by Parker Anderson

It was June 6, 1898. The dust had not yet settled from the hanging three days earlier of legendary Yavapai County outlaw James Parker, when the still of everyday Prescott life was shattered by the sound of gunfire on North Cortez Street. Soon, Dr. John Bryan McNally, one of Prescott’s most prominent physicians (and remembered yet today as a great Prescott pioneer) staggered out into the street with a gunshot wound. It was nothing short of a miracle that McNally was alive, for, as the Arizona Journal-Miner reported: "The bullet struck a watch in Dr. McNally’s pocket, glancing off and then passed through the fleshy part of the left arm between the elbow and wrist."

Dr. McNally said that he had been shot by a deranged prospector named Frank Stewart in a dispute over a bill of $5.00. Stewart, who would later be properly identified as A. A. Stewart, had escaped toward the Verde Valley, but would later double back toward the Hassayampa River. Yavapai County Sheriff, George C. Ruffner, quickly formed a posse and struck the trail after A. A. Stewart.

As a fleeing outlaw, Stewart proved to be as resourceful and vicious as previous outlaw Parker had been. At one point, Ruffner sent an Indian ahead of him to trail Stewart. The Indian later returned on foot, having been bushwhacked and his horse stolen by Stewart. The insane prospector also shot and wounded a country settler named William Deering and stole his horse. Then, when that horse also tired out, Stewart stole one from a country slaughterhouse, all the while staying ahead of Sheriff Ruffner’s posse.

Along the trail, the Ruffner posse discovered that Stewart had broken into a number of vacant cabins apparently looking for food. His trail was fairly easy to follow, as the shooter wore a pair of uncommon hobnailed shoes. At one point, the sheriff went on ahead of the posse and came across Stewart, who proceeded again to escape in a hail of gunfire, with one bullet actually passing through Ruffner’s hat, according to the Journal-Miner.

After several days without food or sleep, A. A. Stewart had enough. He stopped a country settler and told him to go and inform the Ruffner posse that he was ready to surrender; he couldn’t go on any further. On the way back to Prescott, Stewart told Deputy Jeff Davis that one night he had Davis in point-blank range but didn’t shoot when he realized the deputy was not alone.

If this story sounds familiar to some readers, it is because a slightly different version of it exists in local oral and written folklore. In this version, the shooter’s name has been inexplicably changed to "Bugger Bennett," with other things in the story changed as well. The folklore version seems to have originated in an inaccurate biography of George C. Ruffner, written by pulp writers Robert and Toni McInnes for a long-defunct periodical, Sheriff Magazine. It has since been widely repeated in that form, but a thorough check of criminal records of the period reveals that no one named Bennett was ever indicted for shooting a doctor during George Ruffner’s tenure as sheriff. The "Bugger Bennett" legend is unquestionably derived from the story of A. A. Stewart.

A. A. Stewart was convicted of attempted murder and sentenced to fifteen years in Yuma Territorial Prison. There, he was a troublesome prisoner. He was repeatedly put in solitary confinement for assaulting and threatening prison guards, and once for digging a hole in his cell. At one point, he was judged insane and sent to an insane asylum, but was later returned to the Yuma prison.

On November 10, 1900, A. A. Stewart escaped from Yuma Territorial Prison by means of a rope ladder he had somehow acquired or made. He was never seen again, despite extensive manhunts. Two prison guards were fired for negligence over the incident.

As for Dr. John Bryan McNally, he continued his successful medical practice in Prescott until his death in 1928. One has to wonder how many nights of sleep he lost over the years, wondering if the psychotic prospector was coming back for him.

The watch that saved his life in 1898 still exists. It is in the possession of Gerald McNally, the doctor’s grandson. See photo below.

(Parker Anderson is an active member of Sharlot Hall Museum’s Blue Rose Theatre.)

Sharlot Hall Museum Photograph Call Number:(A. A. Frank Stewart) Reuse only by permission.

Photo of convict A. A. Stewart, courtesy of Yuma Territorial Prison State Historic Park, taken in 1898, after he was convicted of attempting to kill Prescott’s Dr. John B. McNally.

Sharlot Hall Museum Photograph Call Number:(2008-6-21-15-37-45) Reuse only by permission.

Current photo of the gunshot damaged pocket watch that saved the life of Dr. McNally, now in the possession of his grandson, Gerald McNally of Prescott.

Sharlot Hall Museum Photograph Call Number:(po0120p)
Reuse only by permission.

Dr. John Bryan McNally, c1890s.

by T. Stone

(In Part I, we learned that the 1918 Spanish flu arrived in Prescott on October 2, 1918 and the spread of infection rose and fell like a scythe cutting ripe wheat.)

