GIRL OUTLAW: The Death of Flora Quick Mundis aka 'Tom King'

The exciting, checkered and lawbreaking career of Flora M. Quick Mundis,  who went by the name 'Tom King' is believed to have come to a violent and sad in January of 1903 in Clifton, Arizona.  Some records have her name as "Flora B. Quick" but many descendants seem to favor the "M".

At about 4:30 a.m. on January 28, 1903, in apartments over the Siranas Italian Saloon, a woman known locally as "China Dot" was shot four times by William Garrison. 

A bullet smashed her check entering her brain, one passed through her breast piercing a lung, one cut through her liver with an upward angle severing her spinal cord and paralyzing her. One bullet broke her right arm.

The shooter, William Garrison, son of Globe, Arizona James Garfield (former mayor of Springfield, IL), then turned the gun on himself. A bullet in his right temple took the top of his head off.

At the time of her death in 1903, after seven years living in Clifton, the papers of "China Dot", said local papers, revealed her to be "Mrs. F. B. Neal" of Warrensburg, Missouri.  As to the 'China Dot', it was said she earned her nickname by being a consort of the Chinese men who were in the area working for various mining companies. These Asian workers suffered racial prejudice and superstition as bad, perhaps worse, than local Hispanic, Native-American and African-Americans.

An alleged diamond trove valued at about $1,500 was missing and had been since the day of the shooting.  This was a common theme when popular working girls died. Many prostitutes gave the appearance that they were better off than they were for a variety of reasons. Often officials and family found they had little more than enough to cover the cost of a burial.

In a short time it was being claimed this was the noted Oklahoma female outlaw, 'Tom King" aka Flora Quick Mundis.  Details are lacking as to how this identification occurred other than one mention of a telegram sent to Missouri. One early newspaper had claimed she never allowed a photograph, and even granting some hyperbole, the issue of identification remains a question mark.

The news accounts are shallow of many facts. It is apparent that in several cases the news stories were more fiction than fact.  Colorful characters attract lurid tales like a magnet on a merry-go-round. She could have only been a successful escapee by using sexual allure; instead several articles indicate she merely outwitted guards.

Some researchers, on genealogy and historic sites,  have also expressed a question if the woman in Arizona might have been the sister of Flora.  Ellen Quick McGee apparently disappears after heading to Oklahoma but one story seems to indicate that the woman followed her sister in many ways.  

A tantalizing article appears in 1894 that seems to support the possibility.  The only article that gave good details on an Ettie/Effie (spelled both ways in some articles) McGee was "Tom King" Caught in Fredonia, KS." Weekly Oklahoma State Capital of Aug 11, 1894 that gives her an alias of Jessie Whitewings. This woman was masquerading as a man but was described as flaxen haired, 23, and very fleshy by this time.  It said was of her that she had been in Fort Sill and El Reno. I did find in the 1889 OKC Directory a listing for a "McGee, J. b-10 l-32 Noble, wife". Noble was a street south of Reno, about the SW 3 or 4th region now. This may or may not be the same couple but the time period is correct. Could she have disappeared to Arizona? If not, where did she go? Is it possible the labels about Flora being a fallen woman might have confused the two sisters?  If Jessie was in Guthrie at the same time as Flora it might be easy for such a confusion to have occurred. Was "Jessie Whitewings" the sister or was someone else simply using the name?

The woman who, as a young woman, had ridden the streets of Guthrie in fine dresses, who masqueraded as a man to become a highly successful horse thief, had, according to articles about her death, had become a prostitute. This seems out of character for a woman who donned, successfully, the male persona to effectively lead an outlaw life.

