He visited the house of a well-known Union sympathizer, the wealthiest resident of the town, brutally beat him, and raped his 12- or 13-year-old black servant. While on public display, a local photographer documented his death. [Photo captions, clockwise from top left, read] , . ; Battle of Lexington State Historic Site in Lexington, Mo. Anderson and his men camped with at least 300 men, including Todd. After a brief gunfight, Baker and his brother-in-law fled into the store's basement. They may be found on the 1850 Census of Randolph County,MO. [55] Anderson ignored Quantrill's request to wait until after the war and a dispute erupted, which resulted in Anderson separating his men from Quantrill's band. 11, but guerrilla activity continued throughout the war in other regions of the state. [125], Anderson visited Confederate sympathizers as he traveled, some of whom viewed him as a hero for fighting the Union, whom they deeply hated. Anderson was upset by the critical tone of the coverage and sent letters to the publications. These companies will be governed in all respects by the same regulations as other troops. [97], On the morning of September 27, 1864, Anderson left his camp with about 75 men to scout for Union forces. [29] In the resulting skirmish, several raiders were captured or killed and the rest of the guerrillas, including Anderson, split into small groups to return to Missouri. They buried him in an unmarked grave in Richmond's Pioneer Cemetery. NPS Ozark Historic Research Study (Submitted on October 1, 2020, by William Fischer, Jr. of Scranton, Pennsylvania. One one hand, they were useful, serving to tie down Union forces. Anderson and his men were in the rear of the charge, but gathered a large amount of plunder from the dead soldiers, irritating some guerrillas from the front line of the charge. The next day, the elder Anderson traveled to the Council Grove courthouse with a gun, intending to force Baker to withdraw the warrant. The Dalton gang, cousins of the Younger brothers and imitators of the James gang, met their end at a bloody dual bank robbery in this Kansas town. In 1908, the ex-guerrillas and former outlaws Jim Cummins and Cole Younger arranged for a funeral service at Anderson's gravesite. Baker, a local judge who was a Confederate sympathizer. Anderson was described as "nearly six feet tall, of rather swarthy complexion and had long, black hair, inclined to curl. [115], By the end of the day, Anderson's men had killed 22 soldiers from the train and 125 soldiers in the ensuing battle in one of the most decisive guerrilla victories of the entire war. Todd rested his men in July to allow them to prepare for a Confederate invasion of Missouri. Details on John (b. [14] However, the group was attacked by the Union's 6th Regiment Kansas Volunteer Cavalry in Vernon County, Missouri;[e] the cavalry likely assumed they were Confederate guerrillas. [Map inset] Nearby Civil War attractions include Pioneer Cemetery and Ray County Museum in Richmond, Mo. However, his gun of choice was said to be the Dance .44 caliber cap and ball revolver. Below is one of the articles written by Brownwood Banner - Bulletin staff writer Henry C. Fuller after Interviewing William C. "Bloody Bill" Anderson of Quantrill's Guerrillas of the Civil War at his home at Salt Creek, Brown County, Texas in 1924. [13], Upon his return to Kansas, Anderson continued horse trafficking, but ranchers in the area soon became aware of his operations. [159] Three biographies of Anderson were written after 1975. [93] However, a guerrilla fired his weapon before they reached the town, and the cavalry garrisoned in the town quickly withdrew into their fort while civilians hid. Dec 28, 2022. However, most were hunted down and killed. Around that time, he received further media coverage: the St. Joseph Morning Herald deemed him a "heartless scoundrel", publishing an account of his torture of a captured Union soldier. Anderson retreated into the lobby of the town hotel to drink and rest. In July of 1864 Anderson moved his operations to Carroll and Randolph Counties. Usually a wife, sister, mother or sweetheart used ribbons, shells and needlework to create the ellaborately [sic] decorated shirts. [33] In August 1863, however, Union General Thomas Ewing, Jr. attempted to thwart the guerrillas by arresting their female relatives,[34] and Anderson's sisters were confined in a three-story building on Grand Avenue in Kansas City with a number of other girls. [83] On August 1, while searching for militia members, Anderson and some of his men stopped at a house full of women and requested food. Similarly, Jesse James' brother Frank became . From the town, they saw a group of about 120 guerrillas and pursued them. Although Union supporters viewed him as incorrigibly evil, Confederate supporters in Missouri saw his actions as justifiable. The Myth that Bloody Bill Anderson had survived the war and was living in Brownwood Texas originated in 1924, after a young Brownwood reporter named Henry Clay Fuller spent several hours talking . 