USA > Missouri > DeKalb County > History of Andrew and De Kalb counties, Missouri : from earliest time to the present; together with sundry personal, business and professional sketches and family records. besides a condensed history of the state of Missouri, etc > Part 8
USA > Missouri > Andrew County > History of Andrew and De Kalb counties, Missouri : from earliest time to the present; together with sundry personal, business and professional sketches and family records. besides a condensed history of the state of Missouri, etc > Part 8
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Meanwhile the Northern States were not idle. Massachu- setts had chartered a wealthy corporation, called the Emigrant Aid Company; Connecticut followed soon after with a similar company. The New York Tribune, edited by Horace Greeley, opened a Kansas contribution, and aid societies sprang into activity at hundreds of points in the Northwest. Thus stimulated, the people of the free States flocked to Kansas in such numbers that in a few months they constituted a decided majority of the actual settlers. The Missourians with force and arms attempted to carry out their measures, and prevent Northern and Eastern settlers from passing through their State, but the emigrants then wound around through Iowa, thus circumventing their plans. The struggle between the hostile parties in Kansas and on the Missouri border resulted in a series of desultory but bloody encounters, some of which assumed the proportions of battles. Large and fiercely excited public meetings were held in Missouri, and at times in some localities a reign of intolerance and pro- scription prevailed. This was intensified in that portion of the State bordering on Kansas.
An election held in the new State in November of 1854 resulted in the choice of a pro-slavery delegate to Congress, and, in the general territorial election of the following year, the same party was triumphant. The State Legislature thus chosen assembled at Lecompton, organized the government, and framed a constitution permitting slavery. The Free Soil party declar- ing the general election to have been illegal, on account of fraud-
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ulent voting, assembled in convention at Topeka, September 25, 1855, framed a constitution excluding slavery, and organized a rival government. Civil war broke out between the factions.
From the autumn of 1855 until the following summer the Territory was the scene of constant turmoil and violence. The people of the North held meetings to enlist additional settlers, cash poured into the Tribune fund, and food, clothing, seeds, arms and money were sent in quantities to the Free Soil settlers.
On September 8, 1856, John W. Geary, of Pennsylvania, was appointed governor. He issued a proclamation of peace, and promised the settlers protection in their persons, pursuits
and property. They therefore laid down their arms. This was no sooner done than an army from the Southern States attacked Lawrence, which had before been the scene of much violence; but Gov. Geary, calling out the United States troops, finally induced the invaders to retire. On January 26, 1857, the free legislature met at Topeka, but was dispersed by the United States marshal, who captured several members and threw them into jail at Tecumseh. The pro-slavery people now met in legis- lature at Lecompton and adopted a resolution calling a convention to frame another State constitution.
Gov. Geary resigned because the pro-slavery United States Senate refused to uphold some of his measures, and Robert J. Walker, of Mississippi, was appointed to succeed him. Gov. Walker guaranteed protection to the settlers on election day, re- jected fraudulent returns, condemned both the Lecompton consti- tution and the methods of promulgation, and started for Wash- ington to prevent Congress from accepting it. The President had officially signed the instrument before the arrival of Gov. Walker, and the latter promptly resigned. J. W. Denver of Cal- ifornia was appointed to succeed him.
An election was held for the rejection or adoption of the pro-slavery clauses of the Lecompton constitution, December 21, 1856. The Free-State men did not go to the polls, and the fraud- ulent instrument was therefore adopted by a vote of 6,143 to 569. The pro-slavery legislature ordered a vote for State officers under the Lecompton constitution, January 4, 1858. The settlers' legislature then submitted that constitution to the people, as a
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whole, to be accepted or rejected, this election also to take place on January 4, 1858. It was rejected by a majority of 10,226. Congress, after a long discussion, again sent the Lecompton con- stitution to a vote of the people, and again it was rejected by a majority of 10,000 votes, on August 3, 1858. Gov. Denver then resigned, and Samuel Medary, of Ohio, succeeded him.
