40 Facts About the Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp

40 Facts About the Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp

Larry Holzwarth - June 14, 2019

40 Facts About the Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp
A warm welcome awaited guests who entered Didge Cty’s Long Branch Saloon in the late 1870s and early 1880s.

8. Doc Holliday saved Wyatt’s life in Dodge City

In the summer of 1878, Doc Holliday and Big Nose Kate, said to be his wife, arrived in Dodge City intent on relieving the cowboys who had recently arrived at the end of a cattle drive of their hard-earned wages. Kate was a prostitute and Holliday a gambler. That summer a group of drunken cowboys entered the Long Branch Saloon, where Holliday was gambling, after shooting up the street outside. When Earp, acting as town marshal entered the saloon to arrest the miscreants he found several guns already drawn and pointing at him. Before Earp could react, Holliday placed his own revolver at the head of one of the cowboys, inducing the others to lower their guns. Earp later credited Holliday with saving his life.

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