Hard Way Out of Hell

by Johnny D. Boggs

  “Golly,” Jesse said.

  Frank spurred his bay forward, and, with masks covering our faces, we rode out of the woods, firing pistols in the air. Most of the boys headed for the express car, but I led my brothers to the passenger cars still on the tracks. Men and women were dropping from the windows, staggering away from the wreckage.

  “Stay where you are!” I yelled, and sent a bullet into the night sky. “Stay where you are and you won’t be hurt.”

  Gun drawn, John swung from his sorrel and made a beeline for a drummer with a satchel, money belt, and bowler, but I stopped him. He spun around, staring at me.

  “We don’t rob citizens,” I said.

  We didn’t. Not then, at least. I kept telling myself that we took money from banks, not people, and railroads, which robbed our people blind. If such is your ambition, you can convince yourself of anything.

  “Watch them,” I said, turning my horse. “Let them out, but keep them by the cars. And don’t steal as much as a kiss from a pretty girl.” I crossed the tracks and eased my way to the express car. Charlie Pitts and Clell Miller waited on the ground, while Frank and McCoy stood on the side of the overturned car, having pulled the door open. Inside, I could hear Jesse’s voice.

  “Damn you, we are grangers. We rob the rich and give to the poor. Where is the bullion? The bullion? Where is it?”

  He poked his head out of the door. The white mask hiding his face had been removed. Sometimes, I think Jesse wanted everyone to recognize him. “I need help,” he was saying. “Help. Such a set of robbers as you are … get in here and help me.”

  McCoy jumped in, with Pitts and Clell following, while Frank shook his head, climbed down, and took his horse’s reins.

  Once again, Jesse’s head appeared. “Damnation, we need a wagon.”

  As he bit off a chaw of tobacco, Frank turned, working the tobacco with his teeth. “Why don’t you ride back to Adair and rent us one?”

  For the son of a Baptist preacher, Jesse replied with an oath that would have gotten his hide flayed and his mouth washed out with soap had he used such language in front of his mother.

  “Get what you can,” I told him, “and let’s ride.”

  McCoy came up with heavy sacks. He had followed Jesse’s example and removed his mask.

  Some old man had climbed out of one of the cars and assaulted us with boisterous talk. “You scoundrels can go to hell! Who’s with me? Come on. Come out, follow me, and let us go for these villains!” No one joined him, of course, but he went right on yelling. He was still yelling when we rode off. As his voice trailed off, we dashed for the state line.

  * * * * *

  “This is all y’all got?” Frank said, looking up from the sack.

  Dawn had found us among the hickory, oak, and razor ridges of the Loess Hills east of the Missouri River.

  “How much is there?” Brother John asked.

  With a shrug, Frank said: “Two thousand … maybe.”

  That prompted a loud whistle from Arthur McCoy. “That’ll make me a favorite with the ladies in Saint Louey … and keep me drunker than Hooter’s goat for a coon’s age.”

  Ignoring the loudmouth, Frank stared harder at his brother. “Where the hell’s the bullion, Dingus? That train was supposed to be hauling seventy-five thousand in gold and silver.”

  “Wasn’t no bullion,” Jesse said defensively. “Must’ve been on another train.”

  Frank spit.

  “He’s right, Bud,” Charlie Pitts said. “Dingus asked for the bullion, and that damned expressman, he just pointed at some bars scattered amidst all the other truck and garbage. That was some wreck.”

  “Bars?” I asked.

  “Yeah,” Jesse said. “Like lead bars. No use to us.”

  Well, it had been mighty dark inside that express car. Frank stared at me, and finally, I started grinning, then laughing.

  Yes, this was the great James-Younger Gang, robbing from the rich to give to the poor, men who schemed robberies like Robert E. Lee planned battles. Strategists we were. Players of chess. Men who did not know what bullion looked like. On the other hand, Jesse had been right. We needed a wagon for that job, and $2,000 seemed better than a hangman’s noose.

  “I suppose you could have done better, Bud,” Jesse hissed, finding no humor that morning.

  All laughter stopped. “I don’t suppose, Dingus.”

