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Northwest Missouri Civil War Experience

Sat, 24 May 2008 08:46:52 GMT

Missouri's past during the Civil War was very divided and the state was 3rd in having the most battles during the war. Museum Hill Bed and Breakfast has created an awesome website dedicated to the history of the Civil War in the Pony Express Region of the state: Northwest Missouri Civil War Excursions. The site has plenty of places to visit. Use this site as a self guided Civil War Itinerary while lodging at Museum Hill Bed and Breakfast in St Joseph Missouri. While sitting on the porch of this property enjoying a glass of wine or a shot of good brandy, you will be able to enjoy the breathtaking view Civil War Union soldiers used for lookouts to watch for gunboats along the Missouri River during the War. The hill and property line Museum Hill Bed and Breakfast is on was at one time a strategic vantage point for observation of the river and the entire central part of the city of St Joseph. Attached is a drawing from 1861 before the war began of the vantage point area. The drawing was drawn from a corner one block behind Museum Hill Bed and Breakfast's property line. The position is angled down, putting the actual property line to the upper right hand corner of the drawing. Also attached is a picture of a genuine Civil War cannon in Patee House Museum. The Patee House was headquarters in St Joseph to Union soldiers during the Civil War. While there were no Civil War battles fought in St Joseph, the city was heavily divided and many "skirmishes" developed including the famous "flag incident" involving the St Joseph postmaster during that time. The rest of this story can be told at the
The Pony Express Museum also in St. Joseph. There is a room in this museum that has a full wall painting illustrating this particular incident and it is well worth seeing. Museum Hill Bed and Breakfast is a proud business partner of the Missouri Civil War Heritage Foundation.

Article by John Courter (CTA-Certified Tourism Ambassador)

Missouri's Gallant 62nd

Sun, 21 Jan 2007 02:59:16 GMT

*By STANFORD L. DAVIS* During the Civil War, 186,000 ex-slaves and black freedmen joined the Union Army. Thirty-seven thousand of them would not see the beginning of the new society. Amongst these men of war was a regiment of veteran black Missouri troops who took part in what is widely recognized as the final battle of the war. In November of 1863 the State of Missouri created its first African-American regiment, the First Missouri Infantry Regiment, Colored. Enrolled and trained at Benton Barracks in St. Louis, the unit was re-designated the 62nd Regiment United States Colored Troops. The 62nd was to play a major role in the "The Battle of Palmetto Ranch", on May 12-13, 1865. This battle, fought near Brownsville, Texas, is considered the final ground battle of the Civil War. Another name for the battle is "Palmetto Hill"; other spellings: Palmitto, Palmito. The story of the Battle of Palmetto Ranch follows: One month after Robert E. Lee surrendered his Confederate Army in Virginia, a gentleman's agreement was struck to forgo fighting between Union and Confederate forces on the Rio Grande. Despite the agreement, Col. Barrett, commanding forces at Brazos Santiago, Texas, dispatched 250 men of the 62nd Regiment U.S. Colored Infantry and 50 men of the 2nd Texas Cavalry Regiment (dismounted) to attack Rebel outposts and camps. Lt. Col. David Branson was in command. Col. Barrettï¿½s excuse for the attack was to procure horses and supplies for his men. Other sources speculated his goal as a young officer was to achieve a measure of glory before hostilities ended. Col. Branson's force surrounded a suspected outpost at White's Ranch, but found it empty. Mexican nationals on the far bank of the Rio Grande discovered his forces and spread the alarm to the Confederates. Col. Branson immediately attacked George Roberson's Confederate camp at Palmetto Ranch, forcing Roberson to retreat. His company counterattacked, forcing Branson to order a retreat to White's Ranch. Col. Barrett arrived on the 13th with 250 men of the 34th Indiana Volunteer Infantry. He took command and fought to a point a few miles past Palmetto Ranch. Confederate Col. John S. "Rip" Ford, in command of Confederate forces, arrived with Anderson's Battalion of cavalry, six 12 pound cannons, and 300 men from numerous other units including Giddingï¿½s Regiment. The die had been cast. Cannon fire ripped the Union lines, and Confederate soldiers were close to breaking through. At one point, Col. Barrett, realizing he was out-flanked, ordered two detachments of the 34th Indiana Volunteer Infantry to cover his flanks. As the battle raged, Col. Barrett and his men were compelled to make a final retreat. The 62nd was ordered to hold its positions at all costs and cover the retreat. In the confusion of battle the two detachments on his flank were not informed of the retreat and were captured. Though out-gunned and out-manned, the 62nd stood firm against the barrage of cannon fire, the onslaught of infantrymen and the repeated cavalry attacks. After three hours of fighting, orders came to disengage. At 8 p.m. the 62nd arrived at Boca Chica. On May 14 at 4 a.m. they embarked for Brazos Santiago. The performance of the 62nd drew praise from Col. Barrett, who said, "Every attempt of the enemy's cavalry to break this line was repulsed with loss to him, and the entire regiment fell back with precision and in perfect order, under circumstances that would have tested the discipline of the best troops." At Palmetto Ranch, when Missouriï¿½s 62nd covered Barrett's retreat it fired the last volley of the Civil War. Pvt. John J. Williams of the 34th Indiana is most often considered the last man to die in battle. He died on the field. Weeks later, however, Missouri resident private Bill Redman of the 62nd died of wounds received at Palmetto Ranch. Missouriï¿½s Bill Redman therefore may lay claim to the distinction of being the last battle casualty of the Civil War to die as an immediate result of his wounds. As men of courage and conviction, the men of the 62nd showed they were willing to die for their country, their honor and for their belief in the future of their race. ï¿½ 2002 Stanford L. Davis, All Rights Reserved Stanford L. Davis is the author and Webmaster of www.buffalosoldier.net. His grandfather, Sgt. Anderson Davis of the 62nd (above), and great-grandfather served in the Civil War. Later, his great-grandfather served in the Indian Wars as a Buffalo Soldier. He holds a B.A. in sociology, an M.A. in learning disabilities and four teaching credentials from California State University in Los Angeles.

