The Grand Korrigan robbery occurred in 1899 when the Van der Linde Gang members Arthur Morgan, Javier Escuella, Leopold Strauss, and Josiah Trelawny robbed a poker tournament aboard the riverboat The Grand Korrigan off New Orleans, Louisiana.
The robbery was masterminded by Josiah Trelawny, who had Morgan, Strauss, and Escuella dress well and pretend to be New York businessmen. They left their weapons with Trelawny's coach driver George Whitney on the docks, and they boarded the ship before it sailed up the Mississippi. There, Escuella changed into a security guard's uniform and obtained a repeater rifle, while Morgan sat at Desmond Blythe's table and gambled against him, with Strauss sitting at a table behind Blythe and giving Morgan cues as to whether he should fold or bet. Morgan won the first game against Blythe after the others folded, as the game had been rigged by the dealer, who was in Trelawny's pocket. Blythe then bet his valuable Swiss Reutlinger watch during a second round, which Morgan also won. Pit boss Frederick Schofield then greeted Morgan and offered to take him upstairs to the safe, where Morgan would retrieve the valuable watch. They were escorted by a rifle-toting Escuella, and Schofield expressed his disbelief that the company was now hiring Hispanics, and then joked that the company would hire blacks next. When the three men joined guard Bradley Ford at the vault, Schofield unlocked the vault, upon which Escuella struck Ford in the head with his rifle butt, and Morgan disarmed Schofield before robbing the vault. Schofield interrupted him by drawing a second pistol, but Morgan outdrew him and shot him in the head. Fearing that the people below might have overheard the gunshots, Morgan and Escuella hurried back downstairs to meet Strauss and Trelawny, but they found Blythe complaining that he had been cheated, and another player identified Morgan as the cheater. As security guards approached them, Morgan and Escuella drew guns, and Escuella knocked over a table as cover, while Morgan took cover behind the bar. A massive shootout ensued, and Morgan, Escuella, Strauss, and Trelawny escaped from the main room and jumped overboard, swimming back to the docks of New Orleans. There, they split the heist money between them before parting ways to evade the law.
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