Outgunned! True Stories of Citizens Who Stood Up To Outlaws—And Won (Cumberland House Publishing, 2004) by Robert A. Waters & John T. Waters, Jr.
In the movies, outlaws ride into town, terrorize the local citizens, and finally meet their match when the heroic sheriff arrives. In real life, it was different. Some of the most notorious western outlaws were killed or captured by townspeople. And the trend continued throughout the Prohibition era.
Outgunned! True Stories of Citizens Who Stood up to Outlaws—And Won describes a dozen such cases. There’s Jesse James, whose gang was decimated by armed citizens while attempting to rob a bank in Northfield, Minnesota.
There’s Tom Horn, assassin for the Wyoming cattle barons, who was shot by citizens during an ill-fated jailbreak.
And there’s George Birdwell, “Pretty Boy” Floyd’s chief lieutenant. He and his partners were gunned down by outraged townspeople as they attempted to hold up a bank in the all-black town of Boley, Oklahoma.
There’s the notorious Dalton gang that entered Coffeyville, Kansas, one cold fall morning in 1892 and attempted to rob two banks at the same time. Four of the outlaws were killed by armed citizens.
Then there’s Anthony Chebatoris, a Prohibition-era socialist who, after murdering an innocent bystander during an attempted bank robbery in Midland, Michigan, was shot by a dentist who kept a hunting rifle in his office.
Outgunned! True Stories of Citizens Who Stood up to Outlaws—And Won is the first book to systematically describe historical accounts of criminals who were captured or killed by ordinary citizens.
Many books romanticize outlaws or lawmen, but until now the role of citizens who banded together to save themselves and their neighbors has been given little more than passing interest.
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