The Long Ride

Tue, 12 Dec 2006 14:37:04 GMT

In June, 1865, JO Shelby's Missouri Calvary Division was the last Confederate military unit remaining in service in the former Confederacy. It never surrendered to federal authorities. Instead, it embarked on one of history's remarkable odysseys. After the disaster at Westport, Missouri in October, 1864, Shelby's men began their trek south, wintering near Dallas, Texas. They operated in northern Texas through the Spring of 1865, and then were joined by a number of Confederate notables who had gone west instead of surrendering. The Missourians gathered in camp at Chatfield, north of Corsicana, Texas, where Shelby announced he would to go to Mexico. A number of his troopers, estimated at between 150 and 400, chose to follow. The first remarkable event on the Missourians' road south occurred in Austin; They arrived just as a mob had entered the Texas State House and looted the last sizable treasure of the Confederate government. The Missourians attacked and routed the mob. The question of "ownership" of $300,000 in gold and silver was then decided by Shelby, who exhorted his men: "We are the last of our race. Let us be the best as well." The treasure was left in the hands of the State of Texas, to become the foundation of Texas' post-war economy. Once in Mexico, Shelby intended to offer the services of his Division to the Juarista rebels seeking the overthrow of the French-backed regime of the Emperor Maximilian. His men, nevertheless, voted to back Maximilian. The adventure culminated when Shelby met the Emperor in the National Palace in Mexico City. The Missourians' offer was not accepted - perhaps out of fear of worsening an already delicate relationship with the United States - but many of the Missourians settled in Mexico on land granted by Maximilian's government. Most, Shelby included, returned to Missouri within a few years. A 1969 John Wayne film, "The Undefeated," is loosely - very loosely - based upon Shelby's long ride into Mexico.

Where was Phil?

