BORDER DEFENSE IN IOWA DURING THE CIVIL WAR

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IOWA and WAR
Edited by Benj. F Shambaugh
Published by The State Historical Society of Iowa

No 10 APRIL 1918

BORDER DEFENSE IN IOWA DURING
 THE CIVIL WAR
By Dan Elbert Clark

If there was any indifference in Iowa to the crisis at the outbreak of the
Civil War in 1861, it was not due to the belief that the conflict was three
thousand miles away.  From the beginning there was danger that the soil of
Iowa itself might be invaded-not by organized Confederate forces, to be
sure, but by guerrilla bands from Missouri and by vengeful red men from the
northwest. The story of Iowa's military accomplishments during the Civil
War, therefore, is not complete until some account has been given of the
vigorous measures which were taken to protect the homes and firesides of
Iowans against hostile attack.

No one realized the need for home defense more keenly than did Governor
Samuel J. Kirkwood who, with no military experience whatsoever, now found
himself confronted with the gigantic task of creating a military
organization in a State wholly unprepared for war. He did not anticipate an
invasion of Iowa by regular troops from Missouri. "But lawless, reckless
men within her limits", he said in his special message to the legislature
on May 16th, "may take advantage of the unsettled condition of public
warfare for the purpose of plunder". The danger of Indian raids on the
northwestern frontier was even more imminent, in his estimation, and he
urged the General Assembly to make adequate provision for defense.

The story of how the borders of Iowa were successfully defended, under the
guidance of Governor Kirkwood and the aids appointed by him, is not without
interest, even though it is less dramatic than the record of the exploits
of Iowa men on the battlefields of the South.


DEFENSE OF THE SOUTHERN BORDER

"Impress on your people the necessity of good order on their part towards
Missourians unless attacked", wrote Governor Kirkwood to a resident of
southern Iowa soon after the outbreak of the war, when disquieting reports
had come from the border. "Act only on the defensive until an attack is
made. Should any outbreak occur notify me at once." At the same time he
urged that companies of "minute men" should be organized in all the
southern counties, with such arms as were to be found, and that these
companies should hold themselves in readiness to respond to a call on short
notice. "This is not what I would like to do", he said, "or what perhaps is
the beat thing could be done if we had arms but is the best thing can be
done now."

In a letter to a citizen of Missouri a few days later the Governor declared
that if there were hostilities between the people of Missouri and the
people of Iowa they must be begun by the former. But, he added, "if we are
attacked we will take what we deem the best means of defense even if that
should be to carry the war across our border into Missouri."

About the middle of May,1861, Governor Kirkwood appointed John Edwards of
Chariton and Cyrus Bussey of Bloomfield as special aids, with large
discretionary powers, to organize means of preserving tranquillity in the
border counties. They were to investigate the situation carefully and take
measures for the raising of companies for home defense all along the
Missouri border. "I was well satisfied the peace of our State would be more
easily preserved by preventing invasion then by repelling it," said the
Governor later in describing his activities to the legislature, "and
therefore while I could not order out State troops beyond our State line, I
instructed Colonels Edwards and Bussey, and through them the troops under
their command, that if at any time the loyal me of Northern Missouri were
in peril and called upon them for assistance, they has as full authority as
I could give them to lead their men into Missouri to the aid of the loyal
men there, and my promise upon their return that my power should be used to
the utmost extent to protect them, if called in question for so doing."

As a matter of fact Iowa men did cross over into Missouri on several
occasions during the summer of 1861. Late in July, for instance, John
Edwards reported that "at least 1,500 citizens of Iowa left their harvest
fields and families and rushed into Missouri to the relief of the Union
men. These citizens were armed in every conceivable manner, without
officers, system, or drill." Edwards also reported that several men in
southern Iowa "not only fed hundreds of dollars, sometimes their last
dollar, in this benevolent and constant alarm along the border out citizens
lost much valuable time by frequent hurrying to arms; therefore a vast
amount of grain was lost on the fields."