  “All right. You try leading this outfit,” he said.

  Frank and I exchanged glances, then turned back toward Jesse. Before I could open my mouth, Frank had started.

  “The way I remember things, Dingus, is that you were working the farm with Ma and the doc when Cole and I were riding with Quantrill. That Cole and I were at Lawrence, and that you didn’t get your nose bloodied till you up and joined with Bloody Bill.”

  “I got more than my nose bloodied, Buck.” Jesse was dead right about that.

  “Yep. But I don’t recall you being elected captain of this outfit.”

  Truth is, none of us had. Ours was a loose-fitting group. You rode with us if you were invited, and if you had a like mind. We divided evenly, and our captains changed with the wind. Jesse had led us at Adair, Columbia, Russellville. I guess Frank and I had planned Liberty. I’m not sure anyone organized the Corydon robbery. And that little spree we went on in 1874? Well, we all had a hand in those jobs.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  During the fall of 1873, Jesse, Frank—and even Arthur McCoy—had their say in a supplement to the St. Louis Dispatch. John Newman Edwards had left the Times and moved east, taking a job in St. Louis, and we met with him outside of town near Daniel Boone’s old haunts. Jesse wanted to meet the journalist in person, and, as a storied newspaperman, Edwards felt delighted at the opportunity to interview Jesse James and other outlaws. I was there for that meeting, too.

  He titled his article “A Terrible Quintette,” Edwards’ sanitized essay about five Missouri boys, unable to live in peace after the war, now pursued by lawmen. Frank, McCoy, John, and I made out all right, I guess, but you could tell just by reading that Edwards loved Jesse, or who he thought Jesse was, maybe even who he had turned Jesse into. I didn’t care that much for the article, as most of it quoted Jesse denying that he or Frank had been involved in any robbery. He never denied any Younger presence, though. Jesse became a saint. Maybe he became the leader of our gang.

  On a cold December night that year, Frank, Jesse, Clell Miller, John, and I met at the Rubicon.

  “Where’s McCoy?” John asked.

  “He talked too damned much,” Jesse said.

  Talked? Past tense. John shot me a look, but we asked no questions. Hell, none of us had cared much for the Wild Irishman, anyhow. “Forget about him. Let’s ride.”

  * * * * *

  Most farmers we met showed kindness to us. We would stop at some home, ask for food or shelter, and we always left one of our men outside with the horses. We chopped wood for the farmers, and we paid for our meals in gold, silver, or greenbacks, and we paid very well.

  With posses increasing in Missouri, we decided to spend some time down south in Louisiana. Knowing that we would likely find some work to do wherever we went, I wanted the best horses I could find—in case a posse came after us. I knew exactly where to find one for myself.

  Everyone in Clay County claimed that Maise Walker raised the best horses in the state. So I rode to the farm on the other side of Liberty late one evening, dismounted, and climbed to the top pole of a round pen. Maybe a dozen horses moved around in the corral, and the worst of the lot would have sold for prime.

  The one catching my eye, however, did not rank among the worst. A chestnut, she stood fifteen hands, short-backed, deep-girthed, and carrying her tail in a high arch, full of vim and vigor. Her shoulders were long and sloping, and her eyes brimmed with a fiery confidence whenever she studied m
e. A horse like that would carry a man far.

  “Howdy, Cole.”

  Turning, I gave Maise Walker a nod and smile, and stuck my thumb out toward the chestnut. “Admiring your horses, Mr. Walker,” I said. “I’d like that mare yonder.”

  Maise Walker had forty pounds over me, and I was not a small man. His muscles strained at the threads of his muslin shirt, and his hands looked like hams. Neighbors said he had little use for firearms, but, before I could jump, he had reached behind his back and pulled an old Colt Dragoon.

  He waved the big .44 at my face. “You’ll pay gold, Cole,” he demanded.

  “Such was my intention, sir.” My left hand came out of my vest pocket with a leather pouch that jingled. Maise Walker’s Dragoon disappeared, though how a man could carry a massive horse pistol stuck in his waistband at the small of his back intrigued me.

  I rode out with a bill of sale in my pocket.

