USA > Kansas > Kansas : the prelude to the war for the union > Part 16
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are a luxury rarely seen here [in Wabaunsee]. In our own dwelling, part of the inmates rest on the earth, while others sleep on sacking stretched between the timbers over our heads, access to which is only to be had by climbing up on the logs constituting the sides of the cabin. I no- ticed yesterday a member of our family making up his bed with a hoe!" Everything was on a primitive basis. Land had been preëmpted in larger or smaller amounts and a rudimentary agri- culture attempted. Horses, cattle, pigs, fowls - an easy, inviting prey for raiders of every sort - gradually increased. Food was always plain, sometimes scanty, and occasionally unique. " We have a pie on the table, the first of any kind I have seen since our arrival, made of sorrel and sweetened with molasses." Unconventional fron- tier habits of dress were in vogue. Among the nearly five hundred persons who presented claims for damages before the auditing commission of 1859, very few included items of clothing. One unpractical mortal brought to the territory a large assortment of dress coats, white velvet and satin vests, trousers, calf-skin boots, and gloves. The wardrobe disappeared when the Missourians sacked Lawrence in 1856, and some of the finery which attracted Mr. Gladstone's attention on their return to Kansas City doubtless came from it. "I frequently spoke to Southmayd," said a witness before the claims commission, " about
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having so much good clothing in this country !" Socially there was an utter democracy - no high- est, no lowest. Everybody stood on the same plane. For amusements the settlers were left en- tirely to their own resources. Lecturers, concert troupes, and shows never ventured so far into the wilderness. Yet there was much broad, rollick- ing, noisy merry-making, but it must be con- fessed that rum and whiskey - lighter liquors like wine and beer could not be obtained -had a good deal to do with it. In the larger towns " sprees " were by no means uncommon. Room No. 7 in the Eldridge House obtained a reputa- tion throughout the territory as a favorite place for carousals, where the uproar frequently con- tinued all night, as one party of roisterers suc- ceeded another. Outside of the villages inconven- iences and hardships were specially oppressive. A woman died in a country neighborhood. " The difficulty after her death was to provide a coffin. There were men who could make it, but no boards could be found. At last one person offered to use a part of the bottom of his wagon, another fur- nished the rest, and a box was put together." A constant back-flowing stream of disgusted settlers set eastward during the whole territorial period. Some of them gave a doleful account of the coun- try - reported Kansas not likely to "become a free or a slave state until all the rest of the world is over-peopled, for nobody that has strength to
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walk, or money to pay for conveyance, will stay there long. The earth .. . is actually parched and burnt to the solidity of brick by the long droughts so that it cannot be plowed, and no vege- tation appears." Schools, churches, and the vari- ous appliances of older civilization got under way and made some growth, but they were still in a primitive, inchoate condition when Kansas took her place in the Union.
The mischiefs which accompanied the strife of hostile civilizations within the territory were pro- longed and aggravated by a new woe. In 1860 a great drought began. For more than a year little or no rain fell, and crops failed everywhere. Probably fifteen or twenty thousand people were thrown upon public charity. Again Kansas put out signals of distress, to which the public made a quick and generous response. Provisions, cloth- ing, and money poured into the famished common- wealth - a magnificent largess that measurably relieved its calamities, though it did not prevent serious depopulation.
Governor Robinson took the oath of office Feb- ruary 9th, 1861. He found himself at a post beset by an extraordinary complication of difficul- ties. April 15th President Lincoln called for seventy-five thousand volunteers to put down the Southern rebellion. Kansas was in a condition the most inopportune and unpromising for a fit- ting response. With the subsidence of domestic
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troubles military organizations generally went to pieces. The exchequer of a community whose six years of territorial broil concluded with a fam- ine could hardly be on a war footing. Yet Gov- ernor Robinson, in his message to the legislature, which met March 26th, said: "Kansas, though last and least of the states in the Union, will ever be ready to answer the call of her country." That promise was nobly kept. Governor Carney, the successor of Governor Robinson, writing Presi- dent Lincoln May 13th, 1864, could say : " Kansas has furnished more men according to her popula- tion to crush this rebellion than any other state in the Union." In all the great western cam- paigns Kansas soldiers made an honorable record. That record belongs to national rather than state history, and no effort will be made here to disen- tangle and isolate it for purposes of valuation.
