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Quantrill's Raiders
Quantrill's Raiders were the best-known of the pro-Confederate partisan guerrillas (also known as "bushwhackers") who fought in the American Civil War. Their leader was William Quantrill and they included Jesse James and his brother Frank.[citation needed]
Early in the war Missouri and Kansas were nominally under Union government control and became subject to widespread violence as groups of Confederate bushwhackers and anti-slavery Jayhawkers competed for control. The town of Lawrence, Kansas, was a center of anti-slavery sentiment. In August 1863, Quantrill led an attack on the town, killing more than 180 civilians.
The Confederate government, which had granted Quantrill a field commission[citation needed] under the Partisan Ranger Act, was outraged and withdrew support for such irregular forces. By 1864 Quantrill had lost control of the group, which split up into small bands. Some, including Quantrill, were killed in various engagements. Others lived on to hold reunions many years later, when the name Quantrill's Raiders began to be used. The James brothers formed their own gang and conducted robberies for years as a continuing insurgency in the region.
The Missouri-Kansas border area was fertile ground for the outbreak of guerrilla warfare when the Civil War erupted in 1861. The historian Albert Castel wrote:
For over six years, ever since Kansas was opened up as a territory by Stephen A. Douglas' Kansas-Nebraska Bill of 1854, its prairies had been the stage for an almost incessant series of political conventions, raids, massacres, pitched battles, and atrocities, all part of a fierce conflict between the Free State and pro-slavery forces that had come to Kansas to settle and to battle.
In February 1861, Missouri voters elected delegates to a statewide convention, which rejected secession by a vote of 89–1. Unionists, led by regular US Army commander Nathaniel Lyon and Frank Blair of the politically-powerful Blair family, fought for political and military control across the state against the increasingly pro-secessionist forces, led by Governor Claiborne Jackson and future Confederate General Sterling Price. By June, open warfare occurred between Union forces and troops supporting the Confederacy. Guerrilla warfare erupted throughout the state and intensified in August after the Union defeat at the Battle of Wilson's Creek.
One historical work describes the situation in the state after Wilson's Creek:
Unlike other border areas in Maryland and Kentucky, local conflicts, bushwhacking, sniping, and guerrilla fighting marked this period of Missouri history. "When regular troops were absent, the improvised war often assumed a deadly guerrilla nature as local citizens took up arms spontaneously against their neighbors. This was a war of stealth and raid without a front, without formal organization, and with almost no division between the civilian and the warrior."
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Quantrill's Raiders
Quantrill's Raiders were the best-known of the pro-Confederate partisan guerrillas (also known as "bushwhackers") who fought in the American Civil War. Their leader was William Quantrill and they included Jesse James and his brother Frank.[citation needed]
Early in the war Missouri and Kansas were nominally under Union government control and became subject to widespread violence as groups of Confederate bushwhackers and anti-slavery Jayhawkers competed for control. The town of Lawrence, Kansas, was a center of anti-slavery sentiment. In August 1863, Quantrill led an attack on the town, killing more than 180 civilians.
The Confederate government, which had granted Quantrill a field commission[citation needed] under the Partisan Ranger Act, was outraged and withdrew support for such irregular forces. By 1864 Quantrill had lost control of the group, which split up into small bands. Some, including Quantrill, were killed in various engagements. Others lived on to hold reunions many years later, when the name Quantrill's Raiders began to be used. The James brothers formed their own gang and conducted robberies for years as a continuing insurgency in the region.
The Missouri-Kansas border area was fertile ground for the outbreak of guerrilla warfare when the Civil War erupted in 1861. The historian Albert Castel wrote:
For over six years, ever since Kansas was opened up as a territory by Stephen A. Douglas' Kansas-Nebraska Bill of 1854, its prairies had been the stage for an almost incessant series of political conventions, raids, massacres, pitched battles, and atrocities, all part of a fierce conflict between the Free State and pro-slavery forces that had come to Kansas to settle and to battle.
In February 1861, Missouri voters elected delegates to a statewide convention, which rejected secession by a vote of 89–1. Unionists, led by regular US Army commander Nathaniel Lyon and Frank Blair of the politically-powerful Blair family, fought for political and military control across the state against the increasingly pro-secessionist forces, led by Governor Claiborne Jackson and future Confederate General Sterling Price. By June, open warfare occurred between Union forces and troops supporting the Confederacy. Guerrilla warfare erupted throughout the state and intensified in August after the Union defeat at the Battle of Wilson's Creek.
One historical work describes the situation in the state after Wilson's Creek:
Unlike other border areas in Maryland and Kentucky, local conflicts, bushwhacking, sniping, and guerrilla fighting marked this period of Missouri history. "When regular troops were absent, the improvised war often assumed a deadly guerrilla nature as local citizens took up arms spontaneously against their neighbors. This was a war of stealth and raid without a front, without formal organization, and with almost no division between the civilian and the warrior."
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