Chapt Eleven- The Worst Mother in America

Chapter 11

The Worst Mother in America

Zerelda James Samuel

No sane woman would ever aspire for that title. And there were several mothers of Western outlaws who would have to be contenders for such a designation. Certainly the Younger and Dalton gangs both had mothers who inexplicably birthed whole litters of bad criminals. There were the Burrow brothers, and the Barrow brothers, both pairs from Texas. The Clantons and McClaurys of Arizona, the Ketchums, again from Texas. Little is known or retrievable about these brothers and their families, or their mothers. But there does seem to be a family dynamic to outlawry, as if some boys, and often brothers, are just wired in the beginning to have a bad time with society, laws and life in general. And their mothers have to accept some of the responsibility for their behavior.

Rube and Jim Burrows

Thus Zerelda Samuel becomes a standard bearer for all Old West outlaw mothers, for no other reason than America has been considering her plight for over a 150 years. And there are only a few close seconds. Her place is secure, since her second son Jesse is probably the most famous Western outlaw in history. There have been more movies made about him than any other badman. Only William Bonney, alias “Billy the Kid,” rivals him on the silver screen. The lure of Jesse's outlaw career, launched from the Civil War, justified by some from the ruthlessness of the railroads, and antagonized by the hated Pinkertons, made him a popular folk hero to a couple of generations after his lifetime. Only in recent times has he been slowly, begrudgingly acknowledged as a habitual criminal and cold-blooded killer.

His mother had come from a respected, religious family. Zerelda could have taught Sunday School, and she could have filled it with the devout mothers of hopeless criminals who rode the fence between Faith and immediate gratification. Somehow, they began to rationalize that their sons were doing God's bidding, becoming agents of judgment, social justice, with as noble a calling as George Washington when he led a revolution against the bad king. And when you let yourself think about it, you can begin to understand their point of view. Mothers have a way of finding the mental path to empathizing with their wayward children, and some of them can become way too proficient at it.

Zerelda always had a wild side. Her family lore says she was a commanding person, tall and confident, and some say very attractive. That is hard to imagine, looking at the pitiful, famous portraits of her, sporting a sculpted frown and just one arm. She looks eternally beaten, literally flattened and downtrodden. She played the part to the very end. Her son's infamy gave her a lifelong platform, which she used very effectively. But Zerelda was a handful, and some say drove away her first husband, a Baptist preacher, who fled all the way to California to find relief, and the freedom to follow his own inclinations. Too bad for him that lasted less than a month before he was dead. So the story goes.

The Daltons

One of the trends one can discern in Old West outlaws is the absence of fathers, or at least strong father figures. The Youngers, the Daltons, the Jameses, and most outlaws lacked strong father figures. Some had downright sorry fathers, by any standard; weak fathers, strong mothers, and mischievous boys who taught each other. Poor Adeline Dalton had four sons who were famous bank robbers. And a daughter who aided them. Three of her sons were killed in their private war with the law. She was supposedly kin to the infamous Youngers of the James Gang, and her boys did their best to outdo them. They died trying. She had been traveling in a covered wagon across country when her husband, a shiftless horse trader and gambler, conveniently disappeared. Somehow, he did not make it to the new destination. But by then her boys were already turning from law enforcement careers, actually jobs as deputies with the U.S. Marshal service, to lawlessness. Outlawing was similar in activities, and risks, but with far better compensations.

Zerelda went through two husbands before she found a kindly old doctor whom she could boss. Things went well enough until the war, and the beginning of her family's personal war with the “authorities.” Her home was in Missouri, a state which could not make up its mind and whose citizens fought fiercely on both sides of the Civil War. Like Samuel Clemens, her boys were patriotic young men who wanted to do their duty... who saw the North as overreaching, dominating intruders, and violating their sovereignty. The Jameses did own some slaves, and lore has it that old Doc Samuels “serviced” the young females, much to the dislike and jealousy of Zerelda, who chose to look the other way, so to speak. This trait alone, of owning slaves in a place where slaves were disapproved by many fellow Missourians, and allowing her husband to have extra-marital affairs with them- or worse raping them, suggests a lot about Zerelda's real spiritual condition.

Zerelda Samuel appeared strong, and was in many ways, but she allowed the worst kinds of sins behind closed doors. Her adoring, protective sons did not have a true moral compass. Only a pretense; A guide for life which made huge exceptions to following God's Will. Some people claim to be an atheist, then live a basically moral (as defined by religion) life. Some people claim to be faithful, quote the Bible, but shrink from actually living their Faith. Neither make very effective mothers. The separations, divorces, the slavery, the consent to evil, perhaps to avoid her own wifely expectations, suggest that Frank and Jesse may actually have been very angry and confused before the war ever gave them an outlet to vent their frustration.

Writers have wasted lots of ink trying to psycho-analyze Jesse James. To understand how a man could have become such a sociopath. There are so many theories. I corresponded with a preacher who was convinced that Jesse James was really a devout Christian, in fact privately an ordained Baptist preacher with an underground flock! Others say he was a leader the mysterious Knights of the Golden Circle, a racist cult, a polygamist who had a fairly normal family in Texas; A Southern hero who never got caught and faked his death and lived to be an old man. And there may be some truth to these claims. But before he was all of these things, he was a broken, bleeding teenager in desperate need of a wise parent to help him make good choices.