Governor Robinson was probably the first state executive to foreshadow the policy which the fed- eral authorities ultimately adopted in reference to slavery " A demand is made by certain states," he said in his message, " that new concessions and guaranties be given to slavery, or the Union must be destroyed. . . . If it is true that the continned existence of slavery requires the destruction of the Union, it is time to ask if the existence of the Union does not require the destruction of slavery. If such an issue be forced on the nation it must be met, and met promptly."
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The inevitable and legitimate difficulties which confronted Governor Robinson - embarrassments of poverty and of chaos - might well have stag- gered any man of ordinary nerve, but they were not the most formidable evils. After an exciting contest the legislature elected J. H. Lane and S. C. Pomeroy to the United States Senate. Lane celebrated his departure for Washington by laying aside the calf-skin vest and seal-skin coat, which had done service during the whole territorial era, and donning a respectable suit. On the realiza- tion of his long-cherished dream a crazy passion for power seized him - an ambition to absorb the entire civil and military functions of the state. Robinson stood squarely, if not defiantly, across his path. In the territorial struggle the natural antagonisms of these two men - antagonisms of temperament, method, and purpose - were cir- cumscribed and held in abeyance by the compul- sions of the situation -
" As the wave breaks to foam on shelves, Then runs into a wave again."
But now disguises and restrictions were flung off. Lane, inflamed by old grudges and new provoca- tions, by long-nursed hatreds and obstructions that crossed his plans, broke out into violent hostilities against Governor Robinson and his successor. By his overshadowing prestige at Washington he was able to wrest from them no small part of their legitimate gubernatorial functions. Lane's singu-
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lar influence over Mr. Lincoln and the secretary of war, Mr. Stanton, is one of the most inexplicable and disastrous facts that concern Kansas in 1861- 65. It was the source of the heaviest calamities that visited the commonwealth during that period, because it put him in a position to gratify mis- chievous ambitions, to pursue personal feuds, to assume duties and offices that belonged to others, to popularize the corruptest political methods, and to organize semi-predatory military expedi- tions. His conduct not only embarrassed the state executive and threw state affairs into con- fusion, but provoked sanguinary reprisals from Missouri. In 1864 Mr. Lincoln, remarking upon Lane's extraordinary career in Washington to Governor Carney, offered no better explanation of it than this: "He knocks at my door every morning. You know he is a very persistent fel- low and hard to put off. I don't see you very often, and have to pay attention to him."
Lane's intrigues in Washington against the state administration prospered. Though recruiting was energetically pushed by the local authorities and three regiments were already in the field - the first and second obtaining honorable recognition for gallant conduct at the battle of Wilson's Creek, Missouri - yet in August Lane, technically a civilian, appeared in Kansas clothed with vague, but usurping military powers. He reached Leav- enworth on the 15th, and announced in a public
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address the extinction of all his personal and polit- ical enmities - a costly sacrifice laid on the altar of his country. Two days afterwards he set out for Fort Scott, where the Kansas brigade, compris- ing the Third and Fourth infantry together with the Fifth and Sixth cavalry regiments, was concen- trating to repel attacks upon the Southeast. He began his brief military career in this region by constructing several useless fortifications, among which the most considerable affair was Fort Lin- coln, on the Little Osage River, twelve miles north of Fort Scott. September 2d there was a skir- mish at Dry Wood Creek, Missouri, between a reconnoitring party and a force under the Con- federate General Rains, which was not wholly favorable to the Kansans, and caused a panic at Fort Scott. Leaving a body of cavalry with orders to defend the town as long as possible, and then fire it, Lane retired to his earth-works on the Little Osage. " I am compelled to make a stand here," he reported September 2d, after get- ting inside Fort Lincoln, "or give up Kansas to disgrace and destruction. If you do not hear from me again, you can understand that I am sur- rounded by a superior force." The Confederates did not follow up their advantage, but retreated leisurely toward Independence, Missouri. En- couraged by their withdrawal, Lane took the field on the 10th " with a smart little army of about fifteen hundred men " - reached Westport, Mis-
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souri, four days later, where he reported - " Yes- terday I cleaned out Butler and Parkville with my cavalry." September 22d he sacked and burned Osceola, Missouri - an enterprise in which large amounts of property and a score of inhab- itants were sacrificed. He broke camp on the 27th, and in two days reached Kansas City. The brigade converted the Missouri border through which the march lay into a wilderness, and reached its destination heavily encumbered with plunder. "Everything disloyal," said Lane, ". .