Most stories, even some that alleged to be actual local interviews, were labeled by at least one reporter as totally false and the creation of overactive imaginations among newsmen. Whatever the true case was, she was a woman who kept her secrets.  Even to her alleged death there is a veil of mystery. Most news accounts indicate she was identified as Tom King but there is scant information about who made that identification. One article indicated authorities sent a telegram to Missouri seeking information on the person named on papers found in China Dot's rooms in Clifton, Arizona. The response returned an identification as "Flora Quick Mundis."  No articles indicated who made that ID in Missouri or if anyone who had actually seen Flora/Tom viewed the body of China Dot. There are local stories her body was returned and buried near the Missouri home place.

Several mysteries surround this figure. There is strong evidence the newspapers made up half of the stories about here, that they blended together a tale of an exotic and well dressed prostitute in the Ingalls-Riply-Stillwater and Guthrie region known for her flashy dressing, fine horses and carriages and to drive up sales of their papers they labeled young women, such as Flora, with a harsh brush of infamy.

She loved adventure and excitement and I am sure that she is pleased that after over one hundred years her story can still generate a lot of adventure, mystery, and excitement.  It is the way she would have liked it.


Rose Dunn aka "Rose of the Cimarron", along with "Cattle Annie", "Little Britches", Jessie Finley (Finley), and Flora Quick Mundis aka Tom King would fill dramatically the void left by the mysterious murder of Belle Starr in 1889 near Eufaula.  A fascinating page of truly unique history...found in Oklahoma...on the fringes of "Hell." But - be warned - do not believe everything you read about any of these women!


Select Sources:
"Tom King". Guthrie Daily News (August 18, 1893, pg.1). Identifies her alleged history and labels her a "female horse thief."
"Mrs. Mundis Breaks Jail." Guthrie Daily News (June 28, 1893, pg. 1). Identifies jail break out of June 27 in Oklahoma City. Notes among those escaping were" William Roach (rapist), Ernest Lewis (Train robber), Mrs. Mundis alias Tom King ('noted female horse thief') who had escaped from jail just the week before.  The escape was made by cutting the steel bars of the cells and digging through the brick wall.
"A Bad Girl."  Weekly Oklahoma State Capital (Guthrie), (August 26, 1893, pg.1). Identifies her as living in Guthrie at corner of Grant Avenue and 4th Street. Notes no scandal had been attached to her until she swore out an arrest warrant on charge of rape for Dr. Jordan (who had disappeared from town).
"She Loved Excitement." News (Frederick, MD) (Sept 16, 1893, pg. 2). Identifies her as wife of livery man and horse dealer, Mundis.  Notes she had 'disappeared' some six months prior and that it was understood she was a 'daughter of a Cherokee Indian of some prominence.' Where, and why, she disappeared for some six months is a matter of some speculation. Other sources indicate she returned with her hair short, wearing men's clothes and calling herself Tom King.
"Tom King Breaks Jail." Phoenix Arizona Republican, December 10, 1893, pg. 4).  Notes escape from El Reno jail, O.T. Unlikely she will be captured, it states, because she was on a 'fleet horse' and 'was riding like the wind.'
"A Horse Thief." Gettysburg (August 21, 1894, pg. 1).  Shares the story she was a "quarter" Cherokee, that her people lived near Springfield, Missouri, and that 1 and one half years ago she was arrested on charges of being complicit with the Wharton Train Robberies and horse theft. Verifies she had escaped first from the Guthrie jail, then the Oklahoma City jail and then the jail in Canadian County, El Reno.
"Chinese Dot Dead Clifton Tragedy" Phoenix Arizona Republican (January 29, 1903;1). First of several articles beginning the process of identifying 'China Dot' with first one name, Mrs. B.F. Neal, and then to Flora Quick Mundis aka Tom King.
"Tom King Dead." Oklahoma State Register (February 5, 1903, pg. 1). A short piece that identifies, for some reason, the person who shoots the woman identified as Flora Quick Mundis, aka Tom King, as someone named "Fletcher."
"Miss 'Tom King' - Oklahoma Girl Bandit" by Nancy B. Samuelson (Twin Territory Journal, Dec.-Jan. 1990-1991, pp. 8-9).
"Flora Quick aka Mrs Mundis aka Tom King aka China Dot" by Nancy B. Samuelson (Quarterly of the National Association For Outlaw And Lawman History, Inc. {NOLA}, Oct.-Dec. 1996, V.22 N.4 pp. 22-27).
"Shoot From The Lip" by Nancy B. Samuelson (Shooting Star Press, 1998, pp. 6, 50-51, 111, 154, 181, 186).
"Bob Dalton's Bandit Bride" by Harold Preece (Real West Magazine - Mar. 1965 p10).
"Flora Quick, Alias Tom King" by Leola Lehman (Golden West magazine - Nov. 1966 p20 & The West magazine - Oct. 1974 p32);
"The Making of an Outlaw Queen" by Robert F. Turpin (Real Frontier magazine - Mar. 1970 p26).
"The Outlaw Was No Lady" by M. P. Lehman (Real West magazine - Oct. 1972 p.65).
"She Was The Jailor's Killer Sweetheart" by Glenn Shirley (Westerner magazine - Mar./Apr. 1974 p.46).
"Chris Madsen's Elastic Memory" by Nancy Samuelson (NOLA Journal Jan-Mar. 1992 p9).

