USA > Missouri > Scotland County > History of Lewis, Clark, Knox, and Scotland counties, Missouri. From the earliest time to the present, together with sundry personal, business and professional sketches and mumerous family records > Part 61
USA > Missouri > Lewis County > History of Lewis, Clark, Knox, and Scotland counties, Missouri. From the earliest time to the present, together with sundry personal, business and professional sketches and mumerous family records > Part 61
USA > Missouri > Clark County > History of Lewis, Clark, Knox, and Scotland counties, Missouri. From the earliest time to the present, together with sundry personal, business and professional sketches and mumerous family records > Part 61
USA > Missouri > Knox County > History of Lewis, Clark, Knox, and Scotland counties, Missouri. From the earliest time to the present, together with sundry personal, business and professional sketches and mumerous family records > Part 61
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Scouts reported the steady advance of the secession forces. Preparations were made for battle, the upper rooms and the roofs of the courthouse were thronged with men on the lookout, and there was no little excitement at the prospect of a fight, for which, it must be said, many of the men were eager and anxious. The leaders, however, were in a state of uneasiness and perturbation. They were assured that the secession army now numbered at least 1,500, and probably 2,000 men, some of whom were citizens of Edina, and knew every street, alley and building in the town. It was reported that Green's men were well supplied with ammuni- tion in the form of cartridges, while the Home Guards had but a few rounds. An attack under such circumstances might result seriously, if not disastrously. Wilson was not a coward, but he deemed this a proper occasion for the exercise of the better part of valor, and determined to retreat to Macon City.
Green's advance reached Troublesome Creek at sundown. A few shots were exchanged with some ranging Home Guards without effect, and the command halted. A little after nightfall Wilson said to some of his officers that he would not take the responsibility of ordering a fight; that he would go to Macon City with those of his men that might choose to follow him, but that everybody was at liberty to do as he pleased. Whereupon
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he set out for the southwest at the head of perhaps 200 men. The remainder had fled, " every man to his tent." The Wilmoth- ville Company went home, the men, mad as hornets, because they had been drawn out on "a wild goose chase," and sent home without a fight when such a splendid opportunity had been pre- sented. Other men from this county were greatly indignant at the retreat and abandonment of the town, and refused to leave the county at all. Some of them followed Wilson and Murray as far as Rock Creek, under the impression that the force was being marched out to fight, and by a circuitous route to fall upon Green's flank as he should approach the town; and when they learned the real object of the movement, and that it meant a skedaddle to Macon City, they turned about and returned to their homes in great indignation and disgust.
Wilson's abandonment of the town has been severely criticised. It is asserted that had he remained and defended the place he could easily have kept out the rebels, and thus given the Union cause a prestige, and the Union men a reputation not easily ob- tained, and worth a great deal. It is claimed that practically his force was fully equal to Green's, if not in numbers, certainly . in general effectiveness. It is alleged that the total number of Home Guards in Edina was not less than 500, and some estimates make it even larger, and that these, behind brick walls and the houses and fences, could easily have driven back a force three times as strong. On the other hand, it is asserted that Wilson had no more than 300 men, indifferently armed, and with but a scanty supply of ammunition, and that these men were not drilled or disciplined, and were, almost without exception, men and boys, who had never discharged a gun at a man with intent to kill, wound, or do great bodily harm. That Green had 1,500 men, well mounted and armed, with two cannons and an abundant supply of ammunition, knew the ground and the situation per- fectly well, and could easily have taken the place either by as- sault or bombardment, and that a fight would have resulted in the killing of a few men, the destruction of considerable property, and the probable capture of the greater part of the Union force; and that the results of a victory over the Secessionists would have been unimportant and without influence.
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However this issue should be decided, it is certain that the Home Guards left Edina with something of precipitation, on the evening of the 30th of July, and that close upon their heels came the secession forces under Martin E. Green. As soon as the Unionists had departed the wife of Hon. Warner Pratt hastened to meet the rebels, and to give them the information. They came up rapidly, and were soon in complete possession of the town. They occupied the public square and the courthouse in consider- able numbers; the streets were patroled, and pickets thrown out on all the roads. Quite a number of Union men, some of them Home Guards, were taken in. There was little or no plundering or robbing of private property, save that every species of firearms, and all of the powder, shot and caps found in the town were taken possession of. The arrest of Unionists went on all night, and until after daylight the next morning, when scouting parties began to arrive from the country with other prisoners. When daylight came, there floated from a staff on the cupola of the courthouse a banner new to the air of Knox County and strange to the people. It was the flag of secession, with its fifteen stars, its three stripes, its grizzly bears, and what not, a banner of strange devices and of much signification and import.
