In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

121 five v Civilians Cope with War Throughout฀1861฀and฀1862, Union army commanders struggled with two urgent problems: how to eliminate outrages committed by guerrilla bands and how to drive regular Confederate forces out of the state. Groups of guerrilla fighters, both pro-Southern bushwhackers and pro-Union jayhawkers, were targeting enemy soldiers and civilians alike. The laws of warfare at the time did not recognize or protect combatants who were not in uniform. Captured Confederate soldiers were treated as prisoners of war, but guerrilla fighters (armed men in civilian clothing) had no such standing and were considered spies or criminals. Complicating matters further, “partisan rangers,” as Confederate guerrillas were euphemistically called, sometimes did attach themselves loosely to the Confederate army or to the Missouri State Guard. Bill Anderson, for example, assumed the rank of captain in the State Guard because General Sterling Price briefly used his services in 1863. All over the state, farm families suffered harassment and robberies. Conditions were especially volatile along the Kansas border. Lingering bitterness over the Kansas troubles of the mid-1850s, marauding gangs of horse thieves, and attacks by Confederate and Union sympathizers wreaked havoc in the area. Kansas jayhawkers like Jim Lane and “Doc” Jennison ranged across the border and through the northwestern counties along the Missouri River, justifying their raids on settlers by characterizing their victims as Confederate sympathizers. Jennison, for example, plundered Osceola and Morristown in 1861, stealing horses and livestock, burning buildings, and terrorizing women and children. These raids by jayhawkers and bushwhackers caused endless problems for Union commanders who were attempting to maintain order in the western part of the state. Missouri civilians were caught up in this process of pacification, in part because federal commanders believed that local residents were not doing enough to rein in the guerrillas. In late July 1861, Major General John Pope, who had been assigned to the northern counties of Missouri, found the “entire population in a state of excitement and apprehension.” The area was rife with secessionist sentiment, as marauding bands destroyed bridges and railroad tracks and attacked pro-Union residents.1 Like most Union commanders in the border states, 122 missouri’s฀war Pope blamed the local citizens for sustaining guerrilla warfare, and his efforts to reestablish order further alienated northern Missourians. He held the local committees of public safety responsible for maintaining the peace and called on men to serve in militia units and put down guerrilla violence. Refusal to do so would bring an occupying force of federal soldiers into their counties.2 Such incidents exacerbated the border violence, inspiring ever greater atrocities in retaliation. Major General Henry Halleck told General John C. Frémont in September 1861 that the only way to prevent Claiborne Jackson from taking St. Louis was to remove Jim Lane from the Kansas border. “A few more such raids,” Halleck explained, would render Missouri as “unanimous against us as is Eastern Virginia.”3 He might have been exaggerating about the threat to St. Louis, but he was correct in claiming that jayhawkers alienated otherwise loyal citizens. By late 1862, Provisional Governor Hamilton Gamble had earned the respect and cooperation of military leaders through his moderation. He determined to use the Missouri militia to keep the peace internally, releasing men badly needed in other theaters of the war. Yet political opponents continued to blame Gamble for the violence along the Kansas border.4 Missouri families suffered depredations by both paramilitary forces and federal soldiers. Often, it simply did not matter where their allegiances lay.5 Internal divisions , already troublesome before the war, erupted into bitter enmities by the end of the first year of the conflict. Old friendships and even family ties were destroyed by mutual accusations, personal assaults, or by neighbors’ informing on one another. That situation was particularly difficult to resolve in southwestern Missouri, a wooded, mountainous region that concealed guerrillas and proved nearly impossible for the U.S. Army to patrol. Civilians in the area wanted to be left alone and had little love for federal soldiers. Union soldiers were frustrated in their attempts to bring the murderous raids to an end and received little cooperation from the people they were supposed to protect.6 Official military policy against guerrillas only exacerbated the suffering of many civilians. When Halleck decreed that disloyal Missourians would be forced to pay $5,000 for each Union soldier or pro-Union resident killed as a result of guerrilla violence, many innocent people lost their...

Share