A Yankee Train Robber!

[Nathanb1]

Jeez Louise! My latest DNA hit links me with a John Finn of Franklin Co., Ky. who show to have served in the 57th KY Mounted Infantry, and after the war, robbed a train with 11 of his old Army comrades. His father supposedly put up $4000. bail and he promptly skipped out, took off for Arkansas and changed his last name to White. He married a Rebecca Jane Coker and apparently reformed. Sheesh!

Two train robbers in the family! Worse yet, another Yankee!

I haven't figured out how we're related, but I definitely had a boatload of Arkansas relatives. Anyone up for a hunt?

 

[Nathanb1]

He's the one on the right... thank goodness for small favors. The other two were hanged for killing another of their gang. My granny is spinning in her grave right now. I kinda think he's on my granddad Moore's side... it's always been a bit shady.

 

[bankerpapaw]

Jeez Louise! My latest DNA hit links me with a John Finn of Franklin Co., Ky. who show to have served in the 57th KY Mounted Infantry, and after the war, robbed a train with 11 of his old Army comrades. His father supposedly put up $4000. bail and he promptly skipped out, took off for Arkansas and changed his last name to White. He married a Rebecca Jane Coker and apparently reformed. Sheesh!

Two train robbers in the family! Worse yet, another Yankee!

I haven't figured out how we're related, but I definitely had a boatload of Arkansas relatives. Anyone up for a hunt?

Which is worse to have in the family? A Yankee or a bank robber? Don't get offended. I'm just kidding.

 

[JOHN42768]

Your missing the worst point. He stiffed his own father for the bail money. No offense intended

 

[Nathanb1]

Which is worse to have in the family? A Yankee or a bank robber? Don't get offended. I'm just kidding.

Well, it's mostly the train robber part. I'm already related to the only guy hung in the US for train robbery. I'm lousy with both sides, so the Yankee part is just a joke... although he appears to have possibly been in battles my closer Mississippi relatives were in. I always knew this day might come.

 

[Nathanb1]

Your missing the worst point. He stiffed his own father for the bail money. No offense intended

Actually, I totally agree with you! I sort of wonder if it was the whole family farm!

 

[WJC]

Just like fishing: you cast your line with baited hook into the water not knowing what you'll catch...

 

[Nathanb1]

Just like fishing: you cast your line with baited hook into the water not knowing what you'll catch...

Boy, are we going to have fun at Wednesday's genealogy group! I might just have outdone John Wesley Hardin's sweet little relative!

 

[moosedog]

You know what they say, "You can pick you friends, but you can't pick your family".

 

[WJC]

Boy, are we going to have fun at Wednesday's genealogy group! I might just have outdone John Wesley Hardin's sweet little relative!

LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1

 

[JPK Huson 1863]

HOLY gee whiz. And I'm sorry, in that photo he does look like the only one you would want to claim? The others honest to goodness look like they were destined to their sad fate, poor guys. Wonder if his father felt the 4K was worth it and told him to go? Different times? Who knows what the circumstances may have been- although that sounds excusatory. Still. You never know.

I don't know Nate. All this slander about Yankees in your tree? Enough to make you swear off Ancestry.

Grandfather swiped an entire train, don't mean to try to one-up. True story. Some idjit left it idling..... . Grandpop said later he always just wanted to know if he could drive one. Transpires he could. Seemed a little surprised how upset everyone was when he pulled in at the next stop, we hear. They were awfully darn upset. No bail was needed. You'd have to have known him.

 

[Aaron Rider]

Good old Kentucky. As a Northerner, I resent these people being called "Yankees." I don't know that I want to be in the same boat as them.

But seriously, thanks for sharing. Stiffing one's own father for bail money........this guy sounds like a character from a Larry McMurtry novel.

The Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board raided the farm of my great-great grandfather back in the day, but we try not to brag.......

 

[Story]

a John Finn of Franklin Co., Ky. who show to have served in the 57th KY Mounted Infantry, and after the war, robbed a train with 11 of his old Army comrades. His father supposedly put up $4000. bail and he promptly skipped out, took off for Arkansas and changed his last name to White.
*
Anyone up for a hunt?

Rogue bands of veterans segueing into the wild West are great, particularly when they go against the stereotype of unreconstructed Confederates. I'll toss this into the pot.
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~kinfolks/civil-war/train-story.html

 

[diane]

Those rogue veterans made the West wild!

Nathanb1, that's great. You ought to see my mom's side - a few sketchy train robbers would be nice. Nobody died without it being noted as shot, drowned in the river, stabbed...everybody was murdered!

 

[DixieRifles]

Two train robbers in the family! Worse yet, another Yankee!

L-o-o-o-ove it.

 

[Nathanb1]

Rogue bands of veterans segueing into the wild West are great, particularly when they go against the stereotype of unreconstructed Confederates. I'll toss this into the pot.
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~kinfolks/civil-war/train-story.html

You are officially my favorite person today... and I suspect I found a link to my known family here; many thanks!

 

[Nathanb1]

HOLY gee whiz. And I'm sorry, in that photo he does look like the only one you would want to claim? The others honest to goodness look like they were destined to their sad fate, poor guys. Wonder if his father felt the 4K was worth it and told him to go? Different times? Who knows what the circumstances may have been- although that sounds excusatory. Still. You never know.

I don't know Nate. All this slander about Yankees in your tree? Enough to make you swear off Ancestry.

Grandfather swiped an entire train, don't mean to try to one-up. True story. Some idjit left it idling..... . Grandpop said later he always just wanted to know if he could drive one. Transpires he could. Seemed a little surprised how upset everyone was when he pulled in at the next stop, we hear. They were awfully darn upset. No bail was needed. You'd have to have known him.

You're right... and he's so respectable in his older portrait... but the link above says his father died a pauper. Can't pick your kids, either.

 

[JPK Huson 1863]

You're right... and he's so respectable in his older portrait... but the link above says his father died a pauper. Can't pick your kids, either.
View attachment 152868

He aged very well, we've seen where a lot of ours- all of ours did not. Boy I don't know. If this war, and hanging around here has taught me anything it's to for-Heaven's-sake-Annie, not make a call on any historical event unless the horse's mouth is around, too. But oh dear, it doesn't look very good, a man dying a pauper, 4K would have come in handy.

If ghosts are real, makes you hope he got a little haunted.

 

[Longhall]

I've heard tales that in the early 1800's the fed sent census takers into the Dark Corner of upcountry South Carolina, where my Tory gr gr gr grandfather was known to live and make whisky. Six census takers went in there, none of them came out. They couldn't find a 7th willing to go.

 

[Rebel from Finland]

Always good to have one Finn in the family