The settlers' legislature submitted another constitution, which was adopted. Some portions of it proving unsatisfactory, another convention was called, and at last the new constitution, forever prohibiting slavery, was promulgated at Wyandotte, July 4, 1859, and was adopted in October by a 4,000 majority. On December 6, 1859, a State election was held under the new constitution, and Charles Robinson, who had been chosen governor under the first Topeka constitution, in 1856, was once more elected to that office. January 29, 1861, Kansas came into the Union as a free State, and ultimately Nebraska was admitted upon the same conditions.
The facts thus briefly stated constitute the civil history of the struggle in Kansas. A fratricidal war raged over her rich plains for three years. Bloodshed, robbery, devastation and fire spread like a pestilence through her humble settlements, and but a faint shadow of the fearful events of that period is cast upon these pages.
In the final adjustment of these questions in Congress, Stephen A. Douglas, of Illinois, and James S. Green, of Missouri, played a prominent part. Senator Green opposed the views of Mr. Douglas, and, as the acknowledged leader of the pro-slavery party, maintained his ground with rare ability and eloquence. Coming into the Senate, in 1857, during the discussion of the question of the admission of Kansas under the Lecompton con- stitution, he supported the policy of the administration in speeches distinguished not only by perspicuity of style, but by powers of argument which called forth commendations, even from those who did not share his convictions.
" THE DRED SCOTT DECISION."
A few days after the inauguration of President Buchanan (1857), the Supreme court of the United States delivered the celebrated opinion known in American history as "The Dred Scott Decision."
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Dred Scott was a negro slave belonging to Dr. Emerson, who was a surgeon in the army of the United States. In 1834 Dr. Emerson took Scott from the State of Missouri to the military post at Rock Island, Ill., and held him there as a slave until April or May, 1836. At the time last mentioned, Dr. Emerson removed Scott to Fort Snelling, Minn., and there held him until 1838. At the latter place Scott was married to a colored woman who had been taken to Fort Snelling by her master in 1835, and had been subsequently sold there to Dr. Emerson. Two children were born of this marriage, and then the whole family were taken back to St. Louis and sold. Dred thereupon brought a complaint of assault and battery against John F. A. Sandford, the purchaser of himself, his wife and children, which was tried in the United States Circuit court for the District of Missouri.
Before beginning this suit Scott had brought another in the State courts of Missouri for his freedom, on the ground that hav- ing been a resident of a free State and a free Territory, he thereby relieved himself from the chains of bondage and became a citizen of the United States. The inferior court gave judg- ment in his favor, but on a writ of error to the Supreme court of the State the judgment was reversed and the case remanded for a new trial. By consent this action was continued to await de- cision on the suit for assault and battery against Sandford, brought in the Federal court.
At the conclusion of the trial Scott's attorney asked the court to charge the jury, on the agreed statement of facts, to find for the plaintiff. This was refused, and the jury being instructed that the law was with the defendant, was ordered so to find. The verdict accordingly was that the plaintiff, his wife and chil- dren were slaves, as alleged by Sandford, and that therefore they had no rights in the court, and no redress against their master for personal violence.
Scott's attorney filed a bill of exception to the charge of the court, and thereupon carried the case by writ of error to the United States Supreme court. After a delay of nearly three years a decision was finally reached in March, 1857. Chief Justice Taney, speaking for the court, decided that negroes, whether free or slave, were not citizens of the United States, and that
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they could not become such by any process known to the con- stitution; that under the laws of the United States a negro could neither sue nor be sued, and that therefore the court had no juris- diction of Dred Scott's cause; that a slave was to be regarded in the light of a personal chattel, and that he might be removed from place to place by his owner as any other piece of property; that the constitution gave to every slave holder the right of removing to or through any State or Territory with his slaves, and of returning with them, at will, to a State where slavery was recognized by law ; and that therefore the Missouri Compromise of 1820, as well as the compromise measures of 1850, was uncon- stitutional and void. In these opinions six of the associate justices of the Supreme bench-Wayne, Nelson, Grier, Daniel, Campbell and Catron-concurred; while two associates-Judges McLean and Curtis-dissented. The decision of the majority, which was accepted as the opinion of the court, gave great satis- faction to the ultra slave-holding people of the South. Observ- ing that the control of Congress and the Government was slowly passing out of their hands by the tremendous expansion of the North, and the growth of the spirit of freedom, they hoped, before it was too late, to so wall in and hedge about their pecul - iar institution, that future Congresses would be unable and would not dare attempt to reach it by legislative enactments.
