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The gunifights of Jesse James - The Ayoob Files

American Handgunner, July-August, 2003 by Massad Ayoob

Situation: A long and spectacular gunfighting career ends abruptly in a single moment; of complacency.

Lesson: Carry backup. Suck up wounds and keep fighting. If you want to hit center, aim. Perhaps above all, when in danger remain both armed -- and alert.

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More than 120 years after his death, Jesse James remains one of the largest figures in the history of "the Wild West." From his contemporary times to the present, he has been seen as a heroic Robin Rood, defending his family and the lost Confederacy alike against monolithic forces of oppression. However, some historians take a revisionist view that casts the famed outlaw as a cold-blooded murderer who indulged in, or at least stood by and watched, the mutilation of those who could not defend themselves, including scalping and even emasculation. (1) T.J. Stiles, author of the recent bestseller "Jesse James: Last Rebel of the Civil War," calls his subject "a compulsive thrill seeker who could not bear to abandon the criminal life. It is true he was daring, brave, and capable of astonishing feats of endurance; but it's also true most of his homicide victims after the Civil War were unarmed and helpless, as were many of the men he murdered as a teenage guerrilla." (2)

Steeped in the lore of our own nation's birth in a bloody but righteous revolution, we Americans have an innate appreciation of the rebel. While all gunfighters certainly were not bandits, and all bandits likewise were not gunfighters, there is no question that Jesse James belonged to both categories. Whether he was the wronged good guy painted by legend or the sociopath more darkly depicted by Stiles, he was unquestionably the successful winner and survivor of multiple shootouts. For that reason alone, the lessons learned in his exploits are worth study by today's lawfully armed good people.

Lesson 1: Pack Up Some Backup

Jesse James and his brother Frank appear to have carried multiple revolvers virtually all the time. They put these "backup guns" to good use on multiple occasions. During the Civil War, these were .36 caliber Navy Colts. On the morning of October 20, 1864, the brothers and their guerrilla band were surrounded by the enemy. Stiles writes, "Cocking and firing in rapid succession, Jesse blazed away at the men on horseback as they appeared through the trees. He clicked through one cylinder, then pulled another revolver, emptied it, and pulled another, until finally both he and Frank had spent all their loads. They succeeded in holding back the enemy for a few precious minutes, but now the were cut off from the rest of the guerrillas, who were themselves scattered by another squad of militiamen that had caught them in an open field. The brothers wheeled their horses into the brush and spurred east, the unexpected direction." (3)

James' bloody career began under the tutelage of famed guerrilla leader William Quantrill, and after the latter's death under Quantrill's protege "Bloody Bill" Anderson. Writes Stiles of the band, "The most common pistol in use in Missouri was Colt's 1851 Navy Model, a (cap and ball) .36 caliber revolver ... Loading was such time-consuming work that each guerrilla carried four or even six revolvers into combat, simply drawing a new pistol when one was emptied or jammed." (4) Anderson was said to keep as many as eight readily at hand, either on his person or in saddle holsters.

Later, as the leader of the James-Younger outlaw gang, Jesse would have reason to give thanks for the fact that he and his cohorts had kept up the practice of carrying multiple handguns after the war's end. In the autumn of 1874, Jesse, his brother and Jim Younger faced off with a band of policemen including St. Louis officer Flourney Yancey. Stiles recounts the incident:

"'Halt!' Jesse shouted, and he and Younger opened fire. But Yancey kept his nerve, drew his revolver, and shot Jesse, sending him crashing to the dirt. Jesse got to his feet and remounted as Yancey and Younger continued to shoot, pulled his other revolver, and began to fire again. Seconds later, the brief, intense skirmish suddenly ended. Yancey's horse, already dancing skittishly from the noise, went wild as the firing intensified and galloped away uncontrollably, carrying Yancey with it. 'The fright of his horse,' the St. Louis Globe reported, 'probably saved his life."' (5) Only slightly wounded, Jesse escaped thanks to his cohort's ability to sustain fire by drawing a second handgun.

Lesson 2: Handle Carefully

Sometime in the year 1863, the mid-teen Jesse James lost the tip of his left middle finger. No fewer than three theories have been postulated as to how this occurred. The general consensus of historians is that he got careless and shot it off by accident with one of his Navy Colts, perhaps while loading the gun. There is a lesson here: even if you are destined to be one of the great gunfighters of history, you need to take constant and scrupulous care in the way you handle firearms.

James biographer Marley Brant has a different take on the accident that amputated the young outlaw's distal digit. In "Jesse James: the Man and the Myth," he notes, "Jesse had been given the nickname Dingus' by his guerrilla buddies he had pinched off the tip of his finger while cleaning his gun. The boy reacted to the injury by claiming that the weapon responsible for the accident was the 'dodd-dingus pistol' he had ever seen. The nickname would stick to Jesse for the rest of his life." (6)

The gunifights of Jesse James - The Ayoob Files

American Handgunner, July-August, 2003 by Massad Ayoob

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