Early in August several companies of Iowa men participated in the
successful defense of the town of Athens in northern Missouri on the Des
Moines River. Later, when Saint Joseph was captured by the Confederates
fully twelve hundred Iowa men went to the assistance of Union men in
Missouri. "This has excited against our people and State a bitter dislike
on the part of the rebel forces and their leaders," wrote Governor Kirkwood
to President Lincoln, "and their threats of vengeance have been violent and
frequent. A battle lost at this time by General Fremont would lay all our
southern border open to devastation and plunder by the victors, and while
we have strong trust that success and not defeat naturally excites alarm."

In order to by ready for any emergency Governor Kirkwood appointed men in
the counties along the southern border to organize all the able-bodied men
into companies and regiments for home protection. "As you are aware," he
wrote in a circular letter to the officers thus appointed, "the State is
not properly armed, nor can arms be had at present by the State. Under
these circumstances you will require every man in your county having
private arms to report the number and kind of arms he has. Double-barreled
shotguns and hunting rifles, although not the best, are good arms in the
hands of brave men." The companies thus raised were to be employed only in
home defense. Each man was required to furnish his own clothing and
equipment and his own horse, in case the company was mounted. The men were
to hold themselves in readiness to be called into service at a moment's
notice.

Fortunately, because of Union successes the time soon came when all danger
from invasion by organized Confederate forces from Missouri was removed.
But bands of guerrillas infested the region throughout the war, and no
section of the border was safe from the raids of these outlaws bent on
horse-stealing, plunder, and murder.

In October,1864, for instance, a band of fifteen or twenty guerrillas
entered Davis County, It is claimed that they were led by Quantrill, the
most blood-thirsty of all border ruffians. Entering the county near the
southeast corner they proceeded westward, stealing horses and murdering
peaceful citizens. The sudden appearance of this band of desperadoes in
Iowa caused great consternation  along the border. The news of the raid
spread rapidly and the seriousness of the situation was so magnified that
the startled settlers hears rumors that General Price's army was about to
invade the State. Militia officers rode through the country calling the
members of their companies to assemble at the appointed places of
rendezvous. But it was soon learned that there was no need for their
services : the outlaws had left the State as suddenly as the had entered
it.

Although there were rumors and alarms and constant danger in southern Iowa
throughout the war, the peace was not often disturbed by hostile raiders
from Missouri. Haphazard and unsystematic through the measures of home
defense may often have been, the served the purpose for which they were
intended. Using the means at hand, the pioneers made the best of a bad
situation and saved Iowa from more than an occasional touch of border
warfare.


DEFENSE OF THE NORTHWESTERN FRONTIER

A danger equally imminent and more to be dreaded threatened the scattered
settlements in northwestern Iowa. Fresh in the minds of many of the
settlers was the memory of the terrible massacre which had been committed
by Sioux Indians in 1857 on the shores of Lake Okoboji - a massacre which
had resulted neither in punishment for the Indians nor protection for the
settlers against further attacks by the red men. And so at the outbreak of
the Civil War there was great apprehension along  the frontier, especially
when it was learned that the troops had been withdrawn from the forts on
the upper Missouri River.

Even before the firing on Fort Sumter the Governor had urged the War
Department to send a supply of arms and ammunition to Iowa for use in case
of a possible Indian invasion. Upon the outbreak of war he redoubled his
efforts. But the Secretary of War either underestimated the danger or he
had very little knowledge of the geography if Iowa.

"I am daily receiving letters from our northwestern frontier expressing
alarm on account of the Indians", wrote Kirkwood on April 29th, after
several previous letters had failed to bring results. "Our people there are
very uneasy, and have in my judgment good cause for fear. I don't ask for
but arms, accouterments, and ammunition.  We have plenty of men willing to
use them in our own defense and that of the government. If no arrangement
has been made for arms for this State, do, for God's sake, send us some. We
should have at least 5,000 beyond those required to arm the troops of the
United States".

