USA > Kansas > A standard history of Kansas and Kansans, Volume II > Part 15
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Before proceeding to call testimony touching the subject matter of investigation, it was deemed best to make a careful examination of the different statutes of the state in relation thereto. They find that an act was passed by the last Legislature and approved May 3d, 1861, authorizing certain persons, to wit : Austin M. Clark and James (. Stone to negotiate the sale of one hundred and fifty thousand dollars of the bonds of the state, and report to the Legislature, within seventy days,
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their acts in the premises. By reference to the journals of the last session, and on page 382, it will be seen that they did report that any attempt at that time to negotiate the sale of Kansas bonds would be utterly useless and unavailing. After receiving the report of said com- missioners, an act was passed by the Legislature, and approved June 7th, 1861, supplementary to the first named act, authorizing the sale of one hundred thousand dollars of the bonds of the state for not less than seventy cents on the dollar. This act gives anthority to the Governor, Secretary of State and Auditor to negotiate the sale of these bonds, a majority of whom ean act. This law provides that the treasurer shall prepare bonds to the amount of one hundred thousand dollars, with coupons attached. bearing interest at the rate of seven per cent. per annum, and to be made payable in fifteen years. The interest to be paid semi-annually.
Another act was passed by said Legislature, which was approved June 7th, 1861, providing for the issuance of twenty thousand dollars of the bonds of the state, bearing ten per cent. interest, and made payable in two years.
These are the only acts that your committee have been able to find, bearing upon the matter of the sale of Kansas state bonds.
With regard to bonds issued by the state during the year 1861, under the acts referred to, your committee would state that the total issue of bonds, of every deseription, amounted to $189.400. Of these, $40,000 were ten per cent. bonds, issued under the act of May 7th, and known as war bonds. Thirty-one thousand dollars of these ten per cent. bonds have been sold by the treasurer to R. S. Stevens, for forty cents on the dollar; the balance are in the treasurer's hands. It appears, on evidence before us, that a large portion of these bonds ($26.000) were sold by Mr. Stevens to the Interior Department at Washington for ninety-five cents on the dollar. Of the seven per cent. bonds, $62,200 were used in taking up state serip, and $87,200 were delivered to R. S. Stevens, for which sixty cents on the dollar was to be accounted for by him to the state. It appears, from evidence before us, that these bonds were sold to the Interior Department at Washington for eighty-five cents on the dollar. The evidence before your committee regarding the sale of the bonds is quite lengthy, and will be placed before your body in printed form.
The conclusions arrived at by your committee are such as to warrant them in the belief that this House will take decisive measures, and deem- ing a fair and full examination of all the evidence proper in the premises, would eommend it to the attention of the House.
Of the $40,000 issued under the act of May 7th, your committee are clearly of the opinion that $20,000 are illegal, and the House should take some action regarding them.
Your committee also are clearly of the opinion that the treasurer had no authority to sell any of the ten per cent. bonds at less than par, and is liable to the state for the face of all ten per cent. bonds sold, and of which $12,400 have been paid into the treasury, leaving a deficiency on bonds sold, to be accounted for, of $18,600.
Of the seven per cent. bonds sold, your committee would call attention to the fact that they are sold by Mr. Stevens, as state agent, he deriving his authority from the state officers authorized by law to sell these bonds. It appears, on evidence, that he was authorized by them to have all he could realize over sixty cents on the dollar. Your committee are of the opinion that the state officers are not authorized by law to make any such agreement, and believe Mr. Stevens liable to the state for all bonds sold by him, for the full amount of which hue negotiated the bonds, viz.,
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eighty-five cents on the dollar. An unlawful act cannot be rendered lawful by any sanction given it by state officers, in the opinion of your committee. We would further state that, from the evidence before us, it appears that the $87,200 of seven per cent. bonds were not negotiated with the Interior Department, until after the semi-annual interest had matured, the bonds having been issued on July 1st, 1861, and negotiated on or about January 1st, 1862. This interest, amounting to $3,052, it appears upon evidence, has been paid to R. S. Stevens, and thus the state has realized on bonds sold but fifty-six and a half eents on the dollar. Your committee are of the opinion that this interest properly belongs to the state.
