Bleeding Borders: Race, Gender, and Violence in Pre-Civil War Kansas

Image Plates

Map of Kansas Territory. The Kansas-Missouri border also served as the boundary between slavery and freedom in the 1850s. The principal towns of Kansas Territory and the locations of many of the border conflicts are shown in this 1857 map. (Thomas H. Gladstone, Kansas; or Squatter Life and Border Warfare in the Far West, London: G. Routledge & Co., 1857) Portrait of Isaac Brown and His Wyandot Wife. Isaac Brown and his Wyandot Indian wife are just one of the many mixed-race couples that formed in the Kansas-Missouri border region before the Civil War. (Kansas State Historical Society) Forcing Slavery Down the Throat of a Freesoiler. This 1856 political cartoon showed Democrats Stephen A. Douglas, Franklin Pierce, James Buchanan, and Lewis Cass “forcing slavery down the throat of a freesoiler.” But freesoilers in Kansas, along with black runaways, made it impossible for slaveholders to establish slavery in the region. (Library of Congress) Portrait of Sara Robinson. Sara Robinson, wife of the first Governor of Kansas, helped forge a new ideal of womanhood that endorsed women’s participation in free-state politics. (Kansas State Historical Society) Portrait of John Brown. John Brown, the most famous “negro stealer,” embodied a martial manhood that gained ascendancy in the late 1850s. (Kansas State Historical Society) Liberty, the Fair Maid of Kansas, in the Hands of the “Border Ruffians.” This 1856 cartoon depicts Democrats William Marcy, James Buchanan, Franklin Pierce, Lewis Cass, and Stephen Douglas harassing the “fair maid of Kansas” who cries out, “Oh, Spare Me Gentlemen, Spare Me!” The feminized and vulnerable Kansas kneels down before the licentious looking Cass and President Pierce, as Douglas scalps a free-state man and Marcy and Buchanan attack and rob another Kansas settler. In the background, a free-state family laments the loss of their children as their house burns, while other scenes depict widespread murder and pillaging. (Courtesy, American Antiquarian Society. Artist: John L. Magee) The exact cartoon captions are as follows, from left to right: [Woman in background]: Come husband let us go to heaven where our poor Children are. [Man in background]: Ho! ho! She thinks I’m her husband, we Scalped the Cus and she like a D_mn fool went Crazy on it, and now she wants me to go to heaven with her, ha! ha! ha! [James] Buchanan: Twas your’s once but its mine now. “Might Makes Right,” dont it. [Franklin] Pierce: You may bet yer life on that, ole Puddin head. Come, Sis_sy, you go along wid me, I’ll take Good care of you (hic), over the left. Liberty: O SPARE ME GENTLEMEN, SPARE ME!! [Lewis] Cass: Poor little Dear. We would’nt hurt her for the world, would we Frank? ha! ha! ha! he! he! he! ho! ho! ho! [Stephen A.] Douglas: Hurrah for our side! Victory! Victory! “WE WILL SUBDUE THEM YET” ...