Bloody Dawn Read online

  Ben Johnson was one of the town’s more strident abolitionists. He was also a man who split no hairs when it came to who he liked and who he allowed in his hotel. Last year, learning that a number of Missouri property hunters had signed his registry, the irate innkeeper collared the startled men and kicked them into the street, a sight that gave everyone a good round of laughs. If you’re from Missouri, and you’re looking for strayed property, “give the Johnson House a wide berth,” chuckled editor John Speer.18

  For quite some time now the white-plastered hotel had been a notorious Red Leg hangout where George Hoyt and his boys drank and “raised hell” between trips to the border. None were here today though, and only a dozen guests or so were in their rooms, riding out the torrid midday heat.

  Directly across the street was the pretty, whitewashed Methodist Church.

  Sundown comes earlier to Lawrence than to the rest of Kansas, one-half hour earlier. Mount Oread ensures this. In the evening the shadow from the hill crosses and cools the town, and the beauty of sunset is captured each dusk in the cottonwoods across the river, glinting strawberry-gold.

  Five blocks west of the Eldridge, through the Central Park and over a short bridge spanning the deep, wooded ravine, at the limits of the city sat the spacious home of Dr. Jerome Griswold.

  Dr. Griswold, a curly haired, husky man, and his wife, Ellen, were just returning this evening from a long trip east. And the house they returned to was a house of friends as well as of guests. Three other families boarded with the Griswolds: Mr. and Mrs. Harlow Baker, newspaperman Josiah Trask and his wife, and State Senator and Mrs. Simeon Thorp.

  A block south of Griswold’s, close by a large cornfield, stood the finest home in Lawrence, the Lane mansion.

  There had never been anyone quite like him before, and most Kansans supposed there would never be anyone quite like him after. He was “heroic,” he was the “devil incarnate.” He was the “liberator of Kansas,” he was a “thorough bred demagogue.” He was at once generous, loving, caring, even “saintly.” He was at once a murderer, a liar, an adulterer, “as bad a man as they make ’em.” He was anything, he was everything, but to his numerous friends, even to a few of his yet more numerous enemies, he was known simply and aptly as “one of our things.” He was Senator James Henry Lane, the “humble servant of the people.”19

  Jim Lane blew into Kansas one fine day in 1855, and whatever small chance there had been for a peaceful solution to the territorial issue quickly went up in smoke. Although he announced shortly after arriving that he would “just as soon buy a nigger as a mule,” Lane saw the shape of things to come and wasted no time in joining the free-soil cause.20

  Vying with Charles Robinson from the first for control of the free-state forces, the sandy-haired scrambler could at once be all things to all men at all times. Part whoremaster, part: camp evangelist, after taking the measure of an audience Lane had the uncanny ability to hold, mold, bend, and sweep it to such fantastic lengths that normally sane, sober-minded men rattled “like a field of reeds shaken in the wind.” One wild moment he might blow thunder and hell fire at slavery and Missouri while he twisted and trembled with excitement, flinging down a coat, then a vest, then a tie, pausing just long enough to roll up his sleeves and, as if it were a whitehot poker, move a long, crooked finger slowly and threateningly over the torchlit crowd. A moment later, while listeners elbowed forward and strained to catch every word, “Jeems” might humor and toy with his audience and in a hissing, hoarse whisper carry on ribaldly about women or his “humble” Indiana childhood. Then, just as the crowd relaxed with this new theme, a chilling scream—“Great God!”—would shatter the night air and slam the audience back to earth.

  “He talked like none of the others,” said a spellbound listener. “None of the rest had his husky, rasping, blood-curdling whisper or that menacing forefinger, or could shriek ‘Great God!’ on the same day with him.”21

  Because he said the things Kansans wanted to hear in the raw and earthy way they wanted to hear it, Lane soon became a feature attraction. Quiet, pragmatic Robinson was never such a pleaser, and consequently the more excitable, impressionable—unfortunately, the vast majority in Kansas—flocked to the Grim Chieftain’s camp. Eventually, a simmering dislike between the faction leaders bubbled into a boiling hatred—Robinson was for patience and peace; Lane for action and war.

