On this day in 1908 a dispute over the location of the McIntosh county seat in Oklahoma turned deadly.
Court house rivalries were not uncommon in the West but the competition between the communities of Chacotah and Eufaula rose to extreme levels of violence and cost two lawmen their lives.
It all began in January, 1907, when the town of Chacotah (below) was notified it 
had been selected by a legislative committee of the territorial government as the temporary county seat until a permanent site could be decided in an election.
Eufaula attorney and delegate to the constitutional convention, William Liedtke, however, was unhappy with the choice and gave an impassioned plea to his fellow delegates to overturn the committee’s decision in favor of his home town. The vote in favor of Eufaula was 42 while Chacotah received 41.
The county records were subsequently moved to a rented two-story building in Eufaula.
A special election to select the permanent county seat was held on May 23, 1908. The initial tally showed Chacotah with 1,647, Eufaula, 1,200 votes and a third contender, Stidham, with 384. That should have settled the matter.
But the citizens of Eufaula cried foul, claiming their supporters had been kept away from the polls by epic rains – a torrent so severe that poet and leader of the Creek Nation, Alexander Posey, had been drowned. To add to their unhappiness, when the ballot boxes were delivered to Gutherie for certification, some 65 ballots were said to be “unaccounted for.” In light of the controversy, Eufaula’s boosters managed to get a temporary restraining order preventing the county records from being moved back to Chacotah.
Chacotah folks were having none of it. On a Sunday morning, 25 heavily armed men from Chacotah arrived about noon by train in Eufaula, led by former U.S. Deputy Marshall W. Frank Jones (left). Splitting up, the Jones group of about 15 sought out county clerk Edward Julian to obtain keys to the county offices.
The group was intercepted by two deputy city marshals named Kessler and Woods. Jones, however, told them to back off or face “the contents of my gun.” Kessler and Woods took the path of least resistance but quickly alerted the men of the town and sent for reinforcements in the person of former U.S. Deputy Marshall Grant Johnson. Eufaula’s men, most just returning from church, armed themselves while the owner of the local hardware store handed out guns.
Deputy Johnson (identified as being on the right) had served with Jones. When he arrived he was able to convince Jones his raiders were outnumbered and the mission was folly. By that time it was too late for Deputy Woods. Chacotah Special Deputy Sheriff Joe Parmenter had shot and killed Woods and wounded Kessler.
The raiders were arrested and sent packing back to Chacotah. Once again, that should have settled the matter. Alas, a third former U.S. Deputy Marshall, “Colonel” Dunlap, got involved, deciding county clerk and possible Chacotah conspirator Edward Julian should be arrested. Its 
unclear exactly what happened when Dunlap arrived at the door of Julian’s room in the hotel (right) at the Foley Building. The pair exchanged gunfire and Dunlap wound up dead.
At the end of the bloody Sunday, the raiders had gone home empty handed. Two men lay dead. Deputy Kessler recovered. Edward Julian and Joe Parmenter were both charged with murder, both tried and acquitted. Frank Jones was roundly criticized in Chacotah for failing to rescue the records but wrote a book anyway, expounding on all his exploits as a lawman and Eufaula managed to keep the county seat.
A legislator by the name of Richard Billups then claimed that back in ‘07 he’d illegally cast that one deciding Eufaula vote for a friend. Realizing he’d reignited a deadly grudge match, however, he quickly recanted. And it didn’t matter anyway. When the final special election for the McIntosh county seat was held on February 10, 1909, dark horse Stidham had dropped out and Eufaula won by 75 votes.
The final irony may be that Eufaula’s courthouse burned to the ground in 1925 taking all those troublesome records with it. Today, the business districts of both Chacotah and Eufaula are on the National Register of Historic Places. That apparently has finally settled the matter.
Lake Eufaula State Park, 111563 Hwy 150, with a 102,000-acre reservoir is midway between those historic districts in Chacotah and Eufaula. Tent camping, RV parking and a number of unique yurts are available as well as 
an 18-hole golf course, horseback riding, nature trails and an airstrip. For rates and more information go to travelok.com, call (918) 689-5311 or (918) 689-4607 or address correspondence to Lake Eufaula State Park, Checotah, OK 74426. © Text Only – 2017 – Headin’ West LLC – All photos – public domain.