The Dalton Gang Bank Raid In Coffeyville Kansas - 5th October 1892 (by Graham Lovegrove)

In 1879 a Colonel James A. Coffey formed a settlement in Indian territory, creating an Indian trading post. Two years later a railway stop was added there on the Leavenworth, Lawrence and Galveston railroad. This depot gave the area access to other markets and business opportunities. Soon after this the railway company posted a surveyor, Napoleon B. Blanton, to the trading post in order to set out the layout for the town. A name was needed for this new town, and a toss of a coin between Colonel Coffey and U.S. ARMY Captain Blanton agreed it should be named Coffeyville. The town was officially founded in 1862 and incorporated in 1873 as Coffeyville. 

Who were the Daltons?

By the time the Daltons had arrived onto the scene most of the big names of the wild west, Billy the Kid, Jesse James (James Gang), Cole Younger etc. were either dead or imprisoned. Adeline Lee Younger, of the notorious Younger family, married James Lewis Dalton, though her husband would continually disappear leaving her to bring up her children, all fifteen, as by then he had left for good. Her young family grew up on land left to her by her father in Cass County, Missouri. Elder son Frank became a Marshall who was shot and killed when battling horse rustlers. Bob, Grat and young Emmett joined the law enforcement but abused the position by rustling horses and sold them and whiskey, which was illegal, to the Indians. After giving the law a bad name, they were fired from the job and so began a life of crime; they were set on rustling horse herds then moving on to robbing trains and banks. At the same time their previous boss Judge Parker’s possies, and Marshalls, were hot on their trail. Meanwhile, the Dalton Gang were becoming well known throughout the west, often leaving a trail of blood behind them. At this time the gang had several outlaws to call on for their raids; Bill Power, Bill Doolin, Bitter Creek, Dick Broadwell to name just a few

I’ve got a plan.

Bob Dalton had an itch to outdo Jesse James, and all previous outlaw raids, by attempting a feat never even considered possible by his peers. His plan was to take a selected group of five men, including himself, and rob two banks at the same time, making him rich and famous. On the night of the 4^th  of October Bob and his chosen band, brothers Grat and Emmett along with Bill Power and Dick Broadwell, camped overnight at Onion Creek, west of Coffeyville.  

5th October 1892                        

The following morning they made their way into town on horseback. The street between the two banks had been dug up along with the hitching posts for repairs, meaning there was nowhere to tie up the horses, so Bob chose the alley across the road from the Condon bank to use as a corral by the old jail. As youngsters the Daltons grew up in this town so to avoid being recognised tried to hide beneath a beard and moustache. There were more people around the plaza than they expected and were caught out for not carrying out a reconnaissance of the place that hadn’t been visited since childhood. Exiting the alley, the two groups crossed the plaza with Grat, Dick Broadwell and Bill Power entering the front door of the C.M. Condon bank, but they were recognised by a local citizen who saw through the fake facial coverings, and watching the gang through the big front windows saw a cashier was suddenly being fronted by a Winchester rifle they called out across the plaza “THE BANK IS BEING ROBBED”.

At this time the other band of Bob and Emmett had rushed over to the First National Bank and were seen with their weapons entering. On the warning call the town’s citizens sprang into action, collecting weapons and ammunition from Isham Hardware, then taking positions outside the Condon bank while others watched the side doors of the banks. Both sets of robbers were having the staff fill their grain sacks with monies or silver and gold coins. At the Conlon Grat Dalton ordered the safe to be emptied but the cashier said that it cannot be opened as the timer lock will not release until 9.30am, and that it was at that time only 9.20am. Grat is quoted as saying “We will wait”. It was a bluff that helped give extra time for the gathering citizens outside to build up their numbers. The bluff was that there was no timer and that the safe could have been opened anyway.

While researching this I came across this statement regarding the safe event, though I am not sure just how authentic and accurate it is, but I like the notion of it being real …

‘If the robbers had bothered to check the bank’s clock they would have seen that it was in fact already 9.40am’

It was during this period that the shooting began.

The gunfight

It began with a hail of bullets through the Condon Bank’s windows by the citizens assembled in the plaza, though nobody inside was injured. The outlaws fired back while still waiting for the safe to be opened, with some civilians being injured, then the gang retreated to the back looking for a way of escape. As Bob and Emmett flee from the First National Bank they are shot at from over by Isham Hardware, but not hit.

