Joseph Isaac Clanton (c. 1847 – June 1, 1887) was an American outlaw who was a member of a loose association known as the Cochise County Cowboys who clashed with lawmen Wyatt, Virgil and Morgan Earp as well as Doc Holliday in Arizona. On October 26, 1881, Clanton was present at the gunfight at the O.K. Corral in the boomtown of Tombstone, Arizona (Arizona Territory), but was unarmed and ran from the gunfight, in which his 19-year-old brother Billy was killed.
Clanton filed murder charges against the Earps and Holliday but after a 30-day preliminary hearing, Justice Wells Spicer ruled that the lawmen had acted within their lawful duty. Clanton was implicated in the attempted assassination of Virgil Earp on December 30, 1881, but other Cowboys provided an alibi and he was released. Six years later Clanton was killed attempting to flee when he was shot by a lawman seeking to arrest him for cattle-rustling.
Early life
Born in Callaway County, Missouri, Joseph Isaac "Ike" Clanton was one of seven children of Newman Haynes Clanton (1816–1881) and his wife Mariah Sexton (Kelso) Clanton. His father worked at times as a day laborer, a gold miner, a farmer, and by the late 1870s, a cattleman in Arizona Territory.
Clanton's mother died in 1866. Ike stayed with the family when they moved to Tombstone, Arizona Territory, around 1877 (before Tombstone became a town or even a mining center). At that time, Newman Clanton was living with his sons Phin (or "Fin"), Ike, and Billy. By 1878 Ike was running a small "lunch counter" at the Tombstone Mill site (now Millville on the San Pedro River—not in modern Tombstone). By 1881, however, he was working on his father's ranch at Lewis Springs, about west of Tombstone and from Charleston.
The Clantons and their ranch hands and associates were known as the "Cowboys", and they had a reputation for reckless behavior. They were accused of cattle rustling from across the U.S.–Mexican border, as well as other acts of banditry and murder.
Notoriety, clashes with the Earp lawmen
Clanton's notoriety is based largely on his conflict with Wyatt Earp and Wyatt's friend Doc Holliday. The Earps and the Clantons had political, personal, and legal differences and the animosity between them grew throughout 1881. The Cowboys supported incumbent Sheriff Charles Shibell while the Earps supported his opponent Bob Paul in the November 1880 election. Clanton repeatedly boasted in public, drank heavily, and had a quick temper. He was well known for talking too much.
In November 1879, shortly after arriving in Tombstone, Earp had a horse stolen. More than a year later, probably sometime in December 1880, Earp was told the horse was being used near Charleston, and Wyatt and Holliday were forced to ride to the Clanton's ranch near Charleston to await ownership papers in order to legally recover it. According to Wyatt's testimony later, 18-year-old Billy Clanton asked him insolently if he had any more horses to "lose", but he gave the horse up without first being shown the ownership papers, demonstrating to Wyatt that Billy Clanton knew to whom the horse belonged. Sheriff Johnny Behan later testified that the incident had angered Ike Clanton. It also angered Earp.
Earp offers Clanton reward money
thumb|left|165px|Wyatt Earp
After he was passed over by Johnny Behan for the position of undersheriff, Earp thought he might beat him in the next Cochise County election. He thought catching the March 15, 1881, robbers of the Benson Stage (in which the driver and a passenger were killed) would help him win the sheriff's office. Earp later said that on June 2, 1881, he offered the Wells, Fargo & Co. reward money and more to Clanton if he would provide information leading to the capture or death of the stage robbers. According to Earp, the plan was foiled when the three suspects, Leonard, Head and Crane, were killed in unrelated incidents.
In the summer of 1881, Clanton got into an argument with gambler "Denny" McCann. On the morning of June 9, 1881, they were drinking in an Allen Street saloon when Clanton insulted McCann. McCann slapped Clanton, who left and fetched his pistol. McCann did the same and the two met on the street in front of the Wells Fargo office. They had already drawn their weapons when Tombstone Marshal Virgil Earp stepped between them, preventing a shooting.
Clanton rustling and ranching
The Clanton Ranch grew into a successful enterprise. During his testimony after the shootout at the O.K. Corral, Clanton claimed to have raised and purchased about 700 head of cattle during the past year, and the Clanton ranch was one of the most profitable cattle ranches in that part of the country. However, the Clantons never registered a brand in either Cochise County or Pima County, which was required to legally raise cattle. The Mexican government at the time placed high tariffs on goods transported across the border, making smuggling a profitable enterprise.
The outlaw Cowboys in Cochise County were not organized, and their acts of violence, rustling or robbery were usually committed by independent groups of Cowboys. Newman Haynes Clanton, also known as "Old Man Clanton", Ike's father, ran a ranch near the Mexican border that served as a waystation for much of the smuggling carried out by the outlaws.
On August 12, 1881, Old Man Clanton and six other men were herding stolen cattle sold to him by Curly Bill Brocius through Guadalupe Canyon near the Mexican border. Around dawn, they were ambushed by Mexicans dispatched by Commandant Felipe Neri in the Guadalupe Canyon Massacre. Old Man Clanton and five other men were killed in the ambush.
Gunfight in Tombstone
Clanton had told others that Doc Holliday, Virgil Earp, Wyatt Earp, and Morgan Earp had all confided in him that they had actually been involved in the Benson stage robbery. On October 25, 1881, while Clanton was in Tombstone, drunk and very loud, Holliday accused him of lying about the Benson stagecoach robbery. Tombstone City Marshal Virgil Earp intervened and threatened to arrest both Holliday and Clanton if they did not stop arguing, and Holliday went home.
