Outlaws

The Story of Bonnie and Clyde

Bonnie Parker (1934)

You've read the story of Jesse James--
Of how he lived and died;
If you're still in need
Of something to read
Here's the story of Bonnie and Clyde.

Now Bonnie and Clyde are the Barrow gang.
I'm sure you all have read
How they rob and steal
And those who squeal
Are usually found dying or dead.

There's lots of untruths to these write-ups;
They're not so ruthless as that;
Their nature is raw;
They hate the law--
The stool pigeons, spotters, and rats.

They call them cold-blooded killers;
They say they are heartless and mean;
But I say this with pride,
That I once knew Clyde
When he was honest and upright and clean.

But the laws fooled around,
Kept taking him down
And locking him up in a cell,
Till he said to me,
"I'll never be free,
So I'll meet a few of them in hell."

The road was so dimly lighted;
There were no highway signs to guide;
But they made up their minds
If all roads were blind,
They wouldn't give up till they died.

The road gets dimmer and dimmer;
Sometimes you can hardly see;
But it's fight, man to man,
And do all you can,
For they know they can never be free.

From heart-break some people have suffered;
From weariness some people have died;
But take it all in all,
Our troubles are small
Till we get like Bonnie and Clyde.

If a policeman is killed in Dallas,
And they have no clue or guide;
If they can't find a fiend,
They just wipe their slate clean
And hang it on Bonnie and Clyde.

There's two crimes committed in America
Not accredited to the Barrow mob;
They had no hand
In the kidnap demand,
Nor the Kansas City Depot job.

A newsboy once said to his buddy:
"I wish old Clyde would get jumped;
In these awful hard times
We'd make a few dimes
If five or six cops would get bumped."

The police haven't got the report yet,
But Clyde called me up today;
He said, "Don't start any fights--
We aren't working nights--
We're joining the NRA."

From Irving to West Dallas viaduct
Is known as the Great Divide,
Where the women are kin,
And the men are men,
And they won't »stool« on Bonnie and Clyde.

If they try to act like citizens
And rent them a nice little flat,
About the third night
They're invited to fight
By a sub-gun's rat-tat-tat.

They don't think they're too smart or desperate,
They know that the law always wins;
They've been shot at before,
But they do not ignore
That death is the wages of sin.

Some day they'll go down together;
They'll bury them side by side;
To few it'll be grief--
To the law a relief--
But it's death for Bonnie and Clyde.

Ned Kelly, part II

With his first shot Ned Kelly sent a rifle bullet through Hare’s wrist, but a bullet also struck Ned in the forearm. This was the most decisive shot in the whole battle, for
it prevented Ned from using his Spencer repeating rifle, which must be supported by the left arm. He was also struck in the upper part of the arm and also in the foot.
Most fatal of all, the heavy armour destroyed the outlaws freedom of movement.

Ned bleeding freely, hopped around to the north side of the hotel. The other three went through the front door into the hotel. It was not Ned’s idea that his gang should
take shelter behind the people imprisoned there. Then Ned decided on a bold stroke to draw the police away from the hotel. He staggered into the stockyard and tried
to mount a horse, but it was impossible in his armour, so he lurched away into the bush where his grey mare was tethered. There he sat down and tried to unfasten his
armour, but because of his injured hands he could not get the bolts undone. After much struggling, he eased the helmet off his head. Next he tried to load the rifle, but
could not do that, either. He decided to lie hidden in the bush for a while, so he untethered his mare and let her go. This was a bad decision, for Ned now had no way
of retreat.

Feeling very weak, he put on his helmet again. He lay, half fainting from loss of blood. Footsteps were coming towards him! Would he be found? But the policemen
were thinking of only surrounding the hotel, and did not look in the bushes where Ned lay hidden.

