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Train robberies were common in the
American Old West where trains slowly carrying valuable cargo, like
payroll shipments, were a frequent target. These shipments would be guarded by an
expressman whose duty was to protect the cargo of the "
express car".
Before the invention of
dynamite, it was almost impossible to break into safes. Criminals required the
combination lock to open safes, and often relied on the expressman to provide it. Following its invention and widespread use, it became much easier to break into safes and rob trains. Criminals sometimes robbed passengers of the
train'scarriages at
gunpoint stealing their
jewelry or
currency.
Contrary to the method romanticized by
Hollywood, outlaws were never known to jump from
horseback onto a moving train. Usually, they would either board the train normally and wait for a good time to initiate the
heist, or they would stop or
derail the train and then begin the holdup.
Famous train robbers include
Butch Cassidy,
Bill Miner and
Jesse James.[1] Jesse James is mistakenly thought to have completed the first successful train robbery in the
American West when on July 21, 1873 the
James-Younger Gang took US$3,000 from a
Rock Island Railroad train after derailing it southwest of the town of
Adair, Iowa.[2] However, the first peacetime train robbery in the United States occurred on October 6, 1866, when robbers boarded the Ohio & Mississippi train shortly after it left
Seymour, Indiana. They broke into one safe and tipped the other off the train before jumping off. The
Pinkerton National Detective Agency later traced the crime to the
Reno Gang. There was one earlier train robbery in May 1865, but because it was committed by armed guerrillas and occurred shortly after the end of the Civil War, it is not considered to be the first train robbery in the United States.
In 2021, train robberies in
Los Angeles resulted in hundreds of discarded packages to be strewn about the tracks. Trains were targeted on a section of tracks that they must slow down on and that are easy to access. Thieves are using bolt cutters to cut open the locks on shipping containers and taking the packages inside.
Union Pacific estimated that losses were in the millions from all the stolen merchandise.[3]
In two robberies on the
Bristol and Exeter Railway two passengers climbed from their carriage to the mail van and back. They were discovered at
Bridgwater after the second robbery.[4] One was Henry Poole, a former guard on the Great Western Railway, dismissed for misconduct (possibly on suspicion of another robbery);[5] the other was Edward Nightingale, the son of George Nightingale, accused, but acquitted,[6] of robbing the
Dover mail coach in 1826,[7] when two thieves had dressed in identical clothes to gain an alibi for the other.[8] They were
transported for 15 years.[9] Henry was sent to
Bermuda on the
Sir Robert Seppings (ship) in December 1850 whilst Edward was transported to
Fremantle on the
Sea Park in January 1854.[10][11]
^Sampson, James; Sampson, Lucille (7 August 1985). Calvert, Wade (ed.).
"Jesse James and the Rock Island Lines". Iowa Train Robbery on the Rock Island. Archived from
the original on 4 August 2008. Retrieved 8 June 2012.
^UK Prison Commission Records 1770-1951 via Ancestry.com
^Andrews, Evan (August 22, 2018).
"6 Daring Train Robberies". History.com. A&E Television Networks. Retrieved November 23, 2019.
^"Robberies". Smithsonian National Postal Museum. Archived from
the original on December 10, 2019. Retrieved November 23, 2019.
^results, search (16 March 2015). Bedlam on the West Virginia Rails:: The Last Train Bandit Tells His True Tale. Arcadia Publishing.
ISBN978-1626198937.