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MISSOURI STATE CONVENTION.

461

the Conditional Unionists bound the stalwart limbs of her Samson-her National allegiance-while it was reposing its head trustfully in the lap of Delilah-the Slave power; and that they came near being instrumental (though not intentionally) in putting out its eyes, and making it grind ignobly in the prison-house of the "Confederate" Philistines. Perhaps the records of the war in Kentucky, that may be found in future pages of this work, may aid us in forming a correct judgment in the matter. It is certain that the record contains some very instructive lessons concerning the danger to a free people of class legislation and class domination. Whenever a single interest overshadows all others, and is permitted to shape the public policy of a subordinate commonwealth, or a great nation, the liberties of the people are in danger.

While the zealous loyalists of Kentucky were restrained and made comparatively inactive by what they deemed an unwise and mischievous policy, those of Missouri were struggling manfully to keep the State from revolution and ruin. We have observed how strongly the people declared for the Union in their election of delegates to the State Convention, which assembled at Jefferson City on the 28th of February. In that Convention there was

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not a single openly avowed disunionist, but there were a few secret ones and many Conditional Unionists.' Notwithstanding the slaves in Missouri wer less than one-tenth of the population, and the real and best interests of the State were in close affinity with free labor, the Slave power, which embraced a large number of active politicians, was potential. These politicians were mostly of the Virginia and South Carolina school, and through their exertions the disloyal Claiborne F. Jackson was elected Governor of the State." On the second day of its session the Missouri Convention adjourned to St. Louis, where it reassembled on the 4th of March," in the Mercantile Library Hall, with Sterling Price as President, and Samuel A. Lowe as Secretary. Price, who had been Governor of Missouri, and who afterward became one of the most active generals in the "Confederate" service in the Southwest, had obtained his election to the Convention under the false pretense of being a Unionist, and hoped, no doubt, to find a sufficient number of disloyal men in that body to enable him and his political friends to precipitate Missouri into revolution. He was mistaken, and was

• 1861.

1 The Convention consisted of one hundred and four members, of whom fifty-three were lawyers. Onequarter of them were natives of Virginia, and only fourteen of them were born in Missouri. Thirteen were from Kentucky, and three were natives of Europe.

2 See page 201.

462

LOYALTY OF THE MISSOURI CONVENTION.

made conscious of the fact at the beginning of the session, not only from conversation with the members, but from the reception given to a communication, written and verbal, from Luther J. Glenn, an accredited "Commissioner" from Georgia, and who was allowed to address the Convention on the subject

1861.

of his mission on the first day of its session in St. Louis." In his a March 4, written communication and in his speech he strongly urged Missouri to join the "Southern Confederacy." The atmosphere of St. Louis, in and out of the Convention, was not congenial to such seditious sentiments. The population of that city was made up largely of New Englanders and Germans, who were loyal, while immigrants from the Slave-labor States, and especially from Virginia, composed the great body of the secessionists. The spectators in the Convention greeted Glenn's remarks with hisses and hootings; and subsequently the Convention itself, through a committee to which the "Commissioner's" communication was referred, assured him that his views were not acceptable to that body, whose proceedings throughout were characterized by great dignity, and acts and expressions that gave cheerfulness to the loyal men of the country.

The Committee of the Convention on Federal Relations, through its chairman, H. R. Gamble, reported at length, on the 9th of March, in a manner to assure the country of the loyalty of the Convention. In that report the great topics of the hour were temperately discussed. It was declared that "the people of the Southern States" had a right to complain “of the incessant abuse poured upon their institutions by the press, the pulpit, and many of the people of the North;" and then enumerated some of the alleged "aggressions on the rights of the South," so commonly found at that time in the newspapers of the Slave-labor States, and the speeches of politicians. Yet it was declared truly, that "heretofore there has been no complaint against the action of the Federal Government in any of its departments, as designed to violate the rights of the Southern States." The Slavery question was reviewed, and the possession of the Government by “a sectional party, avowing opposition to the admission of Slavery into the Territories of the United States," was "deeply regretted," because it threatened dangerous sectional strife; but, after all, the Committee thought that the history of the country taught that there was not much to be feared from political parties in power. The value of the Union to Missouri was pointed out, with forcible illustrations; and the report closed with seven resolutions, which declared that there was then no adequate cause to impel Missouri to leave the Union, and that she would labor for its security; that

