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On the orders of General Bainbridge, United States Provost Marshal for Southwest Kentucky, Lt. Charles Clary, 12th Ky., U.S. removed four prisoners from the jail at Louisville and took them to Franklin, KY, where two of them were executed in retaliation for the death of a Union man. The two prisoners executed had no connection with the death of the Union citizen, having been in prison at the time of the death. They were killed as a matter of retaliation. Could this be called a massacre?
Headquarters
District of the Border
Kansas City, Missouri
August 25, 1863
First, ___ All persons living in Jackson, Cass and Bates Counties, Missouri, and in that part of Vernon included in this district, except those living within one mile of the limits of Harrisonville, Hickman Mills, Independence and Pleasant Hill and Harrisonville, and except those in the part of Kaw Township, Jackson County, north of Brush Creek and west of the Big Blue, embracing Kansas City and Westport, are hereby ordered to remove from their present places of residence within fifteen days from the date hereof. Those who, within that time, establish their loyalty to the satisfaction of the commanding officer of the military station nearest their present places of residence will receive from him certificates stating the fact of their loyalty, and the names of the witnesses by whom it can be shown. All who receive such certificates will be permitted to remove to any military station in the district, or to any part of the State of Kansas except the counties on the eastern border of the State. All others shall remove out of the district.
Officers commanding companies and detachments serving in the counties named will see that this paragraph is promptly obeyed.
Second, ___ All hay and grain in the field, or under shelter in the district, from which the inhabitants are required to remove, within the reach of the military stations, after the 9th of September, next, will be taken to such stations and turned over to the proper officers there; and reports of the amounts so turned over made to district headquarters, specifying the name of all loyal owners and the amount of such produce taken from them. All grain and hay found in such district after the 9th of September, next, not convenient to such stations, will be destroyed.
Third, ___ The provisions of General Order No. 10 from these headquarters will be at once vigorously executed by officers commanding in the parts of the district, and at the stations not subject to the operations of paragraph first of this order, especially in the towns of Independence, Westport and Kansas City.
Fourth, ___ Paragraph 3, General Order No. 10, is revoked as to all who have borne arms against the government in the district since August 20, 1863.
By order of the Brigadier General Ewing,
H. Hannahs, Adjutant
General Alpheus Williams to his daughter
April 26, 1864
Background: Gen. Slocum had been allowed to send an expedition to the village of Mulberry to collect $30,000 in penalities for the killing of nine Union foragers. Slocum's troops collected about ten times the amount authorized. Williams wrote to his daughter:
"The making of fortunes I do not understand. I could have made one here if I had consented to have sold my self-respect and the good name of my children to the third and fourth generation. (Williams was temporarily serving as Provost commanding the area northwest of Chattanooga) While somebody makes $700,000, somebody loses a corresponding sum."
Cited in Quaife, From the Cannon's Mouth: The Civil War Letters of General Alpheus S. Williams
April 6, 1862
Gen. William Sherman authorized commanders in the field to aprove and execute death sentences. He stated that "I expect to execute a good many spies and guerrillas under Congressional approval without bothering the President." The Sect. of War advised Sherman that he had exceeded his authority and could not order executions without approval. However, the seed of massacre had been planted and the practice of executing Southern civilians without trial or higher approval became common among Union officers, espceially Provosts.
Please refer to the OR for the corresondence between Sherman and the Sect. of War.
Sorry, but your most recent post, it doesn't look like it came from an OR or historical document, but it reads more like a dramatic opinion from a recent book or paper.
Do you have the source for this post?
Sincerely,
Unionblue
__________________ "The American people and the Government at Washington may refuse to recognize it for a time but the inexorable logic of events will force it upon them in the end; that the war now being waged in this land is a war for and against slavery." Frederick Douglass
"Loyalty to our ancestors does not include loyalty to their mistakes." George Santayana
Found this web site that had the OR's listed in their entirety. Thought it would help you with your quest to show Union Provost Marshall's illegal acts and war crimes.