"It is not intended to order the State troops from the West at present,"
wrote Secretary Cameron to Kirkwood on the same day, "and they will
therefore be on hand to met any want occasioned by the removal of the U. S.
forces."

"A glance at the map of Iowa", was Kirkwood's reply, "will show you that
the troops raised in this State will at Keokuk be at least 300 miles from
the nearest point (Council Bluffs), and 400 miles from the point (Sioux
City) most exposed to Indian depredations. This will not afford any
protection to the northwestern frontier. All I ask is arms and ammunition;
not any men." And once more he reiterated the story of the Spirit Lake
Massacre.

Even yet the hard pressed authorities at Washington seemed unappreciative
of the situation if Iowa. "I can now only say", wrote Secretary Cameron on
May 6th, "that the Chief of Ordnace advise that 1,000 stand of arms ought
to be forwarded to Keokuk... to be used in case of an emergency."

By this time Governor Kirkwood's stock of patience was nearly exhausted.
"In reply", he wrote, "I can only say that if by this it is intended that
the arms shall remain in Keokuk until an attack is actually made by
Indians, and then be used to repel such attack, such arrangements will not
be of practical benefit. Keokuk is at least 300 miles from Council Bluffs,
and nearly of quite 400 miles from Sioux City, in which region the Indians
will be troublesome if at all. Between Keokuk and either of these points
there are only 80 miles of railroad, and the balance of the way arms, etc.,
must  be carried by wagon. The Indians might invade our State, do
incalculable injury, and be gone beyond our reach long before an express
could reach Keokuk and the arms be taken to the point of attack."

Meanwhile, preparations for defense were not postponed on account of the
Governor's inability to secure a prompt supply of arms. Early in May it was
reported that the people in the western counties were "waking up to the
importance of organizing home guards." In order to give direction to this
work of preparedness the Governor appointed Caleb Baldwin of Council Bluffs
and A. W. Hubbard of Sioux City as his aids. Compaines of mounted men were
organized, with orders to hold themselves in readiness for quick marches to
any scene of threatened danger. Such arms and ammunition as could be found
were collected and forwarded to Council Bluffs and Sioux City.

These measures of defense were not inaugurated any too soon. Early in July
there came reports that Sioux Indians were committing depredations along
the Little Sioux River near Smithland - a village which had been visited by
Inkpaduta and his band shortly before the Spirit Lake massacre in 1857.
Since the first of April, is was said, more than thirty horses has been
stolen at Smithland, Correctionville, Ida Grove, and other points in the
northwest. Mounted riflemen from Sioux City routed a band of Indians in a
small skirmish, and it was hoped that the frontier would rid of the
marauding red men.

Scarcely more than a week had elapsed, however, before two farmers were
murdered by the Indians while at work in the fields not more than two miles
from Sioux City. The news of this tragedy caused great alarm. The Sioux
City company immediately set out in pursuit of the murderers who had a
start of about twenty hours. Even as far away as Des Moines authority was
given to John Mitchell to raise a company of forty mounted men and proceed
at once to the frontier. The instructions were received on Saturday after
noon and by Monday the necessary number of men had been enrolled and the
company was ready to march. Simultaneously the requisite number of short
rifles, cavalry pistols, and camp equipment was sent from Council Bluffs to
Sioux City to be in readiness for the men upon their arrival at the latter
place.

Apparently the murderers were not apprehended, but throughout the fall
companies of mounted men were stationed in the danger zone between Sioux
City and Spirit Lake. About the middle of August the War Department
empowered Governor Kirkwood to raise a company of regular cavalry for the
defense of the northwestern frontier of Iowa.

The members of this company, recruited largely at Sioux City, were mustered
into United States service for a period of three years, and were on the
same footing as the men who served in the Union armies in the South. At
about the same time the Governor was informed that "1,000 Sharpe's
carbines, 1,000 Colt's pistols, and 1,000 cavalry sabres, together with
accouterments and ammunition" had been ordered from the United States
Arsenal at New York for use in the protection of the Indian frontier in
this State.