As soon as it could well be done, Col. Green established his camp at "Mill town," now a part of Southern Edina, and traversed by the Quincy, Missouri & Pacific Railroad. This was done to bring the camp near to the water in the Fabius for the horses, and for the use of the men in the camps. There were quite a number of tents in the command, and, as the weather was warm, camp life was rather enjoyable. Recruits came in daily and almost hourly.
A few days before the appearance of Green's forces, and while the Home Guards were at Edina, a scouting party was sent out south of town to take away some arms from the alleged rebels in that quarter. A young man named Jackson Grant, of Edina, and Daniel Easley rode up to the house of William Everman, who lived nearly five miles south of town, but before they could dismount from their horses Everman fired upon them, from the corner of his house, with a double-barreled shot-gun, shooting Grant out of his saddle, and killing him instantly. Easley gal-
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loped to town and gave the alarm, and a party came out to inves- tigate.
As soon as Grant fell, Mr. Everman's daughter, a young lady of twenty, ran out and took the dying man's gun and revolver from the body. When Green's men came to Edina Miss Ever- man visited the camp at "Mill town," bearing with her the tro- phies of her exploit, which, she said, she desired to present to some brave Southern boys, who would agree to use them. Ac- cordingly a line of men was formed, and the lady and her weap- ons were received with considerable ceremony, and amid cheers and general enthusiasm. A story is current that at one time Miss Everman was Grant's fiancee, but the war and Grant's unionism broke the engagement.
The party of Home Guards that went out to Everman's, made thorough search for- Everman, himself, but could not find him, and returned to Edina with the body of their comrade, all ghastly and gory. Jackson Grant's was the first blood shed in the county in the war, but not the last. His death might have been justi- fiable under the circumstances, but it was fully avenged after- ward. The body was buried in the old cemetery at Edina. Everman and family left the country before the war had been long in progress.
On the 2d of August one of Green's men, named William Cummings, who belonged to a Lewis County company, was shot and mortally wounded by Hance Caldwell, another Lewis County man, and an acting lieutenant. Cummings was in town and intox- icated, noisy, boisterous and insubordinate. Caldwell was a sort of officer of the day, and was sent to compel Cummings to return to camp. Cummings was on the west side of the square; he had his rifle, which Caldwell seized, and, in endeavoring to induce Cummings to mount his horse, the weapon was discharged, and Cummings was shot through the body. He died in a few days. Caldwell claimed that the shooting was accidental, and the mat- ter was dismissed.
The next day, August 3, the expedition against Col. Moore and his force at Athens set out. [See Clark County division. ] Col. Green took charge of the force in person, assisted by Shack- lett, Duell, and others. At Edina, to hold the place, and to form
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a sort of a reserve, was left a strong battalion under Capt. Frisby Mccullough and Lieut .- Col. Joe Porter. The greater part of Porter's men, if not all of them, were with Green, and McCul- lough's were depended upon for garrison service, while an extra number did the scouting and reconnoitering. The camp remained at "Mill town," although a number of the men slept in the houses of friends at Edina.
During the rebel occupation of Edina the county court was in session, and was not disturbed. Col. Green had no disposi- tion to interfere with the authorities, and his men were, on the whole orderly, although many of them were noisy and boisterous. The prisoners made were considerately treated, and the most of them released on the evacuation of the place. Considerable levies were made on the country for provisions and forage, but nobody seemed to be seriously damaged. For a few hours after the reb- els came into town there were a score or more of Union Home Guards in the place, who moved about as they pleased, being mistaken by the sentinels for comrades. On one occasion a sen- tinel on a back street halted Jacob Pugh, James Cody and another Unionist, but they took his gun from him, broke it over a stone, gave him a kick, and sent him to camp at "Mill town," while they took to the brush. During the stay of the rebels Union men were hiding in the brush and timber and in the barns and corn-fields all about Edina. But when the rebel stragglers from the Athens fight began to come in, the Union men came from their hiding places, and when Mccullough and Porter left Edina, and even before, some of the Home Guards planted them- selves in the street and took up quite a number of the demoral- ized fugitives. They soon had the court room half full of pris- oners, who were soon released, after having their arms taken from them, and after subscribing to some sort of oath of loyalty.'