We would further state that, of the $87,200 of bonds placed in the hands of R. S. Stevens, it appears, upon evidence, that he has accounted to the state for $56,200, at sixty eents on the dollar, by the payment into the treasury of $33,720-the balance of the bonds ($31,000) being negotiated with but not paid for by the Interior Department at Wash- ington. Your committee would recommend that an act be at onee created appointing an agent to go to Washington to take charge of this property, with full power to transact all further business necessary in the matter, on behalf of the state.
Your committee call especial attention to the extracts from letters, and the receipts, copies of contraet, and appointment. accompanying the evidence.
In reference to the state treasurer, the committee ask time to take further testimony, which, in their opinion, is necessary to a proper disposal of the case.
From the evidence which your committee submit with this report, they are of the opinion that there has been a collusion of Charles Rob- inson, George S. Hillyer and John W. Robinson with R. S. Stevens, to defraud the state of Kansas of a large sum of money.
Your committee therefore unanimously report the following resolu- tion, and recommend its adoption, as a measure demanded by publie justice and a proper regard for the rights of the people of Kansas:
Resolved, That Charles Robinson, Governor, John W. Robinson, See- retary of State, and George S. Hillyer, Auditor of the State of Kansas, be and they are hereby impeached of high misdemeanors in office.
MARTIN ANDERSON, Chairman.
II. L. JONES. B. W. HARTLEY. THOMAS CARNEY. SIDNEY CLARKE.
William Tholen, of Leavenworth, had been elected State Treasurer on the tieket with Governor Robinson. Governor Robinson refused to accept the official bond made by Treasurer Tholen, which had the effect of vaeating his office. The Governor then appointed H. R. Dutton, of Brown County, Treasurer, to fill the vacaney. Dutton had signed the report, with S. N. Wood, which practically approved the fraudulent bonds issued on Kansas claims. The removal of Tholen, an honest man, and the appointment of Dutton, were the bad features in the ease against Governor Robinson.
The resolution of the committee was unanimously adopted. Being authorized and directed by the House to appoint a committee to con- duct the impeachment cases in the trial before the Senate, the Speaker named Preston B. Plumb, Azel Spaulding, F. W. Potter, W. R. Wag- Vol. JI-9
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staff and Davies Wilson. On the 20th of February, Plumb reported, on behalf of his committee, which was called the Committee of Man- agers of Impeachment Cases, eight articles of impeachment of John W. Robinson, Secretary of State. On the 26th he reported seven articles of impeachment of George S. Hillyer, Auditor of State. On the same day he reported five articles of impeachment of Charles Rob- inson, Governor of Kansas. These reports were all adopted,-the arti- cles against Governor Robinson by a vote of fifty-three to seven, and those against the others, unanimously. The trial of the impeachment cases began on the second day of June, 1862.
The testimony of George S. Hillyer showed that R. S. Stevens was appointed State Agent to sell Kansas State bonds by the Governor, Sec- retary of State, and himself. The agreement was that he should take the bonds, and, when sold, account to the State for sixty cents on the dollar. The Secretary of State wrote from Washington to D. H. Weir, his clerk, "Keep mum about the bonds. Do not say a word to any per- son alive-not even to your wife-for we want it as secret as it can be until it is fixed." On another occasion he wrote, "I had an interview with Mr. Lincoln night before last . . . we may possibly put in the loan at sixty cents, but it will never hurt the State a dime or will even be heard of . . . keep still."
Treasurer Dutton testified: "Sold $31,000 of war bonds to Mr. Stevens for forty cents on the dollar and took his receipt. . . . I also gave him $27,000 7 per cent bonds and took his receipt for them, to be returned or sold at seventy cents on the dollar. The bonds were not returned. He came back and I was informed by the Auditor and Secretary of State that they had made an arrangement for the sale of the bonds, and I took an additional receipt of $53,400, $5,000 being retained by the Auditor to redeem scrip."
Mr. Morrow testified, "I reside in Lawrence. Am interested in the Lawrence Bank. I am at this time nominally president of the bank, but I disposed of my interest sometime in the fall to R. S. Stevens. The directors of the Lawrence Bank are James Blood, T. B. Eldridge, Mr. Stevens and Gov. Robinson and myself. The directors are prin- cipally the stockholders. . Mr. Dutton has an account at the Lawrence Bank. He gives drafts on our bank which we pay in such funds as he draws for."