These measures had the effect of checking Indian depredations and of
producing a feeling of security among the settlers in the northwest.
Throughout the remaining months of 1861 and the first half of the year 1862
there was comparative quiet on the frontier, with only an occasional rumor
of Indian invasion.

Then in the summer of 1862 all northwestern Iowa was thrown into a fever of
excitement. This time there was genuine cause for alarm. The Sioux
tribesmen in Minnesota and the Dakotas has long nursed a feeling of deep
resentment against their Great Father and his white children because of
real and fancied wrongs received during years of treaty-making and
government dealings. When would there ever be a better opportunity to
secure revenge than now when the white men were engaged in a life and death
struggle among themselves? Besides the summer of 1862 found many bands of
the Sioux almost on the verge of starvation and consumed with rage because
their annuities, which should have been paid when the grass grew green in
the spring, had not yet been distributed to them.

Thus it was that the murder of five settlers on August 17th by a wandering
party of Sioux hunters was the spark which kindled a great conflagration.
Under the leadership of Little Crow the redskins took up the hatchet along
the entire Minnesota frontier. At New Ulm and at other points not far above
the northern boundary of Iowa in the next few days they perpetrated the
bloodiest massacre in American history. The estimated of the number of
white victims vary from five hundred o fifteen hundred, but the most
careful count places the number at more then six hundred and fifty.

It is small wonder, then, that there was terror throughout the settlements
in northwestern Iowa. Nor is it any cause for surprise that the settlers
fled from their homes by the hundreds. When Lieutenant Colonel H. C. Nutt
went from Council Bluffs to Sioux City, he found the road south of the
latter place "lined with families leaving, and in such terror as to
preclude getting any reliable information. They were all bound to get away
from the Indians." At Sioux City he found a large portion of the settlers
from southeastern Dakota. Most of them had departed from their homes in
great haste, and in many instances had left all their possessions and
live-stock, to say nothing of their unharvested crops. Many settlers from
Woodbury, Ida, and Sac counties in this State had also rushed to Sioux City
for safety. Similar scenes were being enacted at other points along the
frontier.

This was a situation which demanded prompt action. As was the case at the
time of the Spirit Lake massacre, the seriousness of the danger was not
immediately appreciated. But when the truth became definitely known
Governor Kirkwood and other military authorities were not slow to act. On
August 29th the Governor ordered Schuyler R. Ingham of Des Moines to
proceed at once to Fort Dodge and other points in the northwest. "Use the
arms, ammunition and money placed at your disposal in such manner as our
judgment may dictate as best to promote the object in view, to-wit : the
protection of the inhabitants of the frontier", were the Governor's
instructions to his newly appointed aid. "Use your discretion in all
things, and exercise any power  I could exercise if I were present." At
about the same time three companies of troops who expected soon to be
mustered into United States service at Camp Dodge in Council Bluffs were
rushed to Sioux City, were they found preparations for defense under way.

Fortunately the General Assembly had already been called to meet in special
sessions on September 3rd. More adequate provision for defense could
therefore be made without much delay. The first law passed by the
legislature at this session was one authorizing and requiring the Governor
to raise a volunteer force of mounted men for the protection of the
frontier. On the same day a joint resolution was adopted urgently
requesting the Secretary of War to take vigorous steps to chastise the
Indians who had committed the massacres in Minnesota.

By virtue of the new authority conferred on him, Governor Kirkwood ordered
S. R. Ingham to raise and muster into service five companies of not less
than forty nor more then eighty men each: one at Sioux City, one at
Denison, one at Fort Dodge, one at Webster City, and one which had already
been organized and stationed at Chain Lakes and Esterville. There orders
were faithfully carried out and there was thus created a body of men which
became known as the Northern Iowa Border Brigade.

