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According to Kate: The Legendary Life of Big Nose Kate, Love of Doc Holliday
It was a chilly evening in mid-March 1881. Kate had traveled from Globe to Tombstone to see Doc. According to her, she had made the trip at his request. She noted in her memoirs that they lost no time settling their differences. The smoke from an oil lamp in his room coiled wraith-like to the ceiling, smirching the cobwebs that festooned the top of the faded curtains. Kate studied the sad looking, window coverings in the reflection of the mirror into which she was staring. She had been pinning her hair up and playing with a pair of earrings when she noticed the breeze from the partially opened window ruffle the curtains. Kate anticipated spending a great deal of time with Doc in the room and pondered whether to update the décor.
Doc had taken up residence on Sixth Street in a small boarding house positioned between a funeral parlor and a winery. The furnishing was sparse and covered with dust. Kate’s things were scattered about the room. Doc had promised to take her to dinner when he returned from the errand he had rushed off to handle. Once she finished getting ready for the night out she turned her attention to a copy of the Arizona Weekly Citizen lying on a chair by the door. A story about a murder and an attempted stage robbery twenty-eight miles from Tombstone caught her eye.
“Detective R. H. Paul was on the box with the driver at the time, and his double-barreled Winchester rested by his side,” the March 20, 1881, article noted. “It is believed that the Cow-boys were completely surprised to find Paul upon the stage, as no two of them would attempt to tackle Paul. At the first word, ‘Hold!’ Paul coolly reached for his gun, exclaiming, ‘By God! I hold for nobody!’ It is a question who fired first, Paul or the robbers; but the crack of the rifles were almost simultaneous, frightening the leaders into a run. Paul emptied both barrels of his gun, and his revolver, while the stage was rattling along as fast as the horses could haul it. The driver had fallen dead from the box, and a passenger who was upon the box was dying with a mortal wound. As soon as Paul could regain the lines that had fallen from the hands of Bud Philpot, who was shot through the heart, he drove and transferred Wells, Fargo & Co.’s box and the United States mail intact to J. D. Kinnear, the agent of the line at Benson, and the frightened passengers were sent through to Tombstone. Paul then started back, accompanied by four men, to the scene of the attack. Later particulars are awaited here with great interest.
“A vigilance committee was lately formed at Tombstone, backed by all the money necessary to take these parties in hand and teach them a lesson.”
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