Legends of the Old West - OUTLAWS Ep. 2 | Sam Bass: “Black Hills Bandit”

Episode Date: February 21, 2024

Sam Bass and his business partner, Joel Collins, travel to Deadwood to find their fortunes, but their attempts to make legitimate money end in failure. They believe they have choice but to embrace the outlaw life. They assemble a crew and start robbing stagecoaches… only to discover that they’re miserable stagecoach robbers. But when they reach the peak of desperation, they decide to rob a train. And in the process, they become historically lucky.   Join Black Barrel+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons: blackbarrel.supportingcast.fm/join   Apple users join Noiser+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons. Click the Noiser+ banner on Apple or go to noiser.com/subscriptions to get started with a 7-day free trial.   For more details, visit our website www.blackbarrelmedia.com and check out our social media pages. We’re @OldWestPodcast on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.   On YouTube, subscribe to LEGENDS+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons: hit “Join” on the Legends YouTube homepage. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

At At one time, the life of soon-to-be outlaw Sam Bass showed promise. The poor Indiana farm boy braved the childhood hardship of losing his older brother, then his mother, and then his father. He and his younger siblings survived difficult and strained living conditions. He and his younger siblings survived difficult and strained living conditions. During and after the Civil War, Sam read stories of the developing West and the early pioneers, frontiersmen like Kit Carson, Daniel Boone, and Davy Crockett. But Sam was especially drawn to the first generation of cowboys who drove cattle on the trails between Texas and Kansas. After the loss of their parents, Sam and his siblings had been uprooted and moved to their uncle's farm.

Dave Sheeks was a hard man, and Sam bristled under his uncle's strict rules and grinding workload. More and more, Sam dreamed of becoming a Texas cowboy. He wanted freedom and adventure, and the stories he found in newspapers and dime novels indicated there were lots of both in Texas. When Sam Bass and his uncle Dave finally had it out, Sam decided to leave the farm and strike out on his own. He headed to St. Louis, Missouri, and then he took a steamboat down the Mississippi River to Rosedale, Mississippi.

He was hungry and broke, but he soon found a job at a sawmill. He had spent long hours toiling away at Uncle Dave's sawmill, and he had hated it, but now he found a use for the things he had learned. In Rosedale, Sam learned how to play a mean game of poker and how to handle a pistol. After a year or so, he was ready to strike out on his own again. Having saved up enough money to buy himself a good horse and a good saddle, Sam Bass was Texas-bound. He settled in Denton, north of Dallas. A few years later, he partnered with a saloon owner in San Antonio named Joel Collins. They sold pretty much everything of value, bought a cattle herd, hired some cowboys, and drove the herd up to Kansas.

After years of dreaming, Sam Bass finally got a taste of the cowboy life, and he quickly decided it was not for him. The work was grueling and the conditions were extreme, and Sam realized he wasn't cut out to be a cowboy. He and Joel paid their cowboys and then decided what to do next. It was the summer of 1876, and if there was one way to make money faster and easier than driving cattle, it was being a gold miner, at least in theory. Thousands of people flocked to the Black Hills on the edge of Dakota Territory to take advantage of the latest gold rush. The rumor was you could scoop gold from the streams with your bare hands. There was so much

of it, you would have to be a fool not to get rich. To Sam and Joel, it sounded like the perfect next step. They packed up and traveled north to the heart of the gold rush, the illegal mining camp of Deadwood. Much like Sam's dream of being a cowboy, he would quickly learn that there's a vast difference between theory and reality. In the Black Hills, he did find a way to make money faster and easier than in the cattle business, but it wasn't as a gold miner. From Black Barrel Media, this is Legends of the Old West. I'm your host, Chris Wimmer, and this season we're telling the stories of two outlaws, stagecoach and train robber Sam Bass

and controversial fugitive Ned Christie. This is episode two, Sam Bass, part two of three, Black Hills Bandit. Sam Bass and Joel Collins arrived in the Black Hills late in the summer of 1876. Like most others, they headed for Deadwood. News of the Battle of the Little Bighorn was still prevalent. Army columns were patrolling the region in a vain effort to kill or capture Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse. And another bout of shocking news started spreading from Deadwood on August 2nd,

