The story told by Evans is one of the most remarkable in the history of crime. He admitted the correctness of Robert Pinkerton's inference that the Northampton Bank had been robbed by Scott and Dunlap and their associates, and in order to explain his own connection with this formidable gang he went back to its organization in 1872. The leader of the gang was James Dunlap, _alias_ James Barton, who, before he became a bank robber, had been a brakeman on the Chicago, Alton and St. Louis Railroad. His inborn criminal instincts led him to frequent the resorts of thieves in Chicago, and thus he met "Johnny" Lamb and a man named Perry, who took a liking to him and taught him all they knew about breaking safes. Dunlap soon outstripped his masters, developing a genius for robbery and for organization that speedily proved him the most formidable of all the bank robbers then operating in the country, not even excepting "Jimmy" Hope, the notorious Manhattan Bank robber. He had the long-headedness and stubbornness of his Scotch parents, united with the daring and ingenuity peculiar to Americans. In the fall of 1872 he organized the most dangerous and best-equipped gang of bank robbers that the country had ever known. Dunlap's right-hand man was Robert C. Scott, _alias_ "Hustling Bob," originally a deck-hand on a Mississippi steamboat and afterward a hotel thief. Scott was a big, powerful man, with a determination equal to anything. Their associates were what one might expect from these two. Other members of the gang were Thomas Doty, William Conroy, "Eddie" Goody, John Perry, James Greer, a professional burglar originally from Canada, and the notorious John Leary, _alias_ "Red" Leary, of whom more will be said later on. In addition to these, the gang contained several members of less importance, men who acted merely as lookouts, or as go-betweens or messengers. The first large operation of Dunlap's band occurred in 1872, when they plundered the Falls City Bank in Louisville, Kentucky, of about two hundred thousand dollars, escaping with their booty. This was satisfactory as a beginning, but Dunlap and Scott dreamed of achievements beside which this was insignificant. They began a careful investigation through many States, to learn of banks of weak structure containing large treasure. One of the gang finally found precisely what they were in search of in the Second National Bank of Elmira, New York, which institution, being a government depository, contained, as they learned on good authority, two hundred thousand dollars in greenbacks and six millions in bonds.