1 Mr. Glenn's communication to the Convention was referred to a Committee, whereof John B. Henderson was chairman. That Committee reported on the 21st of March. They regretted that the Commissioner from Georgia, who invited Missouri to withdraw from the Union, had "no plan of reconciliation" to offer. The Committee reviewed the causes of difference between "the North" and "the South," and concluded with a series of five resolutions, in which it declared its disapproval of secession as a right or a necessity; that a "dissolution of the Union would be ruinous to the best interests of Missouri ;" and that "no efforts should be spared to secure its continued blessings to her people." The fourth resolution was a pointed rebuke for all disturbers of the peace of the Republic. "This Convention," it said, "exhorts Georgia and the other seceding States to desist from the revolutionary measures commenced by them, and unite their voice with ours in restoring peace, and cementing the Union of our fathers." Judge Birch, of the same Committee, offered a minority report, in the form of resolutions, less offensive to the slaveholders. The two reports were laid on the table, and, by a vote of fiftysix against forty, the subject was made the special order for the third Monday in December following, to which time it was proposed to adjourn the Convention when it should adjourn.

MISSOURI CONVENTION AND LEGISLATURE.

463 the people of Missouri were devotedly attached to the institutions of the country, and earnestly desired a fair and amicable adjustment of all difficulties; that the Crittenden Compromise was a proper basis for such adjustment; that a convention of the States, to propose amendments to the Constitution, would be useful in restoring peace and quiet to the country; that an attempt to “ coerce the submission of the seceding States, or the employment of military force by the seceding States to assail the Government of the United States," would inevitably lead to civil war; and earnestly entreated the Government and the conspirators to "withhold and stay the arm of military power," and on no pretense whatever bring upon the nation the horrors of such war.

On the 19th of March the report of the Committee was considered, and substantially adopted. An amendment was agreed to, recommending the withdrawal of the National troops "from the forts within the borders of the seceded States, where there is danger of collision between the State and Federal troops." So the Convention declared that the State of Missouri would stand by the Government on certain conditions; and after appointing delegates to the Border State Convention,' and giving power to a committee to call another session whenever it might seem necessary,' the Convention adjourned to the third Monday in De

cember.

a March 21, 1861.

The Legislature of Missouri was in session simultaneously with the Convention. Governor Jackson could not mold the action of the latter to his views, so he labored assiduously to that end with the former. He determined to give to the secessionists control of the city of St. Louis, the focus of the Union power of the State, and the chief place of the depository of the National arms within its borders. He succeeded in procuring an Act for the establishment of a metropolitan police in that city, under five commissioners to be appointed by the Governor.3 This was an important step in the way of his intended usurpation; and he had such assurances from leading politicians throughout the State of their power to suppress the patriotic action of the people, that when the President's call for troops reached him he gave the insolent answer already recorded. The Missouri Republican, a newspaper in St. Louis, which was regarded as the exponent of the disloyal sentiments of the State, raised the standard of revolt on the following day by saying, editorially, "Nobody expected any other response from him. They may not approve of the early course of the Southern States, but they denounce and defy the action of Mr. Lincoln in proposing to call out seventy-five thousand men for the purpose of coercing the seceded States of the Union. Whatever else may happen, he gets no men from the Border States to carry on such a war.”

April 16, 1861.

1 See page 460. The delegates from Missouri consisted of one from each Congressional district. The following named gentlemen were chosen:-Hamilton R. Gamble, John B. Henderson, William A. Hall, Jas. II. Moss, William Douglass, Littlebury Hendrick, William G. Pomeroy.

* This Committee was composed of the President of the Convention, who should be ex-officio chairman, and one from each Congressional district.

3 The Commissioners appointed were the political friends of the Governor. Among them was Basil Duke, afterward the noted guerrilla chief under the notorious John Morgan.

See page 338.

464

• April 22,

1865.

TREASON OF MILITARY OFFICERS.

Jackson followed up this revolutionary movement by calling the Legislature to assemble in extraordinary session at Jefferson City on the 2d day of May, "for the purpose," he said, "of enacting such laws and adopting such measures as may be deemed necessary and proper for the more perfect organization and equipment of the militia of this State, and to raise the money and such other means as may be required to place the State in a proper attitude for defense." The Governor was acting under the inspiration of a disloyal graduate of the Military Academy at West Point, named Daniel M. Frost, a native of New York, who was then bearing the commission of a brigadier-general of the Missouri militia, and was commander of the St. Louis District. So early as the 24th of January preceding, we find Frost giving the Governor assurances, in writing, of his trea

sonable purposes, and of the complicity with him of Major William Henry Bell, a native of North Carolina, who was then commander of the United States military post at St. Louis, and having in charge the Arsenal there. On the day when April 15. the President called' for troops, Frost hastened to remind the Governor that it was time to take active measures for securing the co-operation of Missouri in the disunion scheme. He suggested that the holding of St. Louis by the National Government would restrain the secession movement in the State; and he recommended the calling of the Legislature together; the sending of an agent to Baton Rouge to obtain mortars and siege-guns; to see that the Arsenal at Liberty should not be held by Government troops; to

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DANIEL M. FROST.

