THE CANYON DIABLO TRAIN ROBBERY OF 1889

[Shotgun Steve]

The 1889 Canyon Diablo train robbery was a major topic of Arizona conversation in late March and early April of that year. The train had been stopped by four masked men in a rugged northern Arizona canyon at 1 a.m. on the morning of March 20. They took $1,500 from an express messenger. It wasn't a big haul by present-day standards.

Seriously concerned that train robbery might become a major problem, Arizona's Territorial Legislature had a month earlier passed a bill making train robbery punishable by death.

Despite the small sum the robbers got, train robbery was serious for railroads. The Santa Fe Railroad quickly offered a $500 reward for information leading to the capture of the robbers.

The crime provided a major challenge to the legendary sheriff of Yavapai County, Sheriff William "Buckey" O'Neill. He would later call the robbers "the worst desperadoes that ever operated in this western country." Forming a four-man posse when he learned about their haul the next day, Carl Bucky O'Neill, Ed St Clair, Carl Holton & Jas L. Black were quickly on their trail.

The robbers headed north into Utah after the robbery. Trailing them wasn't difficult because of tracks their horses left in the snow on the ground. With a posse of only five after four desperate outlaws determined to avoid capture, O'Neill's men faced a challenge.

When they finally caught up with them, the robbers quickly demonstrated they weren't going to give up easily. A running gun battle began and continued for five days. The gang was finally cornered in a rocky cedar covered mountain area on the edge of a cliff they had been using to try to spot the posse following them.

O'Neill's men caught the bandits by surprise, coming up behind them on the cliff. A desperate battle began at its edge. Tucson's Star newspaper reported on April 20 that Smith was present during the fight, and when his horse was shot from under him, he fell 50 feet down its side.

During the fight, Steiner fired two shots in the direction of O'Neill and missed. O'Neill then responded with two of his own that also missed. When Deputy St. Clair finally managed to put a bullet through the hat Steiner was wearing, all of the robbers decided to call it quits and surrender.

O'Neill described the battle to a Tucson Star reporter on April 16. Calling the outlaw band "the worse desperadoes that ever operated in this western country," he gave their names as Tony Quince, Billy Steiner, Charles Clark and James Smith. The truth was that Tony Quince was really John Halford while Charles Clark was actually D.M. Harvick. Only Smith and Steiner were using their real names.

Tried for participating in the train robbery, Smith denied his involvement. He said he had been on his way to Hamilton in Nevada at the time of the robbery. He claimed he was going there to be involved in mining.

Meeting the three accused men by chance at the Black Falls Crossing of the Little Colorado River, he said he knew Harvick and Halford from working with them on cattle ranches. When they asked him if he knew the country very well, he said he did. They asked him to accompany them to Canyonville, Utah, and he said he went along only to be arrested with them afterward.

O'Neill also told the reporter that Smith escaped from the train that was carrying the four back to Tucson for trial. Despite the shackles he was wearing and with the train moving at full speed on Ratoon Mountain, Smith managed to jump through a window at 1 a.m. and escape near Trinidad, Colo. Wells Fargo quickly offered a reward of $500 for his recapture, and Sheriff O'Neill put Detective Holton and Deputy Black on his trail.

Fleeing toward Texas, Smith met a girl who was hungry and lost. He let her join him, perhaps believing that it would mislead trackers who thought him alone. When he developed typhoid fever during his flight, a kindly Texan took him into his home to help him recover. What became of the girl he was with was never reported.

Upon regaining health, Smith thanked the family who had allowed him to use their home during his illness and continued east toward Vernon, Texas. Officers out looking for him captured him there and returned him to Arizona for trial.

Smith told the lawyer assigned to defend him that the three men already convicted of train robbery would say that he was innocent. Brought from their prison cells in Yuma to the trial, the judge refused to allow them to testify.

Quickly convicted, his earlier escape from the train made Smith's crimes worse in the eyes of the judge. While the other three accused of the robbery only got 25-year sentences, his was set at 30 years because of his escape from the train.

In the Yuma prison serving his sentence, Smith continued to proclaim his innocence. After having served nearly four years, he applied for a pardon in 1893. It included a statement by the other three bandits that Smith hadn't been one of the robbers.

His health had become poor due to several hemorrhages and a lung infection. Dr. Cotter, the prison physician, included in the pardon request an opinion that keeping Smith in prison would spread germs.

It seems likely that Territorial Gov. Hughes wasn't completely convinced of Smith's innocence. He insisted on personally talking to the other three train robbers. All told him that Smith hadn't been involved.

Finally believing him innocent, Hughes ordered Smith's release. He was set free from the Yuma prison on Aug. 12, 1893. Nothing is known about where he went upon release or his life afterward.

BY FRANK LOVE
Frank Love is a Yuma historian.

[Stillwater]

Finally I get to see a real picture of Carl Bucky O'Neil.

O'Neil was killed during the Spanish American War, on San Juan Hill, in Cuba. At least that is how it happened in the Sam Eliott movie, "Rough Riders." Sam Eliott played the part of Buckey O'Neil.

Darn good movie.

Bill