GEORGE W. SHEPHERD.
The name of George W. Shepherd, which attained prominence during
the old Guerrilla times, when he was one of Quantrell's most
trusted lieutenants, had passed out of the public mind, in a
measure, until the events following the Glendale train robbery once
more brought it prominently before the country.
At the time of the affair at Glendale, Shepherd was following a
peaceful avocation in Kansas City. It was known to the marshal
of that place, and other officers of the law, that the relations
subsisting between the James Boys and Shepherd had been rather
unfriendly for several years, and overtures were made looking to
his engaging in the pursuit of the outlaws. Shepherd's reputation
for desperate courage was not inferior to that of any other man in
the days when he led a band of Quantrell's men, and when Marshal
Liggett, of Kansas City, had obtained his consent to engage in
the desperate undertaking, everyone expected some sensational
denouement. A history of the Jameses, after the events which
occurred since Glendale, would be incomplete without some notice
of George W. Shepherd, the man who is credited with engaging in
a terrible conflict with Jesse W. James and his followers, near
Joplin, Missouri, resulting in the alleged death of the outlaw, and
in Shepherd's receiving a severe wound in the left leg.
George W. Shepherd is a son of the late James Shepherd, a
respectable farmer of Jackson county, Missouri. He was born near
Independence, January 17th, 1842, on a farm now belonging to the
Staten heirs. There were two brothers older than George, namely,
John and James M., and one brother his junior, whose name was
William. J. M. Shepherd is now a respectable farmer in Jackson
county. During his boyhood, George resided with his parents on
the farm, and when of sufficient age he attended the neighborhood
school for a few months every summer and winter until he was able
"to read, write and cipher," as he expressed it. In early youth
he manifested an adventurous and somewhat wayward disposition.
In 1857 he left home and proceeded to Utah, where he joined
the army, at that time operating against the Mormons under the
command of General Albert Sydney Johnston. The Shepherd family,
which originally came from Virginia, were a race of pioneers, and
the disposition of the subject of this notice to seek exciting
adventure on the borderland of civilization was legitimately
inherited.
After a varied experience, and absence of two years, George
returned to Missouri in the autumn of 1859, and resumed farming
operations with his brothers. He continued in this employment on a
farm about one mile and a half distant from Independence, until
the commencement of warlike preparations in 1861. Seized by the
prevailing military fever, and his surroundings being all Southern,
George W. Shepherd was among the first to cast his lot with the
Confederate recruits. He enlisted in company A, Captain Duncan's,
of Rosser's regiment. This command participated in the great
battles fought at Wilson's Creek and Pea Ridge, and engaged in many
other skirmishes in Missouri and Arkansas, in all of which he took
a part. When the Confederate army, under the command of General
Sterling Price, was ordered to the east of the Mississippi, young
Shepherd returned to Jackson county, and soon afterward joined
Quantrell's command of Guerrillas.
The war record of Shepherd would fill a volume if written out in
full. For this we have not the space. We can only summarize the
chief events in this part of his career. We first hear of George
Shepherd in a desperate charge made by Quantrell's men on the
garrison at Independence, in February, 1862. On that occasion he
and a comrade, William Gregg, swept down one of the streets of
Independence, causing the greatest consternation, and inflicting no
little damage on the soldiers of Col. Burris' command. From that
day forward Shepherd took rank among the most daring of Quantrell's
men.
When Quantrell's small command of twenty men was surrounded at
night by a large Federal force, while asleep in the Tate house,
near Santa Fe, Jackson county, Missouri, in March 1862, Shepherd
was with the Guerrillas there, and was selected to guard one of the
doors of the house. The conflict which ensued was terrible. After
some minutes' fighting, and when the house had been fired, the
Federals desired a parley with a view of inducing the Guerrillas
to surrender. Shepherd commanded the men who defended the lower
rooms of the house. He asked for twenty minutes time. It could not
be granted. For ten minutes. No. For five minutes then. No, if
the Guerrillas did not yield within one minute, not a man of them
should escape, was the ultimatum of the Federal officer. "Then
count sixty," exclaimed Shepherd, "and take the consequences." The
fight was renewed. That house had become a pandemonium. In it were
such men as Cole Younger, Stephen Shores, John Jarrette, James
Little, Hoy, Haller, and others. The Federal commander permitted
Major Tate and his family to leave the house. Then the fighting
was resumed more fiercely than before. The building was on fire.
