Personal Recollections of Pardee Butler Part 7

It is expected that every lover of _law and order_ will rally at Leavenworth on Sat.u.r.day, December 1, 1855, prepared to march at once to _the scene of rebellion_ to put down the outlaws of Douglas county, who are committing depredations upon persons and property, burning down houses and declaring open hostility to the laws, and have forcibly rescued a prisoner from the Sheriff. Come one, come all!

The outlaws are armed to the teeth, and number 1,000 men.

Everyman should bring his rifle and ammunition, and it would be well to bring two or three days' provisions. Every man to his post and do his duty. MANY CITIZENS.

In answer to the above appeal 1,500 men, mostly from Missouri, encamped around Lawrence, under such notabilities as Maj. Gens. Strickler and Richardson, Brig. _Gen_. Eastin, Col. Atchison, Col. Peter T. Abell, Robert S. Kelley, Stringfellow and Sheriff Jones. They had broken into the United States a.r.s.enal at Liberty, Clay County, Mo., and stolen guns, cutla.s.ses and such munitions of war as they required.

But when this was known the free State men turned out from all the settlements of Kansas with equal alacrity, to defend Lawrence. They came singly, and in squads and in companies. They came by night and by day.

Sam Wood, Tappin and Smith, the rescuers of Branson, and who were residents of Lawrence, left the city, and there were none there against whom Sheriff Jones had any writs to execute. Dr. Robinson was appointed Commander-in-Chief for the defense of the city, and James H. Lane was appointed second in command. But Lane was the princ.i.p.al figure in the enterprise. He alone had military experience, and he alone had the daring, the genius and the personal magnetism of a real leader.

The free State men, for the last year, had been pa.s.sing through the furnace-fires of a vigorous discipline, and they would have fought as the Tennessee and Kentucky backwoodsmen of Andrew Jackson fought behind their cotton bales at the battle of New Orleans. They had seen their rights wrested out of their hands by a mob of ruffians, and now they were proposing to settle the matter in that court of last resort that is the final and ultimate appeal of the nations. Except Gen. Lane, they had small knowledge of military tactics, but they knew how to look along the barrel of a rifle; moreover, they would fight behind breastworks, and this to raw troops would have been an immense advantage.

It is probable that the first intimation that Gov. Shannon got of the real state of affairs at Lawrence was conveyed to him in the following letter, written by Brig. Gen. Eastin:

GOVERNOR SHANNON:--Information has been received direct from Lawrence, which I consider reliable, that the outlaws are well fortified with cannon and Sharpe' rifles, and number at least 1,000 men. It will, therefore, be difficult to dispossess them.

The militia in this portion of the State are entirely unorganized, and mostly without arms. I suggest the propriety of calling upon the military of Fort Leavenworth. If you have the power to call out the government troops, I think it would be best to do so at once. It might overawe these outlaws and prevent bloodshed.

S. J. EASTIN, Brig. Gen. Northern Brigade, K. M.

Gen. Eastin is mistaken in putting their number at 1,000, but whether many or few they certainly would have fought a hard battle. They were picked men from all the Kansas settlements. Our old friend, Caleb May, was there, as grim and as self-possessed as Andrew Jackson. So also Old John Brown was there with his four sons, though they did not arrive until Gov. Shannon had made overtures for peace.

The Governor telegraphed to Was.h.i.+ngton to obtain authority to call out Col. Sumner with the United States troops at Fort Leavenworth. He also wrote to Col. Sumner to hold himself ready to march at a moment's notice. And now this simple-minded Gov. Shannon, Ex-Governor of Ohio, who had come to Kansas to waste in a few short months the ripe honors he had been so carefully h.o.a.rding up for a life-time, bethought himself that it was time for him to go and look with his own eyes after this rebellion he had so foolishly and recklessly stirred up.

We have already remarked that Gen. James H. Lane was the most conspicuous figure in the defense of Lawrence. It is proper to pause and consider the character of this man, who shone for a time like a brilliant meteor, and then had his light quenched in the blackness of darkness.

He had now been eight months in Kansas. He came out of the Mexican war with a good reputation as a brilliant and das.h.i.+ng officer, and a man of approved courage. As a politician he had been highly favored by the people of Indiana. He was in the convention that nominated President Pierce. He was in Congress at the time of the pa.s.sage of the Kansas-Nebraska bill, and aided in its enactment. He was the friend of Stephen A. Douglas. Yet he came to Kansas a man of broken fortunes. He was bankrupt in reputation, bankrupt in property, and bankrupt in morals, and he came away from unhappy family relations. Notwithstanding, he brought with him boundless ambition, and a consciousness in his own heart that he possessed genius that might lift him up to the highest pinnacle of honor. His first effort was to reorganize that political party that was in control of the Government at Was.h.i.+ngton, and that he had so faithfully served in Indiana. As respects slavery, he probably would have said with Mr. Douglas that he did not care whether it was voted up or voted down. But his effort fell stillborn and dead. Dr. John H. Stringfellow was an old Whig, and so also were many of the Pro-slavery leaders, and they would not hear to it that there should be any parties known save the Pro-slavery and Free State parties. The Free State men were equally averse to making any division in their own ranks.

