Cora Hubbard: Female Bank Robber in Missouri

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On August 21, 1897, the day 27-year-old Cora Hubbard was arrested for robbing the McDonald County Bank in Pineville, Missouri, she stunned observers with her unrepentant attitude. Cora told the Daily Herald in nearby Joplin that she was ‘not a damn bit’ afraid during the robbery and suggested her only regret was that she and her accomplices hadn’t ‘held up the whole damn town.’

Cora Hubbard and her partners had hatched the bank robbery scheme a month earlier on a farm in Indian Territory (present-day Oklahoma) near Nowata, where Cora had taken up residence with her new husband, Bud Parker. She had married Parker around July 1 after divorcing her previous husband just two months earlier. Twenty-three-year-old John Sheets was working on Parker’s farm as a hired hand, and 31-year-old Whit Tennyson drifted in about the time Parker brought home his new bride. Two of Cora’s brothers, Al and William (’Bill’) Hubbard, were also living in the area at least part time.

Tennyson claimed to have experience in the ‘work’ of bank robbery, and he soon had the destitute bunch at the farm ‘in the notion of helping him out’ on his next caper. The gang chose the McDonald County Bank in Pineville because Bill Hubbard had briefly lived in that town and knew its layout. He drew up a map of the place, while Parker, Sheets, Tennyson and Al Hubbard were supposed to carry out the plan. When it came time to put the scheme into action, though, Al Hubbard and Bud Parker backed out. In anger at her new husband, Cora rode off toward Kansas with Sheets and Tennyson, saying she would not live with ‘a damn coward.’

The downsized gang stopped at Coffeyville, Kan., long enough for Sheets to buy a Winchester and ammunition and then continued to Cora’s hometown of Weir City, Kan., where her father, Sam Hubbard, had worked in the coal mines. The old man was alarmed when Cora showed up at his door with her hair cropped short, dressed in men’s clothes and accompanied by Sheets, a young desperado Sam had never seen before. As he later explained, however, he didn’t have the heart to turn his daughter away, since she was ‘a motherless girl.’ After hanging around Weir City a few days and procuring more ammunition, the three-person gang set out for Pineville in the southwest corner of Missouri more than 60 miles away.

They reached Pineville on August 16, 1897, and camped that night just outside town. The next morning, Sheets and Tennyson went into town to reconnoiter the place one last time before putting their plan into action. Seeing nothing to make them reconsider their design, they returned to camp to get Cora Hubbard.

Then all three rode back into town. They stopped about a block from the bank at the Hooper residence. Hubbard held the gang’s horses at a stable on the property while Sheets and Tennyson walked off toward the bank. When Brit Hooper, the landowner’s son, appeared at the door, Hubbard pointed her weapon and told the young man to stand still. He did ‘just as he was told,’ but to Cora he appeared a mite nervous. ‘It’s no use to get excited at a time like this,’ she remarked coolly.

Meanwhile, Sheets and Tennyson sneaked around the corner of the bank and presented their weapons to the three men sitting out front — A.V. Manning, president of the bank; John W. Shields, cashier; and Marcus N. LaMance, county treasurer. ‘We’re here for the money and we want it damn quick,’ one of the outlaws announced as they ordered the two bank officers inside.

While Sheets followed the two men into the bank, prodding them with his Winchester, Tennyson stayed outside to watch LaMance and stand guard. Almost immediately, two ladies drove up to the hitchrack in front of the bank in a buggy, and Tennyson greeted them with an ominous wave of his weapon. ‘Just sit still and you shan’t be hurt,’ he told them.

Inside the bank, Shields turned to remonstrate, but Sheets promptly knocked him to the floor with a blow from his Winchester and sent the cashier on all fours toward the vault. Punctuating his demands with profanity, Sheets ordered Manning to hold a sack and forced Shields to fill it with money. Cashier Shields quickly crammed in all the coins and currency he could find, a total of $589.23.

Tags: Historical Figures, People, The Wild West, Wild West, Women's History

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