October 25th and the Battle of Mine Creek (review)

BOOK REVIEWS169 upon the slave owner. He does ask why, if the slaves had enough to eat, thievery of food was so common. Working conditions among slaves, as with their food, depended largely upon the whims of owners or employers; but it is clear that slaves who worked in iron furnaces, coal mines, and other hazardous occupations were much worse off than the average plantation worker. In the succeeding chapters Savitt takes up a variety of medical problems, starting with the effects of whippingand such topics as female disorders, infant mortality, insanity, tumors and cancers, hernias, and so forth. Medical care for slaves usually began with the master, mistress, or overseer administering home remedies, thefirst resort innearly all cases. When these remedies failed, a physician, either orthodox or unorthodox, was usually called in, but often not until the case was hopeless. A surprising number of slaves relied upon black medicines and black practitioners. Many of the latter combined African herbal remedies and conjure or voodoo medicine, while others modified African methods to include the prevailing white practices. Savitt concludes that blacks in one capacity or another played a significant role in health care for both whites and blacks in Virginia. Savitt shows that the Southern attitude towards slaves insured that dissection was largely performed on black subjects, that physicians had little regard for the personal dignity of blacks when exhibiting them as patients, and that doctors were more prone to use blacks for experimentation. While this situation has been recognized by other historians, Savitt documents it in detail. What comes through clearly from readingMedicineand Shvery is the degree to which the health of slaves, as with poor whites, depended upon their housing, clothing, food, and working conditions. Unlike whites, however, slaves had little choice with respect to any of these and hence were dependent upon the intelligence and humanity of their masters. Unfortunately these qualities have always existed in limited quantities. Medicine and Slavery is a significant contribution to Southern history. John Duffy University of Maryland October25th and the Battle of Mine Creek. By Lumir F. Buresh. Edited by Dan L. Smith. (Kansas City, Missouri: The Lowell Press, 1977. Pp. ix, 265. $12.95.) In September, 1864, General Sterling Price moved north out ofArkansas to once again carry the Confederate banner into the heart of Missouri. The state had been wracked by guerrilla warfare since the summer of 1861, six months before Price had retreated south vowing to return. While most of the guerrilla activity was pro-Confederate, much of it, particularly along the western border, had been touched off by 170CIVIL WAR HISTORY indiscriminate raiding from Kansas troops, many of them with records reaching back into the border turmoil of the 1850's. A strong natural hatred had developed on both sides of theborder as feelings ran deeply. Price hoped to re-establish the pro-Confederate government of Governor Thomas C. Reynolds and to help relieve the pressure of General Sherman against Atlanta. From the outset his efforts went awry. He and his subordinates mishandled the investment and defeat of Fort Davidson at Pilot Knob. With his way into St. Louis effectively blocked, Price's raid became effectively a long retreat along the line of the Missouri River with sporadic skirmishing culminating at the battle of Westport on October 23. Caught in a Union pincers Price was sent reelingback down the Kansas-Missouri border to return from whencehe had come. The above is generally familiar to those acquainted with the Missouri story, but Buresh once again outlines it in his first two chapters. The details of the retreat following Westport have not heretofore been given much attention. To bring that story to light is the purpose of Buresh's book. A past president of the Kansas City Civil War Round Table, the author spent years researching the material for his story and going over the terrain on which the post-Westport fighting occurred. The result is a highly detailed account of a day of fierce encounter. The battle of Mine Creek, in reality a series of four successive engagements on October 25, 1864, marked the only formal encounter between the Union and Confederate forces on Kansas soil. Beginningat 2...