I cannot be sure just how exact this section is, though I think some probably is correct. The basic events are certainly true.

When Bob and Emmett walked out the front door of the First National, with their grain sack full of monies and gold, they were shot upon and made a swift retreat back into the bank. Taking cashier Thomas Ayres as a hostage, they went out through the back door into an alley. There, watching the back exit, was Lucius Baldwin holding up his pistol. Bob ordered him to drop this gun but with no response to his order Bob shot and killed Baldwin, being the first casualty of the event. Thomas Ayres had been left on the sidewalk now, with the gunslingers moving forward they entered the small alley onto 8^th and saw George Cubine, one time friend of the young Bob. George was waiting for the outlaws to leave through the front door and was holding up his Winchester. Bob shot him in the head. Cubin’s partner Charles Brown was standing next to him, unarmed; he reached down and when lifting up George’s rifle was shot dead by Bob. Meanwhile, Thomas Ayres had made his way to a hardware store and came out with a rifle; he saw Bob Dalton shoot Charles Brown and aimed the rifle at him. Bob aimed his Winchester from 200 ft and shot Ayres in the head.

Possibly the worst suffering victim of the day, Ayres survived but didn’t recover from his wound and was permanently disabled.

Bob and Emmett headed off to join the group. As the Condon raiders left the building through the side door they faced a hail of bullets and the three of them were hit when heading to the alley; their bad choice of location was now looking precarious with the posse all firing wildly down the alleyway at them. Bill Power was to die there. Town Marshall Connelly was already in the alley and was by the horses. He was the last civilian to die that day. Also in that cauldron with him was a local sharpshooter named John J Kloehr, who shot the already injured gang leader Bob Dalton in the chest before turning on the toughest of the gang, Grat Dalton, who had just shot down Marshall Connolly. Already probably mortally wounded, Grat was struggling with his rifle when Kloehr’s Winchester finished another Dalton with a bullet to the throat and a broken neck. Dick Broadwell mounted his horse and, though already injured with a back injury, rode off for an escape; unfortunately for him, a ball from Kloehr’s Winchester and a rifle full of shot had him bleeding and dying on his horse. He was found half a mile away with his horse. The gunfight would last for just 12 minutes from first till last shots fired, with four town citizens and four outlaws dead that day as well as a number of horses.

The last Dalton gang member

Emmett managed his way to the hell, where his brothers were dying, without being struck himself until then receiving shots while about to attempt an escape. He stopped on his horse and turned back, leaning over and trying to haul up his brother Bob; while still being fired upon the youngest gang member fell. Having suffered 23 bullet wounds Emmett quite remarkably survived and the slugs were removed from his body, after which he was sentenced and given a lifetime at Kansas Penitentiary. Having been given a pardon after 14 years in jail a new gang was formed as the Doolin-Dalton gang. Eventually he became a real estate agent in California, an author and an actor playing himself in one of the movies. He died at the age of 66.

True or not true?

THE FOLLOWING HAS BEEN PUBLISHED BY THE NATIONAL PARKS SERVICE:

On February 6, 1891, after Bob Dalton had joined his brothers in California. A Southern Pacific passenger train was held up. The Daltons were accused of the robbery, based on little evidence. Bob escaped and Bill Dalton was acquitted, but Grat was arrested, convicted, and put on a train headed for a 20-year prison sentence. According to one account, Grat was handcuffed to one deputy and accompanied by another.

After the train had gone some distance according to one account, one deputy fell asleep and the other busied himself talking to other passengers. As it was a hot day, all the windows were open. Suddenly, Grat jumped up and dived headfirst out of the train window. He landed in the San Joaquin River, disappeared under water, and was carried downstream by the current. The deputies were astounded. Grat must have taken the keys to the handcuffs from the first deputy’s pockets as he slept and then timed his escape to take place when he knew the train would be on the bridge. If he had landed on the ground, he would have almost certainly been killed. Somehow, he found his brothers and made his way back to Oklahoma Territory.

Personally, I think as Grat was known not to be the sharpest pencil in the box. Tough, brave and strong maybe, but I can’t see him putting all of that together.

