GENERAL LYON'S MISSOURI CAMPAIGN. BATTLE OF WILSON'S CREEK, AUG. 10, 1861.

would share it and the honors of it equally with every one who contributes to sustain the great cause of our country, which I have so much at heart. I have not received your notice of me in the Journal of Commerce. Most of the notices by the press are more or less erroneous. But, alas! the past is nothingpainfully, indeed, unfruitful of benefits to our race. It is with the present we are dealing, and let us all devote ourselves to it with a view to secure the future. And let that future be blank and forever oblivious rather than our cause fail before the unscrupulous villainy now at war upon it. Of the ultimate results I have no doubts, though unfavorable incidents may arise under frauds and misrepresentations and a heretofore demoralized sentiment at the North, so unfortunately auspicious to our enemies. I am now deeply involved and concerned in the issues before me. My exertions and will shall not be wanting, though they may not go far to effect the result. What is now before me in this region I hardly know. The Governor and party have gone South, and may make another stand; though it is probable they intend to rendezvous in Arkansas and return with reinforcements. I have been unavoidably delayed by getting up a train, but shall pursue, though I do not expect to catch the fugitives."

WE left General Lyon setting out | have or shall have a conspicuous part, I from Booneville at the beginning of July. He was firmly convinced of the necessity of action, and determined, in spite of every disadvantage of means and resources, to make that action prompt and effective. We may pause here a moment to notice a letter written by him a few days before, to a near relative who had requested some information on previous incidents of his life, doubtless with a view to their publication, for there were at this tune few persons of whom the public more desired to hear than of General Lyon. It was a complimentary call which most persons thus situated would have found some means of complying with. But General Lyon was far too deeply engrossed with the concerns of his country to look at such a time into his past life for materials for eulogy. His reply exhibits the disinterestedness of the man, his superiority to any personal vanity or sense of importance, and his overwhelming conviction-a conviction which he, more than most leaders of the North, at that time felt-of the momentous nature of the conflict upon which the country had entered. He thus wrote from Booneville, June 28th, 1861: "Dear Cousin,--I have your two notes asking for points of my military service. I have not answered, because I have no time, and do not think the subject of the least importance. This great and wicked rebellion absorbs my whole being to the exclusion of any considerations of fame or self-advancement. In this issue, if I

Having diligently collected a train by the purchase of wagons and animals from the farmers of the country-he was not

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The road soon struck a heavy forest, where the dense foliage of the overhanging limbs shut out the glimmer of the stars, leaving the men to grope their way through almost total darkness. The road was little travelled, and extremely rough. Steep hills, deep gorges, swift streams, miry sloughs, gullies washed out by the rains rocks scattered about everywhere, stumps and fallen timber were among the obstacles which had to be encountered in the darkness. Many were the bruised limbs and broken vehicles. For thirty-six hours most of the men had hardly closed their eyes, and now unsupportable drowsiness overpowered them. If the line came to a momentary halt, scores fell asleep in their tracks. Arousing as the column moved on; the men struggled bravely against fatigue till 3 o'clock in the morning, when General Lyon ordered a halt. Scarcely was the order issued before nine-tenths of the army were buried in slumber. Few waited to unroll their

the man to wait for the Government ing from the extreme western part of manufacture of the regulation article- the State to hasten to Springfield. On General Lyon, on the 3d of July, 1861, the 11th the army, starting at sunrise, left Booneville in quest of the enemy. regardless of the heat, accomplished a He had with him at starting 2,700 men, march of twenty-seven miles by 3 o'clock. Iowa and Missouri volunteers, a com- "At sundown," continues Dr. Woodpany of regulars, and Captain Totten's ward, the latest biographer of General battery of four pieces of artillery. Lyon, in his narrative of the expedition, Though the force was small, it was im-"the line of march was again formed. posing and effective, for the men of which it was composed knew their duty, and were prepared to discharge it. A body of pioneers, armed with Sharp's rifles and carrying axes and shovels, followed the regulars, who were placed in advance as skirmishers. Then came the artillery, succeeded by the infantry and a long train of supplies. General Lyon rode mounted on an iron-grey horse, accompanied by a select body-guard of ten stout German butchers from St. Louis, mounted on powerful horses and armed with revolvers and cavalry swords. Thus provided and equipped, the little army, hardly more than a simple brigade, made its way southward through the heat and dust of the sultry season. On the 7th, having secured the passage of Grand river, a branch of the Osage running through Henry county, he was joined at that ferry by 3,000 troops from Kansas, commanded by Major Sturgis, and the whole force was passed over the stream that night and early on the following morning by a single small scow. With blankets or seek a sheltered spot for a similar expedition and success the army next day reached the Osage, striking the river in the heart of a dense forest ten or twelve miles west of Oceola. Here considerable excitement was produced in the camp by the news of Colonel Sigel's engagement at Carthage, which, in consequence of his retreat, was represented as a defeat. It was resolved turn

couch. Wherever they stood, they dropped upon the ground-officers and men indiscriminately-with the earth for a bed and the sky for a covering." Within twenty-four hours the toil-worn force marched nearly fifty miles, over a rugged, disadvantageous country, in the heat of midsummer, to carry aid to a portion of the army supposed to be in dan

ger. Their exertions were rewarded the next morning by hearing that Sigel's command was safe, and, thus encouraged, they marched leisurely to Springfield, which they reached on the 13th, accomplishing the distance of nearly two hundred miles, from Booneville, in eleven days.

