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Tucker’s War

Posted February 19, 2003

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Tucker’s War:

Missouri and the Northwest Conspiracy

G. E. Rule

“So boys answer when we call; make our legions strong.
Knights of the Golden Circle come and join the Rebel throng.
We’ll raise the banner high once more and give the rebel yell;
Come follow us to victory or march with us through hell.”

–Bob Dyer, “The Last Great Rebel Raid” (1993),

from Johnny Whistletrigger: Civil War Songs from the Western Border, Vol 1.

Joseph W. Tucker was one of the hottest “fire-eaters” in Missouri. Thirty-eight years old when the Civil War began, he is described as a well-built man of two hundred pounds, six feet tall, with blue eyes and dark hair.[1] Lawyer, devout Methodist deacon, educator, St. Louis newspaper editor, and ally of Governor Claiborne F. Jackson and General Sterling Price, Tucker would be near the center of Confederate Missouri affairs over the course of the war.

Joseph Wofford Tucker was born on October 4, 1822 in Spartanburg County, South Carolina to Samuel Willis Tucker and Laodicea Tucker (nee Howard). His father was a man of means, with slaves to work the farm and do the household chores. Young Tucker chose the law as his profession and was admitted to the bar in 1844, the same year of his marriage to Miss Emily Barry, also of Spartanburg. In 1847, he was elected to the state legislature. His Wofford relatives had a proud history in the area, and he chose to emphasize the connection, calling himself “J. Wofford Tucker”.

In 1850, his uncle, Reverend Benjamin Wofford, passed away, bequeathing $100,000 for the establishment of a college in Spartanburg to be run under the authority of the state Methodist Conference. Several members of the late Reverend’s family were named to the provisional board of trustees, including 28 year-old J. Wofford Tucker. The Methodist Conference elected him to the first permanent Board as well. More than one hundred fifty years later, Wofford College is a respected and successful private institution on the same grounds as the original campus.[2]

Besides a lucrative law practice and the state legislature, Tucker also became an editor of the Carolina Spartan. Continuing his interest in education, in 1855 he was elected president of the newly established Spartanburg Female College. A serious financial setback in 1858—cause unknown—became the impetuous for a move west.[3]

In an attempt to revive his finances, Tucker moved his wife and three children to St. Louis, changing the form of his name to “Joseph W.” or “J. W.” at the same time. He opened a law practice with Thomas C. Johnson on Olive Street, joined a local Methodist church, and started a newspaper. His interest in education undimmed, by 1860 he was a member of the Board of Curators of the University of Missouri.[4]

As the secession crisis began to build to a climax in early 1861, Tucker and his Missouri State Journal were stridently engaged in the debates over Missouri’s future course. Pro-secession Governor Jackson and his allies were deeply concerned about their ability to control St. Louis, and Tucker was their champion in the press, smiting Unionists and “submissionists” wherever he found them.

While Tucker, in deference to his status in his church, was usually known as “Deacon”, his personality reminded no one of the kindly stereotype usually associated with that position. One of his ecclesiastical colleagues, Pro-Union Baptist minister Galusha Anderson, once found himself on the pointed end of a Tucker diatribe:

Believing with all his heart in the righteousness of secession, and wishing both in season and out of season, to strike telling blows against all advocates of Unionism, he came out in an editorial, one Saturday evening, in which he said: “The devil preaches at the corner of Sixth and Locust Streets, and he is just the same sort of a being that he was more than eighteen hundred years ago; he wants everybody to bow down and worship him.” Now since that was just where I preached, the editorial was rather personal, and was intended to be offensive. The deacon, fearing that I might miss reading his highly complimentary words, and so lack the stimulus that they might impart to my Sunday ministrations, early on the morning of the Lord’s day, sent a copy of his paper to me by special messenger, having thoughtfully marked his amiable editorial with his blue pencil. Instead of demanding satisfaction of the pious editor as almost any hot‑blooded Southerner of that day would have done, the blue‑penciled editorial was read at my breakfast‑table amid roars of laughter.[5]

Happily, Anderson chose to laugh off Tucker’s broadside, and thus spare St. Louis the spectacle of two devout men of the Lord resorting to the code duello to settle their differences.

As events continued to slide inexorably toward war, the State Journal was widely considered the leading secessionist paper in Missouri. Letters poured in from Unionists across the state to Pro-Union congressman Frank Blair’s Safety Committee in St. Louis, complaining bitterly that Tucker’s paper was providing aid and encouragement to the secessionists in their areas.[6]

Tucker worked closely with the other secessionist elements in St. Louis, including Basil Duke’s Minute Men. Union spy reports identified two leading Minute Men, Arthur McCoy and his brother-in-law Robert Louden, as “the head and front of all mischief” in the Minute Men’s efforts to keep the Unionists of St. Louis in an uproar and inflate estimates of their own strength.[7] Tucker and Louden would later be linked together in much more serious “mischief” at Union expense.

On the morning of May 10, 1861, the storm clouds that had been gathering over Missouri for months finally burst. Almost a month after armed hostilities had begun between the United States and the Confederate States at Fort Sumter, S. C., Captain Nathaniel Lyon led roughly seven thousand Missouri Volunteers and U. S. Reserves to surround approximately seven hundred state militiamen at their camp, named for the governor, on the outskirts of St. Louis. Outnumbered ten-to-one, militia general Daniel M. Frost had little choice but to surrender his command at Lyon’s demand. Lyon believed, correctly, that the camp was hostile to the U. S., and siege weapons, intended for use against the federal arsenal in the city, had been received from the Confederate government. However, a bloodless victory turned into tragedy and political capital for the secessionists when Lyon’s troops, goaded by throngs of onlookers while marching their prisoners back through the city to the arsenal, fired on the crowd. When the smoke cleared, twenty-eight people were dead, including women and children. Lyon later argued enraged secessionists in the crowd had fired first, wounding several of his soldiers, but most historians have concluded the Camp Jackson affair was a major blunder by the Unionist leaders of St. Louis.

A telegram that afternoon from Deacon Tucker to Governor Jackson brought the news of the events at Camp Jackson to the State legislature at Jefferson City, causing scenes of wild confusion and the immediate passage of the long-stalled Militia Bill giving the governor control of a newly strengthened Missouri State Guard.[8] Former governor Sterling Price, long a Pro-Union/Pro-Slavery Democrat, now rushed to Jefferson City to offer his services to the state. Jackson named Price Major-General commanding the State Guard on May 12, 1861.

Tucker’s relationship with the governor would lead to serious trouble for both of them. In the wake of Camp Jackson and the consolidation of Union control in St. Louis, Blair and his allies decided it was time to move against Tucker. Union authorities searched his office on July 12, 1861 and found a letter from the governor written on April 28. Jackson’s letter indiscreetly advocated secession for Missouri, and opined the state “ought to have gone out last winter when she could have seized the public arms and public property and defended herself”. This letter, along with Tucker’s public exhortations in defense of “state’s rights” and against “the murderer Lyon”, lead to suppression of the State Journal. Formal charges of treason against Tucker soon followed. James O. Broadhead, a Blair ally and by now Assistant District Attorney for Eastern Missouri, was the prosecutor.[9]

Interestingly, a footnote in Christopher Phillips’ Missouri’s Confederate hints—based on analysis of the handwriting—that the Jackson letter found in Tucker’s office may have been a forgery. While this is an intriguing theory rife with the possibility of bad faith and abuse of office by Union officials, it is unlikely. Thomas L. Snead, another St. Louis newspaperman who would “go south” first as aide to Governor Jackson, then as adjutant to General Price, and finally as a Confederate congressman for Missouri, worked closely with Tucker and Jackson both before and during the war. More than one hundred fifteen years after its publication, Snead’s The Fight For Missouri (1886) remains the best single source for political events in Missouri during 1861. Yet Snead breathes not a hint of skullduggery involved with Jackson’s letter to Tucker. It is highly likely if the letter were a fake and/or a plant, one or both men would have apprised Snead of the fact at the time or shortly thereafter. Such a juicy story at the expense of Union officials could hardly have failed to be included in his book. Genuine or fake, this letter would be one of the justifications cited by the Missouri Convention for removing Claiborne Jackson from the governor’s chair and replacing him with Unionist Hamilton R. Gamble.[10]

Less than confident in his ability to win a trial in Unionist St. Louis, Tucker jumped bail and fled, forfeiting a $10,000 bond.[11] He joined Governor Jackson in the fall of 1861 and started a new paper, the Missouri Army Argus to support Jackson and the State Guard. The first issue was published on October 28, 1861 at Neosho with an editorial note explaining “this little newspaper is paid for by the State, expressly for the use of the army.”[12] Tucker continued to rail against the Union “oppressors” infesting the state. He also used his newspaper as a recruiting tool for the Missouri Confederates.[13] The Argus would follow the Missourians on their travels over the course of the war, known first as the official organ of Governor Jackson. After Jackson’s death in late 1862, it became “universally regarded” as the voice of General Sterling Price.[14]

In December 1861, while the Guard and the Argus were in camp at Osceola, MO, a curious incident occurred. Two men were arrested in St. Joseph for distributing copies of a pamphlet promoting a new anti-Union secret society known as “The Emmanant”. The editors of the Missouri Republican quickly saw the hand of Deacon Tucker in the new society, basing their conclusions on the style of the diatribe in the pamphlets, the content of the oath required of new adherents, and the quantity and quality of the professionally printed material. By this time the Union had a firm hand on the presses of Missouri, and it was believed Tucker’s rebel press with the Argus at the camp of the State Guard was the most likely source of the pamphlets.[15] It would not be the last time Tucker would be linked to an anti-Union secret society.

After victories at the battles of Wilson’s Creek and Lexington, the war began to go badly for the Missouri Confederates. Forced by the burgeoning Union army into Arkansas, they made a credible bid to reclaim the state at the battle of Pea Ridge in March of 1862. A close-run affair that may have been decided by the untimely deaths of two senior southern officers, the Confederate defeat at Pea Ridge (also known as Elkhorn Tavern) had far-reaching consequences. Shortly afterwards, the Richmond government ordered the cream of the Missouri Confederate forces, the 1^st and 2^nd brigades, to cross the Mississippi in order to help stop Union General Ulysses S. Grant’s drive on Vicksburg, Mississippi. Tucker and his newspaper followed them, setting up shop at Jackson, Mississippi.[16]

With the mass of Missouri Confederate forces shifted to the east, regular organized resistance to Union rule diminished, and irregulars and guerrillas such as William Quantrill, “Bloody Bill” Anderson, Sam Hildebrand, and others became the main Confederate presence in the state. Spies and saboteurs infiltrated Union lines to maintain contact with the pro-southern elements and to harass Union communication & supply lines.

The longer the Union controlled Missouri, the more of a problem it would be for the Missouri Confederates. Although admitted by the Confederate congress on November 28, 1861, Missouri’s claim to be a Confederate state was of dubious legitimacy. While the Deep South and Virginia could afford to pursue a policy of “winning by not losing”, this strategy carried little comfort for the Missourians. Even if successful, they would be in a poor position to win their freedom from the Union at the eventual peace conference.

The Confederate Missouri leadership recognized this, but dealt with it in different fashions. Price and Tucker lobbied incessantly to return all of the Missouri troops to the west side of the Mississippi and use them and other Confederate troops to liberate the state. Thomas C. Reynolds, who had been elected Lt. Governor of Missouri in the election of 1860 and became Confederate Governor upon the death of Claiborne Jackson in 1862, tried a different tack. Reynolds chose to embrace the Davis administration as closely as possible so as to make it more difficult for them to toss Missouri over the side at the last minute. This difference in approaches brought tension between General Price and his lieutenants on one side and Governor Reynolds and the Richmond government on the other.

Tucker’s naturally combative personality made him particularly well-suited to the gadfly role, and raising hell with those who disagreed with him his instinctive response. His relationship with Price might remind the modern reader of the relationship of James Carville, known as “the ragin’ Cajun”, with his patron President Bill Clinton in the 1990s. Price could laugh off Tucker’s antics, providing plausible deniability for the General. Price availed himself of it whenever Richmond complained to him that Tucker’s needles in the Argus struck too deeply into President Davis’ hide.[17]

Meanwhile, the Confederate Missouri leadership used spies to keep itself informed of what was going on in the state. In 1862 and 1863, one of General Price’s most important couriers was the St. Louis Minute Man, Robert Louden.[18] Louden became a courier for Price in the summer of 1862, having been recruited by Absalom Grimes, “Official Mail Carrier” for Price and the Missouri Confederates. While Grimes specialized in letters between the troops and their families, with a lesser amount of courier work of an “official” nature, Louden’s work load seems to have been exactly the opposite in proportion. He had a regular route and schedule from Price in Arkansas, up the Mississippi to St. Louis, along the Missouri River through the Boonslick stronghold of the southerners, and then reverse the route back to Price.[19]

In late 1862, elections in the north went poorly for the Republicans, while the anti-war Democracy scored impressive gains. This was due in part to dissatisfaction with the war, particularly in the Northwest (today’s Midwest), and in part because the Northern states had not yet instituted policies allowing for absentee voting by their soldiers in the field. Ironically, this meant hundreds of thousands of the strongest Union supporters, those giving their blood and lives to support it, were not able to vote for like-minded candidates. Their absence in the 1862 polling was a significant factor in the Democrats’ success.[20]

By early 1863, anti-war politicians in the North were in a much stronger position than they had been in 1861 and 1862. A new name began to be heard across the Northwest—Order of American Knights, or OAK. Formed in early 1863[21], the nature of OAK would fuel a controversy that continues to this day.[22]

In March 1863, a book titled “A Voice From the Camp” was published in Missouri. The author, Lieutenant-Colonel Alexander M. Woolfolk of the Missouri State Militia, was a prominent Missouri Democrat, and would be a delegate to the infamous 1864 copperhead-dominated Democratic national convention at Chicago. Woolfolk was arrested, and his book suppressed, when it came to the attention of the Union authorities. It advocated Missouri join a new Northwest Confederacy instead of being in the Union or the Southern Confederacy.[23] Tucker would later tell Jefferson Davis the formation of a Northwest Confederacy was the main goal of OAK. Tucker’s Argus would call for a Northwest Confederacy as well, implying Missouri should be included, and worsening relations between his patron Price and Richmond.[24] Ironically, the Southern Confederacy did not believe in secession—at least not so far as its own states were concerned.

Judge Advocate General of the U. S. Army Joseph A. Holt would conclude OAK had its roots in the moribund “Knights of the Golden Circle” existing in the South before the war, but that Sterling Price had revived it in 1863 first as the “Southern League” and then as the Order of American Knights.[25] Price would have been a uniquely attractive partner in the eyes of Northern peace Democrats, and thus particularly well-suited to serve as a bridge between the northern and southern wings of the movement.[26] To what degree Price was a prime mover in the scheme—or more of a figurehead for the ambitions of his zealous and talented lieutenants—will probably never be known. It seems likely Price’s political lieutenants, Tucker and Thomas L. Snead, played a significant role in originating and pushing forward the Northwest Conspiracy.[27] By early 1863, OAK was holding meetings in St. Louis at the offices of Charles L. Hunt, “Supreme Commander for Missouri”.

Meanwhile, the Missouri troops under Brigadier-General John S. Bowen (Price having since returned to Arkansas without the 1^st and 2^nd Missouri Brigades) on the east side of the Mississippi continued to guard the southern approaches to Vicksburg. On May 1, 1863, they were attacked by Union General Ulysses S. Grant’s army at Grand Gulf and fought a slow retreat back towards the city, eventually being trapped with Confederate Lieutenant-General John C. Pemberton’s troops inside Vicksburg as Grant invested the city on May 18.

As the siege of Vicksburg continued, Confederate department commander Joseph E. Johnston received a proposal offering to help. The author of the proposal was J. W. Tucker.

Tucker’s patron, Price, had been shackled by his immediate commander in Arkansas, General Theophilus Holmes, and prevented from doing anything to interrupt Grant’s communications with the Northwest. Tucker blasted Holmes in a letter to the editor of the Jackson Mississippian on June 19, 1863. Among other failings, Tucker was incensed Holmes had “thwarted” others best efforts to disrupt Grant’s supplies.[28] If Holmes could not see what needed to be done, perhaps Johnston would be more amenable to supporting a strong course of action.

Johnston and Tucker knew that a lack of supplies could force Grant to loose his hold on Vicksburg. The year before, Grant’s drive on Vicksburg from the northern side had been aborted when a successful cavalry raid destroyed his supply base at Holly Springs. Something similar this time could make Grant turn back again.

The river was the key. St. Louis was the top of the supply chain in the theatre, and if the river supply line could be cut, Grant might have to give up for the year and take his army back north. Unfortunately for the Confederates, interdicting a river supply line is a much more difficult proposition than disrupting a railroad supply line. A single successful cavalry raid can tear up miles of railroad track and make the line useless for weeks or even months. Further, this could be accomplished without destroying a single train.

With a river, this method is simply not practical. Even when the Confederates held strong-points at Vicksburg and Port Hudson, the Union navy managed to pass those points successfully. It would be necessary to go after the boats themselves, particularly the supply boats.

