Mollie’s Murder: Frank Leslie Goes to Yuma

Frank Leslie went to Tombstone to celebrate the Fourth of July in 1889. Mollie went with him, and James Neil stayed at Leslie’s ranch to look after things while they were away.

Before the month was over, Mollie was dead, Neil was recovering from two gunshot wounds, and Leslie was sitting in the Tombstone jail.

Here’s how it happened, according to the newspaper reports that followed.

Leslie’s ranch was in Horseshoe Valley, in the Swisshelm Mountains. Mollie had been living there for several months. The papers first called her simply Mollie; a later report identified her as Mollie Edwards.

Leslie apparently made quite a stay of his holiday visit. The early account said he drank heavily in Tombstone and didn’t leave until Tuesday morning. He and Mollie reached the ranch Wednesday night, July 10.

They hadn’t been back long when Leslie got on a horse and rode to William Reynolds’s place, about a mile and a half away.

Whatever Reynolds had been doing that evening, he now had Leslie to deal with.

Leslie was heavily armed and threatening to kill him. He also announced that he intended to clean out the entire valley. Then he threw one of his pistols on the ground and told Reynolds to pick it up and defend himself.

Think about that invitation for a moment. Picking up the gun would have given Leslie the fight he was asking for.

Reynolds left it where it lay. According to the newspaper, he made light of Leslie’s behavior. Eventually, Leslie rode away, firing his revolver from time to time until Reynolds could no longer hear him.

Reynolds went to bed.

Back at Leslie’s ranch, Neil and Mollie were sitting together talking. Neil later said Leslie came into the room, announced, “I’ll settle this!” and fired at Mollie.

She fell from her chair.

Then Leslie turned the gun on Neil.

Neil was unarmed. He was hit in the chest and left arm, but somehow managed to get out of the house.

He knew Reynolds’s place was nearby. A mile and a half ordinarily wouldn’t have been much of a walk, but Neil soon became too weak to make much progress. It took him the rest of the night to get there.

The next morning, Reynolds heard someone calling for help.

It was Neil, badly wounded and barely able to talk.

Reynolds brought him inside and made him as comfortable as he could. Neil told him what had happened, and Reynolds examined his wounds. The chest wound had hardly bled on the outside, but Neil’s breathing was labored and his voice was weak. There was every reason to be worried.

Reynolds headed for Tombstone to find a doctor. The newspaper said he covered more than fifty miles in less than five hours.

Dr. George Goodfellow set out for the ranch country. A carriage was sent as well, in the hope that Neil could be brought into town.

At that point, the reports coming out of Tombstone offered little encouragement. They questioned whether Neil would even be alive when Goodfellow reached him.

Meanwhile, Leslie had reportedly returned to Reynolds’s place that morning looking for Neil.

This time, he had a different story. He claimed Neil had killed Mollie and said he wanted to find and kill him.

But Neil was alive to tell what he had seen.

Goodfellow reached the area and found Mollie dead at the ranch. A bullet had passed through her chest, from right to left. He reported that she had died almost immediately.

Over at Reynolds’s, Neil was still hanging on.

The doctor found that the bullet through Neil’s chest had lodged beneath the skin of his back. Another bullet had shattered his left arm. Goodfellow dressed the wounds and brought him to Tombstone.

Justice Easton arranged a house where Neil could stay, and Goodfellow continued looking after him.

Leslie was on his way to Tombstone too, although under very different circumstances.

Officers Ben James and a deputy named Adams had gone out looking for him. They met J. S. Taylor and a young man named Heyne, who already had Leslie in custody and were bringing him toward town.

The officers took charge of him and delivered him to the jail.

The early speculation that Leslie might have killed himself or escaped across the border could now be put aside. He was in custody, and the man he had shot was recovering.

When Leslie was brought before Justice Easton for a preliminary examination, he asked for time to obtain an attorney. Easton granted the request, and Leslie went back to jail.

For Neil, the news gradually got better.

By July 18, a report said he was getting along nicely. On July 27, the Tucson Citizen said he was able to sit up and described his recovery as remarkable.

That was quite a change from the first reports, which had doubted he would live long enough to see the doctor.

For Mollie, the shooting had ended everything. The reports tell us she had lived at the ranch for several months and had gone to Tombstone with Leslie for the holiday. They give us far less about her life than about the man who killed her.

By December, the grand jury had returned two indictments against Leslie: murder and assault with intent to commit murder.

An early January notice reported a plea of not guilty. Then, on January 8, 1890, Judge Sloan sentenced him to life imprisonment for murder.

A few days later, the news came from Yuma.

The Arizona Sentinel, published January 11, reported that Sheriff Slaughter had arrived the previous day with eleven prisoners from Tombstone. Leslie appeared near the top of the list:

“Frank Leslie, murder; life.”

After all the newspaper columns describing the shooting, the search, and Neil’s condition, that short entry brought this part of the story to a close.

Leslie had gone to Tombstone for a holiday. Six months later, he was taken to Yuma to begin a life sentence.

James Neil survived the shooting and that long night trying to reach Reynolds’s house. His account gave the authorities a witness to what had happened to Mollie.

Leslie’s years in prison—and how he eventually got out—are another story.

Enjoy these trips into the old newspaper records? Follow Tarnished West for more stories.

Follow Tarnished West on Facebook

Follow all the Tarnished West stories here

Sources

Tucson Citizen — July 13, 1889, page 4; July 18, 1889, page 4; July 27, 1889, page 4.

Arizona Weekly Citizen — July 20, 1889, “Further Particulars.” Page number not visible in the supplied clipping.

Arizona Daily Star — July 14, 1889, page 1; July 17 and 18, 1889, page 4; January 3, 1890, page 4; January 9, 1890, page 1.

Arizona Silver Belt — August 3, 1889, page 2. Correction credited to the Willcox Stockman.

Tombstone Epitaph — December 28, 1889, page 3; January 11, 1890, page 3.

Arizona Sentinel — January 11, 1890, page 3, “Arrival of Convicts.”