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Title: William T. Anderson
Description: Portrait of William T. "Bloody Bill" Anderson
Object Type: Image
Date: 1864

Title: Unidentified Man
Description: Charcoal portrait of unidentified man with suit coat, vest, shirt, and tie. Drawing is signed by the artist with "93" immediately below the signature.
Object Type: Image
Date: 1893

Title: From Martin White to John W. Geary
Description: This letter, dated October 5, 1856, was sent by Martin White in Miami County, Kansas, to Kansas Governor John Geary. White is frustrated by Geary’s lack of response to his previous requests for troops to protect local citizens against John Brown’s raids. White states that has raised a company of 80 men who wish to be mustered into the U.S. service to help with local defense.
Date: October 5, 1856

Title: William T. Anderson
Description: A photograph of William "Bloody Bill" T. Anderson that appears in the 1914 publication of "Three years with Quantrell; a true story".
Object Type: Image
Date: 1864

Title: Quantrill’s Raid on Lawrence
Description: This print, originally published in Harper's Weekly on September 5, 1863, shows Quantrill and his rebel guerrillas killing the citizens of Lawrence, Kansas, and setting fire to the buildings.
Object Type: Image
Date: September 5, 1863

Title: Allen H. Parmer
Description: Charcoal portrait of Allen Parmer (sometimes spelled Palmer) with pullover trimmed shirt worn over a checked shirt with tie. Allen Parmer took part in the raid on Lawrence, Kansas, August 21, 1863, the Centralia massacre September 27, 1864, and numerous other skirmishes. In 1870 he married Jesse James' sister Susan. The Parmers lived mostly in Texas after the Civil War. He died in Wichita Falls, Texas, October 25, 1927.
Object Type: Image

Title: Richard (Dick) Burns
Description: Charcoal portrait drawing of Dick Burns in suit, vest, shirt, and hat. Burns enlisted in 1861 and served under Quantrill. He took part in the Lawrence massacre on August 21, 1863. After the war he was a member of the James-Younger Gang and participated in the Richmond, Missouri, bank robbery on May 23, 1867. The Richmond posse found Burns "sleeping in a farmhouse within two miles of Richmond. He was taken outside and strung up on a convenient elm" (Drago, Harry Sinclair, "Road Agents and Train Robbers," p. 158 [MVSC 364.16 D75R]). Other authors say he was killed later by an axe that split open his head.
Object Type: Image

Title: Unidentified Man
Description: Charcoal portrait drawing of unidentified man with long flowing mustache, dressed in suit coat and shirt. Drawing is signed by the artist.
Object Type: Image

Title: The Western Dispatch.
Description: This is the August 17, 1856 evening issue of the Western Dispatch, printed in Independence, Missouri. The newspaper announces that war is "being waged by the Abolitionists," and reports that James Henry Lane, John Brown, and their forces have robbed several Kansas residents and driven them into Missouri. The paper also mentions that Kansas Gov. Wilson Shannon requested aid from the U.S. military, but was refused. A last minute extra, printed at the bottom of the paper, states that Lane and his men have captured Lecompton.
Object Type: Newspaper Article
Date: August 17, 1856

Title: James (Jim) Younger
Description: Charcoal portrait of Jim Younger in suit coat, shirt, and tie. Jim Younger, brother to Robert (Bob) and Thomas Coleman (Cole), joined Quantrill's group in 1863. He was part of the Centralia, Missouri, massacre, September 27, 1864. He went with Quantrill to Kentucky near the end of the war and was captured about April 1865. After the war he moved to Texas and in 1870 and 1871 was deputy sherrif of Dallas County, Texas. He later joined the James-Younger gang and was part of the Northfield, Minnesota, bank robbery on September 7, 1876. He was arrested with his brothers and sent to prison at Stillwater, Minnesota. Jim was paroled in 1901 and committed suicide in Minnesota on October 19, 1902. He's buried at the Lee's Summit, Missouri, Cemetery.
Object Type: Image

Title: Unidentified Civil War Soldiers or Guerrillas
Description: Charcoal portrait of two men dressed in cloaks, uniforms, and hats with plumes and holding pistols. Drawing is signed by the artist with "93" immediately below the signature. Each of these has his own portrait (taken from this one) in this same collection by the same artist (MVO-99F and MVO-100F).
Object Type: Image
Date: 1893