Wed, 11 Oct 2006 20:12:42 GMT

The Camp Jackson incident, which occurred in St. Louis on May 10, 1861, was the first significant event to occur in the Civil War after Fort Sumter. It was the first time units of opposing infantry confronted each other. An incredible congregation of the famous and soon-to-be-famous witnessed the events of May 10. Most remarkably, this included 3 of the 4 men who would command the armies of the United States in the post-War period. In 1860-61 John M. Schofield, commanding general of the Army from 1888-1895, was an instructor of physics at Washington University in St. Louis, on leave from the Army, and re-entered the service as chief of staff to federal commander Nathaniel Lyon. He was at Camp Jackson in this role. William Tecumseh Sherman (Commanding General, 1869-1883) had recently accepted an appointment as president of a street railway company, and moved to St. Louis. He and his son Willie were among the spectators at Camp Jackson, and had to "hit the dirt" when the bullets began to fly. In May, 1861, Ulysses S. Grant (Commanding 1864-1869) was on a recruiting mission at Belleville, Illinois, and crossed the river to St. Louis where he visited the U.S. Arsenal and watched as the federal troops marched from there to Camp Jackson. During these 30 years, the other commanding general was Philip Henry Sheridan (1883-1888). On May 10, 1861, Sheridan was a lieutenant in the regular army, posted in Oregon. It was not until December, 1861, that Sheridan was transferred East. His first post in the war zone - St. Louis.

Kentucky Cousins

Tue, 12 Dec 2006 14:34:37 GMT

Francis Preston Blair, Jr., Joseph Orville Shelby and Benjamin Gratz Brown are a part of one of the most remarkable families in the annals of Civil War history. All from Lexington, Kentucky, Blair and Brown descended from the Gist family of Maryland and Kentucky, as had Shelby, distantly, on his mother's side. Shelby's mother Anna was the second wife of Kentucky pioneer Benjamin Gratz; Frank Blair's aunt had been Gratz' first wife, and Benj. Gratz Brown was named for the elder Gratz - a close friend of his father's. The three were close in their youths, and Blair and Brown were frequent visitors to the Gratz home where Shelby was raised through his teens. Another frequent visitor was Shelby's best friend, John Hunt Morgan. Frank Blair's brother, Montgomery Blair, was to become Lincoln's Postmaster General. Frank, along with "JO" Shelby and Gratz Brown, all sought their fortunes in Missouri. The biography of each of these remarkable men - whose political views covered the whole spectrum of mid-Nineteenth Century America - can be found on this site, but a summary is in order: Frank Blair: U.S. Congressman; Major General, USA; Vice Presidential Candidate (Horatio Seymour Ticket, 1868); United States Senator. Gratz Brown: Brig. General, USA; Governor of Missouri; United States Senator; Vice Presidential Candidate (Horace Greeley ticket, 1872). JO Shelby: Brig. General, CSA; United States Marshall; Most famous Missourian of the post-war era; Most prolific cavalry commander in American military history.

Total War Comes to Missouri

Wed, 11 Oct 2006 20:11:51 GMT

The legend, and the true life story, of the American "Robin Hood", Jesse James, were forged in an era when Missouri's Civil War had become the most brutal form of warfare visited on the continent. The James boys, Frank and Jesse, and Cole Younger and his brothers, carried their form of war on well past Appomattox. Roots of the James legend extend back to the days of “Bloody Kansas,” which helped produce perhaps the most famous figure identified with Missouri’s Civil War, William Clarke Quantrill. The evolution of Quantrill’s Partisan Rangers – more often referred to as “Bushwackers” – was a result also of atrocities practiced by Union troops and militia in the early years of the war. Many of the famous Confederate irregulars, the Jameses and the Youngers and William “Bloody Bill” Anderson included, could trace their motives to violence against family members. The first general atrocity to occur in Missouri after the start of war was a Union one, when in 1862 more that 30 Confederate soldiers captured during Porter’s Raid were executed in Northeast Missouri. On August 13, 1863, a building collapsed in Kansas City. It had been used as a jail housing female family members, wives and sweethearts of Western Missouri irregulars, in an effort by the federal commander in Kansas City, Brig. Gen. Thomas Ewing, to flush the irregulars out of hiding. Four young women died in the collapse, including the teenage sister of “Bloody Bill” Anderson. Four days later, from the vicinity of Warrensburg, Quantrill launched his infamous raid on Lawrence, Kansas, arguably the war’s worst atrocity. Frank James and Cole Younger (whose cousin died at Kansas City) rode with Quantrill. It is said that the Kansas City jail collapse precipitated, or at least set the tone for, the Lawrence Raid. It most certainly contributed to Anderson’s character. The Union’s retribution for Lawrence: Ewing issued his Order No. 11, which depopulated several counties in the Kansas City vicinity and which has been termed the “harshest military measure directed against civilians . . . in American history" before WWII. In a twist of historic fate, the building that was the Kansas City jail was owned by the wife of George Caleb Bingham, a Unionist and then Missouri treasurer. Dissatisfied with Union response to his claims for compensation, Missouri’s most famous artist produced the most famous painting of the Civil War era. Bingham’s Order No. 11 is on display at the State Historical Society of Missouri in Columbia. In 1864, Quantrill was usurped as leader of the Partisan Rangers in Western Missouri and replaced by the more violent Anderson. Anderson cooperated with Price’s Expedition by mounting a series of eastward diversionary raids. The first of these raids started at Rocheport and wound its way north and then east to Centralia, where Anderson, with 300 troops (including 17-year-old Jesse James) arrived on September 27, 1864. Coincidentally, this was the same day the Battle of Pilot Knob closed. There resulted, in Centralia and in a field several miles south of town, a massacre of surrendering federals that ranks among the Civil War’s most gruesome events. Several companies of the 39th Missouri Volunteers, mustered into service in Hannibal the previous month, were destroyed. Anderson raided eastward a second time in October 1864, traveling as far as High Hill in Montgomery County. During his third raid, on October 27, 1864, Anderson was killed near Richmond, Missouri.

