CHAPTER XIV. THE SAD RETREAT FROM SPRINGFIELD.

The partisans of Gen. Fremont bitterly blamed Gen. David Hunter for

having intrigued to succeed Fremont, and they rejoiced that his tenure

of that office proved to be so short-lived. This was both fallacious and

unjust.

Gen. David Hunter, while not of the highest type of military ability,

was yet far above mediocrity. He was one of the best examples of the Old

Regular Army officer--thoroughly devoted to his profession, a master of

all its details, incorruptible, inflexible, and intolerant to all whose

character and conduct lowered the standard of what Hunter thought an

American officer should be.

He was born in the District of Columbia, graduated from West Point in

1822, 25th in a class of 40 members, and had an extensive experience in

Indian fighting, commanding for several years a troop of dragoons. He

resigned in 1836, but re-entered the Army in 1842 as a Paymaster and

served as Chief Paymaster of Gen. Wool's Division in the Mexican War.

At the outbreak of the war of the rebellion he had been made Colonel

of the 6th U. S. Cav.--a new regiment--and commanded a division at Bull

Run, where he showed great gallantry and was wounded. He had been sent

out to Fremont as his second in command and adviser, in the hope that

he would control in some measure the commander's erratic course and be

instrumental in promoting better methods in his administration.

238

He was true to his duties in communicating to his superiors just what he

found in the Department of the West and properly representing Fremont's

incompetence. It was not intended that he should have permanent command

of the army, and probably no man was less desirous that he should be

than he himself, for he had a modest opinion of his own abilities and

never hesitated to subordinate himself when he thought another man would

do better in the place.

The command was given him merely as a stop-gap until another commander

could be determined upon.

In the same envelope which contained Lincoln's letter to Gen. Curtis

inclosing the order for the supersedure of Gen. Fremont, was another

reading as follows:

Washington, Oct. 24, 1861. To the Commander of the

Department of the West

Sir: The command of the Department of the West having

devolved upon you, I propose to offer you a few suggestions.

Knowing how hazardous it is to bind down a distant commander

in the field to specific lines and operations, as so much

always depends on a knowledge of localities and passing

events, it is intended, therefore, to leave a considerable

margin for the exercise of your judgment and discretion.

The main rebel army (Price's) west of the Mississippi is

believed to have passed Dade County in full retreat upon

northwestern Arkansas, leaving Missouri almost freed from

the enemy, excepting in the southeast of the State.

Assuming this basis of fact, it seems desirable, as you are

not likely to overtake Price, and are in danger of making

too long a line from your own base of supplies and

reinforcements, that you should give up the pursuit halt

your main army, divide it into two corps of observation,

one occupying Sedalla and the other Rolla, the present

termini of railroad; then recruit the condition of both

corps by reestablishing and improving their discipline and

instruction, perfecting their clothing and equipments, and

providing less uncomfortable quarters. Of course, both

railroads must be guarded and kept open, judiciously

employing just so much force as is necessary for this. 'From

these two points, Sedalia and Rolla, and especially in

judicious cooperation with Lane on the Kansas border, it

would be so easy to concentrate and repel an army of the

enemy returning on Missouri from the southwest that It is

not probable any such attempt to return will be made before

or during the approaching cold weather.

289

Before Spring the people of Missouri will probably be in no

favorable mood to renew for next year the troubles which

have so much afflicted and impoverished them during this. If

you adopt this line of policy, and if, as I anticipate, you

will see no enemy in great force approaching, you will have

a surplus of force, which you can withdraw from these points

and direct to others, as may be needed, the railroads

furnishing ready means of reinforcing their main points, if

occasion requires. Doubtless local uprisings will for a time

continue to occur, but these can be met by detachments and

local forces of our own, and will ere long tire out of

themselves.

While, as stated in the beginning of the letter, a large

discretion must be and is left with yourself, I feel sure

that an indefinite pursuit of Price or an attempt by this

long and circuitous route to reach Memphis will be

exhaustive beyond endurance, and will end in the loss of the

whole force engaged. Your obedient servant,

A. LINCOLN.

This letter, undoubtedly dictated by McClellan, who was then

the dominant military influence at Washington, is yet strikingly

characteristic of President Lincoln, and abounds in that profound common

sense which made him easily the first General of the War.

The army was already 125 miles away from its base of suppliess on the

railroad, with a terrible rough intervening country. Consequently, the

problem of supplying it was of momentous seriousness and the expense

appalling.

Though in the midst of a region of wonderful fertility, with its crops

gathered in barns, no one seems to have though of utilizing these. They

left them for Price to gather in, while they hauled their supplies from

Rolla. Our officers as yet were only in the primer class in war.

240

The letter also shows the firm hold of the prevailing opinion that

Secession was only a temporary madness, from which the people would

recover when the Winter gave them time to reflect and reason. Probably

this would have been the case had the Government put forth its power

with crushing effectiveness. But the first year of the war was to end

with the Secessionists successful almost everywhere, and big scores

to their credit in Missouri. The fresh disaster at Ball's Bluff on the

Potomac unnerved many loyal people.

Possibly President Lincoln did not anticipate that his suggestions would

be carried out so literally. His best information was that Price's army

had virtually gone to pieces, and that by taking post at Sedalia

and Rolla the central and southwestern parts of the State could be

effectually controlled by parties sent out from there. He could not

have conceived that Price had a strong, compact, aggressive army well

in hand, and that the new commander of the Department of the West would

march away from it without striking a blow or making a manuver to reduce

its capacity for harmfulness.

Certainly some shreds of Lyon's mantle must have fallen on that proud

array of new-made Generals, and they would insist on striking a quick,

sharp blow, as a return for Lexington, for the honor of the Union

army, and to curb Price's rising conviction that he was an irresistible

conqueror.

But the next day after receiving his assignment to command, Gen. Hunter

made a reconnoissance in force to the battlefield of Wilson's Greek,

where Fremont had persisted in believing that Price was waiting to give

him battle. He found no enemy on the scene of the terrible battle of two

months before. Instead, all his information was to the effect that Price

was among the rugged fastnesses about Pineville, 50 miles away, with

McCulloch still farther off in the Boston Mountains.

241

Hunter therefore ordered his columns to countermarch and proceeded to

carry out the President's instructions promptly and exactly.

This backward movement, without a blow at Price, abandoned the whole of

the Union loving country of southwestern Missouri to the Secessionists,

and was a measureless calamity.

The Union people, taking heart from the advance of Fremont with his

great army, had returned to their homes and attempted to re-establish

themselves upon their farms and in their business. All these hopes were

suddenly dashed to the ground by the retirement of the army, and they

had to flee again in haste before the immediate advance of Price to

occupy the abandoned region.

It was not his army which was so terrible, but the horde of guerrilla

bands, which rushed out like venomous serpents after a warm rain, intent

upon rapine, outrage and murder. It was the "Poor White Trash" let

loose under such leaders as Quantrill, the Young-ers, Jameses, Haywards,

Freemans, and a thousand others of bandit infamy.

Aside from these calamities, the retreat, added to Price's victory at

Lexington, was a most stifling moral depression of the Union sentiment

in Missouri.

While the condition of things in the greater central and southwestern

parts of Missouri had been grievously unsatisfactory for many weeks,

and seemed to be growing steadily more so, it was otherwise in the

southeastern section.

242

The so-called Ozark Mountains, which are really a series of rough,

picturesque highlands, separating the watersheds of the Missouri and the

Arkansas Rivers, begin on the Mississippi at the mouth of the Meramec

River, 20 miles below St. Louis, and extend along the Mississippi,

rising frequently into cliffs of limestone 350 feet high, to Gape

Girardeau, 44 miles above Cairo, Ill.

This range, less than 100 miles wide, one of the richest in the world in

minerals, sinks away on the north and west to the valleys of the Osage

and the Missouri and the prairies which stretch across Kansas and the

Indian Territory to the Rocky Mountains. To the southeast it falls into

the lowlands and swamps along the Mississippi, making there a separate

and distinct section--about the size of Connecticut--and of entirely

different character from the rest of the State. Over 3,000 square miles

of this--or nearly three times the size of Rhode Island--are swamps

thickly wooded with towering cypresses, and covered with jungles

impenetrable to man. The principal town In the region was New Madrid, a

fever-smitten little village on the banks of the Mississippi, 44 miles

below Cairo. It had once much promise, but the terrible earthquakes

of 1811-12 had seamed the surrounding country with great crevices and

gulches, adding hopelessly to its forbidding character, and giving a

mortal blow to New Madrid's expectations.

The region was drained--as far as it was drained--by the St. Francis

River, a considerable stream, navigable nearly to the Missouri line, and

emptying into the Mississippi nine miles above Helena, Ark.

Besides the Mississippi River there were then two routes of access from

St. Louis to this region. One was by the Iron Mountain Railroad, which

ran through the Ozarks to Pilot Knob, 84 miles from the city, and the

other by common road through Fredericktown, 105 miles from St. Louis.

243

Gen. Albert Sidney Johnston--regarded by Jefferson Davis as a great

military genius, and appointed to command the entire Confederate army

in the West--had some idea of moving an army up through the swamps to

these roads, flanking the Union position at Cairo and taking St. Louis.

