C2 Proficiency - Reading: Multiple Matching

Jesse James was an American outlaw, gang leader, bank robber, train robber, and murderer from the state of Missouri and the most famous member of the James-Younger Gang. Already a celebrity when he was alive, he became a legendary figure of the Wild West after his death. Some recent scholars place him in the context of regional insurgencies of ex-Confederates following the American Civil War rather than a manifestation of frontier lawlessness or alleged economic justice.

Jesse and his brother Frank James were Confederate guerrillas during the Civil War. They were accused of participating in atrocities committed against Union soldiers. After the war, as members of one gang or another, they robbed banks, stagecoaches and trains. Despite popular portrayals of James as a kind of Robin Hood, robbing from the rich and giving to the poor, there is no evidence that he and his gang used their robbery gains for anyone but themselves.

The James brothers were most active with their gang from about 1866 until 1876, when their attempted robbery of a bank in Northfield, Minnesota, resulted in the capture or deaths of several members. They continued in crime for several years, recruiting new members, but were under increasing pressure from law enforcement. On April 3, 1882, Jesse James was killed by Robert Ford, who was a member of the gang living in the James house and who was hoping to collect a state reward on James' head.

William H. Bonney, better known as Billy the Kid but also known as Henry Antrim, was a 19th-century American gunman who participated in the Lincoln County War and became a frontier outlaw in the American Old West. According to legend, he killed 21 men, but it is generally believed that he killed between four and nine. He killed his first man at 18.

McCarty (or Bonney, the name he used at the height of his notoriety) was 5'8" (173 cm) tall with blue eyes, a smooth complexion, and prominent front teeth. He was said to be friendly and personable at times, and it's been said that he was as lithe as a cat. Contemporaries described him as a "neat" dresser who favored an "unadorned Mexican sombrero". These qualities, along with his cunning and celebrated skill with firearms, contributed to his paradoxical image as both a notorious outlaw and beloved folk hero.

Relatively unknown during most of his lifetime, Billy was catapulted into legend in 1881 when New Mexico's governor, Lew Wallace, placed a price on his head. In addition, the Las Vegas Gazette (Las Vegas, New Mexico) and the New York Sun carried stories about his exploits. Other newspapers followed suit. After his death, several biographies were written that portrayed the Kid in varying lights.

Jack Dunlop, also known as John Dunlop, Jess Dunlop, John Patterson, and most commonly Three Fingered Jack was an outlaw in the closing days of the Old West, best known for being a train robber. Whether or not he actually physically had three fingers on either of his hands has never been confirmed.

Dunlop was born in Texas, and spent most of his early life from his mid to late teens as a cowboy. How and where he first became involved in the outlaw life is uncertain, but he was arrested after several bank robberies in 1893. Released from prison in 1895, Dunlop joined the "Black Jack" Christian Gang, but by 1898 he was riding with the Burt Alvord Gang. The gang began hitting trains in Arizona, with success, and with "Three Fingered Jack" Dunlop quickly becoming the best known of the bunch. At midnight on September 9, 1899, the gang robbed a Southern Pacific Express for just over $10,000. During that robbery, the gang had detached the car containing the money, then opened the safe by way of dynamite. The gang then escaped into the Chiricahua Mountains, and a posse led by Sheriff Scott White and including George Scarborough was unsuccessful in their pursuit.

A few months later, the gang struck again. On February 15, 1900, the gang hit a train at the Fairbank, which served Tombstone, Arizona. Noted and well-known lawman Jeff Davis Milton was working as a guard on that train. A gunfight between Milton and the five gang members ensued, resulting in Milton shooting buckshot into the stomach of Dunlop, while shooting and wounding gang member Juan Yoas. Milton was badly wounded in the right arm during the gunbattle. Not aware that Milton was so badly injured, the gang fled.

Dunlop's wound was serious, as he had been hit by eleven pellets from the shotgun, mostly in the stomach region, whereas Yoas had been shot in the buttocks. The five outlaws split up shortly after fleeing the scene, with the understanding that they would meet up just outside of Contention City, Arizona. Dunlop fell from his horse only a few miles from where the robbery had taken place, where he lay for fourteen hours before a posse came across him. He was taken to Tombstone, where he died on February 24, 1900. Dunlop is buried in Tombstone's Boot Hill cemetery.

William L. "Buffalo Bill" Brooks was a western lawman and later outlaw. Brooks was born in Ohio around 1832 where he later became a buffalo hunter in the late-1840s or early-1850s whose success equaled fellow buffalo hunter William F. Cody earning the same nickname of Buffalo Bill. During the late 1860s, Brooks had killed several men in various gunfights, and was briefly hired as a stage driver for the Southwestern Stage Co., before becoming the marshal of Newton, Kansas in 1872. Although he was reported to have been around 40 years old, several biographers have claimed Brooks was in his 20s.

With Brooks success in Newton he was soon offered a position in Dodge City as town marshal where he was later involved in 15 gunfights during his first month. In one case, one of the men killed had four brothers who came after Brooks in revenge. As the brothers arrived in town Brooks was said to have killed all four men with four shots each. By the following year Brooks had cleared the city of most major criminals. Brooks however began to kill several men in questionable circumstances including one incident where he killed a man over an argument with a local dance hall girl. After backing down from gunfighter Kirk Jordan, Brooks left town shortly after.

According to legend Brooks went to Butte, Montana where he attempted to become the city marshal but, in part because of Brooks' reputation, was instead passed over in favor of Morgan Earp. Confronting Earp over his defeat, Brooks was shot in the stomach and Morgan was shot in the shoulder.

Records show however that, shortly after leaving Dodge City, Brooks returned to his old position as a stage driver for the Southwestern Stage Co. in early 1874. Several months later however the company had lost a mail contract to a rival company and Brooks lost his job. In June several mules and horses owned by the rival company had been stolen and Brooks, with two other men, were arrested the next month. It was charged that Brooks had apparently attempted to weaken the rival company and win back the mail contract for the Southwestern Stage Company. Brooks was hanged by an angry crowd while awaiting trial on July 29, 1874.

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