The Woman Who Loved Jesse James

by Cindi Myers

  Zerelda greeted me stiffly but not unkindly when we arrived at the farm. “You’re looking well, Zee,” she said. “At least we know you come from good stock, and shouldn’t have too much trouble bearing children.” Zerelda herself had borne eight children by now. In addition to Jesse, Frank and their sister Susan from her first marriage, there had been another son, Robert, who died in infancy. With Reuben, she had Sarah, John Thomas, Fannie and the youngest, Archie.

  Charlotte made more of a fuss over me. “You sit right down by the fire and put your feet up to keep them from swelling,” she said. “And I’ll bring you a warm tonic to settle your stomach and strengthen your blood.”

  In addition to Zerelda, Reuben, the four younger children and Charlotte, the household included two more black servants—eighteen-year-old Ambrose and six-year-old Perry. Clel Miller was also a frequent visitor, often staying for dinner. Clel could always make me laugh with his stories and jokes.

  As much as I’d dreaded this visit, I found myself enjoying it. I began to feel better, too. Charlotte and Zerelda prescribed soothing herbal teas for my nausea and cooked rich puddings and eggnogs to build my strength. The children vied to wait on me, and delighted in entertaining me with songs and skits.

  Jesse joined us after a week, his arrival charging the atmosphere in the house with a contagious joy. He loved the farm where he had grown up, and he delighted in being with his younger half-brothers and sisters—fifteen year-old Sarah, thirteen-year-old John, ten-year-old Fannie and especially eight-year-old Archie. Named after Jesse’s friend Archie Clement, the baby of the family was a particular favorite.

  Surrounded by the love of family, I could never remember being happier. When one is in the midst of it, happiness seems the strongest emotion imaginable, something so big and powerful nothing could defeat it. Yet it is the most fragile thing, like a dream made of spun sugar. In an instant it can shatter, destroyed by unimaginable fear and cruelty. In a single instance, so much is lost, and no matter how hard we try, we are never able to abandon ourselves to that joy again.

  Chapter Eight

  January 25, 1874, fell on a Sunday. After church we settled into a pleasant day of visiting and socializing. Frank rode over, though due to the threat of snow, Annie remained behind in Kansas City. Clel Miller came to visit. If the men were worried about recent rumors that the governor had joined forces with the Pinkertons in pursuit of them, they gave no sign of it.

  Sarah, John and Fannie were excited about a party that evening at a neighbor’s house. Archie, too young for the party, cried at being left behind, but Zerelda dressed him in the new suit he had received that Christmas and made a fuss over him, and Jesse promised to take him into Kearney soon and buy him a present.

  We had a hearty dinner, with good food and good company. Afterwards, Jesse, Frank and Clel took their leave. Jesse caught me as I made my way down the hallway from the kitchen to the parlor. He wrapped his arms around me and gave me a long kiss. “You look beautiful tonight, Zee,” he whispered.

  “You should stay home tonight,” I said, caressing his throat. “We can go to bed early.” Marriage had earned us a bed to ourselves in one of the tiny attic rooms, a step up from sharing quarters with Jesse’s half-brothers and sisters.

  “I’d like that.” He kissed my cheek. “But I promised Buck and Clel I’d ride out with them. On the way over here this morning, Buck heard there were a couple of strangers in the area, asking a lot of nosy questions. It’s made him nervous as a cat and he won’t give any of us peace until we check it out.”

  This news made my stomach knot, but I had learned not to allow my fear to show. “Be careful,” I said, the caution and blessing uttered by every mother and wife since Eve. If only words had the power to keep our loved ones safe.

  After the men left, the rest of us sat in the parlor, talking and watching the fire in the stove until the children returned from their party. Zerelda and Reuben and the children all bedded down in the large front room, near the fire, while I retired upstairs. Still exhausted in those early days of my pregnancy, I slept the sleep of the dead.

  I awoke after midnight, to screams and wailing and the smell of smoke. At first I thought I was dreaming, and I struggled against the heavy lethargy of deep sleep.