Kelly’s Courage

After lying encased in his armour on the frosty ground for three and a half hours, Ned came fully to his senses and decided to return to battle. Desperately wounded as
he was, weakened by loss of blood, his limbs frozen and encumbered by nearly a hundredweight of iron, he managed to stand up and walk – not away from the fight,
in the direction of safety for himself, but back to the hotel to rescue his mates.

It was at that moment and by that decision, that Ned Kelly’s name was fixed in Australia’s lore as a symbol of reckless courage.

As game as Ned Kelly…

This was the supreme moment of his life, and perhaps he knew it. It was one of the policemen who first noticed the seemingly gigantic figure lurching among the
saplings. In the mist and grey overcoat over the armour, and wearing the rounded helmet with a slit in it, appeared to be about nine feet tall. The police opened fire,
aiming at the head and chest. The bullets struck with a metallic clang. The tall figure staggered at each impact but continued to advance. A loud muffled voice came
from the slit in the helmet.

“Fire away, you can’t hurt me!”

The police closed in rapidly, firing at the outlaw’s legs and arms, and a charge of gunshot fired from Sergeant Steele finally brought him crashing to the ground. The
police seized his wrist and wrenched the revolver from him. Then they pulled off his helmet.

“Oh my God, it’s Ned!”

They were more than sixty yards from the hotel where Dan and Hart could have fired upon them with deadly effect if they had chosen. But those two dazed and
drink-stupefied youths did not take this opportunity of helping Ned. And so the outlaw was carried to the railway station and placed on a mattress in the station
master’s office. There the police tried to persuade Ned to make his mates surrender – but he knew they never would, and there was nothing he could do.

At about 10a.m. after the police had been firing at the hotel for about seven hours, the order was given to cease fire. A strange silence settled on the scene. No shots
came from the hotel. Then a loud voice called from the police positions : “we will give you ten minutes. All innocent person t come out.”

After about three minutes the people who had been kept prisoner at the hotel came out. Everyone was identified, searched and questioned, and the police learnt for the
first time that Joe Burne was dead. The other two, still wearing their armour, were apparently quiet and miserable and talking together in low tones. They knew that
Ned was captured and that their own position was hopeless

The police now decided to set fire to the hotel and smoke them out. Under a heavy burst of fire, a policeman ran forward with a bundle of straw and placed it against
the weatherboard wall. The rifle-fire ceased. As the flames licked at the wall, fanned by the southerly breeze, a hush of awe fell on the spectators. Now or never the
outlaws must emerge.

Dean Gibney, a Roman Catholic priest, who happened to be on the train, and who had already spoken with Ned, now showed great personal heroism. “May God
protect me,” he said “I’m going into that house, to give those men a chance to have a little time to prepare themselves before they die.”

And as the flames crackles and black smoke billowed, he walked forward alone to the burning building. “In the name of God,” he called out to the outlaws, “I am a
Catholic priest, do not shoot me.”

Inside he ran quickly from room to room. He saw the dead body of Joe Burne, and there in a little room at the back he saw two bodies lying side by side on the floor.
Their armour was off and laid beside them. They were Dan Kelly and Steve Hart. They had been dead for some time and it appeared that they had committed suicide.
The priest emerged and told the police what he had found. A few minutes later the hotel became a raging mass of flames.

So the Kelly Gang was ended in that strange battle which lasted for twelve and a half hours on Monday, 28th June 1880.

Ned’s Trail

Ned Kelly was taken by the police to the Melbourne Gaol hospital, and carefully nursed back to health. On 28th October 1880, he was put on trial. A jury was chosen,
evidence was heard, and the “twelve good men and true” gave their verdict – guilty.

The judge, Sir Redmond Barry, asked the formal question, “Prisoner at the bar, have you anything to say why sentence of death should not be passed upon you?”

Ned looked at the judge thoughtfully.

“Well,” he said, “it is rather too late for me to speak now. I wish I had insisted on examining the witnesses myself. I could have thrown a different light on the case –
but I thought if I did so it would look like bravado and flashiness.”

