1912 The Murder of City Marshall Jose Crixell

Gold-plated badge awarded to Jose' Crixell by the people of Brownsville after being elected City Marshall donated to the Brownsville Historical Association by John Krausse and family.  

Teófilo owned the Crixell Bar on 12th and Elizabeth St. Vicente ran the White Elephant near Market Square. Both served alternate terms as city councilmen and were power brokers for the Independent Republican Red party. They were also the main distributors of beer and alcohol. Jose (Joe, J.L. or Joseph) was the City Marshal from 1908 to August 9, 1912.

Jose' L. Crixell was born in 1871 on a ship in the Gulf of Mexico traveling from New Orleans to Bagdad, a Mexican port on the mouth of the Rio Grande.  The Crixell family lived in Matamoros, moved to Brownsville then settled in Corpus Christi where they prospered.  Teofilo and Vicente returned to Brownsville in the early 1900's and opened the White Elephant then the Crixell Saloon a few years later.  They also had a brother, Louis.

Jose opened a restaurant in 1906 and gained popularity after implicating African-American soldiers in the shooting of the town that same year.  The Crixells had supplied the black soldiers with beer and ice when they opened their own bar to avoid the racism shown them when black soldiers of the 25th Infantry had arrived in 1906 and were accused of shooting up the town but that's a story for another post....

 Various Crixell business ads in the Brownsville Daily Herald of the times

. Market Square 1912

The White Elephant was directly across Market Square where the Heritage Department is today.  The police department was next to fire station which was next to City Hall.

This is what we can imagine the White Elephant looked like back then. The Crixell Saloon and White Elephant lasted from the early 1900's until prohibition in 1920.

 

E Elizabeth and 12th St c1908

 1910 Crixell Saloon on the corner of 12th and E. Elizabeth St.

 1910 Crixell Saloon photo courtesy of Rod Bates of Rio Bravo Gallery in Port Isabel.

 1915 scene with soldiers marching to Fort Brown.

James B. Wells’ (2nd from left) Democratic Blue party dominated local politics until they were challenged by the Independent Red party. As a political boss he used Indiana Pinkerton detectives (wearing derby hats) and Texas Rangers to enforce his rule

 The Blue Club was a billiard hall near alley on E Madison and 13th Sts. where political  rallys were held.

Rentfro B. Creagar led the Independent Red party which elected Benjamin Kowalski as mayor and eliminated control of local politics from democrats. This caused friction between local police, controlled by Independents, and county sheriff’s deputies, under Jim Well’s control. Shootouts between law officers in the White Elephant and streets of Brownsville made regular headlines during the early 1900’s.

Red Club party members were also called the Independent Party because Republican was still a bad word in the south since the Civil War era.  They met at the Dittmann Theater on E Washington St.

The 1911-12 police department grew larger as more officers were commissioned to carry firearms. Conflict arose when law officers from opposing factions disarmed each other for illegally carry firearms out of their jurisdiction. When the Rangers force was reduced, Ranger Paul McAllister became a deputy who would later assassinate J.L. Crixell (seated at center).

Vicente L. Crixell was an alderman on the city council and owned the White Elephant Saloon. It was directly across the Market Square/City Hall. At 9:40 p.m. on December 23, 1910, a shootout involving local and county police occurred there. The trouble originated from an incident in Point Isabel after Officers William Crafts (seated at left) and ... Ignacio Trevino arrested Deputy Guillermo Sosa for carrying a gun. The next day, Sosa was at the Shamrock Bar on Elizabeth Street where he spoke with A.R. Baker, a former Texas Ranger and Constable Harry J. Wallis. Deputy Sosa complained that Crafts and Trevino had no right to disarm him and that his gun should be returned.

Baker and Wallis went to the White Elephant and demanded Crafts return Sosa’s gun to him. Crafts maintained he acted on orders from City Marshal Jose Crixell to arrest any unauthorized persons carrying firearms and suggested they call the Marshall on the phone. After speaking with the J. Crixell over the phone it appeared that the matter was quelled until Wallis began openly criticizing the city police force and was asked by Vicente to leave the saloon. Before Wallis could reach inside his coat to draw his gun he was grabbed on the wrist by Vicente and tossed out of the bar. Wallis immediately returned and the shooting began. Before the smoke cleared, Wallis and Baker had escaped to a nearby pharmacy. Miraculously, the mirrors behind the bar and glassware which fronted them were undamaged by the fusillade. Five other men in the saloon besides Baker, Wallis, V. Crixell, Trevino and Crafts managed to avoid injury. Trevino received a flesh wound on his abdomen and Baker was hit from behind in the shoulder and leg as he ran toward the exit facing Washington Street. A third bullet caught him on the abdomen but did not hit any vital organs. Baker told the Brownsville Daily Herald it was Vicente who shot at him and Trevino who shot at Wallis. All the principals, including Felix Calderon Valdez, a bartender, were arrested and soon afterward, released. To make a long story short, the Democratic “Blue Party” controlled the county police and the Independent “Red” Party, of which Vicente Crixell was a member, controlled the city police force. This was one of several incidents involving these two parties who sought control of local politics.

Sources: The Brownsville Daily Herald, 12/24/1910, 12/27/1910 and 12/29/1910.