  The hollow ring of gunfire brought me to my senses, and my heart pounded as if trying to escape my chest. Fumbling for my wrapper in the darkness, I stumbled downstairs and into a scene out of my worst nightmares:

  Charlotte, John and Perry were clustered around a bloody figure in front of the fireplace. With a sickening jolt, I realized the body was that of little Archie, drenched in blood, his face almost unrecognizable in its anguish.

  I heard a deep moan from the other side of the room and turned to see Dr. Samuel tending to his wife. Zerelda’s eyes were closed, though her mouth was open, moaning in pain. She, too, was drenched in blood, but clearly alive. Ambrose, blood running from his scalp, struggled to carry the woman, who was half again his size, to her bed. A veil of gray smoke filled the room and the stench of blood and ash and charred flesh made my stomach roil.

  But I didn’t have time to think of myself. I rushed to help. Ambrose, Dr. Samuel and I managed to get Zerelda to her bed on the other side of the room. Her right arm dangled limp, and she was in and out of consciousness. The sight of my mother-in-law, a giant of a woman in both size and spirit, reduced to such a state shook me almost as much as the reality of Archie’s injuries.

  But I had no time to mourn these shocks. I left Fanny to tend to her mother and turned my attention to Archie. As I approached, Charlotte’s eyes caught mine and she sadly shook her head. “He’s hurt mortal bad,” she said, and pulled a blanket up to his chin.

  I began to cry, sobs tearing at my body. John, at thirteen already taller than me, put his arm around me and tried to comfort me. I had a sudden image of him eight years previous, little older than Archie, greeting me from the branches of the coffee bean tree. That he would try so hard now to be a man in the midst of so much suffering among those he loved made me weep all the more.

  After seeing his wife safely in bed and determining there was nothing more he could do for his son, Reuben had run out into the yard and shouted for help. Neighbors, having heard the shouts, gunshots and commotion, began to arrive. Doctors were sent for, blankets were fetched. Someone wrapped me in one and ushered me to a chair in the corner, where I was given a cup of strong tea and a hot brick was placed beneath my feet. “What happened?” I asked, over and over, but it would be the next day before I was able to piece the whole story together:

  Shortly after midnight, Ambrose, who had been sleeping in the kitchen with the other servants, woke to the sound of voices just outside the house. He smelled smoke, and got up and looked out the window and saw the shadows of men moving about. Before he could sound the alarm, the window shattered.

  At first, Ambrose thought someone had fired into the house. Then he saw a large metal ball rolling about the kitchen floor.

  By this time, the noise had awakened Reuben and Zerelda. Flames licked from beneath the wallboard of the house. Reuben tore at the burning wood, trying to put out the fire, while Zerelda ran into the kitchen. She found the metal ball, which was also burning now, and tried to kick it out the door, but it proved too heavy. Reuben rushed in and scooped up the burning ball and carried it to the fireplace in the front room. Zerelda and the servants beat at the burning siding with quilts and succeeded in smothering most of the flames.

  By this time, everyone in the house was awake but me. The children gathered with their parents and servants around the fireplace, wondering what to do next. They sensed there were still people outside of the house, but they didn’t know how many, or if they were heavily armed. They were debating what to do when the metal ball in the fireplace exploded.

  Fragments on the bomb struck Reuben and Ambrose in the head, but the glancing blows only momentarily stunned them. A larger chunk caught Zerelda in the arm, and she collapsed, screaming
.

  But it was Archie, standing closest to the fireplace, who bore the brunt of the explosion. Burning metal fragments ripped through his little body. He lingered for several hours, but from the first, there was little hope.

  After the neighbors began to arrive, Archie was carried to Zerelda’s bed so that she could say good-bye. I had always thought her a strong woman, hard even, and fearless. But that night I saw a different side of her, as vulnerable as any mother could be. Her face was a mask of grief as she stroked Archie’s hair and cradled his limp body. “I thought it would be Frank or Jesse I would have to lose first,” she whispered, her eyes blurred with tears. “I know the risks they take and I was prepared to accept their fate. But Archie . . .” She kissed her son’s forehead and rested her cheek against his. “My baby. He never did anything to hurt anybody. Why should he be taken from me?”