news of the murder of Wild Bill Hickok. Sam and Joel arrived that fall, a few weeks after Hickok was killed by a no-account drifter named Jack McCall. The two former cattlemen had enough money in their pockets to enjoy some of the more pleasurable activities Deadwood had to offer. to enjoy some of the more pleasurable activities Deadwood had to offer. After thorough investigation of the saloons and brothels in camp, Sam and Joel began planning their next business venture. It was too late in the year to do any gold prospecting. Winter was fast approaching,

and the hills would soon be blanketed in snow and the streams would be frozen over. Whatever gold was there, the Black Hills would keep it hidden until spring. Bass and Collins hunkered down for the end of 1876 and the early part of 1877. The winter that year turned out to be a harsh one, and the men stayed warm in rented rooms and their favorite saloons. Because both Sam and Joel fancied themselves superior card players, they planned to extract as much gold and cash as possible from the grubby prospectors who spent the winter playing poker. But they were about to get schooled. Deadwood's resident gold prospectors were more than happy to relieve the cocky upstarts from Texas

of a sizable portion of what they'd made on their cattle drive. By spring, Bass and Collins weren't quite back to square one, but pretty close. Then things started to look up when they were given the opportunity to buy a quartz mine. With what little money they had left, they bought the mine, and it didn't take them long to discover they had been swindled. The mine was worthless. Sam and Joel were running out of options, and they turned to their next venture. Sam thought they could get rich in the freight business. As more people moved to Deadwood, more supplies were needed in town. Sam had learned how to handle a team of horses back in Indiana, so the plan was to rent a wagon and a team of horses. Sam would drive the team back and forth between Deadwood and Cheyenne, Wyoming, hauling goods and sometimes people.

Joel would stay in Deadwood and handle the business side of the operation. Sam obviously drew the short straw in the partnership. Hauling freight anywhere in Dakota, Montana, and Wyoming territories was dangerous work. Between the terrain, the weather, the threat of being robbed and murdered by bandits, and the possibility of being attacked by Sioux warriors, Sam was risking his life on every trip. It looked and felt a hell of a lot like driving cattle. But Sam agreed to go for it anyway. They launched the business in the late spring of 1877, when winter had faded enough to make the roads passable. By the end of July, they had given up. They were barely breaking even, and Sam's side of the business certainly didn't qualify as a faster, easier way to make money than driving cattle.

In the summer of 1877, they had reached the turning point. They weren't cut out for driving cattle or hauling freight, and they were failures as miners and gamblers. That was when Joel came up with another get-rich-quick plan. The plan that would lead to where we all know they're going. It was time to become outlaws. As a podcast network, our first priority has always been audio and the stories we're able to share with you. But we also sell merch. And organizing that was made both able to share with you. But we also sell merch, and organizing that

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Joel's idea wasn't unique. By the summer of 1877, he wouldn't have been in the first thousand people to say, hey, let's rob a stagecoach. For decades, stagecoaches all over the West had been targeted by bandits. Robbery was certainly as risky as driving cattle or hauling freight. A bandit could get shot during the act, or go to prison afterward, or be hanged by the neck until dead if he was caught. But at least it was less work. As Sam Bass and Joel Collins contemplated their new endeavor, they had the same thoughts that virtually every outlaw had.

They were too smart to get caught. By that time, Sam knew the road between Deadwood and Cheyenne like the back of his hand, and Joel would be the self-appointed brains behind the operation. He'd handle the intel. He would find out which stages were carrying what and who. At first, Sam wasn't sure he was prepared to risk his neck to become a robber, but he believed he had no other prospects, so he finally agreed. If they could make fast money without hurting anyone, he was in. Next, they needed more men. They figured a gang of six to eight guys would be necessary to successfully hold up a stage, especially now that many were traveling with armed guards. Luckily, they were in Deadwood, where recruitment was easy. The first man to sign up had the perfect outlaw resume. Jack Davis had already held up a few

