Lincoln County War - War

War

In November 1876, a wealthy Englishman named John Tunstall arrived in Lincoln County, New Mexico where he intended to develop a cattle ranch, store, and bank in partnership with the young attorney Alexander McSween and cattleman John Chisum. They discovered that Lincoln County was controlled both economically and politically by Lawrence Murphy and James Dolan, the proprietors of LG Murphy and Co., the only store in the county. The factions were ethnically at odds, with the Murphy faction mostly Irish Catholic, while Tunstall and his allies were mostly Scots-Irish Protestants. LG Murphy and Co. loaned thousands of dollars to the Territorial Governor, and the Territorial Attorney General eventually held the mortgage on the firm. Tunstall learned that Murphy and Dolan, who bought much of their cattle from rustlers, had lucrative beef contracts from the United States government to supply forts and Indian agencies.

The government contracts, along with their monopoly on merchandise and financing for farms and ranches, allowed Murphy, Dolan and their partner Riley to run Lincoln County as a personal fiefdom. Murphy and Dolan refused to give up their monopoly. In February 1878, in a court case that was eventually dismissed, they obtained a court order to seize all of McSween's assets, but mistakenly included all of Tunstall's assets with those of McSween. Sheriff Brady formed a posse to attach Tunstall's remaining assets at his ranch from 70 miles from Lincoln. Few local citizens would join Brady's posse, which enlisted a gang of outlaws known as the Jesse Evans Gang. Lawrence Murphy and Dolan also enlisted the John Kinney Gang.