  Archie died before dawn and as the sun rose I clutched Zerelda’s left hand as Dr. Allen from Liberty, Missouri amputated her right arm just below the elbow. Zerelda held me in an iron grip, but made no sound as the doctor sawed off her arm, nor would she accept the whisky offered as the only anesthesia. When the Justice of the Peace convened a coroner’s jury in the front room that evening to determine the events of the night before, Zerelda was able to give a clear, dignified testimony despite what must have been terrible pain, both mentally and physically.

  My respect for her grew tenfold that night, and I wished for even a fraction of her strength to deal with the ordeal ahead.

  A sheriff’s posse arrived the next day, as Ambrose and Reuben worked to replace the burnt siding on the house and repair the broken window. Archie was to be buried the following morning; I helped Charlotte prepare his body, combing his hair and dressing him in the little suit of Confederate gray that had so delighted him two nights before.

  I thought the posse had set out in pursuit of the fiends who had murdered a little boy and maimed his mother, but as I listened at the door while they addressed Reuben, I realized to my horror that they were intent on tracking Jesse and Frank. I bit my finger to keep from crying out as they informed Reuben that they had posted guards all around the farm, so that no one could leave or arrive without their notice. They demanded the right to search the house, then, not waiting for permission, pushed past the men and came inside.

  The sight of the little body stretched out on the kitchen table stopped them momentarily. Avoiding our eyes, the three who had been designated to search quickly removed their caps and bowed their heads. “What do you mean, intruding like this on a house of grief?” I demanded.

  “Who are you?” one of the men asked.

  I drew myself up to my full height. “I am Mrs. Jesse James,” I said.

  “Then I am very sorry for you, ma’am.” He replaced the hat on his head and moved past me, into the front room.

  Even after the posse left us, we could have no peace. Strangers and inquisitive neighbors gathered in the yard and along the road. Annie took the train from Kansas City the morning of the funeral. She hired a driver to bring her from the station and threatened those who blocked her way with an iron-tipped parasol if they didn’t let her pass.

  “Have you heard from Frank?” a tearful Zerelda asked when Annie stopped beside her bed to offer her sympathies.

  Annie shook her head. “I don’t expect he or Jesse will risk communicating with us as long as they know we’re being watched.”

  Somehow, we got through the funeral, watched over by the government’s guards and the curious crowd. Afterwards, I took to my bed, sick with grief and worry over Jesse. Every hour a new rumor reached our ears, along with sensational newspaper stories. Some reported that Jesse, Frank, and Zerelda James had all been killed in the raid. Others said the house had been burned to the ground. I began to see the unreliability of the press to ever get at the real story.

  Gradually, however, more of the truth came to light. In the middle of the night, a group of Pinkerton agents had surrounded the Samuels’ house and set fire to the siding, then launched the little bomb through the window. One agent claimed they had only intended to illuminate the interior of the house so they could see who was inside, but others argued their intention from the first had been to maim and kill, to exact revenge for the death of one of their colleagues at the hands of the James brothers the previous year.

  While the governor and the Pinkertons and their posses might have hoped to arouse public sentiment against the notorious outlaws, the brutality of their actions only garnered more support for the James family. Papers as far away as New York wrote about the affair, calling it shocking, and a great tragedy.

  The attackers were quickly identified as Pinkerton detectives from Chicago. That men in the employ of the government had committed such atrocities particularly upset the public, and newspapers around the country talked of the persecution of the James brothers. People chose up sides on the issue, largely along Union and Southern lines, and some people talked as if this one horrible act would be enough to start the Civil War all over again.

  I devoted my days to nursing Zerelda. She and I were united in our fears for her sons. Every morning as I changed the dressing on her arm, she asked me, “Have we any word from Frank and Jesse?”