During the Civil War, the privately owned commercial steamboats of the Mississippi River valley were in actual practice completely at the government’s disposal. One expert opined under oath “I consider every boat on the river to be in the government service, directly or indirectly.“[29] Unfortunately, seldom was effort made to segregate military cargoes and passengers on the steamboats. Civilians often traveled on a boat that also carried Union soldiers and supplies.

Johnston later reported to his superiors on Tucker’s plan:[30]

During the siege of Vicksburg, Governor Pettus [of Mississippi] proposed to me the adoption of a plan suggested by Judge Tucker, to be executed under that gentleman’s direction, to cut off supplies from the besieging army. He required $20,000 to inaugurate it. I drew a check for that sum on the assistant treasurer in Mobile, in favor of Governor Pettus, who indorsed it to Judge Tucker. After considerable delay, caused by reference of the matter to the Treasury Department, the money was paid. While I remained in Mississippi, Judge Tucker was, I believe, using this money against the enemy’s navigation of the river. About the end of October, I wrote an explanation of the case to the Secretary of the Navy, to be delivered by Judge Tucker, who had large claims against that Department for enemy’s property destroyed on the water. [31]

What did Tucker tell Johnston that made the latter willing to contribute $20,000 to the effort? The support of Governor Pettus would have been helpful in this regard, and Johnston must also have known Tucker acted as a surrogate for General Sterling Price. Still, it seems likely the Deacon gave Johnston some idea of how he intended to accomplish the mission and the organization he could bring to the job.

Steamboats had been burning with regularity and in suspicious manners since late 1861.[32] It would have been easier to sell Johnston on the capabilities of an already existent organization that merely needed more resources and the imprimatur of official government sanction in order to expand its activities, than to convince him such an organization could be started from scratch in a useful timeframe.

Approximately two months after Tucker’s proposal to Johnston, too late to save Vicksburg, steamboats began to burn with great frequency. Twenty-one boats, the majority of which have been confirmed to be strikes by Tucker’s group, burned over the next eight months. (See Appendix A)

On September 3, 1863, General Price’s courier, Robert Louden, was arrested by Union authorities in St. Louis. Louden had been quite active in his year as Price’s courier. His trips included Detroit, Chicago, Indianapolis, Richmond, Philadelphia, and New York City.[33] In his possession at the time of his arrest were two letters in his own hand, signed “R.L” and “OAK”. One of these letters was addressed to “Major Pleasants”, who would later be identified by the Federals as “principal disbursing agent” for what the Union came to know as Tucker’s group.[34] Louden told Pleasants, “I have engaged the secret organization in the work. It will be a powerful lever for us, but funds will be required.” Another letter advised one of his key Memphis contacts that he was trying to get one OAK team to strike again soon in St. Louis, and would be taking another one to Ohio as soon as possible, probably the next day. He also claims, “the Ruth was a small affair comparatively, if all goes well”.[35] His partner, Grimes, confirms Louden was responsible for the burning of the steamer Ruth near Cairo, Illinois the previous month, killing twenty-six, destroying a $2.6 million Union payroll, and initiating a reign of fire on the Mississippi.[36]

Although Louden was now in Gratiot Street military prison, and would be sentenced to death by a military commission in Dec, 1863, his colleagues with Tucker’s group continued burning steamboats. Two weeks after Louden’s arrest they struck at the St. Louis levee, destroying four boats. A few weeks later they did it again, burning another three boats at St. Louis.[37]

Between the battle of Gettysburg in the east, and the loss of Vicksburg in the west, 1863 had been a disastrous year for the young Confederacy. As 1864 began, the worsening military situation caused Confederate strategies to turn increasingly toward unconventional methods for winning their freedom from the Union. Tucker, on his way to visit his family in South Carolina, wrote a letter on February 16, 1864 to Confederate Secretary of War Joseph Seddon requesting financial help for his boat-burners.[38] (See Appendix B) Tucker referred to a meeting with Seddon the previous December and proposed his boat-burners coordinate their efforts to strike in several places on the same day in the March 1-15 timeframe.

While boats continued to burn in the Mississippi River valley, some of which were certainly the work of Tucker’s crew, there is no evidence a concerted effort was made in the first half of March. The closest incident to the time mentioned confirmed to be the work of Tucker’s group is the destruction of the J. H. Russell, burned by Isaac V. Ayleshire at Plaquemine, LA on March 28, 1864.[39] Ayleshire, an Indiana man, would also be credited by Union authorities with the destruction of the Robert Campbell, Jr. and the City of Madison, both with heavy loss of life.[40]

March of 1864 found Tucker in Richmond with his lieutenant Minor Major, a former member of the Missouri State Guard.[41] They were staying at the Spottswood Hotel, a popular venue for visiting officers and others with official business. Also residing at the Spottswood in this period was another Missouri Confederate, Captain Thomas E. Courtenay. Courtenay had been a prominent businessman in St. Louis before the war, and had served as sheriff for a time in 1860.

Courtenay had been detached in Aug. of 1863 on secret service by an order of General Price, signed by his adjutant, Major Thomas L. Snead.[42] By early 1864 he was in Richmond and building a supply of his hollow cast iron “Courtenay torpedoes”, bombs designed to look like lumps of coal. Filled with explosives and then covered with tar and coal dust, they would be indistinguishable from the real article. Deposited by Tucker’s saboteurs in a coal pile used by Union controlled steamboats, when shoveled into the furnace they would cause a devastating explosion of the boilers, destroying the boat.[43] In a letter from Richmond dated January 19, 1864, Courtenay promises to send some of his torpedoes to a colleague at General Price’s headquarters.[44]

While in Richmond, Tucker lobbied Jefferson Davis directly in a very interesting letter. He described OAK to Davis, claiming nearly 500,000 members in the Order, talked about some of the assistance to the war effort they had provided by their sabotage efforts, and asked for $100,000 for Union property already destroyed (See Appendix C).[45]

There are elements of disingenuousness to Tucker’s letter. In March of 1864 he is finally telling Davis of the existence of a secret and violent organization that he had been in close contact with since early the previous year. Tucker knew Davis trusted neither himself nor Price, and one suspects if the Deacon didn’t need Richmond’s gold to further his schemes he wouldn’t be saying even as much as he did about OAK and its goals. Certainly he was careful to leave Missouri off the list of states proposed for the new Northwest Confederacy he described as the aim of OAK.

Another interesting feature of this letter is Tucker’s reference to two non-steamboat sabotage operations:

“a week ago we burnt $500,000 worth of hay at the Memphis wharf, to embarrass Sherman; not long since Colt’s pistol and gun Factory became an earnest of what can be done”.

The Colt fire, on February 4, 1864, did $2,000,000 in damage to their factory in Hartford, Conn. A report at the time stated “Many believed that it was the work of an incendiary, and among them were some of the most prominent contractors in the concern.”[46] Hartford is certainly a long way from the boat-burners usual haunts in the Mississippi River valley, but Tucker appears to be taking credit for the Colt fire. Union authorities, in piecing together Tucker’s organization from captured correspondence, spy reports and arrested agents who agreed to talk, would later claim a “land operations” section headed by ex-congressman J. Richard Barret of St. Louis.

Two days after Tucker sent this letter to Davis from his Richmond hotel room, Captain Thomas H. Hines of John Hunt Morgan’s Kentucky raiders was dispatched to Canada by order of Secretary of War James A. Seddon. Hines was instructed “In passing through the United States you will confer with the leading persons friendly or attached to the cause of the Confederacy, or who may be advocates of peace, and do all in your power to induce our friends to organize and prepare themselves to render such aid as circumstances may allow. . .”.[47] This is the point traditionally given for the beginning of the Confederate government’s formal involvement in the Northwest Conspiracy.

Certainly Missourians and Kentuckians—the two Confederate states most deeply interested in the success of the Northwest Conspiracy[48]—were prominent in its attempted execution. Hines and John B. Castleman of Kentucky wrote of their involvement, and their participation is better documented than most of the Missourians.[49] But everywhere one looked, there were Missourians—Emile Longuemare, early member of the Missouri State Guard, involved in the attempted burning of New York City by the Confederate secret service;[50] Colonel Vincent Marmaduke, brother of Missouri Confederate General John S. Marmaduke, involved in the attempt to free all of the Confederate prisoners at Camp Douglas in Chicago;[51] James A. Barret, of the powerful St. Louis family, “grand lecturer” of the national OAK/Sons of Liberty, and bagman for their connections to the Confederate secret service;[52] J. Richard “Missouri Dick” Barret of the same family, former congressman from St. Louis, suspected of being “head of land operations” for Tucker’s group;[53] Charles L. Hunt, OAK Supreme Commander for Missouri, one of the most militant of the copperhead leaders;[54] Robert Louden, Price’s courier, delivering Rebel mails in northern states in late ’62 and the first half of ’63; and, of course, Price and Tucker.

The Missouri Confederates recognized they were in the precarious position where the south could “win” and Missouri might very well remain in the Union. Unsurprisingly, this was entirely unacceptable to them. The answer Price, Tucker, and Snead devised was two-pronged: Internal revolution and armed invasion by regular Confederate forces. Tucker’s close contacts with OAK would provide the first, and General Price would provide the second. Price was so insistent he be allowed to invade to “reclaim” Missouri that Governor Reynolds was concerned the general would give up his Confederate commission and “bushwhack it” back in Missouri if he was not allowed to make the effort.[55] The threat worked, and Price received permission to go forward with planning an invasion of Missouri for the summer of 1864.

While all this skullduggery was going on, the Union authorities in Missouri began to realize something unpleasant was brewing. General William S. Rosecrans, who became department commander in January of 1864, had a history of placing a high value on an effective intelligence service.[56] Rosecrans’ new Provost Marshal, J. P. Sanderson, began to infiltrate his agents into OAK. Two of the principal Missouri OAK leaders, Charles L. Hunt and Charles E. Dunn, were arrested and questioned.

The result of these investigations, published in the newspapers in July of 1864, is known as “The Sanderson Report”.[57] Sanderson’s agents claimed OAK had 500,000 members, mostly across the Northwest, that General Price was the military head of the order, that a new invasion of the state by Price was in the offing, and it would be timed to coincide with an internal uprising by OAK. The 500,000 number matches remarkably well with what Deacon Tucker had earlier reported to Jefferson Davis as the membership of the Order as of Dec. 1863. This is hardly surprising, as it was Tucker’s organization Sanderson’s agents had penetrated.

While Sanderson’s agents worked to uncover the conspiracy in Missouri, Governor Oliver Morton and General Henry B. Carrington of Indiana worked to forestall the Order’s activities in that state and Kentucky. Their star spy was Felix G. Stidger of Kentucky who managed to get himself named Grand Secretary of the Order for Kentucky and worked closely with the leaders of both states. On May 9, 1864, Stidger reports that Dr. William A. Bowles, a “General” of the Order for Indiana, disclosed to him the goals of the conspiracy:[58]

He told me that the forces of Indiana and Ohio would concentrate in Kentucky, and make Kentucky their battle-ground, and that the forces of Illinois would proceed to St. Louis, and cooperate with those of Missouri; that Illinois would furnish 50,000 men, Missouri 30,000 men, and that the rebel General Sterling Price would invade Missouri with 20,000 troops, and that with the 100,000 men they could occupy and permanently hold Missouri. . .

Stidger’s work would result in the breaking up of the Order in Indiana and Kentucky, with most of the leaders arrested in August of 1864. Several, including Bowles, would be sentenced to death by a military commission in Indianapolis later that year, but would escape the hangman by presidential intervention. Tucker’s “head of land operations”, Dick Barret, would be listed as one of the co-conspirators in the charges against Harrison H. Dodd of Indiana, Grand Commander of the Order for that state.[59] Dodd did not require presidential clemency, however, as he escaped from custody and fled to Canada during the trial.

Tucker’s organized boat-burners continued to be active as well. On July 15, 1864, six steamboats were destroyed at the St. Louis levee.[60] This was almost certainly the work of the Deacon’s men. His lieutenant, Minor Major, had shown up in Canada not long before to solicit a contribution from the newly-arrived Confederate Commissioners in support of the Tucker group’s activities. He received only $2,000 for his trouble, but it is interesting to note that Commissioner Jacob Thompson reported Major arrived at his doorstep not long after Thompson had reached Canada, showing Tucker’s saboteurs knew just where to go in order to tap Richmond’s gold set aside for the Northwest Conspiracy.[61]

The “land operations” section of Tucker’s crew continued their activities too. On July 2, they burned $800,000 of government medical supplies at Louisville and then headed for Richmond to claim their reward.[62] Once there, they negotiated with Secretary of War Seddon and Secretary of State J. P. Benjamin for remuneration for their sabotage on behalf of the Confederacy. They settled for $50,000. After leaving Richmond, they went to Mobile before re-entering Union lines near Memphis. Tucker’s newspaper, by now renamed the Argus and Crisis, had moved from Jackson to Mobile sometime before, and this side-trip was probably for the purpose of reporting to him the results of the negotiations in Richmond and distributing the money. Tucker had affidavits from all his saboteurs on their strikes at his offices in Mobile, and these were used to distribute reward money.[63]

General Price’s long-awaited invasion to reclaim the state for the Confederates began on September 16, 1864. Price moved slowly north towards St. Louis, then without entering the city, westwards toward Kansas, along the Missouri river bypassing Jefferson City. As Price’s invasion worked its way leisurely through Missouri, OAK finally acted as the Confederates neared St. Louis. Charles L. Hunt’s successor, John H. Taylor, called the membership to arms just as the Sanderson Report had predicted.[64] (See Appendix D)

Taylor told the membership General Price’s invasion had been made at OAK’s invitation, and that Price had been named “major-general to command the members called into the military service”. Taylor promised “at least 20,000 true men” to support Price’s invasion and announced until further notice the headquarters of OAK would be in General Price’s camp. He ended with the Order’s motto, “Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God”, a sentiment Deacon Tucker could support wholeheartedly.

Unfortunately for the Missouri Confederates, it was too little too late. The fall of Atlanta in early September had demoralized the copperheads, making it all too clear the Confederacy was unlikely to survive. Under such circumstances, it is not surprising most of the rank and file copperheads of OAK (those who were needed to do the actual fighting and dying) declined to participate in Price’s invasion. Thousands of southern sympathizers joined him, but OAK had promised—and he expected—tens of thousands.[65] After several weeks in the state—during which Price moved slowly waiting in vain for OAK to swell his ranks—the Missouri Confederates were finally checked bloodily at the battle of Westport near Kansas City on October 23, 1864. Defeated, they turned south for the long march back to Arkansas.

See also The Boat-Burners

One of those sure he would not be allowed to return to his home in St. Louis was the convicted saboteur, Robert Louden. He had escaped from Union custody while being transferred from Gratiot prison to Alton prison during General Price’s raid the previous October, but a death penalty still hung over him should he ever be captured again. After the war, Louden would claim that on the night of April 26-27 he engineered the most gruesomely spectacular strike any of Tucker’s saboteurs ever attempted. Using another of Thomas Courtenay’s coal torpedoes, Louden said he had snuck aboard the Sultana at Memphis and deposited the bomb in the coal piles near her furnace. Shortly after leaving Memphis, Sultana’s boilers exploded, resulting in the deaths of over 1,700 Union POW’s returning to their homes from southern prison camps.[71]

Jefferson Davis, having escaped from Richmond before its fall, tried to make it to the Trans-Mississippi to continue the fight. Union troops were in hot pursuit of the rebel President- without-a-capital. Dispatched to help in the hunt was the famous detective, Allan Pinkerton. He was also instructed to see if he could track down Tucker, Louden, and their colleagues. Pinkerton reported back to Washington on June 6, 1865 rumors both men were on the move. Circulars were dispatched as far away as California alerting Union authorities to keep a close eye out for them.[72]

In the spirit of retribution gripping the North after the assassination of President Lincoln, the trials of the conspirators were full of accusations against the Confederate government for sponsoring various heinous acts in their desperation to stave off defeat. One of the witnesses was the steamboatman from St. Louis, Edward Frazor. Baker’s newest list of sabotaged steamboats had grown to include Sultana. His organization chart of the boat-burners had President Davis at the top, followed by Secretary of State J. P. Benjamin, Secretary of War Seddon and J. W. Tucker.[73]

While General Sterling Price did not make Baker’s chart, it is simply not credible his surrogate Tucker could have sponsored the group on his own without the General’s knowledge and support. Price loyalists like Louden would not have been involved with something so controversial without the General’s blessing. Sterling Price must go down in history as the boss of Tucker’s saboteurs, even if Richmond was paying most of the bills.

Joseph W. Tucker managed to avoid Pinkerton and the rest of the Union authorities in the spring of 1865, escaping to Bermuda. There he stayed for several years, waiting for Union ire to cool. While in exile, Tucker returned to one of his first loves, serving as superintendent for education of the British colony.[74]

While Tucker found safe haven in Bermuda, most of the Missouri leadership went to Mexico, including General Price and Governor Reynolds. There Reynolds, refusing to let the feud over the failed invasion of 1864 die, wrote a poison pen manuscript entitled General Sterling Price and the Confederacy. In it Reynolds detailed his suspicions about Price and the Northwest Conspiracy, leaning heavily on the doings of Tucker and the relationship between the two men. Reynolds alleged Tucker’s paper was “universally regarded as an ‘organ’ of General Price” and called Tucker himself Price’s “confidential friend”. Reynolds’ main complaint was the conspiracy might result in a Northwest Confederacy, and Price intended Missouri to be a member of it. Reynolds’ claimed such had been the consistent tone and some of the articles in Tucker’s paper during the war.

