From 1886 to 1890, he and his gang robbed express trains in Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana, the Indian Territory and Texas while pursued by hundreds of lawmen throughout the southern half of the United States, including the Pinkerton National Detective Agency.

By all accounts, Burrow fully intended to become a rancher by saving up enough money to buy a farm, marry and start a family.

[1] He attempted farming but his wife, Virginia Catherine Alverson Burrow, died of yellow fever in 1881, leaving him to care for two small children.

Learning from their mistakes from the last holdup, Burrows had the engineer held at gunpoint and forced him to stop the train on a trestle outside the town.

[1] Two weeks after making their escape, Rube and Jim Burrow were spotted by a conductor while riding on a Louisville & Nashville train in southern Alabama.

[9] Although Burrow was usually a cautious and detailed planner, he began to develop a reckless attitude which was further encouraged by his recent series of near escapes.

The posse was forced to turn back after two trackers, [one of them William Penn Woodard; the other Harry Annerton], had been killed and three others seriously wounded.

[1][9] Becoming the sole subject of one of the most widespread manhunts in American history, Burrow would continue to elude authorities in the wilderness of Alabama hill country for another two years.

On October 9, 1890,[10] Rube Burrow was captured by Jesse Hildreth and Frank Marshall, with the help of two planters, John McDuffie and Jeff "Dixie" Carter, at George Ford’s cabin, in Myrtlewood, Marengo County, Alabama on Dec 7, 1890 McDuffie had suspected Burrow would be in the area and warned Hildreth to be on the lookout.

In the early morning of December 8, 1890, Burrow complained of hunger and talked his jailers into handing him his bag, which had some ginger snaps inside.

It was reported that on a stop in Birmingham, thousands viewed the corpse and people snatched buttons from his coat, cut hair from his head, and even his boots were stolen.

Allen Burrow carried his son's body back to his home community near Vernon and buried him in Fellowship Cemetery.

[13] Paul Picerni played Burrow in a 1955 episode of the syndicated television series Stories of the Century, starring and narrated by Jim Davis.