["Chinese Dot Dead Clifton Tragedy" Phoenix Arizona Republican (January 29, 1903;1); Chris Enns at http://chrisenss.com/flora-mundis-lady-horse-thief-an-excerpt-from-the-bedside-book-of-bad-girls/ and various articles imply and state she was a prostitute.  However, a look at her time line indicates that prior to her adventures as a horse thief, there did not appear to be adequate time for a long term employment in the trade of a soiled dove. It should be remembered that newspapers and facts did not always go together during the late 19ths and early 20th century; opinion was as good as fact and rumor better than hard evidence.]

They Wore Pants, Carried a Gun or Rode Like A Cowboy: TOM KING aka FLORA QUICK MUNDIS

They were the newspaper writers dream come true and the inspiration for numerous 'penny dreadfuls' and dime novellas. Often ignored for their more violent, gun toting brethren, these women are an important chapter in the history of the westward expansion.

The challenges of the west often meant that some aspects of ‘civilization’ tended to fall under the onslaught of necessity.  It was not unusual for frontier women, from the era of Daniel Boone and beyond to have mastery in firearms that would have shocked people in eastern cities. The further west people moved the more flexible were the social structures defining gender roles. Hunting, riding, chopping wood, and a host of activities that their more rarefied sisters back would have seen as unladylike by Victorian standards were commonplace.    

Wearing men’s clothes was not a fashion statement as much as a safer alternative when forced to do certain work.  There was, to the western woman, a practical streak.  There was also, historic precedence, because in every nearly every conflict of the American nation there were women who donned male attire, signed up or joined in, and fought the enemy as defined in that moment. In the American Revolution, the Civil War, and in the American Frontier women dressed as men to either pass as a man or as a means to do the task of a man forbidden them as a woman.

In Oklahoma, there were several of these stories.  They are delightful in the sense that some adopted the costume but never tried to hide their identities, some hid their gender and their companions, by mutual consent, accepted them for what they presented themselves as and some even pulled the wool over everybody’s eyes in their masquerade.  They cannot be labeled with any common word s they were soldiers, outlaws, and cowhands.  There are probably more of them, hidden from history and family alike, and one can imagine that may still bring a chuckle to the ghosts of these women who shook free of social constraints to establish their unique place in history on their own terms.

"Tom King" was the alias of Flora M. Quick (some records state Flora B. Quick), a Missouri 'half-breed' Cherokee who married John Ora Mundis and then moved to Guthrie.  According to local papers, she had an affair with a local doctor and then left.  When next seen she had adopted male attire and was calling herself "Tom King." In 1893 there are many newspaper articles concerning this dashing person who loved excitement and did not want to be a home body. She was born in Missouri and died in Arizona in 1903.  It appears likely that the "doctor" may have assaulted Flora and not the other way around. Local newspaper writers (especially one) created stories out of the whole cloth and it is believed that is what happened to the horse thief Flora Quick Mundis aka Tom King. No accounts of her appear in print before her charges against the "doctor" who quickly fled town in a manner no innocent man would have under the circumstances.