Mr. Lane was to choose, and he did choose _with a vengeance_.

Bad men usually pay this compliment to a righteous life, that they seek to conceal their wicked deeds and wear the outside seeming of virtue.

But this strange man never pretended to be anything else than just what he was. He displayed such audacious boldness as gave an air of respectability even to his wickedness.

His public speaking did not belong to any school of oratory known among men; yet, if to sway the people as a tempest bends to its will a field of waving grain, be oratory, then was Mr. Lane, in the highest sense of the word, an orator. He spoke once in Chicago when the people were most excited over the Kansas troubles. A great crowd came to hear, and he swayed them to his will, as only such men as Henry Ward Beecher and Patrick Henry have been able to do. But this gospel was the gospel of hate. Implacable, unforgiving hate was his only gospel.

At last this man, at once both great and wicked, having attained the highest honors the people had to bestow, died by his own hand. The people believed that he had gone wrong and betrayed them, and they withdrew from him their favor. Mr. Lane loved popularity more than he loved heaven, and he shot himself through the brain.

The writer, unwilling alone to take the responsibility of expressing such a judgment as the above, appealed to a gentlemen whose high position in public life and kindly and conservative temper eminently qualify him to speak, and this is what he says:

No one can question the fact that Mr. Lane's career in Kansas exerted a great influence in shaping the affairs and controlling the destiny of the young State. During his life I was alternately swayed by feelings of admiration and distrust. I recognized fully the marvelous energy and equally marvelous influence of the man, but I distrusted his sincerity and lacked confidence in his integrity. When I met him, or listened to one of his impa.s.sioned speeches, ne swept me away with the contagion of his seeming enthusiasm, but when I went out from the influence of his personal magnetism I felt that something was lacking in the man to justify a well-grounded confidence.

This man that had in him such a commingling of good and evil was now the leading spirit in the defense of Lawrence. [2]

CHAPTER XI

When Sheriff Jones saw that the control of this business was being taken out of the hands of himself and his fellow-conspirators he wrote the following letter to Gov. Shannon:

CAMP AT WAKARUSA, Dec. 6, 1855.

To His EXCELLENCY, GOV. SHANNON:

_Sir_: In reply to yours of yesterday I have to inform you that the volunteer forces now at this place and Lecompton are getting weary of inaction. They will not, I presume, remain but a short time longer, unless a demand for the prisoner is made. I think I shall have sufficient force to protect me by to-morrow morning. The force at Lawrence is not half so strong as reported. If I am to wait for Government troops, more than two-thirds of the men that are here will _go away very much dissatisfied._ They are leaving hourly as it is.

It is reported that the people of Lawrence have run off those offenders from town, and, indeed, it is said they are now all out of the way. I have writs for sixteen persons who were with the party that rescued my prisoner.

S. N. Wood, P. R. Brooks and Samuel Tappan are of Lawrence, the balance from the country around. Warrants will be put into my hands to-day for the arrest of G. W.

Brown, and probably others in Lecompton. They say that they are willing to obey the laws, but no confidence can be placed in any statements they may make. Most respectfully yours,

SAMUEL J. JONES, Sheriff of Douglas County.

From the above, three facts are apparent:

1. Sheriff Jones is not willing that the militia shall go home, and Col.

Sumner and the United States troops take their places.

2. He has writs against the sixteen rescuers of Branson. But of these he has ascertained that thirteen live in the country, and he does not need to go to Lawrence to find them. The three that belong in Lawrence are gone to parts unknown, and he does not need to go to Lawrence to find them. _At this writing Sheriff Jones has not a single writ against any person in Lawrence._

3. If he has such a warrant the Lawrence people profess themselves willing that he should serve it, but he does not believe them. "No confidence can be placed in any statements that they may make."

So far as Sheriff Jones is concerned, it is now manifest that this was a devilish conspiracy against the people of Lawrence, to cut their throats and burn up the town. How far the men that were with him were conscious partners in his guilt, or how far they were ignorant dupes of a man that had murder in his heart, does not appear.

The people of Lawrence now thought it was time for them to open communication with Gov. Shannon, and Messrs. G. P. Lowery and C. W.

Babc.o.c.k, after running the gauntlet of the patrols, robbers and guerillas that infested the road to Shawnee Mission, succeeded in putting in the hands of the Governor the following letter:

To His EXCELLENCY, WILSON SHANNON, GOVERNOR KANSAS TERRITORY:

_Sir_: As citizens of Kansas Territory, we desire to call your attention to the fact that a large force of armed men from a foreign State have a.s.sembled in the vicinity of Lawrence, are now committing depredations upon our citizens, stopping them, opening and appropriating their loadings, arresting, detaining and threatening travelers upon the public road, and that they claim to do this by your authority. We desire to know if they do appear by your authority, and if you will secure the peace and quiet of the community by ordering their instant removal, or compel us to resort to some other means or a higher authority.

SIGNED BY COMMITTEE.

