The Dalton Gang: End of an outlaw era

Harold Preece

• Publisher: Bonhopai Books
• Year: 2025
• eBook ISBN: 9781779793294
• Edition: 0
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Social Science Biographies
• Index: Social Sciences

The Dalton Gang: End of an Outlaw Era by Harold Preece is a vivid retelling of the rise and fall of one of the Old West's most notorious outlaw bands. Drawing on historical records, eyewitness accounts, and frontier lore, Preece reconstructs the brief but violent career of the Dalton brothers—Bob, Grat, Emmett, and Bill—whose train and bank robberies terrorized Kansas, Oklahoma, and Indian Territory in the 1890s.

The book traces the Daltons' shift from lawmen to outlaws, their audacious raids, and their fateful decision to attempt two simultaneous bank robberies in Coffeyville, Kansas—a daring gamble that ended in bloodshed and legend. Preece brings to life the personalities of the brothers, their motivations, and the lawmen and townspeople who stood against them.

More than a simple chronicle of robberies and gunfights, Preece places the gang within the broader context of the fading frontier. He explores how economic hardship, shifting law enforcement, and the mythology of Jesse James and other desperadoes shaped the Daltons' choices. The book captures both the violence and the mystique of outlawry at a time when the frontier was closing and a new order was emerging.

 The Dalton Gang: End of an Outlaw Era   is both history and legend—an account that entertains while reminding readers of the human costs of violence and the lure of outlaw fame. It stands as a classic narrative of Western history, preserving the story of how one outlaw dynasty met its dramatic end. 

Table of contents

• Title page
• TABLE OF CONTENTS
• LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
• ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
• 1 — BUCKSHOT BELT
• 2 — JESSE JAMES’S HORSE
• 3 — SIX-SHOOTER ACADEMY
• 4 — FIRST KILL FOR THE DALTONS
• 5 — GRAT TIPS THE GAME
• 6 — THE BOYS LOSE THEIR BADGES
• 7 — THE BIRTH OF THE DALTON GANG
• 8 — “RAIDER’S MATE”
• 9 — FIRST HOLDUP
• 10 — THE SP’S MR. SMITH
• 11 — PINNING IT ON THE DALTONS
• 12 — A KIND OF REVENGE
• 13 — THE BATTLE OF TWIN MOUNDS
• 14 — THE DALTON HIDEOUTS
• 15 — MR. BRYANT MOVES TO BOOT HILL
• 16 — THE DALTONS’ BIGGEST HAUL
• 17 — BILL DALTON COMES HOME
• 18 — THE DALTON INTELLIGENCE SYSTEM
• 19 — DORMANT WINTER, DALLYING SPRING
• 20 — ROBBERY AT RED ROCK
• 21 — HOOF DUST
• 22 — THE GOOSE THAT FLEW
• 23 — OMINOUS HOLDUP
• 24 — THE DOWNGRADE BEGINS
• 25 — ANOTHER PIGEON COOS
• 26 — COFFEYVILLE PREPARES
• 27 — THE DALTONS LOAD
• 28 — HOMECOMING
• 29 — THE DEFENDERS
• 30 — TWO BUSHELS OF MONEY
• 31 — “ALLEY OF DEATH”
• 32 — BURYING THE DEAD
• 33 — NEW GANGS A-COMING
• 34 — THE LAST GASP
• 35 — DALTON REDIVIVUS!
• BIBLIOGRAPHY