  And when that war he so feverishly worked for finally came in 1861, Lane lost no time in urging utter destruction on Missouri and slavery. Kansans needed but little prodding to assail the old foe, and advice from their newly elected senator and close friend of Abe Lincoln was merely icing on the cake. Some men, notably the moderates and Governor Robinson, pleaded with fellow Kansans to remain at their farms and shops and let well enough alone. But these were the sage minority, and amid the mad cheers for Lane their voices were all but drowned out as the border war he demanded began.22

  The opportunity for the senator to exhibit his martial prowess, to “play hell with Missouri,” as he styled it, came that autumn as Gen. Sterling Price marched through Missouri and briefly threatened Kansas. When the Rebels finally moved on, “General” Lane and his “smart little army” of fifteen hundred jayhawkers crept behind in their wake, supposedly to harry Price’s rear and slow his movements. In truth, the army was little more than a mob of thieves and adventurers who immediately began treating themselves to the spoils of war.23 At Osceola, a beautiful, bustling city along the Osage, the Kansans scattered a tiny band of Rebels, then broke ranks and got down to business. Stores were looted, safes emptied, homes, barns, and warehouses were torched, horses and mules rounded up, even the tobacco-chewing chaplain Hugh Fisher went to work on local churches. Reportedly, Lane’s share of the booty, which included silk dresses, a piano, and $13,000 snatched from the hands of a widow, topped everyone’s.24 Later that day, with all that Osceola had to give loaded into wagons and carriages—including 300 jayhawkers too drunk to sit in the saddle—Lane and his men marched off to new fields of conquest.

  “As the sun went down… Osceola was a heap of smouldering ruins,” wrote a brigade correspondent. Later a visitor was shocked to find “not half a dozen houses” where before there were hundreds and less than a score of people where formerly there were thousands. Osceola, as a point on the map, had ceased to exist.25

  That autumn, 1861, the senator and his jayhawkers thoroughly scourged the Missouri border, and the name “Jim Lane” inspired a terror fully equal to that of Jennison. “Destroy, devastate, desolate. This is war,” cried the Kansan, his Mexican spurs jingling as he rode along. And like a prairie fire the brigade swept on, murdering, pillaging, and blackening a swath up and down western Missouri. As the flames shot up, Lane looked, to one New York correspondent, like “Nero fiddling and laughing over the burning of some Missouri Rome.”26

  Although the exploits of the senator from Kansas were widely applauded in the North and nationally his star was rising, no group of men could have been prouder or happier than those of his home state, most of whom savored the lesson being taught in “Secessia.” And as John Speer of the Lawrence Republican smugly added, what his friend had done thus far was but a warm-up for what he would do in the future: a “miniature picture,” warned Speer.27

  Only Governor Robinson and a few others gave voice to dissent. Ever mindful of his adversary and well aware that Lane’s stock always soared during periods of strife, Robinson reportedly spoke early in the war with Missouri governor Claiborne Jackson in hopes of snuffing the border war before it began. When this fell through the governor turned to the military, begging them to force the jayhawkers from the line before the Rubicon was crossed. Finally, when nothing came of this, Robinson rolled up his sleeves and continued the battle both orally and in print. The governor mocked the senator’s claim in which he boasted that his brigade had routed “a greatly superior force” at Osceola. Lane’s tenure on the border, wrote Robinson to the newspapers, was a history of theft, arson, and murde
r—of “pouncing upon little, unprotected towns and villages, and portraying their capture as splendid victories.” The governor even insinuated that President Lincoln refused all reports from Kansas unless first endorsed by James Lane. He continued, “If our towns and settlements are laid waste by fire and sword … we will have Gen. Lane to thank for it.”28

  The senator easily brushed aside criticism from Robinson. Any man who made deals with traitors such as Claib Jackson, hissed Lane before a tumultuous crowd in Leavenworth, had no business talking about thievery and such. The gallows were the only high office the governor should hold, he concluded, “and I here arraign Charles Robinson as a Traitor to his country.” To this the audience hotly agreed.29

  Shortly after the Leavenworth speech, and when the anti-Robinson ball had started to roll, the senator closed in for the kill. Sniffing feverishly among the sale of state bonds, Lane announced that profits were filling the pockets of individuals, not of the public. Then came the trial, thus beginning the end of a once-promising career. Battling gamely, Robinson refused to fold and continued the fight as did his dwindling cast of supporters. But soon the governor was forced to retire, beaten and disgraced.

