CHAPTER XXXII.
OTHER EXPLOITS.
"Where I am injured, there I'll sue redress,
Look to it, every one who bars my access;
I have a heart to feel the injury,
A hand to right myself, and by my honor,
That hand shall grasp what gray beard Law denies me."
The James Boys have always claimed that they were driven into outlawry by the very instrumentality which organized society has employed to subserve the ends of justice and afford protection to the rights and liberties of all—namely, the government. This claim, made by them, has been partly conceded by a large class of persons, irrespective of all political affiliations and social relations. So their wild career was commenced, and so it has proceeded through many years.
That the Jameses have been accused of crimes which they did not commit, there is scarcely room for doubt. One of the deeds which has been laid to their charge was the robbery committed at Corinth, Alcorn county, Mississippi. This event happened the same day that the train was robbed at Muncie, Kansas. The two places are many hundred miles apart, and of course the Jameses could not have been at both places at the same time. It is possible, indeed probable, that the robbery at Corinth, which stripped the bank at that place of a very large sum of money, was the handiwork of some of the members of the desperate band of men, of which the Jameses were the acknowledged leaders. The same tactics which had been so successfully employed at Ste. Genevieve, Russellville, Corydon, Gallatin, and other points, characterized the raid on the funds of the bank of Corinth. The spoils obtained were exceedingly valuable, and although energetic pursuit was made, the robbers succeeded in making their escape. Their trail, however, was followed into Missouri, and several circumstances indicate that the successful bandits were members of the same organization with the James Boys and Younger Brothers. After this there was a season of quiet.
In the spring of 1876 the robbers renewed the campaign for spoils. The incidents of the past year had begun to become memories, and the success which had attended the gang during the past years had given them confidence in their ability to plunder at will wherever they might select a field for the exhibition of their prowess and skill. The trees had assumed their green habiliments, and the early spring flowers exhaled their choicest perfumes, scenting the balmy breezes as they blew over hills and through valleys. The schemers had planned another raid. This time they selected an objective point remote from the scenes of their former deeds. It was a romantic expedition away into the mountain regions of Eastern Kentucky and the state of West Virginia. The spring-birds sang cheery lays as the brigands marched on to their destined halting place.