It has remained for an officer of the Confederate army, Thomas L. Snead, in his comment on this letter to utter perhaps the most eloquent eulogy pronounced on General Lyon. “Not one word about the desperate battle that he was to fight on the morrow; not one fault-finding utterance; not a breath of complaint! But true to his convictions; true to his flag; true to the Union men of Missouri who confided in and followed him; true to himself; and true to duty, he went out to battle against a force twice as great as his own, with a calmness that was as pathetic as his courage was sublime.”[[52]]
The next morning before sunrise, the 10th of August, he vigorously attacked the enemy, who were taken utterly by surprise. It is not within the scope of my purpose to attempt any description of the fierce and bloody battle that followed. It raged for fully six hours. According to the most conservative estimates, Lyon lost of his small army of four or five thousand men more than thirteen hundred in killed, wounded, and missing. The Confederates lost still more. Lyon was twice wounded, and afterwards, while leading a regiment of his troops in a desperate charge, was shot through the heart and instantly killed; but even after his death his plucky little army fought on for a time unflinchingly, and with a large measure of success. Nor did they abandon the well-contested field until the ammunition of a large part of their force was utterly exhausted. Even then they retreated in good order. They had inflicted a blow so terrible and unexpected that the Confederates were unwilling or unable to pursue them. Having rested a few hours at Springfield, they retreated unmolested to Rolla, with all their wagons, provisions, and munitions of war; while McCulloch and Price sat down at Springfield and wrote reports of their great victory at Wilson’s Creek. Some of their subordinate officers in their reports declared with refreshing frankness that Lyon, in his attack on their camp, had completely surprised them.
A few days later came the last act of this sad drama. The body of General Lyon was brought back to us. It was borne through the city and across the Mississippi to the railroad depot. It was escorted by prominent citizens, city officials, regiments of soldiers, infantry, cavalry and artillery, marching with arms reversed. Conspicuous in this martial array was General Fremont, with his staff and body-guard. The bands played plaintive dirges. The bells tolled. The national flags of the city, encampments and Arsenal were draped and at half-mast. A great, sad, silent throng, on either side of the street along which the funeral cortège moved, stood with heads uncovered. The dust of one of the best friends the loyal of St. Louis ever had thus passed on its way to burial in Connecticut, the native State of the dauntless hero, who poured out his heart’s blood at Wilson’s Creek to save our commonwealth and city from secession. But strange as it may seem to the present generation, we were then and there so utterly divided in judgment and feeling that while many mourned, some rejoiced; tears stained some cheeks, smiles rippled across some faces.
And during all this pageant of mourning our hearts bled afresh, as we remembered that the ear of Fremont had been apparently deaf to Lyon when he pleaded for at least one more regiment of troops, and was left unaided to fight, against great odds, a forlorn and desperate battle in which he laid down his life. We knew then, as we know now, that Fremont could have granted the request of his subordinate; that General Pope had in the northern part of the State an army of fully nine thousand men that were not just then imperatively needed there; that Fremont called for and put under his own immediate command a part of that force; that he sent troops at that time into different parts of the State; that two regiments were guarding Rolla, and that one of them, without jeopardizing any important interest, could have been sent to Lyon; but for some occult reason he refused to lift a finger in time to help his capable subordinate, but abandoned him to defeat and death. To be sure, on August 5th, he ordered a regiment of a thousand men at Fort Leavenworth to re-enforce Lyon,[[53]] but that was too late. There was no railroad connection. The order had to be sent by express. Before the regiment had gotten half way to Springfield the fate of Lyon was sealed. On the same date, August 5th, he ordered Colonel Stevenson, commanding the Seventh Missouri Volunteers, to report to Lyon with despatch. When the colonel reached Rolla, he found no transportation for his troops. They could not reach their destination in time. The remembrance of this on that funeral march rankled in every loyal heart.
But when our general reported to the War Department the battle of Wilson’s Creek, in just and fitting words he eulogized the slain hero. In a measure that dulled the edge of our resentment towards him, and partially revived our wavering confidence in him. We were still further reconciled to him, when, seeing the anarchy by which we were threatened, and believing that certain inimical movements among us could not be adequately and decisively dealt with by ordinary civil processes, on August 14th, he declared martial law in St. Louis and St. Louis County. At that time, according to the most conservative estimate, there were in our city at least eight thousand pronounced and active secessionists, and seven thousand of them were reported to be armed with weapons of various kinds.[[54]] They were prepared, whenever their compatriots in rebellion should attack the city from without, to join hands with them by a vigorous movement from within. So while the necessity of martial law was regretted by all, its proclamation came as a distinct relief and assurance to all the loyal.
Major J. McKinstry of the United States army was appointed provost marshal. He was an able, faithful officer and discharged his delicate and weighty duties with fearlessness and thoughtful discrimination. He at once issued a proclamation, declaring that he should not interfere with the operation of the civil law, except in cases where that law was found inadequate to the maintenance of the public peace and safety.[[55]] He followed this considerate and reassuring manifesto with orders forbidding under heavy penalties all persons not in the military service of the United States, or in the regularly constituted police of the city, carrying concealed weapons, and prohibiting the sale of all firearms without a special permit from his office. This was striking at the root of all the dangers that immediately threatened the loyal of the city and county, and we retired that night with a deeper sense of security than we had felt for several months.
FACSIMILE OF A PASS ISSUED TO THE AUTHOR IN 1861.
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On the following day, he suppressed The War Bulletin and The Missourian, papers that, to the detriment of the loyal, had maliciously and shamefully misrepresented the movements of the Federal troops in the State. But under a government like ours, where all enjoy such unbounded freedom of speech, such acts, whether by the direction of civil or military authority, are usually offensive, whatever public necessity may be urged as a justification of them. And both the right and expediency of suppressing even these virulent secession journals were doubted by very many of the Unionists. But, at a later day, we felt that we could approve, if not applaud, much of what the provost marshal wrote to the editor of the Christian Advocate, who had inquired if the rumors were true that the marshal intended to suppress his paper. The suggestive reply was: “Permit me to say that in my judgment, in these times of political excitement, and heated discussion, and civil war, it would be more becoming, as well as more consistent, that a public newspaper, belonging to, and advocating the doctrines and principles of the church of Christ, should abstain from publishing articles of a political character, calculated to inflame the passions of men, and evidently hostile to the government of the country. Let your journal be a religious paper, as it professes to be, and it will never come under the discipline of this department.”