The Battle of Rhodes was a major shootout which occurred in the rural Louisiana town of Rhodes in 1899 amid the Gray-Braithwaite feud. The battle left dozens of lawmen and hired guns loyal to the Gray family dead after a failed ambush of four outlaws from the Van der Linde Gang, although the ensuing law enforcement crackdown and the approach of the Pinkertons forced Dutch van der Linde and his gang to relocate away from their Clemens Point hideout.
Background[]
In 1899, Dutch van der Linde and his gang migrated from Nebraska to Louisiana to evade the wrath of the railroad industrialist Leviticus Cornwall, his Pinkerton allies, bounty hunters, and the local law, and they established a base at Clemens Point in the rural Scarlett Meadows region of western Louisiana. He allied with the local Gray family, a prominent plantation dynasty which was in de facto control of the local town of Rhodes, and took part in the Gray-Braithwaite feud. However, he decided to exploit the feud to rob both families, angering both the Braithwaite family and the Grays, who were especially infuriated after his men burned down the tobacco fields at Caliga Hall on the orders of the Braithwaites. The Grays - who possessed an impressive spy network - discovered Dutch's role in the Caliga Hall attack, and Sheriff of Rhodes Leigh Gray and his brother Tavish Gray plotted an ambush of Dutch's gang in the town, hiring gunmen and dispatching lawmen to prepare a surprise for them as they entered town for a "security job" a few weeks after the Caliga Hall attack.
Battle[]
The confrontation at the sheriff office
Bill Williamson and Sean MacGuire arrived at the town first, and they were later joined by Arthur Morgan and Micah Bell. MacGuire initially believed that the Grays had never figured out their culpability in the Caliga Hall attack, but Morgan grew suspicious at how quiet the street was, and that nobody was there to give them instructions for the job. As MacGuire began to reason with Morgan, he was shot in the head and killed by a sniper, causing the three surviving outlaws to rush to cover. They proceeded to engage in a large-scale shootout with the law and the Grays' hired guns, and Bell and Morgan rushed off of the main street to take over the gun store from the lawmen and use it as cover. They proceeded to kill the lawmen who were without cover on the street, but Williamson was captured and taken to the sheriff's office. After killing the last of the lawmen and hired guns on the street, Morgan and Bell stood outside the sheriff's office and taunted Leigh Gray and his men into coming out. However, Gray held Williamson at gunpoint and attempted to convince the outlaws to give up. Instead, Morgan quick-drew his gun and shoot Gray, his right-hand man Archibald MacGregor, and two other deputies dead, enabling the three outlaws to flee the deserted town.