The Jesse James farm

Click on a label to read posts from that part of the world.

Sean,

My great-grandmother, Cassia Russell, lived on the farm next to the James'. She rode for the doctor the night the house was bombed. Our family stories always had it as night-riding abolitionists; it's a little bit of a letdown to hear it was the Pinkertons.
Cassia gave an interview in ~1942 to the local newspaper detailing Quantrill's raiders trying to conscript all the young men at church one Sunday morning. Quite a story. Her husband, Robert Russell, helped prepare Jesse's body for burial.

Thanks for a great series; I learned alot about what I thought I already knew !!

12-08-2010 @ 2:20PM

Sean McLachlan said...

Interesting that your family lived next to the James farm! Throughout the Bleeding Kansas and Civil War times there were many abolitionist raids into that part of Missouri by Kansas Jayhawkers. The James farm was never raided, and they wouldn't have had to in 1874 since slavery was gone (at least in the U.S.). Perhaps the story about the Pinkerton raid got melded with another story about a Jayhawk raid that happened to another branch of your family? None of the major sources mention Jayhawkers raiding Jesse's neighbors, but if you had more kin in that area it's very likely that one of their farms got hit.
Any other family stories? I love this stuff!
By the way, if you have any contemporary photos you might want to look closely at them. Jesse and Frank often posed with friends and neighbors.

Add your comments

Your comments:

Remember me

E-Mail me when someone replies to this comment

Please keep your comments relevant to this blog entry. Email addresses are never displayed, but they are required to confirm your comments.

When you enter your name and email address, you'll be sent a link to confirm your comment, and a password. To leave another comment, just use that password.

To create a live link, simply type the URL (including http://) or email address and we will make it a live link for you. You can put up to 3 URLs in your comments. Line breaks and paragraphs are automatically converted — no need to use <p> or <br /> tags.