jesse james, younger brother of frank james, had now emerged from the awkwardness of youth. he was scarcely thirteen years of age, while frank was four years older. the war made them guerrillas. jesse was at home with his stepfather, dr. reuben samuels, of clay county. he knew nothing of the strife save the echoes of it now and then as it reached his mother’s isolated farm. one day a company of militia visited this farm, hanged dr. samuels to a tree until he was left for dead, and seized upon jesse, a mere boy in the fields plowing, put a rope about his neck and abused him harshly, pricking him with sabers, and finally threatening him with death should they ever again hear of his giving aid or information to the guerrillas. that same week his mother and sisters were arrested, carried to st. joseph and thrown into a filthy prison, where the hardships they endured were dreadful. often without adequate food, insulted by sentinels who neither understood nor cared to learn the first lesson of a soldier—courtesy to women—cut off from all communication with the world, the sister was brought near to death’s door from a fever which followed the punishment, while the mother—a high spirited and courageous matron—was released only after suffering and emaciation had aged her in her prime. before mrs. samuels returned to her home,132 jesse had joined frank in the camp of quantrell, who had preceded him a few years, and who had already, notwithstanding the briefness of his service, made a name for supreme and conspicuous daring. jesse james had a face as smooth and innocent as the face of a school girl. the blue eyes, very clear and penetrating, were never at rest. his form, tall and finely moulded—was capable of great effort and great endurance. on his lips there was always a smile, and for every comrade a pleasant word or a compliment. looking at the small white hands with their long, tapering fingers, it was not then written or recorded that they were to become with a revolver among the quickest and deadliest hands in the west. frank was four years older, and somewhat taller than jesse. jesse’s face was something of an oval; frank’s was long, wide about the forehead, square and massive about the jaw and chin, and set always in a look of fixed repose. jesse laughed at many things; frank laughed not at all. jesse was light hearted, reckless, devil-may-care; frank sober, sedate, a splendid man always for ambush or scouting parties.
scott had to come back from the south and, eager for action, crossed the missouri river at sibley may 20, 1863, taking with him twelve men. frank james and james little led the advance. beyond the river thirteen miles, and at the house of moses mccoy, the guerrillas camped, concocting a plan whereby the133 federal garrison at richfield, numbering thirty, might be got at and worsted.
captain sessions was in command at richfield, and his grave had already been dug. scott found a friendly citizen named peter mahoney who volunteered to do the decoy work. he loaded up a wagon with wood, clothed himself in the roughest and raggedest clothes he had, and rumbled away behind as scrawny and fidgety a yoke of oxen as ever felt a north wind in the winter bite their bones, or deceptive buckeye in the spring swell their body.
“mr. mahoney, what is the news?” this was the greeting he got.
“no news, i have wood for sale. yes, there is some news, too. i like to have forgot. eight or ten of those quantrell men are prowling about my way, the infernal scoundrels, and i hope they may be hunted out of the country.”
mahoney did well, but scott did better. he secreted his men three miles from richfield, and near the crossing of a bridge. if an enemy came the bridge was a sentinel—its resounding planks, the explosion of a musket. scott, with eight men, dismounted and lay close along the road. gregg, with fletch taylor, james little and joe hart, mounted and ready to charge, kept still and expectant fifty yards in the rear in ambush. presently at the crossing a dull booming was heard, and the guerrillas knew that sessions134 had bit at the bait mahoney offered. a sudden clinking along the line—the eight were in a hurry.
“be still,” said scott; “you cock too soon. i had rather have two cool men than ten impatient ones.”
the federals came right onward; they rode along gaily in front of the ambuscade; they had no skirmishers out and they were doomed. the leading files were abreast of scott on the right when he ordered a volley, and sessions, lieutenant graffenstein and seven privates fell dead. what was left of the federal array turned itself into a rout; gregg, taylor, little, and hart thundered down to the charge. scott mounted again, and altogether and away at a rush, pursuers and pursued dashed into richfield. the remnant of the wreck surrendered, and scott, more merciful than many among whom he soldiered, spared the prisoners and paroled them.