After the confrontation with Clanton, Wyatt Earp took Holliday back to his boarding house at Camillus Sidney "Buck" Fly's Lodging House to sleep off his drinking, then went home and to bed. Tombstone Marshal Virgil Earp played cards with Clanton, Tom McLaury, Cochise County Sheriff Johnny Behan and a fifth man (unknown to Clanton and to history), until morning.
Clanton reported in his testimony afterward that Wyatt Earp cursed him. He said Wyatt, Virgil, and Morgan Earp offered him his rifle and to fight him right there in the courthouse, which Clanton declined. Clanton also denied ever threatening the Earps. Clanton was fined $25 plus court costs and after paying the fine left unarmed. Virgil Earp told Clanton he would leave Clanton's confiscated rifle and revolver at the Grand Hotel which was favored by Cowboys when in town. Clanton testified that he picked up the weapons from William Soule, the jailer, a couple of days later.
Billy and Frank stopped first at the Grand Hotel on Allen Street, and were greeted by Doc Holliday. They learned immediately after of their brothers' beatings by the Earps within the previous two hours. The incidents had generated a lot of talk in town. Angrily, Frank said he would not drink, and he and Billy left the saloon immediately to seek Tom. By law, both Frank and Billy should have left their firearms at the Grand Hotel. Instead, they remained fully armed. The city statute was not specific about how far a recently arrived visitor might "with good faith, and within reasonable time" travel into town while carrying a firearm. This permitted a traveler to keep his firearms if he was proceeding directly to a livery, hotel or saloon.
A man named Coleman told Virgil that the Cowboys had left the Dunbar and Dexter Stable for the O.K. Corral and were still armed, and Virgil decided they had to disarm them. The three main Tombstone corrals were all west of 4th street, a block or two from where Wyatt saw the Cowboys buying cartridges.
Cochise County Sheriff Johnny Behan, a friend to the Cowboys, later testified that he first learned of the trouble while he was getting a shave at the barbershop after 1:30 pm, which is when he had risen after the late-night game. Behan stated he immediately went to locate the Cowboys. At about 2:30 pm he saw both Clantons and both McLaurys gathered off Fremont street in a narrow wide empty lot or alley immediately west of 312 Fremont Street, which contained Fly's 12-room boarding house and photography studio. The lot was six lots removed from the rear entrance to the O.K. Corral.
When Virgil Earp learned that Wyatt was talking to the Cowboys at Spangenberg's gun shop he picked up a 10-gauge or 12-gauge, short, double-barreled shotgun from the Wells Fargo office around the corner on Allen Street. To avoid alarming Tombstone's public, Virgil returned to Hafford's Saloon carrying the shotgun under his long overcoat. He gave the shotgun to Doc Holliday who hid it under his overcoat. He took Holliday's walking-stick in return. From Spangenberg's, the Cowboys moved to the O.K. Corral where witnesses overheard them threatening to kill the Earps. They then walked a block north to an empty lot next to C. S. Fly's boarding house where Doc Holliday lived. By the time Clanton finished his testimony, the entire prosecution case had become suspect.
Judge Spicer exonerated the lawmen. In his ruling, he noted that Clanton had the night before, while unarmed, publicly declared that the Earp brothers and Holliday had insulted him, and that when he was armed he intended to shoot them or fight them on sight. On the morning of the shooting, Virgil Earp had arrested him for carrying a revolver. At the gunfight, he was unarmed. Spicer noted that Clanton had claimed the Earps were out to murder him, yet on both occasions that day the Earps had not killed him, and allowed him to escape unchallenged during the fight. Spicer wrote, "the great fact, most prominent in the matter, to wit, that Isaac Clanton was not injured at all, and could have been killed first and easiest."
thumb|left|165px|Frank Stillwell
Clanton was later accused, along with his brother, Phin Clanton, and friend Pony Diehl, of attempting to kill Virgil Earp on December 30, 1881, a shooting which left Virgil with a crippled left arm. Though Ike Clanton's hat was found at the scene where the ambushers waited, a number of associates stood up for him, saying that he had been in Contention that night, and the case was dismissed for lack of evidence.
On Saturday, March 18, 1882, Morgan Earp was killed by a shot through a door window facing a dark alley while playing billiards at Hatch's Saloon in Tombstone. Wyatt was shot at and missed. Wyatt Earp concluded that he could not rely on civil justice and decided to take matters into his own hands.
Deputy U.S. Marshal Wyatt Earp led a federal posse that escorted Virgil Earp to the railroad, bound for his parents’ home in Colton, California. Wyatt shot and killed Frank Stilwell, who was lying in wait at the Tucson, Arizona, rail yard. A few days later Wyatt gathered a larger posse and set out on a vendetta, determined to mete out justice that had evaded him. Wyatt never located Clanton, although they killed three other outlaw Cowboys, and the Earps and Holliday left the Arizona Territory in late April 1882.
Later life
After the gunfight at the O.K. Corral, the Clantons bought land near a ranch owned by their sister Mary. Phin arrived in June and Ike in August 1882. By 1885, each had a 160-acre ranch 10 miles east of Springerville near the New Mexico border.
In April 1887, the Apache County Stock Association met and hired a Pinkerton detective to track down the outlaws. They also hired Jonas "Jake" V. Brighton as a “secret service” officer. Brighton was a constable in Springerville and a range detective.
In April, 1887, Phin Clanton was arrested for rustling and jailed in St. Johns.
A reporter who corresponded with Brighton in late June 1887 relayed Brighton's story about the arrest and shooting: