Real Crime/Paranormal/Conspiracy Theories Book III

The James-Younger Gang

The James-Younger Gang was anotable 19th-century gang of American outlaws that revolved aroundJesse James and his brother Frank James. The gang was based in thestate of Missouri, the home of most of the members.

Membership fluctuated from robbery torobbery, as the outlaws' raids were usually separated by many months.As well as the notorious James brothers, at various times it includedthe Younger brothers (Cole, Jim, John, and Bob), John Jarrett(married to the Youngers' sister Josie), Arthur McCoy, GeorgeShepherd, Oliver Shepherd, William McDaniel, Tom McDaniel, ClellMiller, Charlie Pitts (born Samuel A. Wells), and Bill Chadwell(alias Bill Stiles).

The James-Younger Gang had its originsin a group of Confederate bushwhackers that participated in thebitter partisan fighting that wracked Missouri during the AmericanCivil War. After the war, the men continued to plunder and murder,though the motive shifted to personal profit rather than for theglory of the Confederacy. The loose association of outlaws did nottruly become the "James-Younger Gang" until 1868 atthe earliest, when the authorities first named Cole Younger, JohnJarrett, Arthur McCoy, George Shepherd and Oliver Shepherd assuspects in the robbery of the Nimrod Long bank in Russellville,Kentucky.

The James-Younger Gang dissolved in1876, following the capture of the Younger brothers in Minnesotaduring the ill-fated attempt to rob the Northfield First NationalBank. Three years later, Jesse James organized a new gang, includingClell Miller's brother Ed and the Ford brothers (Robert and Charles),and renewed his criminal career. This career came to an end in 1882when Robert Ford shot James from behind, killing him.

For nearly a decade following the CivilWar, the James-Younger Gang was among the most feared, mostpublicized, and most wanted confederations of outlaws on the Americanfrontier. Though their crimes were reckless and brutal, many membersof the gang commanded a notoriety in the public eye that earned thegang significant popular support and sympathy. The gang's activitiesspanned much of the central part of the country; they are suspectedof having robbed banks, trains, and stagecoaches in at least elevenstates: Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota,Texas, Arkansas, Louisiana, Alabama, and West Virginia.

History

Origins

From the beginning of the AmericanCivil War, the state of Missouri had chosen not to secede from theUnion but not to fight for it or against it either: its position, asdetermined by an 1861 constitutional convention, was officiallyneutral. Missouri, however, had been the scene of much of theagitation about slavery leading up to the outbreak of the war, andwas home to dedicated partisans from both sides. In the mid-1850s,local Unionists and Secessionists had begun to battle each otherthroughout the state, and by the end of 1861, guerrilla warfareerupted between Confederate partisans known as "bushwhackers"and the more organized Union forces. The Missouri State Guard and thenewly elected Governor of Missouri, Claiborne Fox Jackson, whomaintained implicit Southern sympathies, were forced into exile asUnion troops under Nathaniel Lyon and John C. Frémont took controlof the state. Still, pro-Confederate guerrillas resisted; by early1862, the Unionist provisional government mobilized a state militiato fight the increasingly organized and deadly partisans. Thisconflict (fought largely, though not exclusively, between Missouriansthemselves) raged until after the fall of Richmond and the surrenderof General Robert E. Lee, costing thousands of lives and devastatingbroad swathes of the Missouri countryside.