OUTLAWS: THE ILLUSTRATED HISTORY OF THE JAMES-YOUNGER GANG

More than a century after he was murdered by one of his own gang, Jesse James remains America’s foremost folk hero. The myths that surround Jesse, his brother Frank, and their partners in crime, the Younger brothers, have obscured the facts of their rough lives and brazen deeds. 

In this first-ever documentary book about the James-Younger Gang, Marley Brant sifts fact from folklore to tell the true stories of these men whose real-life adventures were frequently more amazing than the fictional accounts that abounded even during their lifetimes. 

Outlaws details the previously unexplored motives for the Gang’s decade-long crime streak. In doing so, Marley brings the brothers as well as their families and associates to vivid life.  Adding to the author’s authoritative text are some 200 photographs of the Jameses, the Youngers, and their relatives, accomplices, and victims – three quarters of which have never been published. 

No book before has looked in as great detail at how the Gang – some of whom were former Confederate guerillas – were driven by a seething bitterness toward the Yankees who had brutalized their families during the War Between the States.  Marley offers compelling evidence that for the Gang, the banks and trains they robbed represented the continued exploitation by the North of the vanquished South. The Gang’s mythic status owed largely to fellow Confederates who felt that the Gang’s robberies were a justified retribution against the oppressive Northern establishment. 

Outlaws draws upon verified accounts to tell a fascinating story of the most famous band of outlaws in American history.  Marley deftly steps through the accumulated legends of the James-Younger Gang to weave a factual and fascinating tale of adventure, terror, grief, and revenge.

 Excerpt:

After many years of research into their story, it at last became clear to me that what motivated the Younger brothers of Missouri was commitment. Regardless of the object of their commitment, be it family, friends, their homeland, or their undertaking of the special task of becoming the most well-known, feared and ruthless of desperado gangs, the Youngers grabbed life by the shirtfront and held on for all they were worth. The manifestation of their passion resulted in unique rewards, such as occasional large sums of money and a fame that has endured over a century. Along the way, however, they paid a heavy price: the death of dear friends and family members, the loss of the ability to experience life as free members of society, their self-respect and finally, for three of them, their own young lives.

The Youngers struggle to maintain the sanctity of their family was certainly not an isolated instance in portwar Missouri. If an attempt is to be made to understand the family's identity and the prestigious position it held in the pioneer days of Missouri history, it becomes necessary to isolate the Younger family to examine a second layer of anti-Confederate action by the state's power structure. The intricacies of Missouri's 1865 Drake Constitution were far-reaching and affected nearly every aspect of postwar adjustment.

Whether the Younger brothers were on the side of good or evil is a question that depends on one's perspective of their times. It cannot simply be determined through an overview of their lives or outlaw careers. There were certainly times when they were motivated by a desire to make their political statement in the hope that those who had chosen to disagree with the country's establishment might be served as well as those who shared the beliefs of the "winners". Yet many times they were motivated by simple greed and a sinister desire to be recognized as career rebels, lightly dismissing the fact that their premeditated acts against authority might cause death or destruction. Eventually, even they realized they fit no conventional category of good or bad, right or wrong. While sstruggling toconvince themselves of their inner virtues, they were unable to rise above their selfish deeds to fulfill their own desires to reform. The question remains: was it that they did not want to end their criminal careers, or did they simply not know how?

Whether offered as a reason or dismissed as an excuse, the fact is that the Youngers seemed to find it impossible to adjust to a structured life within society. What lay beyond their young lives devoted to the fight was terrifying to them. With ideas of assimiliation into the quiet lives of ranchers and farmers, they chose to defy convention to demand rewards that they felt they were entitles to, that they somehow earned, one last time. Another group of disbelievers in their cause unwillingly crossed their path, and yet another innocent man died. The scorecard was tallied, and the Younger brothers of Missouri had failed to win the game or even tie the score.

Reader Review:

The lives of Jesse James and Cole Younger and their brothers are shrouded in myths created by Nineteenth Century journalists who celebrated their deeds and by themselves through the lies they told to cover their tracks and to excuse their crimes. Brant's book attempts to separate reality from legend, covering the James and Younger brothers from birth to death. Her book is not without sympathy for her subjects, but it is by no means an apologia for their manifold sins. Although Brant rightfully sees the origin of their criminal activities in Civil War guerilla warfare which carried over into the atmosphere of bitter reprisals following the war, she also chronicles their slide into simple greed and thrill-seeking. This volume is generous in its presentation of photographs of the outlaw gang, their associates, enemies, and victims, and of the places where they operated.

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