It was manifest that the Guerrillas would be forced to evacuate
their fortress. It was resolved to break through the Federal line.
Quantrell led the desperate charge, followed by George Shepherd,
Jarrette, Younger, Toler, Little, Hoy and others. Seventeen men
made the attempt, and succeeded in making their escape. Three had
surrendered before the attempt was made.
Once, in the spring of 1862, George Shepherd, Cole Younger and
Oliver Shepherd were surrounded at the house of John Shepherd,
in Jackson county. Their peril was imminent. The Federal force
numbered ten to their one. Cole Younger was about to lead a
desperate sortie, when Martin Shepherd, Scott, Little and John
Coger came up and attacked the Federals in the rear. The diversion
enabled the Shepherds and Younger to escape from the house.
Soon after the incident noted above, George Shepherd and Cole
Younger were detailed to go into Jackson county for the purpose of
collecting ammunition. They had collected a large amount of the
materials of war which were most needed in Quantrell's command. One
day they went to find a wagon to convey the ammunition to camp.
They were at a house behind which was an orchard, and this had been
sown in rye which was now tall and luxuriant. While at this house
seventy-five Federal troopers surrounded the place, and demanded
their surrender. They refused, and made a rush to the rye-grown
orchard ground, where they had hitched their horses. Beyond the
orchard was a skirt of timber, now clothed in luxuriant green.
They gained the orchard in safety, although followed by a storm of
bullets. Mounting, they made a dash for the forest. But they were
not destined to reach it unscathed. Three buckshot had penetrated
the body of Cole Younger, and George Shepherd was hit hard and
badly wounded. He, however, continued his flight until he reached
a shelter where he could receive surgical attention.
It was about harvest time, 1862, that Major Peabody undertook to
capture Quantrell's band by a vigorous movement with superior
forces. The two joined issue at Swearingen's place, a few miles
from Pleasant Hill, Cass county. A series of desperate encounters
followed. The Guerrillas were forced to seek shelter in the woods.
In the fights which ensued, George Shepherd lost his horse.
The Guerrillas suffered fearfully, both in the neighborhood of
Swearingen's barn, and later in a depression near Fred. Farmer's
house. A number of Quantrell's followers were seriously wounded.
George Shepherd had great difficulty in escaping from this
sanguinary engagement. He was again wounded, though not severely.
Col. Upton Hayes, Col. Gideon Thompson and Col. John T. Hughes,
co-operating, resolved upon attacking Independence, then garrisoned
by a Federal force of about five hundred men, under command of Col.
J. T. Buell, now of St. Louis. The Confederate forces numbered
about seven hundred. Quantrell was requested to aid the enterprise,
and joined his forces with the regular Confederate troops in an
attack on Independence. George Shepherd was there, and fought with
desperate valor. After the battle was over, when Quantrell was
asked to name the men of his command who had most distinguished
themselves for daring courage, George Shepherd was designated as
one among half a dozen others.
In the early days of the autumn of 1862, George Todd, commanding
about fifty men, prepared an ambuscade, with rifle pits, on the
road leading from Kansas City to Harrisonville. The place was
admirably selected, and the utmost caution and vigilance was
observed in guarding it, but it came near being a slaughter-pen
for the Guerrillas. One evening he succeeded in destroying a wagon
train, and scattering the escort which accompanied it. But sometime
afterward, Gregg, Scott, Haller and Shepherd, with a number of
followers, re-occupied the rifle pits. George Shepherd was sent out
on the road toward Harrisonville, south of the ambuscade. It was,
perhaps, past ten o'clock at night. The rifle pits were still, and
the droning hum of insects was the only sound to break the silence.