Confederate Cavalry West of the River

Mon, 22 Jan 2007 14:01:23 GMT

The organized armies of the Trans-Mississippi South suffered two major defeats in the spring of 1862: at Pea Ridge, Arkansas, just south of the Missouri line, on March 6-7, 1862, and at Island No. 10, below New Madrid, Missouri, on April 8, 1862. Confederate infantry rarely ventured into Missouri in force after this time. Union troops remaining in the state were, in pro-Southern sectors, engaged as an army of occupation, and the area of Little Dixie was essentially “cut off” from the Confederacy. These circumstances created the atmosphere for some of the great Confederate cavalry operations of the war. 1862 saw Confederates mounting a series of incursions into Missouri for the purpose of recruiting troops for Confederate service. The most famous of these incursions was Porter’s Raid, which ranged over most of the counties of Northeast Missouri and ended with an engagement at Kirksville on August 6, 1862. There were three great raids in 1863, one each targeting Springfield, Cape Girardeau and the Missouri River valley in Little Dixie. The principal Confederate actors in these operations were Brig. General Joseph Orville (“JO”) Shelby, commander of the South’s “Iron Brigade” and Missouri’s greatest cavalry leader, and Maj. General John Sappington Marmaduke, a post-war governor of Missouri and the last Confederate promoted to the rank of major general. By 1864, Missouri Confederate troops that remained in the Trans-Mississippi had retreated to the southern reaches of Arkansas. Whether the aim was to capture Missouri or to draw federal troops from other beleaguered areas of the South, pre-war Missouri governor Maj. General Sterling Price, with Shelby and Marmaduke, mounted a cavalry operation with 13,000 Missouri and Arkansas troops that was to carry them throughout Missouri south of the Missouri River. Price’s expedition produced classic battles at Pilot Knob on September 26-27, 1864, and at Westport (Kansas City) on October 26-27, 1864. The Battle of Westport, known as “the Gettysburg of the West,” was the largest battle (measured by numbers of troops engaged) fought west of the Mississippi. Westport was a Union victory; Price was spared a total disaster when Shelby’s Iron Brigade made a last stand on the site of present-day Forest Hill Cemetery, where Shelby was buried long after the war. Price retreated from Westport along the Missouri-Kansas border, fighting a series of rear-guard actions including Kansas’ only battle, at Mine Creek, and one at Newtonia, Missouri. By the time Price reached Arkansas, his forces had been virtually annihilated. From beginning to end, Price and his Missouri and Arkansas regiments had traveled over 1,500 miles. Price’s Expedition was, and is, the longest and largest cavalry raid in American military history.

