William T. Anderson
William T. "Bloody Bill" Anderson (* 1840 in Kentucky ; † October 26, 1864 near Albany , Missouri ) was a captain or captain of the Missouri Partisan Rangers (see also Bushwhacker ) on the Confederate side who was notorious for his brutality during the Civil War . On September 27, 1864, Anderson and his Bushwhackers committed what was probably their cruelest crime when they stopped a train in Centralia , Missouri, robbed passengers, and murdered 22 unarmed Union soldiers .
Early years
Anderson was born in Kentucky but grew up near Huntsville in Randolph County , Missouri. His father, William C. Anderson, was a hatter . He left his family in 1850 to travel to California , leaving William's older brothers Ellis and James to take care of the family during this time. Upon their father's return, the family moved to Agnes City , Kansas, in 1857 .
William T. Anderson worked briefly for a wagon company , but lost that job when he was suspected of horse theft . In fact, he had already committed various crimes, including horse theft, in Missouri.
When the Andersons father was shot dead in March 1862, William T. and Jim Anderson suspected a neighbor and charged him with murder. In the course of the dispute, the suspected of the murder neighbor and a bystander were killed by the Andersons, which is why Anderson had to flee Kansas.
Anderson as a partisan
In the spring of 1863, William and Jim Anderson joined William Clark Quantrill's Bushwhackers . William Anderson quickly received the (unofficial) rank of Second Lieutenant .
Failing to get hold of the partisan leader, the Bushwhackers' family members were imprisoned in Kansas City , Missouri for pressure purposes. Anderson's sisters Mary, Josephine, and Martha were among the prisoners. To make room, some of the support beams of the prison house were removed. On August 14, 1863, the building collapsed and buried the imprisoned women under itself. Four of them died, including Anderson's sister Josephine. Mary Anderson survived but suffered serious injuries and was left physically disabled.
It is believed that this incident had a significant and lasting negative impact on Anderson. He was known for his pronounced brutality towards Union soldiers and civilians sympathizing with the Union, which earned him the name "Bloody Bill". Often it was not enough for him to murder his victims; he mutilated or scalped them. In letters to a newspaper, Anderson announced atrocities against Union sympathizers and threatened to take the wives of Union officers hostage.
In the winter of 1863/1864, William Anderson married Bush Smith from Sherman , Texas .
From attacking Lawrence to returning to Missouri
On August 21, 1863, Anderson participated in the attack on Lawrence, Kansas , justified as an act of revenge for the women who died in prison. A little later, the Bushwhackers fled to Texas to spend the winter there. During this time, the clashes between Quantrill and Anderson increased, which is why Anderson Quantrill's troops turned their backs to return to Missouri in March 1864, where he set up an independent partisan unit.
In 1864, Anderson recruited some partisans who had fought under Archie Clement's command . Among them were Frank James and his sixteen-year-old brother Jesse James , who joined forces with other bandits to form the James Younger gang after the war in order to continue the "craft" they learned at Quantrill and Anderson under changed circumstances and to become the best-known US American outlaws of the Wild West . During this time, Anderson's group attached the scalps of their victims to their saddles in a clearly visible manner.
On September 27, 1864, the Centralia massacre occurred : The Bushwhackers stopped a train on the Northern Missouri Railroad . They robbed all civilians and murdered 22 Union soldiers who were on their way home. Anderson left only one sergeant alive for a possible prisoner swap. The rest of the soldiers were hanged or shot. Their bodies were scalped or otherwise maimed.
That same day, the newly formed 39th Missouri Mounted Infantry Regiment under the command of Major AVE Johnston began to pursue Anderson. In the meantime he had met other partisan leaders, such as B. George Todd, united. They decided to send out some men to trap Johnston. The infantrymen, armed with only one-shot muzzle - loading muscles, were initially able to kill some partisans, but the regiment was overrun by the partisans, who were mainly armed with percussion revolvers. Many of the Union soldiers fled in a panic but were captured. About 120 Union soldiers were murdered. The corpses were partially beheaded or otherwise mutilated by the partisans.
