It seemed for a few momentous days in the opening of 1861 that Missouri would be inevitably swept into the tide of Secession, and even in St. Louis, the stronghold of Republicanism, a monster mass meeting, called and controlled by such afterwards—strong loyalists as Hamilton R. Gamble, later the Union Governor of the State, Nathaniel Paschall, James E. Yeatman, and Robert Campbell, unanimously passed resolutions declaring slave property to be held as a Constitutional right which the Government should secure, and if it did not, Missouri "would join with her sister States and share their duties and dangers," and that the Government should not attempt to coerce the seceding States. This word "coerce" had an extraordinarily ugly sound to all ears, and was a potent enchantment in taking many of the professedly Union men into the ranks of the rebellion. Even Horace Greeley recoiled from "a Union held together by bayonets."
The bill "to call a Convention to consider the relations of the State of Missouri to the United States, and to adopt measures for vindicating the sovereignty of the State, and the protection of her institutions," was promptly reported back to both Houses on the 9th of January, and as promptly passed by them, with only two adverse votes in the Senate and 18 in the House. Of the latter 11 were from St. Louis.
The Secessionists proceeded to a joyful celebration of this new triumph. They hastened at once to another step to ally Missouri with the South. A Commissioner arrived from the State of Mississippi to ask the co-operation of Missouri in measures of common defense and safety. The Governor received him with the distinction accredited an Embassador from a foreign power, and recommended the Legislature to do likewise. The serviceable Lieut.-Gov. Reynolds carried out this idea by putting through a joint resolution to receive the Commissioner in the House Chamber, with both bodies, the Governor and other chief officers of the State, and the Judges of the Supreme Court in attendance, and with every other honor. He dictated that upon the announcement of the entrance of the Commissioner, the whole body should respectfully rise. The radical Union men from St. Louis resisted this vehemently, and did not hesitate to apply the ugly word "traitor" to the Commissioner, and those who were aiding and abetting him.
The Commissioner made a long address, in which he said that the Union had been dissolved, could never be reconstructed; that war was inevitable, and the people of Mississippi earnestly invited those of Missouri to unite with their kindred for common defense and safety. A few days later the Legislature adopted a resolution against coercion, and another introduced by George Graham Vest, of the Committee on Federal Relations, afterwards Senator in the Confederate House from Missouri, and for 24 years representing Missouri in the Senate of the United States. This resolution declared that so "abhorrent was the doctrine of coercion, that any attempt at such would result in the people of Missouri rallying on the side of their Southern brethren to resist to the last extremity." There was only one vote against this in the Senate, and but 14 in the House.
The eager young Secessionists were impatient to emulate their brethren farther south, and strike a definite blow—seize something that would wreck the sovereignty of the United States. Forts there were none. In the historic old Jefferson Barracks, below St. Louis, there were only a small squad of raw recruits, and a few officers, mostly of Southern proclivities, whom it would be cruel to turn out of house and home while they were waiting "for their States to go out."
There were but two Arsenals in the State; a small affair at Liberty, in the northwest, near the Missouri River, which contained several hundred muskets, a dozen cannon, and a considerable quantity of powder. The other was the great Arsenal at St. Louis, one of the most important in the country. It covered 56 acres of ground, fronting on the Mississippi River, was inclosed by a high stone wall on all sides but that of the river, and had within it four massive stone buildings standing in a rectangle. In these were stored 60,000 stands of arms, mostly Enfield and Springfield rifles, 1,500,000 cartridges, 90,000 pounds of powder, a number of field pieces and siege guns, and a great quantity of munitions of various kinds. There were also machinery and appliances of great value. The Arsenal was situated on rather low ground, and was commanded from hills near by. At the beginning of 1861 the only persons in it were some staff officers, with their servants and orderlies, and the unarmed workmen. The officer in command was Maj. Wm. Haywood Bell, a North Carolinian, graduate of West Point, and Ordnance Officer, but who had spent nearly the whole of his 40 years' service in Bureau work, attending meanwhile so providently to his own affairs that he was quite a wealthy man, with most of his investments in St. Louis.
Gov. Claiborne F. Jackson had as his military adviser and executant Maj.-Gen. Daniel M. Frost, a New Yorker by birth and a graduate of West Point. He had served awhile in the Mexican War, where he received a brevet as First Lieutenant for gallantry at Cerro Gordo, and then became Quartermaster of his regiment. He had been sent to Europe as a student of the military art there, but resigned in 1853, to take charge of a planing mill and carpentry work in St. Louis. He subsequently became a farmer, was elected to the Missouri Senate, entered the Missouri Militia, rose to be Brigadier-General, and was sanguinely expected to become for Missouri what Lee and Jos. E. Johnston were for Virginia, Beauregard for South Carolina, and Braxton Bragg for Louisiana. He was really a good deal of a soldier, with foresight and initiative force, and had the Governor had the courage to follow his bold counsels, the course of events might have been different.