You could use this site to reference such acts and provide them as a source so others could check your data.
I know for me it is hard to trust any data or posts without being able to see the original site or material. This should help you with that mistrust.
Sincerely,
Unionblue
__________________ "The American people and the Government at Washington may refuse to recognize it for a time but the inexorable logic of events will force it upon them in the end; that the war now being waged in this land is a war for and against slavery." Frederick Douglass
"Loyalty to our ancestors does not include loyalty to their mistakes." George Santayana
Union Blue,
The source of the quote about Sherman expecting to kill a lot of "guerrillas" is found in Steven Woodworth's new book "Nothing But Victory" which is a history of the Army of The Tennessee. This is an excellent book and contains much information which substantiates my claims about the policies of the United States Provost Marshal's actions. I highly recommend the book.
I use the O.R. on CD from Guild Press. I like the speed with which the Guild Press disk works. The O.R., however, does not contain much of the Provost material. The Provost Records are a separate collection of materials and are filed in the National Archives under the designation previously given. The same is true for the Judge Advocate's records, they are not fully included in the O.R. and one must read them to get a full picture of how civilians were treated by the U. S. armys legal system. The O. R. is good for combat materials but a great deal of historical documentation about the war is to be found in other original, official sources.
I agree that the actions of the United States Provost Marshal troops does sound like a dramatic novel. It is difficult to believe that such crimes were committed by those under the Stars and Stripes. But truth is often more dramatic than fiction.
The duties assigned to the Provost Marshal including seeking out and arresting deserters, spies, and civilians suspected of disloyalty; investigating the thest or misuse of government property; controlling travel in the military zone by issuing passes and monitoring government transportation; maintaining records of persons who gave paroles and who took the Oath of Allegiance. Each army post had a provost who, in addition to carrying out these duties, could alsoconvene courts to try cases involving violations of military orders, departures from the laws of war, and other offenses which arose under military jurisdiction. Since most of the South was under occupation, at one time, most offenses which would have gone before a civil court were taken before the provost marshal. This meant the Provost Marshal of an army post had vast power.
October 18, 1862. . . Palmyra (Missouri) Massacre
On October 18, 1862, Union soldiers under the command of Brigadier General John McNeil executed 10 Confederate prisoners at Palmyra, ordered in retaliation for the abduction of Andrew Allsman by the forces of Colonel Joseph C. Porter. Allsman, a former Union soldier, had been retired to special service and was considered by Confederates as practically a spy. Taken prisoner September 12, 1862, he was released a short while later and conducted toward Palmyra, but he never reached home.
On October 8, Provost Marshal William R. Strachan, acting for McNeil, published a notice to Porter that unless Allsman was returned within 10 days, 10 former Porter men held as prisoners in Palmyra and Hannibal would be executed. It is not known whether Porter saw the notice, but in any event, most writers agree that Allsman had already been the victim of personal enemies among Porter's men and that the Confederate colonel would have been powerless to return him.
Nothing was heard from Allsman, and McNeil was unyielding when Union sympathizer interposed to save the doomed men. On Saturday, October 18, wagons containing 10 pine coffins drew up before the jail and the procession to the fairgrounds began, each condemned man seated on his coffin. At the fairgrounds, a firing squad of 30 men put the Confederates to death. Some of the executioners evidently wavered, for only three of the ten were killed by rifle volley and a pistol party was sent forward to finish the execution.
Those executed were Captain Thomas A. Sidenor of Monroe County, Willis J. Baker, Thomas Humston, Morgan Bixler, John Y. McPheeters, and Hiram T. Smith of Lewis County, Herbert Hudson, John M. Wade, and Marion Lair of Ralls County, and Eleazer Lake of Scotland County.
In 1864 Strachan was tried for this and other offenses; sentenced to prison, he was released by General William Starke Rosecrans on the ground of persecution and unjust trial. Strachan's accuser was a Union officer. The Palmyra Confederate monument association erected a granite monument in Palmyra on February 25, 1907.
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