James Erwin - The Homefront in Civil War Missouri

Published by The History Press

Charleston, SC 29403

www.historypress.net

Copyright 2014 by James Erwin

All rights reserved

Cover images: Photo of George Maddox from Wilsons Creek National Battlefield.

First published 2014

e-book edition 2014

ISBN 978.1.62584.809.3

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Erwin, James W.

The homefront in Civil War Missouri / James Erwin.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references and index.

print edition ISBN 978-1-62619-433-5

1. Missouri--History--Civil War, 1861-1865--Social aspects. 2. United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865--Social aspects. I. Title.

E517.E79 2014

973.709778--dc23

2014019125

Notice: The information in this book is true and complete to the best of our knowledge. It is offered without guarantee on the part of the author or The History Press. The author and The History Press disclaim all liability in connection with the use of this book.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form whatsoever without prior written permission from the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This book does not pretend to exhaust the subject. To the contrary, it barely scratches the surface. A separate book could be written about virtually every topic and many of the individuals covered here. I have relied heavily on the work of Louis S. Gerteis and William E. Parrish, as well as the other works listed in the bibliography that provide the detail that word limits preclude here. I urge you to consult them; you will find them as fascinating as I did. I do hope the readers will find the stories selected for this book illustrative of the experiences of thousands of Missourians who had to live through the terrible time that was the Civil War.

Once again, I wish to thank Ben Gibson and the folks at The History Press for the opportunity to continue to publish works about the Civil War in my home state. I also wish to thank the following persons from the National Park Service for their assistance and suggestions: Deborah S. Wood, museum curator at Wilsons Creek National Battlefield; Karen Maxville, Ulysses S. Grant National Historic Site; and Curtis Gregory, park ranger, George Washington Carver National Monument. I am especially indebted to Wicky Sleight and Andrea Hatfield at the Marshall Missouri Public Library for their help in finding information about Elvira Scott. I also appreciate the quick response by Polly at the Kingdom of Callaway Historical Society for material on Jefferson Jones. My thanks go to Sally Conrad and Kathleen Macknicki for a photograph of Rachel King Anderson and permission to quote from her diary. And finally, a hat tip to Peggy Curran for suggesting the topic.

Finally, I can never say enough to show the appreciation or debt I owe to my wife, Vicki. She has provided needed encouragement throughout this entire project. And she has shown remarkable patience in putting up with the clutter of books, files, papers, DVDs, note cards, scribbled scraps of paper and all manner of junk that has taken over the dining room table while this book was in preparation.

PROLOGUE

Thank God the war was over.

Moses Carver came to Southwest Missouri in 1843. The Preemption Act of 1841 allowed him to buy 240 acres of the choicest land in Newton County, with timber, prairie, two springs and a creek nearby, for only $1.25 an acre. By the time the war started, Moses and his wife, Susan, had improved the property until it was one of the most valuable in the area. Like most Missourians, he did not raise only cash crops for sale. Rather, Carver grew wheat, oats, potatoes, hay and flax. Carver had a reputation as an eccentric and aloof neighbor. He cultivated bees and bred racehorses. The locals said he even had a special way with the animalsroosters sat on his shoulders and squirrels ate from his hand. He was also known as a good fiddler.

The Carvers had no children. As they grew older, they needed help to run the farm. Although he had a white hired hand, Carver bought a slave woman named Mary from a neighbor. Carver was neither a fire-eating slaveholder nor a dedicated abolitionist. He disapproved of slavery, but it was difficult to find white men who would stay on a farm for any length of time, and certainly there were few, if any, white women who would hire out as domestics.

Mary gave birth to two boys. Their father was likely a man living on a neighboring farm. The older boy, Jim, was born in October 1859. The younger boy, George, was born in late 1864 or the spring of 1865as with many slaves, the exact date was not recorded.

Although a slave owner, Carver was a Unionist. That was not easy living in Newton County. Carvers corner of Missouri lay on the path of Confederate and Union armies as they fought for control of the state. Pro-Southern governor Claiborne Jackson and a rump legislature that escaped from Jefferson City in 1861 met just a few miles away in Neosho to approve secession and entry into the Confederate States of America. Carver likely could hear the guns when the armies clashed at Newtonia, only about ten miles away.

Moses Carver. George Washington Carver National Monument.

Worse yet, Newton County also was in the heart of the guerrilla war. John Coffee and Tom Livingston, among other bushwhackers, raided back and forth across the area, chased by Federal troops. Neither side showed much patience with civilians.

Carver tried to stay out of the way of marauding or foraging Confederate and Union forces. He was too old to join the militia. For the most part, he succeeded in keeping a low profile. But he was not entirely successful and nearly paid for it with is life.

In late 1862, a band of guerrillas (likely on their way to winter quarters in Texas) appeared at the Carver farm. They did not want any of his livestock or foodthey wanted Carvers money. Moses refused to turn it over. The guerrillas then put a rope around Mosess neck, hung him from a tree in the yard and even put hot coals to his feet. Moses still refused. Frustrated, the raiders cut him down and left.

The next day, twelve-year-old Mary Alice Rice found Carver with his feet blistered from the bushwhackers torture. It was an image that stuck with her the rest of her life (she lived until 1949). The war was just as troubling for her as for Carver. She saw dead and wounded men as the opposing forces fought back and forth over Southwest Missouri, leaving the landscape and most of the towns devastated. Rices own home was burned twice during the war. One day, she was trapped at school because of a firefight on the road to her home.

But in May 1865, the war was finally over. Missouri had adopted a new constitution that would free the Carvers slaves on July 4, and the Thirteenth Amendment freeing slaves everywhere was quickly being voted on by the states.

Unfortunately, the violence continued. A group of bushwhackers once again visited the Carver farm. Moses and Jim were able to hide in a brush pile, but the raiders took Mary and young George. Moses thought they may have gone to Arkansas, but as a fifty-two-year-old civilian, he was hardly in a position to track them down.

Moses turned to a former soldier, John Bentley, for help. Bentley, a carpenter born in Leicester, England, had been a sergeant in the Eighth Cavalry, Missouri State Militia (MSM). The MSMs primary mission was to hunt down guerrillas, thus freeing other troops to join Union armies fighting conventional Confederate forces elsewhere. Bentley spent part of the war as one of the regiments most active spies. He was captured by guerrillas in October 1862 but apparently managed to escape. Bentleys military career was sidetracked in January 1865, when he was arrested for murder, but he was released two months later, without any apparent ill effects, by order of the general commanding the district. He was mustered out in April.