The train robbery by the James-Younger gang in 1874 at Gads Hill, Missouri, was a big news item of the day. Americannewspapers from as far away as New York and Boston carried the story, and journalists in St. Louis, Chicago, and even European cities wrote scathing editorials about the crime. In time, the excitement subsided, but the raid at Gads Hill had a lasting effect on the lives of the James and Younger brothers. Dramatic events that occurred during the robbery, retreat, and pursuit brought the bandits world-wide attention and became the source for much of the Jesse James legend we know today. Here, told largely by trainmen, passengers, farmers, detectives, outlaws, news reporters, and others who were directly or indirectly involved with thecrime, is a true, documented account of Frank and Jesse James, the Younger brothers, and Missouri�s first train robbery. Many of the photographs included have never been published.

The killing of the outlaw Jesse James did little or nothing to put an end to train robberies in the state of Missouri. After a daring train robbery just outside of Kansas City in 1898 the usual suspects were suspected, and this time the son of Jesse James, known by all as Jesse James, Jr., was thrown into the mix. At the age of 23, the son of the bandit was a popular, handsome young man with a reputation as an honest, hard worker. Had young Jesse decided to follow in his infamous father's footsteps after all, or was this just another chance for a railroad detective and a prosecutor to "get themselves a James" in a county that had never successfully prosecuted a train robbery case in its history? Read the events of this true story as they unfolded, in the words of the reporters who covered the case and in the words of the James family, who thought the days of persecution on account of their name were long behind them. Includes a four-chapter excerpt from the book, "Jesse James, My Father," written by Jesse James, Jr.

It was the beginning of the end for the James gang. In the past ten years Frank and Jesse James had gone from unknown ex-Confederate guerrillas to the most famous outlaws in the world. A string of daring robberies of banks, trains, and stagecoaches had brought them fame, admiration, hatred, and a surprisingly small amount of wealth. In 1876 they planned their most daring raid yet--to ride hundreds of miles from their home state of Missouri to rob the First National Bank at Northfield, Minnesota. Riding with them were Cole, Bob, and Jim Younger, famous outlaws in their own right and ex-bushwhackers like themselves. Charlie Pitts, Bill Chadwell, and Clell Miller, no strangers to gunfighting and outlawry, rode with them. They hit the bank on 7 September 1876. At least they tried. The tellers fooled the outlaws into thinking they didn't have a key to the safe, and as half of the gang wasted time inside arguing, the outlaws standing guard outside were attacked by the enraged citizenry. A bloody gunfight ensued on Northfield's town square, and before the smoke cleared Chadwell and Miller lay dead and nearly all of the gang had been wounded. They hurried out of town with a posse hot on their trail. Bob Younger was badly hurt, and when Frank and Jesse James suggested they leave him behind, the Younger brothers nearly drew their guns on them. The two parties went their separate ways. Frank and Jesse James had a running battle with several posses before making it back to Missouri and safety, but the Younger brothers and Pitts made slow progress. They only had stolen plough horses as mounts. A young boy spotted them and called for a posse to chase them. The outlaws got cornered in a growth of trees and after a long shootout in which Pitts was killed, they surrendered and ended up in prison. This book will tell the story of one of the most daring bank jobs in American history. With most of the gang being former bushwhackers, they used many guerrilla tactics in the planning and execution of the raid, yet failed because of poor discipline and their own fame, which meant that every town in the Midwest had their guns loaded waiting to fight off bandits. Just before the Northfield job, the James gang robbed the Missouri Pacific No. 4 train in order to get money for horses, equipment, and traveling expenses. Since this was preparation for the raid, it should be included in this book. It will add to the book's appeal because it gives the reader a classic Jesse James train robbery in addition to a bank holdup.

It was the beginning of the end for the James gang. In the past ten years Frank and Jesse James had gone from unknown ex-Confederate guerrillas to the most famous outlaws in the world. A string of daring robberies of banks, trains, and stagecoaches had brought them fame, admiration, hatred, and a surprisingly small amount of wealth. In 1876 they planned their most daring raid yet-to ride hundreds of miles from their home state of Missouri to rob the First National Bank at Northfield, Minnesota. This book will tell the story of one of the most daring bank jobs in American history. With most of the gang being former bushwhackers, they used many guerrilla tactics in the planning and execution of the raid, yet failed because of poor discipline and their own fame, which meant that every town in the Midwest had their guns loaded waiting to fight off bandits.

After the Civil War through 1876, almost every criminal escapade committed in the Midwest was laid at the feet of the James-Younger Gang. Their banditry suffered an inglorious end in September 1876, at the failed First National Bank robbery in Northfield, Minnesota. Frank and Jesse remained on the lamb for the next three years, living in seclusion and under aliases until Jesse was compelled in 1879 to ride again! This time, the bandit rode with hillbillies too young to have served in the War and too immature to have been loyal followers . . . ultimately proving to be the beginning-of-the-end for Frank and Jesse. It all began under the darkness of night at the backwoods Glendale Train Depot, six miles southeast of Independence, Jackson County, Missouri. Two years later, Bill "Whiskeyhead" Ryan stood trial for that heist, in the politically-charged and terrorized community, and in the same courtroom that still exists today in the Historic Truman Jackson County Courthouse on the Independence Square.

At sixteen, Jesse James began his fighting career by killing Unionist neighbours on their doorsteps. In the bloodshed and bitterness that followed the South's surrender at Appomattox, Jesse and his fellow guerillas, with their gunfights and hold-ups, became part of the intensely brutal struggle by the White South against the racial egalitarianism and Federal power fostered by Reconstruction. In the first serious biography of Jesse James in forty years, T. J. Stiles paints a strikingly new and vivid portrait of the period before the American Civil War, during the conflict and its aftermath. With groundbreaking scholarship and dazzling reinterpretation, T. J. Stiles has refashioned one of the great legends of American history.