This interruption of the death sentence was something quite new. Ned continued to argue quietly and coolly with the judge. At last he said, “A day will come, at a
bigger Court than this, when we shall see which is right and which is wrong. No matter how long a man lives, he has to come to judgement somewhere. If I had
examined the witnesses, I would have stopped a lot of the reward, I assure you!”

After a few more exchanges, the judge decided the fantastic argument to a close. He looked at his notes, prepared in advance, and read in solemn tones a homily on
the miseries of an outlaw’s lot and on Ned’s misdeeds. He ended on pronouncing the sentence, “You will be taken from here to the place from whence you came, and
thence to a place of execution, and there you will be hanged by the neck until you be dead, and may the Lord have mercy on your soul!”

Ned looked fixedly at the ageing judge. “ I will add something to that,” he said, as the court listened in awe-struck silence. “ I will see you where I am going!”

Many people remembered these words when Sir Redmond Barry was suddenly taken ill two days after Ned was hanged, and died soon afterwards.

The date fixed on Ned’s execution was 11 November 1880. On the day before his brother and sisters were allowed to visit him, and after this, his mother. Her last
words to him were: “Mind you die like a Kelly, Ned!”.

The morning of Thursday, 11th November, dawned fine and clear. Ned was taken to the gallows. As the hangman adjusted the noose Ned looked round him
resignedly and said, “Ah well, I suppose it had to come to this!”.

A white cap was put over his head and face. As it was pulled down over his eyes Ned spoke three words, with a sigh:

“Such is Life”

Billy the Kid is one of the best known characters of the Old West. Unfortunately, parts of the his life have been built on legends.

Basically, Billy was born in the east and moved west with his mother to Silver City, NM. At a young age he was jailed for a minor offense and escaped. In Bonito, Az, he killed Frank Cahilll.

Billy arrived in Lincoln, NM during a time when the Murphy-Dolan Faction and John Tunstall were trying to secure beef contracts with the military in Fort Stanton. Tunstall had befriended Billy and a number of young drifters. The conflict between the Murphy-Dolan Faction and Tunstall turned ugly. John Tunstall was killed. Angered by the death of their friend, the drifters formed a group known as the 'Regulators'. As a self-impose police force, they tried to round up the people responsible for the death of Tunstall.. Many people died during this pursuit..

The plot becomes more complicated and Billy is a wanted man. Pat Garrett becomes sheriff of Lincoln county and begins his pursuit of Billy. The cat and mouse game between these two lasts about a year and a half. Billy is cornered, but escapes. Billy is caught and sentenced to die, but escapes. Finally, Pat Garrett waits for Billy in a room at Pete Maxwell's home in Fort Sumner, NM. Billy enters and Pat Garrett fires.

Billy the Kid is buried in the old Fort Sumner Post Cemetery near present day Fort Sumner, New Mexico. There are plenty of signs directing you to the grave.

Jesse James

Of all the worlds' legendary characters, few have attracted world-wide fascination like the outlaw, Jesse James. Some call him America's Robin Hood, while others see him as a cold-blooded killer. Perhaps he was all of these things.

Jesse Woodson James was born in Kearney, Missouri on September 5, 1847. His father, the Rev. Robert James, was a Baptist minister who helped found William Jewell College in Liberty, Mo. Some people say it was the cruel treatment from Union soldiers that turned Frank and Jesse to a life of crime during the Civil War. Certainly during the war years they learned to kill while riding with William Quantrill and Bloody Bill Anderson. After the war, Jesse was wounded while surrendering. Within a year, Frank and Jesse are believe to have pulled off the first daylight bankrobbery in peace time. They made off with $60,000 from the Liberty, Mo. bank not far from their home, and one man was killed.

For the next 15 years, the James boys roamed throughout the U.S. robbing trains and banks of their gold, building a legend that was to live more than a century after Jesse's death. Jesse married his own first cousin after a nine-year courtship. She was named for his own mother, Zerelda, and he called her Zee for short. They had two children, Jesse Edwards and Mary.

