With the Border Ruffians.rtf

							   Excerpt from With the Border Ruffians: Memories of the Far West, 1852-1868 by R.H.
                                     Wilson (1908)
                                     Web Version:
             http://www.assumption.edu/ahc/Kansas/wilsonwiththeruffians.html

Chapter II:

....Fully resolved to throw in my lot with the South, I now joined a company of mounted
Rangers....No oath of enlistment was taken, but there was no fear of desertion or insubordination,
since death would have been the penalty for either crime.

Our company was the best mounted and equipped in the Southern force, and, as soon as we were
mustered, moved into camp at Salt Creek, about three miles from Leavenworth City, where
about eight hundred Missouri and Southern volunteers were assembled.

Our commander was "General" Davy Atchison, a well-known and influential character in those
parts. When I met him, and served under him, he was about fifty-five years of age, and one of the
most popular men in his section of the country; in fact, a typical Western politician. A lawyer by
profession, he was also a planter and large slave-owner; consequently thoroughly "Sound on the
goose." At this time he was U.S. Senator for the State of Missouri, and had been Vice-President
of the United States. As an Indian fighter and hunter he had made himself a great reputation....

Life in camp was pleasant enough at first, for our "General" didn't go in for much drill, possibly
because he didn't know much about it himself, and our principal duty was to keep watch and
ward over the river and stop all passing steamboats to search them for Free Soilers and their
arms. Those that did not stop when ordered were promptly brought to by a field battery we had
posted on the river, commanding the passage. All suspected Free Staters were taken out and kept
under guard, and of course all their arms were confiscated.

Our excuse for this rather high-handed proceeding was that " The Massachusetts Emigrants' Aid
Society," with great resources at its back, was pouring men and arms into Kansas, with the
avowed object of conquering and dominating the Territory, by fair means or foul, for the Free
State party.

Our first apparently important movement was now made on Lawrence, the Northern
headquarters, which was protected by considerable earthworks and held by a force of some two
thousand men under Robinson, the "Free State" governor, and other leaders of the party....

So one fine morning we "Border Ruffians," as the enemy called us, struck camp and marched out
some fifteen hundred strong, with two 6-pr. field-pieces, to attack Lawrence, my company acting
as the advance guard. We halted the first night near Lecompton, our capital, my company being
on picket duty, spread out fan-like some two miles round the camp. Next morning Governor
Shannon, our own party's governor, paid us a visit of inspection, and was pleased to express his
high approval of our discipline and workmanlike appearance....
The morning after the inspection we marched on Lawrence, where we expected a sharp fight,
which we were fully confident of winning. My company acted again as the advance guard, and
when, about midday, we reached Mount Oread, a strongly fortified position, on which several
guns were mounted, covering the approach to the town, great was our surprise to find it had been
evacuated. As soon as our general r received the report, he ordered our company to make a wide
circuit round the town, to seize the fords of the Kansas River and hold the road leading east.

Then he moved the rest of his force to within half a mile of the town, formed square on the open
prairie, and sent in a flag of truce, demanding an unconditional surrender of the place. To the no
small disgust of the "Border Ruffians," Governor Robinson, without further parley, threw up the
sponge, and meekly surrendered the town and the 2,600 men it contained.

No doubt his men were not very keen on fighting, being the riff-raff of the Northern towns
enlisted by the Emigrants' Aid Society, and most of them quite unused to bear arms of any kind.
Many of them bolted for the Kansas River ford and the Eastern road; and we of Miller's's
company took quite three times our own number of these valiant warriors prisoners. I well
remember how scared the poor wretches were! I am glad to say that the prisoners' lives were
spared, all but two, and they were hanged by the Provost Marshal for horse-stealing, the penalty
for which was invariably death, in that Western country, even in ordinary times.

Though the prisoners were spared, I regret to say the town was not, for Atchison's men got
completely out of hand, battered down the "Free State Hotel," and sacked most of the houses. It
was a terrible scene of orgy, and I was very glad when, about midnight, we of Miller's company
were ordered off to Lecompton to report the day's doings to Governor Shannon. There we were
kept several days, scouring the country for Free Soilers, and impressing arms, horses, and corn....