Jesse James - Folklore Hero or Cold Blooded Killer?

Jesse James - Page 4

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Jesse justified much of his actions by his hatred of the Industrial North, feeling as if he were continuing the fight through his outlaw activities. Beginning in 1866, the gang robbed their way across the Western frontier for the next fifteen years.

The first James-Younger bank robbery occurred on February 13, 1866 at the Clay County Saving Association Bank in Liberty, Missouri. The first daylight robbery during peacetime, the gang made off with over $60,000 in cash and bonds in bonds. As they made their escape, gunfire erupted and an innocent 17 year-old boy, by the name of George Wymore, was killed.

For the next several years, the gang continued in their crime spree robbing 8 more banks and a Kansas City Ticket office before robbing their first train. (See the list of banks on the James Gang Timeline.)

Not limiting who they robbed or killed, sometimes innocent by-standers were wounded or lost their lives while witnessing one of their crimes. During these years, the gang was constantly trailed by the Pinkerton Detective Agency.

Despite their criminal and often violent acts, James and his partners were much adored. In 1866 and 1867 John Newman contributed to the fame of the outlaws by writing glorifying articles and "dime novels.” Journalists, eager to entertain Easterners with tales of a wild West, exaggerated and romanticized the gang's heists, often casting James as a contemporary Robin Hood. While James did harass railroad executives who unjustly seized private land for the railways, modern biographers note that he did so for personal gain. Any humanitarian acts were more fiction than fact.

In fact, they could be ruthless. On December 7, 1869 the gang held up the Davies County Savings Bank in Gallatin, Missouri. The teller, a man by the name of John Sheets, was a former Union officer who was said to have been involved in the death of "Bloody” Bill Anderson. Jesse hated him and shot the man in the back of the head. When clerk William McDowell ran for the door, he too was shot, but survived the whole affair. Making off with only $700, a $3,000 reward was placed on their heads.

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Jesse James Bank in Liberty, Missouri, February, 2004, Kathy Weiser

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Inside the Jesse James Bank, February, 2004, Kathy Weiser

By the early 1870s robbing banks was getting riskier as banks increased their security with time lock vaults. But that didn’t slow down the gang – they turned to stagecoach and train robbery.

The James-Younger Gang robbed their first train near Adair, Iowa on July 21, 1873. During the robbery, they wrecked the Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad Train and overturned the engine. The train engineer died in the accident and the gang made off with $3,000 from passengers and funds retrieved from the express car.

By 1874 Jesse's crimes were a chief issue in Missouri's campaign: whether or not to suppress outlawry so that "capital and immigration can once again enter our state." But nothing was done; his raids continued.

After nine years of courtship, Jesse James married Zerelda Mimms, on April 23, 1874. The wedding ceremony was performed by Methodist Minister William James, Jesse's uncle and held in Kansas City. While honeymooning with his bride Zee on the Gulf of Mexico at Galveston, Texas , a reporter from the St. Louis Dispatch, did what the Pinkertons had failed to do, track down Jesse.

Frank and Jesse James

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In June of 1874, Frank married Annie Ralston in Omaha Nebraska. Though the brothers settled down for a time with their new brides, the gang was blamed for most every bank, stage coach, or train robbery that occurred almost anywhere in the west. Zerelda, the ever protective mother, began her own public relations campaign, spreading the folksy tales of the James gang and their roles as Robin Hood figures, stealing from the rich and giving to the poor.

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