Bill Tilghman - Murder

Murder

Tilghman was on the job less than a year before he was killed in the line of duty. He died on 1 November 1924, after being shot by Wiley Lynn, a corrupt Prohibition Agent. Lynn and Tilghman had had numerous verbal confrontations because Lynn repeatedly released prisoners who were arrested by Tilghman. The incident began on Halloween night, when Tilghman, Deputy Marshal Hugh Sawyer, and businessman W. E. Sirmans were having coffee at a cafe called Ma Murphy's.

Shots were heard outside, and Tilghman drew his handgun and went outside. In the street stood a drunken Wiley Lynn, with a gun in his hand. Brothel madam Rose Lutke was standing beside him. Another prostitute, Eva Caton, was sitting inside Lynn's car with a date, a furloughed army sergeant. Tilghman clasped Lynn's gun hand and called for Deputy Sawyer to come assist. As Sawyer ran outside, Tilghman, Lynn and Rose Lutke stood body to body in the darkness. Two shots rang out, and Lutke screamed. As Deputy Sawyer rushed forward, Tilghman slumped forward and fell. Deputy Sawyer, inexperienced, did not fire but rather disarmed Lynn and yelled "Wiley Lynn has shot the marshal". Lynn then fled with Rose Lutke to the car and sped away.

Wiley Lynn was acquitted after several of the witnesses to the shooting, allegedly intimidated, failed to appear, and Deputy Sawyer, whether he was coerced or merely incompetent, testified that he could not see clearly as to what actually happened. Rose Lutke disappeared, and was never heard from again. Despite his acquittal, Lynn was dismissed from the Prohibition Unit. Years later, in a shootout with another police officer, Agent Crockett Long of the Oklahoma State Crime Bureau, Lynn was killed, but not before fatally wounding Long and an innocent bystander.

The local Knights of the Ku Klux Klan demanded justice and printed fliers and warnings to criminal elements to leave town or suffer the consequences. One month after Tilghman's murder, the town of Cromwell was torched, with every brothel, bar, flophouse and pool hall burned to the ground and no arrests were ever made. The town of Cromwell never recovered its former "wild" status after that, and as of the 2000 census, its population was less than 300 residents.

In 1960, the western actor Brad Johnson played Tilghman in the episode "The Wedding Dress" of the anthology Death Valley Days.

Tilghman was portrayed by Rod Steiger in the 1981 film Cattle Annie and Little Britches.

The 1999 made-for-television movie You Know My Name dramatized Tilghman's life and final days, and was based on Matt Braun's novel One Last Town, which fictionalized Tilghman's activities in Cromwell. Veteran western movie actor Sam Elliott produced the film and starred as Tilghman.

Tilghman's widow, Zoe Agnes Stratton Tilghman, wrote about him in the book Marshal of the Last Frontier.

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