As a lifelong resident of Pittsburgh, I can tell you the movie is not at all like the true story. The screen writer crafted this into a fictional romance. First of all, Ed Biddle never wrote the poem too Mrs. Soffel. Ed wrote the poem to a clergyman's daughter in the back of a book. Second, Ed cold blooded killed Detective Patrick Fitzgerald in a raid on his apartment in the Hill district.He shot Fitzgerald twice in the heart. The murder of grocer Kahney was a secondary thing. Third, Ed played Mrs. Soffel like an Irish harp. Ed never loved Mrs. Soffel. Even Jack said so after they were recaptured. That's right no one died in the snow. Ed and Jack bled slowly to death in a cell in the Butler City jail. As they say it's never a good idea to kill a cop. Strangely enough Detective Charles "Buck" McGovern who had one line in the movie became the most successful character in the movie--elected twice as a commissioner of Allegheny county.