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.

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.

By 1875, Alan Pinkerton had become infuriated by the agency’s failure to arrest even a single member of the gang. The agency had been hired in 1871 by several bankers and railroad owners to track down the deadly James-Younger Gang. In January, 1875 a Pinkerton agent Jack Ladd was posing as a field hand at work on the farm across the road from the James Farm. The farm, belonging to neighbor Dan Askew, served as a hideout for the Pinkerton spy. One afternoon, the agent thought he spotted Jesse and Frank at the farm house, though actually the brothers were miles away.

On January 26, six Pinkerton reinforcements surrounded the farmhouse and tossed a smoke bomb into the house, in an attempt to lure them out.

However, Archie Samuel, thinking it was a loose stick from the fire, tossed it "back" into the fireplace and the "bomb” exploded. The blast killed the young boy and wounded Zerelda’s hand so badly; she later had to have it amputated.