History tells us he found something else, and chose a life of rebellion, crime, murder, hiding, fame, revenge and a negative public legacy, which has lasted for generations.

Here is where I will lose some of my Southern readers. Zerelda's example gave her two older boys a double standard, of submitting to God when it was self-serving or convenient, but making excuses when it was not. But meanwhile through slavery she was a consistent role model for cruelty and oppression; For intolerance, and racism, and narcissism. 

Frank James with his three sisters,

Susan, Fannie and Sarah

Their trouble began, and here is the rest of story, when her oldest son Frank was captured by Union forces, and in order to be set free, took a sworn oath that he would not pick up arms again against the United States. He had been captured while in the military hospital and rationalized that he had not had a fighting chance to escape... so he lied and came home and became a Confederate informer, and eventually joined Quantrill, the most treacherous and murderous Confederate general in the war. At that point he was considered either a spy or a traitor, and probably a war criminal, and had to be arrested, and probably executed according to wartime protocol.

Frank's family was put into great danger at this point, and only foolish or arrogant people would have stayed in Northern Missouri and harassed Union troops and taken their chances. The fact that the family uprooted after the hanging incident and fled to safety in Nebraska proves that they had some place to go and the ability to get there. But they chose to stay and run a bluff, even after they had been warned and threatened. This was plain foolishness, hard-headedness, which cost them dearly. Did they have a right to stay? Absolutely! Did the Federals have a right harass them? Absolutely! To hang poor old Doc? Absolutely not, but it was a war, and these kinds of things were happening all over Missouri, and they knew it. Another instance where “discretion was the better part of valor.”

The same can be said about the James Gang's exploits, no matter how popular they may have been. It was utter foolishness to think the boys could rob and pillage at will and the family would be left alone. Again, utter foolishness and hard-headedness. Some would call it reckless stupidity. It is often the ploy of the criminal element to play on the public's sympathies, after they have been victimized by law enforcement, and the gullible public almost always obliges. But one must ask the question, why was there so much tragedy in this one Southern family? The shear bravado, of a whole neighborhood aiding and abetting a crime ring, a family engaging in a personal war against a number of peacetime institutions, suggests irrational, unstable people who are destined to be killed.

Many students of the James Gang believe they were trying to revive the Confederacy, and the War Between the States; That they were incorrigible terrorists with a death wish. How might Zerelda have calmed their indignation, had she so chosen?

My father, a Houston politician among other things, used to ride around with some of his friends... on evenings as they did their jobs... as Houston policemen. One police story he must have told a hundred times, actually pretty boring compared to the rest, was his favorite because of a moral well illustrated. In a nutshell, A policemen was trying to reason with an angry mother, who was instinctively defending her son, a "good boy" she insisted, whom the police she said, were picking on. The patient policeman listened to her, and let her vent. Then when she took a breath, he told her just how it was:

“Mam, I understand your concern, but I promise you, we have better things to do than harass your son. Look into our jail. There all kinds of criminals in there, burglars and wife-beaters and hot check-writers. All of them started out with caring mothers who did not believe, would not believe their little boy was bad. They chose to believe that the police were picking on their sons. We don't want to waste any time going after your son or anybody else's, we have much greater problems...

So Mam, let me leave you with this. We are going to let him go. But just know, that when it comes to men who end up in trouble with the law, the world is not picking on anybody. If a boy or a man constantly keeps showing up in trouble with the authorities, it is not the police who have a problem, it is that man, and his mother is not helping, or doing him any favor to save him from his mistakes, or to repeatedly blame the police. So take your son home, and teach him to take responsibility for his own actions, and we will probably never see each other again.”

Zerelda never heard that story. Or one about karma. She came from pioneer stock who valued family over everything, including criminal law or public approval. Her son Frank had joined an army which challenged the President of the United States, and his power and his authority, and when he was captured he swore an oath he did not mean. And then he proceeded to serve as a spy, which was punishable by death. And we can only surmise that Zerelda stood behind Frank's actions. It was deadly serious business, and if he was going to do such things, he should have spared his family any suffering and turned himself in. Or helped them get out of the country! It would have been the honorable thing to do. Instead they all took their chances, and they suffered. And Frank went on to participate in one of the most heinous massacres in American history, under Quantrill, murdering scores of men and women in the streets, in Rebel revenge for a wartime injustices.

Jesse James and Archie Clement. Both served 

under the dreaded Bloody Bill Anderson

Little brother Jesse fell in with “Bloody Bill Anderson,” the most irregular of guerillas, and learned firsthand while just a teenager how to humiliate and massacre his enemies. Wholesale.

Rebellion and a false oath led to murder and plunder. And in the end, the mother thought the authorities were simply picking on her family. But according to the way I was raised, the world is not picking on anybody. Not even Frank or Jesse James.

When a mom finds herself constantly having to defend her child, as if everybody is somehow against him, she needs to stop, take a deep breath, ask God for guidance, and remember Jesse James.