The Case of the Bumbling Bandits

The Worst Train Robbers the West Ever Knew

The exploding safe shattered the night stillness, hurling a litter of Mexican silver dollars across the desert near Willcox.

As early as the next morning, and for weeks thereafter, Mexican section hands working nearby descended on the area of the holdup to hunt for the sparkling bounty, some sifting through the brush with garden rakes.

But raining wealth on poor laborers was not what the holdup men had in mind.

It was Wednesday, January 30, 1895, when Grant Wheeler and Joe George rigged dynamite to the Wells Fargo safe and lit the fuse, thus beginning their short career as train robbers.

They would pull only one other job, less than a month later, but they made such a frightful mess of that one as well, that the two cowboys earned their place among the worst train robbers the West ever knew.

As Southern Pacific passenger train No. 20 inched away from the Willcox depot that winter night, brakeman W.F. Young made his customary check for hobos, discovering two men hunched between the locomotive and the mail coach.

When Young attempted to eject the "hobos," one of them "commanded him to lay his lantern down on the platform and do as they said or else they would bore his body full of big holes," according to an account in The Arizona Daily Star.

This threat appeared real to Young when one of the men produced twin six-shooters, and the other swung a Winchester carbine out from beneath his heavy overcoat.

By the time the train was two miles west of town, the hobos actually Wheeler and George had the drop on two other train employees: fireman O.J. Johnson and engineer P.B. Ziegler.

At the two-mile mark, the train was ordered stopped and the express and mail cars detached from the passenger coaches and sleepers. Engineer Ziegler was then told to steam ahead another three miles, where the bandits intended to plunder the valuables.

Meanwhile messenger G.W. Mitchell, a veteran of another train heist two months earlier, caught the scent of foul play and reacted quickly, pocketing as many valuables as he could before running back to the passenger coaches.

Mitchell's escape was the bandits' first misfortune of the evening because he was able to carry with him a sizable cache that would otherwise have been stolen.

Under orders from Wheeler and George, Ziegler gripped a coal pick and splintered the door to the express car, which Mitchell had locked again upon fleeing.

Using explosives they'd stashed nearby, the bandits easily blew open a small safe and removed what little was stored inside.

Next they turned their attention to the Wells Fargo safe, which the holdup men believed contained a fortune greater than the eight sacks of Mexican silver dollars standing loose in the car.

But the big safe withstood four violent explosions, leaving the robbers with one dynamite stick remaining. They placed it on top of the safe, securing it with the sacks of silver dollars. How much loot was in the bags varies from $6,000 to $30,000, depending on who is telling the story. As the fuse sizzled down, Ziegler and one of the robbers took shelter behind a stack of boxes. Then, as the Sulphur Valley News reported, "The great safe was blown open, twisted, and warped beyond description." The explosion, heavier than the previous ones, wrecked the express car, knocking the top and sides into kindling wood, and scattering the Mexican dollars across the countryside. Newspapers reported that in the ensuing days "the whole of Willcox had been down the road trying to find some of the dollars sent heavenward by the robbers." Coins were discovered as far as 200 yards from the blast site, some imbedded in the bark of trees. But what was a boon for Willcox residents was a disaster for Wheeler and George. Between what was found in the safe and the silver dollars that remained inside the car, the crooks made off with about $500, a pittance compared with the fortune in silver dollars that was theirs for the taking. After an hour and a half of work, the bungling bandits "thanked the engineer for what he had done at the point of a pistol, and disappeared into the night," according to the Star. Meanwhile, fear governed the passengers waiting in the detached cars, many of whom expected the robbers to descend on them next. Some crawled under their seats, trembling there until the smoke cleared. The News reported that "the ladies slipped their rings, pins, necklaces, and ear ornaments into their hose and down their backs, in the hopes that even the highwaymen would not be so rude as to look for them there." By the next morning investigators began circulating the culprits' names and descriptions. Grant Wheeler, 28 to 30 years old, was

described as 5 feet 6 or 5 feet 7 inches tall, weighing 165 pounds, with a dark complexion, a prominent Roman nose, and dark eyes with "an uncommon stare in them."

Joe George, age 35, stood an inch taller, weighed 130 pounds, had large eyes and a black beard, and the "forefinger of his right hand is off."

It didn't take painstaking police work to settle on the men as suspects.

Remarkably the two had strolled into the Norton & Co. store in Willcox shortly before the holdup and "purchased a quantity of powder, 50 feet of fuse, 20 caps, and a box of cartridges, claiming that it was for mining purposes at Dos Cabezas," according to the Sulphur Valley News.

In addition to that indiscretion, Wheeler dropped his quirt in the vicinity of the holdup, and George forgot to retrieve the spurs he'd left on the nearby bridge before executing his escape.

Local cowboys easily identified the owners of both items.

And trailed the cowboys for many miles, finally following their tracks into the rugged Chiricahua Mountains.