  * * * * *

  So we drifted down to Louisiana, gambling in Shreveport, where Jesse wrote a letter to the St. Louis Dispatch denying any involvement in the Adair train robbery. He said he was in Deer Lodge, Montana, and thought that to be a fine, fine joke. By January, the weather turned bitterly cold, so, donning heavy Yankee greatcoats, we drifted back home. That’s when Jesse got the idea to rob the eastbound Shreveport-Monroe stagecoach.

  While Frank, Jesse, Clell, John, and I began retrieving valuables from passengers, the westbound stagecoach rode up—so we robbed that one, too. The eastbound netted us $800 or so. The westbound, on the other hand, carried no passengers and no mail, so we paid the driver five dollars for his trouble and sent him on his way. That made us laugh, and we decided to refund the eastbound folks five or ten dollars for their troubles. We also stole newspapers to read on the ride north and to help us start campfires. About an hour later, we galloped toward the Arkansas border.

  Well, Jesse felt quite satisfied with our haul, which chafed Frank. So Frank came up with the idea to rob the Malvern-Hot Springs stage as we left Hot Springs after enjoying the nepenthe and relief of those warm healing waters.

  That one wasn’t really well planned, either. Spotting the stagecoach, we got out of the road and let it pass. Then Frank pulled a double-barrel shotgun from the scabbard, brought a bandanna up over his mouth and nose, turned his sorrel, and put the spurs to her. Laughing, we followed his example.

  “Stop this coach,” Frank told the driver, pointing the shotgun in the stunned man’s face. “Or I’ll blow your damned head off.”

  The driver stopped, and back to work we went.

  When I jerked the door open, the first gent I saw was an old man with a wooden leg. “You stay put, old-timer,” I said. “But the rest of you …” Feeling like a gentleman, I held the door open, and chatted with the invalid while John, Clell, and the James boys went to work.

  Hot Springs drew all sorts, including plenty of Yankees. Jesse collected a fine gold watch, plenty of cash, and a diamond pin from a guy from Dakota Territory. Frank relieved a Massachusetts Yankee of more than $650. While the others deposited valuables into the grain sack Clell held, something came over me of a sudden.

  “Did any of you wear the gray during the late war?” I asked.

  An old man nodded. With the barrel of Navy Colt, I motioned him over.

  “What’s your name, sir?”

  “Crump,” he said, staring at his feet.

  “Collect what we took from you, Mr. Crump,” I said. “We do not rob former Confederate soldiers.”

  Of course, Jesse had to get the last word in. “We do not rob our comrades with the Confederacy,” he said, sounding a lot like John Newman Edwards. “It is Northern men that we seek. For men of the North drove us into outlawry, and we shall make them pay for such unjust treatment.”

  Our haul was right around $2,000, including the watches and like. Frank explained to Jesse: “A stagecoach bringing folks to Hot Springs should be more promising than two stagecoaches bound for Shreveport or Monroe, Dingus.”

  Jesse chuckled at the mock rebuke. “Well, all this proves is that we James boys have better ideas than our Younger minions.”

  Ah, but I was already thinking of a plan. One of the Arkansas newspapers we had taken off the Shreveport coach had printed a train schedule and a small article about a railroad.

  “Boys,” I announced as we followed a road that ran alongside the Cairo and Fullerton Railroad line. “I have a plan for a job myself.” Mine would net us more money than any stagecoach job, I figured, and give me an opportunity to show how I could hornswoggle the press, too.

  As we drifted northeast, toward Cairo, Illinois, I turned to Frank and asked: “How would Gads Hill strike you, Buck?”

  Frank laughed, and quoted from Henry IV, Part I: “ ‘At Gad’s Hill! There are pilgrims going to Canterbury with rich offerings, and traders riding to London with fat purses.’ ”

  Shaking his head, Jesse spit in the cold. Frank thought of another line: “ ‘If you will go, I will stuff our purses full of crowns.’ ”

  Grinning at my pal, I said: “I figured you’d like the symbolism, Buck.”

  “What are you two talking about?” Jesse asked.

