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    Old Bill Miner: Last of the Famous Western Bandits
    Old Bill Miner: Last of the Famous Western Bandits
    Old Bill Miner: Last of the Famous Western Bandits
    Ebook116 pages1 hour

    Old Bill Miner: Last of the Famous Western Bandits

    By Frank W. Anderson

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    Bill Miner, the gentleman bandit, enjoyed more popularity in his day than Jesse James or Billy the Kid. He robbed stagecoaches and trains across California, Colorado, Arizona, Georgia, Washington State and British Columbia until just before the First World War, by which time the public actually wanted him to escape the police.

    Reporters visited him during his time in jail and dubbed him “Old Bill Miner.” When he died in Georgia, where he had committed the state’s first train robbery, locals chipped in to pay for his funeral. Described by some as North America’s Robin Hood, Bill Miner has been portrayed in folk songs, stage productions and movies. He is also credited with the invention of the phrase “Hands up!”

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHeritage House
    Release dateFeb 1, 2011
    ISBN9781926613208
    Old Bill Miner: Last of the Famous Western Bandits
    Author

    Frank W. Anderson

    Born in Brandon, Manitoba, in 1919, Frank W. Anderson was orphaned at 18 months and grew up in foster homes, reform schools and jails. At age 16, he was convicted of killing a prison guard and was sentenced to death. This was commuted to life and he spent the next 15 years in a penitentiary. There he completed his high school education and became the first prisoner in Canada to take university courses behind bars. Paroled in 1951, he completed a BA and an MA in social work from the University of Toronto. He then joined the John Howard Society and became a parole officer. He developed a two-year course in human behaviour that was adopted by several colleges, and he was appointed to the National Parole Board in 1974, placed in charge of the region covering Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and the Northwest Territories. He held this position until he retired. In 1998, the University of Ottawa created the Frank W. Anderson Archives of Criminology to serve as a resource centre for students across Canada. He married Edna Marshal in 1955 and they had two children. He moved to Saskatoon after retiring and managed Frontier Books, publishing more than 100 books on Canadian history written by himself and other authors, including Ken Liddell and W.O. Mitchell. He also wrote a book about women who were executed in Canada, A Dance with Death: Canadian Women on the Gallows. Although he was later based in Calgary, Frank wrote, edited and produced numerous titles pertaining to British Columbia.

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      Book preview

      Old Bill Miner - Frank W. Anderson

      Preface to this Edition

      Frank W. Anderson’s Bill Miner, Train Robber was first published in 1963. A revised edition in 1982 changed the title to Bill Miner … Stagecoach and Train Robber. Since then, public interest in Miner’s story has grown more universal, thanks in part to Mercury Pictures’ The Grey Fox, a popular movie also released in 1982. In the last two decades, researchers have questioned various aspects of the traditional Bill Miner story; the most extensive retelling, published by the University of Oklahoma Press, challenges Miner’s very status as a folk hero.

      This Heritage House edition expands and updates Anderson’s work, and reconfirms Miner’s role as one of North America’s most elusive and fascinating criminal characters. Like the original text, this book treads a line between strict history and folklore. Its title, Old Bill Miner, was a nickname used by newspaper reporters in the early 1900s. The phrase, Last of the Famous Western Bandits, is carved into Miner’s tombstone in Milledgeville, Georgia.

      Thanks to Bob Bossin, Emily Jacques, Darlene Nickull, Terri Elderton, Rodger Touchie, and the staff at the B.C. Legislature Library and the B.C. Archives.

      The Great Train Robbery

      A Canadian Pacific Railway train at Mission Junction near the time of the country’s first train robbery, in 1904.

      National Archives of Canada

      Engineer N.J. Scott eased the throttle forward on the Canadian Pacific’s Transcontinental Express No. 1. The train drew away from the water tower and the lights of Mission Junction, British Columbia. Scott watched as the big engine’s headlight fell weakly against the thick night fog. Already two and a half hours late because of poor visibility, the veteran trainman knew he would sink even further behind schedule before reaching Vancouver, 65 km (40 miles) away. His watch showed 9:30 p.m. It was Saturday, September 10, 1904.