On Christmas day, 1868, President Andrew Johnson granted an unconditional pardon to all but the highest ranking members of the Confederacy. Shortly thereafter, Tucker and his family returned to the United States. Instead of Missouri, they chose Florida, settling in Sanford.

Tucker made Sanford his home for the rest of his life, taking up his old profession of the law and enjoying the family life that had largely been denied him during the war. He returned to using the old form of his name, “J. Wofford Tucker”, as well. The Deacon remained active in the Methodist church, serving as a delegate to the First Ecumenical Methodist Conference held at London in September of 1881.[75] In 1893, he returned to his native South Carolina for the first time in nearly thirty years, speaking at Wofford College, which he had helped to found forty-two years before.[76]

Joseph Wofford Tucker passed away in Sanford after a full and eventful life.[77] A friend since his boyhood days in South Carolina, Reverend Charles A. Fulwood, eulogized him for The American Illustrated Methodist Magazine in the monthly issue for October of 1901. Fulwood wrote that Tucker had “hoped, prayed and labored to prevent bloodshed and a disruption of the Union”, an assertion which would have elicited howls of derision from the Unionists of St. Louis. On much safer ground historically, Fulwood continued, “but when he saw that the catastrophe was inevitable, he sought to unify the South and at least a portion of the West, so that they might stand together in the conflict.”

Tucker’s War

Appendix A

Ruth	1863/08/04	Cairo, IL	Burned	Louden. 26 dead. $2.6M Union payroll destroyed.
City of Madison	1863/08/18	Vicksburg, MS	Exploded	Baker says Isaac Elshire (Ayleshire)
Champion	1863/08/21	Memphis, TN	Burned	William Murphy. Received $3k from Tucker in reward.
Diuranal	1863/09/12	St. Charles, ARK	Burned
Hiawatha	1863/09/13	St. Louis, MO	Burned	4 boats burned. OAK
Imperial	1863/09/13	St. Louis, MO	Burned
Jesse K. Bell	1863/09/13	St. Louis, MO	Burned
Post Boy	1863/09/13	St. Louis, MO	Burned
Henry Chouteau	1863/09/26	Columbus, KY	Burned
Robert Campbell, JR	1863/09/28	Cairo, IL	Burned	Approx. 40 dead (Ways 22 dead). Baker says Isaac Elshire received $5k from Tucker.
Catahoula	1863/10/04	St. Louis, MO	Burned	3 boats burned. OAK
Chancellor	1863/10/04	St. Louis, MO	Burned
Forest Queen	1863/10/04	St. Louis, MO	Burned
Sunny Side	1863/11/13	Island 16, Miss. R.	Burned	“Considerable” loss of life
Science No. 2	1863/12	Portland, KY	Burned
Allen Collier	1863/12		Burned
Colonna	1863/12/01	Newburgh, IN	Burned
Thomas J. Patten	1864/01/25	Memphis, TN	Burned	Walker’s Bend
Daniel G. Taylor	1864/02/05	Louisville, KY	Burned	JAG Joseph Holt says sabotage. One person killed. Frazor says sabotage at Lincoln trial.
Des Arc	1864/03/22	Memphis, TN	Burned
J. H. Russell	1864/03/28	Plaquemine, LA	Burned	Isaac V. Ayleshire. Trial in St. Louis Oct-Nov 1865. Boat formerly “Cherokee”.

Note: The above table is part of a larger spreadsheet prepared by G. E. & D. H. Rule that includes approximately one hundred Union-controlled boats destroyed under suspicious circumstances during the war. It is a work in progress. We have attempted to exclude from the list boats known to be Confederate-controlled, destroyed by regular military action, guerrillas, or other causes clearly inconsistent with sabotage (“snagged and lost” being the most common of these). We have another list of approximately thirty boats that were removed from the original list as we were able to confirm their destruction by means other than sabotage. As an example of this latter, we were beginning to be very curious about a group of boats burned at Johnsonville, TN in early November 1864, until we realized what we were seeing was the result of Hood’s great invasion of Tennessee, and saboteurs had nothing to do with it. Lastly, this table is not meant to suggest there were no boats sabotaged by agents affiliated with Tucker and the Missouri Confederates prior to August of 1863. U.S. Quartermaster Charles Parsons named the E. M. Ryland, October 10, 1861, as the first boat sabotaged, and there are thirty-three boats on our list before the Ruth on August 4, 1863. However, the period shown above contains the highest concentration of steamboats known to be destroyed by Tucker and his saboteurs, and coincides with their receiving official sanction and funding to do so by General Johnston. Activity prior to August of 1863 would have been under the authority of General Price and probably unknown to higher levels of the Confederate hierarchy.

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Tucker’s War

Appendix B

AUGUSTA, GA., February 16, 1864.
Hon. JAMES A. SEDDON,
Secretary of War:

Mr. SEDDON: I beg your permission to write a few words, after the style of a plain, unofficial, but earnest man, writing to a man of practical wisdom. I feel, as intensely as it is possible to feel, the vital necessity of striking hard blows now, and striking at as many points and in as many ways as possible, so as to aid our cause and save our country.

I have perfected my plans and distributed my men, with means improvised for the purpose (since the Government has not as yet paid our force any money), and between the 1st and 15th of March, on the same day, I propose to destroy the enemy’s transports, arsenals, navy-yards, stores, &c., in accordance with the outline of the plan I gave you in December.

I beg that this plan be borne in mind as our link in the chain of testimony in favor of our force. On the same day at all points we mean to strike effectually, so as to exert an influence upon the spring campaign.

Hon. John B. Clark did me the kindness to advise me by letter that the Senate had passed a bill—he did not state its provisions—which might aid in facilitating my plans, which he supposed would also be passed by the House. This led me to conclude it was the bill which you informed me in our latest interview you would propose and submit to the Military Committee, for the purpose of putting this secret service upon a systematic and legal footing, and then would give me those facilities which I asked in some written propositions submitted at your suggestion.

Mr. Seddon, please do me the kindness to take ten minutes of your overtaxed time, and give me the commission or order or direction or authority or recognition which will enable me to prosecute this work vigorously and systematically, and I promise you to render a good account of our labors.

I visit my family for a few days, with whom I have spent one week in two and a half years. I shall be much gratified to receive your orders, and for twenty days to come my address will be Hebron, S. C.

With great respect, &c.,
JOSEPH W. TUCKER.

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Tucker’s War

Appendix C

J. W. Tucker to Jefferson Davis.

(From Confederate Memorial Hall.)

(Spotswood Hotel 14th March, 1864.)

Confidential statements; for the President alone.

1. There exists in the North West and North a secret political organization, having a Lodge in St. Louis with one thousand members.

2. The principles and objects of the organization are, among others, the following:

(1) The preservation of state rights and free representative government; (2) everlasting opposition to Black and Red Republicanism; (3) self-preservation against the unscrupulous and bloody purposes of the war and plunder party of the North; (4) the distinct recognition of the Southern Confederacy, and aideing that government in all practicable ways, because, it is contending for the same rights; (5) the distinct recognition that all the slave states, including Kentucky and Missouri, of right belong to the Confederacy; (6) the formation of a North West Republic including Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana and Ohio; (7) the institution of the most friendly relations, commercially and otherwise, with the Confederate States; (8) and making open war with the perverted government of the United States, if that become necessary to carry out these objects.

3. That organization numbered, on the 3rd December 1863, Four hundred and ninety thousand men, distributed as follows:

Illinois, ………………………….110,000

Indiana,……………………………120,000

Ohio,……………………………….40,000

Iowa, ………………………………15,000

Pennsylvania,………………………..40,000

New York, …………………………..40,000

New Jersey, …………………………15,000

and other numbers proportionate to population in other states, chiefly in the North West.

4. A deputation, under the authority of the order, was sent to confer with me in Mobile in relation to the destruction of the enemy’s marine service, together with armories, arsenals, depots of stores, etc. etc., as a means of weakening and paralyzing the military strength of the Federal Government. The Order is desirous of thus aideing our cause. In the Lodge in St. Louis there are seventy-two Engineers serving on the Western Waters, by whom we destroyed ten Federal Transports in ten days. But a doubt arose whether our work was prosecuted by the approval of the Confederate Government; and whether the men employed in this perilous service would be compensated by any provision of law, and especially when officers in the marine service were thrown out of employment by the destruction of the vessels on which they were employed.

5. Our future plans, if sanctioned and aided by the Government, embrace the destruction of that transport service upon which Grant must rely in the great coming struggle of the spring campaign; a week ago we burnt $500,000 worth of hey at the Memphis wharf, to embarrass Sherman; not long since Colt’s pistol and gun Factory became an earnest of what can be done. We design to strike a blow on the same day, at many points, that will paralyze the foe. To do this confidence in the countenance and approval of our government must be inspired. To do this an adjustment for work already done must be had. The final agents are often ignorant, and sometimes vicious men. No argument but money will avail with them. If a settlement now be practicable, and a sum of money, say $100,000, of a character of funds current within the Federal lines, greenbacks, or Foreign exchange, can be placed in the hands of Lieut. Gen. Polk, for disbursement, some in advance, and the rest as the work proceeds, I am most confident we shall be able, through this association, to render important and telling service to our government in the ensuing campaign.

We had sent through a young man, Mr. Major, now with me, to make himself a member of the order; this induced the coming of the deputation to confer with me personally, since I was known to very many of its members. No mere stranger can by possibility work through the order, or in connection with it. It is the most perfect and the most secret the world has known. Out of 490,000, only two individuals have ever shown a disposition to betray the secrets of the order; and these two men disappeared mysteriously. I could give more information, but fear prolixity and tediousness. I beg respectfully to commend the subject to the notice of His Excellency the President. I know that by a recent enactment the question of secret service is transferred to the War Department.

But there is an important sense in which the Chief Magistrate of the Republic is the Government; and this ought to be so; since to him attaches the responsibility of failure, and to him pertains the glory of success.

I have the honor to subscribe, with great respect &c.

J. W. TUCKER.

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Tucker’s War

Appendix D

O. A. K.

HEADQUARTERS,
Saint Louis, Mo., October 1, 1864.

To THE MEMBERS OF THE ORDER OF AMERICAN KNIGHTS OF THE STATE OF MISSOURI:

SIR KNIGHTS: Morning dawneth. General Price with at least 20,000 veteran soldiers is now within your State. Through your supreme commander (and with the approbation of the supreme council) you invited him to come to your aid. He was assured that if he came at this time with the requisite force you would co operate and add at least 20,000 true men to his army. He has hearkend to your prayer and is now battling for your deliverance. Sons of Liberty, will you falsify your plighted word? I know you will not. You are strong in numbers—full 30,000 strong—and your influence is potent. It requires but prompt action on the part of the members to insure the ultimate triumph of our cause. As you value your property, your liberties, your lives, and your sacred honor, fail not to give a helping hand in this crisis. Under and by virtue of the authority vested in me by section — of the code of the O. A. K.s, authorizing the appointment of a major-general to command the members called into the military service, I shall appoint that brave and true soldier, Missouri’s favorite son, Maj. Gen. Sterling Price, military commander of the O. A. K.s of the State of Missouri.

All able-bodied men of the O. A. K.s are hereby called upon and required to render military service in behalf of our cause. All true knights will yield prompt obedience to the orders and commands of General Price. Meantime do all possible damage to the enemy. Seize all arms and munitions of war within your power. Take possession of and hold all important places you can, and recruit as rapidly as possible. If you cannot sustain yourselves fall back upon the army of occupation. In townships and counties where you cannot concentrate on account of the presence of the enemy repair singly or in squads without delay to the army, or to points where your brethren may be marshaling their forces, and in all cases be ready to obey the commands of your chieftain and unite with the forces when an opportune moment others. Ye knights, who belong to the militia, a change of government is now impending and you possess peculiar advantages for doing good service, and it is believed you will not fail to act efficiently. You joined the militia that you might the better protect yourselves under Radical rule. Now prepare to strike with the victorious hosts under General Price and aid in the redemption of the State. Already hundreds of militiamen, arms in hands, have taken position beside the brave and gallant soldiers under General Price. In no event permit yourselves to be arrayed against your brethren. I enjoin it upon the district and county commanders and the grand seniors to be vigilant and active in the discharge of their respective duties. Let each one feel that upon him depends the successful issue of this contest, and that it is paramount duty to immediately enter the service. I address you perhaps for the last time. You have honored me and given me your confidence. I have endeavored to merit as I appreciate that consideration. Danger has not deterred me from the discharge of duty, and the period of my intercourse and collaboration with you and brethren of other States I shall ever revert to with feelings of pleasurable emotion. I have rejoiced to note the unanimity of sentiment and earnestness of purpose evinced to put forth every effort, with force of arms if need be, to establish the great principles of liberty and free government and States rights, so soon as the event which is upon us transpired. Brethren, the time for action has come. We must now meet the hosts of the tyrant in the field and sustain our friends and our cause. Be assured I shall buckle on my armor, and I trust I shall greet many thousands of you in the camp of our friends. If we do not sustain General Price, and our cause in consequence fails, all will be lost. We must fight. Honor and patriotism demand it. Then remember your solemn oaths. Remember the sacred obligations resting upon you and resolve, individually and collectively, to do your duty knowing it full well.

Until otherwise ordered headquarters of the O. A. K.s will be hereafter in the army of General Price.

All officers of the O. A. K.s are charged to use the utmost dispatch in communicating this letter to the members. Absence from the city prevented an earlier issue of this communication. Remember our motto: “Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God.”

Given under my hand and seal of the O. A. K.s of the State of Missouri, this 1st day of October, A. D. 1864.

JOHN H. TAYLOR,

Supreme Commander of the State of Missouri.

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[1]Dr. J. B. O. Landrum, History of Spartanburg County, 1900; 1860 St. Louis census; 1880 Florida census; NARA provost marshal records.

[2]Wofford College website, www.wofford.edu. The college’s Board of Trustees is still selected by the state conference of the United Methodist Church. Family genealogy records in Landrum, History of Spartanburg County, suggest that Reverend Wofford was actually J. Wofford Tucker’s paternal great-uncle.

[3]Rev. Charles A. Fulwood, D.D., “The Late Hon. J. Wofford Tucker”, The American Illustrated Methodist Magazine, October, 1901. Fulwood hints that Tucker was a soft touch where money was concerned and may have been taken advantage of in some way. The Spartanburg Female College would eventually fail in 1871, and an email to author from Wofford College archivist R. Phillip Stone suggests that the women’s college’s shaky finances might have had something to do with Tucker’s own financial problems.

[4]Fulwood, “The Late Hon. J. Wofford Tucker”, 1860 St. Louis business directory; “University of Missouri Installation Exercises, Address by J.W. Tucker, Esq., of St. Louis, Member of the Board of Curators, and Response by Benj. A. Minor, A.M., President of the University, Delivered in the Chapel, October 2, 1860”, Columbia, MO., William F. Switzler, Publisher, Statesmen Office, 1860

[5]Galusha Anderson, The Story of a Border City During the Civil War, 1908

[6]James O. Broadhead papers, Missouri Historical Society

[7]Union spy report, James O. Broadhead papers, Missouri Historical Society. Letter from Basil Duke to Thomas L. Snead, Letter from Colton Greene to Thomas L. Snead, Thomas L. Snead papers, Missouri Historical society.

[8]James Peckham, General Nathaniel Lyon and Missouri in 1861, 1866, 165-169. Chris Phillips suggests an alternate scenario for how the news got to the legislature in Missouri’s Confederate, 252-253. Peckham was an Unconditional Unionist member of the assembly for St. Louis at the time, and his account reads like straight first-hand reporting including little details like who was peeking over whose shoulder to read the telegram.

[9]James O. Broadhead papers, Missouri Historical Society; Christopher Phillips, Missouri’s Confederate: Claiborne Jackson and the Creation of Southern Identity in the Border West, 2000, 249. Peckham, Lyon and Missouri, 202.

[10]Phillips, Missouri’s Confederate, 249-250; Thomas L. Snead, The Fight for Missouri, 1886; Civil War researcher Kirby Ross, in an email to author, points out that Tucker published a series of newspapers over the course of the war and had ample opportunity to trumpet any duplicity on the part of Union authorities regarding this letter. One of these, the Missouri Army Argus, was funded by Governor Jackson. While few copies of Tucker’s newspapers have survived, secondary sources would have reported the fact had Tucker ever made the claim.

[11]James O. Broadhead, St. Louis in the Early Days of the War.

[12]James Melvin Lee, History of American Journalism, 1923 revised edition, 301

[13]R. S. Bevier, History of the First and Second Missouri Confederate Brigades 1861-1865, 1879, 76-77, quoting a Tucker editorial in the Missouri Army Argus of Dec. 12, 1861.