When this photo was taken in 1915 there were several drinking establishments between 12th and 13th on Elizabeth St. They were the Crixell Saloon, Office Bar, Crystal Saloon, H.H. Weller Saloon, Bank Bar, American Billiard and Pool Parlor, Club Bar and Shamrock Bar.  It was common for public intoxication, police brutality, knife or gunfights, to spill out of the saloons and onto this street.  

On August 9, 1912, Marshal Crixell tied his horse in front of the Crixell Saloon and walked over to Deputy Sheriff Paul McAllister who was sitting on a chair in front of the Club Bar and concealing a .45 caliber pistol. McAllister fired at Crixell who was standing about five feet away. The marshal was hit several times, and then shot twice more as he lay dying.

The Obreros Lodge, Mexican Knights of Honor and the Woodmen of the World, all orders J.L. Crixell belonged to, were present for the funeral on August 12, 1912. A procession was led by eighty carriages and over a thousand people. Father Paulino S. Preciado delivered an address which included: “Death takes him from our side in tragic manner, depriving his people and numerous friends of his presence, Brownsville of a good marshal, and the poor of a good protector. Joe L. Crixell, … your spirit shall float clamoring for justice, and your people shall not forget you.”

After the shooting McAllister was whisked away and eventually tried in Hallettsville, TX where he was set free to turn up a few years later in Corpus.

[Story and photos compiled by Javier R. Garcia for a presentation in 2010 at Brownsville Heritage Museum.]

[insert photo of Crixell Saloon in museum here]

Editor's note:  I wanted to know what became of Paul McAllister who got away with the murder of Jose Crixell.  I had no farther to go than contact author/historian Norman Delaney who sent this via Ret. Colonel Murphy Givens who wrote this little story for Corpus Christi news publication.

From: Givens, Murphy
Subject: RE: Question
To: "Norman Delaney"
Cc: "Givens, Murphy"
Date: Friday, June 26, 2009, 3:19 PM

 I have more information, but not readily at hand. Here is the last thing I wrote about it:

It was Sunday at sundown, July 5, 1925, the time of the Scopes monkey trial in Tennessee . In Corpus Christi , three men left Bessie Miller’s, a house of, uh, sporting girls on Sam Rankin Street .

 One of the men was Paul McAllister, a game warden, and another was George Ryder of San Diego . A third was Rufus Mc Murray of Three Rivers. As McAllister and Ryder were getting into their car, two officers drove up — Constable C.M. Bisbee and Deputy Constable R.R. Bledsoe. Angry words were passed. Constable Bisbee looked at Ryder and said:

»Where you going?«

»San Diego.«

»No, you’re not,« said Bisbee. »You’re under arrest.«

»What for?«

»It don’t make no difference ‘what for’. I can lock you up for any reason I want to.«

Bisbee told Ryder he was tired of seeing him drunk, making a nuisance of himself.

»You can’t be,« said Ryder, »cause I don’t get drunk.«

»You’re a liar.«

Shots were fired and the shooting continued until five men were down. The sporting girls in Bessie Miller’s watched from the windows. The shootout left four men dead — officers Bisbee and Bledsoe, game warden McAllister, and Ryder of San Diego. The fifth man, McMurray of Three Rivers, was seriously wounded but survived.

Detectives learned that Deputy Constable Bledsoe started the violence when he shot Ryder in the leg, then shot the game warden McAllister, who had fallen to the ground in getting out of the car. Then it became a general shootout. For weeks, people would drive down Sam Rankin and point out Bessie Miller’s yard, site of one of the city’s worst shootouts in history.

*********

So why didn't Vicente or Teofilo and company take revenge after the murder of their brother?  Supposedly it was their mother who made them promise not to.  She had lost a son and did not want to lose another.

 

***from email 2017 0206 ***

Javier, long time no contact. After my family research project of a couple of years ago, I have not kept up with Brownsville, but I see that there is a bit of misinformation here and there in the e-mail below from Bronsbil Estación.

Where your blog says: 

“Jose' L. Crixell was born in 1871 on a ship in the Gulf of Mexico traveling from New Orleans to Bagdad...”

and:

“Jose' arrived in 1906 and opened a restaurant.” ---------

I have attached Joseph’s Death Certificate with its information provided by my grandfather/V.L., which says that Joseph was born in “Mexico” (meaning Matamoros), not on a ship in the Gulf.  Teofilo was born in New Orleans in 1867 and V.L. was born in 1869.  Since the big hurricane happened in 1867, which caused Vicente pere, Eliza, and those two sons to relocate from Baghdad to Matamoros, they weren’t on a ship in the Gulf by the time Joseph was born in 1871.

And the Brownsville Herald clippings in my research say that Teofilo and Joseph were in Brownsville in 1903, when Teofilo had “received the fixtures and furnishings for the saloon which he will open in the Barreda building on Elizabeth street and expect to be ready for business by May 1” of 1903 (not 1906).  On June 9 1903, Joe is named as the “manager of the Crixell Saloon,” such that he did not arrive in 1906 for a restaurant.

I’m sure that I will be corrected by whomever, maybe they arrived by 1903 and opened a restaurant in 1906, but my project of Herald clippings allows me to say that all I know is what I see in the newspaper
John A. Garza