Stevens seemed to have managed the whole matter of disposing of the bonds. The result of the trial of the State Officers on the impeach- ment charges were that the Secretary of State and State Auditor were found guilty and removed from office. Governor Robinson was acquit- ted, it having been shown that he was not present in Washington when the bonds were sold and that his name was signed by the Auditor or Secretary, and that he refused to sign such a paper when Stevens requested him to do so.
This was a very unfortunate transaction. Kansas was immedi- ately spoken of in the newspapers as "The rotten Commonwealth." That was unjust. There was no party rancor in these impeachment
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cases. They were the result of a desire of the people to secure an honest and capable administration of their affairs. In fact, very lit- tle damage was caused to the financial reputation of the State. At the close of the Civil War, Kansas made ample provision for the payment of all her obligations. The credit of the State has been what finan- ciers call "gilt edge" from that day.
This bond transaction destroyed Governor Robinson politically. The Republican State Convention met at Topeka September 17th. On the 18th Thomas Carney was nominated for Governor. Governor Robin- son was not a candidate, and afterwards he did not act with the Repub- lican party.
THE ELEVENTH KANSAS
The Eleventh Kansas Infantry was organized in September, 1862. Thomas Ewing, Jr., was mustered as Colonel on the 14th of Septem- ber. On the 24th of September, P. B. Plumb, Captain of Company C, was elected Major. The Eleventh Regiment was one of the best regi- ments organized in Kansas in the Civil War. It was immediately equipped and sent to Northwest Arkansas, where it became a part of the Army of the Frontier under command of General James G. Blunt. Its first battle was that of Old Fort Wayne, in the Cherokee Nation, on the 22nd of October. General D. H. Cooper of the Confederacy, in command of the rebel forces, was defeated. On the 28th of November, General Blunt attacked Marmaduke at Cave Hill, Arkansas. The Confederate forces were defeated and driven ten miles over the Boston Mountains. The retreat was continued to Van Buren. At that point General Hindman made a hasty reorganization of his forces and deter- mined to drive the Army of the Frontier from Arkansas. In his effort to do this occurred the Battle of Prairie Grove, one of the most impor- tant in which the Kansas troops were engaged.
CHAPTER XLI
PRAIRIE GROVE
The defeat of Marmaduke at Cane Hill and his expulsion from the region north of the Boston Mountains did not change the purpose of General Hindman. He was well informed as to the strength and position of General Blunt's army, and he knew that the nearest troops which Blunt could call to his aid were more than a hundred miles away. Hindman's army consisted of infantry, cavalry, and artillery, and numbered about twenty-five thousand men, though in his official reports he insisted that he had only twelve to fifteen thousand. He had six thousand cavalry, and thirty pieces of artillery.1 He believed he could march from Van Buren to Cane Hill, fifty miles, and defeat Blunt before he could be reinforced. It is probably true that lack of supplies prevented him from taking all his troops on his campaign against Blunt, but he had at least fifteen thousand effective troops in the field, probably more, although he reported eleven thousand in addi- tion to his artillery. He believed it was necessary for him to achieve some success at onee, if his army was to be held intact. Both ammu- nition and food were short. There was a spirit of insubordination in his ranks. Many of his men were conseripts, Union men, who had been forced into the Confederate army, and they had no sympathy with the Southern cause. Numbers of them were deserting every day. Hind- man, while an able officer, was unpopular, and even then the Confeder- acy was failing west of the Mississippi. But if a decisive victory could be won in Northwest Arkansas, and Kansas and Missouri thrown open to invasion, a better face would be put on the cause in the Southwest. These were the considerations which actuated the Confederate com- mander.
General Hindman moved north from Van Buren on the 3d of December. So certain was he of success that he ordered a regiment of Confederate Indians to occupy Evansville, a village immediately west of Cane Hill, to prevent the escape of Blunt in that direction. On the night of the 4th the rebel force bivonacked at Oliver's store, on Lee's Creek, at the mouth of Cove Creek. Up Cove Creek the march was slow, but by the evening of the 6th the entire army had reached the junction of the Cane Hill and Fayetteville roads, at General Price's