The St. Francis River would aid in supplying the army. His immediate

subordinate, Maj. Gen. Polk, was still more in favor of the plan, and it

went in this proportion down through Gen. Gideon Pillow, with his "Army

of Liberation," to the most enthusiastic advocate, of the scheme,

our poetical acquaintance, Gen. M. Jeff Thompson, file "Swamp Fox of

Missouri." The idea was to move in concert with Price coming up from the

southeast.

Maj.-Gen. Leonidas Polk, C. S. A., who had been placed in command of

the Mississippi River, and subsequently had the States of Arkansas

and Missouri added to his Department, had gathered about him in the

neighborhood of Memphis some 25,000 or 30,000 Mississippi, Louisiana,

Tennessee and other troops, with which, scorning Kentucky's claim of

neutrality, he advanced to Columbus, Ky., the terminus of the Mobile &

Ohio Railroad, and 20 miles from Cairo, Ill. Upon the high bluff there

he proceeded to construct one of those "Gibraltars" so numerous in the

early history of the war.

With the force at his command and the opposition he was likely to meet

from the Union commanders in southeast Missouri, a march on St. Louis

by the roads indicated was a promising venture. Besides the forces

immediately around him, he had control of McCulloch's, Pearce's and

Hardee's columns in Arkansas, and potential control of Price's and

Thompson's Missouri forces, making altogether an aggregate approaching

70,000 men.

244

But he hesitated, while Pillow fretted and fumed, and wrote that while

he honored his superior officer as a prelate and admired him as a

patriot, he had small opinion of his military judgment.

M. Jeff Thompson, who had no mean opinion of his own abilities, wrote

to Jefferson Davis that what the Southern Confederacy needed in that

quarter was "a first-class leader," and he cast a unanimous vote for

himself for that position.

In the meantime an event occurred as to the significance of which Polk,

Pillow and Thompson were as unappreciative as the country at large.

In August, U. S. Grant, lately commissioned a Brigadier-General, was

sent down to Cape Girardeau to look after matters in southeast Missouri,

including Cairo, Ill., and he took with him his former regiment,

the 21st Ill., to the command of which Col. John W. S. Alexander had

succeeded. A peculiarity of Gen. Grant, which President Lincoln speedily

noticed, was that wherever he was "things kept moving." There were no

grand reviews, no sounding proclamations, no sensational announcements

of plans, but somehow everybody about him was found to be speedily

employed in an effective way against the enemy. But little clamor ever

came from Grant for reinforcements or additional strength. If he was

given a thousand men he at once set them to work doing all that 1,000

men were capable of. Given 2,000 men he would do twice as much, and

so on. If supplies were not furnished him, he gathered them from the

surrounding country, giving vouchers carefully based on the prevailing

market rates. If no wagons or teams were at hand, he impressed them and

gave vouchers.

245

As unassertive and modest as Grant seemed to be, he had a remarkable

faculty for bringing in everybody near him and securing from them prompt

and energetic obedience to his orders.

Among Gen. Grant's subordinates was our old acquaintance, Capt. J. B.

Plummer, who had done such good work at Wilson's Creek and who was now

in command of the 11th Mo. There was also Col. W. P. Carlin, a Captain

in the Regular Army, whom the Governor of Illinois had wisely made

Colonel of the 88th 111. Carlin, a graduate of West Point in the class

of 1850, was a somewhat austere, highstrung man, wrapped up in his

profession, an excellent soldier, and feverishly anxious to do his duty

and justify his promotion to the important position he held.

Like all Regulars he was jealously sensitive about his rank, and one

of his first performances was insistence that he outranked Col. C. E.

Hovey, of the 33d Ill., and should therefore have command of the post.

Hovey, who had been Principal of the Normal Institute before becoming

a Colonel, felt that his position had been quite as high as that of a

Captain in the Regular Army, and his men, who entered warmly into the

dispute, could hardly understand how the Colonel of the 38th Ill. could

outrank the Colonel of the 33d, and though they at last gave way, there

was some bitterness of feeling.

246

Though Gen. Grant had only about 14,000 men all told, he kept Johnston,

Polk and Thompson, with their 30,000, so well employed guarding points

that he threatened, or might take without threatening, that their

superiority was neutralized and they were kept on the defensive.

Burning with desire to do something, M. Jeff Thompson, who, in spite of

his gasconade, was really a brave, enterprising man, and a good deal of

a soldier, started out from Columbus early in October with some 2,000

men, expecting to be joined by other forces on the way, capture Ironton

and Frederick-town, open up the road for Pillow's columns to St. Lous,

and to co-operate with Gen. Price.

He went down the river in boats to New Madrid and there began a march

across the country toward Bloomfield, which was to become the base of

so many of his subsequent operations. Leaving his infantry under the

command of Col. Aden Lowe, of the 3d Mo. State Guards, a prominent young

attorney and politician, to follow more slowly, Thompson pushed on with

500 mounted men, whom he calls "dragoons," made a wide circuit, and

struck the railroad north of Ironton at Big River Bridge, only about

40 miles from St Louis. He had made astonishing progress so far, and

jubilantly reported to Gen. Albert Sidney Johnston, who had come to

Columbus to watch the movement, that his men were so anxious to fight

that he reached his objective point two days ahead of the appointed

time.

247

At the Big River Bridge he struck a small company of a somewhat noted

regiment, the 33d Ill. (the Normal Regiment), largely made up of

students and teachers in the Normal Institute of Illinois, who, despite

the disparity in numbers, gave him a sharp little fight, in which he

lost two killed and quite a number wounded. He reported having captured

45 prisoners, with a quantity of supplies, and succeeded in burning

the bridge across the river. While engaged in distributing the supplies,

another company of the 33d Ill., hearing the noise, came up to the

assistance of their comrades, and Thompson had another fight on his

hands, in which he admits he lost four men killed and quite a number

wounded, but insists that he "killed another lot of the enemy and took

10 prisoners." He said he "had the enemy terribly frightened," and that

if Albert Sidney Johnston had the rest of his men in striking distance

that he could take Ironton, with its 12,000,000 rations stored for the

Winter, in an hour.

Johnston transmitted Thompson's report to Richmond with a complimentary

indorsement. Thompson also reported having received several hundred

recruits and captured about 17,000 pounds of lead. These were destined

to be the last of his rejoicings for some time.

Thompson sent word to all the commanders of Confederate forces in the

neighborhood to join in his attack on Ironton, promising them victory

and unlimited spoils.

Gen. Grant ordered Col. Carlin to move forward with his force from Pilot

Knob and attack Thompson's main body, which was then in the neighborhood

of Fredericktown. He also ordered Col. J. B. Plum-mer to march from Cape

Girardeau, strike at Thompson's line of retreat, and endeavor to capture

his whole force.

248

Thompson had cunningly magnified the number of his troops, and Plummer

and Carlin were both impressed with the idea that he had somewhere in

the neighborhood of 5,000 or 6,000 men and was likely to be joined by

Gen. Hardee's column from Pocahontas, Ark., with many more.

Grant, with that accurate knowledge of his enemy which was one of his

conspicuous traits and never failed him at any time during the war,

informed them that Thompson had only between 2,000 and 3,000 men. As

usual in Grant's operations, the columns moved on time and arrived when

expected.

Col. Carlin moved Oct. 20 from Pilot Knob with about 3,000 men made up

of the 21st Ill., Col. Alexander; 33d HI., Col. C. E. Hovey; 38th Ill.,

Maj. Gilman; 8th Wis., Col. Murphy; part of the 1st Ind. Cav., Col.

Conrad Baker, and some of the guns of the 1st Mo. Art., under the charge

of Maj. Schofield.

Col. Plummets column, about 1,500 strong, consisted of the 17th Ill.,

Col Ross; 20th Ill., Col. Marsh; 11th Mo., Lieut.-Col. Panabaker; Lieut.

White's section of Taylor's Illinois Battery, and two companies of

cavalry commanded by Capts. Stewart and Lan-gen.

Col. Plummer moved to Dallas, on Johnston's line of retreat, and there

sent through a messenger to Col. Carlin, stating where he was and

what his intentions were, so that the two forces could cooperate.

The messenger was captured by some of the Missourians, and therefore

Thompson came into possession of the plans of his enemies. He moved back

with his train until he saw it safely on its way to Greenville, and

then returned with his command toward Fredericktown to accommodate his

opponents with a fight if they desired it and to gain time for his train

to get back to Bloomfield and New Madrid.

249

Not finding Thompson at Dallas, Col. Plummer moved up to Fredericktown,

arriving there at noon, Monday, Oct. 21, and found that Col. Carlin

had arrived with his forces about 8 o'clock in the morning. There was

immediately one of those squabbles over rank which were so frequent

on both sides during the early part of the war and not absent from its

history at any time.

In spite of being a younger man than Col. Plummer, a younger Captain in

the Regular Army, and in spite of Plummer's experience in the Mexican

War and at Wilson's Creek, Carlin insisted upon the command of the

whole, upon the grounds that he had been commissioned a Colonel Aug.

15, and by the Governor of Illinois; while Plummer's commission was from

Fremont. Carlin insisted that he had a plan by which Thompson's whole

force could be captured, but was at length induced to yield the command

to Plummer, who went ahead with the combined force to attack Thompson,

leaving Carlin, who was exhausted and ill, in town with a portion of his

command.

