MISSOURI’S GOVERNOR AND THE CIVIL WAR

Understanding the early years of the Civil War in Missouri is a little easier if you meet the Governor, Claiborne Fox Jackson, and know where he stood on the issues leading to the Civil War. 

Born in 1806 in Kentucky, his father was a wealthy tobacco plantation and slave owner.  In 1826, along with several of his brothers, he moved to Missouri.  He was elected to the state senate in 1848 as leader of the pro-slavery Democrats.   In 1857, Jackson became Banking Commissioner of Missouri and in the fall of 1860 he resigned that position to run for governor. Jackson campaigned, and was elected, as a Douglas Democrat on an anti-secession platform.

Although, as a Douglas Democrat, he presented himself during his campaign as a supporter of the Union, in his inaugural speech, he made it clear that he was determined to support the South even though a majority of Missouri’s voters, at that time, rejected secession.  After his election and after the election of Abraham Lincoln, he pushed for secession. 

Following the firing on Fort Sumter, April 1861, President Lincoln called each state to provide troops to participate in the defeat of the Confederacy.  Missouri was to send 4 regiments. Governor Jackson refused and then called up the Missouri State Militia.  

Beginning April 22, 1861, on orders from President Lincoln, Lyon established 4 regiments of Federal Missouri Volunteers (most were former members of Republican Wide Awake marching clubs - paramilitary campaign organizations affiliated with the Republican Party during the presidential election of 1860). On orders from President Lincoln, they were issued weapons from the arsenal and the weapons remaining in the arsenal were secretly transferred to Illinois the night of April 24–25, 1861.

Union leaders, realizing that Jackson intended to secede, thought he would try to seize the St. Louis Arsenal.  They appointed Captain (later General) Nathaniel Lyon of the 2nd US Infantry (commander of the St Louis Arsenal) to protect the arsenal.  Lyon prepared, knowing the governor had called on the St Louis secessionist Minutemen paramilitary organization and the local Missouri Volunteer Militia to capture the arsenal.

The State Militia affiliated with the Confederacy was camped at Camp Jackson (named for the governor) just outside of St Louis.  On May 8-9, 1861 a shipment of Confederate artillery arrived at the camp. To Lyon, this was proof of treasonous plotting at Camp Jackson and he marched his Federal Regular troops and Missouri Volunteers to the camp to arrest the militia.  

On May 10, Lyon, with his troops, surrounded Camp Jackson.  Confederate Gen Daniel M. Frost, realizing he was outnumbered, surrendered his militia. Lyon’s men took the members of the militia prisoner and marched them back to the arsenal in St Louis.  

The march back to the arsenal drew crowds and incited a deadly riot known as the Camp Jackson Affair. Some of the onlookers began protesting and throwing items as the prisoners marched. Soon a shot was fired which set off a wave of gunfire. Twenty-seven citizens, 3 militia members, and 2 Federal troops were killed.

The capture of Camp Jackson established Union control in St. Louis, but angered the people of Missouri who felt their home was under attack. This caused greater movement away from the Union and toward the Confederacy.  Representatives of the city petitioned Lincoln for Lyon's dismissal. However the “Unconditional Unionists” of St Louis supported Lyon’s action. Both Unionists and Secessionists quickly prepared for war.

Gen William S. Harney, commander of the Army's Department of the West at Jefferson Barracks in St. Louis and Missouri State Guard commander Gen Sterling Price agreed that the State Guard would control most of Missouri (Price-Harney Truce). This truce fired up the concerns of the Unconditional Unionists and led to Harney's removal on May 31, 1861 on charges of disloyalty during the Missouri secession period. 

On June 10, 1861, Lyon met with Gov Jackson and Gen Price at St. Louis' Planter's House hotel in an effort to solve the conflict.  After 4 hours, with no agreement acceptable to both sides, Lyon ended the meeting.  Jackson and Price retreated to Jefferson City, ordering railroad bridges burned behind them. Jackson then called for 50,000 state volunteers for the militia. 

In response, Lyon led forces from St. Louis and captured Jefferson City, the state capital on June 13, 1861. By the time Lyon arrived, Jackson and his supporters, including most of the state legislature, had fled. The state convention passed measures removing Jackson from office and replaced him with Hamilton R. Gamble, who served as Missouri’s provisional governor for more than 2 years.

As Lyon and his Union forces advanced, Col Franz Sigel took command of a unit of Federal troops and moved them from St. Louis to southwest Missouri in an attempt to cut off Missouri State Guard forces retreat to Confederate Arkansas. 

Lyon moved 2 of his battalions, along with 5 infantry companies, 2 rifle companies, and an artillery battery towards Springfield. The Missouri State Guard retreated to Boonville, where a skirmish took place on June 17. Lyon quickly took the town and chased the Missouri State Guard south.   He did not have the logistical support to keep up with the retreating Guardsmen. 

Hearing of the defeat at Boonville, Price, with another group of State Guardsmen in Lexington, were also moving south. Commanding 1,100 Federal troops, Col. Franz Sigel was intent on keeping Missouri in the Union. He heard Gen. Price and the State Guard had left Lexington, MO, and were moving south and that Confederate Gen. Ben McCulloch was moving north to the Arkansas border to support the Missouri rebels.

Sigel planned to cut Price off at Neosho, MO and then turn north to take on Governor Jackson. When he reached Neosho, he found that Price had already escaped south to meet up with McCulloch.  He turned back north to try to hold the Governor with his forces until Gen. Lyon could catch up. 

The Jackson and Price forces met in Lamar MO on July 3, increasing Jackson’s army to 6,000 men, a large number joined along the march south.  Most of the newcomers were armed only with hunting rifles, shotguns, knives and some had no weapons at all.  Jackson did have 7 cannons in his armament.

In Richmond VA, August 1861, Jackson met with Confederate President Jefferson Davis and gained support for Missouri’s Confederate army under the command of Gen Price.  Jackson then accompanied Price’s forces to Lexington and then led a congressional session of what was left of his government in Neosho MO on Oct 28-30.  The bill for secession and membership in the Confederacy was passed during this session.  

 

When Union Gen Samuel Curtis forced Price’s State Guard out of the state in early 1862, Jackson set up his exiled government in Arkansas. It cooperated fully with the Confederacy during the remainder of war; it never again controlled Missouri. Jackson, the only sitting U.S. Governor to lead troops in battle, died of stomach cancer in Little Rock on Dec 6, 1862. 

At first denied a burial in Missouri due to the ongoing war, he was buried in Little Rock's Mount Holly Cemetery. Following the end of the war he was exhumed, and re-interred in the Sappington Cemetery near Arrow Rock MO where he had owned a business and was the town’s first postmaster in 1832.