the floor and cut the knot of discussion in a sum-
mary way. "I felt called upon to say some words
myself," he writes naïvely, "appealing to these
militia officers as an old resident of Kansas and
friend to the Missourians to submit to the patriotic
demand that they should retire, assuring them of
my perfect confidence in the inflexible justice of
the Governor, and that it would become my pain-
ful duty to sustain him at the cannon's mouth."1
This argument was decisive. The border chiefs
felt willing enough to lead their awkward squads
against the slight barricades of Lawrence, but
quailed at the unlooked-for prospect of encounter-
ing the carbines and sabers of half a regiment of
regular dragoons and the grape-shot of a well-
drilled light battery. They accepted the inevita-
ble;
and swallowing their rage but still nursing
their revenge, they consented perforce to retire
and be "honorably" mustered out. But for this
narrow contingency Lawrence would have been
sacked a second time by the direct agency of the
territorial cabal.

Nothing could more forcibly demonstrate the unequal character of the contest between the slaveState and the free-State men in Kansas, even in these manœuvres and conflicts of civil war, than the companion exploit to this third Lawrence raid. The day before Governor Geary, seconded by the "cannon" argument of Colonel Cooke, was convincing the reluctant Missourians that it was better to accept, as a reward for their unfinished expedition, the, pay, rations, and honorable dis

1 Cooke to Porter, Sept. 16, 1856. Senate Ex. Doc., 3d Sess. 34th Cong. Vol. III., p. 122.

VOL. II.-2

CHAP. I.

CHAP. I. charge of a "muster out," rather than the fine, imprisonment, or halter to which the full execution of their design would render them liable, another detachment of Federal dragoons was enforcing the bogus laws upon a company of free-State men who had just had a skirmish with a detachment of this same invading army of Border Ruffians, at a place called Hickory Point. The encounter itself had all the usual characteristics of the dozens of similar affairs which occurred during this prolonged period of border warfare-a neighborhood feud; neighborhood violence; the appearance of organized bands for retaliation; the taking of forage, animals, and property; the fortifying of two or three log-houses by a pro-slavery company then on its way to join in the Lawrence attack, and finally the appearance of a more numerous free-State party to dislodge them. The besieging column, some 350 in number, had brought up a brass fourpounder, lately captured from the pro-slavery men, and with this and their rifles kept up a longrange fire for about six hours, when the garrison Examina of Border Ruffians capitulated on condition of beEx. Doc., ing allowed "honorably" to evacuate their strong34th Cong. hold and retire. The casualties were one man killed and several wounded.

tion, Senate

3d Sess.

Vol. II.,

pp. 156-69.

The rejoicing of the free-State men over this not too brilliant victory was short-lived. Returning home in separate squads, they were successively intercepted by the Federal dragoons acting as a posse to the Deputy United States Marshal,' who arrested them on civil writs obtained in haste by

1 Captain Wood to Colonel Cooke, September 16, 1856. Senate
Ex. Doc., 3d Sess. 34th Cong. Vol. III.,
pp. 123-6.

an active member of the territorial cabal, and to
the number of eighty-nine1 were taken prisoners
to Lecompton. So far the affair had been of such
frequent occurrence as to have become common-
placea frontier "free fight," as they themselves
described and regarded it. But now it took
on a remarkable aspect. Sterling G. Cato, one of
the pro-slavery territorial judges, had been found
by Governor Geary in the Missouri camp drilling
and doing duty as a soldier, ready and doubtless
more than willing to take part in the projected
sack of Lawrence. This Federal judge, as open
a law-breaker as the Hickory Point prisoners
(the two affairs really forming part of one and
the same enterprise), now seated himself on his
judicial bench and committed the whole party
for trial on charge of murder in the first degree;
and at the October term of his court proceeded
to try and condemn to penalties prescribed by
the bogus laws some eighteen or twenty of these
prisoners, for offenses in which in equity and good
morals he was personally particeps criminis
of the convicts being held in confinement until the
following March, when they were pardoned by the
Governor.2 Inter arma silent leges, say the pub-
licists; but in this particular instance the license
of guerrilla war, the fraudulent statutes of the Ter-
ritory, and the laws of Congress were combined
and perverted with satanic ingenuity in further-
ance of the conspiracy.

some

The vigorous proceedings of Governor Geary,

1 Geary to Marcy, October 1, 1856. Senate Executive Documents, 3d Sess. 34th Cong. Vol. II., p. 156.

2 Gihon, pp. 142-3. Geary, Executive Minutes, Senate Ex. Doc., No. 17, 1st Sess. 35th Cong. Vol. VI., p. 195.

CHAP. I.

the forced retirement of the Missourians on the one hand, and the arrest and conviction of the free-State partisans on the other, had the effect to bring the guerrilla war to an abrupt termination. The retribution had fallen very unequally upon the two parties to the conflict,' but this was due to the legal traps and pitfalls prepared with such artful indemnity. The detailed figures and values of property destroyed are presented as follows:

design by the Atchison conspiracy, and not to the personal indifference or ill-will of the Governor. He strove sincerely to restore impartial administration; he completed the disbandment of the territorial militia, reënlisting into the Federal service one pro-slavery and one free-State company for police duty.1 By the end of September he was enabled to write to Washington that "peace now reigns in Kansas." Encouraged by this success in allaying guerrilla strife, he next endeavored to break up the existing political persecution and intrigues.

It was not long, however, before Governor Geary became conscious, to his great surprise and mortification, that he had been nominated and sent to Kansas as a partisan manoeuvre, and not to institute administrative reforms; that his instructions,

1 We quote the following from the executive minutes of Governor Geary to show that border strife had not entirely destroyed the kindlier human impulses, which enabled him to turn a portion of the warring elements to the joint service of peace and order:

66 September 24, 1856. For the purpose of obtaining information which was considered of great value to the Territory, the Governor invited to Lecompton, Captain [Samuel] Walker, of Lawrence, one of the most celebrated and daring leaders of the anti-slavery party, promising him a safe-conduct to Lecompton and back again to Lawrence. During Walker's visit at the Executive Office, Colonel [H. T.] Titus entered, whose house was, a short time since, destroyed by

a large force under the command
of Walker; an offense which was
subsequently retaliated by the
burning of the residence of the
latter.

These men were, per-
haps, the most determined ene-
mies in the Territory. Through
the Governor's intervention, a
pacific meeting occurred, a bet-
ter understanding took place,
mutual concessions were made,
and pledges of friendship were
passed; and, late in the after-
noon, Walker left Lecompton in
company with and under the
safeguard of Colonel Titus. Both
these men have volunteered to
enter the service of the United
States as leaders of companies
of territorial militia."-Geary,
Executive Minutes. Senate Ex-
ecutive Documents, 3d Session
34th Congress, Vol. II., pp.
137-8.

CHAP. I.