And the outlaw culture of the late 1800s

The James Gang is probably the most well-known band of outlaws ever produced in America.  Their roots trace back to the Burning Kansas period immediately preceding the Civil War (See Ch. 2 of The Unassigned Lands), and during the war they rode with "Bloody Bill" Anderson and William Quantrill.  (Quantrill is an interesting character himself - He was so violent that Confederate officers often refused to recognize him as one of their own,  Jesse's association with him is telling.)  The exact details of where the James brothers were at any given time in the War (and their lives, for that matter) are very fragmented and, unfortunately, much of the popular literature is simply wrong. (Jesse James was his Name by William A. Settle is a good place to get the truth and reports from the Pinkerton Agency on Jesse James are illuminating if not slightly biased.)  What we do know for certain is after the war ended the James brothers, along with their friends and family, kept on going.

I noted in The Unassigned Lands that Jesse had an enthusiastic following in the media of the time and referenced Jesse's number one apologist, John Newman Edwards.  Edwards is largely responsible for the fabrication that Jesse James was a fair and even-handed man.  Comparisons to Robin Hood were common and Edwards liked to claim all of Jesse's activities (not crimes, you see...) were directed at the North and Jesse was merely balancing the scales of justice.  Pinkerton disagreed, noting that almost all of the James Gang's murders and robberies happened in the South and to people with Southern ties.  Pinkerton believed the sooner Jesse was killed, the better. 
 
James Gang operated across the country, mostly in the Kansas and Missouri region but also as far east as West Virginia.  If the Gold Legend is true, they also ranged as far south as Mexico and as far north as Minnesota, where the gang met its end.  Right in the center of all that geography was the Indian Territory.  Occupying what is now the state of Oklahoma, the Territory was policed by the federal government.  Federal Marshals, mostly out of Judge Isaac Parker's court in Arkansas but also from Kansas agencies, were responsible for maintaining the "peace".

At a time when getting away with any crime was mainly a matter of getting out of sight, the Indian Territory was a God-send to criminals of every variety.  Simply cross the border and any pursuers had no jurisdiction to arrest or detain, plus their presence was just as illegal as the villain's.  Jesse was known (or rumored, rather, if we're being truthful) to have escaped into the Wichita Mountains on many occasions.  In complete contrast to Oklahoma's rolling plains, the Wichita's are very rugged and materialize abruptly regardless of which direction they're approached, perfect to elude whatever pursuit might still be threatening.  Near present-day Lawton, the mountains were on the southern edge of the Territory and very accessible from Texas, luckily for Bud. 
 
The other batch of criminals in The Unassigned Lands are Bud's brothers Bob, Grat, and Emmett - the Dalton Gang.  While the James gang was managed mostly through Jesse's cunning and Cole's brains, the Dalton Gang appears to have been ruled by emotion - irrational anger seems to be the predominant one - culminating in their own destruction in Coffeeville, Kansas.  Their time as lawmen and their time in jail left enough artifacts to paint the big picture (thanks again to Nancy Samuelson, this time from The Dalton Gang Story) of their journey from one side of the law to the other.  When we connect the dots we find what's ultimately a sad tale.
 
Again, much of the contemporary reporting is simply wrong, some maliciously so.  The best example is briefly described in The Unassigned Lands:    After the gang was wiped out in Coffeeville, Bill Dalton came to Kanas to assist with the sole survivor's (Emmett) legal defense.  Emmett had no chance and was as guilty as they come, but Bill tried his best.  In the process, Bill got on the wrong side of the local newspaper's editor, David Elliott.  Perhaps  slightly more ethical than the Daltons (or perhaps not), Elliot took Emmett's pistols as Emmett lay bleeding in the alley.  Elliot almost certainly believed that Emmett was just moments from death - he'd suffered over twenty wounds, most notably a shotgun blast in the back. 
 
Emmett refused to die, though, and his pistols were evidence for the trial.  Elliott refused to turn them over, claiming they were a gift from the dying man.  No one, including the "dying" man, bought that and Bill was eventually able to force the pistols return.  Elliott  took the opportunity to write amazing lies about Bill almost daily, some truly magnificent in their absurdity.

Not to be outdone, a pamphlet titled “The Dalton Brothers” was soon published, authored under a pseudonym of ‘An Eye Witness’.   The pamphlet focused on the failed raid and made many detailed claims about the gang members as well as the lawmen chasing them.  One lawman, a Deputy Marshall named Ransome Payne, stood out as a hero while everyone else was inept.  

It was all false, and it was obvious that Payne had written the book because he made numerous preposterous claims, such as it had been he, not Heck Thomas, who had been hot on the gang’s trail.  The fact that Thomas arrived in Coffeeville moments after the gunfight and personally identified the bodies didn't seem to register anywhere, nor the fact that Payne wasn't even at the scene. 

That wasn’t what got him in trouble, though.  The previous summer, one of the Dalton Gang's members named Charlie "Black-face" Bryant took ill and was forced to find a doctor.  He slipped into the village of Hennessy but was recognized by the powder burn on his cheek that gave him his nick-name.  He was arrested without incident.  A Federal Deputy Marshall, Edward Short, was dispatched to return the the outlaw to Kansas for trial and almost certain execution.  On the train ride back to Wichita Bryant somehow got a pistol and engaged in a shoot-out where both he and the deputy were fatally wounded.

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The lie got the attention was that he, Payne, had apprehended Bryant and turned him over to Deputy Short along with detailed instructions on how to transport the prisoner.  Payne’s boss was U.S. Marshall William Grimes (who appears many times in The Unassigned Lands), and Grimes knew every particular of how Ed Short and Charlie Bryant had shot each other to death on the way back to Wichita.  Grimes responded to Payne in an open letter, published in the Coffeeville Journal, where he publicly fired Payne and laid bare every lie Payne had uttered as “an eye witness”.  
 
The distinction between 'outlaw' and 'lawman' was fuzzy, at best, back then and corruption was rife throughout every level of government.  Like the newspaper reporting, anything any government official did or said was suspect and the corruption was largely regarded as simply business as usual.  That theme runs cover to cover through The Unassigned Lands, and I went to quite a bit of effort to preserve the overlap between 'good guys' and the 'bad guys'.  Depending on which newspaper you read, anyone could be both.  (click HERE for some of that)