>Jair
I don't know about a fountain, Jair, but I will spout off a little! ;-D
Here's what I have been able to come up with re Mattie.
She was listed on the 1880 U.S. Census Tombstone, Arizona Territory along
with the other Earps as:
Earp, Mattie, age 22 place of birth Wisconsin, occupation Keeping House, and
as Wyatt's common law wife.
Notes to Chapter Two of the annotated "I Married Wyatt Earp" (annotations by
the editor: Glenn Boyer) have the following insights:
First: to set the state is some background on Wyatt:
"Wyatt's first marriage, to Urilla Sutherland took place on January 10, 1870
at Lamar Missouri, the ceremony having been performed by his father N.P. Earp
as justice of the peace....his young wife died later that year in childbirth,
along with the infant....Shortly after her death, one Wyatt S. Earp (probably
our man) had a true bill returned by the grand Jury of the U.S. Court of the
western District of Arkansas at Fort Smith, not far south of Lamar, in May
1871 on the charge of larceny -- "horse stealing in the Indian nations". He
skipped bail and was never tried.....If this is in fact our Wyatt, perhaps he
was footloose and desperate after the death of of his young wife."
"Sometime prior to his arrival in Tombstone, Wyatt married or at least lived
with, Celia Ann Blaylock, who went by the nickname Mattie. She came to
Tombstone with Wyatt and publicly lived with him there as his wife. See note
23 this chapter for speculation regarding the length of Wyatt's association
with Mattie before be bcame enamored of Josie."
Note #23:
"Josephine tried to keep the fact that Wyatt was married from the
Cason/Ackerman team of writers, but Mrs. Cason eventually discovered the
truth....Mrs. Cason got the impression froom Josie that Wyatt and Mattie had
been together for ten or twelve years. However, Wyatt's documented marriage
to his first wife, Urilla Sutherland.....rules out the twelve year figure. I
suspect that after his first wife died in late 1870, wyatt probably met
mattie in Fort Scott, Kansas, near Lamar, since I have a photo of her in that
town in which she appears to be perhaps twenty years old. I have no
information confirming Josie's bland assertion that Wyatt's marriage was on
the rocks. However when I asked Mattie's neice if that were likely, she
said, 'If Mattie had a temper like her sister, I don't blame him for leaving
her." (Conversation of editor with Mrs. O.H. Marquis, Denver, 1965).
Mattie's sister was Mrs. Marquis's mother-in-law."
A book called "The Earp Papers: In A Brother's Image" by Don Chaput sheds the
following light on the Earps involvement in prostitution :
"While Wyatt and James Earp were in Wichita, several "girls" carrying the
name Earp, were regularly arrested and fine for prostitution. Either of the
brothers should have been 'running the girls' as both engaged in such
activities later in places like Dodge City, Tombstone and Nome. The
following is a small portion of the prostituation information presented in
Bartholomew, the Untold Story:
'.....State of Kansas, Plft Vs. Sallie and Bettsy Erp, deft. Saml. A Martin,
Prosecutor. PErsonally appeared before me Samual A Martin who being duly
sworn deposes and says: that on the 3rd of June 1874 at the Co. of Sedgewick
and State of Kansas, one Sallie ERp and Betsey Errp did then and there
unlawfully and feloniously set up and keep a bawdy house or brothel and did
appear and act as mistress and have the care and management of a certain one
story frame building situated and located North of Douglas Aven near the
bridge leading across the Arkansas River used and kept by such paties as a
house of porstitution in this city of Wichita, Count and State, aforesaid
contrary to the Statutes of Kansas'
Might Mattie have been one of the number of "girls bearing the name Earp'?
This book also has a small blurb on "Wyatt's Non Wife" and states: "Wyatt's
women have figured in several books and magazine articles. Other than his
marriage in 1870 to Rilla Sutherland in Lamar, there is no record of any
further marriage. In Dodge City, he jouned with Mattie (Cely Ann) Blalock,
and she accompanied him to Topmbstone and was with him until he fell for
Josephine Marcus. After the shootout, Mattie accompanied other Earps from
Tombstone to Colton [California, where pater Nicholas Earp had settled with
his second wife.]
Note that this book says that Wyatt took up with Mattie in Dodge City,
another area where the Earp Brothers were involved/holding shares in
brothels.
As far as where the Earp Brothers met their wives--a book called "Virgil
Earp: Western Peace Officer" also by Don Chaput, recounds Virgil and Allie
Earp meeting when he was driving a stage and she was working as a waitress in
Council Bluffs, at The Planters House. So, it is not clear that Virgil and
Allie, at least met as Tombstone hints....but the interesting thing about the
line of dialogue is that it is couched vaguely "probably where we met
ours"--could that have been a way for the scriptwriter to insert hints about
Matties past?
This book makes no mention of Mattie until the collected Earps moved en masse
to Tombstone, in 1879.
Was Mattie a prostitute? The sources aren't clear. That she later drifted
into prostitution would seem to indicate at least a possibility that she had
plied the trade before. Many other women found themselves deserted and
broke, and did not end up as prostitutes--though the West was notorious for
not having too many respectable roles for women. She had family living (and
as indicated above, they have descendants), and it is curious that she did
not return to the bosom of her family, or that Wyatt had not met her closer
to her family home stated in the Census records as being Wisconsin...... She
might also have found some assistance from Allie Earp who was very fond of
her.
If the drug addiction, as Tombstone suggests was already in place before
Wyatt ever left her for Josie, then the slide into prostitution becomes more
believable. But there arises the question--how did Mattie get addicated to
laudanum? Drugs were then, as now, very much a part of the world of the demi
monde......
There is an account in The Earp Papers of Mattie's death in 1888 the result
of an overdose of laudanum, helped along with a bottle of whiskey--but I will
have that for another day, if there is any interest in hearing it.
Lest anyone be aghast at the lack of marriage vows amongst the Earps
(Virgil and Allie, these sources seem to agree, had never officially tied
the knot according to any official records), it should be noted that
co-habitation without the benefit of formal marriage ceremony was NOT
UNCOMMON in the frontier West. That would probably come as a shock to those
in our day who bemoan the break-down of the family unit and the erosion of
"family values". As any study of history will reveal (and the seemingly
staid Victorian Era was notorious in this regard) that while humans have long
cried out for moral uprightness and family values, it always has been a goal
that proves elusive!
Hope this helps somehow...
Lisa Adolf
>This reviewer claims that though Mattie certainly
>became a prostitute after being abandoned by Wyatt, and did
>die of a drug
overdose, there is no evidence that she was
>either a prostitute or serious
drug user before that time. I
>have no evidence one way or the other, other
than this
>review. Lisa, are you going to be our fountain of
>information
again?