Beadle's New Dime Novels: 'Dingle, the Outlaw'

About this issue

This 1871 dime novel by Edwin Emerson features "Dingle, the Outlaw," opening with three hunters—young Philip Campbell, weathered scout Tom Badger, and Irish laborer Arran O'Rourke—camped by the Cumberland River in Tennessee. Their discussion of Tecumseh's planned uprising against white settlers segues into Campbell's backstory: his lost fiancée Leonola, a half-breed daughter of English inventor Vivian Rooke, murdered years ago near the Chattahoochee River. The dialogue hints at Campbell's future romantic prospects with Christine Wilde. The chapter concludes with a mysterious scream in the darkness—a man apparently leaping eight feet into the air before collapsing—followed by running footsteps, leaving the hunters mystified. The narrative combines frontier adventure, historical setting, and romantic melodrama typical of the period's popular fiction.