Never Meet Your Heroes, But What of Your Folk Heroes?

Cole Younger, A Portrait in Words

Cole Younger in his own words. He wrote his memoirs after being released from prison, but the jailhouse letters of Cole and Jim Younger to their friend and advocate, Cora McNeill, are revealing.

When the Youngers were in St. Clair, Missouri, in 1870, they met Dr. D.C. McNeill, a physician who had served as such in the Confederate Army. He had a 13 year …