[14]Thomas C. Reynolds, General Sterling Price and the Confederacy, unpublished manuscript, Missouri Historical Society

[15]“Another Secret Society”, Missouri Republican, Dec. 29, 1861. “Another” being a reference to the old Knights of the Golden Circle. “The pamphlet itself, judging by the mechanical execution, was printed at Price’s camp, Osceola, and Deacon Tucker has, no doubt, exercised his leisure moments in getting up this infernal society.”

[16]Robert E. Shalhope, Sterling Price: Portrait of a Southerner, 1971, 236

[17]Albert Castel, General Sterling Price and the Civil War in the West, 1993 (reissue of 1968 edition), 63-64, 132-133, 135, 194; Reynolds, Price and the Confederacy.

[18]D. H. Rule, “Sultana: A Case for Sabotage”, North & South, Volume 5 Issue 1; Absalom Grimes, Confederate Mail Runner, 1926

[19]Trial transcript of Robert Louden, NARA

[20]David E. Long, The Jewel of Liberty: Abraham Lincoln’s Re-election and the End of Slavery, 1994 (1997 Da Capo press edition), 43-44

[21]Frank L. Klement, Dark Lanterns, 1984, 66. An account provided by Missouri Confederate secret service agent Emile Longuemare, Mary K. Maule, “A Chapter of Unwritten History”, Western Reserve Historical Society, suggests a birth date for O.A.K. in early 1862. While this would be interesting if true, no other confirmation for such an early date can be found, and I believe it likely that Longuemare, giving his account as an old man, misremembered the year.

[22]

The works of Frank L. Klement, The Copperheads in the Middle West (1960), The Limits of Dissent (1970), Dark Lanterns (1984), and Lincoln’s Critics: The Copperheads of the North (1998) argue that the copperhead societies were really a misunderstood and overestimated “loyal opposition” whose sins were only of the venial and “indiscreet” (a favorite word Klement uses to minimize what he cannot ignore) variety. Before Klement, it was generally understood that the copperheads were dangerous and serious. See Wood Gray, The Hidden Civil War, 1942, for an example of this earlier understanding. Several historians have expressed reservations about Klement’s work, with Long, The Jewel of Liberty offering the strongest and most convincing attack. Two “state-specific” experts who have also demurred on Klement’s findings, at least in their own states, are G. R. Tredway, Democratic Opposition to the Lincoln Administration in Indiana, 1973, and Louis S. Gerteis, Civil War St. Louis, 2001. Klement touches just briefly on Tucker’s saboteurs in Copperheads in the Middle West, without naming any names or showing any awareness of the ample evidence –Confederate and Union– for their existence and considerable success in burning government steamers and supplies. He refers to it as “the legend of the boat-burning conspiracy” (pg 204), as if Tucker and his crew had as much historical evidence for their exploits as Robin Hood and his Merry Men.. In Dark Lanterns, Tucker makes the barest of cameos –without mention in the index– as a Missouri editor who was in favor of the Northwest Confederacy.

[23]“The Scheme of a Northwest Republic”, Missouri Democrat, Aug. 2, 1864

[24]Castel, Sterling Price; Reynolds, Price and the Confederacy

[25]Report of Judge Advocate General Joseph A. Holt, OR S2 V7 pp930-953

[26]Before the war, Price, a former governor of the state, had been a leader of the Pro-Union/Pro-slavery faction of Missouri’s Democracy, and had only reluctantly been moved to the secession side by the Camp Jackson massacre. His near religious faith in the Democracy’s mission to preserve—including slavery—“The Union as it was; the Constitution as it is” would have made him seem a perfect partner for the Peace Democracy of the North. See Shalhope Portrait of a Southerner for a discussion of Price’s fervent belief in the mission of the Democratic Party before the war. It is worth noting, however, that Price’s dedication to a “Northwest Confederacy”, with or without Missouri, is not as well documented as his involvement with figures associated with the “Northwest Conspiracy”, which isn’t quite the same thing. It is possible that Northwestern Democrats saw what they wanted to see in Price’s involvement, or even that Price (or his lieutenants) lead them on. A revolt in the Northwest had significant benefits to the Missouri Confederates whether or not it resulted in a separate Northwest Republic.

[27]The evidence of Snead’s involvement is almost entirely circumstantial and the most speculative element of this article. He did sign the order on behalf of General Price detaching T.E. Courtenay on secret service against Union shipping in the summer of 1863. What it comes down to is an analysis of Snead’s talents and personality and his relationship to Price and Tucker during the war. It is nearly inconceivable that Snead, as Price’s adjutant until May 25, 1864 when he went off to Richmond as a Confederate congressman, could have been kept in the dark on something of this scale. By all reports, Price leaned heavily on Snead, and after the failed invasion of 1864 Snead wrote Price that he never should have left him at such a time. The Northwest Conspiracy was, at its heart, a political operation and Snead had been a political operative before the war. Therefore I believe it likely that he was an active player. See Robert E. Miller, “Proud Confederate: Thomas Lowndes Snead of Missouri”, Missouri Historical Review, Jan. 1985. The Northwest Conspiracy is not touched on in the MHR article, but it does nicely cover Snead’s talents, devotion to Sterling Price, and hostility to Governor Reynolds and Confederate policy vis-à-vis Missouri. Interestingly, even a planned second volume of The Fight for Missouri would have stopped short (Summer of 1862) of the period where Snead would have been required to either go into detail or suppress whatever he knew about the Northwest Conspiracy. So far as is known, Snead never wrote about any of these issues, not even to defend his old hero Price from Governor Reynolds’ accusations on the subject.

[28]Shalhope, Portrait of a Southerner, 237. Shalhope says this letter was reprinted in the Richmond Whig of June 29, 1863. I have not been able to acquire a copy of this letter yet, so I am staying very close to Shalhope’s characterization of it, including the use of “blasted” to describe Tucker’s broadside. Indeed, Shalhope gives a whole paragraph of adjectives and insults against Holmes in describing Tucker’s wrath. Given the pattern of sabotage of Union steamers both before and after this date, and the Deacon’s role in those efforts, the charge of “‘thwarted’ the best efforts of others to do so” (an exact quote from Shalhope) is very suggestive that Tucker was taking Holmes’ obstruction personally.

[29]Trial transcript of Robert Louden, NARA, testimony of prosecution witness C. C. Ferguson, insurance investigator.

[30]Official Records of the War of the Rebellion (OR) Series 1 Volume 24 Part 3 page 1066. Letter is dated January 31, 1864.

[31]It will be noted that Tucker is referred to here as “Judge Tucker”. That “Judge Tucker” and “Deacon Tucker” were indeed the same man can be confirmed from documents both Union and Confederate. See OR S1 V52 P2 p763; OR S1 V48 P2 pp195-197. The former is General Price’s adjutant Maj. Thomas L. Snead noting in a letter to the General from Mobile that “Judge Tucker is here editing the Argus.” The latter is Union Provost Marshal James H. Baker noting the “Judge Tucker” in charge of the boat-burners was formerly editor of the Missouri State Journal. Landrum, History of Spartanburg County notes that J. Wofford Tucker, “entered the special secret service of the Confederate States, in which he remained to the close of the war.” The excellent Come Retribution, William A. Tidwell, James O. Hall, and David W. Gaddy, chapter 7 “Department of Dirty Tricks” provided the epiphany that the “Judge” and the “Deacon” were one and the same. Landrum, History of Spartanburg County, pg 229, claims that Tucker became a judge after moving to Missouri. I have been unable to confirm the details on how Tucker earned the distinction of being addressed as “Judge Tucker”. There is no dating for Tucker’s proposal more specific than Johnston’s “during the siege of Vicksburg” (May 18-July 4, 1863). I believe it would have been shortly after Tucker gave up hope on Holmes allowing anything to be done on the same subject, about the same time as the appearance of his letter in the Mississippian referred to previously.

[32]Charles Parsons (U.S. Quartermaster at St. Louis) papers, Missouri Historical Society

[33]NARA RG 109, M345, roll 170, 171 / RG 94, M797, roll 40; Grimes, Confederate Mail Runner. While Grimes is silent on the purpose of Louden’s trips in northern states, Federal authorities document in at least two instances (Indianapolis and Philadelphia) that he delivered “Rebel mail” while on these trips. If, as I believe, Price, Tucker, and Snead were busy making contact with northern Democrats in this period for the purpose of coordinating with the northern wing of the movement, then these trips by Louden are the most likely conduit for that contact. It is interesting to note that the strongest anti-war protests in Philadelphia during the war occurred immediately after Louden’s visit there in May of 1863.

[34]OR S1 V32 P2 p13

[35]Trial transcript of Robert Louden, NARA

[36]Grimes, Confederate Mail Runner

[37]OR S1 V48 P2 pp194-196; Frederic Way, Jr., Ways Packet Directory, 1848-1994, 78, 223, When talking about saboteurs, I am using “Tucker’s group” and “OAK” interchangeably from the summer of 1863 forward as there is no distinction worth making between the two.

[38]OR, S4 V3 p125

[39]Way, Jr., Way’s Packet Directory, 1993, 231-232

[40]OR S1 V48 P2 pp194-196; J. H. Baker Report on Steamers Burned, Edward Steers, Jr. collection. Ayleshire is alternately spelled as “Elshire” and “Alshire” in some sources, including James H. Baker’s provost marshal reports.

[41]Compiled service records, NARA, RG109 M253

[42]OR S1 V22 P2 pg970

[43]J. Thomas Scharf, History of the Confederate States Navy; “Sultana: A Case for Sabotage”, D. H. Rule, North & South Volume 5 Issue 1. Of course other saboteurs than Tucker’s could use them too, and there are at least two accusations that Courtenay’s torpedoes were used on the east coast as well. See Milton F. Perry, Infernal Machines, 1965

[44]Navy OR S1 V26 pp186-187.

[45]Jefferson Davis, Constitutionalist, Vol. 6 pp 204-206

[46]“The Fire at Colt’s Armory”, New York Times, February 7, 1864, reprinting Hartford Courant of Feb. 5. “Incendiary” at the time would refer both to the device and the man who used it. As given in this article it would be a clear suggestion of sabotage. If Tucker isn’t taking credit for the Colt fire in the Davis letter, then the other reading would be simply pointing out that much good could be done with “land operations” as well, and that his group could do either. The use of “earnest” is interesting in this context as Tucker was a very educated man, and must have known that “earnest” would suggest to Davis that Tucker’s group had done the Colt fire “free of charge” as it were just to prove their capability to do future operations of the same type. Combining the Colt fire reference in the same sentence with the Memphis wharf fire, which he very clearly was taking credit for, makes a claim of credit the most likely reading.

[47]John B. Castleman, Active Service, 1917; James Horan, Confederate Agent, 1954

[48]Kentucky was admitted to the Confederacy on December 10, 1861, but the Kentucky Confederates’ legitimacy to speak for their state was even more tenuous than the Missourians, and their motivation for supporting the Northwest Conspiracy was at least as strong.

[49]Castleman, Active Service

[50]John W. Headley, Confederate Operations in Canada and New York, 1906

[51]Klement, Dark Lanterns; Castleman, Active Service

[52]Castleman, Active Service; Horan, Confederate Agent

[53]Correct spelling seems to be “Barret”, but most records use “Barrett” instead. There is some confusion in the records between the two men and it is often difficult to be sure which of them is being referred to. See Benjamin Perley Poor, editor, The Conspiracy Trial for the Murder of the President, Vol. III, Arno Press reprint, 1972, pp 424-431 where the questioner is clearly trying to lead witness Edward “Frazier” (Frazor) to J. Richard Barret (“Missourian… formerly in congress”), and Frazor seems just as clearly to be answering in relation to James A. Barret (“adjutant-general… Illinois”). It doesn’t help that apparently both men were entitled to be called “Colonel Barret”. Also, James A. Barret is sometimes referred to as being from Illinois instead of Missouri.

[54]Klement, Dark Lanterns, p107

[55]Reynolds, Price and the Confederacy

[56]William B. Feis, Grant’s Secret Service, 2002, 112

[57]OR S2 V7 pp. 228-340

[58]Felix G. Stidger, Treason History of the Sons of Liberty, Formerly Circle of Honor, Succeeded by the Knights of the Golden Circle, Afterwards the Order of American Knights, 1903, reprint edition by Dogwood Press, pg. 37

[59]Ibid pp 144-145; Baker’s report in OR S1 V48 P2 pp194-196

[60]Way, Jr., Ways Packet Directory, entries for Edward F. Dix, Cherokee, Northerner, Glasgow, Sunshine, Welcome. Entry for Sunshine, #5234, notes “dreaded rebel steamboat burners” believed to be responsible. Baker’s report in OR S1 V48 P2 pp194-196

[61]OR S1 V43 P2 pp930-936, report of Confederate commissioner Jacob Thompson. In trying to control the scope of this article, I’ve chosen not to go into the role Thompson, Clement Clay, and J. P. Holcomb played as Confederate commissioners to Canada. See William A. Tidwell, James O. Hall, and David W. Gaddy, Come Retribution: The Confederate Secret Service and the Assassination of Lincoln, 1988 and Headley, Confederate Operations in Canada and New York for more information on their role in the Northwest Conspiracy and Confederate sabotage in the last year of the war.

[62]Burlington Iowa Weekly Hawkeye, Saturday, July 9, 1864, “A great fire occurred in Louisville on Saturday of last week. . .government stores to the value of $800,000, belonging to the Medical Perveyor’s Department. . .” One of Tucker’s saboteurs, Edward Frazor, would refer to this as a “hospital fire”, crediting the saboteur as a man named Henry Dillingham. Frazor also said that no one was killed, which seems incredible when considering all the immobile individuals in a war-time hospital at all hours of the day. Felix Stidger, in his Treason History, refers to a “warehouses” fire destroying government supplies at Louisville in July of 1864, but says nothing about a hospital fire that would have been equally interesting to Stidger. The Hawkeye article unscrews the inscrutable. These two seemingly separate incidents are really the same single incident; Frazor’s “hospital” was really a large store of medical supplies stored in government warehouses.

[63]OR S1 V48 P2 pp194-196; RG109 M345 roll 97

[64]OR S1 V41 P3, pp975-976

[65]Shalhope, Portrait of a Southerner, 266-267

[66]“Destruction of Steamer Maria”, Missouri Republican, Dec. 12, 1864

[67]OR S1 V48 P2 pp194-196

[68]Charles Parsons papers, Missouri Historical Society. There is some dispute about just how much “immunity” Murphy received from Baker in early 1865. Murphy was later captured and tried for his boat-burning activities.

[69]D. H. Rule & G. E. Rule papers

[70]J. M. Bundy, “The Last Chapter in the History of the War”, Galaxy, 1870

[71]D. H. Rule, “Sultana: A Case for Sabotage”, North and South, Vol. 5, Issue 1, December, 2001; “Blew up the Sultana”, Missouri Democrat, May 6, 1888. Louden’s claim is a matter of some dispute. See our Sultana section for more information and documentation.

[72]NARA, RG 109, M345, roll 270, Provost Marshal’s file on Joseph W. Tucker, report of Allen Pinkerton dated June 6, 1865 from New Orleans.

[73]Edward Steers, Jr., “Terror 1860’s Style”, North & South, Volume 5 Issue 4; Baker list of steamers sabotaged, Edward Steers, Jr. collection.

[74]Fulwood, “The Late Hon. J. Wofford Tucker”

[75]Landrum, History of Spartanburg County, pg 229, says after the war he was “lay delegate to the great Ecumenical Conference held in London”. E-mail to author from R. Phillip Stone, Wofford College archivist, identifies this as being a reference to the First Ecumenical Methodist Conference at London in September of 1881. Nolan B. Harmon, editor, “Methodist Conferences”, The Encyclopedia of World Methodism, Volume II.

[76]Fulwood, “The Late Hon. J. Wofford Tucker”; Atlanta Constitution, June 15, 1893

[77]Tucker died in 1897 and is buried in Lakeview Cemetery, Sanford, FL. American Illustrated Methodist Magazine eulogized him in Oct. 1901, including a picture captioned “on the day of his death”. Unfortunately, the article does not state what day, or even year, that was. Landrum, History of Spartanburg County, which was published in 1900, pg 201-202, has this to say about Tucker’s wife Emily, “Emily Augusta [Tucker, nee Barry], born 1824; died 1898” and “…died in Sanford, Florida, her husband having preceded her a short time.” Sanford Historic Trust cemetery search website, at http://www.sanfordhistorictrust.org/cemeterysearch.html confirms Landrum’s account for both Joseph Wofford Tucker and Emily Augusta Tucker.

Arthur McCoy

Arthur C. McCoy

by D. H. Rule

Arthur C. McCoy, who became known as the “Wild Irishman” under Jo. Shelby, was born in Ireland about 1825. After coming to America he went to California where, according to a family history, he was a Forty-Niner in the goldfields. In 1850 he was in Centerville (now called Pilot Hill) in El Dorado County, California. Not far away, in Placerville, was Drury James, uncle of Frank and Jesse James. Their father, Robert James, had died shortly before in California. Whether Arthur McCoy met any of Missouri James family members in 1850 is unknown. It may have been coincidence that he came so near to crossing paths in 1850 with the family with whom his fate would be tied in the 1870s.

