The James Boys In Kentucky

©Sandi Gorin

Part 1

1880 Mammoth Cave, KY, Stage Robbery

From the Glasgow Times: The James boys did all their proven Kentucky raids work rather close to this vicinity robbing the Columbia bank, the Russellville bank and also the Mammoth Cave stage. At Columbia the outlaws killed a cashier in the bank. In Russellville they fatally wounded another man. They came through Glasgow enroute from Columbia to Russellville.

There is a famous story built up around the robbery of the Mammoth Cave stage in 1880, and it involves a watch that belonged to a Bardstown resident who was a victim in the robbery. Another man was accused and convicted of the stage robbery and served a sentence for the crime, the watch proved years later that Jesse James was the man behind the guns in the famous old time drama of the highwaymen.

Here is the story as it was told to Glasgow's John NELSON many years ago when he was a guide in Mammoth Cave, and the story came from the lips of the man who guided Jessse and Frank James through the cave the day before they held up the stage. The man was the famous Negro guide, William GARVIN, who was the discovered of the Statue of Martha Washington, and many other interesting attractions in the cave. Mr. NELSON was also a guide during the last years of the old Negro's active cave duty and heard the story from his lips many times.

There were fifteen in the party that included the notorious James boys, although the identity of the outlaws was unknown. Two more members of the party were Mr. ROUNTREE of Lebanon, Kentucky, and his very comely young daughter, Lizzie. The party had been together, mingling with each for three days and were taking a long all-day trip through the cave with guide GARVIN before leaving for home the following day. Jesse James had been a constant companion of Miss ROUNTREE and was her escort through the cave on the last trip. When they stopped in Bandit's Hall, at the foot of the Corkscrew, the guide announced that they would have a few minutes rest there in Bandit's Hall.

Someone in the crowd asked the Negro if there had ever been any bandits in the hall, and then Frank James made his little speech.

"Folks," he said, "there's bandits in the hall now. I am Frank James and the gentleman sitting over there with Miss ROUNTREE is my brother, Jesse. We've all been together for three days now; and we will all be leaving for different ways tomorrow and I just thought we ought to be a little better acquainted." With this introduction, the bandit sat down.

The members of the party thought it was a good joke and shouted, "Hang on to your wallets, we're being held up," and many other such jestful remarks. Howevr, the keen eye of the Negro guide noticed that the faces of the two self-styled bandits registered disapproval at the matter being taken as a joke. From that minute on Garvin belieed they were really the James brothers, but no one else in the party attached any importance to the incident.

The next day, two stages left the cave hotel for Cave City. Two miles from their starting point and one quarter mile from the site where the Home Like Inn stood until torn down years ago, Jesse and Frank James held up the two stage coaches, lining the passengers along the side of each carriage. The bandits relieved each passenger of money, jewlry and departed on horsback toward Cave City.

The James boys stopped at the old Cave City Hotel, when they of course were not recognized, and Frank James put the money and jewelry he had taken from Miss Lissie Rountree into an envelope addressed to her. This he gave to the clerk with the instruction to personally give it to Miss Rountree when the stage arrived.

NOTE: He probably did not leave all her rings, since other accounts state Jesse James' wife was wearing one of the Rountree rings when Jesse was murdered. The name is spelled differently by writer, but most of the family now spell their name ROWNTREE as the old Virginia spelling.