Possibly, what helped induce Carlin to yield was the knowledge of an

agreement between Col. Plummer and Col. Ross, of the 17th Ill., who

outranked both of them, that if Carlin persisted in his claim, Ross

should assert his seniority and take command of the whole. Carlin

retained the 8th Wis. and two 24-pound howitzers in Fredericktown to

hold the place, while Plummer took the rest of the force and started out

in search of Thompson.

He did not have to go very far.

250

A half mile from town shots were heard, and the cavalry came back with

the information that the enemy was just ahead. The leading infantry

regiment, the 17th Ill., went into line to the left and moved forward

into a cornfield, where the enemy's skirmishers were immediately

encountered.

Lieut. White came up with his section of artillery and opened fire upon

a hill about 600 yards distant where it was likely that Thompson had his

artillery masked. Thompson's guns could not stand the punishment quietly

and opened up only to be speedily suppressed by other guns which Maj.

Schofield hurried up to join two which had been firing.

Col. Lowe, commanding the Missouri State Guards, first engaged, was soon

shot through the head and his regiment began falling back before the

steady advance of the 17th Ill., to which was soon added the fire of the

33d Ill. and a part of the 11th Mo.

At first the Missourians fell back steadily, but after the rough

handling of the artillery their retreat became a rout and Col. Baker

dashed forward with the 1st Ind. Cav. in pursuit.. A half mile in the

rear Thompson succeeded in rallying his men and also brought one piece

of artillery into action, receiving the cavalry with a fierce volley, by

which Maj. Gavitt, who had been active and prominent in the operations

in that section, and Capt. Highman were killed.

Notwithstanding this, the cavalry rallied, charged, and took the gun,

which they had, however, to soon give up under a charge led by Thompson

himself.

251

The 17th Ill. had already secured one gun, and now as the infantry

came up Thompson's men broke and retreated rapidly in every direction.

Hearing the noise of the fighting, Col. Carlin arose from a sick-bed,

galloped to the battlefield, and took command of a part of the troops.

The pursuit was continued by the infantry for 10 miles, and by the

cavalry 12 miles farther, when it was decided that Thompson's men had

scattered and gained a refuge in the swamps, and that further pursuit

would be useless.

Plummer recalled his forces to Fredericktown. He claims that he took 80

prisoners, of whom 38 were wounded, and buried 158 of Thompson's dead,

with other bodies being found from time to time in the woods. His own

loss he reports as six killed and 16 wounded.

Thompson reported that he had lost 20 killed, 27 wounded, and 15

prisoners, but that he "had mowed down the enemy as with a scythe;"

that "they acknowledge a loss of 400 killed and wounded," etc, etc. He

admitted he had lost one cannon by its being disabled so that it could

not be brought from the field. He said that his "dragoons" had stampeded

in a shameful way, but that his infantry had behaved very well.

Later, he reported from New Madrid that his command was "very much

demoralized."

Gen. Polk seems to have been much depressed by the news of Thompson's

defeat, because he ordered an abandonment of the post at New Madrid and

the bringing over of the men and guns to his "Gibraltar" at Columbus.

Gen. Grant, though probably disappointed at the failure of his plans to

capture Thompson's force, was careful to write complimentary letters to

all the commanders, recognizing their good services in the expedition.

262

The fight at Fredericktown quieted things pretty effectually in

southeastern Missouri, and ended for a long while the project of

capturing St Louis by the New Madrid route.

Gen. Grant was preparing some startling things to occupy the attention

of Johnston, Polk and Pillow in quite another quarter.

263

CHAPTER XI. GEN. H. W. HALLECK IN COMMAND.

Henry Wager Halleck, who succeeded Gen. Fremont in command of the

Department of Missouri, Nov. 9, 1861, had been pointed to as a

brilliantly shining example of what West Point could produce. He was

born in 1819 near Utica, N. Y., of a very good family, and had graduated

July 1, 1839, from West Point, third in a class of which Isaac

I. Stevens, afterward to conclude a brilliant career by dying a

Major-General on the field of battle, was the head. Other conspicuous

members of the class were Maj.-Gens. James B. Ricketts, E. O. C. Ord,

H. J. Hunt, and E. R. S. Can-by, of the Union army, and A. R. Lawton, a

Confederate Brigadier-General. Halleck was commissioned in the Corps of

Engineers, and during the Mexican War received a couple of the brevets

so easily won in that conflict.

With his attainments and cast of mind, he made an admirable staff

officer for Commodore Shubrick and Gens. Mason and Riley in their

administration of California while the territory was being reduced to an

American possession. He became a Captain in his Corps in 1852, but the

opportunities in California were so tempting, that he resigned to enter

the practice of the law and embark in various business enterprises of

railroad building and quicksilver mining. He was unusually successful

in all these, becoming Director-General of the New Almaden Quicksilver

Mining Company, President of a railroad, and a member of a leading law

firm. He kept up his military connection by accepting the commission of

Major-General commanding the California Militia.

264

He was a constant student and a ready writer, and during this time

published a number of military and scientific books, some of which were

original and others translations.

Intellectually, professionally and socially he stood very high, and

the bestowal of a Major-General's commission upon him, dating from Aug.

19,1861, met with universal approval, though it gave him seniority in

that coveted rank to many distinguished soldiers. At that time Halleck

was in his 46th year and the very prime of his powers. He was tall,

spare, and commanding in figure, with a clean-shaven, authoritative,

intellectual face in which men read great things. He had large,

searching eyes, which seemed to penetrate the one with whom he was

talking. As far as education and observation could go, Halleck was

as complete a soldier as could be produced. Whatever could be done by

calculation and careful operation, he could do on a high plane. He only

lacked military instinct and soldierly intuition. Of that moral force

which frequently overleaps mere physical limitation he seems to have had

little, nor could he understand it in others.

There was in him none of the fiery zeal of Lyon, or the relentless

pugnacity of Grant; apparently these qualities were so absent in him

that he did not know how to deal with them in others. He never put

himself at the head of his troops to lead them in battle.

255

He could build up, block by block, with patient calculation, without

comprehension that somewhere might be a volcanic energy suddenly

unloosed which would scatter his blocks like straws.

If he had political convictions, they were so unobtrusive as to be

rarely mentioned in connection with him. Probably his views were the

same as generally prevailed among the Regular Army officers of that day

which were represented by the attitude of the Douglas Democrats and "Old

Line Whigs."

He believed, above all things, in law and system, and wanted all the

affairs of this world to go ahead in strict accordance with them. The

soldier epithet of "Old Brains" was bestowed upon him, and he seemed to

relish the appellation.

In the long and specific letter of instructions accompanying his

assignment to command, Gen. McClellan directed him to carefully

scrutinize all commissions and appointments, and revoke those not

proceeding from the President or Secretary of War; to stop all pay and

allowances to them, and if the appointees gave any trouble, send them

out of the Department, and if they returned, place them in confinement.

He was to examine into the legality of all organizations of troops

serving in the Department, and deal with those unauthorized in a similar

summary way. All contracts were to be rigidly probed, and payment

suspended on those of which there was the slightest doubt. All officers

who had in any way violated their duty to the Government were to be

arrested and brought to prompt trial.

256

Halleck began at once to justify the high expectations entertained

of him. Order and system followed the erratic administration of his

predecessor. Soldiers were subjected to vigorous discipline, but they

were given the supplies to which they were entitled, and they were made

to feel that they were being employed to some purpose.

The futile and aggravating marches made in pursuit of the elusive

guerrillas and bushwhackers, who were never caught, were replaced by

well-directed movements striking at the heart of the trouble.

Acting under Gen. Price's orders sometimes, but frequently under their

own impulses to commit outrages, inflict blows, and create excitement, a

large part of the State was covered by bands of guerrillas who appeared

as citizens, were well armed, rode good horses, and were annoyingly

successful in sweeping down on the railroad stations, water tanks,

bridges, and settlements of Union people, burning, destroying, and

creating havoc generally.

Gen. Halleck proclaimed martial law, and issued an order that any

man disguised as a peaceful citizen, if caught in the act of burning

bridges, etc., should be immediately shot. The troops proceeded to

execute this order with good hearts. A large number of the offenders

were shot down in the neighborhoods where they had committed their

offenses; others were taken before a military commission and condemned

to the same fate.

Gens. Pope, Prentiss, Schofield and Henderson were given sufficient

forces and ordered to move directly upon the more important bodies of

Secessionists who formed a nucleus and support for these depredators.

They all did so with good effect.

Gen. Prentiss moved against a force about 3,000 strong operating in

Howard, Boone and Calloway Counties, and succeeded in striking them very

heavily at Mount Zion Church, where they were dispersed with a loss of

25 killed, 150 wounded, 30 prisoners, 90 horses, and 105 stands of arms.

257

Gen. Pope operating from Sedalia achieved even better success, capturing

Col. Robinson's command of 1,300 men and about 60 officers, 1,000 horses

and mules, and 73 wagons loaded with powder, lead and supplies and 1,000

stands of arms.

Gen. Prentiss very effectually cleaned out the State north of the

Missouri River, and in conjunction with Gen. Pope's operations south of

it, made it so threatening for Gen. Price, who had advanced to the Osage

River to support the Secessionists there, that he broke up his camp and

rather hurriedly retreated to Springfield.

