page_title: Bisbee Riot
section_title: Riot
hierarchical_section_title: Bisbee Riot / Riot
caption_attribution_description: English: Panorama of Bisbee, Arizona, 1916
context_page_description: The Bisbee Riot, or the Battle of Brewery Gulch, occurred during the Red Summer on July 3, 1919, between the black Buffalo Soldiers of the 10th Cavalry and members of local police forces in Bisbee, Arizona. Following an incident between a military policeman and some of the Buffalo Soldiers, the situation escalated into a street battle in Bisbee's historic Brewery Gulch. At least eight people were seriously injured, and fifty soldiers were arrested, although the consequences of this skirmish were relatively minor compared to others during the summer of 1919.
context_section_description: On July 3, 1919, the 10th Cavalry arrived in Bisbee from Fort Huachuca to march in the Independence Day parade on the next day. While the regiment's white officers were attending a prearranged dance, the Buffalo Soldiers went to Upper Brewery Gulch, where the Silver Leaf Club was located. According to Bisbee's Chief of Police, James Kempton, many of these soldiers were seen carrying their automatic service pistols, "most of them carrying them inside their blouses or in other places where they were not visible." Kempton and Officer William Sherrill began to disarm the Buffalo Soldiers, informing them that they could retrieve their weapons from the police station once they had left town. Kempton and his officers were then approached by one of the Tenth Cavalry's officers, who told the lawmen that the soldiers were allowed to carry their sidearms if Kempton didn't object. When Kempton informed the cavalry officer that he did mind, the man allegedly then gave orders that none of the Tenth's troopers would be allowed to leave camp armed, an order that was apparently ignored by some of the soldiers.
  Later on that night, at about 9:30 PM, a white military policeman from the 19th Infantry, George Sullivan, got into a fight with five "drunken" Buffalo Soldiers outside of the club. According to Sullivan, he exchanged "hostile words" with the soldiers, who then drew their revolvers, hit him on the head, and took his weapon. Jan Voogd notes that several citizens came to Sullivan's aid, and validated his report of the encounter. She also says various sources agree that the soldiers immediately went to the police station and reported the incident to Chief Kempton. Kempton, sensing more trouble, advised the soldiers to turn over their weapons, but the latter refused. So, after the soldiers left the station, the chief began assembling a posse to "disarm all the negroes they could find."
  Among those that Kempton enlisted was Cochise County Deputy Sheriff Joseph B. Hardwick. Hardwick, was an Oklahoma native who had once spent time in prison there for manslaughter. Following his release, he moved his family to Arizona, settling in Cochise County, where in 1917 he shot and killed a Mexican ranch hand for allegedly assaulting his daughter. Not long after that incident, Hardwick (who had once worked as a lawman in Washington) was hired on as an officer with the Bisbee Police Department, where he first worked with James Kempton, then serving as a Sergeant with the police. In 1918, Hardwick wounded a man named Joel Smith who had opened fire on Hardwick with a shotgun during a wild spree in Upper Brewery Gulch. In January 1919, Hardwick accepted a commission as a deputy sheriff under Sheriff James McDonald and for the next several months helped patrol the more remote regions of Cochise County and nearby Douglas.
  The following attempt to disarm the soldiers resulted in a street battle, centered on Brewery Gulch, that lasted for over an hour. According to McWhirter, deputized white civilians participated in the fighting, however, Jan Voogd says there is very little evidence that Bisbee's local residents played any significant role. Either way, most of the whites involved were city police officers, or Cochise County sheriffs and deputies. More than 100 shots were fired during the melee, and it ended around midnight, when fifty of the Buffalo Soldiers surrendered to the police. The remaining soldiers were put on horses and told to ride back to their camp at Warren, under escort by two police cars. Shortly after the column headed out, five soldiers who had stayed behind began arguing with some of the officers. During this, Deputy Joe Hardwick, who had a reputation as a gunman, pulled out his revolver and shot one of the soldiers in the lung.
caption: Panorama of Bisbee in 1916.
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