against several men, including Mayor John Clum, Wells, Fargo & Co. agent Marshall Williams, and defense attorney Tom Fitch. Judge Spicer received the following threat: Spicer, in characteristic fashion, wrote a lengthy retort in The Tombstone Epitaph, in which he wrote: Disappearance Spicer returned to prospecting, first in Pima County, Arizona, then in Ures, Sonora, Mexico. A silver strike was made in the Quijotoa Mountains near Tucson. Spicer put all of his resources into a mine at Quijotoa, but the veins were not deep enough. It is widely believed that a destitute Spicer wandered into the Arizona desert in January 1887 and took his own life. An article 3 months later in the Daily Star stated that shortly before his disappearance while en route to Covered Wells, Spicer visited a man named Bill Haynes and tried to commit suicide twice while there. One theory is that Spicer, who had a history of evading creditors, planned his "suicide" by pretending to be despondent while at Haynes' cabin and then quietly made his way to Mexico (possibly Ures) where he spent the rest of his days. Another modern historian reports that his body was found in Ajo, Arizona in 1885. Portrayals in film/television John Lawlor in Wyatt Earp (1994) imdb.com James Seay in The Life and Times of Wyatt Earp (Episode titled "Gunfight at the O.K. Corral", 1961) imdb.com William Schallert (as Judge Herman Spicer) in Hour of the Gun (1967) imdb.com Notes References Bagley, Will. Blood of the Prophets: Brigham Young and the Mountain Meadows Massacre (University of Oklahoma Press) Bailey, Lynn R. A Tale of the "Unkilled": The Life, Times, and Writings of Wells W. Spicer (Westernlore Press, 1999) Lubet, Steven. Murder in Tombstone: The Forgotten Trial of Wyatt Earp (Yale University Press, 2004) Tefertiller, Casey Wyatt Earp: The Life Behind The Legend (John Wiley & Sons, 1997) 1831 births 1887 deaths American judges People from Tipton, Iowa People from Tombstone, Arizona People of Utah Territory People of the Arizona Territory Mountain Meadows Massacre Cochise County conflict People of the Utah War People from Chemung, New York Iowa Democrats Iowa Republicans Utah Republicans Arizona Republicans People of the American Old West