  “ Henry the Fourth, Part One,” Frank explained.

  “If it ain’t in the Bible,” Jesse said, “I don’t care about it.”

  “It’s not about the Bible or the Bard,” I said. “It’s about a train. And a little faraway place that actually got its name from Charles Dickens. It’s about money, Dingus. Does that interest you?”

  * * * * *

  Gads Hill lay in the rough country in the southeastern corner of the state, right on the tracks of the St. Louis, Iron Mountain, and Southern Railway. Turning north, we followed the Black River into southeastern Missouri. We spent the night in the barn on a widow’s farm outside of Piedmont, and rode into Gads Hill around 3:00 p.m. the next day.

  Three houses, a station platform, a mercantile, and a sawmill that no longer had any saws and probably had not seen a speck of sawdust in ten years. The place wasn’t anything more than a flag station for the railroad.

  “This?” Jesse shook his head and let out a mirthless chuckle.

  “Gather the citizens, John,” I said. “Tell them it’s a camp meeting.”

  The only gun we found was at the mercantile, and the owner gave it up a lot quicker than he did the money in his till.

  When we had corralled the citizens, poor folks with their young ’uns, we built up a good fire to keep them warm while we sat around, smoking and waiting. About an hour later, after checking the schedule I had liberated, I snapped shut my gold watch. “About that time,” I said, and directed Frank to set the red flag on the side of the tracks. Five minutes later, the Number Seven came into view, chugging hard on the grade. The engineer stuck his head out the cab, saw the flag, and hit the brakes.

  Slowly but perfectly, the train pulled to a stop at the station.

  “That, Dingus,” I whispered, “is how you stop a train.”

  As the engineer and conductor ran to me, I drew my Navy, and thus began our fun.

  Jesse took the express car, liberating bills, coin, and the Adams agent’s revolver, and even signed the receipt book: Robbed at Gads Hill.

  John stayed by the station, chatting with the engineer, fireman, brakeman, and conductor, while keeping an eye on the citizens still hovering by the bonfire. Clell, Frank, and I visited the other cars—a smoker, a ladies car, and a Pullman sleeper.

  “We robbing citizens now?” Clell whispered.

  “Depends on the citizens,” I said, and fired a shot into the ceiling of the first car. I had determined that more Yankees would ride this train. “Show us your hands!”

  Frank picked up on my intention. “For we do not wish to rob ladies or working men.”

  I stopped to study a pair of weasels in blue suits and brown hats. “What do
you plug-hats do?” I asked.

  The older one ground his teeth. His fool underling said: “We’re bankers.”

  “Bankers?” I laughed, and stepped aside as Clell leaned over with his wheat sack.

  “Why don’t y’all make a deposit?” Clell suggested.

  A spindly gent sat alone at the rear of the car, long-nosed, big-eared, bald, and pale. He put a coin purse, a ring, and a billfold into Clell’s bag.

  “What do you do?” Clell asked.

  “I preach the Word of God,” he said softly.

  “Take back your money, Reverend,” I said. “And pray for us.”

  I’m not altogether certain that he prayed on our behalf, but he did get his valuables back.

  Now, this was not the greatest crime we had or would ever pull off, but it had to be the most fun. On our way out of the cars, we stopped again to torment the two plug-hats and forced them outside. They thought we would kill them, but all we did was make them strip down to their unmentionables and take a stroll into the woods.

  Frank gave back a watch when the baggagemaster said it had been a present, and I made faces at a pretty little baby that made both her and her ma smile. The daddy didn’t care much for it, though.

  When we were done, we walked back toward the engine, where Jesse and John had already mounted.

  “Mr. Wetton”—Frank stuck his hand out toward the engineer—“it has been our pleasure. Should you see any other red flags down the line, I think you would do well to stop.”

  The rest of us shook hands, too, those already mounted leaning down and extending their hands. We thanked the conductor, the brakeman, gave them our best, and tipped our hats to the citizens of Gads Hill still warming themselves by the bonfire.

  Frank gave them one more bit of Shakespeare. “ ‘And I have heard it said, unbidden guests are often welcomest when they are gone.’ ”