stagecoaches and a train. Next up was a man from Missouri named Jim Berry. Jim had a wife and four kids back home who he needed to provide for, so he was chomping at the bit to get rolling. Tom Nixon was also happy to get on board. Nixon was a Canadian who'd had no luck prospecting and was flat broke. Bill Heffridge was from Pennsylvania where he had a wife, and for good measure, he had another wife in Kansas. Six became eight when two more men joined up, Frank Towle from unknown origins and a man known to the others only as Reddy. The gang had been hearing about large quantities of gold being shipped by stage out of the Black Hills. There were also government paymasters traveling by stage,

carrying large sums of cash. And then there was the daily influx of people coming into the territory who were flush with cash, ready to invest. With so many inviting targets, the gang was sure it would score big. The men set up camp in Deadwood Gulch, which would be the base of their operation, and began planning their first holdup. The first rule, agreed upon unanimously, was that there would be no shooting unless it was in self-defense. That rule, predictably,

held true for about 30 seconds. The first stagecoach the gang set out to rob was a nightcoach traveling from Cheyenne to Deadwood. The plan was to hide behind some boulders at a location they had scouted about two and a half miles west of Deadwood. When the stage was in sight, they would step into the road with their guns drawn and order the driver to stop and get down off the coach along with the guard if there was one. Then they would order the passengers to get out. They would steal anything of value and ride off into the night. Like all good outlaws, the crew had purchased handkerchiefs to hide their identities. The handkerchiefs were all red, like the classic image of the outlaw that we all know today.

They brought a little whiskey to steady their nerves, and when it got dark, they hunkered down and waited. Then they waited some more, but there was still no sign of the stage. It was either very late or had been cancelled altogether. Just as they were about to head back to camp, they heard the faint but unmistakable sound of horses approaching. As planned, the bandits jumped out into the road with their pistols pointed at the driver. That was a stroke of good luck. The driver was alone, there was no guard with him. But that would be the end of their luck, thanks to the mystery man known only as Reddy.

Seven of the eight bandits were armed with pistols, but Reddy had a shotgun. As the stagecoach driver tried to obey the command to stop, his two lead horses got spooked and swerved off the road. The coach tilted so violently that the two passengers inside tumbled out. During the commotion, and for reasons known only to him, Reddy fired his shotgun at the driver. The driver fell off the coach with a chest full of buckshot and hit his head on a tree stump. It was a double whammy. If the buckshot hadn't killed him, the blunt force trauma to the head would have. The frightened horses, now driverless, trauma to the head would have. The frightened horses, now driverless, raced toward Deadwood at a full gallop, dragging an empty coach. The two men who had fallen out of the coach

fled into the night. And that left eight bandits standing in the road with nothing but a dead stagecoach driver at their feet. Some of the outlaws were so angry at Reddy for making such a stupid move, they nearly shot him dead. But after they cooled down, they ended up letting him go, as long as he agreed to ride out of the hills immediately and never return. He accepted their offer, and after he was gone, the others skedaddled too. When the empty stage pulled into Deadwood, Sheriff Seth Bullock quickly put a posse together and rode out to the scene where they found the dead driver. Bullock offered a $500 reward to anyone who brought the murderers in, dead or alive.

So, on their very first holdup together, the bandits were facing murder charges and had a bounty on their heads. They had stolen no money, and to add insult to injury, the gang later learned the coach was carrying $15,000 in cash. With Reddy out, the gang was down to seven men, and soon six when Frank Towle decided to sign on with another outlaw outfit. That turned out to be a bad decision. One of those outlaws eventually learned Frank was part of the failed holdup. He also knew about the $500 reward, so he killed Frank. And because the outlaw couldn't be bothered to haul a body into town, he cut Frank's head off and rode in to collect his reward with Frank's head in a burlap bag. Unfortunately for the cutthroat outlaw, he learned the reward was no longer being offered.

Sam and Joel's gang of six robbed several more stages in July and August of 1877 with more pitiful results. And after there was a clear pattern at work, the Deadwood newspaper, The Pioneer, began referring to the gang as the Black Hills Bandits. During the early days of the spree, with Reddy gone and Frank dead, no one knew the identities of the robbers. But before too long, for whatever reason, people in Deadwood started to suspect that Bass and Collins, along with their four buddies, Davis, Barry, Nixon, and Heffridge, might be the Black Hills Bandits. The Bandits began to sense the suspicions of those around them, and came to a consensus that a change of scenery might be a good idea. They also came to a consensus that they were pretty bad at robbing stagecoaches.