Before the Civil War McCoy lived in St. Louis, Missouri where he worked for a time as a coppersmith in “Blackman & McCoy,” a stove and tinware business he shared with William L. Blackman. Shortly before the outbreak of the war he had changed occupations, going into business as a painter, painting steamboats as well as houses. This line of work gave him the working knowledge of steamboats that made him an able boat-burner later.

McCoy was a member of the Liberty Fire Company, one of the volunteer fire departments in the St. Louis until paid fire fighting companies were established in 1858. Liberty Fire House The Liberty Fire Company was known for its rowdiness and combativeness, fighting with other volunteer fire companies. Being in the fire company gave McCoy connections to both the business and political side of St. Louis, with John M. Wimer, a mayor of St. Louis, being one of its prominent members. Many of the early secessionists were connected to the fire company. McCoy had made the connections for his painting business, called “Farmer and McCoy” with Thomas Farmer, by way of the fire department as his partner’s father-in-law, a hardware store owner, had been a member.

McCoy seems to have met his wife through the fire department as well. In December of 1855 he married Louisa Gibson (baptised Heloise), youngest daughter of a well-to-do St. Louis family. His brother-in-law, Robert Louden, who also became a notorious Civil War spy, mail runner, and saboteur, met his wife Mary Gibson, Louisa’s sister, through the fire department connection he shared with Arthur McCoy. Family history says that McCoy spent some time living and operating a business in Alton, Illinois before returning to St. Louis. By 1859 he was again in St. Louis.

By 1860, Arthur and Louisa had two sons, Joseph, born in October 1856, and Arthur Willam, born in May 1858. Their first daughter, Elizabeth, was born in July of 1861.

According to Basil Duke, Arthur McCoy was one of the founding members of the Minute Men, the secessionist organization formed in response to the Unionist Wide Awakes. McCoy’s brother-in-law Robert Louden was also known as a strong Minute Man. It was Arthur McCoy’s wife, Louisa, who is said to have sewed the secessionist flag that flew tauntingly over the Berthold mansion. McCoy was one of those who helped raise the Missouri state flag over the courthouse.

The passages below by John N. Edwards describe McCoy’s military service under Shelby during the Civil War. McCoy’s capture by the Federals took place just days after his son, Arthur William died in St. Louis. It’s possible the two events were connected as McCoy was known to pass in and out of St. Louis several times during the war, often carrying mail with him.

Further Reading: Jesse James Was His Name by William A. Settle, Jr.

General Jo Shelby: Undefeated Rebel
by Daniel O’Flaherty

More books on the James-Younger gang

After the war, McCoy’s life and career are necessarily hazy. He was said to have been a member of the James-Younger gang of bank and train robbers. McCoy is believed to have been one of those involved in the killing of a Pinkerton agent investigating the James. Arthur McCoy is identified as one of those who participated in the robbery of the Russellville, Kentucky bank in 1868, the Adair, Iowa train robbery, as well as the Gad’s Hill train robbery, and numerous others through the first half of the 1870s. The one with the highest likelihood of attribution to McCoy is the Ste. Genevieve, Missouri robbery.

McCoy, though a city-boy from the eastern border of Missouri, would have made his connection to the western border train and bank robbers (most of whom were former Quantrill guerrillas) by way of John Jarrette. Jarrette was also a captain under Shelby in the last part of the war and was married to Cole Younger’s sister, Mary Josephine. More on this part of McCoy’s life.

For a time after the war, Arthur and Louisa McCoy lived in Ste. Genevieve, Missouri. In the 1870s they had a farm in Montgomery County, Missouri. Two more sons, Lee and Eugene, were born to them. Family history tells it that Arthur did not particularly enjoy farming and so went to Texas to see about getting into cattle and living there. Other (published but unconfirmed) history says he was arrested for a stage robbery near Austin, Texas in 1874 for which one of the robbers confessed and named McCoy. By late 1874 or 1875 McCoy effectively vanished.

There is no confirmed death date for Arthur C. McCoy. The family believed he had died in Texas in the early 1880s. Other sources place his death in early 1874, several weeks before the Gad’s Hill train robbery in which he is often named (source: “Jesse James: The Man and the Myth” by Marley Brant–footnote unsourced). A reliable St. Louis source places his death as having been by 1880. Louisa McCoy also lists herself as a widow at this point.

Louisa Gibson McCoy remarried, lived briefly in the Oklahoma Territory where her second husband died, before returning to the St. Louis area. Around the turn of the century she and most of her children moved to Oregon and Idaho, where she remained until her death at age 81.

The Boat-Burners (McCoy’s brother-in-law, Robert Louden)

Rock Champion(a fellow Minute Man)

Minute Men(describing the St. Louis secessionist organization)

The James-Younger gang pages

Arthur McCoy: Confederate “Wild Irishman” of St. Louis

John N. Edwards

Introduction to author John N. Edwards

with notes by G. E. Rule

[Noted Guerillas]

All legs, and eagerness, and animal spirit McCoy reported to [William H.] Gregg [for duty in hunting down a group of bandits behind Confederate lines] as a schoolboy might report to his master for a holiday. McCoy laughed a great deal, Gregg scarcely at all; McCoy sang a song now and then that was next of kin to a bird’s song, Gregg was a taciturn, unmusical man; McCoy’s face was always mirthful, Gregg’s always in repose and as strong as Cromwell’s. As steadfast, heroic, and unconquerable fighters, neither could be surpassed.

Shelby’s advance [during Sterling Price’s raid into Missouri in 1864] had been led valiantly by Captain Arthur McCoy, and he associated [famous Confederate guerilla George] Todd with him and bade them fight together. McCoy had never been a Guerrilla. He had nothing in common with the Guerrillas except their desperation. He was a tinner [Actually, McCoy was a painter before the war but had worked as a coppersmith at a tin/metal working business before that] working in St. Louis when the war commenced. At the first tap of the recruiting drum, impetuous as a boy and as eager, he espoused the cause of the South and joined the 1^st Missouri Confederate Infantry, Bowen’s immortal yet decimated regiment –that regiment with Beauregard lifted his hat to as it was marching past—or, rather, to what was left of it—after Shiloh, and exclaimed: “I salute the 1^st Missouri. I uncover to courage that has never yet been surpassed.”

In the infantry, however, McCoy would have dwindled into a consumptive—for his chest was weak, and had that hectic flush, and that dry, short, rasping cough that were ominous. He needed the air and the exercise of a Comanche. He had to breath where there were no canvas house, no shelter, no covering save a blanket, and no habitation save the leaves on the trees.

After Shiloh, the name and fame of Shelby were beginning to fill the West, and there came to him, attracted by the unexampled enterprise and heroism of the man, quite a large number of daring spirits who asked only esprit de corps and a leader that would fight every hour in every day for a year and a day. Among them was Arthur McCoy, six feet and over, a little stooped about the shoulders, very long in the arms, having a stride like a racehorse, and a nervous energy that was expending itself even while he slept. All the lower face was massive—the lower jaw especially square cut and huge. The eyes were of that cold, glittering, penetrating blue that might be cruel as a serpent’s, soft and tender as the eyes of confidence or trust. When the battle was dubious or desperate, or when the wreck was darkest and thickest, and the dead lay rank and plentiful, the eyes seemed to transform themselves and become absolutely scintillant. About the man’s whole nature, too, there was an element of grotesqueness impossible to analyze. He sang little snatches of song in battle; he rode out in advance of his own skirmish line and challenged Federal skirmishers to single combat; he would get down on his knees under fire the most pitiless, uncover himself, and pray fervently beside some comrade mortally wounded; he seemed never to have known what the meaning of fear was; he begged incessantly to be sent upon forlorn and desperate service; he was a spy without a peer in either army; he was a scout that seemed to have leagued with the devil and received from his majesty invaluable protection papers; he charged pickets for pastime, and rode yelling and shooting through Federal outposts, at the head of fifty or sixty followers, at all hours and in any weather. Shelby’s division gave him the soubriquet of the “Wild Irishman”, and yet for cold calm, penetrating soldier-sense—for acuteness, military logic and undoubted strategy, McCoy had the head of Vidocq and the nerve of d’Artagnan. Seven times during the war—through the Federal lines, and past scouts, patrols, cantonments, and militia and predatory bands—McCoy came into St. Louis with a thousand letters at a time, and departed hence with as many more.

[Shelby and His Men]

Shelby broke ground first with unceasing activity. The second day after the arrival at Cane Hill, Lieutenant Arthur McCoy, with fifty picked men, was sent to look up one hundred Pins [Indians], reported to be encamped near a little town twenty miles in the Cherokees Nation. This Arthur McCoy was a gay, dashing, devil-may-care St. Louisan who joined the old 1^st Missouri Infantry, Bowen’s immortal regiment, Duffee’s company, in St. Louis, and had won red laurels at Shiloh, but being attracted by the rising star of Shelby’s genius, came over to join his galaxy of knights. Like some of the cuirassiers of Napoleon’s Old Guard, he always doffed his plumed hat to this adversary just as he murmured through his moustache, “En Garde.” McCoy, above all others, suited exactly for the enterprise, and ferreting out, by good luck, and excellent guide, he succeeded in completely surprising the Indian encampment. The sleepy pickets were cut off and sabered silently. The doomed warriors lay rolled up in their blankets alongside of a heavy rail fence, which had been fired in a hundred corners to give heat during the night, when the silent horsemen rode upon them without the ringing of a musket. The work, short and bloody, lasted on a few moments. McCoy sabered seven with his own hand, and but ten of the whole number escaped. The next morning he rode quietly into camp with not a rose on his fresh, blooming face withered or fled.

Captain Blackwell, in command of Marmaduke’s escort, entered Marshfield suddenly, picked up a dozen of or rusticating Federals, and took possession of five large stores filled with everything needed by soldiers. Finding their proprietors unwilling to take Confederate money at par—although the notes were worth something as containing correct photographic likenesses of President Davis—and possessing a very conservative disposition with his many other good qualities, Captain Blackwell detailed five accurate salesman, Peter Turley, James Walton, Arthur McCoy, James Herndon, and Joel Whitehurst, to wait upon those customers having the “six months after a treaty of peace” bills. Business, previously quite dull, expanded visibly under this new commercial arrangement, and soon every store became crowded with anxious buyers. At night a large auction followed, the Southern ladies attending in crowds and having heavy amounts of the proscribed money in their possession. The uses made afterward of these funds by the bona fide merchants were never ascertained, yet it is highly probably they were put carefully away until a day of redemption came, which every one among them believed was near at hand, if their vociferant assertions of loyalty to the Confederacy could be relied upon.

[Edwards reminiscing about sitting around a campfire in Arkansas listening to various men tell their stories . . .]

. . .McCoy telling some galloping story of border foray, and how he went snugly into St. Louis and brought out seven hundred thousand musket-caps.

The restless and insatiate Arthur McCoy—whose energy and battle-intellect were Titanic—hovered around Clayton for three days, cut off two picket posts, captured seven wagons, killed a notorious Union bushwhacker living near Pine Bluff, and returned loaded with arms and accoutrements.

After the capture of the Queen City, and after the battle with the Tyler and her consorts, a man presented himself to Shelby’s picket line, weak, emaciated—but wary and defiant—his clothes dripping with moisture and covered by the mire and the sand of the swamps. Not recognized by the officer on duty, he was sent into camp. When the dirt was washed from his face, and his long lank hair combed out, he proved to be Captain Arthur McCoy, before spoken of as one of the most daring, debonair, heroic scouters and fighters in the whole brigade. His escape had been romantic, and in every way characteristic of the indomitable Confederate. Captured several months before, on an expedition toward the Arkansas river, because his horse had been shot dead under him, after his five men had fought seventy-eight Federals for eleven miles, he had been carried first to Pine Bluff, where Clayton, although a Kansan, treated him soldierly; thence to Little Rock, where the penitentiary was too good for him, had finally arrived at Duvall’s Bluff, on his way to Alton, and maybe that dark, mysterious death suffered by so many.

The roar of Collin’s guns, which had shattered the life out of the Queen City and the fight out of the Tyler, told to McCoy’s quick ears the tale of Shelby’s attack, and the rumors about the town, and the hasty mustering of the garrison, told equally well that the attack had been successful. He determined at every hazard to escape, and was greatly favored by some friends on board the boat upon which he had been confined, and the mention of whose names here can do no good. [McCoy and his brother-in-law –Confederate spy, courier, and saboteur Robert Louden– had worked at painting steamboats on the St. Louis levee before the war, and both of them would have had many friends on the boats working the rivers. In addition, Louden’s partner, Ab Grimes, was a steamboat pilot and had even more river friends–these would certainly be available to Louden, and probably by extension to McCoy. The Federals had noted many times that the majority of the river men were Southern-leaning.] The time for action came. He stood on the hurricane roof of the boat in earnest conversation with an engineer—his friend and accomplice. Suddenly the engineer exclaimed to McCoy, who had dressed himself in the working suit of one of the hands of the boat:

“I tell you we can not move from the wharf unless the thing is fixed,” mentioning the name of some part of the machinery.

“And I tell you,” answered McCoy, “that the d—-d thing can’t be fixed until you send to the Little Rock foundry.”

“I know better,” replied the engineer. “Come with me and I will prove it.”

The guard, calmly pacing his beat during the time of the conversation, had heard every word, and naturally enough supposing they were two engineers disputing about some machinery needing repair, scarcely noticed them as they went below. Quick as lightning McCoy descended through the wheelhouse and into the water with a noiseless motion. Floating quietly along, his head barely enough above the waves for respiration, he passed the lowest boat, the lookouts on the batteries, around a bend in the river, and at last beyond sight, without his escape being noticed. At length, wearied from incessant exertion, he drew upon the nearest shore for rest and observation, when, horror of horrors, a grim ironclad lay quietly at anchor about three hundred yards below. To go back was simply impossible, to take to the woods seemed madness, as White river spread out ten miles wide at this point, and the bottoms on either shore were a wilderness of water—so McCoy gathered a large bundle of dry canes, launched them very quietly, and boldly floated past the gunboat in safety, and for eight miles further, until he reached the shelter of his old ark, worn out, haggard, and exhausted.

Three days in camp furnished all the rest he required, and after this time had been spent lazily, it was ascertained that tin the Mississippi River about thirty miles above Helena, a large steamboat, the Mariner, loaded with coal for the fleet, stood hard and fast aground, and that by a little wading she might be captured. Taking seventy-five picked men, he made a forced march, surprised the guard of five men on the bank watching the steamer, waded waist deep two hundred yards to her, and finally gave the boat and cargo to the flames—sending the officers and crew on board to the commanding general at Helena.

Arthur McCoy returned with his spoils in the shape of two or more dozen fine carbines and revolvers. . .

Marmaduke was resting after Springfield and Hartville, preparing for Cape Girardeau. Musket caps were fearfully scarce in the department and none anywhere in reach nearer than St. Louis. The detail came originally to Shelby for a lieutenant and ten men, and he sent McCoy, who had been twice before into St. Louis. McCoy reported to Marmaduke and suggested that two men where sufficient, as the chances would be better for getting through and accomplishing the object of the mission. A young St. Louisan, brave, cool, wary and accomplished, Captain John W. Howard, was selected by McCoy to accompany him, and about the 13^th of January [1864?] these two devoted officers started northward through the snow and the ice, with no passport save their wonderful assurance, and no diplomatic documents in addition to several hundred letters from Confederate soldiers to their friends in the loyal States.

Slowly and painfully they toiled through the drifted snow and the barren wastes along the dreary road until after three days’ hard traveling the State line was reached. Davidson’s cavalry division was scattered and roaming about in squads promiscuously over the country, and caution became not only necessary but so extreme as to be absolutely painful. At Current river a scout of fifty were encountered, but they were avoided by taking to the woods. Near Pilot Knob an old man was seen who mistook the two Confederates for Federal, as they were dressed in complete Federal clothing, except the pants of Howard, which were gray. The old man was very glad to see the “boys in blue”; had two precious cut-throats in the militia, and wanted McCoy to take some letters for him into Pilot Knob. “Money in them?”, asked Howard. “Oh! No, only on business.” “All right,” said McCoy, “the d—-d Secesh might rob us if it were supposed we had valuables.” They further imposed upon him by making inquiries about some sick Federals they had accidentally heard of as being in the neighborhood, and he gave them ample directions for a day’s journey. In Washington county they were hard put to it. The militia were swarming, and for information they called upon Mr. Pleas. Johnson. Mr. Johnson had gone to a funeral somewhere, and nothing could be found out there. All one night was spent in riding around Potosi—they were four miles south of it at dark and were four miles north of it at daylight. After daylight came broad and good they called upon another Mr. Johnson, and he sent them to a Mrs. Smith who had two sons in the militia, but was a true Southern lady. The tired, hungry men asked for food and sleep. In a short time her militia sons returned, but only to stand picket over the sleeping Confederates, and after three hours of sleep, they were awakened, fed, and sent on their toilsome way. The next house visited belonged to a Mr. Stovall.