. . must be cleaned out," and never were orders more lit- erally or cheerfully obeyed. Even the chaplain succumbed to the rampant spirit of thievery, and plundered Confederate altars in the interest of his unfinished church at home. Among the spoils that fell to Lane personally there was a fine car- riage, which he brought to Lawrence for the use of his household.
From the first the local authorities, civil and mil- itary, had regarded the brigade with apprehension. " We are in no danger of invasion," Governor Robinson wrote General Fremont, commander of the Western Department, September 1st, "pro- vided the government stores at Fort Scott are sent back to Leavenworth, and the Lane brigade is removed from the border. It is true small par- ties of secessionists are to be found in Missouri, but we have good reason to know that they do not intend to molest Kansas . until Jackson
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shall be reinstated as governor of Missouri. In- deed, a short time since, when a guerrilla party came over and stole some property from our cit- izens, the officers in command of the Confederates compelled a return of the property, and offered to give up the leader of the gang to our people for punishment. But what we have to fear, and do fear, is, that Lane's brigade will get up a war by going over the line, committing depredations, and then returning into our state. This course will force the secessionists to [retaliation] . . . and in this they will be joined by nearly all the Union men of Missouri. If you will remove the supplies at Fort Scott to the interior, and relieve us of the Lane brigade, I will guaranty Kansas from inva- sion . . . until Jackson shall drive you out of St. Louis."
Captain Prince, in command at Fort Leaven- worth, wrote Lane September 9th: "I hope you will adopt active and early measures to crush out this marauding which is being enacted in Captain Jennison's name, as also [in] yours, by a band of men representing themselves as belonging to your command." When General Hunter took charge of the department in November the brigade, ac- cording to the report of Assistant Adjutant-Gen- eral C. G. Halpine, was " a ragged, half-armed, diseased, mutinous rabble, taking votes whether any troublesome or distasteful order should be obeyed or defied. ... To remedy these things
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mustering officers were sent to remuster the reg- iments of Lane's brigade. . . Had the depart- ment, as previously, been without troops from other states, there is every probability that a gen- eral mutiny ... would have taken place instead of the partial mutinies which have been sup- pressed." The thieving, foot-pad, devastating ex- pedition of Lane's brigade did much to incite ani- mosities and reprisals, whose ghastly work sent a thrill of horror through the country.
Lane made a furious harangue at Leavenworth October 8th in defense of his campaign. He wrote President Lincoln the next day : "I . . suc- ceeded in raising and marching against the enemy as gallant and effective an army, in proportion to its numbers, as ever entered the field. Its opera- tions are a part of the history of the country. . . . Governor Charles Robinson . . . has constantly, in season and out of season, vilified myself and abused the men under my command as marauders and thieves." He suggested the formation of a new military department out of Kansas, the In- dian Territory, and portions of Arkansas, with himself as commander, and not less than ten thousand troops at his disposal. He would resign his seat in Congress and accept the military ap- pointment. In case the department should not be created, he saw only calamities ahead. " I will . . be compelled to leave my command," he continued, "quit the field, and most reluctantly
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become an idle spectator of the great struggle, and witness, I have no doubt, the devastation of my adopted state and the destruction of its peo- ple."