  “No.” I shook my head and avoided looking into her eyes, fearful of giving way to tears in front of this woman who never wept.

  “If anything had happened to them, we would have heard by now,” she said.

  “Yes. I imagine you’re right.”

  “They’re too clever to ever be caught,” she continued. “No one can outsmart the James boys.”

  I wish I had her confidence in Jesse and Frank’s invincibility. To the rest of the world—and to Zerelda, too—they were larger-than-life figures. But I had nursed Jesse’s wounds and knew the narrowness of some of their escapes. I knew how vulnerable they could be, and that knowledge weighed heavy on me during those long, empty days.

  We had no word at all until John Newman Edwards visited the second week in February. “I’m sorry we must meet again under such dire circumstances,” he said as he bowed low over my hand.

  “Have you seen Jesse recently?” I asked. “Have you talked to him?”

  “I have not seen him, but we have been in communication. I promised him I would personally visit to assure that you and the rest of his family are all right.”

  “I’ll never be all right again,” Zerelda moaned. “Not without my dear Archie, never mind my arm.”

  “A great loss indeed,” Edwards said gravely. “Jesse is quite upset about it, and if it were in his power to seek revenge on those who have caused you such pain, he would do so, as Odysseus avenged the suitors’ depredations on Penelope.”

  I stared at him, uncertain whether to be awed or amused by this man who spoke as floridly as he wrote.

  “That’s all well and good, but is there anything you or other members of the press can do to make the Pinkertons and sheriffs and other lawmen leave us alone?” Annie asked. “I can’t go into town to shop for a yard of ribbon without being followed by some armed man on horseback.”

  “That is another reason for my visit, dear lady,” Edwards said. “Shall we sit and converse?”

  We sat, and Charlotte served coffee and cake while Edwards shared his news. “Certain sympathetic lawmakers, sensitive to the public outcry against the persecution of your family, intend to propose legislation granting amnesty to Jesse and Frank for all previous trespasses,” he said.

  “Amnesty?” Zerelda asked. “Does that mean they’ll be declared innocent?”

  “It means it will be as if the events never took place,” Edwards explained. “They will be wiped from the record.”

  “And they’d be allowed to return home, unmolested?” Annie asked.

  “On the contrary, they would be welcomed home as heroes,” Edwards declared. “They could resume life as law-abiding citizens, with the full voting rights that have been denied to them thus far.”

  “Praise be to God!
” Zerelda declared. “My boys have been persecuted too long.”

  I bowed my head, hiding my expression from the others. The promise of amnesty was an exciting one, but after so many years of taking what he wanted from those he considered his enemies, would Jesse be content to live as a farmer again?

  For the next month and a half, the debate raged in the Missouri legislature. Were the James brothers persecuted heroes or ruthless outlaws? Did they steal because the draconian laws of the time gave them no other choice, or because they lacked consideration for their fellow man?

  In the end, the bill was defeated, by the narrowest of margins. Lawmen continued to haunt the road in front of the Samuels’ farm, though they knew better than to venture down the driveway. Ambrose and others had been posted along the property line, with orders to shoot to kill any trespassers.

  Jesse did manage to slip through the woods to see us a few times, arriving in the dark of night and leaving well before morning. His brother’s death and mother’s maiming hit him hard, etching new lines of pain on his face. Not even joy over the growth of the baby within me could wipe out the sadness that was now always present in his eyes.

  If Frank and Jesse felt any guilt for not having been at the farmhouse to protect their loved ones that night, or for having drawn their enemies to the house in the first place, they never indicated such to me. But they wasted no time exacting revenge on any they thought had aided the attackers. When neighboring farmer Daniel Askew, who was known to have provided a base of operations for the Pinkertons, was gunned down at his home, there was little doubt who was responsible for the slaying. Samuel Hardwick, another neighbor who had helped the Pinkertons, had sense enough to leave town before the James brothers came to call.