The Governor began to think it was time for him to go to the camp of Sheriff Jones' army on the Wakarusa; and when he came he was frightened at his own work, and became just as eager to get out of the sc.r.a.pe as he had been forward to get into it. He wrote to Col. Sumner, frantically begging him to come to the rescue; but he had got no orders, and would not move without orders. Sheriff Jones and the rank and file of his camp were furious that they were held back from pitching into the Lawrence people; but the officers had become cognizant of the b.l.o.o.d.y job they would have on hands, and were willing to be let off. And so the Governor patched up a peace, and sent his militia home again, with their curses diverted from the Lawrence Abolitionists to Gov. Shannon. Cowardly, weak-minded and infirm in purpose as this unhappy man was, he was not wholly a fool; and we may justly believe that he had in his heart a foreboding of that awful day of reckoning that would surely come, when inquisition would be made for the blood of these citizens, and the Governor himself would be called to answer, "Why were these men slain?"

And now that peace--angelic peace--sat brooding over Lawrence with her dove-like pinions, they made a love-feast and invited the Governor to partake of it; and what with the ravis.h.i.+ng music, and the blandishment of flattering tongues, and the intoxication of fair women's eyes and sweet voices, the Governor was made to forget, for the time being, that he was the property, body, soul, and spirit, of the "Law and Order" party; and his soft and plastic nature was beguiled into signing a doc.u.ment const.i.tuting the army of defense of Lawrence a part of the Territorial Militia, and giving them authority, under his own hand and seal, to fight with teeth and toe-nails against the outside barbarians that he himself had invoked to cut their throats. When, however, he had come to himself, and had to front the frowns and ungrammatical curses of the "Border Ruffians," he was fain to lay the blame on the sparkling wine of the feast, and the more sparkling eyes and sparkling wit of beautiful women.

These felicitations of the people of Lawrence with Governor Shannon did, however, have a somber and awful background. While this had been going on a boy had been murdered in the vicinity of Lawrence. Some young men rode out to see about it, and one of them was shot and killed. But a still more ghastly crime threw its baleful shadow over the people. It was perpetrated two days before the Governor concluded his treaty of peace.

Thomas W. Barber and Robert F. Barber were farmers, living about seven miles from Lawrence; and on December 6th started with a Mr. Pierson to go home to their families. These were two brothers and a brother-in-law.

They were intercepted on their way by J. N. Burns, of Weston, Mo., and Major George W. Clarke, United States Agent for the Pottawatomie Indians. These two men shot Thomas W. Barber. It is hard to find an explanation of their act, unless it were that they came to Lawrence to shoot down Abolitionists as they would have shot wolves on the prairie.

They had no provocation. They rode apart from their companions to intercept the Barbers, and called on them to halt. Thomas W. Barber was unarmed, and gave mild and truthful answers to their questions. After the shooting the brothers started to ride away, when the murdered man said, "That fellow hit me;" began to sway in his saddle, was supported for a little time by his brother, then fell to the ground dead. His horse also had been shot, and died the same night. Familiar as Kansas had become with cruel and devilish deeds, there were circ.u.mstances connected with this act that made it exceptionally a blood-curdling horror. Thomas W. Barber was a somewhat notable farmer, and had married a young wife, that loved her husband with a love so pa.s.sionate that she was sometimes rallied about it by her sister-in-law. It had been with misgivings and forebodings she had consented for Barber to go to Lawrence. The news of her husband's death had been kept from her; they dared not tell her. A young man was sent to bring her into the city, whither her husband's body had been already carried, and he blurted out, "Thomas Barber is killed!" and she shrieked, "O, my husband! my husband! Have they killed my husband?" It has been said that so frantic were her struggles, that it was with main force they had to hold her in the carriage which conveyed her into the city. Much has been written of the pathetic and voiceless woe of this wretched and sorrow-stricken woman, but we will spare the reader the recital.

This question, however, we did often ask ourselves: "What had we done that we should be made to suffer thus?"

But now there was peace, and Sheriff Jones, breathing out curses against the Governor who had balked him of his antic.i.p.ated revenge, disbanded his army and went back to his post-office at Westport. It was past the middle of December, but some lingered on their way, robbing and stealing. The cold grew intense. A driving snow came down from the North. It was one of the coldest winters Kansas had ever known, and there fell one of the deepest snows. And now, winding through the deep snow, benumbed with cold, and all unprovided with clothing suitable for such inclement weather, the rear guard of the ring-streaked, speckled and spotted regiment of Kansas and Missouri Militia pa.s.sed out of the Territory.

Thirteen leaders of the "Law and Order" party had met with Lane and Robinson, acting on behalf of the people of Lawrence, and had agreed to the terms of the treaty. But Sheriff Jones is reported to have said: "Had not Shannon been a fool I would have wiped out Lawrence." It is reported that Stringfellow said that "Shannon had sold himself and disgraced himself and the whole Pro-slavery party." Atchison accepted the terms, saying to his followers: "Boys, we can not fight now. The position that Lawrence has taken is such that it would not do to make an attack on them. But boys, we will fight some time!"

The peace was to be broken at the earliest opportunity.