Jesse James's Poker Trick

Rumor has it that after a big hold up, The Jesse James Gang made their way to their hideaway and decided to play a game of poker with their winnings. This would end up being Jesse's last hand due to being caught cheating.

After agreeing on a game of poker to celebrate their spoils, the gang sat around their favorite table. The players consisted of Jesse and the six other gang members.

To show that everything was fair and above board, a new deck of cards was opened and the pack was shown to all the gang to be in new deck order.

The deck was then placed face down and each of the gang members in turn cut the pack.

A fifth and final card was dealt by Jesse to each member and to himself.

The gang member whom had witnessed the bottom deal, pulled out his revolver and called him out, accusing him of cheating.
This caused a real upset amongst the other gang members against Jesse.

Jesse was volunteered as dealer and proceeded to deal out the first card, face down to each of the six gang members and finally dealt a card to himself. Next,
He dealt a second card to each of the members and finally dealt a card to himself ( off the bottom of the pack ). A third card was dealt to all six members and finally Jesse dealt himself again.

On the fourth card deal, each member was dealt another card but Jesse again dealt himself a card ( from the bottom of the pack ). This was noted by one of the gang members.

They agreed to turn over each of their hands. Each gang member found that they all had a full house .

Before Jesse turned over his cards, he was told that as he had cheated, that instead of his dealt hand, that he should be dealt the top five cards of the top of the remaining cards in the pack and that would be the hand that counted.

This was done and Jesse was dealt a straight flush .

This seemingly caused a great deal of upset and confusion and although there are many versions of how this story ended, it is believed that Jesse was shot dead by one of the gang.

This is a very impressive trick and a big part of it is self working.

A lot of the tricks success in in the set up, which should be in new deck order .

How To Do The Trick

You play the role of Jesse. Make sure you have set the pack up in new deck order .  Ace, two. three e.tc in each suit as shown in photo.

The deck of cards is placed on the table and each player is asked to cut the cards as follows

Each player has a turn at giving the cards a complete cut. So you cut the cards a total of six times on their behalf.

When dealing the cards, this should be done from left to right in a clockwise direction.

You the dealer, deal yourself last.

The first deal is done as normal, clockwise direction and the cards, face down

The second deal is done in the same sequence as before .

Deal yourself a card from the bottom of the deck while dealing the second cards . This should be done discretely.

The third deal is done as normal, clockwise direction and the cards, face down

The fourth deal is done in the same sequence as before

Deal yourself a card from the bottom of the deck when dealing the fourth cards.

The fifth deal is done in the same sequence as before

Jesse is called out for cheating and each players hand turned over except his.

Amazingly, each of the other players has a full house

Jesse is told that as he had been cheating, to turn over the top five cards in the deck which will act as his new hand of cards. These are turned over to reveal a straight flush which beat all the full houses.

To try and prove he was not cheating , Jesse turned over his original hand which would have lost to the other players full houses.

This was not enough to save him however, as legend has it that a gunfight ensued and one of the other players shot him dead, ending another wild west legend.

This is an excellent routine which is brought to life by the Legend of Jesse James and his gang.

It should be relatively self working as long as you stick to the rules i.e. new deck order set up. Each player does a complete cut ( actually you do each cut on behalf of each player as you tell the story . )

It does not work 100% of the time but has a pretty high success rate.

Y'all move along now and get practicing this great folk yarn which makes for a very entertaining act.

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