"Missouri has a right to speak on this subject, because she has suffered. Bounded on three sides by free territory, her border counties have been the frequent scenes of kidnapping and violence, and this state has probably lost as much, in the last two years, in the abduction of slaves, as all the rest of the Southern States. At this moment several of the western counties are desolated, and almost depopulated, from fear of a bandit horde, who have been committing depredations—arson, theft, and foul murder—upon the adjacent border"[[56]]
Brigadier-General Daniel M. Frost, who had been employed in repressing lawlessness in the western counties of Missouri, in reporting conditions prevailing there in November, 1860, said:
"The deserted and charred remains of once happy homes, combined with the general terror that prevailed amongst the citizens who still clung to their possessions, gave but too certain proof of the persecution to which they had all been subjected, and which they would again have to endure, with renewed violence, so soon as armed protection should be withdrawn." [note] "In view of this condition of affairs," continues the historian of Missouri I am quoting, "and in order to carry out fully Governor Stewart's order to repel invasions and restore peace to the border, General Frost determined to leave a considerable force in the threatened district. Accordingly, a battalion of volunteers, consisting of three companies of rangers and one of artillery, was enlisted, and Lieutenant-Colonel John S. Bowen, who afterwards rose to high rank in the Confederate service, was chosen to the command."[[57]]
"With the organization of this force, and perhaps owing also, in some degree, to the inclemency of the season, 'jayhawking,' as such, came to an end, though the thing itself, during the first two or three years of the Civil War, and, in fact, as long as there was anything left on the Missouri side of the border worth taking, flourished more vigorously than ever. The old jayhawking leaders, however, now came with United States commissions in their pockets and at the head of regularly enlisted troops, in which guise they carried on a system of robbery and murder that left a good portion of the frontier south of the Missouri river as perfect a waste as Germany was at the end of the Thirty Years' War."[[58]]
While this description confines the scenes of violence and rapine to the border counties south of the Missouri river,—it included Jackson county, however, which was one of the heaviest sufferers both in this border warfare and subsequently during the Civil War—still, the counties north of that stream also suffered from lawlessness and violence.
At the outbreak of the Civil War Missouri was peculiarly situated. She was surrounded on three sides by free states. The great majority of her own people were for the Union, but her government, with Clairborne Jackson as the state executive, was in sympathy with the South. As the extreme Southern States one after another seceded from the Union, Missouri was confronted with the question: What position she ought to assume in the impending conflict. The question was referred to a state convention in which appeared no secessionists. Indeed, the people of Missouri in this election by a majority of eighty thousand decided against secession. The convention, in setting forth the attitude of the state on the subject, said that Missouri's position was, "Evidently that of a state whose interests are bound up in the maintenance of the Union, and whose kind feelings and strong sympathies are with the people of the Southern States, with whom we are connected by ties of friendship and blood. We want the peace and harmony of the country restored, and we want them with us. To go with them as they are now * * * * is to ruin ourselves without doing them any good."[[59]]
While this doubtless voiced the sentiment of a great majority of Missouri's people, the government of the state and many thousands of its inhabitants sympathized with the South. The general assembly of the state authorized the raising and equipment of large military forces held subject, of course, to the orders of the governor, under the pretense of being prepared to repel invasion from any quarter whatsoever, and enable the state to maintain a neutral attitude. The governor refused to raise Missouri's quota of four regiments under President Lincoln's first call for seventy-five thousand men to suppress the rebellion, on the ground that these regiments were intended to form "part of the President's army, to make war upon the people of the seceded states." This he declared to be illegal, unconstitutional, and therefore could not be complied with. This precipitated a conflict between the state and national forces that resulted in a civil war within the state since some of her citizens sided with the general government and some with the state.
On the 20th of April, 1861, the state militia under the governor's orders captured the Federal arsenal at Liberty, Clay county, and in the nineteen months following that event "over three hundred battles and skirmishes were fought within the limits of the state," and it is assumed that in the last two years of the war, there were half as many more; "and it may be said of them," continues our historian, "that they were relatively more destructive of life, as by this time the contest had degenerated into a disgraceful internecine struggle."[[60]]
In the fall of 1864, General Sterling Price penetrated the state at the head of twelve thousand men; captured Lexington, in Ray county, and Independence, in Jackson county, and thence made his escape into Arkansas. "In the course of this raid he marched 1,434 miles, fought forty-three battles and skirmishes, and according to his own calculation destroyed upwards of 'ten million dollars' worth of property,' a fair share of which belonged to his own friends."[[61]]
In August, 1863, the celebrated Military Order No. 11 was issued from Kansas City, by General Thomas Ewing, by which "all persons living in Cass, Jackson, and Bates counties, Missouri, and in that part of Vernon included in this district, except those living within one mile of the limits of Independence, Hickman's Mills, Pleasant Hill, and Harrisonville, and except those in that part of Kaw township, Jackson county, north of Brush creek and west of the Big Blue, embracing Kansas City and Westport, are hereby ordered to remove from their present places of residence within fifteen days from the date hereof. Those who, within that time, establish their loyalty to the satisfaction of the commanding officer of the military station nearest their present place of residence, will receive from him certificates stating the fact of their loyalty, and the names of the witnesses by whom it can be shown. All who receive such certificates will be permitted to remove to any military station in this district, or to any part of the state of Kansas, except the counties on the eastern borders of the state. All others shall remove out of this district. Officers commanding companies and detachments serving in the counties named will see that this paragraph is promptly obeyed."[[62]]