1 See official reports, Series 1, Vol. XXII, Part 1, Rebellion Records, pp. 67-158, for number of troops on each side.
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old headquarters, on the farm of John Morrow, about eight miles south- east of Cane Hill. It did not, however, reach this point, without oppo- sition from Blunt. On the 3d of December Captain Samuel J. Craw- ford, Second Kansas, was sent down Cove Creek with a part of his regiment, and at Oliver's he met and skirmished with Marmaduke's advance. The next day Captain A. P. Russell, Second Kansas, was sent to scout down Cove Creek, where he met the enemy in increasing force. Crawford was again sent out on the 5th with two or three com- panies of his regiment and resisted the advance of Marmaduke up Cove Creek most of the day. Near night he posted Captain John Gardner, with two companies, at the junction of the Cane Hill and Fayetteville roads, and as it was certain that he would be attacked by an over- whelming force and pushed back at daylight, Crawford was to send out substantial reinforcements during the night. From that point to Cane Hill the advance of Hindman was to be stubbornly fought. For some cause the reinforcements were not sent to Captain Gardner, although General Blunt assured Crawford that they should be sent and gave the proper orders. Of this Crawford learned at daylight of the 6th while discussing conditions with a group of officers at the head- quarters of Colonel Cloud. These officers did not believe with Craw- ford that a general battle might be fought that day-certainly within a day or two-in the vicinity of Cane Hill and possibly between the town and the position of Captain Gardner. "In thirty minutes," said Crawford, "you will see a courier from Captain Gardner on a foam- covered horse coming around that hill. His command is, I fear, cut to pieces." Within fifteen minutes the courier appeared, and Craw- ford, who had taken the precaution to have his men ready, secured orders and at once started with five companies of the Second Kansas to the assistance of Captain Gardner, whom he found had been driven a mile and a half, but formed across the road, and falling back slowly before a greatly superior force, fighting at every step. Crawford formed just behind him and ordered him to file by and form in the rear.
In a short time General Blunt sent other troops down the Cane Hill road, among them Major Plumb with two companies of the Elev- enth Kansas. Plumb was the ranking officer at the front; and, although hotly engaged, Captain Crawford offered him the command. "Plnmb was a patriot and never stood on fine points of military usage," said Crawford.2 "He was an infantry officer, and most of the troops at the front were calvary and then in line fighting back the advance of the enemy, and he insisted that a cavalry officer retain the command, requesting me to continue in that capacity. I agreed to do so and pointed out the position where I desired him to post his men." Other reinforcements were sent out, and the position was held, but at times it was a difficult matter. Crawford, afterwards a Colonel, and, later, Governor of Kansas, bears witness that Plumb handled his men admir-
2 Statement made to the author April 27, 1911.
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ably and fought well all day, though it was the second time he had ever been under fire. Toward night the main weight of the battle fell on him, and he held his ground, and the day ended with the whole foree of Hindman checked on Reed's Mountain six miles southeast of Cane Hill. At night the officers who had been at the front throughout the
SENATOR PRESTON B. PLUMB
[ Plumb was a pioneer in Kansas. He was one of the founders of Emporia. Ile was in the Union army, and both major and colonel of the Eleventh Kansas. He was long United States senator from Kansas. In the Senate he was one of the men who accomplished things. He was the father of the idea of the conservation of the natural resources of America. It was his law that created the National Forest Reserves and extended aid to irrigation and the reelamation of arid lands. Many of the laws on the national statute books were put there by Preston B. Plumb. He was a great man and a great Kansan. He died at Washing- ton, D. C., in 1891, while still in the Senate.]
day were relieved, and Plumb and Captain A. P. Russell rode back to Cane Hill with Crawford. Russell had a presentment that he would be killed the next day, and gave some directions as to the disposition of his effects. He could not be shaken in his belief-and the next day fell while fighting manfully.3
3 The fighting here this day. December 6, was a most important engage- ment. It seems to have been overlooked by historians. See Rebellion
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During the night of the 6th Major Plumb was sent back to the front with reinforcements, where he remained on Sunday, the 7th, until after General Blunt's army had moved out of Cane Hill to meet Hindman. An officer of the general staff found him there and in surprise inquired if he did not know that Cane Hill had been evacuated and that Hindman had passed on north. Plumb said he knew it. "Then what are you staying here for?" asked the officer. "I haven't had any orders to fall back," replied Plumb. The officer, on his own responsibility, ordered Plumb back, and he joined his regiment north of Cane Hill just as the artillery firing was heard and the march to Prairie Grove began.
