Bain News Service photograph of Younger, undated. Thomas Coleman "Cole" Younger (January 15, 1844 - March 21, 1916) was a leader with the James-Younger gang and the eldest brother of Jim, John and Bob Younger. During the American Civil War, savage guerril
Bain News Service photograph of Younger, undated. Thomas Coleman "Cole" Younger (January 15, 1844 - March 21, 1916) was a leader with the James-Younger gang and the eldest brother of Jim, John and Bob Younger. During the American Civil War, savage guerrilla warfare wracked Missouri. Younger joined the Confederate guerrilla leader Quantrill in a raid on August 21, 1863, taking part in the killing of some 200 men and boys at Lawrence, Kansas, which the guerrillas looted and burned. The James-Younger Gang had its origins in this group of bushwhackers. The gang's crimes began in 1866, though it did not truly become the "James-Younger Gang" until 1868 at the earliest, when the authorities first named Cole Younger and both the James brothers as suspects in the robbery of the Nimrod Long bank in Russellville, Kentucky. It dissolved in 1876, after the capture of the Younger brothers in Minnesota after the ill-fated attempt to rob the Northfield First National Bank. The James brothers made it back to Missouri, but the three Youngers (Cole, Bob, and Jim) did not. They and another gang member, Charlie Pitts, waged a gun battle with a local posse in a wooded ravine west of Madelia, Minnesota. Pitts was killed, and Cole, Jim, and Bob Younger were badly wounded and captured. They pleaded guilty to their crimes to avoid being hanged and were sentenced to life in prison at the Stillwater Prison at Stillwater on November 18, 1876. Bob Younger died in Stillwater prison on September 16, 1889, of tuberculosis. Cole and Jim were paroled on July 10, 1901, with the help of the prison warden. Jim committed suicide in a hotel room in St Paul, Minnesota, on October 19, 1902. He lectured and toured the south with Frank James in a wild west show, The Cole Younger and Frank James Wild West Company in 1903. On August 21, 1912, Cole declared that he had become a Christian and repented of his criminal past. He died in 1916 at the age of 72.
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Photo credit: © Photo Researchers / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
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