Mr. Stovall gave them food and fire-water. Howard watched the horses and McCoy did the talking. “Are you a good Union man, Mr. Stovall?” “As good as the best, Captain.” “Well,” said McCoy, “have you seen pass here lately a red-headed man riding a little shave-tailed mule?” (He had heard of this fellow two houses back from Stovall’s). “Yes,” said the host. “Well, he is a deserter from General Davidson’s forces. I am after him hot, and must have a guide on the most direct road leading to St. Louis.” “I can’t go myself, captain, but my neighbor, Captain —–, has a good horse and is long in these parts.” “Go for him,” said McCoy sternly. The captain soon came, splendidly mounted, armed, and equipped. He was a vicious militia man, too, and McCoy’s eyes had a bad look when resting upon him. “You are a good guide, I hear”, said McCoy, “and I desire you to accompany me.” “I can not,” replied the Federal. McCoy straightened up, towered over the militiaman and drew out a huge paper in an official envelope and said ominously: “General Davidson has given me this document for my authority; it empowers me to impress and to kill; I shall do one or the other, or my name is not Captain McKeever.” This threat had its effect. A little before dark they started in a terrible rainstorm, which penetrated to the skin, although opposed by heavy and excellent overcoats. The Federal captain did his duty well, and took them to within eight miles of the Merrimac bivouacking was encountered. The rain which had been cursed and blasphemed, save the two spy heroes. God does not always destroy those who violate the seventh commandment, or from an army of fifty thousand there would scarcely survive ninety and nine. This rain had driven the cavalry from the road to the shelter of the timber, some thirty rods away, yet they halted loudly when the party came in sight. “Trot fast,” were the low, calm words of Howard, his right hand toying with the heavy dragoon under his coat. “No, no”, replied the Federal, “we must halt; they will fire else.” “Let them fire and be d—-d”, sneered McCoy, “do you suppose I would halt in such an infernal rain as this? Close up, Howard.”

Howard struck the Federal officer’s horse fiercely with the long reins of his bridle, and altogether, the three steeds bounded off at a sharp canter.

Carondolet was reached about three o’clock the next day, and the town was full of soldiers. The two daredevils dismounted leisurely, got shaved, and then went sauntering into a public barroom. Twenty Federals were drinking—they were infantry bear in mind. “Hallo, infantry”, shouted McCoy, “come and take a drink with some of the crack fellows of Davidson’s cavalry”. This bluff frankness told well with the soldiers, and the infantry came crowding around with five hundred questions about the Rebels in Arkansas—about Price, Marmaduke, Shelby, Kitchen, the bushwhackers, and what not. A brawny, burly fellow, with rough cheekbones and a bright, bad eye, peered long at Captain Howard, with some straggling instincts of recognition. “Who are you?”, he asked at length; “I have seen you in St. Louis”. Howard knew the fellow well, yet his composure was wonderful, and his voice clear and distinct as the ring of a silver anvil: “Likely, comrade; I have been there often. I am Captain Beard, of Hubbard’s 1^st Missouri Cavalry Battalion”. The rank imposed upon the crowd—they had never been to the front and were privates—so they became reticent instantly. After another drink at Howard’s expense—the two improvised Federals rode boldly for St. Louis, which they entered without remark or comment, passing within two feet of the sentinel at the arsenal mechanically walking his beat. [Gee, I wonder what happened to their scout? They seem to have misplaced him somewhere.]

Once inside and these gay gallants threw away almost the simplest precautions. Both of them had fine Confederate cavalry uniforms mad, which, consistent with regulations, were gaudy and attractive. “I’ll get the caps,” said McCoy, “but I must have some fun.” One night the two were enjoying an hour’s tête-à-tête with five or six Rebel ladies, when in came two Federal majors. McCoy felt invigorated by some rare old Krug, and the devil danced about his cold gray eyes till they sparkled and glittered. Excusing himself a moment, he stepped into an adjoining room, unpinned the skirts of his uniform coat, threw off the great blue overcoat, and burst back upon the astonished Federals in all the glory and horror of buff and gold lace. “This farce of being Yankee is about played out”, said McCoy; “please give us Dixie, Miss —–“. The beautiful girl, catching inspiration from the sight of the “darling gray”, sprang like a with upon the piano, and tangled her white fingers in among the keys until the air gave out Rebel infection and the whole house joined in the chorus. The [Federal] officers started simultaneously for the door. “Not this night”, said McCoy; “we have no desire to hang for an useless frolic. Be quiet, gentlemen, and let’s make a night of it,” and his pistol and Howard’s were out in a twinkling. The Federals, who were really sensible fellows, remained quietly, drank deeply, and were finally carried to bed in a state of blissful ignorance.

Long before day the Confederates were moving. Two splendid horses had been procured, forty thousand musket caps were stowed away in saddlebags. Howard carried from the city an elegant saddle and bridle for General Shelby, and, after seeing McCoy well on his way Southward, returned quietly to organize and take out to Arkansas a company of recruits.

[Noted Guerillas –same trip into St. Louis as above. Note that in the above telling, Howard had accompanied McCoy “well on his way Southward”, but there is no mention of him as McCoy passes Benton Barracks and baits the sentinel. Noted Guerillas also has a shorter but more flamboyant telling of the encounter with the Federal officers given above, with McCoy forcing one of the Federals to wear a Confederate uniform and dance to Dixie.]

As McCoy rode out from St. Louis, in the cold gray of the following morning, the devil still seemed to have possession of him. As he passed Benton Barracks a sentinel stood by the roadside with his gun at a right, shoulder shift. McCoy rode up to him and halted: “I am a Confederate officer. I represent the Confederate President—if you should present arms to me I should consider that you had presented them to Mr. Jefferson Davis. Present arms!” The sentinel thought the man was evidently mad. It was still early morning. No soldiers were astir anywhere about the barracks. McCoy’s revolver was at the soldier’s breast before he could take his musket from his shoulder. “You will not present arms to me?” “Not to save your life.” “But you see I have the drop on you! Do you want me to kill you?” Still thinking McCoy was one of his own uniform, and being drunk or mischievous, was trying to play a prank on him, the sentinel replied, “shoot and be d—-d!”

McCoy’s face darkened instantly, and he cocked his pistol, “I will not shoot you so,” he said, “nor will I shoot you at all without giving you a chance for your life. Listen, I shall ride back fifty paces, turn my horse, and charge you. As I come by I shall fire at you once. You have but one shot and I who have eighteen will take but one also. Get ready.”

The sentinel, as he saw McCoy deliberately countermarch and wheel about to charge, began, at last, to have his suspicions aroused. He took his musket from his shoulder and cocked it and waited. McCoy dashed furiously down upon the sentinel, and the sentinel, when he was with about ten paces of him, fired at point blank range and missed. As McCoy passed him, he put out his pistol suddenly and shot him down where he stood, the garrison turning out in force, and hurriedly saddled, cavalry coming on in rapid pursuit. The sentinel, however, although badly wounded, finally recovered and McCoy, scarcely quickening his pace, rode on southward unmolested.

[Shelby and His Men –after McCoy left St. Louis on this trip]

At a bridge some twenty miles from St. Louis, McCoy met trouble—one company of Federals held it. He was on the bridge before he discovered the guard, an almost right on him. “Halt!”, was the challenge. “Well”, says the unabashed adventurer, “what do you want?” “I want you to get down and show your pass”, says the “boy in blue”. “What, Sir?”, says McCoy in a voice of thunder, “do you dare to insult an officer of the day, with his saber by his side, by such a piece of insolence as this? Can’t you see my rank, sir?” “Well”, says the abashed Federal in an exculpatory tone, “I was only trying to obey the order of my captain.” “Your captain, eh! Where is your captain, sir? Had he did his duty this thing would not have happened to you. He should have taught you to say, ‘Halt! Who comes there?’ and let me answer the challenge in that shape. Instead of that you halt me improperly, and show at once that you have not been well instructed. Where is your captain, sir?” “He has just passed the bridge with the rest of the company to put them on picket”. “Very well, sir”, said McCoy, somewhat mollified, “I can excuse you, but I can not overlook such negligence in your captain. I will go and see after him.” And thereupon he put spurs to his trusty steed, and rode off past the guard at a brisk canter. As soon as he came to a turn in the road he darted out into the woods and fields, every foot of which he knew too well to venture upon giving “that captain” the lecture he had promised, and made his way safely to Shelby’s headquarters in Batesville.

Of course there must have been staunch Southern sympathizers in St. Louis, or McCoy and Howard would have gone to the wall; and to two men these officers went for material aid—Mr. John King and Captain William D. Bartle. It would be difficult to make an accurate estimate of the assistance furnished by these two devoted “Rebels”. McCoy was in St. Louis three times during his connection with Shelby, and John King upon every occasion gave him money, pistols, horses, and better than all, information, for is a keen, observant man, and a shrewd tactician. So also did Captain Bartle. St. Louis is filled with generous people who aided the Confederate in every possible manner, and who, many of them, endured exile for their sympathies; but there are none who excelled these gentlemen in the secrecy of their operation, the munificence of their gifts, and in the indefatigable manner by which they equipped and hurried to the army young men unable to purchase the necessary accouterments.

[Noted Guerillas]

Later, in 1864, a deed was done by McCoy which attracted the attention and won the admiration of two opposing forces. General John B. Clark was attacking Glasgow from one side of the river, in 1864, and General Shelby from the other. Between the two lines drawn about the doomed town were the Federal forts and garrison commanded by General Chester Harding. A large steamboat lay at the wharf and Shelby desired to know if it were serviceable; if it were, he intended to man it and ferry over his command, and to attack from the north side. He did not want to sacrifice over one man in the perilous undertaking, and he did not desire to order any soldier to perform the desperate duty. Volunteers were called for, and while fifty came to the front, McCoy was chosen because he knew more than any of them about steamboats and their machinery, and because he pleaded so hard to be permitted to take the risk. He started in a skiff as slight as a pasteboard. Having to pull himself, his back was necessarily to the town, thus depriving him of whatever advantage he might have attained by watching the operations of the enemy. Glasgow is built upon a hill, and from the foot of the bluff to the river there is probably a stretch of bottom land a dozen paces across. Closely engaged from the south, the Federal skirmishers did not descend from the hill tops, where, half hidden and partially entrenched, they fired closely and vigorously upon McCoy. He kept right onward. As he left the shelter of his own lines, the bullets thickened in the water about him and fairly plowed up the surface of the river with lead. Collins, with two guns of his memorable battery, succored him all that was possible and threw canister rapidly into the skirmishers. Once when the fire was desperately hot, McCoy turned around upon his seat, ceased rowing, and lifted his hat to the Federal skirmishers. Both sides cheered spontaneously. How he escaped is a matter yet unexplained. Probably two hundred men fired at him, each man firing five shots, or one thousand shots in all. Blood was not drawn once from his body, miraculous to relate. One bullet cut off a lock of his hair, another knocked his cap into he river, which he deliberately stopped to pick up, seven balls struck the skiff in various parts, four more went through is clothes, and one cut almost in two at the oarlock the left hand oar. In despite of everything, however, McCoy gained the northern bank, landed the boat, obtained what information he desired, and actually returned as he had crossed under a tremendous volley of small arms.

Once he fought a duel—a duel to the death—but not one of his own seeking. In the Western army there were many Confederate Indians, and in a Choctaw regiment there was a young half-breed captain who had a pony sensible enough to have been a circus pony. It would dance, talked with its head, fire off a pistol, and do other and numerous tricks at the bidding of its master. McCoy owned a savage stallion, a favorite, however, because of its fleetness and strength. The pony and the stallion got together one night, and the next morning the Choctaw had no pony—McCoy’s horse having literally devoured him. The Indian was furious. He would have revenge. He would kill the horse that killed his horse. He would have revenge. He started to execute his threat. McCoy stood across his path with a drawn, saber in his hand, and said to the Choctaw: “Arm yourself. Shall it be sword or pistol? You want satisfaction and shall have it. My horse’s hide is more precious than my own, therefore not one hair upon it shall be ruffled.” The Indian chose a saber also, a ring was formed, seconds appointed, and probably half a brigade gathered to see the desperate work. McCoy fenced warily; the Indian, quick and savage. Both were wounded. McCoy had an ugly cut on his right temple and another on his left hip. The Indian had been slashed twice severely, and once across the saber arm. Each was getting weak. Finally McCoy made a feint as if he would deliver the right cut, shortened his sword arm, and ran the Indian squarely through the body. Thus ended the fight and the life of the Choctaw as well. He died before midnight.

Curtis heavy division, retreating before General Price [in the 1864 raid] all the way from Lexington to Independence, held the western bank of the Little Blue, and some heavy stonewalls and fences beyond. Marmaduke and Shelby broke his hold loose from these, and pressed him rapidly back to and through Independence, the two Colorado regiments covering his rear stubbornly and well. Side by side McCoy and [George] Todd had made several brilliant charges during the morning, and had driven before them with great spirit and dash every Colorado squadron halted to resist the continual marching forward of the Confederate cavalry. Ere the pursuit ended for the day, half of the 2^nd Colorado regiment drew upon the crest of a bold hill and made a gallant fight. Their Major, Smith, a brave and dashing officer, was killed here, and here Todd fell. General Shelby, as was his wont, was well up with the advance, and leading recklessly the two companies of Todd and McCoy. Next to Shelby’s right rode Todd, and upon his left was McCoy. Close to these and near to the front files where Colonel Nichols, [John] Thrailkill, Ben Morrow, Ike Flannery and Jesse James. The trot had deepened into a gallop, and all the cloud of skirmishers covering the head of the rushing column were at it, fierce and hot, when the 2^nd Colorado swept the road with a furious volley, broke away from the strong position held by them, and hurried on through the streets of Independence followed by the untiring McCoy, as lank as a foxhound and as eager.

That volley killed Todd.

[Shelby and His Men –on the retreat from Missouri, thru Kansas, after the 1864 raid]

Shelby moved this day with his division in advance, making desolate a broad track through the fertile fields of Kansa, and leaving behind him long trails of fire and smoldering ruins. Scattered militia were captured at nearly every house, and McCoy, with one hundred and fifty men, stormed Fort Lincoln, took its garrison of one hundred prisoners, burned it and all its surrounding houses, and returned to the column loaded with horses and supplies. [The accounts of McCoy do seem to have a consistent thread of booty. . .uh, acquired. . . to them.]

The advance, composed of two hundred volunteers from all the regiments in the brigade, and superb body of soldiers they were, lost one hundred and twenty in killed and wounded. It was led by McCoy. At Newtonia, Slayback from three hundred and twenty men lose in killed forty-nine, besides a large number wounded. These statements may show to a small extent the sacrifices Shelby was called upon to make.

General Magruder commenced about this time [early 1865] the organization of a secret corps for operations within the enemy’s lines, and, as usual, Shelby was called upon for some of his best and truest of men—those he had trained, hardened, and schooled in every species of desperate and reckless warfare. McCoy plead so earnestly for the mission that General Shelby—whose own ambitious heart was ever soft and yielding to the daring wishes of his men—gave it to him. McCoy took fourteen men—Jim Kirtley, Sam Redd, James Cather, Dan Franklin, Jim McGraw, At Persinger, Nick Coil, Bob Allen, Sam Downing, Asa Tracey, John Manion, Sid Martin, Ed Ward, and a little boy scarcely fifteen year old—Lem Stevenson—but acute and intelligent to a most wonderful degree. His fresh, guileless face and soft, amiable manners made him invaluable as a spy, and McCoy used him constantly to great advantage. A record of the adventures of these daring Confederates would be marvelous, indeed, and almost beyond belief. McGraw spent most of his time at the Federal naval station, near the mouth of White River, and managed always to keep McCoy posted regarding the movement of all detachments sent out for his capture. Sid Martin, another boy, about eighteen years of age, but cool and wary as a grenadier of Napoleon’s old guard, went twice into Memphis and once into St. Louis, and brought back to his captain, in addition to valuable information, twenty-three revolvers and a large sack filled with Ely’s pistol caps—more precious than greenbacks. He was captured twice, but on both occasions eluded his guards and returned to camp riding the best horse in the squad having charge of him. Lem Stevenson visited St. Louis twice, was lionized, petted, spoiled, and concealed by the Southern ladies there and returned each time with a great budge of news for Magruder. Ed Ward, James Cather, At Persinger, Jim Kirtley and Sam Redd did the scouting from Napoleon to Pine Bluff; Coil, Sam Downing, and Asa Tracey, were the river detail—especially commissioned to burn transports and trading-boats. Two fine steamers and tree little Yankee coasters—loaded with jews-harps, gew-gaws, and, maybe a few wooden nutmegs—were given to the flames, the crews were give to the sword, and the supplies that were valuable distributed to the suffering and heroic Southern women in the neighborhood of the captures. [There’s McCoy and his booty again]

Such was the terror and annoyance inspired by the reckless and unceasing efforts of McCoy’s partisans that General McGinnis, the Federal commander in that portion of the country, sent daily detachments in quest of them. Major Davis, of the 15^th Illinois cavalry, leading a squadron one day in this kind of pursuit, was ambushed by War, Cather, Coil, Persinger, Redd, Downing and Tracey, at the mouth of a long lane and completely routed. It happened just at dark, and five men falling at the first close, deadly fire, the Illinoisans were seized with a panic, thinking they were outnumbered and enfiladed, and fled franticly back followed by the seven back followed by the seven Confederates shooting everything they could overtake. Superbly mounted, they overtook many, too. Captain Norris, of the same regiment—the 15^th Illinois—came out the next day and fared even worse. He had twenty-two men killed, five wounded, and lost ten horse and fourteen prisoners. This time McCoy had his whole force concentrated and on the alert.