When General Blunt was convinced that he was to be attacked by Hindman with greatly superior numbers he determined to hold his ground and call to his aid the Second and Third Divisions, camped then on the old Wilson Creek battlefield ten miles southwest of Spring- field, Mo. General F. J. Herron was in command, and on the morning of the third, he received the telegraphic order of General Blunt to join him at Cane Hill as quickly as possible. Within three hours he moved with the Third Division and was immediately followed by the Second. That night he camped at Crane Creek, in Stone County, Mis- souri, where it is crossed by the famous Wire or Telegraph road, which led from Springfield, through Fayetteville, to Van Buren. He kept to this road, passing rapidly over it, reaching Elkhorn Tavern (Pea Ridge) on the evening of the 5th. There he received an order from General Blunt to forward his cavalry force at once, which he did, sending it on sixteen hundred strong under Colonel Dudley Wicker- sham; it arrived at Cane Hill near midnight of the 6th1.
General Herron arrived at Fayetteville at four o'clock Sunday morning (the 7th), having marched all night, and pushed on expecting to join General Blunt at Cane Hill about ten o'clock. He intended to follow the Van Buren road to Prairie Grove Church and there take the road leading southwest to Cane Hill. From the vicinity of Fay- etteville information reached General Hindman of Herron's near approach, and early on the night of Saturday the Confederate com- mander determined to move his army up the Fayetteville road to meet and defeat Herron before he could join Blunt-after which he would fight it out with Blunt. Colonel J. C. Monroe, with his brigade of Arkansas cavalry, was ordered to engage the Union forces on the mountain southeast of Cane Hill at daylight and deceive them as long as possible, and at four o'clock Hindman moved toward Fayetteville with the remainder of his army. Marmaduke's cavalry led the march, and shortly after daylight it came upon Herron's advance-the First Arkansas Cavalry-about halfway between Fayetteville and Cane Hill.
Records, Series 1, Vol. XXII, Part 1, pp. 60-66, for the official reports of it. There it is called the battle of Reed's Mountain. The best account of this battle is to be found in Kansas in the Sixties, by Samuel J. Craw- ford, who was in command. See pp. 72-76, inelusive, where the subject is treated as the battle of the Boston Mountains.
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The cavalry of Herron's Second Division had come up with the First Arkansas and stopped to rest and feed their horses, intending to start on to join General Blunt at dawn. There seem to have been no pre- cautions taken to guard against surprise. The attack was sudden and fierce, and the Union cavalry fled in panie and disorder, pursued by at least three thousand Missouri cavalry, including Quantrill's guer- rillas, under Shelby. At seven o'clock this rabble, with blood-thirsty guerrillas on its heels, ran into the Union infantry advance, led by General Herron, six miles south of Fayetteville, and it was with diffi- culty that the mad rout was checked. General Herron had himself to shoot dead one of the panic-stricken cavalrymen as an example of the fate of all who would not halt, face about and fight. Taking four companies of infantry, some cavalry, and a section of artillery, Gen- eral Herron drove Marmaduke's outriders back four miles to Illinois Creek, beyond which he found Ilindman's whole army in a strong posi- tion. The command of Shelby, with the prisoners and train taken shortly before, was just ascending to this position from the creek val- ley when it was opened on with two pieces of artillery, which served only to increase its speed.
General Herron now made a survey of the Confederate position. It was in an extensive grove of timber on a singular elevation, which extends from east to west across the Fayetteville and Van Buren road which euts through it in a southwesterly direction. The elevation rises from a prairie or plain. It slopes gently to the south, but on the north it presents a sharp escarpment. The grove on the ridge joined larger bodies of timber at either end. At the south side of the grove the Cane Hill road turned sharply southwest toward that village. In the fork of the road a mile south of the Confederate position, stood the Prairie Grove Church. North of the elevation there is a wide valley through which a small stream flows into Illinois Creek, and much of which had been cultivated, the dead stalks of the corn still standing in the fields. Beyond this valley, to the north, is a prairie, and some timbered hills which rise to the same level as the hill on which is Prairie Grove. In front of the Confederate position, along the north fringe of the grove, on the slope, stood some dwellings surrounded by enclosures; and about the fields were rail fences. The survey revealed a Confederate line more than two miles in length, and while there were no means of ascertaining the number of the enemy, enough could be seen to indi- cate certainly that the Union forces were far outnumbered.
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