By October 8th, Prescott was shut down but not yet officially quarantined. The newspaper warned that there should be "no public gatherings of any sort." In Jerome, approximately 20 cases of influenza were reported. In the predominately Mormon town of Snowflake, the only physician, Dr. Caldwell, became an early influenza fatality, causing the community of 900 people to put out a call for another doctor.

On October 9th, the Prescott Journal-Miner reported only 1 new case at Whipple with an article entitled "Spread of Flu is Halted at Fort Whipple." Two days later there were 18 new cases at the post.

By October 12th, over 400 cases of flu were reported in Flagstaff, 300 cases in Williams, and Winslow suffered with 375 cases. In Winslow alone, at least 17 people had already died. Fort Whipple had about 75 patients. As for sick Prescottonians, the local paper had little to say.

By October 14th, 125 people had the disease in Jerome, filling the rooms at the United Verde Hospital. Temporary hospital beds had to be placed in the public school’s annex buildings. Prescott and Winslow also used their public schools as makeshift hospitals. As in the regular hospital facilities of that era, people of Mexican heritage and other "coloreds" were kept segregated from the white patients.

By October 16th, 21 people in Jerome were dead from the disease. Armed guards were stationed on every road leading into Jerome to insure a strict quarantine. The Verde Copper News listed the dead, all between the ages of 25 and 32, including a young Mexican couple leaving two small children.

The Prescott papers were fairly tight-lipped about how the influenza was spreading among the civilian population. There was hardly any mention of the fact that the entire town was shut down and that people were requested to wear gauze facemasks in a vain attempt to filter out the virus. Instead, the local Journal-Miner printed benign features about the soldiers at Whipple: "Because of the fact that most of the afflicted men have been placed on diet, it is necessary for the inspectors to go through all of the parcels which come to the boys each day in the mails, and take out all of the contraband food articles. Most of the soldiers have friends and relatives who keep them supplied with all sorts of delicacies, including candy, cake, chocolate, and many other dainties which are alright for a well man but not exactly the proper food for a man who is in bed with the flu. Consequently, each morning a large pile of pastry, candy, etc., accumulates in the postal department…yesterday morning a big sack of these good eats was turned over to the nurses and to the soldiers who are not suffering from the influenza." The Flagstaff, Winslow, and Jerome newspapers printed a more straightforward accounting of the flu, while the Prescott paper somewhat downplayed it.

In Winslow, where at least 30 people were now dead, every public school teacher volunteered to help the sick. Gallup, NM (on that fateful Santa Fe line) was claiming 100 dead. In Flagstaff there were 80 dead. In Prescott, so many people were sick that the newspaper asked for men to volunteer as nurses at the temporary hospital at the Washington School.

The Journal-Miner, on November 1st, reported, "After having been dormant for nearly a week, the influenza epidemic flared up again at Fort Whipple and, as a result, more than 20 new cases were reported last night by Colonel Holmberg." At least to the press, Col. Holmberg claimed that none of the new cases appeared to be serious.

On November 5th, the Journal-Miner tried to explain why it believed the epidemic didn’t seem as bad in Prescott as in other locales: "Since the influenza made its appearance in Prescott, there are said to have been 125 cases reported with a total death list directly attributable to the disease of some 12, which is less than one percent of the number of cases reported. With the general use of masks and other preventive measures taken, together with the good expected to be accomplished in the expenditure of the funds voted yesterday by the supervisors, it is not believed that Prescott will suffer as greatly from the malady in proportion to population as other places of the state, owing to its comparative freedom from Mexican and foreign population, among which class of residents in other cities the toll has been heavy because of their disinclination to take precautionary measures." One might point out that 12 dead out of 125 cases is actually about a ten percent death rate.

World War I ended on the 11th of November, while the flu continued its advance. While some places such as Jerome and Clarkdale were lifting their quarantines, other towns were still in the grip of the fever. In mid-November, Seligman, for instance, reported 150 cases of influenza with 15 deaths. The Coconino Sun reported on November 22nd that the disease had been devastating to the Apache tribe. "So terrible has the influenza become on the San Carlos Indian Reservation that it is impossible to build coffins in which to bury the dead."

In Phoenix, a rumor spread suggesting that dogs carried the flu virus, causing much of the canine population there to be indiscriminately killed by fearful citizens. The Phoenix Gazette worried that the city would "soon be dogless."

By December, it seemed the rate of illness was truly in decline, at least in Prescott and Jerome. Although the schools and churches were still closed, the stricter quarantine policies were lifted and most people looked forward to the coming holidays.