The year 1861 therefore ended with the Union men again in possession of

nearly four-fifths of the State, with their hands full of prisoners and

supplies captured from the enemy.

The Secessionists of St. Louis had been encouraged by the untoward

course of events in the East. After Bull Run had come the shocking

disaster of Ball's Bluff, and with Gen. Price only a short distance away

on the Osage threatening Jefferson City and north Missouri, they felt

their star in the ascendant, and became unbearably insolent. Gen.

Halleck repressed them with a vigorous hand, yet without causing

the wild clamor of denunciation which characterized Gen. Butler's

Administration of New Orleans.

258

It will be remembered that at that time it was thought quite the thing

for young Secessionist women to show their "spirit" and their devotion

to the South by all manner of open insult to the Yankee soldiers.

Spitting at them, hurling epithets of abuse, and contemptuously

twitching aside their skirts were regarded as quite the correct thing

in the good society of which these young ladies were the ornaments.

This had become so intolerable in New Orleans, that Gen. Butler felt

constrained to issue his famous order directing that women so offending

should be treated as "women of the town plying their vocation." This

was made the pretext of "firing the Southern heart" to an unwarranted

degree, and Jeff Davis issued a proclamation of outlawry against Ben

Butler, with a reward for his head.

Sanguine Secessionists hoped that this "flagrant outrage" by "Beast

Butler" would be sufficient cause for the recognition of the Southern

Confederacy by France and England.

Gen. Halleck met the same difficulty as Butler very shrewdly. The Chief

of Police of St. Louis had some measure of control over the disreputable

women of the city, and made law for them. Under Gen. Hal-leek's order he

instructed these women to vie with and exceed their respectable sisters

in their manifestations of hostility to the Union cause and of devotion

to the South. Where the fair young ladies of the Southern aristocracy

were wearing Secession rosettes as big as a rose, the women of the

demimonde sported them as big as a dahlia or sunflower. Where the

young belle gave a little graceful twitch to her skirts to prevent any

possible contamination by touching a passing Yankee, the other class

flirted theirs' aside in the most immodest way. It took but a few days

of this to make the exuberant young ladies of uncontrollable rebel

proclivities discard their Secession rosettes altogether, and subside

into dignified, self-respecting persons, who took no more notice of a

passing Union soldier than they did of a lamp-post or tree-box.

259

Another of Gen. Halleck's orders did not result so happily. It will be

remembered that Gen. Fremont declared free the slaves of men in arms

against the Government, and that their freedom would be assured them

upon reaching the Union lines.

In the inflamed condition of public sentiment in the Border States on

the negro question this was very impolitic, and the President promptly

overruled the order.

Gen. Halleck went still further in the issuance of the following

order, which created as intense feeling in the North as Gen. Fremont's

"Abolition order" had excited in the Border States:

It has been represented that important information respecting: the

number and condition of our forces is conveyed to the enemy by means of

fugitive slaves who are admitted within our lines. In order to remedy

this evil, it is directed that no such persons be hereafter permitted to

enter the lines of any camp, or of any forces on the march, and that any

now within such lines be immediately excluded therefrom.

It was particularly distasteful to the Radicals in Missouri who had been

represented by Gen. Fremont. During his administration the Union

party in the State had divided into two wings--the Radicals and the

Conservatives, who soon came to hate each other almost if not quite as

badly as they did the Secessionists. The Radicals, or, as their enemies

called them, "the Charcoals," were largely made up, as before stated, of

the young, aggressive, idealistic Germans who had poured into Missouri

after the suppression of the Rebellion of 1848, and who looked upon

slavery as they did on "priest-craft" and "despotism"--all monstrous

relics of barbarism. They had absolutely no patience with the "peculiar

institution," and could not understand how any rational, right-thinking

man could tolerate it or hesitate about sweeping it off the earth at

the first opportunity. Those of them who had gone into the army had only

done so to fight for freedom, and without freedom the object of their

crusade was lost.

260

The German newspapers attacked Halleck with the greatest bitterness,

meetings were held to denounce him and secure his removal, and strong

efforts were made to obtain Sigel's promotion to a Major-General and his

assignment to the command.

Gen. Halleck, in a letter to F. P. Blair, explained and justified this

order, as follows:

Order No. 3 was, in my mind, clearly a military necessity. Unauthorized

persons, black or white, free or slave, must be kept out of our camps,

unless we are willing to publish to the enemy everything we do or intend

to do. It was a military, and not a political order.

I am ready to carry out any lawful instructions in regard to fugitive

slaves which my superiors may give me, and to enforce any law which

Congress may pass. But I cannot make law, and will not violate it. You

know my private opinion on the policy of confiscating the slave property

of the rebels in arms. If Congress shall pass it, you may be certain

that I shall enforce it.

Among other well-taken measures was the passage of a law by Congress

authorizing the enrollment of citizens of Missouri into regiments to

be armed, equipped and paid by the United States, but officered by the

Governor of Missouri, and employed only in the defense of the State.

This had many advantages besides giving the services to the Government

of about 13,000 very good soldiers. It brought into the ranks many

wavering young men who did not want to fight against the Union, nor did

they want to fight against the South. To enlist for the "defense of the

State" satisfied all their scruples.

261

The time had come when every young man in the State had to be lined up

somewhere. He could not remain neutral; if he was not for the Union he

would inevitably be brought into the Secession ranks.

The law authorized the necessary staff and commanding officers for

this force, and prescribed that it should be under the command of a

Brigadier-General of the United States selected by the Governor of

Missouri.

Our old acquaintance, John M. Schofield, Gen. Lyon's Chief of Staff at

the battle of Wilson's Creek, who had since done good work in command of

a regiment of Missouri artillery, was commissioned a Brigadier-General

to date from Nov. 21, 1861, and put in command of the Missouri Enrolled

Militia, beginning thus a career of endless trouble, but of quite

extended usefulness.

It will be remembered that Brig.-Gen. U. S. Grant, recently promoted

from the Colonelcy of the 21st Ill., had been relieved from his command

at Jefferson City, and sent to that of a new district consisting of

southeast Missouri and southern Illinois. He had made his headquarters

temporarily at Cape Girardeau, to attend to M. Jeff Thompson, who was

determined to lead the way for Gens. Leonidas Polk and Gideon Pillow

into St. Louis by the Mississippi River route. Grant, as we have seen,

organized his movements so well that Thompson was driven back from

Fredericktown and Ironton with some loss, and returned to his old

stamping-ground at New Madrid, below Columbus, Ky., where Polk had

established his headquarters and the fighting center of the Confederacy

in the West.

262

Polk was reputed to have at that time some 80,000 men under his command,

and Grant, following his usual practice of getting into proximity to his

enemy, transferred his headquarters to Cairo, where, also in accordance

with his invariable habit, he begun to furnish active employment for

those under him in ways unpleasant for his adversary. An enemy in the

territory assigned to Gen. Grant was never allowed much opportunity to

loll in careless indolence. This idiosyncrasy of Gen. Grant made him

rather peculiar among the Union Generals at that stage of the war.

Two days after Grant arrived at Cairo he learned that Gen. Polk was

moving to take Paducah, at the mouth of the Tennessee River, 45 miles

above Cairo. This was a most important point, as a lodgment there would

have stopped navigation on the Ohio, and absolutely controlled that

on the Cumberland and Tennessee. Grant at once decided that he would

anticipate him and telegraphed for permission to St. Louis, but his

telegram and another one still more urgent received no attention, and

he proceeded to act on his own volition, loading his men on the steamers

and starting for Paducah in the night, arriving there in the morning,

thereby anticipating the rebel advance some six or eight hours. This was

characteristic of Grant's other operations around Cairo, and it was not

long until he had that point not only free from apprehension as to what

Polk might do against it with his mighty army, but he had Polk becoming

anxious as to what Grant might do against him at Columbus, which he had

proclaimed as the "Gibraltar of the West."

263

Everywhere in his district Grant had introduced the best discipline

into the force of 20,000 men which he had collected. He had looked

out carefully for their wants, and had them well supplied, and he was

gaining their confidence as well as his own by well directed movements

which always led to considerable results.

Fremont, who had at last started out in his grand movement against

Price, was fearful that Price's army might be strongly reinforced by

Polk from Columbus, and it was made Grant's duty to prevent this.

Grant with his habitual boldness had been desirous of moving directly

against Columbus, but the reputed strength of the works and the force

there made the suggestion carry shivers to the minds of his superiors,

where the memories of Bull Run and Ball's Bluff were so painfully

recent. But if Grant was not allowed to do one thing, he would always

do another. He heard of a force under M. J. Thompson, numbering about

3,000, on the St. Francois River, about 50 miles to the southwest of

Cairo, and promptly started Col. Richard J. Oglesby with about 3,000 men

to beat up Jeff Thompson and destroy him.

Later he ordered Col. W. H. L. Wallace to take the remainder of the

11th Ill., and some other troops to move after Oglesby, to give him help

should he need it.

Soon after, believing that Jeff Thompson had gotten out of Col.

Oglesby's reach, he sent another order to Oglesby to move directly upon

New Madrid and take the place. This was a bold performance, for the

capture of New Madrid would have placed him on the Mississippi below

Columbus and cut off Polk's principal line of supplies.