One company was stationed at Chain Lakes and another at Estherville, while
the remaining companies were divided into detachments located at Ocheyedan,
Peterson, Cherokee, Sac City, Correctionville, Little Sioux, Melbourne, and
other points in the threatened region. These, together with the Sioux City
cavalry company part of which was stationed at Sioux City and part at
Spirit Lake, constituted a chain of garrisons which extended entirely
across the northwestern corner of the State from Sioux City to Chain Lakes.
Furthermore, at Correctionville, Cherokee, Peterson, Estherville, Spirit
Lake, and Iowa Lake, there was constructed blockhouses, surrounded by
stockades, which might serve as places of refuge for the settlers in case
of an Indian attack.

Of all these frontier fortifications apparently the most extensive was Fort
Defiance at Estherville, built by a company under Captain William H.
Ingham. The stockade of the "fort" was built of planks four inches thick
and enclosed an area which was about one hundred and thirty feet square. At
one corner and extended  six feet beyond the stockade were the barracks, "
a building fifty-two feet in length, eighteen feet in width, made of
timbers eight inches thick". The office and commissary room at another
corner was a building  fourteen by thirty-two feet in dimensions, built in
much the same manner as the barracks. The entire south side of the
enclosure was formed by a barn, the sides of which were covered with boards
an inch thick, while the ends were built of four-inch planks. The exposed
side of the barn was protected by "a sod wall, five feet at its base and
two feet wide on top, seven and one-half feet high". Within the stockade
were a guard-house, a well furnishing "an abundance of excellent water",
and a flag-staff.

The preparations for defense at other points were less elaborate but
equally well adapted to repel an Indian attack. The block-houses and
officers' quarters at Peterson, for instance, were built of oak and ash
timbers ten inches square, with roofs of soft maple boards. The stockade
was constructed of timbers six inches square. In each case the stockade
surrounded an area large enough to accommodate a considerable number of
settlers with their live-stock and wagons.

These preparations for defense had the desired effect. Not once did the
Indians  invade Iowa during this great uprising which left such a trail of
death and devastation in Minnesota. Settlers soon began to return to their
abandoned homes and a feeling of confidence was restored. This time the
Federal government took energetic measures to punish the hostile Indians,
and they were so decisively defeated that they did not again seriously
menace the tranquillity of the Iowa frontier. The companies of the Northern
Iowa Border Brigade were disbanded before many months had passed and their
places were taken by United States troops. Although as late as January,
1864, Governor Kirkwood urged that means of protection be maintained, the
period of serious danger had passed and the problem of frontier defense in
Iowa had ceased to worry either the military authorities or the settlers.


                                D.E.C.


NOTES ON BORDER DEFENSE

At the special session of 1862 the General Assembly passed a law requiring
the Governor "to raise a volunteer force in the State of Iowa, from the
County of Wapello and each of the Counties in the southern tier of Counties
bordering on the Missouri, not less than one Company of mounted men . . .
for the repealed at the regular session of the legislature in 1864, at
which time every person in Iowa subject to perform military duty, who was
not at that time in the service, was required to enroll in some company of
militia. In other words, it was the purpose of this law to effect a
complete organization of the militia of Iowa - a plan which of course
superseded the necessity of maintaining special border defense companies in
the southern counties.


_________________________________________


The defenseless condition of the Indian frontier in northwestern Iowa had
been a matter of grave concern to the Governors of Iowa, as well as to the
settlers, for many years before the outbreak of the Civil War. The
establishment of Fort Dodge in 1850 encouraged settlement in that region
and kept the Indians in check. But after that fort was abandoned in 1853
the Frontier in Iowa was left without protection. Governor Grimes and
Governor Lowe both used every means in their power to secure action by the
War Department, but without success. Even after the Spirit Lake massacre of
1857 the authorities at Washington failed to appreciate the danger which
threatened the settlers in northwestern Iowa. The State did what it could
with limited resources and inadequate military equipment to keep mounted
rangers on the frontier or in readiness to be called on short notice. In
this way the Indians were kept in check, until they became emboldened by
the disturbed condition of affairs at the outbreak of the Civil War.