house occupied by women light of love
four miles from independence, and a little back from the road leading to kansas city, stood a house occupied by several women light of love. thither regularly went federal soldiers from the independence garrison, and the drinking was deep and the orgies shameful. gregg set a trap to catch a few of the comers and goers. within the lines of the enemy much circumspection was required to make an envelopment of the house successful. jesse james was chosen from among the number of volunteers and sent forward to135 reconnoiter the premises. jesse, arrayed in coquettish female apparel, with his smooth face, blue eyes, and blooming cheeks, looked the image of a bashful country girl, not yet acquainted with vice, though half eager and half reluctant to walk a step nearer to the edge of its perilous precipice. as he mounted, woman fashion, upon a fiery horse, the wind blew all about his peach colored face the pink ribbons of a garish bonnet and lifted the tell-tale riding habit just enough to reveal instead of laced shoes or gaiters, the muddy boots of a born cavalryman. gregg, taking twelve men, followed in the rear of james to within a half a mile of the nearest picket post and hid in the woods until word could be brought from the bagnio ahead. if by a certain hour the disguised guerilla did not return to his comrades, the pickets were to be driven in, the house surrounded, and the inmates forced to give such information as they possessed, of his whereabouts.
jesse james, having pointed out to him with tolerable accuracy the direction of the house, left the road, skirted the timber rapidly, leaped several ravines, floundered over a few marshy places and finally reached his destination without meeting a citizen or encountering an enemy. he would not dismount, but sat upon his horse at the fence and asked that the mistress of the establishment might come out to him. little by little, and with many gawky protests and many a bashful simper, he told a plausible story of136 parental espionage and family discipline. he, ostensibly a she, could not have a beau, could not go with the soldiers, could not sit with them late, nor ride with them, nor romp with them. she was tired of it all and wanted a little fun. would the mistress let her come to her house occasionally and bring some of the neighborhood girls with her, who were in the same predicament? the mistress laughed and was glad. new faces to her were like new coin, and she put forth a hand and patted the merchantable thing upon the knee, and ogled her smiling mouth and girlish features gleefully. as the she-wolf and venturesome lamb separated, the assignation was assured. that night the amorous country girl, accompanied by three of her female companions, was to return, and the mistress, confident of her ability to provide lovers was to make known among the soldiers the attractive acquisition.
it lacked an hour of sunset when jesse james got back to gregg; an hour after sunset the guerrillas, following hard upon the tracks made by the boy spy, rode rapidly on to keep the trysting place. the house was aglow with lights and jubilant with laughter. drink abounded, and under cover of the clinking glasses, the men kissed the women. anticipating the orgy of unusual attraction, twelve federals had been lured out from the garrison and made to believe that barefoot maidens ran wild in the woods and buxom137 lasses hid for the hunting. no guards were out; no sentinels posted. jesse james crept close to a window and peered in. the night was chilly and a large wood fire blazed upon a large hearth. all the company were in one room, five women and a dozen men. scattered about, yet ready for the grasping, the cavalry carbines were in easy reach, and the revolvers handy about the persons. sampson trusting everything to delilah, might not have trusted so much if under the old dispensation there had been anything of bushwhacking.
gregg loved everybody who wore the gray, and what exercised him most was the question just now of attack. should he demand a surrender? jesse james, the boy, said no to the veteran. twelve men inside the house, and the house inside their own lines where reinforcements might be hurried quickly to them, would surely hold their own against eleven outside, if indeed they did not make it worse. the best thing to do was to fire through the windows and kill what could be killed by a carbine volley, then rush through the door and finish, under the cover of the smoke, horror and panic, those who should survive the broadside.
jesse james going to house of light of love
luckily the women sat in a corner to themselves and close to a large bed fixed to the wall and to the right of the fireplace. on the side of the house the bed was on, two broad windows opened low upon the138 ground, and between the windows there was a door, not ajar, but not fastened. gregg, with five men, went to the upper window, and taylor, with four, took possession of the lower. the women were out of immediate range. the house shook; the glass shivered, the door was hurled backward, there was a hot stifling crash of revolvers; and on the dresses of the women and the white coverlet of the bed great red splotches. eight out of the twelve fell dead or wounded at the first fire; after the last fire all were dead. it was a spectacle ghastly beyond any ever witnessed by the guerrillas, because so circumscribed. piled two deep the dead men lay, one with a glass grasped tightly in his stiffened fingers, and one in his shut hand the picture of a woman scantily clad. how they wept, the poor, painted things, for the slain soldiers, and how they blasphemed; but gregg tarried not, neither did he make atonement. as they lay there heaped where they fell and piled together, so they lay still when he mounted and rode away.
* * * * *
in the three months preceding the lawrence massacre, over two hundred citizens were killed and their property burned or stolen. in mid-winter houses were burned by the hundred and whole neighborhoods devastated and laid waste. aroused as he had never been before, quantrell meditated a terrible vengeance.
