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| Bill Dalton |
The Doolin-Dalton Gang was formed from the remnants of the Dalton Gang after
their failed raid on the Coffeyville, Kansas Bank in October 1892.
The
gang comprised Bill Dalton, Bill Doolin, George “Bitter Creek” Newcomb, William
“Tulsa Jack” Blake, Charley Pierce, and a negro named Israel Carr. Bill Doolin
was the acknowledged leader, but “the negro Carr was said to have killed more
men than all the rest of the gang put together.” He was one mean
son-of-a-bitch. Over time, the gang included Dan “Dynamite Dick” Clifton,
“Arkansas Tom” Jones, and several others.
Bill
Dalton wasn’t part of the original Dalton Gang. Before 1892, he led a
respectable life in California, where he ranched
and served two terms in the California legislature. However, after his brothers
got wiped out in the Coffeyville Bank raid, Bill Dalton decided it was time to
shake things up a bit. He robbed his first train outside of Los Angeles,
California, in 1891. Then, in 1892, he joined Bill Doolin’s gang and began a
short-lived reign of terror throughout Texas, Arkansas, Oklahoma, and Kansas.
Bill
Doolin was something of an enigma in Oklahoma Territory. Several newspapers
published stories that made him out to be a “Robin Hood” type character. Jack
Dodsworth, a spy sent to infiltrate the gang, told a story about a man the gang
robbed. Doolin took $35 from him but
asked the man what he intended to do with the money.
After
the man told his story, Doolin calculated it would cost him $24.50 to
accomplish his goal. So Doolin gave him back $25.00 and told him the extra
fifty cents was to get himself a good meal. Another newspaper article said
Doolin appropriated $300 from a peddler
but gave most of it back so the man could cover the cost of his goods and get
back home comfortably.
The
Cimarron train robbery occurred on June 10, 1893. “Four masked robbers held up
the California Express on the Santa Fe road” west of the Cimarron. Two men
jumped onto the engine, guns drawn, and forced the engineer to go to the
express car with a sledgehammer.
The
messenger refused to open the door. The gang blew it open with dynamite when
arguing and shooting couldn’t convince him to open the door. They beat it out
of there with close to $1,000 in cold, hard cash.
Sheriff
Byrns and his posse rode out after the gang the following day. They were close
on the gang’s trail but could never quite catch
up. Several travelers spotted the gang along the lane east of Brannon’s.
At 11 a.m., they had lunch at John Randolph’s ranch. Randolph didn’t know who
they were. The boys told him they were chasing a horse thief who got away.
Cimmaron train robbery on the Santa Fe Road
On September 1, 1893, Marshal Evett Dumas Nix led a posse of 27 marshals and Indian police to Ingalls, Oklahoma Territory. They had received a tip that the gang was holed up in a saloon owned by John Ransom.
At
the first sign of trouble, “Bitter Creek” burst out of the saloon, firing his
Winchester at deputies. He took a bullet in the thigh
but kept moving to make his getaway. Meanwhile, deputies kept up a murderous
fire on the saloon. Finally, the outlaws escaped through a side door of the saloon and took shelter in a stable until they
could hightail it out of there.
“Arkansas
Tom” Jones opened fire from his hotel room window
and was eventually captured. “Bitter Creek” Newcomb, Dan “Dynamite Dick”
Clifton, and Charley Pierce all took bullets
but made their getaway.
The
Doolin-Dalton gang next raised their angry heads in Longview, Texas, on May 23,
1894.
“At
3 p.m....two rough-looking men walked into the First National Bank at Longview,
Texas. One had a rifle concealed under his coat,” reported the Abbeville Press and Banner. Jim Jones
handed a note to bank President Clemmens. “This will introduce you to Charles
Spelemeyer,” it read, “who wants some money and is going to have it.”
As
Jones handed the note to the bank President, he jammed his rifle into the man’s
throat. The other man with him jumped over the counter and grabbed roughly
$2,000, stashing it in a cloth sack.
Two
other robbers were shooting it up in the alley outside the bank. City Marshal
Muckleroy and Deputy Marshal Will Stevens returned their fire. “Bullets flew
thick and fast, and the bank men hastened around the corner with several shots
flying after them.”
