Early in the morning of the 15th, having left the troops to protect the town, the Governor proceeded alone to the camp of the invading forces, then within three miles and drawn up in line of battle. Before reaching Franklin, he met the advance guard, and upon inquiring who they were and what were their objects, received for answer that they were the Territorial Militia, and called into service by the Governor of Kansas, and that they were marching to wipe out Lawrence and every Abolitionist in the country.
Mr. Geary informed them that he was now Governor of Kansas, and Commander-in-chief of the Territorial Militia, and ordered the officer in command to countermarch his troops back to the main line, and conduct him to the center, which order, after some hesitation, was reluctantly obeyed.
The red face of the rising sun was just peering over the top of Blue Mound, as the Governor, with his strange escort of three hundred mounted men, with red shirts and odd-shaped hats, descended upon the Wakarusa plain, where in battle array were ranged at least three thousand armed and desperate men. They were not dressed in the usual habiliments of soldiers, but in every imaginable costume that could be obtained in the western region. Most of them were mounted, and manifested an unmistakable disposition to be at their bloody work. In the back-ground stood at least three hundred army tents and as many wagons, while here and there a cannon was planted ready to aid in the anticipated destruction. Among the banners floated black flags, to indicate the design that neither age, sex nor condition would be spared in the slaughter that was to ensue.
In passing along the lines murmurs of discontent and savage threats of assassination fell upon the Governor's ears, but heedless of these and regardless, in fact, of everything but a desire to avert the terrible calamity that was impending, he fearlessly proceeded to the quarters of their leader.
This threatening army was under the command of John W. Reed, then and now a member of the Missouri Legislature, assisted by ex-Senator Atchison, Gen. B. F. Stringfellow, Gen. L. A. Maclean, Gen. J. W. Whitfield, Gen. George W. Clarke, Gens. William A. Heiskell, Wm. H. Richardson and F. A. Marshal, Col. H. T. Titus, Capt. Frederick Emory and others.
Gov. Geary at once summoned the officers together, and addressed them at length and with great feeling. He depicted in a forcible manner the improper position they occupied and the untold horrors that would result from a consummation of their cruel designs; that if they persisted in their mad career the entire Union would be involved in a civil war, and thousands and tens of thousands of innocent lives be sacrificed. To Atchison he particularly addressed himself, telling him that when he last saw him he was acting as Vice-President of the nation and President of the most dignified body of men in the world, the Senate of the United States, but now with sorrow and pain he saw him leading on to a civil and disastrous war an army of men with uncontrollable passions, and determined upon wholesale slaughter and destruction. He concluded his remarks by directing attention to his proclamation, and ordered the army to be disbanded and dispersed. Some of the more judicious of the officers were not only willing but anxious to obey this order, while others, resolved upon mischief, yielded a reluctant assent.
CHAPTER XXI.
It is now one-third of a century since Kansas began to be settled. Great as has been the progress of the States of this Union within this period, the progress of Kansas has been exceptionally and peculiarly so. Its chief glory is not in its large agricultural and mineral resources; it is not in its railroads and lines of telegraph; it is not in the rapidly increasing population of educated men and women, but it is in this, that it was not only the first State in the nation, but the first Commonwealth in the world, to solve the problem of the drink evil, the giant curse of Christendom, by incorporating prohibition into its fundamental law.
In union there is strength. Jesus said so. He said, "Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation." And so evidently does this principle commend itself to the common sense of men, that we have engraved on our national ensign the motto, "E Pluribus Unum" —one out of many.