Victoria's request for support for Henrietta was stricken from the divorce petition.
27.
Johnny Behan did not restrict his extramarital liaisons to paid arrangements.
28.
Johnny Behan then moved to the northwest Arizona Territory, where he served as the Mohave County Recorder in 1877, and then deputy sheriff of Mohave County in Gillet in 1879.
29.
In October 1879 the Weekly Journal Miner reported that Johnny Behan was planning on opening a business in Tip Top, a then fast-growing silver mining town in central Arizona, and in November 1879, Johnny Behan opened a saloon there.
30.
Johnny Behan was elected to represent Mohave County at the Tenth Arizona Legislative Assembly, which met beginning January 6,1879, in Prescott.
31.
On June 2,1880, Johnny Behan was counted in the 1880 census in Tip Top, Arizona as a saloon keeper.
32.
Johnny Behan's was initially the only one of six saloons without a prostitute.
33.
Johnny Behan said Behan followed her and persuaded her parents to approve their engagement.
34.
Sadie later said Johnny Behan told her parents that he couldn't leave his livery stable business for a wedding in San Francisco and Sadie said her parents approved their engagement.
35.
Sadie reported later in life that Johnny Behan pestered her in San Francisco with letters from Tombstone, bragging about the growing town and promising to marry her.
36.
Johnny Behan said she thought Behan's marriage proposal was a good excuse to leave home again.
37.
When Johnny Behan avoided setting a wedding date, she was ready to end the relationship, but Johnny Behan persuaded her to stay.
38.
Johnny Behan instead enjoyed some brief success as a juvenile actress on the San Francisco stage during the 1870s.
39.
When Johnny Behan first arrived in Tombstone in September 1880, he got a job bar manager in the Grand Hotel, a favorite of the outlaw Cowboys, and a good place to make political connections.
40.
Johnny Behan bought part interest in the Dexter Livery Stable with John Dunbar, where local businessmen could rent horses.
41.
The Dunbars used their influence to help Johnny Behan get appointed sheriff of the new Cochise County, in February 1881.
42.
Johnny Behan had already served two terms in the Territorial Legislature and was more politically connected than Earp.
43.
Later that year, Johnny Behan gave a contrived explanation of his actions during the hearings after the gunfight at the OK.
44.
Johnny Behan said he broke his promise to appoint Earp because of an incident shortly before his appointment.
45.
Johnny Behan was in Charleston to serve a subpoena on Ike Clanton.
46.
Johnny Behan developed a reputation for graft and was seen as the head of the "Ten Percent Ring".
47.
On January 31,1882, Johnny Behan was arrested for collecting bills totaling $300 twice, arraigned in front of Justice Stilwell, and discharged due to a technicality.
48.
The Board of Supervisors reduced the assessment to $1,000,000, substantially reducing Johnny Behan's take by $25,000.
49.
Johnny Behan was already living with Sadie in 1880, and Albert grew close to her.
50.
Corral, Johnny Behan explained that he appointed Woods rather than Earp due to an incident involving a stolen horse of Virgil Earp's, which was recovered by Wyatt from Billy Clanton.
51.
At the time, Wyatt was not a law officer, but had used the threat of Johnny Behan riding out to the Clantons' ranch as a bluff to get Clanton to turn over the horse.
52.
Johnny Behan waited for Earp to come get her there and when he didn't, she resumed a life of prostitution in Pinal, Arizona, where on July 3,1888, she took a lethal dose of laudanum together with alcohol.
53.
Johnny Behan's death was officially ruled as "suicide by opium poisoning".
54.
Frank Stilwell was an assistant Deputy under Johnny Behan for several months until shortly before he was a suspect in the Bisbee stage holdup.
55.
Johnny Behan employed several of the outlaws as sheriff's deputies during their pursuit of Deputy US Marshal Wyatt Earp's posse after he was alleged to have killed Frank Stilwell in Tucson.
56.
Johnny Behan was a key player in the events immediately preceding the shootout at the OK.
57.
Johnny Behan went down to try to disarm the Cowboys carrying weapons in violation of city ordinance.
58.
Johnny Behan attempted to persuade Frank McLaury to give up his weapons, but Frank insisted that he would only give up his guns after City Marshal Virgil Earp and his brothers were disarmed.
59.
Johnny Behan walked about "22 or 23 steps" and intercepted them at Bauer's Butcher Shop.
60.
Johnny Behan testified for the prosecution during the preliminary hearing, supporting the Clanton's version of events.
61.
Johnny Behan gave strong testimony that the Cowboys had not resisted but had thrown up their hands and turned out their coats to show they were not armed.
62.
Johnny Behan testified that from the time the Earps passed him by to confront the Cowboys, he had watched them closely.
63.
Johnny Behan testified he was concentrating on the Earps during the gun fight, but he did not see the shotgun used.
64.
Johnny Behan insisted that Holliday fired the first shot from a nickel-plated revolver.
65.
Johnny Behan sent a telegram to Tombstone telling Behan they were wanted in Tucson for killing Stilwell.
66.
Johnny Behan found the men in the lobby of the Cosmopolitan Hotel, heavily armed.
67.
In September 1882, after the Earp Vendetta Ride, Johnny Behan had a feud with his own deputy, Billy Breakenridge.
68.
An investigation found that Johnny Behan had somehow set aside $5,000 in funds while he was sheriff from unknown sources.
69.
Johnny Behan failed to gain the nomination and thus left office at the end of his term, in November 1882.
70.
Johnny Behan killed one of several prisoners who died during a large escape attempt, saving a guard's life.
71.
Johnny Behan was allowed to roam free within the prison, and she became pregnant, delivered a child, and got pregnant again while he was warden.
72.
Former Tombstone resident and writer George W Parsons commented that he thought Behan was "on the wrong side of the bars".
73.
Johnny Behan then moved to El Paso, Texas, where he worked as a purchasing agent for Texas Bitulithic, a paving company.
74.
Johnny Behan followed that with work supervising survey parties repairing levee breaks on the lower Colorado River.
75.
Long after the gunfight, Johnny Behan continued to spread rumors about the Earps.
76.
The story was reprinted by the San Francisco Call, which quoted Johnny Behan describing the Earp's lawbreaking behavior in Tombstone.
77.
Johnny Behan died at St Mary's Catholic Hospital in Tucson, Arizona, on June 7,1912.
78.
John Johnny Behan was buried on the day after his death in Tucson's Holy Hope Cemetery.