Death of a Marshal

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Tilghman: The Legendary Lawman and the Woman Who Inspired Him

Tilghman was appointed Chief of Police of Cromwell, Oklahoma, in September 1924. He found Cromwell to be as rotten a location as he was warned. The landscape was thick with oil derricks. Massive sections of pipe were stacked near mining shacks and mining equipment, stray tool pieces and wood shards from derricks that had been rocketed into the air by oil gushers were strewn about, and puddles of mud and oil were all around.

Among the businesses on the main thoroughfares were numerous taverns, dance halls, and houses of prostitution. “This is a bad place,” Tilghman wrote to his wife shortly after he arrived, “and these modern criminals are not like your old outlaws that had a sense of honor and gratitude, and decency in certain ways. These dope runners and the like would sooner shoot you in the back than meet you face to face.”

Tilghman wasted no time in helping to make Cromwell a safer and more desirable place to live. He functioned as sanitary officer and general welfare custodian as well as policeman. One of the first directives was the installation of water barrels for fire emergencies. He also ordered the trash and debris that littered the streets and alleyways around businesses to be cleaned up. By the end of the month his focus had shifted from the exterior of the store fronts to the businesses themselves. He shut down and padlocked the doors of twenty-five pool halls and arrested owners who had violated the Prohibition Act.

Not everyone applauded the lawman’s efforts. Deputy Sheriff of Seminole County turned federal prohibition officer Wiley Lynn, did not care for Tilghman, and resented his presence in Cromwell.

Since Chief Tilghman had come to town, he’d put a stop to drunken miners and oil field workers firing their weapons indiscriminately. Few had dared to violate the directive. So, when the lawman heard a gunshot outside Murphy’s Café where he was having coffee with one of his deputies, he hurried out of the building to investigate. As he exited the eatery, he saw Lynn at the end of the boardwalk holding a gun. “What the hell are you doing out here?” Tilghman asked gruffly. Lynn approached Tilghman with his gun in his hand and the lawman walked toward him holding his own gun.

School Commissioner Hugh Sawyer saw Lynn quickly walking toward Tilghman with his gun drawn and tried to intercede to disarm him. In the meantime, Tilghman moved in to meet Lynn’s attack. When the two met a scuffle ensued. Tilghman was using both arms to keep Lynn from pointing his gun at him. Lynn, seeing an opening and using his free hand, reached for another gun he had in his suit jacket pocket. He leveled the gun at Tilghman and fired three bullets into his chest. The veteran lawman sank to the street, unconscious, and his colleagues and townspeople rushed to him.

Wiley Lynn ran back to his car and sped away from the scene with his passengers by his side. Chief Tilghman was carried to a secondhand furniture store and placed on a sofa. He died shortly thereafter.

To learn more about the killing of Marshal Tilghman read

Tilghman: The Legendary Lawman and the Women Who Inspired Him