Street fight at Longview after the robbery of the First National bank
George Buckingham, a townsman who joined the fracas, was shot and killed in the crossfire. Muckleroy took a ball in the abdomen. J. W. McQueen, a saloonkeeper, heard the shooting and ran out into the alley. He was shot and mortally wounded. Another citizen, Charles Leonard, was enjoying a stroll through the courthouse yard when he took a ball in his leg. It later had to be amputated.
The
papers reported that one robber, Gene Bennett, was shot and killed. He wore
high-heeled boots, spurs, a full cartridge belt, and carried two double-action
revolvers on his person. The marshals found 300 rounds of ammo packed on the
saddle of his horse.
Two
hundred shots rang out in less than fifteen minutes. If the gang had an inkling
of what was to come, the odds are ten times that many rounds would have been
let loose in Longview that day.
Bill
Dalton cashed in his chips at Gidding’s Ranch near Elk, Indian Territory, in April
1894.
The Daily Ardmoreite,
on June 9, 1894, devoted an entire page to his death. The headline screamed,
“Bill Dalton died with his boots on pistol in hand.”
The
way it came about, Houston Wallace, Bill Dalton’s wife, and another woman went
on a wild spending spree in town, shooting nearly $200 in a brief period. It
set off an alarm, and they were detained and questioned. The local marshal
raised a posse and headed out to Houston Wallace’s ranch, arriving about 8 a.m.
The posse split up and reconnoitered the place. At first glance, things looked
normal enough. There were just a few women and children playing in the yard.
They
probably could have taken Bill Dalton alive, but what gave the posse away was a
woman tending cattle in the yard who
spotted them and raced towards the house to warn Dalton. “He immediately jumped
through the window in the rear of the house, thinking that was unguarded.” But
that turned out to be a big mistake. “There stood Lou [Loss] Hart, true game, and a dead shot.” Hart hollered at Dalton
to surrender as he ran towards the nearby woods, but when Dalton reached for
his pistol, Hart fired his.
When
they searched Dalton’s body, officials found $325 on his person. The marshals
also found a Longview Bank money sack in the house. That settled the question
about whether Bill Dalton was involved in that job.
Bill
Tilghman captured Bill Doolin at a bathhouse in Eureka Springs on January 16,
1896. It was more of an accident than anything. Tilghman bumped into Doolin in
the bathhouse, quickly overpowered him, and took him captive.
Doolin
later told the Guthrie Daily Leader,
“I was looking for a crowd with guns. I expected to be found sooner or later—felt
that I would be shot down like a dog—and intended to do my share of the
shooting. Had I been sure of Tilghman when he came into the door, I would have
shot him dead in a twinkle.”
Fortunately
for Doolin, Tilghman didn’t feel the same way.
After
his capture, Doolin was jailed in Guthrie, Oklahoma Territory, then quickly
escaped in a mass jailbreak of fourteen prisoners.
Unfortunately
for Doolin, he didn’t think things through. He went to stay with his wife at
her home in Lawson, Oklahoma Territory, where she was the postmistress. A
newspaper report said Doolin didn’t bother to hide that he was there. He rode
into town several times, and local law enforcement officials turned a blind eye
to his presence.
Bill Doolin took 21 rounds of buckshot and one rifle shot
But when Deputy Marshal Heck Thomas learned Doolin was in the area, Doolin’s days became numbered. Doolin left the house around 2 a.m. on the morning of August 25, 1896, armed with a Colt 45 caliber and a Winchester rifle.
He
walked out of the door and straight into the waiting posse. “The outlaw heard
the command ‘HALT!’” wrote the Arizona
Republican. “Then someone cried, ‘Hold up your hands!’ Doolin brought his
Winchester to his shoulder and fired two volleys almost as soon as the words were spoken.”
“Thomas
discharged his rifle. Doolin stumbled, and as he fell forward, fired off his
revolver.” At the sound of gunfire, the entire posse opened fire.
When
the marshals examined his body, they discovered he took 21 rounds of buckshot and a rifle shot that shattered his
arm.
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