Running with Dillinger:
The Story of Red Hamilton and
Other Forgotten Canadian Outlaws
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by Edward Butts
Dundurn Press, Toronto, 2008
232 pp., illus., $24.99 paperback
Edward Butts’ Running with Dillinger is easy on readers but treats lawbreakers seriously. In this sequel to his previous story collection The Desperate Ones: Forgotten Canadian Outlaws, Butts travels through time and country describing the exploits of famous and not-so-famous criminals.
As he moves from one villain to the next, we learn how some of Canada’s worst desperados become celebrities and folk heroes. Names like bank robber “Bloody” Jack Krafchenko, train robber James Henry “Blackie” Audett — whose exploits made him a resident of Alcatraz — and of course John “Red” Hamilton, the right-hand man of bandit John Dillinger, come to life.
Butts tells of cross-border smuggling at Lake Champlain; of Toronto’s great train robbery; and of the lengths one master sleuth went to track down a counterfeiter who was so skilled at engraving that he fooled the banks. The historian’s task often involves separating fact from fiction, and Butts’ careful research helps readers do this.
— Beverley Tallon (Read bio)
Beverley Tallon is a freelance writer and the former Assistant Editor for Canada's History.