264

Urgent dispatches continued to come from Fremont to prevent any

reinforcement of Price from Columbus, and Grant started in to impress

Gen. Polk with the idea that he would have quite enough to attend to at

home. He sent orders to Gen. C. F. Smith, commanding at Paducah, to send

a column out to threaten Columbus from that side, and to Col. Marsh to

advance from Mayfield, Ky., and Grant himself, gathering up about 3,000

men from the troops he had around Cairo, embarking them on steamers, and

under the convoy of two gunboats (the Lexington and Tyler), steamed down

the river directly for Columbus, 20 miles away.

Nov. 6 the flotilla dropped down the river to within six miles and in

full view of Columbus, and landed a few men on the Kentucky side. This

was to still further confuse the mind of Gen. Polk, and make him believe

that he must expect an attack on the land side in co-operation with the

forces advancing from Paducah and from Mayfield directly in front of

Cairo.

Gen. Grant says that when he started out he had no intention of making

a fight, and of course did not contemplate any such thing as a direct

attack with the force he had upon the immensely superior numbers at

Columbus, but he saw his men were eager to do something, and that

they would be greatly discontented if they returned without a fight.

Therefore, on learning that the enemy was crossing troops to the little

hamlet of Belmont, opposite Columbus, presumably with the intention

of cutting off and crushing Oglesby, he resolved to strike a blow, and

determined to break up the small camp at Belmont, which would give the

enemy something else to think about.

265

About an hour after daybreak he began landing his men on the west side

of the Mississippi River, while the gunboats moved down a little further

and waked up the enemy by throwing shells into the works at Columbus.

Grant handled his men with the skill he always displayed on the field of

battle, pushing forward the main body through the corn fields and

woods, but leaving a regiment in a secure position in a dry slough as

a resource for an emergency. They with the gunboats were to protect the

transports.

Gen. Polk probably saw all this, but interpreted it as a mere feint

to get him to send troops across the river and thus strip his

fortifications so as to make easier the work of the columns advancing

from Paducah and Mayfield. He therefore held his men with him and did

not interfere with Grant's movements.

Grant pushed on through the cornfields and woods for a mile or more,

and then rearranged his lines and pushed forward a heavy line of

skirmishers. By this time the enemy in camp at Belmont had learned of

the movement, and started out to meet it. The two lines of skirmishers

soon came in contact, and there was a spiteful, bickering fire opened

between them. Both sides were expert woodsmen and riflemen, and thoroly

at home at this kind of work. The Union line pressed the Confederates

slowly back for four hours, receiving and inflicting considerable

losses. Grant's horse was shot under him, but he got another, and kept

his place in the advance, directing and encouraging the men, whom he

says acted like veterans and behaved as well as any troops in the world

could have done.

266

He pushed the enemy so closely that when the latter reached the abatis

they broke into confusion and rushed over the river bank for shelter,

yielding possession of their camp to the victorious Unionists.

This triumph completely intoxicated the victors. They broke ranks, threw

down their guns, began rummaging through the camps for trophies, running

up and down and cheering wildly. Their officers were no better than

they. Many of them had been political "spellbinders" in civil life and

very naturally proceeded to "improve the occasion" by getting on

stumps and delivering enthusiastic Union speeches and addresses of

congratulation over the gallantry of their men and the wonderful victory

achieved. In vain did Gen. Grant try to recall them to a sense of

soldierly duty and discipline. He alone appeared to comprehend the

object of the expedition, and what was necessary to be next done. He

could not rally enough men to go down the river bank and capture

the garrison which was sheltered there. A number of the men who were

attracted by the captured cannon began firing them with great jubilation

down the river at steamboats which they saw there, and Grant tried to

have them, since they would fire guns, turn them upon the steamers which

were coming across from Columbus loaded with troops. Polk had at last

waked up to what was being done across the river, and began a fire upon

Belmont from his siege guns, while he hurried troops aboard steamers to

recover the lost position.

267

The shells began to startle the exultant soldiers, and Grant took

advantage of this to employ them in setting fire to the tents and other

camp equipage. Presently the sky of victory was overcast by the sudden

announcement that the rebels were in line of battle between them and the

transports, and that they were cut off and surrounded. The exultation of

victory was followed by almost a panic, but Grant steadied them with

the quiet assurance "We have cut our way in here, and we can cut it out

again." This was taken up by the officers as they reformed their men for

the battle.

Again the skirmish line was pushed forward in search of the enemy, but

he offered only a moderate resistance, and the troops made their way

back to the transports with little difficulty, though the excitement was

tremendous.

The commanders of the gunboats had kept alert, and came promptly forward

to engage the guns on the Columbus bluffs and later to discourage the

pursuing rebels with liberal volleys of grape and canister, which, as

the bend of the river gave them an enfilade on the river line, were

delivered with great effect and considerable slaughter.

The troops were gotten again on board the transports without any

particular trouble, though about 25 wounded were left in the hands of

the enemy. The Union troops had brought off about 175 prisoners and two

guns, besides spiking four other cannon.

While the wounded were being gathered up and brought aboard, Gen. Grant

rode out some distance to reconnoiter, and almost rode into a body of

the enemy. He turned and made his way back to the transports, which

were just starting; the Captain recognized him, and held his boat for

a moment while Gen. Grant's horse slipped down the steep bank and then

trotted on board over the single gangway. The expedition returned to

Cairo immediately.

268

Gen. Grant officially reported his losses as 485 in killed, wounded

and missing. Gen. Polk officially reported his losses as killed, 105;

wounded, 419; missing, 117; total, 641. He estimated the Union losses

at 1,500; "fourteen-fifteenths of that number must have been killed,

wounded or drowned." He also said that he had a stand of colors,

something over 1,000 stand of arms, with knapsacks, ammunition, and

other military stores.

Medical Director J. H. Brinton gives the following list of losses by

regiments:

Command. Killed. Wounded

27th Ill. Vol.......................... 11 47

80th Ill. Vol......................... 9 27

31st Ill. Vol.......................... 10 70

22d Ill. Vol........................... 23 74

7th Iowa Vol........................... 26 93

Cavalry and Artillery................. 1 11

Total.................................. 80 322

While Gen. Grant and the officers and men under him regarded the

affair as a great victory, and deservedly plumed themselves upon their

achievements that day, there was a decidedly different opinion taken

in the North, and the matter has been the subject of more or less sharp

criticism ever since. It was pronounced by the McClellan-Halleck school

of military men as a useless waste of men in gaining no object, and

probably the most charitable of Gen. Grant's critics could find no

better excuse for him than that he was like the man in the Bible who had

bought two yoke of oxen and wanted to go and try them. All this did not

disturb the equanimity of Gen. Grant and his men in the least. He

knew he had accomplished what he had set out to do, to give Gen. Polk

something else to occupy his mind than capturing Oglesby or reinforcing

Thompson and Price.

269

Col. Oglesby made his way unmolested back to Cairo. Polk was probably

beginning to think that he would have quite enough to do to stay in

Columbus, and his dreams as to St. Louis were dissipated.

Gen. Grant's men knew that they had met their enemies on equal terms in

the open field, and had driven them, whether they were in their front or

rear, and so they were content.

The Confederates of course proclaimed a great victory, and made the

most of it. Albert Sidney Johnston enthusiastically congratulated Polk,

Jefferson Davis did the same, and the Confederate Congress passed

a resolution of thanks to Maj.-Gen. Polk and Brig.-Gens. Pillow and

Cheatham and the officers and soldiers under their commands.

The battle was the occasion of still further increasing the bitterness

between Polk and his insubordinate subordinate, Gideon J. Pillow, who

resigned his commission, and sent to the Confederate War Department a

long and bitter complaint against Gen. Polk, a large part of which was

taken up with charges against his superior for non-support when he,

Pillow, was engaged in a terrible struggle on the west side of the

river with a force "three times my own." Pillow asserted that he had

repeatedly driven back the Unionists at the point of the bayonet, after

his ammunition had been exhausted, and no more was furnished him by Gen.

Polk. He said that Polk had thus needlessly sacrificed many brave men,

and that a like, if not greater, calamity was possible if he were to

continue in command. "His retention is the source of great peril to

the country." Pillow said: "As a zealous patriot, I admire him; as

an eminent minister of the Gospel, I respect him; but as a Commanding

General I cannot agree with him."

270

Southeastern Missouri had, therefore, a season of rest for some time.

271

CHAPTER XVI. HUNTER, LANE, MISSOURI AND KANSAS.

Maj.-Gen. David Hunter felt that fortune was not smiling on him

according to his deserts. He had graduated from West Point in 1822,

and had been in the Army 39 years, or longer than any but few of the

officers then in active employment. He was a thorough soldier, devoted

to his profession, highly capable, inflexibly upright, strongly

loyal, an old-time friend of President Lincoln, and enjoyed his full

confidence. He had done a very painful piece of necessary work for the

Administration in investigating the conditions in Gen. John C. Fremont's

command, faithfully reporting them, and in relieving that officer,

thereby incurring the enmity of all his partisans. Then he had handed

the command over to Maj.-Gen. H. W. Hal-leck, who had graduated 17 years

later than he, and who had been seven years out of the Army.

