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Bob Dalton

Robert Rennick "Bob" Dalton (13 May 1869 – 5 October 1892) was an American outlaw of the Wild West and the leader of the Dalton Gang from 1891 until his death in the Coffeyville bank robbery in Kansas in 1892.

Biography[]

Robert Rennick Dalton was born in Belton, Cass County, Missouri on 13 May 1869, one of twelve children; he was the brother of Grafton, Emmett, Frank, and Bill Dalton. The brothers were raised in Visalia, California and became muleskinners in the San Joaquin Valley, and Frank later moved to Arkansas and served as a deputy US Marshal until he was killed by whiskey bootleggers in 1887. Bob and Grat were given their brother's job and moved to Fort Smith, Arkansas, and Bob was hired to organize the Osage nation's police force in the Indian Territory, which had been opened to white settlement in 1890, allowing for the Dalton brothers' mother to buy a home at Kingfisher. Bob and his brothers began to take a turn for the bad by becoming drinkers, and Bob once shot a man on the job, claiming that it was in self-defense. In Oklahoma, Bob and his brothers began to steal Osage horses as a side hustle, and, when caught, they were forced to flee to California. They stayed with their brother Bill at his ranch near San Miguel, San Luis Obispo County. On 6 February 1891, Bob and Emmett Dalton robbed a Southern Pacific Railroad train near Alila, California, but they failed to take any money. The local sheriffs assembled a posse to search for them, forcing them to flee to Ogden, Utah and then to Oklahoma, where they robbed a train at Perry in May 1891. At this time, Bob and Emmett formed the Dalton Gang, and they robbed several banks, stagecoaches, and trains in California and Oklahoma before deciding on one last score, a double-bank heist, in Coffeyville, Kansas in October 1892, aiming to make enough money to flee the country. On 5 October 1892, Bob, Grat, and Emmett Dalton, along with their gang members Bill Powers and Dick Broadwell, carried out the Coffeyville bank robbery. In the ensuing shootout, only Emmett survived, as Bob and the other gang members were gunned down during their failed escape.

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