1 General Frost informed the Governor that he had just visited the Arsenal, and said:-"I found Major Bell every thing that you or I could desire. He assured me that he considered that Missouri had, whenever the time came, a right to claim it [the Arsenal], as being upon her soil. . . . He informed me, upon the honor of a gentleman, that he would not suffer any arms to be removed from the place, without first giving me timely information, and I, in turn, promised him that I would use all the force at my command to prevent him being annoyed by irresponsible persons. I, at the same time, gave him notice that if affairs assumed so threatening a character as to render it unsafe to leave the place in its comparatively unprotected condition, that I might come down and quarter a proper force there to protect it from the assaults of any persons whatsoever, to which he assented. In a word, the Major is with us, where he ought to be, for all his worldly wealth lies here in St. Louis (and it is very large); and then, again, his sympathies are with us."

Frost then proceeded to inform the Governor that he should keep a sharp eye upon the sensationists," that is, the Unionists; that he should be "thoroughly prepared, with proper force, to act as emergency may require," and that he would use force, if any attempt at "shipment or removal of the arms" should be attempted. "The Major informs me," he said, "that he has arms for forty thousand men, with all the appliances to manufacture munitions of every kind." He continued:-"This Arsenal, if properly looked after, will be every thing to our State, and I intend to look after it, very quietly, however." Then again, referring to Major Bell, he said:-"He desired that I would not divulge his peculiar views, which I promised not to do, except to yourself. I beg, therefore, that you will say nothing that might compromise him eventually with the General Government, for thereby I would be placed in an awkward position, whilst he would probably be removed. which would be unpleasant to our interests."-Letter of D. M. Frost to C. F. Jackson, Governor of Missouri. January 24, 1861. See Appendix to the " Journal of the Senate, Extra Session of the Rebel Legislature," called together by a proclamation of Governor Jackson, and held at Neosho, Missouri, in October, 1861. It was published by order of the House of Representatives of the General Assembly of Missouri, in 1865. This Journal, in MS., was captured by the Forty-ninth Missouri Volunteers, in the State of Alabama.

TREASONABLE MOVEMENTS IN MISSOURI.

465

publish a proclamation to the people, warning them that the President's call for troops was illegal, and that they should prepare to defend their rights as citizens of Missouri, and to form a military camp at or near St. Louis, whereat the commander might be authorized to "muster military companies into the service of the State, erect batteries," et cetera.

In accordance with General Frost's advice, the Governor, on the day when he issued his call for the meeting of the Legislature, caused his Adjutant-General (Hough) to send orders to the militia officers of the State to assemble their respective commands on the 3d of May, and go into encampment for a week, the avowed object being for the militia "to attain a greater degree of efficiency and perfection in organization and discipline." In all this the treasonable designs of the Governor were so thinly covered by false pretense that few were deceived by them. The intention clearly was to give to the Governor and his friends military control and occupation of the State, that they might, in spite of the solemn injunctions of the people, expressed in their Convention, annex Missouri to the "Southern Confederacy." Had evidence of his treasonable designs been wanting, the Governor's Message to the Legislature on the 2d of May would have supplied it. "Our interests and our sympathies," he said, "are identical with those of the Slaveholding States, and necessarily unite our destiny with theirs. The similarity of our social and political institutions, our industrial interests, our sympathies, habits, and tastes, our common origin and territorial contiguity, all concur in pointing out our duty in regard to the separation which is now taking place between the States of the old Federal Union." He denounced the President's call for

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Governor, and he began at once to work the machinery of revolution vigorously.

The capture of the United States Arsenal at St. Louis, with its large supply of munitions of war, and the holding of that chief city of the State and of the Mississippi Valley, formed a capital feature in the plan of the conspirators. Already an unguarded Arsenal at Liberty, in Clay County, had been seized and garrisoned by the secessionists, under the direction of the Governor, and its contents dis

April 20, 1861.

1 Letter of D. M. Frost, Brigadier-General commanding Military District of Missouri, dated "St. Louis, April 15, 1861."

2 The grounds of the Arsenal slope to the river, and on two sides have a sort of terraced wall. It is south of the city; and near the river a railway passes through the grounds. Connected with that wall at the railway, a battery was established.

VOL. I.-30

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