Gen. Hunter had been assigned to Kansas, which was created a Department

for him, but it had few troops, and was remote from the scene of

important operations. He was particularly hurt that Brig.-Gen. Don

Carlos Buell, 19 years his junior, should be assigned to the command

of a splendid army of 100,000 men in Kentucky; and Brig.-Gen. Thos. W.

Sherman, 14 years his junior, should be selected to lead an important

expedition to the coast of South Carolina and Georgia.

272

Like the faithful soldier he was, however, he made little plaint of his

own grievances, but addressed himself earnestly to the work to which he

was assigned. He soon had other troubles enough to make him forget his

own. His hardest work was to keep the Kansans off the Missourians. In

the strained and wavering conditions of public opinion, every effort had

to be made to prevent any pretext or incentive to take the young men

of Missouri into the ranks of Price's army. Gen. Halleck estimated that

indignation at the border raids of Lane, Jennison and Montgomery had

given Price fully 20,000 men. The years of strife along the borders

had arrayed the people in both States against one another. Every Kansan

considered every Missourian the enemy of himself and the State, and the

feeling was reciprocated by the Missourians.

For years Kansas had been inflicted with raids by the "Poor White

Trash," "Border Ruffians," and "Bald Knobbers," who had, beside

committing other outrages, carried off into Missouri horses, cattle,

furniture, farm implements, and other portable property.

The Kansans held all Missourians responsible for these crimes by

the worser element, and the war seemed a chance to get even. When

opportunity offered, Kansas parties invaded Missouri, bringing back with

them everything which they could load on wagons or drive along the road.

273

The great mass of the Missourians still held aloof from both sides,

remaining as neutral as they would be allowed. Douglas Democrats,

Bell-and-Everett Old-Line Whigs, two-thirds of the entire population,

were yet halting between their attachment for the Union and their

political and social affiliations. It was all-important that they should

be kept loyal, or at least out of the Confederate camps, hence the

stringency of Halleck's orders against any spoliations or depredations

by Union troops, and hence his orders that the negroes should be kept

out of the camps, and their ownership settled by the civil courts. Every

offense by Union soldiers was made the most of by Price's recruiting

agents to bring into their ranks the young men for the "defense of the

State."

At the head of the vengeful Kansas element was the meteoric James H.

Lane, who had for years ridden the whirlwind in the agitation following

the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Bill, and the rush of settlers into

those Territories. Volumes have been written about "Jim Lane," but the

last definitive word as to his character is yet to be uttered. Arch

demagogue he certainly was, but demagogues have their great uses in

periods of storm and stress. We usually term "demagogues" those men

active against us, while those who are rousing the people on our

own side are "patriotic leaders." No man had more enemies nor more

enthusiastic friends than "Jim Lane."

As with all real leaders of men, the source of his power was a mystery.

Tall, thin, bent, with red hair, a rugged countenance and rasping voice,

he had little oratorical attractiveness, and what he said never read

convincingly in print. No man, however, ever excelled him before an

audience, and he swayed men as the winds do the sea.

274

Lane was born in Lawrenceburg, Ind., in 1814, and was therefore 47 years

of age. His father was Amos Lane, a lawyer of great ability, a member of

Congress, and conspicuous in Indiana. James H. Lane went into politics

at an early age, and entered the Mexican War as Colonel of the 3d Ind.,

distinguishing himself at Buena Vista, where he was wounded. Upon the

expiration of the term of service of his regiment he raised the

5th Ind., and became its Colonel. This gave him quite a prestige in

politics, and he was elected Lieutenant-Governor, and Representative

in Congress. The atmosphere of Indiana was, however, too quiet for his

turbulent spirit. He broke with his party, joined in the rush to Kansas,

and speedily became the leader of the out-and-out Free State men. On the

strength of his Mexican War reputation these elected him Major-General

of their troops, in the troubles they were having with the Pro-Slavery

men and the United State troops sent to assist in making the Territory a

Slave State. When the Free State men gained control of the Territory,

he was made Major-General of the Territorial troops. His principal

lieutenants were James Montgomery and Dr. Charles R. Jenni-son, brave,

daring men, colleagues of "Old Osawatomie Brown," entertaining the same

opinions as he with regard to slavery, and with even fewer scruples than

he as to other forms of property.

275

When the United States troops were assisting the Pro-Slavery men,

Montgomery and Jennison went into active rebellion at the head of some

hundreds of bold, fighting men--"Jayhawkers"--who carried terror into

the ranks of their adversaries. They insisted that they were acting

according to the light of their own consciences and the laws of God.

So terrible did they become that, Nov. 26, 1860, Geo. M. Beebe,

Acting Governor of the Territory, reported to President Buchanan

that Montgomery and Jennison, at the head of between 300 and 500

"well-disciplined and desperate Jayhawkers," equipped with "arms of the

latest and most deadly character," had hung two citizens of Linn

County, and frightened 500 citizens of that County into flight from the

Territory. One of their number having been captured, was about to be

brought to trial before the United States District Court at Fort Scott,

and what they alleged was a packed jury. They had proceeded to so

frighten the court that the Judge and Marshals incontinently fled to

Missouri, leaving a notice on the door that there would be no session

of the court. Therefore Gov. Beebe humanely recommended to the President

that Montgomery and Jennison be immediately killed, as there would be no

peace in the Territory until they were.

In spite of Lane's constant prominence, there was always a faction in

Kansas as bitterly his enemies as his friends were enthusiastic for

him, and it was ever a question which of the two were the stronger. It

demanded his utmost activity and cunning to keep himself on top. Upon

the admission of the State, Lane succeeded in having himself elected

Senator, but the legality of the proceeding was questioned and this

called for more activity to keep himself at the front.

276

When the Union army retreated after the battle of Wilson's Creek, Aug.

10, there went back with it the 1st and 2d Kan.--all the organized

troops the State had in the field. This left the border exposed to the

vengeance of Price's on-sweeping hordes, who made loud threats of what

they proposed to do. Lane sounded the trumpet. Wilson's Creek with Bull

Run had awakened the people to the stern realities of the contest, and

there speedily gathered into camp the men who formed the 3d, 4th, 5th,

6th and 7th Kan., Montgomery becoming Colonel of the 3d Kan.; Jennison

of the 7th (Jennison's Jayhawkers). Lane took command of the troops

assembled at Fort Scott, moved out aggressively on Price's flank, gave

Rains, who was in command there, a sharp skirmish at Dry Wood, and his

manuvers were so menacing that Price called Rains back when within five

miles of the Kansas line, relinquishing his cherished idea of "scourging

the Abolitionist nest," and pushed on to Lexington. Lane then made

a dash into Missouri in Price's rear, fought a lively skirmish at

Papinsville, and followed up the retreating Confederates, capturing

Osceola, as has been previously stated.

After Gen. Hunter assumed command Lane reappeared with a commission

as Brigadier-General of Volunteers, of which he had beguiled President

Lincoln, and began playing a game which gave intense annoyance to the

bluff, straightforward old soldier. To Hunter he represented that he was

there merely as a Senator and a member of the Senate Military Committee,

which latter he was not. To the President and War Department he

represented that he and Hunter were in brotherly sympathy and

confidence, and planning a movement of mighty importance. The "sympathy"

and "confidence" part were believed so completely, that the War

Department did not take the trouble to communicate with Hunter in regard

to the details of the proposed movement.

277

To his friends and to the press he talked magniloquently about a grand

"Southern expedition" to be made up of 8,000 or 10,000 Kansas troops,

4,000 Indians, seven regiments of cavalry, three batteries of artillery,

and four regiments of infantry from Minnesota and Wisconsin, which he

would command. It would move from Kansas down into Texas, and there

meet an expedition coming up from the Gulf of Mexico. The War Department

seems to have been impressed with the feasibility of this, and began

ordering troops, officers and supplies to Fort Leavenworth to report to

"Brig.-Gen. James H. Lane."

Lane's enemies as well as his friends in Kansas heartily approved of

this, as it would take him away from Kansas, and the Kansas Legislature

united in a request to have him appointed a Major-General, as that would

vacate his seat in the Senate.

General-in-Chief McClellan "invited" Gen. Hunter's attention to the

proposed expedition, and suggested that he prepare for it and report

what might be necessary. Gen. Hunter replied that he had had no official

information as to the expedition, and gently complained that the War

Department seemed entirely unmindful of the Commander of the Department,

and had consistently ignored him. As to the expedition, he regarded it

as impracticable. It was 440 miles from Leavenworth to the nearest point

in Texas, and the road was over a wild, barren country, which would

require an immense train of supplies for the troops. He had in the

Department only about 3,000 men, entirely too few to successfully defend

Fort Leavenworth and its valuable supplies against a raid such as Price

and McCulloch were continually threatening. He said he knew no such

person as "Brig.-Gen. J. H. Lane," to whom so many came with orders

to report. He also said that Lane himself now saw that he had raised

expectations which he could not fulfill, and that he was seeking to

pick a quarrel with the Department Commander to give him an excuse for

dropping the whole business, and was making himself very annoying in a

thousand ways.

278

Secretary Stanton was profoundly distrustful of Lane, and said that

he would leave the Cabinet rather than put him in independent command.