Mrs. Douglass, an estimable and hospitable Southern matron, living in the heart of the “dark and bloody ground,” had her house used as a hospital for both parties—and often wounded Confederated and Federals would be lying side by side in the same room, receiving alike from her hands nourishment and sympathy. Her young and beautiful daughters emulated the example of their mother, and tried to outdo her in acts of mercy and benevolence. They often deprived themselves of their scanty supplies of provisions for the soldiers, and were in every particular angels of good deeds.

Cotton speculators, Yankee agents, itinerant preachers, and psalm-singing schoolmasters fled from McCoy’s scene of operations in ludicrous hast, spreading the most frightful repots of guerrillas, demons, giants, and what not. McCoy once suggest to a Federal Colonel, under flag of truce, that, as the vocabulary of epithets had been exhausted upon him men and himself, he would ask thereafter, as an especial favor, that they might be called gorillas.

Until the downfall of the Confederacy, McCoy’s little band kept watch and ward upon the river, keeping General Smith advised of every military movement upon the Mississippi.

Confederate Secret Service Attack on St Louis Levee

The Confederate Secret Service Attack on the St. Louis Levee, September, 1864

By John B. Castleman

Excerpted and introduced by G. E. Rule

from “Active Service”, John B. Castleman, Major CSA, General USA, 1917

Major John B. Castleman had an active career. First as captain of one of John H. Morgan’s cavalry companies, and later as Thomas H. Hines’ junior partner in the Northwest Conspiracy. In late September of 1864, Castleman was captured in Indiana and spent the rest of the war in a Union prison wondering if he was to be executed. He was finally released on the condition that he leave the country and never return.

A few years later his exile was rescinded and he returned to his native Kentucky where he had a very successful career. Castleman was a U.S. General in the Spanish-American War, and many observers credit his cool actions for preventing another Civil War in Kentucky in 1900 when a disputed election for governor, and assassination of one of the candidates, threatened anarchy there.

Did The Confederate Secret Service Attack on the St. Louis Levee, September, 1864 actually occur? The documentation is sketchy. While Castleman’s account does not claim a specific number of boats burned, it certainly leaves the impression that at least some were destroyed. That he was in Missouri about the time in question seems proven by the Charges and Specifications brought against him by the Federals and by his own account. James D. Horan, working from Hines’ and Castleman’s papers in his account of Thomas H. Hines career (“Confederate Agent”, 1954), claims 5-10 boats destroyed at St. Louis by Castleman and his comrades in September of 1864.

The levee at St. Louis was a favorite target of the Confederate secret service and their copperhead allies, OAK (Order of American Knights). Not counting Castleman’s action, there are at least four documented instances of multiple-boat burnings at St. Louis during the course of the war. These accounted for the destruction of 18 boats. While one of them, in 1862, may (or may not) have been accidental rather than intentional, the other three were almost certainly the work of the Confederate secret service and/or OAK.

St. Louis was the top of the supply chain in the theatre. Men and supplies were funneled from the northern states down the river network to St. Louis and then distributed from there. In 1862-1864, Grant’s and then Sherman’s armies were both principally supplied from St. Louis. Each so-called “civilian” boat was a military asset to the Union, and recognized by the authorities as such. One government witness at Robert Louden’s trial testified “I consider every boat on the river to be in the government service, directly or indirectly.” The Confederates were quick to take notice of the state of affairs and act accordingly.

But did Castleman’s attack result in the destruction of any boats? Did it really take place in September of 1864 at all? We have not been able to find any documentary evidence outside of Castleman’s and Hines’ accounts that any attack took place in the timeframe claimed. Even the Charges and Specifications against Castleman only claim that his mission was to destroy public property, including in Missouri, not that he and his comrades had actually done so. Neither Castleman nor the charges name a specific boat either. Other sources that make no mention of this attack are the newspapers of the time, other memoirs, various official records, and “Way’s Packet Directory 1848-1994”. This last source is considered “the bible” for steamboats on the western waters (someday we’d like to share our research with the current editors to make it even more complete), and is a truly impressive achievement of 6,000 listed boats and their fates. Mr. Frederick Way, Jr. (now deceased) spent roughly 80 years of his life collecting this information. While we have identified approximately 100 “suspicious” steamboat burnings on the western waters during the war from Way’s, there are none at the levee at St. Louis later than July of 1864.

It is highly unlikely that if 5-10 boats had been destroyed at once at St. Louis it could have gone without notice from all these separate sources. Unless further evidence appears, it must be considered either Castleman had his dates wrong or his “Greek Fire” was even more ineffective than he complained –so much so the St. Louis papers disdained to even notice the attack. If several boats really were destroyed, then the other candidate dates for Castleman’s attack would be September of 1863 and July of 1864. The traditional timeline would have Castleman in Canada on the latter date, but September of 1863 is a mystery as to Castleman’s whereabouts. He was with Morgan on his Ohio raid that summer, but was not amongst those captured after the Battle of Buffington’s Island. Castleman’s memoirs leave this period entirely to Hines account of events –Castleman himself does not appear in the narrative from approximately April of 1863 until December of 1863. Another hint that September of 1863 might be the true date is Castleman’s description of “embarrassing the United States Army at Vicksburg”. While this would certainly be true in September of 1863, one year later that army was at Atlanta.

Our interpretation of “Military Direction” led to the contemplation of embarrassing the United States Army at Vicksburg by partially destroying its means of supply. It was known that the army at Vicksburg was with commissary stores, quartermaster stores, ordnance, forage, supplied chiefly from St. Louis by steamboats.

From Marshall [Illinois], George B. Eastin was sent to inspect and report in particular detail. Where such inspections were made, immediate report was required. Within twenty-four hours verbal information was brought of the approximate number of boats lying at the St. Louis wharf, between what streets, the names and approximate size of the steamboats, character of cargoes and probably sailings.

The same date ten of us went back to St. Louis to attempt partial destruction of this government service and embarrass the supply to the Vicksburg army.

We stopped separately at the Olive Street Hotel, where we arrived early in the morning. Directly after breakfast, without seeming concert of action, each one went aboard of the boats, previously assigned, lying between the foot of the streets allotted and each quickly knew his boats by name and location, and where was to be found the most combustible or most easily ignited feature. Citizens were not denied permission to go at will about the boats.

By eleven-thirty this was done. We took our luncheons separately and proceeded to make the best use of the information obtained by the personal inspection, advices of which had been considered by our little “conference of war”, held in my room.

We had had the misfortune to have had made a quantity of small bottles of liquid designated “greek fire” [typically made of turpentine and phosphorous]. “Greek fire” was a combination of chemicals which, when exposed to the air, ignited and had, or was designed to have, the advantage of ignition after a minute had elapsed in which time the user of the liquid could move from the scene.

It is probable that had the little band of fearless Confederate soldiers used a few boxes of matches, there would have been none of the seventy-three steamboats left on that day or landed at the St. Louis wharf.

But “greek fire” was not reliable and in most instances the self-ignition did not occur. We dared not go back to complete the work and, as previously arranged, we quietly left–taking passage separately—on the train that afternoon.

One cannot, in the fifty years that have passed, forget the deliberate courage of that little body of men. It is a picture still vivid in memory that made lasting the quiet demeanor of those boys, each taking life in hand, and going with nonchalance in performance of service.

Those boys are now all dead, but one –God bless those fearless boys.

On the first of October I had an engagement at Sullivan, Indiana, to meet some men who were trusted by Hines and me. The chief of those men was Mr. Humphrey.

I drove across from Marshall, Illinois, and instructed my comrades to come via railroad to Sullivan. To do this they went to Terre Haute, and thence over the Evansville Road. I was arrested at Sullivan, and afterwards, after detention, was taken to Terre Haute on a train that arrived there in the early morning.

Charges and Specifications Preferred Against John Breckenridge Castleman,

Major of the Second Regiment, Kentucky Cavalry of the Rebel Army.

Charge 1st: Lurking and Acting as a Spy.

Specification 1st: In this, that the said John Breckinridge Castleman, Major of the Second Regiment, Kentucky Rebel Cavalry, did, on or about the 26th day of August, 1864, secretly, in disguise and under false pretenses, enter and come with the lines of the regularly authorized and organized military forces of the United States, and within the states of Michigan, Illinois, Missouri and Indiana, and did secretly and covertly lurk and travel about as a spy in the dress of a citizen, and under and assumed name, and did seek information with the intention of communicating it to the enemy, and remained within said military lines until arrested as a spy at Sullivan, Indiana, on or about the 30th day of September, 1864. All this within the states of Michigan, Illinois, Missouri and Indiana, during the months of August and September, 1864, and within the military lines and the theater of military operations of the Army of the United States, at a period of war and armed rebellion against the authority of the United States.

Specification 5th: In this, that the said John Breckinridge Castleman, Major of the Second Regiment, Kentucky Rebel Cavalry, was found lurking and acting as a spy in the state of Missouri, at or near the city of St. Louis on or about the 14th day of September, 1864, within the military lines and the theater of military operations of the Army of the United States, at a period of war and armed rebellion against the authority of the United States.

Charge 6th. Conspiring to Destroy Government Property in Violation of the Laws of War.

Specification: In this, that the said John Breckinridge Castleman, Major of the Second Regiment, Kentucky Rebel Cavalry, did, on or about the 26th of August, 1864, enter the states of Illinois, Missouri, and Indiana, in pursuance of an agreement with Jacob Thompson, Clement C. Clay, Jr. [Confederate commissioners in Canada], James A. Barrett [Missouri OAK leader], Captain Hines, and others unknown, to burn and destroy government arsenals, depots, and storehouses, and steamboats in government employ, and incite others thereto, with the purpose and intent of hindering and impeding the efforts of the lawfully constituted authorities of the United States in suppressing an armed rebellion against its authority.

[All emphasis added by editor]

Sabotage of the Sultana – Baker’s Boatburner List

Sabotage of the Sultana…

Provost Marshal J. H. Baker’s report on the boat-burners:

Official Records, Series I, Volume XLVIII, pages 194-198

HEADQUARTERS DEPARTMENT OF THE MISSOURI,
OFFICE OF PROVOST-MARSHAL-GENERAL,
Saint Louis, Mo., April 25, 1865.

Hon. C. A. DANA,
Assistant Secretary of War, Washington, D.C.:

SIR: I have the honor to state that in the month of January last I obtained information from various sources of the presence, in Saint Louis and other river cities, of a number of men employed by the rebel authorities to destroy Government property and steam-boats. I gave immediate attention to the matter, using all the means at my command to find and secure the parties, with so much success that early in February 1 was enabled to make the arrest of ten of them, among whom was one Edward Frazor, the leader. One of the parties implicated at once made a full confession, upon the understanding that he should not be prosecuted. I then preferred charges against Frazor, intending to make his the test case, and turned him over with the evidence to a military commission. Circumstances over which I had no control have delayed the trial, and Frazor, probably becoming weary of his imprisonment, and hoping that he might be reprieved by giving evidence against his accomplices, a few days since made a confession of his connection with the boat burners, which not only corroborates the information I had already procured, but throws additional light on the matter.

From this statement it appears that Frazor went, in company with others, to Richmond in the summer of 1864, and was introduced to Mr. Seddon, the Secretary of War. His account of what occurred at that interview is as follows:

At Richmond, Clark introduced me to the Secretary of War, Secretary Seddon. Clark told his business, when he sent us to the Secretary of State, J.P. Benjamin. I believe he looked our statement over and took time to consider. * * * The next day I went there, and Mr. Benjamin asked me if I knew all these claims for destroying U. S. property were right and correct. I told him they were, as far as I knew. He then offered $30,000 in greenbacks to settle. I told him I could not take that. Then he said he would take time to study again.

* * * * * * * * * *

Benjamin next offered $35,000 in gold. Then Clark went to see him, and before he went I told him to get all he could, but not take less than the $35,000 down and get all the more he could. When he came back he said he had taken the $35,000 down and $15,000 on deposit, payable in four months from date, provided those claims of the Louisville matter (burning of Government medical stores last year) were all right. I think that is the way the receipt read. I went over to Benjamin’s to sign the receipt, and while I was there the President, Jefferson Davis, sent for me. I went in to see him with Mr. Benjamin. Mr. Davis was talking about sending men up here to destroy the long bridge, near Nashville. He asked me if I knew anything about it–knew where it was. I told him I did. He asked me which would be the best route to send men up here to do it. I told him I thought it was rather dangerous to send men up here who had never been here. He wanted to know if I would not take charge of it. I told [him] yes, provided he would stop all men from coming up here, as they would only hinder the work. He said he would do it, and wanted to know if I wanted any men from there to help me. I said I didn’t. Benjamin said the pay would be $400,000 for burning the bridge. After we got all ready to leave Mr. Benjamin gave us a draft for $34,800 in gold on Columbia, S.C. * * * Clark got passes from the Secretary of War, twelve or thirteen in all.

The party, some six in all, left Richmond, drew the money, and started for Memphis. At Mobile they were arrested, but upon telegraphing the fact to Jeff. Davis, he ordered General Taylor, commanding the department, to release them, which was done, and they proceeded on their way, entering our lines near Memphis. At this place they separated, going in various directions. The names and residences of the principal men engaged in this infamous pursuit, which has resulted in the destruction of so much valuable property and life, are as follows:

No.	Name	Residence	Remarks.
1	Tucker, Judge ^a	Mobile, Ala	Chief of this service under the Secretary of War.
2	Majors, Minor		Next in rank to Tucker, and chief of this service in our lines.
3	Barrett, Hon. John R. ^b	Saint Louis, Mo	In charge of “land operations;” can get him any time.
4	Harwood, S. B	do	Can arrest him any time.
5	Frazor, Edward	do	In Gratiot Prison..
6	Clark, Thomas L	Grenada, Miss	Supposed to be in rebel lines.
7	Irwin, William	Louisville, Ky.
8	Dillingham, Henry		Inside our lines.
9	Fox, Harrison	Saint Louis, Mo
10	Stinson, —	Mobile, Ala
11	Roberts, Kirk	do
12	Louden, Robert	Saint Louis, Mo	Under sentence of death. Escaped from Lieutenant Post while being transferred from Gratiot to Alton Military Prison. Last heard from in New Orleans; supposed to be in rebel lines east of Mississippi.
13	Elshire, Isaac ^c	….	In Gratiot Prison last year, but released for want of evidence; supposed to be inside rebel lines east of Mississippi River.
14	Raison, John	….
15	Mitchell, Peter	Saint Louis, Mo.	Inside our lines.
16	Murphy, William	New Orleans, La	Came voluntarily and exposed the others; afterward left suddenly; am looking for him.
17	O’Keife,–	Natchez, Miss
18	Triplett, —
19	Parks, John G	Near Memphis,Tenn.	In Gratiot Prison.

a Tucker formerly resided in Missouri, and was an editor; published the State Journal, and was subsequently connected with the Missouri Republican

b Formerly Member of Congress from Missouri. Went to Europe in 1863, it is supposed on business for the rebels, where he was in conference with Mason and Slidell. Arrested by this office in 1864 on charge of being a member of the Order of American Knights, but afterward released. Has a brother in rebel artillery service.

c Burned the Robert Campbell, during which the lives of a number of soldiers were lost.

The foregoing list contains the names of the principal men only, as far as I have been able to ascertain them, and does not embrace any merely supposititious cases. A number of those most needed, it will be observed, are in territory which until recently has been occupied by the rebel army, where it will require your authority to operate. I therefore respectfully suggest that you order the commanding generals of the several departments to ascertain whether any of the parties above named are within the limits of their jurisdiction; and if so, to arrest and forward them to Saint Louis without delay.

It would be impossible to obtain a correct account of the property destroyed by these parties during the war, but the following list has been traced to one or the other of the men whose names are given above:

Name	Where Burned	Date
City of Madison	Vicksburg, Miss	August 1863
Champion	Memphis, Tenn	do
Robert Campbell, jr	Milliken’s Bend	September 28, 1863
Imperial	Saint Louis, Mo	do
Hiawatha	do	do
Post Boy	do	do
Jesse K Bell	do	do
Chancellor
Forest Queen
Catahoula	Saint Louis, Mo	September, 1863
Wharf-boats	Mound City, Ill	do
Do	Cairo, Ill	do
Small tow-boat	Memphis, Tenn	do

Since the outbreak of the rebellion to the present time over seventy steam-boats owned in Saint Louis have been destroyed by fire alone. Of this number only nine have been fired by rebels in arms, and there can be little doubt but the greater portion of the balance were fired by the above or similar emissaries of the rebel government.

By direction of Major-General Dodge:

I am, sir, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

J. H. BAKER,

Colonel and Provost-Marshal-General, Dept. of the Missouri.

[First indorsement.]

HEADQUARTERS DEPARTMENT OF THE MISSOURI,
Saint Louis, April 26, 1865.

Respectfully forwarded to the Assistant Secretary of War, Washington, D.C.