St. Louis Cemeteries

Wed, 11 Oct 2006 20:10:47 GMT

It doesn't get better than this. In North St. Louis, near by Interstate 70, two adjacent cemeteries hold the "mother load" of Civil War burials. Bellefontaine and Calvary Cemeteries (4947 and 5239 West Florissant Avenue, respectively) together comprise about a square mile. There is no place, on earth, where more Union and Confederate generals lie at rest in such close proximity. More generals who commanded armies in the Civil War lie here than are buried at Arlington or West Point. Sherman, Price, A.P. Stewart, Pope, Buell. The short list of other Civil War figures whose graves are here: At Bellefontaine: John McNeil, USA (the Butcher of Palmyra) Almira Hancock (You saw the movie) Francis Brownell, USA (Ellsworth's avenger) Given Campbell, CSA (Davis' bodyguard) James B. Eads (invented the ironclad) Francis Lee, CSA (invented the spar torpedo for the CSS Hunley) Henry O'Brien, USA (M of H, flag bearer, 1st Minn., Gettysburg) Frank Blair, Jr., USA A. S. Smith, USA Albert Gallatin Edwards, USA At Calvary: Dred Scott Seth Cobb, CSA Henry Guibor, CSA John Wesley Turner, USA Willie Sherman, drummer boy Want to see more? Travel to the south of St. Louis, to Jefferson Barracks National Cemetery. Site of the largest army hospital in the West, thousands of graves of union casualties of the war to control the Mississippi are a sober reminder of the cost of victory.

European Revolutions Produce Missouri Combatants

Wed, 11 Oct 2006 20:10:25 GMT

In 1848-1849, revolutions rocked the European continent. A peaceful effort, initially, by left-leaning intellectuals to democratize the Austro-Hungarian Empire, brutal repressive reaction lead first to war, and then to emigration by the losers. It has been estimated that in the area now comprising the German Republic, alone, as many as One Million people emigrated as a result of the revolutions. Many of the "'48'ers", as they were known, came to Missouri. In fact, as a result of this migration in 1861 St. Louis had the largest proportionate population of persons of foreign birth of any city in North America. '48'ers and other European expatriates played an important role in the American Civil War and particularly in Missouri’s Civil War. German-Americans, organized around St. Louis Turnvereins, composed the largest body of troops participating in the Camp Jackson affair in St. Louis, May 10, 1861. Among the units at Camp Jackson was the 3rd Missouri Volunteer Regiment commanded by (then Colonel) Maj. General Franz Sigel. The most famous of the '48'ers, Freiderich Hecker, was at Camp Jackson in the uniform of a private of the 3rd Missouri. At one time, Hecker was one of the most famous men in the western world. Look for his biography on our website. The 3rd Missouri, organized at Belleville, Illinois, and other German-American units from St. Louis, fought with Sigel at the Battles of Carthage and Wilson’s Creek. The nearly all-German 3rd regiment is memorialized today by a Civil War re-enactment group in Stuttgart, Germany. Polish expatriate Captain Constantin Blandowski, a veteran of the European revolutions, immigrated to the United States and was a fencing instructor in New York, Philadelphia and St. Louis. At Camp Jackson, Blandowski received a wound to the knee and died from complications of his wound two weeks later. He thus became the first officer of either army killed in the American Civil War. “Fremont’s Body Guard,” a cavalry unit organized in St. Louis in 1861, was commanded by Hungarian revolutionary Major Karoly (Charles) Zágonyi. On October 25, 1861, 300 troopers successfully attacked a force of Confederates estimated at 1,000 at the western edge of Springfield, Missouri, in an action known as “Zágonyi’s Charge” or “Zágonyi’s Death Ride.” This was arguably the first great cavalry charge of the Civil War, and Fremont himself is said to have compared it to the "Charge of the Light Brigade."

African-Americans' War for Freedom - From First to Last

Tue, 12 Dec 2006 14:49:59 GMT

Ironically, it was a losing case, and the persistence of Dred and Harriett Scott of St. Louis who brought the case in 1847, which contributed more than any other single event to the coming of war and the abolition of slavery. The Scotts? suit, which was brought first in the Circuit Court in St. Louis, pursued the theory that they became free when they lived in a Free territory with the Army officer to whom they were bound. This was one of many such cases brought by Missouri slaves on this theory in the years before the Civil War, and most of them were successful. A true “ test case ” from the beginning, forces for and against slavery were determined to take the Scott case to the highest authority, and when Chief Justice Roger B. Taney issued an Opinion in 1857 the forces for abolition received an undesired benefit: An opinion, adverse to the Scotts, which elevated partisanship above logic as perhaps no court decision ever has, before or since. The controversy moved from a battle of words to a battle of arms. Once hostilities began, Missouri was home, literally, to the first and the last African-American military experiences of the Civil War. The first African-American fighting unit organized during the war was not a Massachusetts regiment. It was the First Kansas Colored Infantry Regiment, formed at Fort Scott, Kansas, and mustered into federal service in January 1863. Many of the enlisted men of the 1st Kansas were former Missouri slaves. In October 1862, before official enrollment in the federal service, the 1st Kansas ventured into rural Bates County, Missouri, and on a hill called Island Mound engaged a force of Confederates. The 1st Kansas left from their number seven dead and 10 wounded. This was history?s first battle engagement of an African-American unit in the uniform of the United States. At the other end of the spectrum, the First Missouri Infantry Regiment (Colored), organized in St. Louis in December, 1863 and later designated the 62nd Regiment, U. S. Colored Troops, was one of two Union regiments that fought the last battle of the Civil War, at Palmetto Ranch, Texas, on May 15, 1865. In 1866, veterans of the 62nd established the Lincoln Institute in Jefferson City, now Lincoln University.