2. A low-level conflict had already been raging in the Missouri-Kansas borderlands in the years preceding the outbreak of the Civil War. [133] The group then traveled west, disregarding the mission assigned by General Price[134] in favor of looting. A Note on Sources [48] After a dead raider was scalped by a Union-allied Lenape Indian during the pursuit, one guerrilla leader pledged to adopt the practice of scalping. [149] Some of them cut off one of his fingers to steal a ring. A lot of the federal troops in Missouri were Infantry & only the officer's would have pistols. Anderson reached a Confederate Army camp; although he hoped to kill some injured Union prisoners there, he was prevented from doing so by camp doctors. [15] The Anderson brothers escaped, but Baker was captured and spent four months in prison before returning to Kansas, professing loyalty to the Union. [65], On July 6, a Confederate sympathizer brought Anderson newspapers containing articles about him. At least 40 members of the 17th Illinois Cavalry and the Missouri State Militia were in town and took shelter in a fort. Jesse James and his brother Frank were among the Missourians who joined Anderson; both of them later became notorious outlaws. The guerrillas were only able to shoot the Union horses before reinforcements arrived; three of Anderson's men were killed in the confrontation. The rest rushed to obey the orders. [132], Anderson traveled 70 miles (110km) east with 80 men to New Florence, Missouri. "Born in Kentucky in 1839 before moving to Missouri and eventually living in Kansas when the Civil War started, Bill Anderson soon earned the nom de plume "Bloody Bill.". Around the same time, William T. Anderson fatally shot a member of the Kaw tribe outside Council Grove; he claimed that the man had tried to rob him. [52] Not satisfied with the number killed, Anderson and Todd wished to attack the fort again, but Quantrill considered another attack too risky. several of Anderson's men were cut down immediately & Anderson & 2 more continued but just a short distance when they were cut down. [94], On September 26, Anderson and his men reached Monroe County, Missouri,[95] and traveled towards Paris, but learned of other nearby guerrillas and rendezvoused with them near Audrain County. A State Divided: The Civil War in Missouri. [Photo captions, clockwise from top left, read] [79] General Clinton B. Fisk ordered his men to find and kill Anderson, but they were thwarted by Anderson's support network and his forces' superior training and arms. ; Battle of Lexington State Historic Site in Lexington, Mo. Their duty will be to cut off Federal pickets, scouts, foraging parties and trains and to kill pilots and others on gunboats and transports, attacking them day and night and using the greatest vigor in their movements. [23] They also attacked Union soldiers, killing seven by early 1863. [57] Quantrill appointed him a first lieutenant, subordinate only to himself and to Todd. They relied on knowledge of the local terrain for survival. Clad in Union uniforms, the guerrillas generated little suspicion as they approached the town,[92] even though it had received warning of nearby guerrillas. Anderson subsequently returned to Missouri as the leader of his own group of raiders and became the most feared guerrilla in the state, robbing and killing a large number of Union soldiers and civilian sympathizers. [10], In the late 1850s, Ellis Anderson fled to Iowa after killing a native American. Bloody Bill was played by John Russell who played Marshall Stockburn in Pale Rider. [44] They proceeded to pillage and burn many buildings, killing almost every man they found, but taking care not to shoot women. [107] The guerrillas set the passenger train on fire and derailed an approaching freight train. [113] One Union officer reached Centralia and gave word of the ambush, allowing a few Union soldiers who had remained there to escape. [77][78] His fearsome reputation gave a fillip to his recruiting efforts. so there couldn't have been that many to obtain from citizens. Anderson, perhaps falsely, implicated Quantrill in a murder, leading to the latter's arrest by Confederate authorities. They often used unorthodox tactics to fight Union troops, such as using a small party of horsemen to lure them into an ambush. [129] Anderson presented him with a gift of fine Union pistols, likely captured at Centralia. The Union troops took his body to Richmond, Mo. In response, Union militias developed hand signals to verify that approaching men in Union uniforms were not guerrillas. Doing some quick math on the number of men who rode with Quantrill, numbers around 700 ( those who can be named), maybe more. The act sanctioned guerrilla activities against the Union army while attempting to gain some measure of control over the guerrillas. He took a leading role in the Lawrence Massacre and later took part in the Battle of Baxter Springs, both in 1863. Notorious Confederate bushwhacker Bloody Bill Anderson Three bushwackers; Arch Clements, Dave Pool, and Bill Hendricks. Burial. Others, like William Anderson, had already entered a dark abyss from which there was no return and no escape except death. [112] Although five guerrillas were killed by the first volley of Union fire, the Union soldiers were quickly overwhelmed by the well-armed guerrillas, and those who fled were pursued. [87] Although they forced the Union soldiers to flee, Anderson and Jesse James were injured in the encounter and the guerrillas retired to Boone County to rest. [104] Anderson forced the captured Union soldiers to form a line and announced that he would keep one for a prisoner exchange but would execute the rest. After Frank and Jesse James joined the Anderson band, they robbed a train of $3,000 and executed 25 Union soldiers on board. By the time the war started, Missouri's pro-rebel guerrillas were known as . The younger Anderson buried his father[17] and was subsequently arrested for assisting Griffith. Wood believes that these stories are inaccurate, citing a lack of documentary evidence. Anderson's bushwhacking marked him as a dangerous man and eventually led the Union to imprison his sisters. For instance, you could play Jesse James-an American outlaw who was also a confederate soldier under Bloody Bill Anderson's leadership. John Russell. Location: Missouri, United States. In what became known as the Centralia Massacre, Anderson's bushwhackers killed 24 unarmed Union soldiers on the train and set an ambush later that day which killed over a hundred Union militiamen.

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