Title: From Thomas R. Mitchell to J.T. Sweringen
Description: This letter is from Thomas R. Mitchell to J.T. Sweringen. Mitchell writes from Huntsville, Missouri on June 20, 1857, to inform Sweringen that Mrs. Ralston has safely arrived in town: "She found no difficulty in getting along amongst the 'border ruffians.'" He also expresses his concern that crops in Missouri are scarce this season.
Date: June 20, 1857

Title: Edward Payson Fitch, Jr.
Description: This black and white photograph, taken circa 1890, depicts Edward Payson Fitch, Jr., son of Edward and Sarah Fitch. He was born in Lawrence, Kansas in 1863. As a baby, he survived Quantrill’s raid on Lawrence, but his family’s house was burned down and his father was killed in the attack.
Object Type: Image

Title: Julia Sumner Fitch
Description: This black and white photograph, taken circa 1890, portrays Julia Sumner Fitch. Julia was born to Edward and Sarah Fitch in Lawrence, Kansas in 1858. At the age of five, she survived Quantrill’s Raid on Lawrence, but her family’s house was burned down and her father was killed in the attack.
Object Type: Image

Title: Statement of Wilson Shannon
Description: This statement by Kansas Gov. Wilson Shannon was written ca. December 1855. Shannon describes the series of events leading to the Wakarusa War, beginning with the murder of a Free State supporter named Charles Dow by Franklin Coleman, a proslavery man. To address the subsequent civil unrest in Douglas County, Kansas, Shannon asks General Richardson, General Strickler, and Col. Sumner to supply troops and assist Douglas County Sheriff Samuel J. Jones in restoring order.
Object Type: Government Document

Title: Joseph Orville Shelby
Description: Charcoal portrait of General Joseph Orville Shelby in suit coat, vest, shirt, and tie. General Shelby lived in Waverly, Missouri, at the beginning of the Civil War where he raised hemp. He organized a company of State Guards and fought at the Wilson's Creek, Lexington, and Pea Ridge battles. His unit became known as Shelby's Iron Brigade. In the summer of 1862, the Confederate government sent him to organize guerrilla groups in Missouri. After the war, he went to Mexico for a couple years before returning to Missouri. In 1893 until 1897, Shelby was the U.S. Marshal of the western district of Missouri. He died February 13, 1897, and was buried in Forest Hill Cemetery in Kansas City, Missouri. (O'Flaherty, Daniel. "General Jo Shelby, Undefeated Rebel." Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1954 [ MVSC 92 S544O ]).
Object Type: Image

Title: Proclamation to the State of Missouri
Description: In response to the federal government’s order that all eligible men enroll for the draft, Upton Hays and William Clarke Quantrill issue this proclamation to the state of Missouri. Hays and Quantrill state that all Missourians joining their forces will be furnished with arms and ammunition. “Any one who shall be found guilty of reporting to any military post the whereabouts of any Southern person shall be shot,” while men eligible for military duty who leave the state will be deemed “enemies of the ‘South’ and treated accordingly.”
Object Type: Circular
Date: August 4, 1862

Title: From Thomas Carney to James L. McDowell
Description: This letter, dated June 26, 1863, was written by Kansas Governor Thomas Carney in Washington, DC, to James L. McDowell. Carney writes that Edwin Stanton, Secretary of War, has refused to approve Major General Schofield’s order to raise a regiment. Carney says that if necessary he will “foot the bill” himself to defend “helpless women and children” from the “brutal...ruffian raids that have so long cursed our state.”
Date: June 26, 1863

Title: From William Clarke Quantrill to William W. Scott
Description: William Clarke Quantrill writes a letter from Olathe, Kansas to William W. Scott on January 22, 1858. Quantrill reports the results of a recent election on the Lecompton Constitution, which he refers to as the "Lecompton swindle." He mentions a recent skirmish at Fort Scott and declares it "a pity" that the Kansas settlers "had not shot every Missourian that was there." He also calls James Henry Lane "as good a man as we have here" and describes Kansas Democrats as "rascals."
Date: January 22, 1858

Title: From George E. Young to My Dear Father
Description: This letter, dated August 23, 1863, is from George E. Young in Minneola, Kansas to his father. Young writes that he was in Lawrence on the day of Quantrill's Raid and "came very near being killed." He describes how the attackers approached the boarding house where he was staying, ordered all the women and children to leave, then lined up the men and shot at them. Young tells his father that he ran away and hid in a nearby cellar, narrowly escaping death.
Date: August 23, 1863

Civil War on the Western Border: The Missouri-Kansas Conflict, 1854-1865

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