At the North, on the contrary, the decision excited thousands of indignant comments, and much bitter opposition. This indig- nation could not be expended in mere words, but crystallized into a well-grounded determination to resist in the free States the enforcement of the laws of the slave States which contravened or were repugnant to their own.
EVENTS PRECEDING THE CIVIL WAR.
The presidential campaign of 1860 must ever be regarded as one of the most important in the history of the republic, as the canvass of that year was one of the most exciting. Four candi- dates were in the field. The Republican party nominated Abra- ham Lincoln, on a platform in which opposition to the further extension of slavery was declared to be the vital issue. The Dem- ocratic convention, assembled at Charleston, divided on the
6
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question of slavery in the Territories, and, after a long and stormy session, the party was disrupted, and the "Southern Rights" delegates withdrew from the convention. They met first at Richmond and afterward at Baltimore, where they nomi- nated for president John C. Breckinridge, of Kentucky. The squatter sovereignty Democrats nominated Stephen A. Douglas -the apostle of popular sovereignty. Still another-the "Ameri- can" party, or Constitutional Unionists-chose John Bell, of Tennessee, as their candidate.
The contest resulted in the election of Mr. Lincoln. The leaders of the South had declared that his election would be con- sidered as a just cause for the dissolution of the Union. The Government was under the control of the Douglas Democrats, but a majority of the cabinet and a large number of members of Congress in both Houses were supporters of Mr. Breckinridge, and the advocates of disunion. It was now evident that under the new administration all the departments of the Govern- ment must pass into the power of the Republican party. Dis- union was now possible, but the opportunity would shortly be past. The attitude of President Buchanan favored the measure. He was not himself a disunionist, but he did not consider that he had the constitutional right to coerce a sovereign State. The interval, therefore, between the presidential election of November, 1860, and the inauguration of the following March was improved to its full extent by the political leaders of the South.
SECESSION.
On the 17th of December, 1860, a convention assembled at Charleston, S. C., passed a resolution declaring that the union hitherto existing between that State and others, under the name of the United States of America, was dissolved. The cotton-growing States were almost unanimous in support of the measure. By the 1st of February, 1861, six other States - Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana and Texas - had withdrawn from the Union. Nearly all the senators and representatives of those States resigned their seats in Congress, and joined the disunion cause.
In the secession conventions there was little opposition to the
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movement, although in some instances a large minority vote was cast. A few of the speakers denounced disunion as wrong in principle and tending to certain ruin. Alexander H. Stevens, afterward vice-president of the Confederate States, while advo- cating the doctrine of State sovereignty and the right of seces- sion, spoke against the latter as a practical measure on the ground that it was impolitic and disastrous. Not a few promi- nent men at the South held similar views, and yet were governed by the opinion of the majority.
On the 4th day of February, 1861, delegates from six of the seceded States met at Montgomery, Ala., and formed a new government under the name of the Confederate States of America. On the 8th of the same month, the government was organized by the election of Jefferson Davis, of Mississippi, as provisional president, and Alexander H. Stevens as vice-president.
In 1850 when the representatives of the slaveholders de- clared in Congress, that, unless California should be admitted as a slave State, they would break up the Union, albeit they would do it " calmly and peaceably," Daniel Webster arose in his maj- esty and uttered this remarkable and prophetic warning :-
"I hear with pain, anguish and distress the words secession; peaceable secession! Sir, your eyes and mine are never destined to see that miracle-the dismemberment of this vast country- without convulsion! The breaking up of the fountains of the great deep without ruffling the surface! Who is so foolish as to expect to see such a thing ? Sir, he who sees these States now revolving in harmony around a common center, and expects to see them quit their places and fly off without convulsion, may look the next hour to see the heavenly bodies rush from their spheres and jostle against each other in realms of space, without producing the crash of the universe. There can be no such thing as peaceable secession. Peaceable secession is an utter impossibility. Is the great constitution under which we live here, covering the whole country, is it to be thawed and melted away by secession, as the snows of the mountains melt under the influence of the vernal sun, disappear almost unobserved and die off? No sir! No sir! I see it as plainly as I see the sun in heaven. I see disruption must produce such a war as I will not describe in its two-fold character."
