When was the northfield raid

Younger and Miller mounted their horses. Other outlaws galloped to the scene, shooting, shouting, trying to scare off the residents. Instead, some residents got their guns. Medical student Henry Wheeler grabbed a rifle and ran to a second-floor window at the Dampier Hotel. His shot killed Miller.

A short while later, Manning killed Chadwell. It is getting too hot for us! Heywood was brained with a pistol, and as the outlaws tried to coerce Heywood, Bunker ran for the back door. Pitts shot him, but Bunker escaped and lived. Finally, Cole Younger kicked in the bank door. The robbery had lasted roughly seven minutes. Jesse, Stiles says. Jesse was clearly more volatile, and he became more so as the years went on. Frank, says Gardner, who, like many historians today, puts Jesse outside during the robbery.

Crittenden in , Wilcox made a special trip to Missouri to get a good look at the notorious outlaw. Wilcox visited James in the jail in Independence, and just as soon as Wilcox returned to Minnesota, he signed a detailed affidavit identifying Frank James as the killer of Joseph Heywood. Does it matter? The surviving outlaws—six men on five horses—galloped out of town, leaving behind two dead robbers and one dead banker Heywood and one dying citizen unarmed Swedish immigrant Nicolaus Gustavson, shot in the head on the street.

Meanwhile, Minnesotans gave chase. The posses blew at least three excellent opportunities to nab the fugitives in Minnesota, including Lake Crystal, where nine of 10 guards stationed at a key bridge decided to take a nap. At some point, the James brothers left the badly wounded Youngers and Charlie Pitts.

Indeed, Pitts died game, killed in the barrage, and the Youngers again were riddled with bullets, but somehow survived. Bob Younger died in prison of tuberculosis in at age Cole and Jim were paroled in In , Jim killed himself.

The next year, granted a conditional pardon, Cole returned home to Missouri. Cole never implicated the James boys in the Northfield crime. As the townspeople ran for cover, three other men wearing wide-brimmed hats and long dusters took advantage of the distraction to walk unnoticed into the First National Bank.

Brandishing pistols, one of the men ordered the bank cashier to open the bank safe. Though the cashier recognized the famous face of the dangerous outlaw, Jesse James , he stalled, claiming that the safe had a time lock and could not be opened.

As Jesse James considered his next move, a brave—or foolish—bank teller made a break for the back door. One of the robbers fired twice, hitting the teller in the shoulder, but the man managed to stumble to safety and sound the alarm. The citizens of Northfield ran to surround the bank and mercilessly shot down the robbers as they tried to escape.

A year-old medical student killed one gang member, Clell Miller, while the owner of the Northfield hardware store mortally wounded Bill Chadwell, peppering his body with bullets from a rapid-firing Remington repeater rifle. Jesse was the last one out of the bank. After pausing briefly to shoot the uncooperative cashier in the head, Jesse leapt onto his horse and joined the rest of the survivors as they desperately fled town.

For the next two weeks a posse pursued them relentlessly, eventually killing or capturing four more of the gang members. Luckily for Frank and Jesse James, the two brothers had decided to go their own way, escaping to Dakota Territory. After things had cooled down, they went to Nashville, Tennessee , where they started rebuilding their gang and planning new robberies.

But if you see something that doesn't look right, click here to contact us! Consider what happened in the First National Bank on September 7, Acting cashier Joseph Lee Heywood made a decision not to open the bank safe for the robbers. Why did he refuse? What would you have done? Why do you think a Missouri gang of ex-Confederate soldiers traveled all the way to Minnesota to rob a bank?

Consider the aftereffects of the Civil War as you discuss. There were many eyewitnesses to the robbery in Northfield that day. Read the transcript of Thomas Hughes' letter for his account. How does he describe the events of the day? Evaluate his tone, his language, and the details he chose to include. Compare the Rice County Journal's newspaper account of the robbery with Hughes' letter. How are the two stories similar? How are they different? Post-mortem photography—taking pictures of dead people—seems gross today, but it was quite common in the late 19th century.

People often died before getting their picture taken, but their family still wanted a photograph to remember them by. Photographers like Northfield's Ira Sumner specialized in post-mortem photography, and he was the one who photographed Clell Miller and Bill Chadwell. Why do you think Mr. Sumner photographed these men? Does it help you understand the bank raid story better since you can see the robbers' faces? Why or why not? What would have happened to the city of Northfield if the James-Younger Gang had succeeded?

Most of the businesses and both colleges kept their money in the bank, and it was not insured. The posse that finally caught the gang was called the Magnificent Seven. Other than their names, historians do not know very much about them or why they decided to hunt down the outlaws. Why do you think that is? Would you have joined the posse? Even though he was a criminal, Jesse James is famous to this day in American popular culture. Countless books and movies have been made based loosely on his life — what we would call historical fiction.

What is the difference between a historical account for example, a newspaper article or eyewitness testimony from and historical fiction? Even if historical fiction might not be based completely on facts, can we still learn something about real events through them? Choose a position for your eyewitness testimony, such as standing on the street, in a store across from the bank, inside the bank itself, etc.

Write down what you saw and what you did as if you were telling someone about it in a letter. Use descriptive words to convey how you felt - excited, scared, mad, amazed, etc. What details do you include? Then compare what you wrote with your classmates. How are your stories similar? How do they help you understand what happened more fully? Create a comic book based on the bank raid. Choose your main character - will it be a hero, an outlaw, a bystander, a child, or someone else?

Draw pictures of the scenes and write dialogue between the characters. What information can you convey with pictures that you can't with words, and vice versa?