I consider it important that these parties be brought to justice, and would suggest that good detectives be sent to Richmond and Mobile to arrest the parties named as in the rebel service and obtain further evidence. There is no doubt of the guilt of the parties. They were in the habit of burning boats, store-houses, &c., taking to Richmond papers with full account of burning, there filing affidavits, and on that receiving their pay. They then came into our lines and squandered the money, which brought them to our notice, and on making arrests the entire modus operandi was divulged. We have a large amount of testimony in the case, but desire to obtain more proof before we go to trial, and, if possible, get all the parties.

G. M. DODGE,

Major-General.

[Second indorsement.]

WAR DEPARTMENT,
BUREAU OF MILITARY JUSTICE,
May 16, 1865.

Respectfully returned to the Secretary of War.

It appears from the within report of Col. J. H. Baker, provost-marshal-general, Department of the Missouri, that two members of the conspiracy engaged in destroying Government boats and property on the Mississippi River, principally in 1863, have confessed that they were employed by the rebel authorities and that they were paid at Richmond by the rebel Secretary of State, and that in one instance one of them was personally engaged and contracted with by Davis himself to destroy valuable property in the use of our Government. The confession of Frazor to this effect is fully detailed by Colonel Baker, and would appear to be most conclusive.

Colonel Baker presents a list of names of the parties connected with this conspiracy (by which, as he estimates, some sixty boats were consumed and in some cases lives of soldiers, &c., were destroyed), and urges that the commanding officers of the various departments be ordered to ascertain which, if any, of the individuals named are within their jurisdiction and to arrest such as are found and send them to Saint Louis for trial. Major-General Dodge further advises, in his indorsement, that detectives be sent to Richmond and Mobile to arrest parties supposed to be commorant there, and to obtain further evidence. These recommendations are concurred in.

The subject is regarded as one of great importance, especially as illustrating the fact that Davis and other leaders of the rebellion have been the principals in this and other similar detestable and treasonable enterprises executed by men who were merely their hirelings. It is esteemed to be of the greatest consequence that such men, especially as Judge Tucker, John R. Barrett, Isaac Elshire, Louden, and other conspicuous members of the conspiracy, should be apprehended as promptly as possible, and that all of the gang who can be found should be tried together by military commission for a treasonable conspiracy in the interest of the rebellion. It is further recommended that certified copies of all the affidavits and other written evidence in the case be required to be forwarded to the War Department for the use or reference of the executive officers of the Government.

A. A. HOSMER,

Major and Judge-Advocate. (In the absence of the Judge-Advocate. General.)

[Third indorsement.]

WAR DEPARTMENT,
May 26, 1865.

Respectfully referred to the Adjutant-General. The recommendations of the Judge-Advocate-General, Colonel Baker, and General Dodge are approved, and will be carried into effect without delay. By order:

JAS. A. HARDIE,

Inspector-General U.S. Army

Sabotage of the Sultana – Globe Democrat

Sabotage of the Sultana…

This is the last of the three Globe-Democrat Sultana articles appearing between April 23 and May 6, 1888. It is amazing that this article seems to have been completely lost to history until rediscovered as part of our investigation. It is a roadmap to Robert Louden’s and William Streetor’s careers. Using it an experienced person could track down most of the rest. The most serious omission is the fact that Louden’s death-sentence was not just for spying and mail-running, but for boat-burning as well.

Streetor is being either somewhat disingenuous or modest when he talks about “the burning of so many boats by Confederate agents came up in the course of the conversation” and “I asked him in an offhand way what he knew of the Sultana explosion”. Remember who these two men were and their history together. They were important figures on opposite sides of the secret war in the West. Streetor had spent most of his career during the war protecting the Union against the likes of Louden. The two maximum security areas of Gratiot were full of Confederate secret service agents, including Louden and his mail-running partner Ab Grimes. Streetor as assistant keeper was deeply concerned with keeping them above all others under lock and key. Streetor had also been personally involved in thwarting one of Ab Grimes’ regular and always creative escape attempts. As chief clerk of the prison as well, Streetor would have had access to all Louden’s records and been familiar with the charges and suspicions about Louden’s activities and connections to J.W. Tucker and the “organized boat-burners”. Certainly Louden knew who Streetor was as well. The casual conversation that Streetor describes is like an ex-FBI agent and a pardoned serial bank-robber sitting down for a few drinks. Can anyone be surprised where the conversation would end up?

It appears that the transcript of Louden’s Dec. 1863 trial is the origin of Streetor giving his pre-war alias as “Dale” instead of “Deal”. Louden had used “Charlie Deal” as an alias when he first came to St. Louis, principally in his connection with the Liberty Fire Co. No. 6. In taking down the testimony of Chief of U.S. Police Peter Tallon, the court transcriber apparently heard it as “Dale” and used that spelling throughout. Histories of the Volunteer Fire Department of St. Louis –one of which was written by the ex-brother-in-law of Louden’s wife and uncle of his two step-children– clearly give it as “Deal”. As for “Lowden” instead of the proper “Louden” –well, there is a consistent record of mucking-up the spelling of that in creative ways by multiple sources, Union and Confederate, with “Lowden” being the most popular of the incorrect versions.

Unfortunately, this article was practically the last thing we found instead of the first. Almost all of the revelations found in this article had been discovered by us from other sources before we ever saw it. We had talked for months about our case being built around the fact (as we see it) of the centrality of St. Louis –as opposed to Vicksburg or Memphis– to the “sabotage theory.” More and more we convinced ourselves that if the Memphis papers had published Streetor’s story, then there had to be some significant mention of it in the St. Louis papers. These two men were just too well known there for the St. Louis papers to have taken no notice whatever of Streetor’s accusation against Louden.

Since we are too far away to easily visit St. Louis, it was decided to take Dennis Northcott of the Missouri Historical Society into our confidence, lay out our suspicions, and ask him if he would search for the article we strongly suspected must exist in the May 5^th-10^th period. Dennis reacted like a trooper –after determining that the MHS collection of the Missouri Republican contained no such article, he volunteered to go to the St. Louis Public Library and search their collection. A few days later a photocopy of the article below arrived in our mail. Certainly we had hoped for more detail than the Memphis paper had published, but we were shocked at how much more there was.

How could this article have been lost? Well, for one thing, in a city that knew Bob Louden very well indeed –both friends and enemies—there was no reaction. His wife, who still lived there, did not come to his defense in print. Ab Grimes, his war-time partner, still lived near St. Louis and also did not rise to challenge Streetor’s story. It is simply not credible Ab Grimes –riverman, Bob Louden’s mail-running partner, and sometime “guest” of William Streetor’s at Gratiot Street Military Prison– didn’t know about this article, yet his memoirs say not a word about it, are relatively friendly to Streetor (who was, after all, a Yankee), and even confirm the post-war relationship between Streetor and Louden. The total silence about Louden in post-war Confederate sources until Ab Grimes memoirs were published in 1926 (his daughter published them 15 years after his death; it is not clear Ab ever intended them to be read outside the family) strongly suggests a tacit understanding by all Louden’s friends that it would be better to leave sleeping dogs lie.

Sultana’s last voyage

A line drawing of this photo appeared in the St. Louis Globe-Democrat article

St. Louis Globe-Democrat

May 6, 1888

BLEW UP THE SULTANA

The Cause of the Horrible Disaster

Explained at Last.

Charlie Dale, a St. Louis Painter, Placed a Torpedo in the Coal Bin on the Boat—The Steamer Just Before the Wreck.

The recent publication of a number of statements from survivors of the explosion of the Mississippi River steamer Sultana twenty-three years ago, has led to the cause of the disaster, a matter of much historical interest in connection with the war of the rebellion. The generally accepted theories of the explosion are faulty condition and bad management of the boilers. Mr. William C. Streetor, a painter of this city, who now has a shop at 314 Locust street, was a resident of St. Louis during the war, and was employed as a clerk in the Gratiot and Myrtle street prisons. The facts in his possession regarding the cause of the Sultana explosion, as related to a GLOBE-DEMOCRAT reporter, yesterday, removes this much discussed subject from the field of speculation, fixes the fearful catastrophe as the result of no accident, but of fiendish design, and locates with much particularity the boss dynamiter and murderer of the age.

“Yes, I know something about the Sultana disaster,” said Mr. Streetor, in reply to an inquiry. “I can give the cause of explosion. A torpedo in a lump of coal was carried aboard the steamer at Memphis and deposited in the coal pile in front of the boilers for the express purpose of causing her destruction. The man who placed the torpedo on the boat is my authority, for I had the statement from his own lips. He was a notorious Confederate mail carrier and blockade runner, was captured some five or six times, and once, at least, was sentenced to death by a military commission in this city. Toward the close of the war, it will be remembered, President Lincoln issued an order that no one should be executed under military laws until the sentence had been confirmed by the President. It was while awaiting confirmation of the sentence that he escaped from the military prison in this city and made his way South, where he remained until after the close of the war. His friends obtained a pardon for him from President Johnson, and, armed with that, he returned to his home in St. Louis. It was after his return home that he told me the story of how he smuggled the torpedo on board the Sultana. His real name was Robert Lowden, but he was always known in this city by his alias, Charlie Dale. He was a painter by trade, and he worked in the same shop with me for William H. Gray, some three years after the close of the war. Dale was at that time a young, vigorous dare-devil. He possessed bravery of a certain kind, I think, equal to that of any man who ever lived. He was cool and calculating in his disposition, but at times he drank heavily, and when in his cups was disposed to talk a little too much for a man with a record like he had. It was while he was drinking one day that he and I got to talking about the war, and the burning of so many boats by the Confederate agents came up in the course of the conversation. He told me that he had fired no less than half a dozen steamboats on the Mississippi. I asked him in an offhand way what he knew about the Sultana explosion. Then he told me the story of the torpedo in the coal, and, using his own expression, ‘It had got to be too—ticklish a job to set the boat afire and get away from her.’

Out of a hundred other of Dale’s daring exploits during the war one in particular impressed me forcibly as showing the character of this remarkable man. It was accomplished while the federal fleet was lying between Memphis and Vicksburg. Dale had escaped from prison in this city, and was on his way South. He was in a quandary for several days as to how he was going to get through the Federal lines. Finally he hit upon a plan and it was successful. He got a coffin at Memphis, calked it up with white lead, and launched it on the Mississippi. Then he laid himself out in the ghastly looking boat and floated down the stream. He passed the Government gunboats at night, and two or three times when the current of the stream drifted the coffin up against the hulls of the boats he reached out with his hands, pushed his craft clear and landed in the morning safe within the Confederate lines.

“Before the war Dale was a member of the old Liberty volunteer fire company in this city and was well known to a great many people living here now. He died in New Orleans during the yellow fever epidemic along in the latter part of the ‘60s. But to return to the Sultana explosion. I have read carefully all the information I could find about it, and from the character of the explosion I have been led to believe that Charley Dale’s story of the torpedo is true.”

[Article continues with scenes from rescue of survivors. . .]

J W Tucker and the Boatburners

Sabotage of the Sultana…

Joseph W. Tucker and the Boat-Burners

by G. E. Rule

See also Tucker’s War: Missouri and the Northwest Conspiracy by G. E. Rule – original research on J. W. Tucker, one of the most important, yet shadowy, figures in the secret war for Missouri, head of the Boat-Burners a secret service sabotage unit

A South Carolinian by birth, Joseph W. Tucker has been greatly underestimated by historians trying to understand the War in the West. Methodist minister, pro-secession newspaper editor, lawyer, political ally of Claiborne Jackson and Sterling Price, spymaster—the very diversity of his roles has lead to a fragmentary telling of his story.

You will find Albert Castel and Thomas C. Reynolds talking about “Deacon Tucker” and his role as one of Sterling Price’s most important political lieutenants. Christopher Phillips writes of Tucker the St. Louis newspaper editor tried for treason by U.S. Attorney James O. Broadhead in the spring of 1861. According to Broadhead, Tucker skipped bail when the trial appeared to be going against him, forfeiting a $10,000 bond. Tidwell, Hall, and Gaddy speak of Tucker the boss of the boat-burners in “Come Retribution.” The Official Records of both armies note “Judge Tucker” in this role as well. Pro-Union Baptist minister Galusha Anderson writes with astonishment of the pro-secession minister who tried to bait him into a duel. David E. Long credits Tucker as a relatively minor Confederate spy in “The Jewel of Liberty.” It does not help matters that Tucker sometimes identified himself as “J. Wofford Tucker.”

All are the same J.W. Tucker, and all of these authors seem unaware of the totality of Tucker’s role and just how influential he was in Confederate Missouri circles—and by extension to the War in the West. Appreciation for Tucker’s influence wasn’t always so unknown, however. One post-war history of St. Louis goes so far as to credit Tucker with arranging the naming of Sterling Price to head the Missouri State Guard. This meeting was said to have taken place in Tucker’s St. Louis State Journal offices, with most of the important pro-secession leaders—including Governor Jackson—in attendance. While certainly apocryphal in its exact details (Jackson’s aide Thomas L. Snead and Lt. Gov. Thomas C. Reynolds give more reliable accounts of how Price came to be Major General of the Guard), this account shows just how influential Tucker was believed to be at a time when many of the war’s participants were still around to share their memories of events.

Tucker had his bellicose thumb in other important pies than just the effort to interdict Union shipping on the Mississippi. In due course we will be sharing our research in those areas as well.

Below are two letters relating to Judge Deacon J.(oseph) W.(offord) Tucker (take your pick on combination of names—everyone else has) and the boat-burners. The first letter, from the OR, provides the earliest documented evidence of official non-Missouri Confederate support for Tucker’s boat-burners. Johnston’s dating of this encounter suggests that it was probably June of 1863 when he agreed to provide funds to support Tucker and his boat-burners. However, keep in mind that Tucker’s close connections to the highest levels of Missouri Confederates strongly suggests that he and his group could have been drawing financial support from that quarter from well before this date. It isn’t documented—it wouldn’t need to be—but it is a reasonable supposition.

The excerpts from Tucker’s 1864 letter to Jefferson Davis do not paint the boat-burners in a particularly patriotic light. “Filthy lucre” seems to be much more the aim of at least some of them, even by the admission of their paymaster. It is however another indicator of how easily Tucker’s group was able to strike in Union-held Memphis.

While Robert Louden is well-documented to have been a drinker, which can be expensive, and he was not unfond of money, there is no reason to believe that his early career as a spy and saboteur was driven by anything other than his support for the Confederacy. Louden was an early Missouri secessionist, closely associated with the Minute Men and their leaders in the spring of 1861. As “Sultana –A Case for Sabotage” documents, in his later career a warm grudge against the Union probably played an increasingly important role.

* * * *

DALTON, January 31, 1864.

Hon. JAMES A. SEDDON, Secretary of War:

SIR: I have had the honor to receive the letter of the Secretary of the Treasury to the President, dated January 9, with your indorsement, dated 11th.

During the siege of Vicksburg, Governor Pettus proposed to me the adoption of a plan suggested by Judge Tucker, to be executed under that gentleman’s direction, to cut off supplies from the besieging army. He required $20,000 to inaugurate it. I drew a check for that sum on the assistant treasurer in Mobile, in favor of Governor Pettus, who indorsed it to Judge Tucker. After considerable delay, caused by reference of the matter to the Treasury Department, the money was paid. While I remained in Mississippi, Judge Tucker was, I believe, using this money against the enemy’s navigation of the river. About the end of October, I wrote an explanation of the case to the Secretary of the Navy, to be delivered by Judge Tucker, who had large claims against that Department for enemy’s property destroyed on the water.

This sum was not a part of that transferred to me by Commander [Samuel] Barron, all of which was returned by me to the Navy Department.

Most respectfully, your obedient servant,

J. E. JOHNSTON.

* * * * * * * *

J. W. Tucker to Jefferson Davis.

(From Confederate Memorial Hall.)

(Spotswood Hotel 14th March, 1864.)

Confidential statements; for the President alone

* * *

4. A deputation, under the authority of the order, was sent to confer with me in Mobile in relation to the destruction of the enemy’s marine service, together with armories, arsenals, depots of stores, etc. etc., as a means of weakening and paralysing the military strength of the Federal Government. The Order is desirous of thus aideing our cause. In the Lodge in St. Louis there are seventy-two Engineers serving on the Western Waters, by whom we destroyed ten Federal Transports in ten days. But a doubt arose whether our work was prosecuted by the approval of the Confederate Government; and whether the men employed in this perillous service would be compensated by any provision of law, and especially when officers in the marine service were thrown out of employment by the destruction of the vessels on which they were employed.

5. Our future plans, if sanctioned and aided by the Government, embrace the destruction of that transport service upon which Grant must rely in the great coming struggle of the spring campaign; a week ago we burnt $500,000 worth of hay at the Memphis wharf, to embarrass Sherman; not long since Colt’s pistol and gun Factory became an earnest of what can be done. We design to strike a blow on the same day, at many points, that will paralyze the foe. To do this confidence in the countenance and approval of our government must be inspired. To do this an adjustment for work already done must be had. The final agents are often ignorant, and sometimes vicious men. No argument but money will avail with them. If a settlement now be practicable, and a sum of money, say $100,000, of a character of funds current within the Federal lines, greenbacks, or Foreign exchange, can be placed in the hands of Lieut. Gen. Polk, for disbursement, some in advance, and the rest as the work proceeds, I am most confident we shall be able, through this association, to render important and telling service to our government in the ensuing campaign.