Column No. 19
Bob Ring, Al Ring, Tallia Pfrimmer Cahoon
Within a month of the murder of the Fraser brothers, Frank Pearson, from a
farming family in Liberty Hill, Texas, approached Phil Clarke about buying the
Ruby store from the Frasers’ estate. Clarke recalled later, “I was not anxious
to turn the store over to anyone after what had happened. I tried to dissuade
him, but he was determined to buy. His arguments made sense too. As he pointed
out, my wife and I, and the Andrews before us, had lived through the worst
period of that part of the country, it certainly wasn’t likely that lightning
would strike twice.”
So 33-year old Frank Pearson and his 30-year old schoolteacher wife Myrtle
bought the Ruby mercantile. With their three-year old daughter, Margaret, they
moved into the living quarters in the back of store building and began a happy
period in the Ruby mining camp.
In August 1921 Frank Pearson’s 17-year old sister, Irene Pearson, and Myrtle’s
22-year sister, Elizabeth Purcell, visited from Texas.
On August 26, 1921, barely 18 months since the murders of Alexander and John
Fraser, lightning did strike again. This time seven bandits robbed the Ruby
store.
Irene Peterson testified later that at about 11:00 am, she and her brother Frank
Pearson were in the Post Office (at the front of the building to the right of
door) when three Mexicans entered the store. One of the men asked for tobacco,
so Irene left the Post Office area and went over to the store side. One of the
Mexicans shot her brother without warning. Irene then ran back to the living
quarters, chased by two of the bandits. The two bandits caught Myrtle Pearson
(frantically rushing to the store from the living area) and dragged her back to
the store. Irene Pearson then heard more shots.
Years later, surviving daughter Margaret, who had also heard the first shot and
raced to the store from the living area, gave this eyewitness account:
“. . . my mind has never let me accept what I saw. . . they knocked out my
mother’s gold teeth with a rifle butt. . . I turned and ran and one of the men
came up out of the store to the living area and started chasing me. We had a
screen porch along the side of the house and I was running down that porch which
was an outside entrance, and I fell spread-eagled. I can remember his spurs, his
chaps, his boots, as he was chasing me. For some reason when I fell, he turned
around and went back, I don’t know where. The younger aunt, Irene . . . saw me
and she came and got me very quickly, and we went out to a bunkhouse. . . We hid
in the bunkhouse.
“While we were doing that, . . one of the men went into the bedroom where she
[Elizabeth] was, and he pulled out his gun and shot at her, and she . . I
remember hearing her tell this . . . hand on her forehead . . in fear – and this
is a real miracle, he aimed at her head, and the bullet slanted up and wounded
her hand. Blood gushed – she fainted, I guess, from fear – and he thought he had
killed her, so he left her. [Elizabeth Purcell had grabbed a revolver
immediately upon hearing the first shot in the store and tried to shoot the two
bandits as they came into the living area from the store. But her gun didn’t
fire.] She [Elizabeth] came to very shortly, I think, and then she ran out to
the bunkhouse. We left the bunkhouse and went up in the hills . . . I still
remember [Elizabeth] had a blue and white check dress, and it was stained with
blood.”
Oliver Parmer, now a Deputy Sheriff, arrived at the scene of the crime that
evening with Santa Cruz County Sheriff George White. He described what he saw:
“Chairs were overturned in the store, drawers were pulled out, papers scattered,
the safe rifled, blood spattered on the floor, and boxes, bottles and canned
goods strewn about. [Mr.] Pearson lay behind the counter in a pool of blood with
two bullet [wounds] – stiff in death. His wife’s lifeless body lay sprawled on
the floor. Her skull was fractured, a bullet had entered her left temple and
come out at the back of the head. [She also had two additional bullet wounds.]
Her jaw was broken her lips horribly mashed and lacerated. Many of her teeth had
been knocked out . .”
According to Irene Pearson, the bandits cut “the safe open with an old double
edge hatchet, taking all the money [unknown amount] it contained, and carrying
away Frank Pearson’s two rifles, and his revolver. . ” The robbers also
reportedly took 24 pairs of shoes, calico undershirts, tobacco, other clothing,
groceries, and unknown mail from the post office.
Three Mexican women, neighbors of the Pearsons in Ruby, positively identified
Placido Silvas and Manuel Martinez as two of the seven bandit murderers.
Area residents knew Placido Silvas well; indeed he had been born in Oro Blanco
in 1900 and lived in Arivaca at the time of the crime.
Manuel Martinez was not an American citizen. He was born in Saric, Sonora,
Mexico in 1894. Ruby area people knew Martinez as a bootlegger. (Prohibition
against the manufacture, sale, or transportation of alcoholic beverages in the
U. S. started in 1920.)
On September 3rd, the bodies of Frank and Myrtle Pearson started on their final
journey by train to Liberty Hill, Texas for burial. Irene, Elizabeth, and
Margaret accompanied the bodies as the train left the Nogales station at 7:15
am.
The Nogales Herald reported on the emotional scene:
“Although an early hour when the bodies were taken away this morning a fair
sized crowd of people were at the train. Many expressions of sympathy were heard
in the crowd, and statements frequently made that the murderers of the young
couple should be quickly run down by the Mexican and United States governments.
“Marjorie was clinging onto her aunt, Miss Purcell this morning as they boarded
the train. The little girl, too young in years . . . to fully realize the
calamity that has befallen her . . she has forever been deprived of the loving
care of parents . .
“But it was different with Miss Purcell, Miss Pearson . . They were bowed down
in grief, and tears rolled down their faces as they told friends in Nogales
goodbye and boarded the train. Strong men in the crowd wept as the caskets were
loaded onto the train.”
(Sources: Phil Clarke, “Recollections of Life in Arivaca and Ruby, 1906-1926,”
Arizona Historical Society; Oral interview of Margaret (Pearson) Anderson, 1994;
Oliver Parmer and Kathleen O’Donnell, “How We Trapped the Deadly Border
Bandits,” Startling Detective Adventures, 1936; Nogales Herald; Twelfth Census
of the United States; Arizona Supreme Court Criminal Case 550)
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Myrtle Pearson with her daughter Margaret in Liberty Hill, Texas, 1918. (Photo courtesy of Scot Anderson) |
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Frank Pearson with his daughter Margaret in Ruby, 1920. (Photo courtesy of Scot Anderson) |
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The safe the killers robbed. The Pearson murderers cut open the store’s safe with an old double-edged hatchet. (Photo courtesy Arizona State Archives, No. 03-0084) |