Finally the matter came to President Lincoln, who wrote the following

characteristic letter:

Executive Mansion, Washington, Feb. 10. Maj.-Gen. Hunter and

Brig.-Gen. Lane, Leavenworth, Kan.:

My wish has been and is to avail the Government of the

services of both Gen. Hunter and Gen. Lane, and, so far as

possible, to personally oblige both. Gen. Hunter is the

senior officer, and must command when they serve together;

tho in so far as he can, consistently with the public

service and his own honor, oblige Gen. Lane, he will also

oblige me. If they cannot come to an amicable understanding,

Gen. Lane must report to Gen. Hunter for duty, according to

the rules, or decline the service.

A. LINCOLN.

Lane, who then thought his seat in the Senate safe, decided that he

would rather serve his country in the forum than in the field, and his

commission was cancelled. Five years later, dismayed to find he had lost

his hold on the people of Kansas by his support of Andrew Johnson, he

ended his strange, eventful history with a pistol-shot from his own

hand.

Gen. Hunter having reported that the division of Kansas from Missouri

was unwise, the Department was merged into Gen. Halleck's command, and

Gen. Hunter assigned to duty in South Carolina.

279

Gen. Halleck's laboriously elaborate system received a little shock so

ludicrous as to be almost incredible were it not solemnly told in an

official communication by himself to Gen. Sterling Price:

St Louis, Jan. 27, 1862. Maj.-Gen. Sterling Price,

Commanding, etc., Springfield, Mo. General: A man calling

himself L. V. Nichols came to my headquarters a day or two

since, with a duplicate of your letter of the 12th instant.

On being questioned, he admitted that he belonged to your

service; that he had come in citizen's dress from

Springfield, avoiding some of our military posts and passing

through others in disguise, and without reporting himself to

the Commander. He said that he had done this by your

direction. On being asked for his flag of truce, he pulled

from his pocket a dirty pocket-handkerchief, with a short

stick tied to one corner.

Gen. Halleck then proceeded to read Gen. Price a lecture on the

etiquette of flags of truce.

A feature of peculiar pathos was the war storms' reaching and rending of

the haven of refuge which the Government had provided for its wards in

the Indian Territory. More than a century of bitter struggling between

the Creeks, Seminoles, Cherokees, Choctaws, and Chickasaws, and the

Carolinians, Georgians, Floridians, Alabamians, and Mississippians,

marked by murderous massacres and bloody retaliations, had culminated

in the Indians being removed in a body from their tribal domains,

and resettled hundreds of miles west of the Mississippi, where it was

confidently hoped they would be out of the way of the advancing wave of

settlement and out of the reach of the land-hungry whites. Their mills,

churches, and school houses were reerected there, and the devoted

missionaries, the Congregationalists, Methodists, Baptists, Moravians

and Jesuits resumed with increased zeal the work of converting them to

Christianity and civilization, which had been so far prosecuted with

gratifying success.

280

In their new home they had prospered wonderfully. Their numbers

increased until they were estimated from 100,000 to 120,000. Many of

them lived in comfortable houses, wore white men's clothes, and tilled

fields on which were raised in the aggregate great quantities of wheat,

corn, cotton and potatoes. They had herds of horses, cattle, sheep and

swine large beyond any precedent among the whites. It was common for

an Indian to number his horses and cattle by the thousands, while the

poorest of them owned scores which foraged in the plenty of limitless

rich prairies and bottom land. Churches, school houses and mills

abounded, and they had even a printing press, from which they issued a

paper and many religious and educational works in an alphabet invented

by a full-blood Cherokee. Each tribe constituted an individual Nation

under a written Constitution, with a full set of elective officers.

Slavery had been introduced by the half-breeds, and the census of

1860 shows the following number of slaves and slave-owners in the five

Nations:

Owners. Slaves.

Choctaws..........................385 2,297

Cherokees.........................384 2,604

Creeks............................287 1,661

Chickasaws........................118 917

Semlnoles..................... ....-- ------.

One Choctaw owned 227 negroes.

Into the Territory the Government also gathered other tribes and

remnants of tribes, Quapaws, Kiowas, Senecas, Comanches, etc., mostly

in the "blanket" stage of savagery.

281

The dominant sentiment in the civilized tribes was strongly averse to

the war and in favor of peace. The memories and traditions as to the

meaning of war were too fresh and grievous. The object lessons as to the

advantage of peace were everywhere striking and overwhelming. They hoped

to maintain a complete neutrality in the struggle, and pleaded to be

allowed to do so. June 17, 1861, John Ross, Principal Chief of the

Cherokees, wrote a long official letter to Gen. Ben. McCulloch, in which

he said that his people had done nothing to bring about the war, were

friends to both sides, and only desired to live in peace.

As in the rest of the South, the Confederates were not listening to any

talk of neutrality, and they proceeded as energetically to stifle it as

they had the Union and peace advocates in the several Southern States.

All the Indian Agents and officials were ardent Secessionists, and

at the head of them was Superintendent Albert Pike, originally a

Massachusetts Yankee, and the son of a poor shoemaker. He had gone South

as one of the numerous "Yankee schoolmasters" who invaded that section

in search of a livelihood, had become a States Rights Democrat, and,

as usual with proselytes, was the most zealous of believers. He was a

lawyer of some ability, a successful politician, an active worker in

Masonry, and made much pretense as a poet. Nothing that he ever wrote

survives today.

[Illustration: 281-General Albert Pike]

Each of the Indian Agents began enlisting men into the Confederate

service and using them to impose Secession ideas upon their

fellow-tribesmen who were either indifferent or actually hostile.

282

The missionaries, being mostly from the North, were strongly for the

Union, and their influence had to be encountered and broken down.

The Indian Agents were commissioned Colonels in the Confederate service,

and were expected to raise regiments, with the Chiefs as subordinate

officers. The leader among the Agents was Douglas H. Cooper, Agent for

the Choctaws, a man of courage, decision and enterprise, who raised a

regiment mainly of the half-breeds of the Choctaws and Chickasaws.

The Cherokee regiment was almost wholly half-breeds, with Stand Waitie,

a half-breed, courageous, implacable, merciless, as its Colonel. Albert

Pike was rewarded for his great service in bringing the Indians into

line with a commission of Brigadier-General, C. S. A., and placed in

command of the whole force.

Principal Chief John Ross temporarily bowed to superior force and gave

his adhesion to the Southern Confederacy. A large portion of his people

would not do this. They, with a similar element in the other Nations,

gathered around the venerable Chief Hopoeithleyohola, nearly 100 years

old, and whose span of life began before the Revolutionary War. He had

been a dreaded young war leader against Gen. Jackson in the sanguinary

scenes at Fort Mimms, Tallapoosa, and Red Sticks in 1813-14. When he was

a boy his people were allied with the Spaniards in Florida to resist the

British encroachments upon their tribal empire in Georgia. When he was

a War Chief, the British at Pensacola and Mobile had put muskets and

ammunition into his hands for his men to resist the North Carolinians,

Georgians, Tennesseeans and Kentuckians. In every decade he had fought

and treated with the grandfathers and fathers of the same men who were

trying to coerce him.

283

Every battle and every treaty had ended in a further spoliation of the

"hunting grounds" of his people. He was now to end his career as

he began, and consistently pursued it, in stern resistance to his

hereditary enemies. He calculated that he could put into the field about

1,500 reliable, well-armed warriors, who would be more than a match for

the Indians who had entered into the Confederate service. If the white

Confederates came to their assistance, he could make an orderly retreat

into Kansas, where he hoped to receive help from Union troops, if they

should not have advanced before then.

Col. Douglas H. Cooper was sent against him, and at first tried

diplomacy, but the wily old Hopoeithleyohola had seen the results of

too many conferences, and refused to be drawn into one. Cooper then

assembled a force of 1,400 men, consisting of some companies of white

Texas cavalry and the Chickasaw, Creek, and Seminole regiments, under

their War Chiefs, D. N. Mcintosh and John Jumper, and moved out to

attack Hopoeithleyohola, who beat them back with considerable loss.

The advance of Gen. Fremont called for the concentration of every

available man to oppose him, so Hopoeithleyohola was given a few weeks'

respite. As soon, however, as the Union army retreated to Rolla and

Sedalia, Col. Cooper resumed his operations against Hopoeithleyohola,

who at Chusto-Talasah, Dec. 9, inflicted such a severe defeat upon him

that Cooper retreated in a crippled condition to Fort Gibson. There Col.

James Mcintosh, commanding the Confederate forces at Van Buren, Ark.,

went to his assistance with some 1,600 mounted Texans and Arkansans, and

the combined force closed in upon the Union Indians at Shoal Greek.

284

Hopoeithleyohola and his Lieutenant, Haleck-Tustenugge, handled their

men with the greatest skill and courage in an obstinate battle, but

after four hours of resistance the overpowered Union Indians were

driven, pursued by Stand Waitie's murderous half-breeds, who took no

men and but few women and children prisoners. Back over the wide,

shelterless prairie, bitten by the cruel cold and pelted by the storms

of an unusually severe Midwinter, Hopoeithleyohola led his defeated

band to a refuge in far-away Kansas. The weather was so severe that Col.

Cooper reports some his men as frozen to death as they rode along, but

the scent of blood was in the half-breed Stand Waitie's nostrils, and he

pressed onward remorselessly.

