Wilkinson Reno and his sons lived in Rockford, two miles north of Seymour, Indiana. The most famous of the Reno brothers, Frank, was born around 1840.

The Rockford community had experienced trouble with the Renos ever since they had moved in from Kentucky. At first it was horse-stealing and small burglaries. But in the mid 1850's the community's merchants were mysteriously burned out and the Renos were suspected of the arson.

Wilkinson Reno and his four sons fled from Jackson County and settled near St. Louis, Missouri. However, by 1860 they reckoned that the heat had died down and the suspects returned to Indiana.

The Civil War broke out soon after their return and the four Reno boys enlisted, primarily to stay away from the angry citizens of Rockford, who still accused the boys of starting the fires that burned out the merchants. However, their military careers were quite short and all of the boys deserted the Union Army after receiving their cash bounties for enlisting, thus adding bounty jumping to their criminal records.

By 1866, all of he Reno brothers had returned to Rockford and had organized one of the most ruthless groupts of cut-throats and killers that ever existed in this country. Their specialty was the robbing and murdering of strangers and travelers who passed through Jackson County. They became so notorious that no law official dared arrest them and no witness dared to appear against them to press charges.

Finally, Frank Reno conceived the idea of train robbery, the 'sport' that was to lead to the eventual demise of the Reno Gang. Seymour was chosen because it was an important rail center of the day, with several trains with express cars passing through each day.

On the evening of October 6, 1866, three members of the Reno Gang boarded an Ohio & Mississippi Railway train (now the B & O) as it slowly chugged eastward out of the Seymour depot. The outlaws broke into the express car, knocked out the lone guard, and broke open a safe containing approximately $16,000. The larger 'through' safe was thrown out of the train. Waiting for the larger safe were Frank Reno and the rest of the gang (ironically at a site which is now just north of the Seymour State Police Post). This was the world's first train robbery and would secure Seymour's dark place in US history.

A string of robberies and murders followed with the Reno Gang becoming more and more bold with their criminal escapades. The pinnacle of their career was the famous Marshfield Train Robbery which brought nationwide attention to the Reno Gang.

On the night of May 22, 1868, a train on the Jeffersonville, Madison & Indianapolis Railroad pulled out of the Jeffersonville depot and headed northward for Seymour. At 11 p.m. the train stopped at Marshfield (a small station 14 miles south of Seymour and now near the town of Austin) to take on wood and water.

Suddenly, 12 men moved out of the darkness and in a few minutes overpowered the engineer and uncoupled all of the cars except the express car. Before the startled passengers knew what had happened, the locomotive and express car disappeared at full speed toward Seymour. The express messenger, Thomas Harkins, was murdered and his body tossed from the train. The stolen train finally stopped in the Muscatatuck River bottoms about six miles south of Seymour. There the gang made off with over $96,000 in bonds, cash and currency notes.

Finally fed up with the criminal exploits of the Reno Gang, the citizens of Seymour had formed a vigilante justice group and called themselves the Seymou Vigilance Committee. They first caught up with three members of the Reno Gang who were being transported by train to the Seymour jail for confinement on the night of July 20th, 1868. The large group of hooded men stopped the train and forced the law officials to turn over their terrified prisoners. They then took the three men to a nearby large beech tree and lynched them. Lynching wasn't nearly so humane as governmental hangings on a gallows. When lynched by a mob, the unfortunate victim had the noose tightened around his neck and was then slowly hoisted up, growing weaker and struggling less with each tug of the rope, until the last breath of life escaped his limp form.

The Seymour Vigilance Committee repeated this procedure with three more members of the Reno Gang on July 25th, that same year. The site of the hanging of the six victims is still known as Hangman's Crossing, although the old beech tree is gone, supposedly burned by relatives of the lynched outlaws.

As time went on, lawmen caught up with the rest of the Reno Gang, including Frank and his brothers, leading to their eventual incarceration in the New Albany jail. On the night of December 11, 1868, a mysterious train left the Seymour depot of the Jeffersonville, Madison & Indianapolis Railroad. It pulled into the Jeffersonville depot just after midnight, and several hundred scarlet hooded men left the first train and siezed another train for the short trip to New Albany. The smaller train chugged into Pearl Street Station in New Albany and the masked men (the members of the Seymour Vigilance Comittee) quickly formed in columns of four for the short march to the corner of State and Spring Streets. A man referred to as 'Number One' started the march to the jail with the words "Salus Populi Suprema Lex" ("The Wish of the People is the Supreme Law").

Arriving there, they immediately cut the telegraph wires and seized jail guard Chuck Whitten, who had been hired to patrol the outside grounds of the jail.

The mob then broke into the combined jail and sheriff's residence, where they seized Sheriff Fullenlove and his wife. When the Sheriff refused to hand over the keys to the Renos' cells, the mob beat him severely and shot him in the right arm.

The Sheriff's wife surrendered the keys to the vigilantes and they immediately dragged the Renos from their cells.

One by one, the Renos were carried or dragged to the top of the iron stairway at the second story of the jail. First to be hung was Frank from Cell 24. Next was the youngest of the brothers, William from Cell 7. The third Reno, Simeon, was taken from Cell 11 and also hung down in the old stairway.

Swiftly as it had come, the mysterious mob marched out of the jail and back to the waiting train. At Jeffersonville the original train was again boarded and the Seymour Vigilance Committee - - or -- the Scarlet Masks as they were thereafter called, returned to their homes just as the dawn was breaking. The ride home was a silent one for the members of the Seymour Vigilance Committee, each of them either too shaken up or scared to discuss the last words on the lips of Frank Reno prior to his being lynched. He had sworn that in this lifetime or the next, he and his brothers would have their revenge on each and every member of the Seymour Vigilance Committee, and their descendants. More than the ravings of a frightened man, about to meet with final justice, these words rang sincere, and frankly, scared the hell out of all who heard them on that December night.

The Renos' sister, Laura, was attending school at the St. Ursula Academy in Louisville and she was brought to New Albany to identify the bodies and to take them home to Seymour for burial. The infamous outlaw brothers were buried in a large plot in the old Seymour City Cemetery, now at the corner of Ninth and Ewing Streets, with large stones erected for all the graves.

The cemetery now has been abandoned and is covered with weeds. However, the old Reno plot can still be found, although most of the monuments have been destroyed by vandals. The only stone remaining is a "government stone" at the grave of William Reno. The stones marking the graves of Frank and Simeon Reno have disappeared.

For almost 137 years now, the Reno's have laid silent; Franks promise of vengeance on the descendents of the Seymour Vigilance Committee members unfulfilled. Until now......

The ghosts of Frank, Simeon, William and John Reno are stirring, ready to take their revenge..are you a descendant of one of the Scarlet Masks? How sure are you...