In November Lane returned to Washington and at once entered upon fresh military schemes. He projected an expedition, which he would lead in person from Fort Leavenworth into Arkansas and the Indian Territory - representing the move- ment as the result of conferences between himself and General Hunter. With this understanding, he obtained for it the approbation of President Lincoln and the War Department. Friends in Kansas sent on to Washington resolutions ap- plauding his military genius, and urging that the most ought to be made of it. Lane, said the "Leavenworth Conservative " "has every quality of mind and character which belonged to the histor- ical commanders. ... There are no obstacles in his path, and to him a difficulty is simply a thing to be overcome." Refugee Indians at Fort Leav- enworth, driven from the territory by disloyal tribes, concurred in these sentiments. " General Lane is our friend," said two chiefs with sesquipe- dalian names in a communication to " Our Great Father the President of the United States." "His heart is big for the Indian. He will do more for us than any one else. The hearts of our people will be sad if he does not come. They will follow him wherever he directs. They will sweep the
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rebels before them like a terrible fire on the dry prairie." Lane unfolded his plans, shaped evi- dently by the recent experiences of his brigade, to General McClellan. He proposed to extir- pate disloyalty in Missouri and Arkansas. If conciliatory methods should not be successful, he would employ the most violent. "Sir, if I can't do better I will kill the white rebels, and give their lands to the loyal blacks !"
General Hunter received communications from the War Department in January, 1862, announcing that a Southern expedition, consisting of eight or ten thousand Kansas troops and four thousand Indians had been decided upon, and implying the existence of a definite, mutual understanding that Lane should have the chief command. These communications took Hunter by surprise, and in his perplexity he wrote General Halleck, who had succeeded General Fremont in command of the Western Department, for information : -
" It seems . . . that Senator J. H. Lane has been trading at Washington on a capital partly made up of his own senatorial position, and partly of such scraps of in- fluence as I may have possessed in the confidence or es- teem of the president, said scraps having been 'jay- hawked' by the Kansas senator without due consent of the proper owner. . . . I find that ' Lane's great South- ern expedition ' was entertained by the president under misrepresentations ; . .. that said ' expedition ' was the joint design of Senator Lane and myself. .. . Never to
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this hour has he consulted me on the subject, directly or indirectly, while the authorities at Washington have pre- served a similar indiscreet reticence. . . . Thus I am left in ignorance, but ... I think it more than prob- able that the veil of mystery has been lifted in your particular case."
Some weeks before receiving Hunter's letter, which was written February 8th, 1862, rumors reached Halleck that Lane would be commissioned brigadier-general, and he immediately forwarded a remonstrance to headquarters. " I cannot con- ceive a more injudicious appointment," he wrote General McClellan. " It will take twenty thou- sand men to counteract its effect in this state, and, moreover, is offering a premium for rascality and robbery." President Lincoln indorsed upon Halleck's communication, which was of consider- able length, and touched various topics - " an excellent letter ; though I am sorry General Hal- leck is so unfavorably impressed with General Lane." Concerning the " expedition " Halleck had no information aside from current rumors. Yet this unofficial hearsay sufficed to rouse his indignation. "I protested " .. . he wrote Hun- ter February 13th, "against any of his [Lane's] jayhawkers coming into this department, and said positively that I would arrest and disarm every one I could catch."
Lane reached Leavenworth January 26th in high spirits. But on the next day he met a sud-
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den and stinging rebuff. Without waiting for in- terview or explanation, without intimating to Lane what was impending, Hunter issued an order an- nouncing his purpose to command the " expedi- tion " in person. The unexpected turn of affairs nonplused Lane. He sent a telegram to Rep- resentative John Covode : "See the president, secretary of war, and General Mcclellan, and answer what I shall do." There was nothing to do except to retire or take a subordinate position. He succeeded, however, in breaking up the expe- dition. "I have been with the man you name," Covode telegraphed. "Hunter will not get the
men or money he requires. His command cannot go forward. Hold on. Don't resign your seat." Lane followed Covode's advice and returned to Washington after addressing a public letter to the legislature, which had passed complimentary res- olutions : "I have been thwarted in the cher- ished hope of my life. The sad yet simple duty only remains to announce to you and through you my purpose to return to my seat in the United States Senate."
Lane's military intrigues reached their final stage in his appointment July 22d, 1862, as " Com- missioner for Recruiting in the Department of Kansas." He proceeded to organize regiments, completely ignoring the state authorities in whose hands the laws and the constitution placed the whole business. At this time he began to enlist
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colored men - probably the pioneer movement in that direction - protesting that "a nigger can stop a bullet as well as a white man." But Lane's scheme did not altogether succeed. Governor Robinson, who proposed to stand upon his con- stitutional rights, declined to commission the offi- cers whom Lane had appointed. The secretary of war telegraphed that if the state executive did not issue the commissions the War Department would. "You have the power to override the constitution and the laws," was the unconcilia- tory response ; " but you have not the power to make the present governor of Kansas dishonor his own state."