According to speculation, the two had help from confederates who stashed food, supplies, and fresh horses at spots along the getaway route. Newspapers fretted that once into the mountain reaches, they might disappear.

That, undoubtedly, was what Wheeler and George had planned, and it was the only aspect of their plot that worked. Eight days later, the trail was ice cold, and the two posses had to give up.

Even Wells Fargo detective Johnny Thacker, in nearly a month of trying, failed to bring the bandits out of the mountains.

But Wheeler and George couldn't have planned for the dogged determination of Billy Breakenridge, a special officer of the Southern Pacific.

By 1895 the 48-year-old Breakenridge, a former deputy sheriff in Tombstone in the brawling days of 1880, had achieved legendary status as a stalwart foe of badmen. He was a peace officer who knew the West when it was wild and loved it. (See Arizona Highways, April '93) In explaining his reasons for writing Helldorado, a book about his life, Breakenridge told an interviewer in 1928: "It can't be long before I hit the trail. Before I go, I want to tell some of the things I know about the West during the days before it was a misdemeanor to carry a gun, and before Geronimo became a Sunday school teacher."

In addition to that book, one of the documents Breakenridge left behind was a detailed account of his pursuit of Grant Wheeler.

Breakenridge's four-week chase began at Stein's Pass on the Arizona/New Mexico line where, on February 26, 1895, the two train bandits struck again.

As fate would have it, engineer Ziegler was on board this train as well, and when Wheeler and George saw him, one of them said, "Well, here we are again."

Given their record of buffoonery, Ziegler probably assumed that the train's loot, as well as his own life, was safe in their hands. He was right.

This time instead of detaching the express car, they made the mistake of cutting off the mail car instead. Having committed this fatal blunder, and pulling away from the car containing the money, the holdup men knew their night's work was done.

But before riding off in disgust, they ignited their now useless dynamite, an explosion of frustration at their second botched performance.

Breakenridge eventually received word that Wheeler and George had been spotted near Gallup. At the same time, he heard of a woman who had a photograph of Wheeler.

His instincts as an investigator serving him well, Breakenridge told his informant he'd be $20 richer if he'd steal the picture. The deed was done, and Breakenridge promptly had 100 copies printed.

Once in New Mexico, the posse handed out Wheeler's likeness in numerous towns west of Albuquerque, and again as they kept to his trail up to Flagstaff and beyond.

At a farmhouse near Farmington, New Mexico, a woman recognized Wheeler's photo and told Breakenridge he had camped close by only two days before. "He's the one the children call 'the bad man," the women said.

It seemed that in trying to obtain water for his horse, Wheeler took down some fence posts and led the animal to the creek. When the horse refused to drink, Wheeler shot it dead.

Working now with a Navajo tracker and two cowboy deputy sheriffs, the law closed in on Wheeler's camp near Mancas, Colorado, blocking both ends of the ravine in which he'd set up camp.

After cooking breakfast and enjoying a cup of coffee, Wheeler walked unknowingly up the bank toward the two deputies, who yelled: "Throw up your hands!"

"I won't," Wheeler responded. "I ain't doing nothing." Back into the ravine he ran, the two deputies shouting at him as he went.

What Breakenridge saw next was strange indeed. Sitting up on his horse to get a clear view, he spotted Wheeler lying on the ground, his head barely a foot from the blazing campfire.

Seeing this Breakenridge may have pondered the "uncommon stare" known to exist in the eyes of his quarry and the bizarre act of shooting a horse for refusing to drink.

Breakenridge didn't have to wonder long about Wheeler's mental state for at that moment the cornered criminal stood, put his pistol in his mouth, and killed himself.

But the tale of the bungling bandits didn't end there. Joe George was nowhere to be found, and the reason for his absence fit the course of foolery these two cowboys seemed determined to follow.

Breakenridge wrote in his memoirs that George had split off from his partner because he could no longer stand Wheeler's snoring. Not only was it aggravating, but George believed it so loud it would inevitably lead to their capture.

George had headed for Texas on his own, and Breakenridge sought permission from his superiors at Southern Pacific to pursue him.

But politics intervened when Wells Fargo's Johnny Thacker, apparently envious that Breakenridge had nabbed his prey, put out the story that the man who killed himself in that Colorado ravine was not Wheeler.

In the wake of this fiction, Breakenridge was fired from his position at Southern Pacific. It was a short-lived departure. Before long Breakenridge was returned to the job, and those on his side claimed to the end that the absence of any future holdups proved the dead man was Wheeler.

This dispute might've consumed sufficient time to allow George to vanish. According to one reputable account, he was never caught. But Breakenridge contends in his memoirs that George was indeed apprehended in Texas.

However it eventually played out, it would be hard to imagine two men more wrongly suited to the criminal life than the bungling Grant Wheeler and Joe George.