Photo Courtesy of Don Wilson, originally published in the
Maries County Advocate
"Sir: Your dispatch of the 15th instant, making a call on Missouri for four regiments of men for immediate service, has been received. There can be, I apprehend, no doubt that the men are intended to form a part of the Presidents army to make war upon the people of the seceded states. Your requisition, in my judgment, is illegal, unconstitutional, and revolutionary in its object, inhumane, and diabolical and cannot be complied with. Not one man will the state of Missouri furnish to carry on any unholy crusade.
-Governor Clairborne Jackson in Response to President Lincoln's call for
Missouri to provide 75,000 troops
By 1861, all options to resolve the internal conflict surrounding the issue of slavery had all failed. the nation was divided, and the promised constitutional amendments, court cases and the Presidential election had only served to fan the flames of war. The Kansas-Nebraska act had failed to provide a workable path to allow new states to enter the union and the question of slavery had poured over the borders of Kansas and Missouri as the enigmatic abolitionist firebrand radical, John Brown had conducted an insurgency into the region by way of Iowa, Missouri and Kansas. Brown ran guns and committed acts of violence against the pro-slavery factions in Kansas. John Brown first came to attention when he led anti-slavery volunteers and his sons on a mission into the region, during the Bleeding Kansas crisis of the late 1850's. This conflict pre-dated the civil war and was state-level war over whether Kansas would enter the union as a slave state or a free state. Brown was dissatisfied with abolitionist pacifism, saying of pacifists, "These men are all talk. What we need is action—action!" In May 1856, John Brown, along his sons killed five supporters of slavery in the Pottawatomie massacre, an apparent response to the sacking of Lawrence by pro-slavery forces. Brown then commanded anti-slavery forces at the Battle of Black Jack and the Battle of Osawatomie.
The War in the West / The Border War
Jayhawker: A mythical Irish bird of prey that stole eggs from
the nests of other birds, became the name attached to Kansas troops. Western Missouri was plagued by Jayhawker raids.
The American civil war in the west was truly a war which pitted brother against brother and neighbor against neighbor. As time has passed, many descendants of those who were swept up in the Border wars in that region, have begun to come forward to tell the story of their ancestors who suffered through that time. Local historian and author Don Wilson from Maries County Missouri is descendant of William "Bill" Wilson a famed Bushwhacker, who was born around 1830 in Phelps County, Missouri. His father, Sol Wilson, was a very well-to-do farmer who owned several slaves, but freed them before the Civil War. Sol remained neutral and advised his children to do the same. But the war in Missouri was very heated and the state endured some 40 percent of the battle and engagements nation-wide in the first year of the war and 40 percent of the casualties. In fact, three of the four biggest battles of the first year of the civil war, Wilsons Creek, Lexington and Belmont were fought in Missouri, in most part by Missourians. According to historian Don Wilson, Union troops entered Maries County under the guise of maintaining order, but instead, he says that troops took what they wanted, destroyed what they could and left families struggling to survive.
Bushwhackers
Guerrilla warfare common during the American Revolutionary War, War of 1812, American Civil War and other conflicts in which there were large areas of contested land and few governmental resources to control these tracts. This was particularly prevalent in rural western areas during the Civil War where there were sharp divisions between combatants.
"Our rights have been usurped, dear, by Northmen of our land:
Fanatics raised the cry, dear politicians fired the brand, the Southrons spurn the galling yoke, the tyrants' threats defy, They find we've sons like sturdy oaks to raise the battle cry."
- The Volunteer by Harry MaCarthy
While Union troops were mostly portrayed as "the good guys," for the Wilson family, soldier's actions were a form of war time terrorism. These actions created Bushwhackers who were civilian soldiers who felt that they needed to fight for their freedom. The military activity in Missouri was not isolated, and was widespread throughout the state, the situation created a chaotic mix of regular army troops (both union and confederate), militias, and gangs of independent home guard "Bushwhackers." The war in the west is filled with moral ambiguity, which brings the story down to a very human level, as Missourians were fighting Missourians. These personal stories handed down through families, give life to the deeper story of the civil war. A reminder that wars aren't just fought on battlefields, the war in Missouri was brought home to the front yards of the people who lived there. Children saw troops march through their towns, where crops were destroyed, and livestock were stolen. Even decades later those events are still visible in Missouri, and the descendants of families like the Wilson's carry those oral histories forward, keeping the memories of their ancestors alive. It's interesting to note that Wilson's great grandfather, Bill Wilson's experiences during the civil war inspired the Hollywood movie "The Outlaw Josey Wales" In the 1976 dramatized movie, Clint Eastwood, playing Wales was a farmer whose family had been killed by a group of "Red Leg Jayhawkers" when they attacked his homestead. Wales then joined Missouri guerillas during the war and became a feared outlaw and wanted fugitive while trying to flee south to escape his Red Leg pursuers. The films portrayal of the attack on Wales home, draws attention to the real-life devastation that many families in Missouri experienced during the war between the states.
About Don Wilson
Born in 1946 Don Wilson grew up on the farm built by his great grandfather Bushwhacker Bill Wilson. Without any electricity he grew up as the last of his generation to learn how to do things “the old way”. He grew up hearing the story of his great grandfather along with his fourteen brothers and sisters, and has been asked by many to recite his story onto the pages of his book. Complying he has created this book in the honor of his great grandfather to describe what his true story was.
References
-Maries County Advocate Article by Alvin Hett
- 1861 Civil War Almanac "The Civil War in Western Missouri and Eastern Kansas"
By Harold Dellinger Special Projects Editor, Windingriver.com
Author portraying a confederate guerilla
250 Years of American History
No comments:
Post a Comment