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THE BEGINNING OF HOSTILITIES.
The American nation seemed on the verge of ruin. The Government was for the time being paralyzed. The army was stationed in scattered detachments on remote frontiers. The fleet was dispersed in distant seas. President Buchanan was distracted with hesitancy and the contradictory counsels of his friends. With the exception of Forts Sumter and Moultrie in Charleston Harbor, Fort Pickens near Pensacola, and Fortress Monroe in the Chesapeake, all the important posts in the seceded States had been seized and occupied by the Confederates, even before the organization of their government.
In vain had Gen. Scott, lieutenant-general of the United States army, observing the energy of the Secessionists, repeatedly urged upon the President that strong garrisons be sent to the imperiled fortresses, some of which were indifferently occupied and some not at all. Scott was not allowed to do anything to save the United States forts, or even to send a warning to the hand- fuls of soldiers who garrisoned them, until it was too late to avail. Early in January, 1861, the President made a feeble effort to re- inforce and provision the garrison at Fort Sumter. The steamer " Star of the West " was sent with men and supplies, but upon ap- proaching Charleston harbor it was fired upon by a Confed- erate battery, and was obliged to return without performing its mission.
In March Abraham Lincoln was inaugurated as President of the United States, and entered upon the duties of his office. William H. Seward, of New York, was chosen Secretary of State; Salmon P. Chase, of Ohio, Secretary of the Treasury; Simon Cameron, of Pennsylvania, Secretary of War, succeeded in the following January by Edwin M. Stanton, and Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy. Lincoln declared, both in his inaugural address and in his early official papers, that the efforts of the new administration would be directed to the re- covery of the forts, arsenals and other public property which had been seized by the Confederate authorities, and it was with this intention that the first military preparations were made. With the second attempt of the Government to reinforce Fort Sumter came the actual beginning of hostilities.
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The defenses of Charleston Harbor were held by Maj. Rob- ert Anderson with only seventy-nine men. He had deemed it prudent to evacuate Fort Moultrie and retire to Sumter, which was situated on an island in front of the city but at some dis- tance. That occupancy having been decided to be "a menace to the free people of the State," Fort Sumter was attacked by Gen. Beauregard, April 12, 1861, on the order of George W. Randolph, secretary of war for the Confederacy. On the 14th, Maj. Anderson and his gallant little band were forced to sur- render, and thus were the fountains of the great deep broken up, deluging the South in blood, and turning her smiling fields to desolation.
On the 15th of April, Lincoln issued a proclamation declar- ing the South to be in a state of rebellion, and calling for 75,000 militia "to repossess the forts, places and property seized from the Union." He also summoned both Houses of Congress to assemble in extraordinary session on July 4, 1861.
The War of the Rebellion now began in earnest. With the firing on Fort Sumter a radical change took place in the senti- ments of a large portion of the Democracy of the North. Every free State, and the slave States of Delaware and Maryland, pledged men and troops to suppress the Rebellion, and such Democratic leaders as Stephen A. Douglas, Matthew H. Carpen- ter, Daniel S. Dickinson, John J. Crittenden and Benjamin F. Butler announced their hearty support of the President. Jef- ferson Davis also issued a proclamation, two days later than that of Lincoln, calling upon the " good people of the Confederacy" to rally and drive out "the invaders." On the same day Vir- ginia seceded from the Union; on May 6 Arkansas followed her example, and then North Carolina on the 20th of the same month. In Tennesseee, specially East Tennessee, there was a strong opposition to disunion, and it was not until the 8th of June that a secession ordinance could be passed. The people of Maryland were divided in their opinions, but the disunion senti- ment prevailed largely. In Missouri, as will presently be seen, the movement resulted in civil war, while in Kentucky the authorities issued a proclamation of neutrality.