      Scott felt a hand on his shoulder. A man whispered, Hands up.

      The engineer turned to see a bandit in a soft-brimmed hat and a dark cloth mask with eye slits. The man carried a revolver in each hand. Behind him stood two more masked gunmen. One of these men levelled a rifle at Scott.

      I want you to stop the train at the Silverdale crossing, said the leader, softly. His accent suggested the southern U.S. states. Do what you are told, he murmured, and not a hair on your head will be harmed.

      Scott nodded. I am at your service. The engineer turned to the task of bringing the locomotive to a smooth stop.

      Detectives from Seattle and Vancouver scoured the region around the British Columbia-Washington border after the Mission holdup.

      Heritage House Collection

      None of the men spoke until the train halted at the Silverdale siding. Then the leader gestured fireman Harry Freeman down from the cab. While the rifle-bearing sidekick guarded Scott, the bandit leader and his other partner escorted Freeman along the train to the express car behind the coal tender. As they approached the car, express messenger Herbert Mitchell opened the top half of his door and looked out. Seeing the fireman, he thought it was only a routine stop and closed his door again. Darkness and fog had prevented him from seeing the two gun-wielding men behind Freeman.

      Brakeman Bill Abbott caught on, though. I knew when the engineer stopped the train just outside Mission that something was wrong, he later recalled. As I poked my head out of the car, I came face-to-face with a masked fellow holding a gun that looked as big as a sewer pipe. He told me to get back inside unless I wanted my head blown off, and be quick.

      Abbott obeyed, but he spread news of the robbery to the passengers, prompting the conductor to collapse in fright. A passenger fired a random shot in the direction of the express car but hit no one. Other passengers in the sleeping cars tore off their valuables, throwing them into spittoons or hiding them in crevices. The porter inexplicably began shouting that the engineer had already been killed. Abbott, meanwhile, managed to sneak away and run five miles along the track to Mission. When he arrived and reported the holdup, however, the agent at the Mission Junction depot thought the brakeman was drunk, and refused to believe him.

      The bandits behaved calmly despite all this panic. They asked Freeman to uncouple the express car from the rest of the train. When he had done this, they escorted him back to the engine where Scott was still under guard. Go to the Whonock mile post and stop in front of the church, the leader instructed.

      When the train reached the Whonock church, the bandit with the rifle stayed with the engineer and fireman while the other two hurried back to the express car. Again Herbert Mitchell looked out. This time he realized what was happening. He shut the door and reached for the .38 Smith & Wesson, kept on hand for emergencies.

      Open up or we’ll blow the door down with dynamite, ordered the bandit leader.

      After a long silence, the express car door opened. Mitchell and a second employee jumped from the car. The bandits searched them and lined them up beside the engineer and the fireman. Mitchell’s revolver joined the bandit leader’s arsenal.

      The leader ordered Mitchell back into the express car. Now, open up that safe, he said. Co-operate and no harm will come to you. Mitchell co-operated. (He was later fired because of the robbery.)

      Inside the safe was a package containing $4,000 in gold dust consigned to the U.S. Assay Office in Seattle, and a second package of gold dust worth $2,000, intended for the Bank of British North America in Vancouver. There was also about $1,000 in cash. The masked man emptied Mitchell’s travel bags and stuffed them with loot, then roved through the express car, picking up registered letters and throwing them into the bags. He also tossed in a few parcels. In doing this, he unknowingly bagged $50,000 in U.S. bonds and $200,000 in Australian securities. (Afterwards, the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) kept very quiet about the latter.)

      The bandit wasn’t satisfied. He searched through more packages and envelopes rapidly, casting anxious glances back at Mitchell. Finally, he asked the messenger about a $62,000 treasure chest that he had expected to find on the train. He had heard that the gold would travelled by stagecoach from the Consolidated Caribou Mine down the Cariboo Road to the Bank of British North America at Ashcroft. Then the gold was supposed to ride the westbound train for the final 320 km (200 miles) to Vancouver. Mitchell replied that, at the last moment, a delay caused the bullion to end up on a later train.

      Thirty minutes after the holdup began, the bandits gave up pillaging the express car. Before

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