During the Battle of Centralia, Union forces faced a massive attack by the Confederate cavalry under the command of General Sterling Price . Price led a division of around 12,000 riders. They headed straight for St. Louis, attacked the Union garrison at Pilot Knob , but then turned west, forcing Union forces to retreat south across the Missouri . Anderson met with Price briefly, but decided to head back to northern Missouri as he would only encounter the local militias there who sympathized with the Union.
Anderson's death
In the meantime, Colonel Samuel P. Cox was tasked with eliminating the partisan leader. He was able to track down Anderson on October 26, 1864 in Ray County near Albany , Missouri. Ironically, Cox used one of Anderson's tactics to catch the partisan leader: he sent a small detachment of soldiers on horseback as bait to lure the partisans into an ambush. Anderson and his men rode straight into the arms of the waiting militiamen. These shot volley after volley into the ranks of the partisans, killing a large number of the horsemen. "Bloody Bill" fell from his horse, fatally hit by a head shot. The survivors fled. A 53-knot silk cord was found on Anderson's body. It has been claimed that this was the number of people he killed. Human scalps were also found on his horse's bridle, a photograph showing him with his wife, and a lock of his child's hair. All of this could be used as proof of identity.
Commenting on the battle, Cox said:
“I only had around 300 men under my command, and I gave them my word not to back down; this fight must be a victory or we are all doomed and no man hesitated.
We dismounted our horses by the wooden bridge and had the train guard them. After we crossed the bridge, I placed my men in the woods and instructed them not to fire a shot until I gave the order. Lieutenant Baker was sent ahead to provoke a skirmish and then immediately retreated towards our lines. Morton, a general a. D., from Washington DC, was sent to Baker with orders to begin combat. Anderson and his men were resting and eating their meals. They opened fire and immediately threw themselves into the saddles of their horses to pursue Baker, who immediately retreated behind our line exactly as instructed. Anderson and about 20 men rushed up in old partisan fashion, with the reins between their teeth and a revolver in each hand. When my men opened fire, some of Anderson's men fell, the others we routed. However, Anderson and two other riders rode straight through our line, Anderson and one rider turned and were killed by my men. The last of the three, the famous Captain Archie Clement , rode undeterred on over the wooden bridge over to our entourage. There he rode screaming towards the men who fled immediately, but he caught the commandant and killed him with his saber. It took us two days to find the soldiers who had fled. Clement escaped.
Among the captured and partially wounded partisans was Clell Miller , who would later become a notorious bank and train robber. It was very difficult to stop my men and the local people from lynching the survivors. "
Anderson's remains were brought to Richmond , Missouri, where photographs were taken and were on public display. Then the body was dragged through the streets to be buried in an unnamed grave in Richmond's cemetery. It was not until 1908 that the ex-partisan and ex-outlaw Frank James arranged for Anderson to have an adequate burial site. In 1967 the grave was given a veteran tombstone. This one has the wrong year of birth 1840.
Controversies over Anderson's death
Jesse James claimed that Samuel P. Cox killed Anderson. During a bank robbery in Gallatin , Missouri, he shot and killed the cashier in December 1869 because he mistook him for Cox. Still, many believed Anderson survived. As with other notorious characters in American history, people who claimed to be "Bloody Bill" appeared after his death. In 1924, Henry C. Fuller, a contributor to the Brownwood Banner Bulletin, interviewed a man named William Columbus Anderson of Brownwood , Brown County , Texas . This stated to be William T. Anderson. He referred to his last name, the middle name he had taken from his father. The body of another partisan had been mistaken for Anderson. William C. Anderson lived in a farmhouse on Salt Creek near Brownwood. He died in 1927 at the age of 87. None of the descriptions withstood scientific research.
literature
Albert Castel and Thomas Goodrich: Bloody Bill Anderson: The Short, Savage Life of a Civil War Guerrilla . 1st edition. Stackpole Books, Mechanicsburg, PA 1998, ISBN 0-8117-1506-X ( google.de ).
Individual evidence
Web links
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Anderson, William T. |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Bloody Bill |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Confederate partisan leader during the US Civil War |
| DATE OF BIRTH | 1840 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Kentucky |
| DATE OF DEATH | October 26, 1864 |
| Place of death | Ray County , Missouri |