Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1899-01-20
THE AN OF HERED|TY.
Young Jesse James Seems t( be Following in the Foot
 steps of His Father.
THE NOTORIOUS GANG.
Sons of a Baptist Minister They Developed an Amazing Ca
 paeity for Crime.

Holding Up Railroad Trains and Bank Rob-
 ping Their Speciality Allowed Nothing
 to stand in Their Way-Their Adventure
 With the Guneless Cashier of County
 Fair.
 The dominating power of heredity over the individual is once more forcib- ly illustrated by the arrest in Kansas City, of Jesse James, IT,, for the al- leged participation in the holdup and robbery of Missouri Pacific express train
 Not yet has the elder generation of the public forgotten the criminal ex- ploits of the famous James Boys" re- spectively, and father and the uncle of Jesse Jr., who for a quarter of century headed a gang of train rob- bers and bandits that terrorized the Southwest.
 They were the sons of a respectable Baptist minister. The father went to California in 1S49 and died there in 1851, driven away from home, it is said, by his wife, from whom the sons seem to have inherited their deyiltry. The latent evil in them was brought out by the war. Early in 1861 Frank James, who had just reached his majority, joined Quantrells band of guerillas, in which he soon became noted for ferG~ cious daring. Jesse joined year later, and soon eclipsed his brother and all other members of that gang of murder CTS and cutthroats, masquerading as soldiers. Both brothers participated in the sacking and burning of Law renee, Kan, when nearly every male inhabitant was guthlessly murdered, and in the massacre at Gentralia, Mo-, where, after the village itself had been plundered, the gueillas waylaid an east-bound train, robbed the passen- gers and killed thirty two sick. soldiers en route for the St. Louis hospitals. be- side fifty members of 8 company of Iowa volunteers, who had hurried to the rescue.
 When the war ended the State be- came too hot to hold the guerillas. Jesse James, with a eongeniaT spirit named George Shepherd. fled to Texas, while Frank followed the fortunes of Quantrell into Kentucky. where he es- caped by the merest accident from be- ing in the fight when Quanmell was mortally wounded and his band exter- minated
 Comparatively little is known of the Jameses, except a personal adventure or two, from this time until 1868 In that year they began the life which made them famous as bank and train robbers. Early in the spring Jesse James, accompanied by Cole. Young CT, Al" and George Shepherd and Jim" White, dashed into Russellville, Ky, and robbed the bank of $14,O00. Part of the party entered the bank, while the others remained outside and began a fusillade up and down the street to prevent the approach of help. Accomplishing their ohject. the robbers rode away, and, though vigorously pur- sued, escaped.
 One of their most daring atrocities was committed at Kansas City in the autumn of 1872. The County Agrieul- tural Fair was going on, when three men were seen to ride up to the gate of the grounds. They were well mounted and wore long linen dusters and wide brimmed hats. On reaching the gate one dismounted, handing his bridle reins to his comrades. He approached the ticket office, and, looking through the window, said to the cashier:-"I If 1 was to say 1 was Jesse James, and told you to hand out that tin box of money, what would you say?"
 .'I'd say I'll see you in - first, " was the cuntemptuous reply.
 Well, that's just who am-Jesse James-and you had better hand 1t out pretty quick. or 1'lP'-and the rest of t'.o sentence was finished by levelling d huge navy revolver at the cashier. The box was handed out with its con tents of $10,00 Jesse remounted, and the three desperadoes began firing their pistols, and hurriedly rode off The alarm became general, and almost im- mediately pursuing party was organ ized, but with no results.
 Train and stage robberies followed the bank robberies. In many of their murderous exploits members of the gang were killed or caught, hut such was the terror inspired by the James es that for more than ten years during which price was set on their heads no one was found to earn the money by betraying them.
 The offer of these sums led to the killing of Jesse James in April, 1882, by Robert Ford, lad of twenty, who was in collusion with tlne detectives, but who had been accepted as a promising recruit by the unsUspicfous bandit. Frank James few months later gave himself ID, was tried and was acquit- ted on successive charges of robbery and murder in the teeth of the plainest evidence, but amid the pIeudits of a Western assemblage- He then settled 1Opyp in, is foAH AHr,.