Who Was Lester Moore & Why Was His Grave So Important In Tombstone?

In Tombstone, a grave for a man named Lester Moore makes a momentary appearance and serves as an important bit of symbolism in the film. Tombstone, the classic 1993 Western, tells the story of the legendary Earp brothers and their friend Doc Holliday as they work to bring order and justice to the lawless frontier. Kurt Russell (Wyatt Earp), Bill Paxton (Morgan Earp), and Sam Elliott (Virgil Earp) all earned praise as the Earp brothers, but it was Val Kilmer’s doomed, sickly portrayal of Doc Holliday that stole the movie and Tombstone‘s ending. Along with the actor, the magic of Tombstone was down to how real the movie felt.

Small touches throughout the movie helped to create the feeling of being dropped into the Old West. That includes a small, weatherbeaten graveyard at the edge of town that served up the most memorable headstone in movies. As the Earps make their way from Tuscon to Tombstone, the camera zooms in on an old grave in Boot Hill Cemetery. It reads, “Here lies Lester Moore, Four slugs from a 44, No Les No More.” It’s a darkly comedic epitaph and a bit of foreshadowing that Wyatt Earp, his brothers, and Doc Holliday won’t get a warm welcome in Tombstone.

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Lester Moore & His Grave In Tombstone Aren’t Real

According to legend, Lester Moore was a Wells Fargo & Co. station agent in the border town of Narco, Arizona who lived and died around the time in which Tombstone was set. Moore was killed when a man named Hank Dunstan, arrived at the station to retrieve a package from Wells Fargo, which, at the time, provided express delivery services across the frontier. Dunstan’s package was damaged, and in a rage, he shot at the station agent, hitting Moore four times in the chest. Moore died, but not before getting in his own fatal shot at Dunstan. Moore was buried in Boot Hill Cemetery, with the famous epitaph etched on his tombstone. No one knows where Dunstan’s body was laid to rest.

As brilliantly tongue-in-cheek as the epitaph is, neither it nor Lester Moore are real. The story is very much one that might have realistically played out in the Old West. However, there is no record of anyone named Lester Moore ever being shot and killed in Arizona Territory at the time. Nor is there any evidence of anyone named Hank Dunstan having ever been in that area, or any record of where his grave is located. Moore’s is one of a few fake graves in Boot Hill placed among the real burial plots to play to the tourists who visit the cemetery every year. Ultimately, the shot of Lester Moore’s grave is a fun, but fictitious, moment in Tombstone.

Why Lester Moore’s Grave Appears In Tombstone

Lester Moore’s grave may be fake, but Boot Hill Cemetery is very much a real place and historical landmark in Tombstone, Arizona. The cemetery was first erected in 1878; the events of Tombstone happened in 1881, which aligns with history. After 1883, Boot Hill only saw a few more burials, accepting a few dead outlaws and other lawless types. It got its name from the fact that the men buried there “died with their boots on,” all true gunslingers, lawmen, outlaws, and bandits.

Tombstone was filmed in various locations, both on set and on location. While the majority of filming happened at the Old Tucson Studios in Mescal, Arizona, the production also shot in and around Arizona. One of these real locations was Boot Hill Cemetery in Tombstone. Tombstone has been preserved as a historical monument and looks today pretty much exactly as it did back in the 1880s, so it served as the ideal filming location, and including Boot Hill gave the movie an extra bit of authenticity. While Lester Moore isn’t real, he still provided Tombstone with a perfect bit of dark humor and foreshadowing in the perfect location.