Certainly Col. Holmberg had plenty to feel thankful for. The World War was over, the flu was all but gone, and the soldiers at his post were rapidly returning to good health. No more quarantine was necessary. The officers of Fort Whipple planned a formal ball to be held on December 21st. The soldiers were allowed to accept Christmas dinner invitations in Prescott.

But the influenza again flared up along the Santa Fe line. "As in the early stages of the disease it is traveling westward from Albuquerque and practically every point on the Santa Fe is being attacked." The week before Christmas, Fort Whipple was once again placed under quarantine. The soldiers lost their town privileges and could no longer accept dinner invitations in Prescott homes. The officers, however, managed to have their ball before the quarantine went into effect.

On December 23rd, Holmberg fell ill with a fever of 106 degrees. From the Journal-Miner: "As several cases of flu are reported to have had their inception at the ball given by officers at Fort Whipple on Saturday night last, it is likely that this is where he (Holmberg) contracted the influenza." As usual, the newspaper suggested that this particular strain of flu was probably less virulent than previous cases.

Carl Edward Holmberg spent the last week of his life bed-ridden and attended by nurses. Eight months earlier he had moved to Arizona from New Mexico to manage the hospital facilities and soldiers of Fort Whipple. Now he was a hospital patient realizing that he would not get to celebrate the New Year. On Wednesday, January 1, 1919 at 11 a.m. Holmberg died. The post flag was lowered to half-mast. His body was shipped back to his parents’ home in Saginaw, Michigan for burial.

The Spanish flu plagued Arizona until the spring of 1919, affecting every town and nearly every family. But like all viruses, this one eventually burned itself out. After almost six months, the residents of Arizona could get on with their lives without the fear of another Spanish flu outbreak. When spring arrived, the scythe was stilled.

(Terrance L. Stone is the author of "Grave History: a Guidebook to Citizens’ Cemetery, Prescott, Arizona.")

Sharlot Hall Museum Photograph Call Number:(Photo courtesy of the Jerome Historical Society) Reuse only by permission.

Jerome 1918. By mid-October 1918, 125 people had the flu in Jerome and 21, between the ages of 25 and 32, were already dead from the disease despite quarantines, canceled town functions and wearing gauze masks.

Sharlot Hall Museum Photograph Call Number:(Photo courtesy of the Jerome Historical Society) Reuse only by permission.

Jerome 1918. World War I ended on the 11th of November but the Spanish flu plagued Arizona until the spring of 1919, affecting every town and nearly every family. When the rooms at the United Verde Hospital filled in Jerome, temporary hospital beds had to be placed in the public school’s annex buildings.

by T. Stone

Ninety years ago, the world, in the final throes of the Great War (known today as World War I), was confronted with an influenza pandemic that ended up killing more than 50,000,000 people worldwide; a number at least twice the number of those soldiers who died in battle during the war. Some called it the "plague" but most called this contagion the Spanish flu because it was first reported as a pandemic in Spain. War hysteria initially laid the blame on the Germans for concocting this pestilence. But, as research has now shown, the Spanish influenza originated in the United States, unknowingly incubated on Kansas farms by Kansas poultry, passed on to nearby army camps and then spread worldwide by American soldiers scattered to all parts of the U.S. and stepping off the boats in Europe. War always has unexpected consequences.

Annually in the United States today, approximately 36,000 people die from influenza while another 200,000 are hospitalized with complications. But the Spanish influenza of 1918 killed over 675,000 Americans. And millions were hospitalized!

Usually influenza victims are the very young or the elderly; middle-aged healthy people aren’t frequent causalities. However, the Spanish influenza was a distinctly unique strain of virus because it had a penchant for killing otherwise healthy adults. Why so many relatively young adults died can be explained simply enough: the flu turned the victims’ immune systems against themselves. Often, in infants and the elderly, the immune system is already weakened and has a difficult time fighting off infection, which explains why they succumb more readily to disease. But the 1918 influenza was so virulent that it forced naturally healthy immune systems to overreact and kill the very bodies they were trying to protect from the virus. This over-reaction of the immune system is called a cytokine storm.

In Prescott’s Citizens’ Cemetery there is a lone marble headstone simply inscribed: "Will King, Pvt., 317 Sup. Tn. 92 Div., March 17, 1918." Those carved letters and numbers suggest a complex and fascinating story that the casual observer might not appreciate. "317 Sup. Tn. 92 Div." informs you that Will King was a soldier in the United States Army who was a part of the 317th Supply Train for the 92nd Division, an ‘all colored’ division that was training in a segregated portion of the Camp Funston cantonment at Fort Riley, Kansas.