The first news of the Athens fight was brought by the fugi- tives from the field. Porter and Mccullough evacuated and re- paired to the northwestern part of Lewis, in the Fabius timber, where there was a reorganization of the forces, and in a few days the series of menacing movements against Kirksville and other points began. The rebel force moved to Bee Branch in Adair, but after the skirmish on the branch [ see Lewis history ], it fell
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back, on the 20th of August, to Feltz's bridge in the southwest corner of this county. After a series of desultory movements, which can not here be described, the entire army repaired to Mar- shall's mills, in Marion County, from where about the first of September, it moved southward to Florida, in Monroe.
When Capt. Wilson and his men reached Macon City and gave informatian of the situation at Edina, word was at once sent to Gen. Pope, at Mexico, and that officer took steps immedi- ately to have the rebel force attacked. There were no unem- ployed Federal troops nearer than Keokuk, where there were a few hundred raw recruits, who were being organized into regi- ments. To Col. W. H. Worthington, commanding the recruit- ing station and camp of instruction at Keokuk, instructions were sent to organize a campaign, with Edina as the objective point. Gen. Pope's instructions to Col. Worthington were as follows:
HEADQUARTERS DISTRICT NORTH MISSOURI, MEXICO, August 2, 1862. 5 COL. WORTHINGTON, COMMANDING IOWA TROOPS, KEOKUK:
Sir, Immediately upon receipt of this order you will direct Col. Bussey, with his cavalry, to march forthwith to Memphis, in Scotland County, and hav- ing discharged the duty hereafter specified in this order, to effect a junction at Edina with the remainder of the forces under your command. You will please put one of your infantry regiments on march for Edina, by the way of Water- loo, and with the other regiment under your immediate command you will take the boat for Canton, and proceed to Edina by way of Monticello. When you have effected a junction there with your other forces, report to me your opera- tions and all matters of interest. Buy provisions for your troops whenever you need them, and give orders for payment on the chief commissary at these head- quarters.
You will disperse all bands of armed secessionists, and if any are captured in arms send them direct to this place for trial. I send you a printed notice to be distributed along the routes pursued by your respective columns, and direct the commanding officer to appoint committees specified in the printed order, se- lecting for that purpose the most wealthy and prominent men in the county, preferring mostly the secessionists. The printed orders and accompanying let- ter will inform you fully of the system I intend to adopt in Northeast Missouri .* I wish to give the secessionists such inducements as loss of property and dan- ger to families to aid Union men in keeping the peace. Notify all the popula- tion that the forces stand prepared to enforce this printed notice fully and vigor- ously, and commence it with your forces as soon as you think it desirable. Act promptly and vigorously, and I think peace will result to all parts of North Mis- souri. Respectfully, your obedient servant,
JOHN POPE, Brig. Gen. Commanding North Missouri.
*The "system " referred to was the general plan of holding the rebel citizens of a county re- sponsible for all damages done by the insurgent forces. A "committee of safety" was to be ap- pointed to assess all damages so effected and to require the "disloyal " to pay them.
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But in a few days after the issuance of the foregoing order the force under Green was defeated in the engagement at Athens, and the contemplated movement upon Edina was never made. In a few weeks Gen. Pope took the field in person against Green, but accomplished nothing of value, and Green, with his entire force, made his way safely to Lexington.
About the middle of August, Col. David Moore, with his " Northeast Missouri Regiment," came to Edina in pursuance of his plan for the expulsion of all the rebel forces from this quarter. With him were many Knox County men, who had joined him at Memphis and elsewhere. The advent of the Union column, with the old flag flying, the drums beating, and the soldiers cheering, was greeted with great enthusiasm by the Unionists of Edina. Moore and his men were considered guests of the town. So engrossed were soldiers and citizens in their interchange of congratulations and compliments that they omitted to note the presence of half a dozen of Green's men-Judge John R. Black among the number-who were in town taking notes, and who, a few hours later, were in Green's camp making reports.
