b'Jews in the Old West fascinating in that Lake had high regard for WyattOtero that Wyatt angrily broke with Doc after the and pretty much portrayed him as a frontier lawmanVendetta Raid when Doc, not fond of Josie, insulted hero (Hugh O\'Brian was said to be so enthralled byher and then contemptuously called Wyatt a "damn Lake\'s book that he made the author the consultantJew boy." According to Otero\'s account Wyatt and for his "Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp") but what heHolliday had been fast friends since Holliday saved wrote about Josie Earp did not sit so well with her asEarp\'s life in Dodge City in 1878. During their stay she blocked the publication of the book until after herin Albuquerque (April 1882), the two men ate at the husband passed on. Retreat Restaurant owned by "Fat Charlie." (Otero wrote in his letter) "Holliday said something about And it must be said that Josephine Marcus Earp wasEarp becoming "a damn Jew boy." Earp became angry no paragon of virtue. While she was no Calamity Jane,and left. (Henry) Jaffa (a prominent Albuquerque she was also certainly no Lily Langtree either. She livedbusinessman who himself was Jewish and also a the life of an independent frontier woman at a timeclose friend of Wyatt Earp\'s) told me later that Earp\'s most were not independent, or at least independentwoman was a Jewess. Earp did mezuzah (a piece of enough to stand up to their men. She loved easy butparchment inscribed with Torah writings placed in could be a spitfire as when she confronted Johnnya small case and affixed to the front door entrance Behan in bed with another woman - and kickedof Jewish homes) when entering the (Jaffa\'s) house." him out of her house (paid for by her parents). SheEarp\'s anger at Holliday\'s ethnic slur may indicate knew how to get what she wanted, even if it meantthat his feelings for Josephine were more serious than "trampling" over another more luckless woman likeis commonly known. The information in the (Otero) Mattie Blaylock Earp - whom she managed throughletter is compelling because at the time it was written charm and wit to get Wyatt to abandon. in the 1940s, the relationship between Wyatt Earp and Josephine Marcus while living in Tombstone (Mattie Blaylock Earp lived a few more years in awas virtually unknown. The only way Otero could haze of men and drugs - until she sadly died, buriedwrite about these things was if he had a personal in a pauper\'s grave in the old ghost town of Pinal, justrelationship with some of the individuals involved.west of Superior, some say of an accidental overdose - some say a depressed suicide). Josie and Wyatt Earp Earp and Holliday would stay in touch but only see each other on rare occasions in those last five years Josie did get Wyatt and they roamed the Westof Holliday\'s life - the final time a visit to Holliday at together, sometimes as fugitives, sometimes aslike cats and dogs, and it has been said that thereGlenwood Springs, Colorado, where he lay dying, and honored guests in the years following Wyatt andwere also times when both were unfaithful to eachhis frame was reduced to skeletal. They talked about Doc\'s "Vendetta Ride," to Colorado,Alaska,other. In the end, they stayed together, there is noold times, and then Earp, with Josie, left. They would California, back surreptitiously to Arizona, then backdoubt they did love each other and it is indeed on thenever see each other again, and Earp would not attend to California where they spent the last years of theirhistorical record, first suggested in a letter writtenDoc\'s funeral. Josie Earp was, for richer or poor, lives. It appears that there were times they foughtby Wyatt\'s friend, New Mexico Governor MiguelEarp\'s life until death did them part.continued on page 21ArizonaRealCountry.com September 2023 19'