More than 1,000 men, women and children of Hopoeithleyohola's band

left their homes to whiten and mark the dismal trail, and the aged Chief

himself died shortly after reaching Fort Scott, where he was buried with

all the honors of war.

Upon the fertile Indian Territory descended the war storm which

blighted the work of the missionaries, and completely ruined the

fairest prospects in our history for civilizing and Christianizing

the aborigines. When the storm ended, one-quarter of the people had

perished, the fences, houses, mills, schoolhouses and churches were all

burnt, and the hundreds of thousands of horses, cattle, sheep and hogs

had disappeared so completely that the Government was compelled to

furnish the Indians with animals to stock their farms anew.

285

Sterling Price had reached his zenith in the capture of Lexington, Sept

20, 1861. In substantial results it was the biggest achievement of the

war that far. Bull Run had been, indeed, a much larger battle, but at

Lexington Price had captured 3,000 prisoners, including five Colonels

and 120 other commissioned officers; 1,000 horses and mules; 100 wagons;

seven pieces of artillery; 3,000 stands of arms; $900,000 in money, and

a very large quantity of Commissary and Quartermaster's supplies.

Though he was to fight nearly four years longer with the greatest

enterprise and determination, though he was to command vastly stronger

forces, and though he was to be followed by myriads of Missourians with

unfaltering courage and enthusiasm, he was never to approach a parallel

to this shining achievement.

It was felt that Lexington was only the earnest of incomparably greater

things he was going to do in delivering Missouri from the hated Yankees,

and making hers the brightest star in the Southern Confederacy, paling

with her military glory even historic Virginia. Then McCulloch would

come up with his Texans, Louisianians and Arkansans, and Albert

Pike with his horde of Indians. There would be such an overthrow and

annihilation of their enemies as the world had never before seen,

followed by a race to get to St. Louis before Polk, Pillow and M. Jeff

Thompson could reach her from down the Mississippi.

Sterling Price was eager to fight Fremont among the rough, high lands

south of Springfield, and his ardent followers wanted a repetition

of the triumph of Lexington; but McCulloch would not come up from his

fastness at Cross Hollows. Without him Sterling Price, his strength

depleted by defections on his long retreat, did not feel warranted in

offering battle, even with the advantage of the defensive hills.

286

McCulloch was importuned to come forward without success. The best

comfort he could give Sterling Price was to destroy that part of

Missouri and make it worthless to the enemy. McCulloch wanted to advance

into Kansas, however, and utterly destroy that Territory, to strike

terror to the Abolitionists. It speaks very badly for their intelligence

system that both Price and McCulloch maintained, that neither of them

was aware for days that the Union army had left Springfield, Nov. 8, on

its retreat to Rolla and Sedalia. Although their camps were only some 70

miles from Springfield, they did not learn of the retreat until Nov. 16,

when McCulloch, seized at last with a sudden desire to enter Missouri,

rushed all his mounted men forward in hopes to capture trains and

detachments. They were disgusted to find upon arriving at Springfield

that the last Union soldier and wagon had left there more than a week

previous.

After some destruction of property, McCulloch sullenly returned to

his old position in Arkansas, where, leaving his command to Col. James

Mcintosh, lately Captain in the United States Army, he departed for

Richmond to give the Confederate War Department his version of the

occurrences in his territory.

Sterling Price had learned the same day, Nov. 16, of the departure of

the Union army, and set his columns in motion northward, announcing that

he was going to winter on the Missouri River. Again he sent an appeal to

McCulloch to cooperate, but Col. Mcintosh declined, on the ground that

the troops were not properly clad for the rigorous weather so far north,

and, besides, he did not think that the expedition would do any good.

287

Sterling Price simply let loose his army on the country evacuated by the

Union troops, and a reign of indescribable misery ensued for the Union

people and those who were vainly trying to keep the neutral middle of

the road. The army was spread out as much as possible in order to gather

in recruits and supplies and assert its influence most widely.

From Marshall, in Saline Co., Sterling Price issued a most remarkable

proclamation to the people, calling for 50,000 volunteers. He reminded

them that their harvests had been reaped, their preparation for Winter

had been made, and now they had leisure to do something to relieve

the people from the "inflictions of a foe marked with all the

characteristics of barbarian warfare." He admitted that the great

mass of the people were not in the war, and especially the

substantial portion of the population, for, he said, "boys and small

property-holders have in the main fought the battles." He begged,

he implored that the herdsman should leave his folds, the lawyer his

office, and come into camp to win the victory. He even dropped into

poetry in his tearful earnestness, quoting the school boy's declamation

from Marco Bozarris:

Strike, till the last armed foe expires; Strike, for your

altars and your fires! Strike for the green graves of your

sires, God, and your native land!

An infinitely harmful part of the proclamation was the following:

Leave your property at home. What if it be taken--all taken?

We have $200,000,000 worth of Northern means in Missouri

which cannot be removed. When we are once free the State

will indemnify every citizen who may have lost a dollar by

adhesion to the cause of his country. We shall have our

property, or its value, with interest.

288

This was naturally interpreted as meaning that all those not distinctly

favorable to Secession forfeited their property to those who were.

This seemed ample warrant to the Poor White Trash banditti for seizure

of the property of any man whose principles might not be of exactly the

right shade.

Experience teaches us that that class of people are pretty certain to

find heterodox the opinions of any man who has something they may want.

It certainly made a very dark outlook for anybody in Missouri to hold

moveable property.

The turbid thrasonics of the proclamation shows that it was not written

by Price's Adjutant-General, Thomas L. Snead, who was a literary man. He

was then absent at Richmond looking after the fences of his General. The

proclamation sounds the more as if it came from the pen of our poetical

acquaintance, M. Jeff Thompson, the "Swamp Fox" of the Mississippi. It

concluded in this perfervid style:

But, in the name of God and the attributes of manhood, let me appeal to

you by considerations infinitely higher than money! Are we a generation

of driveling, sniveling, degraded slaves? Or are we men who dare assert

and maintain the rights which cannot be surrendered, and defend those

principles of everlasting rectitude, pure and high and sacred, like God,

their author? Be yours the office to choose between the glory of a free

country and a just Government, and the bondage of your children! I will

never see the chains fastened upon my country. I will ask for six and

one-half feet of Missouri soil in which to repose, but will not live to

see my people enslaved.

Do I hear your shouts? Is that your war-cry which echoes through the

land? Are you coming? Fifty thousand men! Missouri shall move to victory

with the tread of a giant! Come on, my brave boys, 50,000 heroic,

gallant, unconquerable Southern men! We await your coming.

289

Sterling Price established his headquarters again at Osceola, on the

banks of the Osage, but sent forward Gens. Rains and Steen to Lexington,

the best point on the Missouri to hold the river and afford a passage

for recruits coming in from the northern part of the State.

The results of the proclamation were not commensurate with the desperate

urgency of the appeal. Large parties of recruits, it is true, tried to

make their way toward Price's camp, but many of them were intercepted,

and dispersed; strong blows were delivered against Price's outlying

detachments, driving them in from all sides. Meanwhile those he had in

camp were melting away faster than hew ones were coming in.

Sterling Price had other troubles. He was not a favorite in Richmond.

Jefferson Davis was a man never doubtful as to the correctness of his

own ideas, and he was most certain of those relating to military men

and affairs. He had had extraordinary opportunities for familiarizing

himself with all the fighting men, and possible fighting men, in the

country. He graduated from West Point in 1828, 23d in a class of 33;

none of whom, besides himself, became prominent. He had served seven

years as a Lieutenant in the Regular Army on frontier duty, and as

Colonel of a regiment in the Mexican War, where he achieved flattering

distinction. He had been four years Chairman of the Senate Committee on

Military Affairs, and four years Secretary of War. It must be admitted

that his judgment with regard to officers was very often correct; yet

he was a man of strong likes and dislikes. His reputation was that of

"having the most quarrels and the fewest fights of any man in the Army."

290

Undoubtedly his partialities drew several men into the Confederate army

who would otherwise have remained loyal, and his antipathies retained

some men in the Union army who would otherwise have gone South. His

reasons for disliking Price are obscure, further than that Price was a

civilian, who had had no Regular Army training or experience, and that

he believed Price to be in conspiracy to set up a Trans-Mississippi

Confederacy. But little evidence of such intention is to be found

anywhere, yet that little was sufficient for a man of Davis's jealous,

suspicious nature. Repeatedly, at the mere mention of Price's name, he

flew into an undignified passion and denounced him unsparingly.

Price's men were carrying havoc as far as they could reach. Nov. 19 they

burned the important little town of Warsaw, the County seat of Benton

County and a Union stronghold. In 1860 the people of Benton County had

cast but 74 votes for Lincoln and but 100 for Breckinridge, while they

gave Bell and Everett 306 votes and Douglas 574. Dec 16 Platte City,

County seat of Piatt County, was nearly destroyed by them. This was

another Union community, and a large majority of the people were

Bell-and-Everett Unionists or Douglas Democrats. Dec. 20 a concerted

foray of guerrillas and bushwhackers burnt the bridges and otherwise

crippled nearly 100 miles of Northern Railroad. But Halleck's splendid

systematizing had begun to tell.

291