One time U.S. Deputy Marshall, Charles Colcord in his autobiography indicates he and U.S. Marshall E.Nix, accompanied her to Massachusetts where she had been sentenced to serve four years at South Farmingham, just outside of Boston. He identified her a girl who had been on e of the 'wild bunch' that ran with Oklahoma outlaw Bill Doolin. She was about 20 years old at the time and 'not bad looking' which was a Victorian era criteria for potential respectability as low intelligence, evil and the like were thought to be plainly visible in all cases. "Bill Doolin told me that she had more nerve than most of the men in his gang." (pg. 175). Other records indicate this was NOT Flora Quick but a mangled account of another young female outlaw.

In 1894 she was apprehended in Fredonia, Kansas in the company of a former madam from Guthrie. Strangely, Flora was dressed as a woman and her companion was dressed as a man using the name "Ed Bullock".  Ettie McGree aka Jessie Whitewings was an "Oklahoma sport", a euphemism denoting a prostitute. There is a possibility this Ettie was Ellen McGee, sister to Flora.  Some sources claim Flora had also worked as a prostitute in Guthrie and various newspaper accounts seem to be in conflict as to when and why the Mundis couple separated.

Many legends, lies, and labels attached themselves to her and some tried to ride her coat-tails by claiming a lot of knowledge they did not have about her.  What is a matter of record is that she twice escaped from jail: in Guthrie and in El Reno.  She rode with some 'desperadoes' and stole  horses.  She may have planned some jobs for the Bill Doolin gang, as Charles Colcord in his autobiography indicates that outlaw described her as smart and daring. In 1903 she was allegedly going by the name 'China Dot' and was killed by a man (William Garland) in Arizona.  Some allege that William Garland was actually her estranged husband John Ora Mundis there are many questions related to the theory.  

Early drawing of 'Tom" ca 1893

An 'old-timer' in 1909 named J.E. Van Mattie in an interview said he remembered her from her days as a child in Holden, Missouri. He said she graduated from Holden College and after her unfortunate marriage with 'George Mundis' she lost all feelings for her family and severed ties.  That article shared the story that 'Tom King" had died in the Chinese Quarter of a California town about three years ago, known to the denizens of the underworld as "China Dot."  The sub-text of this story is that she had become either a prostitute or an opium addict. It seems unlikely a woman who rode the land as "Tom King" as horse thief would have entered the life of prostitution found in Chinese communities of the time.  This may rank on the same level as the theories she hit on jail guards to escape when she actually just out maneuvered them. When she broke jail in El Reno she got the key away from the guard and locked him up!  Then, to hide his cries for help, the other prisoners would break out in a rousing line of "Annie Rooney" every time the jailer called out.

"Tom" allowed no photographs, according to one source, and so an unnamed artist is believed to have sketched the depiction shown here.  The dress is supposedly what she was wearing when arrested. It was noted that she was dressed in the 'cowboy fashion': high heeled boots, white broad brimmed hat pushed far back on her head, trousers held up by leather cartridge belt. (Boston Post, Aug.22,1893, pg. 3. The image was found, uncredited in numerous other publications).

In 1903 local papers reported various version so of her life with different levels of accuracy and half-truths. Many said she had been killed in Arizona by a man named Fletcher (some accounts it was a William Garland) who turned the gun on himself. She was going by the name "China Dot" but her real name, according to reports at the time,  was Mrs. B.F. Neal. This is interesting because her mother's maiden name was "Neal" and so may have been an alias. 

Just what is the truth?  We may never really know. Maybe 'Tom' was like the 'Dread Pirate Roberts' of 'The Princess Bride' and simply passed on the identity....stranger things were known to have happened in the old west.