Belle Starr
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Myra Maybelle Shirley better known as Belle Starr (February 5, 1848 – February 3, 1889) was famous as an American female outlaw.
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[edit] Early life
She was born Myra Maybelle Shirley near Carthage, Missouri, into a farming family. Her family moved to Carthage in the 1860s, and her father became an inn owner. After the Union attack on Carthage in 1864, the Shirleys moved to Scyene, Texas. At Scyene, the Shirleys became associated with a number of Missouri-born criminals, including Jesse James and the Youngers. There was a legend that she had a relationship with Cole Younger which was fictionalized into a work published after her death. She certainly knew the Younger brothers and the James boys because she grew up with them in Missouri, and her brother, Bud, served with them in Quantrill's Raiders in the Confederate Army, alongside another local Missouri boy, Jim Reed. {The Younger Brothers were involved in the killing of 3 law officers in 1871 and 1874. See [1].}
[edit] After the Civil War
After the war the Reed family, too, moved to Scyene and she married Jim in 1866, giving birth to her first child, Rosie Lee (nicknamed Pearl) in 1868. Jim soon turned to crime and, wanted for murder, the family moved to California, where their second child, James Edwin (Eddie) was born in 1871. Returning to Texas, Jim worked with a number of criminal gangs. In April 1874, despite a lack of evidence, a warrant was issued for her arrest over a stage coach robbery carried out by her husband and others. Jim was killed in Paris, Texas, in August of that year.
[edit] Marriage to Sam Starr
According to the fiction that grew up around her after her death she was briefly married to Bruce Younger in 1878, but again, this was entirely unsubstantiated by any primary evidence. But she did marry a Cherokee Indian in 1880 named Sam Starr and settled on Starr family land in Indian Territory. In 1883, she and Sam were charged with horse theft and went to trial in "Hanging" Judge Isaac Parker's Federal District Court in Fort Smith, Arkansas. Found guilty, she served six months at the Detroit House of Corrections in Detroit, Michigan. In 1886, she escaped conviction on another theft charge, but Sam Starr was shot and killed in December, possibly in a drunken brawl. He killed Officer Frank West [2] December 17, 1886. {Officer West shot Starr}
[edit] Belle Starr's unsolved murder
After Sam died, the legend has her associated with several men (almost all of whom died violently and some on Judge Parker's gallows at Fort Smith), but again, without foundation. In fact, in order to hang on to her interests in her residence on Indian land she very quickly married a member of Sam's extended family, Jim July Starr. Later, in 1889, she was, herself, killed; although her murder was (briefly) investigated, it is considered "unsolved".
[edit] Belle Starr's story becomes popularized
Although an obscure, quiet figure throughout most of her life, her story was picked up by the dime novel publisher, Richard K. Fox (who had the reputation of being lax with regard to historical accuracy or the rigours of historical research). Fox made her name famous with the novel Belle Starr, the Bandit Queen, or the Female Jesse James, published in 1889 (the year of her unsolved murder). Unfortunately, this work of fiction is still often mistakenly cited as a historical reference. It was the first of many popular stories that used her name.
[edit] Belle Starr's children
Her son Eddie was convicted of horse theft and receiving stolen property in July 1889 and Judge Parker sent him to prison in Columbus, Ohio. Belle's daughter, Rosie Reed, also known as Pearl Starr, went into prostitution to raise funds for his release resulting in a presidential pardon in 1893. Eddie eventually became a police officer and was killed in the line of duty in December 1896.
Evidently finding a good living in prostitution, Pearl went on to operate a group of bordellos in Van Buren and Fort Smith, Arkansas, from the 1890s until World War I.
[edit] Historical Fiction
One of the more unique adaptations of the legend of Belle Starr was made by the Japanese mangaka Akihiro Itou - perhaps best known to Western audiences as the creator of Geobreeders - who, in 1993, created a manga known as Belle Starr Bandits. Freely inspired by her life and exploits, the two volume series takes several liberties with historical figures, facts, and events, and, in spite of its heavily comedic and action-orented overtones, portrays Belle Starr as something of a tragic figure. Initially a somewhat ditzy young girl who just happens to be a crack shot, she is, as time progresses, forced to accept living life as an outlaw due to a series of misunderstandings and circumstances beyond her control, eventually developing a kind of inner strength and iron resolve as a result of her experiences.
The framing sequence of the story takes place in Canada in 1932 and chronicles the efforts of a female author and Belle Starr afficianado to write the definitive work on the female outlaw by uncovering the truth about her life and times.
Originally serialized in Fujima Fantasia and later in Dragon Comics, the only known foreign translation was made by the French publisher Pika Edition as part of their Manga Player Collection series in 1997, though, for unknown reasons, translation work ceased following the release of Volume 1. While still available for purchase online and elsewhere, the series is currently out of print and a release of the second and final volume seems highly unlikely after a nearly decade-long hiatus.
In addition, a 1941 film with little historical connection and a 1980 television movie were made with the title Belle Starr.
[edit] References
- Shirley, Glenn, Belle Starr and Her Times: The Literature, the Facts and the Legends. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1982.
[edit] Trivia
- The Starrs were related to Bank robber, police killer of a Deputy Marshal [3] and movie actor Henry Starr.
- Contrary to Legend-as stated in Handbook of Texas below-, Belle Starr was not a lover of Cherokee killer Bluford "Blue" Duck -although their picture was taken together.[4]
[edit] Notes
- ^ http://www.odmp.org/officer.php?oid=9936
- ^ http://www.odmp.org/officer.php/?oid=14019
- ^ http://www.odmp.org/officer.php?oid=14332
- ^ http://www.westernoutlaw.com/gravesites/bluford_duck.html
[edit] External links
- Belle Starr from the Handbook of Texas Online