In a day or two Moore left Edina and Knox County, march- ing to Fairmont, and thence to Waterloo, to unite with Wood- yard. He took with him a number of alleged secessionists from Edina and the county, who were all, or nearly all, released at Waterloo, and compelled to make their way to their homes as best they could. Some Home Guards were left in this county to preserve the peace and to keep watch and ward.
Near the last of August Col. Moore returned to Edina, en route to form a junction with the Federal forces from Kirksville, under Gen. Hurlbut, moving against Green, who was then in camp at Marshall's mills, in Marion County, organizing and con- centrating his forces for a movement southward, to join the army of Gen. Price. Leaving Edina on the 1st of September, Moore marched to Bethel, Shelby County, where, on the 2d, he formed a junction with the Sixteenth Illinois, Col. R. F. Smith, and the Third Iowa Infantry, Lieut .- Col. John Scott, and about 100 Knox and Adair Home Guards, under Capt. Call. The Northeast Mis- souri Regiment and the Sixteenth Illinois moved eastward from
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Bethel to Philadelphia, and thence to Palmyra. The Third Iowa went to Shelbina via Shelbyville.
In August another Home Guard company was organized in the county, this time at Goodland. It numbered about sixty men. Valentine Cupp, an old citizen of the county and a Mex- ican war veteran, was made captain, and George Hamblin was first lieutenant. The company went to Kirksville soon after its organization, and was received into service by Gen. Hurlbut, and employed in scouting for the troops. A majority of the members accompanied the Third Iowa to the western part of the State, and, on the 14th of September, the company took part in an en- gagement near Blue Mills Landing, Clay County, wherein Capt. Cupp was killed, and some two or three of the men wounded. Subsequently Lieut. James Call, of the Third Iowa, was acting captain of the company, and ultimately it became Company F, Third Missouri Cavalry.
Thereafter, during the year 1861, the Federal authority in Knox County was not even disputed. The Confederates who cared to fight were off in the army with Price; their sympathiz- ers at home were subdued and quiet. The county officials made haste to take the oath of allegiance to the provisional government of the State, at whose head was Hamilton R. Gamble, the de facto governor. The machinery of the county started and ran very smoothly under the circumstances.
On the 26th of October "Claib. Jackson's Legislature," as the secession members of the General Assembly were sometimes called, met in the Masonic Hall, at Neosho, Newton County, pur- suant to a proclamation previously issued by Gov. Jackson, and on the 28th an act of secession was passed by both houses. In the Senate the only vote in the negative was cast by Charles H. Hardin, of Callaway, who was elected governor in 1874; in the House the sole member voting "no" was Shambaugh, of De Kalb. That the action of this body was entirely void is hardly disputed. The entire question of secession, or of the relation of the State to the Federal Government, had long before been dele- gated to and vested in the State convention, by act of the Legis- lature, approved by the governor and ratified by the people. The only restriction upon the power of the convention was a
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provision that secession could not be accomplished, nor the rela- tion of the State to the general Government disturbed, without a vote of all the people. The Legislature could not have sum- marily resumed the power once delegated away, even in regular session; but the Neosho body was composed of a mere minority of the Legislature proper, containing but thirty-nine members of the House, and ten members of the Senate, when, by the consti- tution, a quorum for the transaction of any business was required to consist of seventeen senators and sixty-seven representatives. The acts of such a "rump " organization could have no validity, and certainly its alleged ordinance of secession could have no effect without the ratification of the people, for which there was no provision made.
But the Missouri "secession ordinance," and the subsequent act of annexation to the Southern Confederacy, were approved by the Confederate Congress, and so far as that relation could be created by those desiring it, Missouri became a member of the tur- bulent Confederate States family. A convention held at Rich- mond, October 31, between Thomas L. Snead and E. C. Cabell, on the part of the Jackson government, of Missouri, and R. M. T. Hunter, on the part of the Confederate States, agreed upon the admission of Missouri into the Southern Confederacy, and it was really this agreement which was ratified by the Confederate Congress.
