Zerelda Elizabeth Cole James Simms Samuel (
January 29, 1825 –
February 10, 1911) was the mother of
Frank James and
Jesse James.
Born as Zerelda Elizabeth Cole in Woodford County, Kentucky her parents were James and Sarah Lindsay Cole; she had one younger brother, Jesse Richard Cole. One year younger than she, her brother committed suicide in 1895 for undisclosed reasons.
When Zerelda was a small child, her father broke his neck in a riding accident leaving her mother with two small children; they were taken in by her paternal grandfather who owned a saloon. Later her mother re-married (to a farmer surnamed Thompson). Zerelda, by all accounts, did not get on with her new stepfather so she went to live with some of her mother's relatives in Kentucky where she attended a Catholic girls school.
At the age of 16 Zerelda Cole married Robert Sallee James on December 28, 1841, at the home of her uncle, James Madison Lindsay, in Stamping Ground, Kentucky. A college friend of Robert's officiated as the best man and tobacco was given in bond. The two moved to the vicinity of Centerville (later Kearney, Missouri).