  With his long-time enemy now out of the way, and with western Missouri a blackened waste, Lane turned once more to Kansas and set about crushing what little political opposition remained. And with his popularity at an all-time high, and with a horde of more than willing henchmen to help out, it was a simple matter. By the summer of 1863 the “most radical of radicals” found himself in complete control of Kansas, both politically and militarily—a virtual king without a crown. Most men would have relaxed following such an achievement. After a seven-year climb to the top most men would have chosen to savor their triumph somewhat and bask in the warm glow of victory. But James Henry Lane was quite unlike most men. And whatever else the tireless senator was, stupid he was not. Well did he understand the volatile and precarious nature of Kansas politics, and when he saddled the radical tiger in 1855 he, above all others, knew that he could never dismount without being devoured. To keep his name dancing in the public’s mind was and always would be his goal—never to let the people forget it, not for a month, not for a moment—for if the words “Jim Lane” were on everyone’s lips there was no time to utter the name of another. And to keep his name there, as in the past, almost any excitement or pretext would do.

  Now, a bit after midnight on August 21, Lane was back home following a railroad meeting at the Eldridge. Asleep were his grown daughter and teenage son. Also in bed, Mary Lane, a tired, troubled woman whose aging and careworn face spoke without words her tempestuous life with the senator. Throughout the mansion there were trophies and mementos: a shining sword, compliments of Winfield Scott for service in the war with Mexico; a beautiful black piano in the parlor, silk dresses hanging in the closet, and other appointments, courtesy of western Missouri.

  General, senator, king; Jim Lane was riding the tiger in Kansas, and he had every intention of holding hard in the saddle.

  Outside, others plodded home from the meeting. Save for this the town was still and the night black as a tomb.

  A short distance from the Lanes lived the mayor of Lawrence, George Washington Collamore. A tiny, balding man with large, smiling eyes, George Collamore, like most of the leading citizens, was an early and active free-soil fighter. Mayor Collamore was also, like his old friend and law partner, Massachusetts governor John Andrew, an administrator who believed strongly in efficiency and the letter of the law in government. And like everyone else after 1862, the safety of Lawrence was the source of his greatest concern. Hence, upon entering city hall in the spring of that year Collamore had made some changes.

  Although the old citizen guard had served a purpose, to the new mayor’s way of thinking it had served it rather poorly. Unsophisticated, unreliable, though most had posted about the town cheerfully enough, other guardsmen had begged off or fallen asleep when they did show up for duty. It was a job best left to professionals. Thus from General Ewing the mayor sought and received soldiers for the task, much to the relief of everyone. Then, too, there was the town’s weaponry. For much of the war the Lawrence militia used an odd array of arms with no uniformity whatsoever. When drill and target practice were through for the day each gun went to each man’s home to suffer neglect and abuse in one form or another. Again the mayor petitioned and again the army delivered, this time with rifles and shot, enough to arm the militia. Unlike the past, however, Mayor Collamore insisted on storing these weapons in the Massachusetts Street armory where, after the town had rallied to any given alarm, a rapid and smooth distribution of arms could be effected.

  It was in the midst of these preparations that the bottom had suddenly fallen out of the war—Vicksburg, Gettysburg, the appointment of Ewing—and two weeks ago, when Hadley and his guards left, even the mayor was convinced they were needed no longer. And after the full moon scare and all the ribbing he took, Collamore, the “nervous mayor,” saw no reason to call back the citizen patrols, for even without a guard any emergency could be met by every man in town ready and waiting at the armory; this in fifteen minutes, thirty at the latest.30

  Like Lane and Collamore, other prominent men were now home from the Eldridge, taking in something cool, a bite to eat, a quick glance at the newspaper before bed.

