Between 1875 and 1883, Charles Boles, aka Black Bart, committed some 28 stagecoach robberies in California, according to Smithsonian Magazine. What made this particular thief unique was he was always well dressed, polite, never fired a shot, and refused to rob women. In fact, according to The Storm King, Bart didn't even own a horse and sometimes pretended his gang was hiding in the bushes. He also favored leaving poems at the scene of the crime, signing them "The Po8." "Here I lay me down to sleep, To wait the coming morrow," read one of them in the Sacramento Daily Record. "Perhaps success, perhaps defeat, And everlasting sorrow. Yet come what will, I'll try it on, My condition can't be worse, And if there's money in that box, 'Tis money in my purse."

Bart's poems were revealed after the robber was finally caught in 1883. He pleaded guilty, served four years of a six year sentence at San Quentin, and was paroled for good behavior. The California Department of Corrections verifies Bart, who paid stagecoach drivers after stealing their guns and even solicited donations for orphans, was a model prisoner. He spent the remainder of his life around San Francisco. But History says he was suspected of one more robbery in 1888, which he denied and was never held accountable for.

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