It was February 10, 1918, when a sheriff’s posse attempted to arrest a group of miners at their cabin in the Galiuro Mountains.  Four men were killed, including three lawmen and the owner of the cabin, Jeff Power.  Jeff’s sons, Tom and John, escaped to Mexico with their friend, Tom Sisson.  What then evolved was the largest manhunt in Arizona history.

The Power family consisted of Jeff (the old man) and his wife, Martha.  Their three sons were Charles (b. 1881), John (b. 1891), and Tom (b. 1893).  They also had a daughter named Ola May (b. 1895).  The Power family moved over to Arizona from Texas in 1909.  They established a homestead in lower Rattlesnake Canyon, south of Klondyke.  Two years later, Charles purchased a nearby goat ranch (presently known as Power Garden), and the family moved there.

After improving the ranch by expanding the cabin, the Powers began developing the goat ranch into a cattle operation.  At the best of times, ranching did not offer an easy life — especially on the frontier, which is what Arizona was in the early 1800s.  Charlie, John, and Tom worked as hands-on ranchers or miners on neighboring ranches or mines to make ends meet.

In 1915, Jeff lost his wife Martha in a horse-and-buggy accident.  By 1917, the ranch had been sold, and Charles had moved to New Mexico.  Later that year, Jeff purchased Perry Tucker’s one-quarter interest in the Abandon Claims Mine, an old gold mine in nearby Keilberg Canyon.  Today, the mine is remembered as the Power’s Mine.

The Power family was hardworking.  Jeff and his sons and Tom Sisson built a 25-mile wagon road through what some have described as the most challenging country imaginable.  The wagon road extended from the Haby Ranch, several miles north of Klondyke on the Aravaipa Creek, south for about twelve miles before dropping down Power’s Hill into Rattlesnake Canyon, then up the canyon to the Abandoned Claims at Keilberg.  Sisson and the Powers built a cabin to live in, and when they were in control of three-quarters of the property, they purchased a second-hand stamp mill.  A stamp mill is a machine that crushes material by pounding rather than grinding.

According to a county coroner’s report, 22-year-old Ola May Power “came to her death by an unknown cause” on December 6, 1917.  Frontier folks talk, so there was a lot of speculation about Ola May’s untimely death.  To this day, it remains a mystery.  Soon after, the Powers moved to a cabin on a hill overlooking their entrance to the mine.

Of course, by this time, the United States had entered the First World War, and President Woodrow Wilson had called for national conscription.  All able-bodied men were obliged to register for the draft, but according to the Power brothers, when they attempted to do so, the military recruiter informed the boys that they weren’t needed.  That was their story — but the U.S. Forest Service had their account.  In their version, Jeff Power convinced his sons to avoid the draft. 

The Forest Service’s version is entirely plausible because many citizens of the time saw no need for Americans to interfere in European affairs.  In any case, John and Tom returned home thinking all was well.  However, someone reported them to the police as draft dodgers.

In mid-January 1918, just after the Powers had completed their preparations to extract ore from the mine, Graham County Sheriff Robert F. McBride sent a deputy named Jay Murdock to deliver a message to the Powers.  McBride explained the situation in his message and asked John and Tom to surrender peaceably.  Jeff decided to ignore the warning.

After a suitable period of time, Sheriff McBride assembled a posse consisting of himself, Klondyke Deputy Marshal Frank Haynes, and two sheriff’s deputies, Martin Kempton and T. K. “Kane” Wootan.  Haynes carried two arrest warrants for John and Tom Power.  McBride had an arrest warrant for Jeff Power and Tom Sisson, wanted for questioning in connection with Ola May’s death.

On February 9, 1918, the posse drove from Klondyke to the Upchurch Ranch, where they borrowed horses and saddles for the overland march to the Power Cabin.

McBride’s posse arrived at the cabin later that night, but the sheriff decided not to serve their warrants immediately.  Instead, McBride put his men into positions around the cabin and waited until morning.

Just before dawn on February 10, Jeff woke up and built a fire in the fireplace.  A few moments later, John made a fire in the wood-burning stove.  Then, the horses outside began making skittish noises, alerting the dog, who started barking.  Jeff knew something was up, so he grabbed his rifle and approached the front door (facing eastward).

From this point forward, there are two versions of what happened: one according to the Power brothers and the second story of Deputy Marshal Haynes, the sole surviving member of the posse.

Haynes reported that when Jeff Power stepped through the door, Wooten shouted, “Throw up your hands.”  Someone from inside the cabin began shooting through the doorway.  Haynes drew his weapon and fired two shots through the door and one through a window as he and McBride ran to take cover behind the northern wall of the cabin.

Wootan and Kempton also started shooting, but the latter was shot dead shortly after that, either by Jeff Power or by somebody inside.  Wootan mortally wounded Jeff with a bullet to the chest.  He immediately fired at Tom Power, who was looking out a window.  Pieces of glass struck Tom on the left side of his face, but he managed to aim at Wootan, who was trying to get away and killed him with a single shot.

Meanwhile, Sheriff McBride and Deputy Marshal Haynes were hugging the northeastern corner of the cabin.  At some point, Haynes suggested that he go and check the back side of the cabin.  When he returned, he found McBride dead.  Haynes testified that spent casings suggested that Tom Sisson had poked his rifle through a crack in the logs and put three bullets into McBride.  Haynes then retreated to where the posse had left their horses, and after mounting up, he rode to Klondyke as fast as he could.

One might wonder how Haynes could find spent cartridges lying on the ground next to McBride’s body if someone had fired through the wall of the cabin.  A more plausible story would have been that the spent casings belonged to McBride.

As with most shootouts, this one lasted a few minutes, within which around 25 shots were fired.  McBride, Kempton, and Wooten were dead; all three of the Powers suffered gunshot wounds.  Tom was struck in the face with slivers of glass, and John suffered wood splinters in the face after a bullet smacked into a door jamb.  Jeff Power died later that night.

According to the Wanted Poster, Tom Powers was 25 years old in 1918.  He would have been born in 1893.  John was 27 at the shootout, placing his birth in 1891.

As soon as the shooting ended, John, Tom, and Tom Sisson carried the old man into the cabin and made him comfortable.  They then took their weapons and the horses left behind and started riding south toward Redington.  From there, they headed eastward, crossing into Mexico near Hachita, New Mexico.

Several posse were assembled to search for the three desperados, but the group managed to evade them all.  When local lawmen couldn’t find the Power Boys and Sisson, the Army was called upon to help.  A cavalry detachment took the three men into custody on March 8, 1918.

In a remarkable miscarriage of justice, the three men were found guilty of murder and sent to prison in Florence.  Tom Sisson died in custody at the age of 86.  John and Tom Power endured and were eventually released from prison in 1960.  In 1969, Gov. Jack Richard issued a pardon to both men.  At the time, John Power was 78; his brother was 76.

Tom Power (1893 – 1970) passed away in San Francisco, California.  John Power (1891 – 1976) lived in Aravaipa Canyon, Arizona.  Charles Samuel Power (1881 – 1973) died in Monticello, Sierra County, New Mexico.

The Power Cabin shootout was one of Arizona’s last major “old west” gunfights.  When John and Tom went to jail (for no other reason than defending themselves against unknown assailants), Arizona was still part of the Old West.  When the brothers came out of jail, everything in America had changed.  They must have felt that they were living on an entirely different planet.

Jeff Power was laid to rest alongside his wife, two of his sons, and his daughter.  According to the plaque on his grave, Jeff was “Shot down with his hands up in his own door.”

That’s what too much government will do for you.