Another feature in the singular tangle was a formidable effort to crush Governor Robinson, whom the Lane politicians found intractable and difficult to manage. In the autumn of 1861 these gentry made an abortive effort to displace him on the ground that, by the provisions of the con- stitution, the term of state officers expired Jan- uary 1st, 1862. There was an election, but the courts pronounced it illegal.
The failure of this first personal assault lent ad- ditional violence and venom to the second. Jan- uary 20th a resolution of inquiry concerning the sale of certain state bonds was offered in the leg- islature. The bonds in question had no quotable market value, and a sale was effected only through negotiations - evidently not ruled by the severest
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business maxims - with the Interior Department, which held, in trust, Indian funds for investment. It appeared that bonds to the amount of ninety- five thousand six hundred dollars were delivered, upon which the sum of fifty-five thousand dollars was paid ; that while the sale was effected at eighty-five per cent., only sixty per cent. reached the state treasury, notwithstanding the law de- clared that nothing less than seventy per cent. should be accepted. Here was a palpable viola- tion of the law, and the official upon whom it could be fastened, especially if he happened to be the governor, would fare badly. It is now well understood that the whole movement, which pro- ceeded from Lane, was aimed at Robinson. The prosecution had no wish to harm the auditor and secretary of state who went down in the fight.
Though the committee of investigation ap- pointed by the House of Representatives discov- ered no evidence connecting the governor with the negotiation, they resolved to include him among the inculpated officials. They ventured their case on chances that the progress of the trial might bring out criminating facts.
An intensity of excitement, unsurpassed even in the stormiest territorial days, convulsed the legislature when, on the 13th of February, the committee of investigation reported resolutions impeaching the auditor, the secretary of state, and the governor. On the next day a vote was
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reached, the resolutions passed unanimously, and there followed cheers long and loud. Why these law-makers applauded it would be difficult to say. They had not read the voluminous report upon which the resolutions were alleged to be based. If it were true that the executive had brought dis- grace upon the state and ought to be driven from office, that would be poor cause for any outbreak of jubilation. When at a later stage specific articles of impeachment against the governor came before the House the unanimity gave way, and seven representatives are on record as voting against them. So far as Robinson was concerned the prosecution broke down, and he was almost unan- imously acquitted, though a majority of the Sen- ate belonged to the Lane faction.
That a rank growth of general freebooting should have sprung up in Kansas during the war was no more than might have been expected. The border naturally attracts men adapted to shine in this calling, and the territorial period afforded admirable training for the wider field of spoliation opened by the war for the Union. Early in the struggle an organization appeared known as "Red-legs," from the fact that its mem- bers affected red morocco leggings. It was a loose - jointed association, with members shifting between twenty-five and fifty, dedicated originally to the vocation of horse - stealing, but flexible enough to include rascalities of every description.
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At intervals the gang would dash into Missouri, seize horses and cattle - not omitting other and worse outrages on occasion - then repair with their booty to Lawrence, where it was defiantly sold at auction. " Red-legs were accustomed to brag in Lawrence," says one who was familiar with their movements, " that nobody dared to in- terfere with them. They did not hesitate to shoot inquisitive and troublesome people. At Law- rence the livery stables were full of their stolen horses. One day I saw three or four Red-legs attack a Missourian who was in town searching for lost property. They gathered about him with drawn revolvers and drove him off very uncer- emoniously. I once saw Hoyt, the leader, with- out a word of explanation or warning, open fire upon a stranger quietly riding down Massachu- setts Street. He was a Missourian whom Hoyt had recently robbed." The gang contained men of the most desperate and hardened character, and a full recital of their deeds would sound like the biography of devils. Either the people of Law- rence could not drive out the freebooters, or they thought it mattered little what might happen to Missouri disloyalists. Governor Robinson made a determined, but unsuccessful effort to break up the organization. The Red-legs repaid the inter- ference by plots for his assassination, which barely miscarried.
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