Then there is the significant date: March 17, 1918. That date coincides precisely with the beginning of the Spanish influenza that started its spread among the dirty tents and barracks of Camp Funston. The Prescott newspaper said that Will King died from pneumonia while he was training for war. Doctors, at first, did not understand that pneumonia was an aggravating factor of this new and deadly disease. Mr. King may well have been one of the very first people to die in what was to become one of the largest pandemics in history.

Col. Carl Holmberg was the newly appointed commandant of Fort Whipple at the time. He took over the post in May 1918, and went about organizing the hospital there, as well as involving himself with Prescott society. The Prescott Journal-Miner reported, "Colonel Holmberg found time to freely mingle with the local populace, attended the meetings of the Chamber of Commerce, and was willing and happy at all times to extend any courtesy or furnish any aid to the Prescott people." A young Army officer and physician, Holmberg, 38, undoubtedly saw his new command as a positive step in his military career.

The Spanish influenza rode into Arizona along the silvered rails of the Santa Fe Railroad. What had flared up among soldiers in the Midwest was now racing across the broad shoulders of Arizona. Holbrook, Winslow, Flagstaff, Williams, Ash Fork and Seligman fell one after the other to the virus. From Ash Fork, the train brought it to Prescott and Jerome. According to newspaper accounts, the influenza showed up in Arizona the first days of October 1918 and spread statewide in less than a week. In Prescott, the flu arrived on Wednesday, October 2nd in the lungs of soldiers transported from Camp Dodge, Iowa. Eight of these soldiers grew ill when they got to Fort Whipple.

Col. Holmberg initially wondered if these first cases warranted placing Fort Whipple under quarantine. He posted sentries at the doors to restrict people from entering the hospital. The next day, October 3rd, five more soldiers showed symptoms of the flu. On October 4th, twelve new cases broke out among the soldiery and Col. Holmberg decided the barracks must be quarantined. The Prescott Journal-Miner reported, "It is understood that there are a number of cases of ‘flu’ among the local civilian population, and closing the post was ordered partially as a protective measure for the benefit of the soldiers, the officers fearing that some of the boys might become infected while on a visit (to Prescott)." It is interesting to note that the blame for the contagion first went to the civilians! Also disturbing was that "all of the officers" from Whipple were exempt from the quarantine and traveled without restriction to town.

Like most social catastrophes unfit for political propaganda, the influenza arrived in Prescott heralded by soft words and denial. For the first week, even as the city closed down public entertainments such as the theatre, saloons and pool halls, the newspaper was careful to suggest that there should be no panic because this Prescott influenza appeared to be less dangerous than the one decimating the eastern seaboard. In fact, after warning its readers for over two weeks with front-page columns that the flu was on the way, the Journal-Miner only managed to mention the pandemic’s Prescott arrival on page three.

Across Arizona the influenza raged. People no longer loitered in crowds. Gauze masks were de rigueur for those who could get them. Schools, churches and pool halls closed down for two months. Besides the standard admonitions discouraging public gatherings, the Arizona State Board of Health requested that posters be placed in conspicuous places to warn citizens against the dangers of coughing, sneezing, spitting, handshaking and kissing.

Winslow and Flagstaff were hit especially hard by the epidemic. The copper towns including Bisbee, Globe and Jerome, where many impoverished miners lived in crowded rooms, suffered severely.

The influenza was unpredictable in the way it infected communities. Some days, several people would come down with fever. Other days, no one got sick. The spread of infection rose and fell like a scythe cutting ripe wheat. (Hence the reference to the "Scythe.")

(Terrance L. Stone is the author of "Grave History: a Guidebook to Citizens’ Cemetery, Prescott, Arizona")

Note: In part II, we will discover how the Spanish flu of 1918 affected many of the small towns of northern Arizona, including Prescott.

Sharlot Hall Museum Photograph Call Number:(Flu 2000-016-002a) Reuse only by permission.

Jerome, 1918. Photo courtesy of the Jerome Historical Society. Those who were lucky enough to avoid infection of the Spanish flu had to deal with the public health ordinances to restrain the spread of the disease. Gauze masks were distributed to be worn in public, stores could not hold sales, funerals were limited to 15 minutes and bodies piled up with a shortage of coffins, morticians and gravediggers.

Sharlot Hall Museum Photograph Call Number:(1918 flu) Reuse only by permission.

Those in close living quarters, such as mining and military camps, were most susceptible to the Spanish flu of 1918. An estimated one-third of the worlds’ population (or 500 million persons) was infected and had clinically apparent illness. It is referred to as the "mother of all pandemics."