Terror on the Red Sea Liveaboards

Within the last couple of years there have been a number of incidents in the Red Sea where diving vessels, known as liveaboards, have suffered some kind of mishap or disaster and in some of these cases a number of lives have been lost. Last November the Sea Story capsized and sank with a party of divers on board who were heading out from Port Ghaleb to a number of dive sites out in the middle of the Red Sea. Eleven people were killed, some of the bodies have not been located, with a further 35 others being rescued, some of them days later. This disaster highlighted what turned out to be a multitude of failings and slap-dash ways of running these vessels that has been going on for years. And Sea Story is not the only one.

In June 2023 the Hurricane had left the same port when fire broke out mid-voyage with 29 people on board, three of them were killed in the disaster. The image of the vessel blazing while rescue ships gathered was one that shocked the diving industry. But are these just isolated incidents? Are we putting our trust in these dive boat operators when they are not fit to head out to sea with people on board? Are the boats themselves perfectly fine but the people running them lacking skills and common sense? Well until an investigation is carried out and reports their findings we can only speculate.

But this took me back to the May of 2005 when I was out on a Red Sea liveaboard heading out to the wreck of the Thistlegorm for what was promised to be a fantastic diving experience on a wreck that I had heard so much about and had studied for years. I was over in Dahab learning to become a PADI Dive Master and on completion of the course I ended up with several days where I was doing nothing when the company decided to book my Instructors exam the same day that I flew home. With two weeks of course now cancelled I was offered the trip on board a boat going out from Sharm el Sheikh to dive what was classed as the best wreck dive in the world. 

I boarded the Embero and slept on board as it would be departing in the early hours of the morning. I was excited that this was actually happening and settled in for a long overnight voyage where the following morning we were almost at the site. The dive team leader gave us a run down of the wreck and spoke of pulling items out of the wreckage and “shining them up” for us to see, which annoyed me as if every dive team did that then there would be very little left of this wreck in a few years. Still, I was excited that soon I would be down there myself and ticking off this famous – and beautiful – shipwreck from my list. 

But this is where it all stopped, for the waves were too high for us to safely dive the wreck, I was gutted but completely understood their logic. They said not to worry as we would instead head over to a reef at Ras Mohammed. Several hours sailing later and we were at the dive site, after checking our kit we stepped off the back of the boat and our team went down together, consisting of a guide, myself and a Danish couple as well as a few others grouped in. When we reached the bottom I started having complications and began floating to the surface without realising, the guy who was partnered up with me just watched as I floated away without any sense of urgency. Thankfully I sorted myself out and we headed off on to the reef where the strong currents made us almost “fly” around the reef at some speed. There was the remains of the cargo of the wreck of the Yolanda, in this case a container full of toilet seats had spilled out, kind of summed up the dive as I wasn’t really having a relaxing dive it seemed very much hard work. 

But it was the surfacing that got me the most, for when we finally came to the top there must have been 15-20 liveaboards all gathered round, nobody had a clue which one was which as they were all looking exactly the same. Suddenly a horn went off and a number of them faced us and came straight towards us at speed from different directions. Eventually we found which one was ours but the waves were picking up and I was now struggling to cling on to the ladder as each wave threw me about. The dive boat crew stood and watched, they could see I was now really having difficulty climbing on and would have done anything for just one of them to grab hold of my BCD or even just held out their hand. The ladder offered no grip and my breathing was becoming faster as I was becoming more and more exhausted. Eventually I got a grip and only then did one of them assist me just to get me out of the way where I collapsed on the deck utterly drained of all energy. When I checked my air gauge it read zero….. I was probably just a few breaths away from sucking on the rubber. 

Both me and the Danish couple were furious that there was no safety involved and that everyone here was so lax it was unbelievable, I refused to go in again when the second dive was ready to go. Seeing all those vessels suddenly coming towards me at once was terrifying enough, but to then have our own boat be so close yet not be able to get onboard was enough to persuade me to stay out of the water and live to dive another day elsewhere. 

Today I have continued diving and I have been with some really professional (and safe!) diving clubs and the wrecks I have explored have been amazing, but I never did get to the Thistlegorm and that continues to be one wreck that I still want to do, just not with dive boats that risk your life and have no care for their passengers.

This must be why many of them ask you to sign a waiver that exonerates them of all blame even if it is their negligence.