The Pinkerton Detective Agency was called in to help catch the famous desperadoes. Once during a nighttime raid on the family home outside Kearney, Mo., a firebomb was tossed into the log cabin. When it exploded, it tore off the hand of Jesse's mother, and led to the death of his half-brother Archie.

Jesse reached his Waterloo in September, 1876, when his gang, including the Younger brothers, took on the bank at Northfield, Minn. Within minutes the town people returned fire. All except Frank and Jesse were either killed or were wounded and captured.

Frank James also married, and their wives tried to get them to take on a more normal life. With a $10,000 reward on his head, Jesse moved to St. Joseph, Mo., with his family in the fall of 1881 to hide out. On Christmas Eve, Jesse and Zee moved their family into a small house atop a high hill overlooking St. Joseph. Living under the assumed name of Tom Howard, Jesse rented the house from a city councilman for $14 a month. He attended church, but did not work for a living.

During the winter of 1882, Jesse tried to buy a small farm in Nebraska. But in April, he was short of cash. All of his earlier gang members were either dead or in prison, but Jesse recruited Bob and Charlie Ford to help him rob the Platte City bank. The Ford brothers posed as cousins of Jesse James, but actually were not related to Jesse at all.

The $10,000 reward on Jesse proved too appealing. While Jesse stood on a chair in the family home at 1318 Lafayette Street in St. Joseph to dust and straighten a picture, Bob and Charlie Ford drew their guns. Bob Ford put and end to the James Legend with a single bullet to the back of the head on April 3, 1882.

The Ford brothers attempted to collect the reward. Instead, they were charged with murder. They were sentenced to hang, but were pardoned by Governor Tom Crittenden. Two years later Charles Ford committed suicide and Bob Ford, the »dirty little coward who shot Mr. Howard, and laid poor Jesse in his grave,« was himself killed in a bar room brawl in Creede, Colorado, in 1892.

Jesse James was a moral paradox. He was a good father and family man, and was religious in his own way. Whether he stole from the rich and gave to the poor, or just kept it all, has never been decided.

Jesse James died in 1882, but the legend of Jesse James continues more than a century beyond his death. Today Jesse and Frank James are among the best-known Americans in the world.

Dalton/Johnson Outlaw Gang
from 1889 to 1997



The Dalton/Johnson outlaw gang included more than a single group of the five individuals whom the citizens of Coffeyville exposed on the morning of October 5, 1892, in Kansas. In fact, there is evidence to support and to prove there was a sixth member in the raiding party and that member was female.

The history of the Dalton's began before 1892 and lives on today in the Dewey and Bartlesville area of Oklahoma and in the Houston area of Texas. Family members retain land and political powers within those regions of the country.

There are a multitude of unanswered questions remaining concerning the Daltons and their final actions in 1892. Also, a myriad of contradictions lingers, concerning the Coffeyville aftermath
and the years which followed. We now know that Minnie Johnson existed and was in truth a first cousin to Lucy and Julia Johnson. However, she was never considered to be either of the Johnson
women, who played a significant role in the gang's activities. Minnie Johnson appears briefly in the Kentucky history of the Dalton/Johnson clans and is then never recalled, except by Emmett in his writing years later, which for the most part was extremely fabricated. Documentation notes a Lucy Johnson married shortly after the Coffeyville, Kansas debacle and then moved out of the area. A daughter was born to Lucy in the late 1880's and her father was, Robert »Bob« Renick Dalton.
Years later Emmett Dalton would adopt her and regard her as his own, and her illegitimate son. Marriage records prove Julia Johnson was married five times. Four of her husbands were killed in one fashion of another, while she was nearby.

To this day, the Dalton name and family heritage lives on and thrives on the mystery started more than a hundred years ago with the deaths of Westley and Martha Johnson. The killings, attributed to the Dalton gang, did not begin at Coffeyville nor did they end with Emmett's death in 1937.