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69 of 71 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Read it for yourself..., October 19, 2002
This review is from: Jesse James: Last Rebel of the Civil War (Hardcover)
I have just finished a careful reading of this book, and it is one of the most remarkable books on American history I have ever read. Instead of being simply a compilation of facts and speculations about someone who lived underground for his entire life, this beautifully written book is a sweeping story of how the United States went through the Civil War and the years that followed. The author knits together the lives of one remarkable person after another, including Jesse and Frank James, their larger-than-life mother, Zerelda, the outlaws' friends and enemies (such as John Edwards and Allan Pinkerton), together with the story of the community the James family belonged to, as it was torn apart during the war. The most astonishing thing this book reveals is how important Jesse James was in the politics of his times, and how he understood that and tried to use his fame to promote the Confederate cause. I frankly don't understand the angry reviews that some have posted on Amazon. This is a very careful, thoughtful book, with almost 100 pages of endnotes (and bibliography) that explain the author's reasoning as well as sources. Clearly he's telling us what he thinks, but he never goes overboard. So who gets to decide what an "error" is? Were they videotaping robberies, so we know exactly what happened? Some of the critics seem to think they have special, secret knowledge. One thing that is especially silly is that the people who are attacking Stiles's book go on and on about the fact that the endnotes mention Michael Bellesiles, a historian who is now the subject of an academic investigation. I was curious, and I checked: I found only a couple of mentions of Bellesiles in the notes, and they say things like, "Bellesiles's work has come under harsh criticism." One of the Amazon reviewers says things about Stiles's book that just aren't true (claiming that Stiles says there were few guns in Missouri before the Civil War, and only one man in three had a gun--none of that's in here). Then again, one man said he was basing his comments on a pre-publication proof, which is not the same thing as the actual book, and so the critics may have been too lazy to read the real thing. This is a book worth reading. It is wonderful. I have never read a biography like it.
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48 of 52 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A truly brilliant biography, November 12, 2002
This review is from: Jesse James: Last Rebel of the Civil War (Hardcover)
I loved this book. I have had a fascination with the Civil War in Missouri, and Jesse James, for many years, and I have to say that this is far and away the best thing ever written on either topic. The book is brilliantly written, but it is also packed with new insights and new reseach. For example, the author uses probate records and newly discovered letters from Watkins Mill State Park to put new light on Jesse and Frank's father, Robert James, and on the hardships faced by Zerelda, his widow, after he died in the Gold Rush. Stiles does something that no one else has done before when he looks at the family's slaves, trying to understand their lives and how slaveowning made the James and Samuel family what it was. And the portrait of the Civil War in Missouri is genius. Stiles shows us that there was a lot more going on that simply Missourians fighting invading Kansans. He uses new sources, including a report by the Missouri state legislature and reports by the provost marshals (including some reports missed by everyone else who has written about Jesse James) to show how much the war there was a real neighbor-against-neighbor struggle that the James boys plunged into wholeheartedly. I could go on and on about the new insights Stiles has, such as the way he explains the differences between the various state militia forces as no one else has. When he gets to Jesse's bandit years, he uses governors' papers in the Missouri State Archives to show that the first bank the bandits robbed, in Liberty, was owned by the Radical Republican officials of Clay County where Jesse lived. Stiles explains something that I never realized: The bandits were really robbing express companies when they robbed trains, so the notion that they were Robin Hoods punching the big bad railroad companies in the nose is nonsense. He explains Jesse's letters to the press like no one else ever has, showing just how political a fellow he was. I could go on for much longer. Best of all, this book is beautifully written. The author doesn't force us to slog through every possibility when it comes to each robbery. He paints a portrait, then uses his footnotes to explain his reasoning. His reasoning is consistently sound--he's vivid, but he's not just making stuff up. Don't be fooled by any bad customer reviews. If you didn't know, there are a lot of Jesse James buffs who are glued to one version of his life, and don't like a really fresh, well-written account of his life by someone outside their club. The leading historians of Missouri and Western outlaws (including William Parrish, Christopher Phillips, and Richard Maxwell Brown) looked over the book before it was published, and they gave it a big thumbs up, as have such historians as James McPherson. This book is reseached like a doctoral dissertation, but it is written like a novel--not because the author is making it up, but because it is simply well-written.
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51 of 57 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
It's About Time!, November 13, 2002
This review is from: Jesse James: Last Rebel of the Civil War (Hardcover)
After a century of glorification and hero-worship idolatry, fuelled by hollywood's total lack of interest in true history in favor of romantic swashbuckle and garbage, the Jesse James myth has finally been exposed for what it is: nonsense, masking the ruthless, murderous career of a racist and terrorist. T. J. Stiles has come into Missouri and painstakingly researched the real motives and events in the life of Jesse James. With a great, readable style and the dedication to facts of a professional historian, without bias, Mr. Stiles unmasks our modern 'robin hood' and exposes Jesse as the politically motivated arch-villain that he was. I loved his previous 'In Their Own Words' series, but Mr. Stiles has taken a great leap with this book to the foremost ranks of American historians. We need more Stiles!
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