On the 19th of April some Massachusetts regiments, pass-
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ing through Baltimore on their way to Washington, were attacked by the citizens with stones and fire-arms, and three men were killed. This was the first bloodshed of the war. On the preceding day a body of Confederate soldiers advanced on the armory of the United States at Harper's Ferry. The officer in charge destroyed a portion of the vast stores collecte d there, and then escaped into Pennsylvania. On the 20th of the month, another company of Virginians attacked the great navy yard at Norfolk. The Federal officers commanding fired the buildings, sank the vessels, spiked the guns, and withdrew their forces. Most of the cannons and many of the vessels were afterward recovered by the Confederates, the property thus captured amounting to fully $10,000,000.
. The Southern forces poured into Virginia in such numbers that for a time the city of Washington seemed in danger. May 3 the President called for 83,000 more soldiers, whose term of enlistment should be for three years, or during the continuation of the war. Lieut .- Gen. Winfield Scott was made comman- der-in-chief of the United States forces. As many war ships as could be mustered were sent to blockade the Southern harbors. In the seceded States, also, there were tireless preparation and activity. Richmond was chosen as the capital of the Confeder- acy. Mr. Davis and the officers of his cabinet had already re- paired thither, for the purpose of directing the affairs of the government and the army. So stood the opposing powers in the beginning of the summer of 1861.
It was now evident that a great war, perhaps the greatest in modern times, was about to break over the American nation.
Having thus outlined the causes of the war, and the breaking out of actual hostilities, let us turn to our own State and see what part she bore in the mighty conflict.
THE ATTITUDE OF MISSOURI.
The people of Missouri had been, as we have seen, deeply in- volved in the agitation caused by the territorial questions con- nected with the subject of slavery. Moreover, the State was largely populated by emigrants from Kentucky, Virginia and other Southern States, or by their descendants, and naturally
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there was a widespread sympathy with the secession movement. Nevertheless there was much intelligent conservatism among the people, and they were not, in the language of Gov. Stewart's last message, to be frightened from their property by the past un- friendly legislation of the North, or dragooned into secession by the restrictive legislation of the extreme South.
The General Assembly met in Jefferson City on December 31, 1860, under peculiarly embarrassing circumstances. Ten days before it convened South Carolina had passed an ordinance of secession, and before the 20th of January four other Southern States had followed her example. Besides this, the preceding national and State canvass had resulted in returning to the State Legislature representatives of each of the four political parties into which the people were divided. There were, in each branch of the General Assembly, Breckinridge Democrats, Douglas Democrats, Union or Bell-Everett men, and Republicans, and in neither Senate nor House was any one of these parties domi- nant. January 4, 1861, Claiborne F. Jackson, author of the famous " Jackson Resolution," was inaugurated as governor, having been elected by the Douglas Democrats. While Gov. Stewart's farewell message concluded with an eloquent appeal for the maintenance of the Union, as he depicted the inevitable ruin and bloodshed that must attend secession, Gov. Jackson's inaugu- ral insisted that the interests of all the slave-holding States were identical; that in case the Union were really divided, it would be the duty and privilege of Missouri to stand by the South; that the State was in favor of remaining in the Union as long as there was any hope of maintaining the guarantees of the constitution, but that, in any event, he was utterly opposed to coercion.
Believing that Missouri was entitled to a voice in the settle- ment of the questions then pending in the country, he recom- mended the immediate call of a State convention, that the will of the people might be ascertained. Such a convention was called by Gov. Jackson, in accordance with an act of the Legislature, and met at Jefferson City, February 28, 1861. Each senatorial district sent to this convention three times as many delegates as the number of members in the State Senate to which said district was entitled. In all ninety-nine members were present, and the
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convention was permanently organized by the election of the fol- lowing officers: Sterling Price, of Chariton County, president (he was then regarded as a decided Union man) ; Robert Wilson, of Andrew County, vice-president; Samuel A. Lowe, of Pettis, secretary ; Robert A. Campbell, of St. Louis, assistant secretary ; C. P. Anderson, of Moniteau, door-keeper; B. W. Grover, ser- geant-at-arms.
On March 9, during an adjourned meeting at St. Louis, Mr. Gamble, chairman of the Committee on Federal Relations, re- ported from the majority of that committee a list of resolutions, which, after some amendments were adopted by the convention, which thus refused to pass the ordinance of secession.
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