  Kansas State Journal

  Lawrence, Kans. Aug. 20, 1863

  Why does a sculptor die a horrid death?

  He makes faces and busts.

  COURT REPORT

  R. Wilson, drunkenness and fast riding, $5 and costs. Paid.

  White Turkey [Indian], contempt of court, $2 and costs. Paid.

  Calvin Ware [Colored], petty larceny. To be tried Aug. 24.

  MILITARY

  Army of the Potomac: Picket firing has ceased entirely … both armies seem to have settled down in a state of lethargy. … Parties recently arrived from Richmond represent the people there as sunk in deep gloom … sickness prevails to a fearful extent.…

  Grant: Unimportant skirmishes occur daily.

  Rosecrans: Very little news.… The rebel army has fallen back.…

  Arkansas: There are very few Confederate troops in Arkansas.

  … Already our lines have been extended.…

  Missouri: Gen. Ewing … to remove all suspected families … to end bushwhacking. … A three-story brick building in Kansas City, used as a guard house for she rebels, fell Thursday afternoon and killed four … badly bruised several others.

  LOCAL

  Ninety to one hundred degrees in the shade every day this week. … Fremont’s visit postponed till October. … Bernstein & Cohn’s burglarized last night … church affairs … politics … crops.

  One by one the last lamps in Lawrence flickered out. Windows were thrown wide open to catch the absent breeze of a hot, sultry night, the kind of night when a person turned and tossed and shifted the pillow continually to the cool side, kicking sheets to the floor, rising tired and sweaty for a ladle of water. One o’clock, two o’clock, three—only the twinkling stars kept the vigil. All else slept. The war was over.

  No one in the sleeping town would have guessed that, in fact, nearly two more years of smoke and death lay ahead. Even had the predictions been correct and had the Rebel army buckled on all fronts, few in Lawrence understood that for a good many Southerners, particularly in Missouri, the war was not over. Win or lose, the killing would never end now, at least not until the debt had been paid, not until someone paid and paid dearly for the destruction of their homes, for the loss of their loved ones, for the death of an age.

  The signs were all there. Had any in the sleeping town bothered to study these signs they might have seen that the time for collecting this debt had come. But no one studied the signs and no one was awake. And no one would have guessed that at that moment, like a great heavy fog, dark and deadly, the collectors were flowing down through the bluffs into the quiet Kansas Valley, not a dozen miles away. Leading them wa
s the only man who could, the man who by stealth and boldness had paralyzed the border for the past two years, and a man whose very name was the most feared word in Kansas. This man and those who followed were two hours from their destination—Lawrence.

  By 3:00 A.M. Captains Coleman and Pike had discovered where the trail of the invaders rejoined—a trail now six hours cold. From Spring Hill the pursuers followed as rapidly as possible, northwest toward Gardner. A messenger sent back by Coleman to Aubrey ordered all arriving troops to push on without delay.

  At the same time, fifteen miles to the southeast, Lt. Col. Charles Clark at Coldwater Grove received a message. It was a hastily written note from Coleman informing him that the guerrillas had crossed the border and that he, Pike, and 180 men were in pursuit. Throughout the night Clark had awaited more information from Pike. What were the Rebels doing on the Missouri side? Had they crossed the line? In what direction? Clark had called in scores of men from other posts and was prepared to march at once. But no further word arrived, and the troopers were sent back. Now came first news of invasion. With only a handful of horsemen, Clark quickly saddled up.31

  6

  VENGEANCE IN MY HEART

  In the final hours before dawn on August 21, the last of the invaders entered the Kansas Valley. Now, to save time the scouts in advance often strayed from the winding California Road, cutting through pastures and fields, and leading the column over paths and lanes. But in the dark, among the woods, the work was slow. At length, a boy was taken from his home and forced to act as guide.

  Several people along the route became uneasy. At Hesper, ten miles southeast of Lawrence, some heard the horsemen and quickly guessed the worst. A child was forbidden by his father to saddle and ride to the town. Because of his team’s exhaustion, a farmer who might have gone didn’t. One woman did send a servant rushing north to Eudora. But for most, their sleep was unbroken and others who were awakened suspected nothing.