Civil War in St. Joe

Sun, 28 Jan 2007 16:57:13 GMT

Saint Joseph, Missouri, was the most northern southern city in the United States at the outset of the War of the Rebellion. As neighborhoods and families were torn apart by sympathies to opposing sides, fierce tension brought the establishment of martial law to the city which lasted until the end of the war. Today more than 300 Union and Confederate veterans lie in close proximity on Mount Mora Cemeteryï¿½s shady hillsides. No fences, no divisions separate the graves. Walking tours related to various periods in St. Josephï¿½s history are available upon request. The Civil War Walking Tour acquaints the visitor with William Faunstock Ridenbaugh, first newspaper editor and southern sympathizer, M. Jeff Thompson who came to be known as the Swamp Fox, Captain John C. Landis, General James Craig, the Ashton family slave, Sallie Alice Travis who is buried in the Ashton family plot, William Halley and Thomas Jefferson Brown who both rode with Quantrill, Governor Willard Prebble Hall, Missouriï¿½s governor under unusual circumstances, and many others.

Article by Suzanne Lehr, who is a Research Associate with the St. Joseph's Musuem in St. Joseph.

1861 - Missouri is the Seat of War

Sat, 21 Dec 2002 06:00:00 GMT

Not surprisingly, most battles or engagements of the war’s first year occurred in the border states of West Virginia, Kentucky and Missouri. In fact, except for several actions in the northern portion of Virginia, all of the principal battles of 1861 occurred in these three states. It should not be surprising – although it is – that because of its geographic position and pre-war demographics, Missouri was the principal scene of conflict in 1861. Forty-five percent (45%) of all land battles or engagements in 1861, and 45% of all Civil War casualties in that year, occurred in Missouri. The Virginia battle known as the First Battle of Bull Run, or First Manassas, which was fought on July 21, 1861, is generally regarded to have been the opening battle of the Civil War. In fact, however, there had been nearly 30 battles or engagements in the war up to that time. Four hundred men had died or were wounded in Missouri alone. The Battle of Carthage, Missouri, was fought on July 5, 1861, and although there was only a fraction of the casualties that occurred two weeks later at Bull Run, Carthage deserves the title of first major land battle of the Civil War. An interesting statistic: Measured by total number of casualties, putting aside Bull Run, the three largest battles of 1861 occurred in Missouri. The combined casualty totals in these three battles compare favorably to the Bull Run totals. In terms of casualties as a percentage of forces engaged, Bull Run does not compare in brutality to Missouri’s “big three.” The combined casualty rates in the Missouri battles of Wilson’s Creek, Lexington and Belmont were nearly twice the Bull Run rate. Missouri’s claim to primacy is further confirmed by analysis of the events of the Civil War that preceded infantry combat. The first incident, Fort Sumter, involved an effort by Southern forces to seize a federal military installation and occurred on April 12, 1861. This was an artillery duel that produced no casualties. The second such effort occurred on April 20, 1861, when Missourians captured the federal arsenal at Liberty. Another effort was under way in St. Louis in early May; The Missouri State Guard was encamped in St. Louis for its annual gathering and purportedly planned to capture the St. Louis Arsenal. Pro-Union troops, mostly German-born, surrounded and “arrested” the militia on May 10, 1861, the Civil War’s first confrontation between armed and organized infantry. A riot ensued that, after a similar but smaller incident in Baltimore, was the first casualty-producing event of the war.