They decided it was time to shift their focus to something potentially more lucrative, namely robbing trains. They must have used some sort of logic to determine that they would be better at robbing trains than stagecoaches, but it's hard to know what it was. But their course was set, and they went to work. The Black Hills Bandits did their research. They knew the Union Pacific was carrying passengers and hauling various amounts of gold, silver, and cash from California to Omaha on a regular basis. The larger shipments were then

sent from Omaha to banks in Chicago, New York, Philadelphia, and Boston. If the bandits were lucky, although luck had eluded them thus far, they might score big the first time out and be rich enough to retire. The Black Hills bandits left their namesake behind and rode south to Nebraska. On the 1st of September, 1877, Sam Bass, Joel Collins, and the other four outlaws packed up their camp in Deadwood Gulch and started riding to Ogallala, Nebraska, 300 miles away. The would-be train robbers had $40 between them, so a lot was riding on this robbery. Ogallala was out on the Nebraska prairie with miles of open space around it. It was a stop on the Transcontinental Railroad, on which the Union Pacific traveled, and the outlaws thought it was a good area for a robbery. They scouted the region

and discovered what they believed to be the perfect spot for a holdup. It was a tiny depot called Big Springs, about 20 miles east of Ogallala. Big Springs Station was a water stop for steam locomotives. Thanks to a large natural water source, hence the name, trains could stop and fill up with water when needed. The bandits set their sights on the No. 4 express train that came through Big Springs at 10.48 p.m. Big Springs was roughly 350 miles west of Omaha By the time the news of the robbery reached Union Pacific headquarters in Omaha and a posse was sent out, the bandits would be long gone It was perfect, and for once, the bandits received the luck they had been sorely lacking. Though in the long run, the bandits would realize that their bad luck

far outweighed their good luck. In Ogallala, the gang prepped their horses and loaded up on provisions, all of which was organized for a fast getaway. They rode the 20 miles out to Big Springs and set up camp. While Sam stayed in camp, Joel Collins and Jim Berry rode back into Ogallala so Jim could replace his worn-out boots. Why didn't Jim replace them before they left? No one knows. And this was where the long-term bad luck started. When Jim went into a store to see about his boots, he was recognized by the owner. The man had sold Jim's supplies on credit at a store that he ran in South Platte, a few

miles down the road. The owner remembered Jim because Jim had skipped town before paying his bill. Now, the owner refused to give Jim any more credit. Jim and Joel were able to scratch up enough money to pay for the boots, and Jim told the shopkeeper he'd be back in a few days to settle his previous bill. By then, Jim hoped he would be rich. Then, Jim and Joel bought six red bandanas, similar to the ones they wore during their robberies outside Deadwood. At the time, the purchase didn't register as anything unusual.

All cowboys kept bandanas handy to wipe away the sweat and dust, or to cover their skin to keep from being burned by the sun or pelted with grit during a dust storm. But, of course, the simple piece of red cloth also worked as a handy way to hide a man's face when he committed a crime. In a couple days, that basic purchase would come back to haunt the Black Hills Bandits. For now, Jim and Joel headed back to camp near Big Springs. For now, Jim and Joel headed back to camp near Big Springs. The group went over the final touches of their plan and made sure each man knew what he was doing. Lastly, they agreed on a date.

