First of all, without neglecting for a moment the movements of the army of Price in the State, he began to disentangle the military snarl in and about St. Louis. One after another, the different divisions of Fremont’s army were returning from their bootless campaign. There was great confusion. All seemed to be at cross-purposes. Each subordinate commander, uncertain as to his duty, was anxiously awaiting orders. But General Halleck, amid the din of conflicting interests from various quarters demanding his immediate attention, never for a moment lost his head. With a masterful hand he reduced to system what, at first blush, seemed an inextricable mass of antagonistic interests. In a comparatively short time every imperative call upon him had been fully met, every subordinate officer had found his place, learned his duties and was efficiently doing them. The internal affairs of his department were at last running as smoothly as the most critical could reasonably expect.
As soon as General Halleck had put things to rights in his military household, he broke up the different secret rendezvous in St. Louis, where the secessionists met to plot against the government, where they stowed their war material, and clandestinely drilled that they might be prepared for open conflict, which they still hoped would soon be precipitated. He did this important work with such downright thoroughness, that so far as could be seen he put an end to these secret rebel gatherings.
He also determined to sustain with all the power at his command the enactments of the sovereign Convention, now the only legislative body of the State. During the preceding month the Convention had once more reassembled in St. Louis and enacted weighty laws to safeguard loyal Missouri. Among other important measures, it prescribed an oath of allegiance to the United States to be taken by all municipal and State officers under pain of deposition.
The general did not permit this requirement to go unheeded. He insisted that all who were amenable to this law should obey it. So from time to time peremptory orders were sent out from his headquarters, commanding all who had been remiss in subscribing to the oath to take it at once or vacate their places. He expressly enjoined the mayor of St. Louis to compel all city officers to take the prescribed oath, and the provost-marshal general to arrest all State officers who had from any cause failed to subscribe to it.[[81]] As late as January 26th, 1862, he ordered all officers of the St. Louis Mercantile Library Association, and of the St. Louis Chambers of Commerce to take the oath before the provost marshal within ten days, or quit their posts. On February 4th, he issued a similar order, which was a drag-net, in which he tried to catch every disloyal official in Missouri, of whatever grade. He decisively commanded all officials of the University of Missouri, all presidents and directors of railroads, all quartermasters, clerks and agents in the service of the United States to subscribe to the oath or immediately to resign their offices.[[82]] And at last he evidently considered even this to be inadequate, since, a month later, he ordered all licensed attorneys, counsellors-at-law and proctors, and all jurors to take the oath or at once cease to exercise their public functions;[[83]] and to make the work complete in every detail, to unearth all rebels in hiding, he ordered every voter in Missouri to take the oath of allegiance to the United States on pain of disfranchisement.[[84]] Thus did this Union general, with his numerous drastic orders, endeavor to uncover every disloyal man in our commonwealth. Was it wise? He thought it was, else he would not have done it.
But we have not enumerated a tithe of his swarming manifestoes. We soon concluded that his distinguishing characteristic was orders. Orders, orders came in volleys from his headquarters. He was evidently earnestly endeavoring to find out who, in his military department, were for the Union and who were against it. His orders were trumpet-calls to every man to take his stand openly and show his colors. He wished to ascertain who were the enemies of the Union that he might justly deal with them. When, therefore, by the testimony of reliable witnesses, and by his own daily observation, he had gotten a clear view of the state of things that confronted him, the disloyal began to feel the grip of his iron hand. He ordered the arrest of occupants of carriages carrying rebel flags, and the confiscation of the carriages.[[85]] Rebel flags from all such vehicles disappeared as by magic. Their owners of course had not met with any change of heart, but in order to save their personal property concluded to conduct themselves with outward decency and civility in a loyal city.
The general directed another manifesto against the fair sex, who, having the courage of their convictions, and relying on the courtesy and gallantry universally shown in our country to women, had vauntingly carried the Confederate flag on their persons, and at times had waved it to their rebel friends, who were confined in the Gratiot Street prison. He ordered their arrest. Some of them were apprehended and imprisoned. One, who had been a prominent worker in my own church and congregation, having been found guilty of conveying important information to the enemy, was banished from the city and State. Having acted the part of a spy, her punishment was exceedingly mild. If a man had committed the same crime he would have been shot or hung. In fact General Halleck had already ordered that all persons found within the Federal lines, giving aid to the rebels, be treated as spies, arrested and shot. But previous good character and deference to sex saved the guilty woman from a fate so dire.
Other women of high social position, whose homes were outside the city in the State, had fled from the disorder and violence of their neighborhoods to St. Louis for safety. Generously protected within our gates and by our army, some of them hatched and executed schemes to aid the Southern Confederacy, to overturn the very government under whose sheltering wings they were abiding in security. While the disloyal deeds of many of them remained undiscovered, and they continued during the whole period of the war to dwell unmolested under the flag that they hated and clandestinely plotted to destroy, others, betrayed by their over-bold acts of disloyalty, were by our general remorselessly banished from our city. He sent them back to their homes in the State, around which the swirling tides of war still swept. Some prominent loyal men pleaded for them, but pleaded in vain. The general unflinchingly did his duty as he saw it.
Nor did the disloyal press elude his eye, or escape his retributive hand. By his direction the provost-marshal general ordered all newspapers throughout the State to furnish him a copy of each issue. The penalty for any failure to obey this drastic mandate was suppression or confiscation.
Moreover, every important military movement within the bounds of his department received his thoughtful critical attention. At this time, General Price had returned to the State and was leading his army northward. He wished to destroy the Hannibal and St. Joseph Railroad, and so cut off communication between that part of the State and St. Louis. He also desired to secure recruits for his depleted ranks from the northern counties, especially notorious for their disloyalty. Many of the people of that region hailed his approach and flocked to his standard. But aside from those who enlisted in his army there were various companies of secessionists, that enthusiastically entered into the work of destroying the railroad. At several different points they tore up the tracks, bent the rails, burned depots and bridges, and demolished telegraph-poles. This was a serious blow to us, and men in our city were anxiously asking to what this would lead. But General Halleck was equal to the situation. He regarded such irresponsible bands of rebels, engaged in the wanton destruction of public property, as mere outlaws, having no claim to the immunities accorded to regularly enlisted soldiers. To meet the exigency he ordered that these lawless bridge-burners be forthwith arrested and shot. Scores of them were apprehended; the ringleaders were court-martialed, condemned to be shot, and were long kept in prison awaiting the execution of the sentence, which was afterwards commuted to a period of hard labor.
He also followed up the first manifesto by a second, in which he ordered that, where railroad property had been destroyed, the commanding officer nearest to the scene of devastation should impress the slaves of all secessionists in that neighborhood, and, if need be, also the owners of them, and compel them to do all the menial work required in repairing the damage that had been done. This order was faithfully carried out, and it put an end to the destruction of railroad property in that part of the State. It was a great comfort to us in St. Louis to see that the orders of our general were not mere fulminations, but the immediate precursors of deeds; that they hit hard the things aimed at.