loch, was a person of some mark in military frontier life. A native of Rutherford county, Tennessee, the son of an aid of General Jackson's warrior-friend, General Coffee, he had early addicted himself to the hunter's life of the wilderness. In his younger days he acquired some reputation as an adept in bear hunting. When the tide of emigration began to set beyond the Mississippi, he made some ineffectual attempts to join parties of traders and trappers to Santa Fe and the Rocky Mountains. He then settled in Gonzales county, Texas, joined General Houston at the first outbreak with the Mexicans, and was present, in command of a gun, at the battle of San Jacinto. When the province was annexed to the United States, and the war became national, he raised a company of Texans, and joined General Taylor on the Rio Grande, accompanying him to Monterey and Buena Vista, rendering good service as a scout. He was thence transferred to the column of General Scott, and entered Mexico with the triumphant army. After the war he returned to his home, and received his reward in the appointment by President

The retreat of Sigel through the enemy's forces at Carthage, was a fiery indication of the storm of war gathering in the South-west, which, sweeping onward, was destined to overpower-though not without a desperate struggle-the inferior bands of loyal men gathered round General Lyon at Springfield-numbers daily diminished by the expiration of the time of enlistment of the volunteers, of which his force was mostly composed. The preparations making by the rebels were the most formidable of their many attempts in this quarter during the war. Their army, collected from various quarters, at Cassville, to the south-west of Springfield, near the Arkansas line of Missouri, included a large body of Missourians, under General Price, a force of Arkansas troops led by General Pearce, a regiment of Texan Rangers under Colonel Greer, a Louisiana regiment under Colonel Hebert, and a regiment of mount-Pierce of United States Marshal in ed riflemen under Colonel Churchill, with other commands comprehending the best military talent of the South-west. Few names of those who were distinguished at that time in the rebel service of the South-western region were missing from the muster of forces which, advancing under the command of General McCulloch, were encamped on the 6th of August at Wilson's Creek, a position ten miles south-west of Springfield. The object was the investment and capture of the Union forces of General Lyon at that town.

The rebel commander, Ben McCul

Texas. He subsequently enjoyed another appointment from President Buchanan, who, oddly enough, sent him with the army, when difficulties arose in the region, as Peace Commissioner to Utah. At the first overt acts of the Rebellion he was hovering about Washington, and his name was frequently mentioned in connection with rumors of attacks upon the city. He then disappeared from that quarter to become a more certain source of terror, and fulfil his destiny as the leader of the insurgents of Arkansas and South-western Missouri.

BATTLE AT DUG SPRINGS.

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minutes, when some enthusiastic lieutenant giving the order to 'charge,' some twenty-five of the gallant regulars rushed forward upon the enemy's lines, and, dashing aside the threatening bayonets of the sturdy rebels, hewed down the ranks with terrible slaughter. . . . The ground was left in our possession, being strewn with muskets, shot-guns, pistols, etc. Our men seized some fifteen muskets and the same number of horses and mules and rode off, when a large force of the enemy's cavalry was seen approaching from the woods, numbering some three hundred or more. At the instant when they had formed in an angle, Captain Totten, who had mounted a six and twelve-pounder upon an overlooking hill, sent a shell right over them; in another minute the second-a twelve-pound shell, a very marvel of gunnery practice

It was General Lyon's intention to meet the detached bodies of the enemy on their route before they were concentrated in their new position, and setting out from Springfield with this purpose on the 1st of August, he had advanced nineteen miles in a south-westerly direction, when, on the afternoon of the 2d, after a forced march of unusual severity, under a burning sun, he encountered a portion of the rebel forces under command of General Rains, in a sharp action at Dug Springs. The engagement is thus described by an eye-witness: "In order," says the writer, the correspondent of a New York journal with the army, "to understand the position of the parties, imagine an oblong basin of five miles in length, surrounded by hills, from which spurs projected into the main hollow, covered with occasional thickets and oak openings. The winding of the road round the spurs had the effect of concealing the strength of each party from the other, so that from the top of each successive ridge could be seen the rear of the enemy's forces. At about five o'clock a brisk interchange of shots was .commenced by our skirmishers, The entire Union loss in this affair Captain Steele's regular infantry taking has been stated at 8 killed, 30 wounded ; the lead on the left, supported by a com- that of the enemy 40 killed, 44 woundpany of cavalry, the rest of the column ed. Although, says the correspondent being back some distance. Presently just quoted, "the entire action cannot be we could see a column of infantry ap- raised to the dignity of a great battle, proaching from the woods with the de- for the whole affair lasted less than half sign of cutting off our infantry. Captain an hour, it was in reality a great Stanley immediately drew up his men, triumph. Our advanced cavalry was and as soon as within range, they open-alone engaged on our part, and they suced fire from their Sharp's carbines, when cessfully fought and drove off a force ten several volleys were exchanged. The times their number. It moreover renumber of the enemy's infantry was vealed the fighting animus of the enemy; seemingly about five hundred; our it revealed the state of their armament, cavalry not quite a hundred and fifty. and afforded a brilliant example for our The infantry kept up the firing for some

which landed right at their feet, exploding, and scattering the whole body in the most admired disorder. The third, fourth, fifth and sixth were sent into their midst. The horsemen could not control their horses, and in a minute not an enemy was to be seen anywhere."

Tribune Almanac for 1862, p. 45.