Bushwhacker

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Bushwhacking was a form of guerrilla warfare practiced in the border areas between north and south during the American Civil War . The organized independent of the regular army Bushwhackers ( . English about "bush proles", aptly but "tramps") fought mostly for the Confederacy ; its counterparts on the Union side were commonly referred to as Jayhawkers (predominantly in Kansas ).

General

For the most part, Bushwhackers were not under any military command. In large gangs, sometimes several hundred men strong, they undertook well-planned and organized raids in which entire cities were occasionally burned down. However, the actions were essentially limited to ambushes and attacks on opposing people or families in rural areas. A particularly ugly aspect of bushwhakings was that often neighbor fought neighbor and the attacks on vigilantism or Vigilantentum marginalized.

As these attacks were mostly carried out by uniformed people, governments' response was hampered by the need to decide whether they were legitimate military actions or crimes.

Three Bushwhackers proudly showing off their percussion revolvers

Bushwhacker in the service of the south

The term itself was very common during the Civil War, but it was mostly associated with the Missouri guerrilla forces sympathizing with the South. That is where the Bushwhacker activities were most intense. By the end of the war, the guerrilla war also devastated the states of Kentucky , Tennessee , Arkansas and northern Virginia .

The Bushwhacker's most notorious act during the Civil War was the Lawrence , Kansas massacre .

Partisan ranger

In many areas, Bushwhackers operated in addition to conventional military operations. The most famous of these "partisan rangers" (the term was introduced by the Confederate government) was Colonel John Singleton Mosby , who concentrated his attacks on the Union forces in the Shenandoah Valley.

In Missouri, the Bushwhackers operated outside the Confederate chain of command. Occasionally, a prominent Bushwhacker leader was given a formal rank in the Confederate Army . So the gang leader William Clark Quantrill was appointed captain . Other commanders received written orders from Confederate generals : William T. Anderson, for example, was commissioned in October 1864 to support the Missouri invasion of the Confederate troops. Joseph C. Porter was authorized by Sterling Price to recruit men in northeast Missouri .

Most of the Bushwhackers in Missouri were self-organized groups of young men from the slavery counties along the Missouri or Mississippi. They voluntarily decided to fight against the Union troops of neighboring Kansas or to respond to the invasions of their home states.

Bushwhacker in the service of the north

In some areas, especially in the Appalachian Mountains of Tennessee and North Carolina , partisans of the US Army were also known as Bushwhackers. These partisans specialized in targeting stragglers of the Confederate troops. Especially at the Battle of Gettysburg , there was a band of civilians from Pennsylvania who targeted the stragglers of the Northern Virginia Army .

Atrocities

The war soon resulted in atrocities on both sides. Union troops often executed or tortured suspects without a trial or burned the homes of people suspected of being guerrillas or their supporters.

In 1861, the "Kansas Jayhawkers" plundered under the leadership of James Henry Lane's place Osceola , Missouri, burned him down and executed nine men.

In August 1863, an improvised prison in Kansas City , Missouri, containing female relatives of suspected bushwhackers , collapsed . Five of the women died. These events in turn influenced the Lawrence massacre in Kansas; William Quantrill led this attack in August 1863. Almost the entire city was looted and burned and up to 200 men were murdered. As a result, Union General Thomas Ewing, Jr. ordered in the now famous Order No. 11 states that three and a half counties along the Kansas-Missouri border south of Kansas City are to be evacuated in the state of Missouri . All residents were affected, regardless of whether they were on the north or south side. Among other things, the family of Jesse James and the grandparents and mother of the future President Harry Truman were evicted.

In the Centralia massacre in September 1864, 22 unarmed Union soldiers were taken from a train and murdered by bushwhackers under the command of William T. Anderson . Shortly afterwards, the Union troops who were pursuing were ambushed and captured. Here, too, well over 100 opponents were massacred, some of them on the run.

In October 1864, William "Bloody Bill" Anderson was ambushed and killed by a militia under the command of Colonel Samuel P. Cox. Anderson's body was displayed to a cheering crowd.

Bandits after the war

After the war ended, the Andersons troop remained together under the leadership of Archie Clement. Frank and Jesse James were among them. These began in February 1866 with a series of armed robberies. Some, including the leader Clement, were captured; but others such as B. Cole Younger and his brothers about it. Soon the group was known as the James Younger Gang .

In 1867, near the city of Nevada , Missouri, Sheriff Joseph Bailey , a former Union brigadier general, was shot dead by bushwhackers trying to arrest them.

Jesse James

The guerrilla war in Missouri was a civil war within a civil war. One of the most famous actors was Jesse James . Involved in the conflict since 1864, he fought mainly his fellow citizens in Missouri, provided they served in US regiments or US militias ; but sometimes it only affected unarmed citizens. The only confirmed engagement with regular US troops from another state occurred one month after the surrender of Southern Commander-in-Chief Robert E. Lee with a cavalry unit from Wisconsin .

During the turmoil of the war, Jesse James' mother was imprisoned, his stepfather was tortured and the rest of his family was temporarily banished from Missouri. The Missouri State Militia, which was hated by James and fought on the side of the Union, was always involved.

Jesse James was the most famous member of the James Younger gang and a prime suspect in the attack on the Daviess County Saving Association in Gallatin , Missouri , in 1869 . The cashier John W. Sheets was murdered in this robbery. During his escape, Jesse James stated that he had avenged the death of Bloody Bill Anderson with the murder of Samuel P. Cox. So he assumed that the bank clerk Sheets shot was Colonel Cox.

During his criminal career, Jesse wrote often to newspapers and proudly shared his role as Bushwhacker, how he supported the Confederates and helped the people of Missouri after they were brutally treated by the Union government.

Bushwhacker in the film

  • The film Der Texaner ("The Outlaw Josey Wales") with Clint Eastwood contains the story of a former Bushwhacker, on the run from his tormentors after the war.
  • Ride with the Devil tells the story of young Missouri boys of different origins who fight together as Bushwhackers.

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