Pearl "Bandit Queen" Hart

When we took our daytrip to Miami and Globe, we stopped by a couple of cemeteries. Resting in the Pinal Cemetery, near Globe, is Pearl Hart Bywater. Debe showed us where her grave was located and told us a brief history on her escapades. Sharon (Autumnforest) told me that she would make a great post, so I took her advice. I did some research on Pearl but there a many conflicting stories of her life. Some of the details are uncertain and often inconsistent leaving many to speculate what the real story is on this Arizona outlaw’s life. She is acknowledged as the only known female stagecoach robber in Arizona’s history earning her the nicknames of “Bandit Queen” or “Lady Bandit”. She was born Pearl Taylor in 1871 in Lindsay, Ontario, Canada. Her parents were religious and wealthy affording her the best education. Her father, James, was a civil engineer who moved his family to Toledo, Ohio in 1878. She was enrolled in boarding school at the age of 16. It was there where she met a young