The robbery of the No. 4 express train would happen on September 18, 1877. The night of the 18th was a quiet one in Big Springs, like most nights. The sounds of the open prairie were present, the steady wind, the crickets, and the occasional bark of a coyote, but not much else. George Barnhart was probably used to quiet nights out there in the darkness of the Nebraska plains. He was the stationmaster and telegraph operator at Big Springs Station, and if he liked the quiet nights, his serenity was about to be rudely interrupted. Sometime around 10.30 that night, six men with new red bandanas pulled up to their eyes to disguise their identities burst into George's tiny office. up to their eyes to disguise their identities, burst into George's tiny office. They had their pistols drawn, cocked, and pointed directly at him. Joel Collins ordered Barnhart to destroy

the telegraph apparatus. Next, Barnhart was ordered to hang out a red lantern, which was the universal signal that a train needed to stop at the depot. The gang instructed George to get his mail bag ready and stand on the platform as he usually would if he had mail for the train. Before long, the men heard the low rumble of the Union Pacific No. 4 express train in the distance. The outlaws hid in their assigned spots and reminded George that he had six guns pointed at him. At 10.48 p.m., right on schedule,

the train billowed clouds of steam as it slowed to a stop at the station, and the robbery began. As instructed, George Barnhart stood on the platform and waited for his cue to knock on the door of the express car and request entry. Even before the train had come to a full stop, Joel Collins and Bill Heffridge jumped up and commandeered the engine. They took the engineer and the fireman off the train at gunpoint. Collins threw water on the fire, which rendered the locomotive powerless. Collins threw water on the fire, which rendered the locomotive powerless. Jim Berry and Tom Nixon took the conductor off the train and forced him to join the engineer and the firemen, who were being held at gunpoint by Heffridge. All three employees were tied up and warned not to try to escape.

The newsagent and the baggage handler both opened their doors to see what the unscheduled stop was about. Each man was met with a pistol in his face and told to close his door and stay inside. The outlaws wanted access to the express car, and that was left to Sam Bass and Jack Davis. It would take a certain amount of finesse because express agents were armed. a certain amount of finesse because express agents were armed. The outlaws gave Barnhart his cue to knock on the door and tell the Wells Fargo agent inside that he had some freight for him. When the agent opened the door a little ways, Bass and Davis pulled it open. In one swift motion, they jumped in and took the agent's gun and his keys. Collins and Heffridge entered the car,

and the four men began searching for money. They instructed the agent to open what was called the Way Safe, a safe where some of the passengers kept their money during the journey. Inside was $458. Next, the bandits ordered the agent to open the main safe, which was where the Wells Fargo cash was kept. The agent told them the safe was on a timer and couldn't be opened until they reached Omaha. Jack Davis wasn't buying it, and he pistol-whipped the agent, who swore to the bandits he was telling the truth. He grabbed a document and handed it to Davis. Davis handed it to Bass, and Bass passed it to Collins. Collins read the document and, with no small measure of disappointment, assured the gang that the agent was telling the truth.

He had no way of opening the safe, which was all the more painful because, according to the document, there was $200,000 in cash inside the safe. An angry Jack Davis marched out of the express car and joined Nixon and Barry who were busy robbing the passengers. They left the women alone, but they took four gold watches and about $1,300 in cash from the men. watches and about $1,300 in cash from the men. When Davis, Barry, and Nixon returned to the express car, they saw that something had changed. Bass, Collins, and Heffridge were now in a much better mood. It turned out that the three bandits in the express car had been about to jump down to the platform to begin their escape when Sam Bass noticed three wooden boxes in a corner.

He lifted one up and discovered it was heavy. The quick-thinking agent said the boxes were filled with machine parts, but Sam decided to have a look for himself. Inside each box was $20,000 in gold coins, freshly minted in San Francisco and headed to banks in the east. The Black Hills bandits had finally done it. They hit the motherlode, and they were rich beyond their wildest dreams. But now they had to act fast. They had been on the scene for about an hour, which meant the No. 4 express train had been stopped at Big Spring Station for an hour. In the distance, everyone could hear the

whistle of the No. 10 Midnight Freight Train echoing through the darkness. The outlaws quickly loaded all the gold coins onto their horses and rode away at a full gallop. The robbery had been an overwhelming success and extremely lucky. But now they had to escape, and that was when their luck ran out. Next time on Legends of the Old West, Sam Bass and the Black Hills Bandits have stolen a historic amount of money. But with hundreds of posse men, the U.S. Cavalry, and soon the Texas Rangers on their trail, avoiding capture would prove to be impossible. One by one, the bandits would fall, leaving Sam Bass as the last man standing. And Sam wasn't going down without a fight. That's next week on Legends of the Old West.

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