Shepherd was motionless at his post down the road. Suddenly he was
made conscious of the presence of an enemy, by a tall form which
rose up at his right stirrup--a form which had apparently come
from the shadows around him. But it was no apparition conjured up
by a disordered brain. The leveling of a gun barrel at his breast,
and the sharp utterance of the single word, "Surrender!" convinced
George Shepherd that the form was very real. A glance satisfied
him that crouching forms were all about him, and all were armed.
He threw himself forward, shot the dismounted trooper in the
breast as he whirled his horse around, and received a scattering
volley as he dashed away to arouse his comrades in the rifle
pits. The Federal forces were under command of Major Hubbard, a
gallant officer of the Sixth Missouri Cavalry. He had received full
information about Todd's rifle pits, had dismounted his command,
and but for Shepherd's extraordinary nerve and presence of mind,
he would have made a complete surprise of the Guerrilla garrison.
As it was, a terrible conflict ensued, and a number of Federals
were killed and eight of the Guerrillas were wounded, among them
Shepherd, who received a slight flesh wound.
[Illustration: Geo. W. Shepherd.]
In August, 1863, Quantrell began to rally around his standard all
the small, detached bands in Western Missouri for his expedition
against Lawrence, Kansas. At this time Shepherd was one of his
confidential advisers. In that grim council of war, summoned by
the Guerrilla chieftain to consider the feasibility of engaging in
such an enterprise, George Shepherd sat among the stern, relentless
warriors of the border.
When Fletcher Taylor returned from Lawrence, whither he had gone
to obtain information concerning the military situation there,
and made his report at Quantrell's headquarters to the assembled
leaders, the Chief spoke:
"You have heard the report. Before you decide, you should know it
all. The march to Lawrence is a long one; in every little village
there are soldiers. We leave soldiers behind us; we march between
garrisons of soldiers; we attack a town guarded by soldiers; we
must retreat through swarms of armed men; and when we would rest
after such an exhaustive march, we must do so with soldiers all
about us, and do the best we can. Come, speak out, somebody! What
is it, Shepherd?"
Thus appealed to, the answer came deliberately and firmly from
George Shepherd:
"Lawrence! I know the place of old. They make no difference there
between negroes and white people. It is a Boston colony, and it
should be cleared out."
And the others gave similar replies, and so the expedition, which
was destined to be fraught with consequences so baleful, was
resolved upon. George Shepherd went with the rest of the command,
and in the terrors and tragedies of that dreadful day, he had his
share.
The winter of 1863-4, Shepherd spent in Quantrell's camp, in the
vicinity of Sherman, Texas, leading a comparatively inactive life;
but the following summer he was engaged in innumerable skirmishes.
At Pink Hill, in Johnson county, at Pleasant Hill, at Keytesville,
and many other places the fighting was severe. Then came the
mustering to aid General Price. In that summer campaign the
Guerrillas took a conspicuous part. Toward the middle of September,
Bill Anderson was carrying destruction to many neighborhoods in
North Missouri. Todd and Anderson combined, had a force of a little
more than two hundred men. In this troop rode George Shepherd. He
was present at Centralia. The particulars of that dreadful day's
work are given in another place in this volume, and need not now
be recited. It may be accepted as a fact that George Shepherd
performed his part in that carnival of Death.
Price and Shelby were compelled to retire from Missouri. In a
desperate encounter with the Federal advance, in pursuit of the
retiring Confederate army, Todd, who was protecting the rear, was
killed. George Shepherd succeeded him in the command, and after
lingering awhile in Missouri, he led the remainder of the once
formidable band of Guerrillas, save about twenty men, who went with
Quantrell into Kentucky--to Texas. The forces under Shepherd had
fighting all the way. The Indians beset their pathway and struck at
them viciously as they marched. Among those who went to Texas with
this force was Jesse James. In the following spring the Guerrillas,
or at least a part of them, returned. The cause of the Confederacy
had suffered. Lee surrendered. Johnston followed. The catastrophe
came; the Confederacy was no more. Then the Guerrillas of Missouri
were permitted to go in and surrender, and all save eight men of
the band which Shepherd had led back from Texas surrendered. His
career as a Guerrilla had ended, and Shepherd went to Kentucky soon
after the close of the war.