The troops of Missourians in arms against the United States thereafter were generally called Confederates, because they claimed to be citizens and in the service of the Confederacy. The State, however, even in the estimation of those who favored the se- cession cause, occupied an anomalous position toward the Confed- eracy. Its representatives in the Southern Congress were not elected by the people, but chosen by the Legislature. It had not a single municipal government or organization, and not a single civil officer claiming to hold a commission from Confeder- ate authority, it paid not a cent of taxes for the support of the Richmond government, and, in short, made but a pretense of its claims to recognition as a Confederate State.
In the winter of 1861-62 matters were comparatively quiet in the county. The theater of war had been removed to a distance,
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and the county's actors were playing their parts upon the scenes. In the first part of the year 1862 certain Knox County men, who had been with Gen. Price, and had served six months in the Missouri State Guard, returned to their homes. A few came forward and readily took the oath of allegiance to the United States, but others kept in the brush, and in the end occasioned much trouble and mischief.
In the month of February recruiting was begun for the Elev- enth Missouri State Militia, Lipscomb's regiment, by Capt. James A. Reid, at Edina, Capt. Lewis Sells, at Newark, and elsewhere in the county. The men so secured were afterward mustered into service as Companies K and L of the Eleventh. The officers of Company K were Wesley Lair, of Marion, cap- tain; and James A. Reid and James Wamsley, lieutenants. Company K was a Knox County company, recruited chiefly from about Newark. Its officers were Lewis Sells, captain; Benjamin F. Snyder, Isaac G. Bohon, lieutenants. Upon the consolidation of the Eleventh Missouri State Militia and the Second Regiment, with John McNeil as colonel, this company became Company K of the latter regiment.
In March, 1862, the Confederate partisans in this quarter bestirred themselves. As noted in other divisions in this quarter, they were active, elsewhere, in preparing for more exciting events than had yet happened. It was expected that there would be a general "rising" in North Missouri the coming summer, and the people were preparing for it. In this county certain returned soldiers from Price's army were busy in half-organizing the rebel element, and stimulating it to efforts against the Fed- eral cause.
In the latter part of the month occurred two incidents illus- trating the temper of the Confederates, and the condition of af- fairs and of public sentiment. In the northern partof the county, or in the southern part of Scotland, a band of Confederate par- tisans, or " bushwhackers," as they were generally called, led by William Ewing, of that community, had been operating for some weeks in this county, Schuyler and Scotland, in conjunction with another small band of Schuyler, led by Bill Dunn. Ewing was a farmer, and lived just across the border of Scotland County, in
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the neighborhood of that never-failing fountain of water known to rebel raiders and Federal troopers as Short's Well. It is said that originally he was a Union man, but that his views changed with the times and circumstances, and he took up arms and " went to the brush."
Orders were given to Lieut. Joseph H. Cell, at Edina, to take a squad of the newly-recruited Eleventh Missouri State Militia, capture Ewing and some others in his neighborhood, and « bring them before the military authorities at Palmyra. It was not definitely known at the time that Ewing was actually in arms; reports on that point were conflicting. On the 24th of March Lieut. Cell set out on his mission. Reaching the vicinity of the house no preparations were made for a fight-there seems not to have been a consciousness of peril. Approaching the building suddenly, without warning, a volley from half a dozen or more rifles and shot-guns blazed therefrom, and two of the Federals were killed outright, and two more severely wounded. The re- mainder retired in some confusion, returning an ineffectual fire. Ewing, with a number of his followers, was in the house await- ing the attack, forewarned and forearmed. Upon the conclu- sion of this skirmish he repaired to the woods.
The next day a strong party, bent on vengeance, went to the Short's Well neighborhood, scouted the country thoroughly, but failing to find Ewing, took some satisfaction in burning his house, and in seizing considerable of his property. There was great excitement in the country, over the little skirmish, which many feared was but the beginning of more serious troubles.
The two Federals killed were Thompson Botts and Wilson Spiers, both of whom lived in the southern part of the county, in the neighborhood of Novelty. Their bodies were conveyed to their homes, and on the 26th buried in the neighborhood cemetery.
The State militia troops from Edina, some twenty-five in number, took charge of the funeral ceremonies of their comrades, and buried them with the honors of war. Killed in action, they died the death and received the burial of soldiers, with beat of drum and roll of volley. After Jack Grant, these were the first Federal soldiers killed in the county.
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