JESSE JAMES
Name: Jesse Woodson James
Born: 5 September 1847 Clay County, Missouri, USA
Died: 3 April 1882 St. Joseph, Missouri, USA
Jesse Woodson James (September 5, 1847 – April 3, 1882) was an American outlaw
and the most famous member of the James-Younger Gang. After his death, he became
a legendary figure of the Wild West.
Jesse Woodson James was born in Clay County, Missouri, near the site of present
day Kearney. His father, Robert James, was a commercial hemp farmer and Baptist
minister from Kentucky who helped found William Jewell College in Liberty,
Missouri (hemp was the raw material for rope, and a major crop in the Missouri
River valley). Robert James traveled to California during the Gold Rush and
died there when Jesse was three years old. After Robert's death, Jesse's mother
Zerelda remarried, first to Benjamin Simms, and then to a doctor named Reuben
Samuel. After their marriage in 1855, Samuel moved into the James home. Jesse
had two full siblings: his older brother, Alexander Franklin "Frank" James, and
a younger sister, Susan Lavenia James. In addition, Reuben and Zerelda
eventually had four children: Sarah Louisa Samuel (sometimes Sarah Ellen), John
Thomas Samuel, Fannie Quantrell Samuel, and Archie Peyton Samuel.
The approach of the American Civil War overshadowed the James-Samuel household.
Missouri was a border state between the North and South, but Clay County lay in
a region of Missouri later dubbed "Little Dixie," where slaveholding and
Southern identity were stronger than in other areas. Robert James owned six
slaves; after his death, Zerelda and Reuben Samuel acquired a total of seven
slaves who raised tobacco on the farm. Clay County became the scene of great
turmoil after the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act in 1854, when the question
of whether slavery would be expanded into the neighboring Kansas Territory
dominated public life. Much of the tension that led up to the American Civil War
centered on the violence that erupted in nearby Kansas between pro- and anti-slavery
militias.
Name: Jesse Woodson James
Born: 5 September 1847 Clay County, Missouri, USA
Died: 3 April 1882 St. Joseph, Missouri, USA
Jesse Woodson James (September 5, 1847 – April 3, 1882) was an American outlaw
and the most famous member of the James-Younger Gang. After his death, he became
a legendary figure of the Wild West.
Jesse Woodson James was born in Clay County, Missouri, near the site of present
day Kearney. His father, Robert James, was a commercial hemp farmer and Baptist
minister from Kentucky who helped found William Jewell College in Liberty,
Missouri (hemp was the raw material for rope, and a major crop in the Missouri
River valley). Robert James traveled to California during the Gold Rush and
died there when Jesse was three years old. After Robert's death, Jesse's mother
Zerelda remarried, first to Benjamin Simms, and then to a doctor named Reuben
Samuel. After their marriage in 1855, Samuel moved into the James home. Jesse
had two full siblings: his older brother, Alexander Franklin "Frank" James, and
a younger sister, Susan Lavenia James. In addition, Reuben and Zerelda
eventually had four children: Sarah Louisa Samuel (sometimes Sarah Ellen), John
Thomas Samuel, Fannie Quantrell Samuel, and Archie Peyton Samuel.
The approach of the American Civil War overshadowed the James-Samuel household.
Missouri was a border state between the North and South, but Clay County lay in
a region of Missouri later dubbed "Little Dixie," where slaveholding and
Southern identity were stronger than in other areas. Robert James owned six
slaves; after his death, Zerelda and Reuben Samuel acquired a total of seven
slaves who raised tobacco on the farm. Clay County became the scene of great
turmoil after the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act in 1854, when the question
of whether slavery would be expanded into the neighboring Kansas Territory
dominated public life. Much of the tension that led up to the American Civil War
centered on the violence that erupted in nearby Kansas between pro- and anti-slavery
militias.