17 Facts About Tom McLaury

Tom McLaury was a member of a group of outlaws Cowboys and cattle rustlers that had ongoing conflicts with lawmen Wyatt, Virgil, and Morgan Earp.

Tom McLaury was 5' 3" tall and his brother Frank was 5'4" tall.

Tom McLaury was involved in several outlaw activities that brought him into conflict with the Earps.

Tom McLaury was a Cowboy, which in that time and region was generally regarded as an outlaw.

Hurst printed a handbill describing the theft, and specifically charged Tom McLaury with assisting in hiding the mules.

Tom McLaury reproduced the flyer in The Tombstone Epitaph, on July 30,1880.

Tom McLaury angrily printed a response in the Cowboy-friendly Nuggett, calling Hurst "unmanly," "a coward, a vagabond, a rascal, and a malicious liar," and accused Hurst of stealing the mules himself.

Spence and Stilwell, friends of the Tom McLaury brothers, were arrested by sheriff's deputies Breakenridge and Nagel for the stage robbery, and later by Deputy US Marshal Virgil Earp on the federal offense of mail robbery.

Ike Clanton, a good friend of Tom McLaury's, had repeatedly threatened the Earps.

Tom McLaury was armed and told others he was looking for Holliday or an Earp.

Tom McLaury wrote that Tombstone residents were divided about the justification for the killings.

Saloon owner Andrew Mehan testified that an hour before the gunfight Tom McLaury had checked his pistol with him at Mehan's Saloon.

Wyatt Earp testified that Tom McLaury fired one or two rounds at them from behind a horse, and that if he was unarmed he did not know it.

In two of Wyatt Earp's three biographies he indicated that Tom McLaury fired the first shots.

Tom McLaury knew none of those involved, and was only in Tombstone to visit her sister, therefore making her an unbiased witness.

Frank Tom McLaury had told others that he had decided to remain in town to take care of some business.

Tom McLaury wrote that Billy Clanton, who had arrived on horseback with Frank, intended to go with the McLaurys to Fort Worth.