The Reno Gang

The Reno Gang. . After the Civil War the Reno brothers returned home to Rockford, IN with a number of thieves and questionable characters. Soon the gang's far reaching crime sprees included train robbery, theft and murder. On the night of October 6, 1866, gang members John and Simeon Reno, along with Frank Sparks, boarded an O&M train hear here and took $12,000 to $18,000 from an Adams Express Company safe. The Reno Gang had just committed the first moving train robbery in the United States. Soon the Pinkerton Detective Agency was asked to search for the thieves., It wasn't until after the gang's last and most profitable train robbery at Marshfield, IN that the tides began to turn. During July 1868, on two separate occasions, hooded members of the Jackson County Vigilance Committee overpowered armed guards just west of Seymour and took a total of six gang members to a nearby beech tree to hang. Finally, in the early morning of December 12, 1868 the vigilantes forcibly entered the New Albany, IN jail. Brothers Frank, William and Simeon Reno, along with fellow gang member Charlie Anderson, were dragged from their cells and hung from the jail rafters. The hangings, which caused a public outcry and an international crisis, prompted an investigation. There were no arrests and the identity of the vigilantes still remains a mystery. The brothers are buried at the Old Seymour City Cemetery. , This steel-plated cell, believed to have held Charlie Anderson, was removed in 1961 when the 103 year old, two-story brick New Albany jail illustrated here was razed. Purchased by Eldo's Coffee Club members and presented to the City, the cell is on loan from the City of Seymour.