Centralia Battlefield

[archieclement]

 

[archieclement]

guerrilla POV, CSA front, CSA back, Union front Union back, dedication marker, and Union POV

 

[JOHN42768]

Somehow that bronze marker plate talking about valor and patriotism is not justified when remembering a guerrilla massacre. Executions are not worthy of that honor. Maybe in an other area, but not together.

 

[Buckeye Bill]

Nice photos!

This massacre was the epitome of the term Bushwhacking.

Bill

 

[archieclement]

Somehow that bronze marker plate talking about valor and patriotism is not justified when remembering a guerrilla massacre. Executions are not worthy of that honor. Maybe in an other area, but not together.

The massacre is a separate site in town, nothing really period is left there so didn't take pictures, theres a marker next to the RR and another in a park a block away however

Would add the union marker honors/names the union killed on the battlefield....I don't think there is a marker naming the massacre victims off the train, if there is I didn't see it today

And the actual union battleline would be the crest of the hill in the Guerilla POV pic. the park ends just short of the crest of actual union battleline so its pov pic is a little shorter, however you can imagine after they dismounted seeing up to 400 mounted guerrillas moving up lining the edge of the woods

 

[Boonslick]

Has anyone ever read the personal account of Sergeant Thomas M. Goodman? He survived the Centralia Massacre at the RR station and was forced to be a captive hostage of Anderson. He eventually was able to escape and make it back to the Federal base at Fayette. This interesting account gives light to life in Anderson's band. This is an interesting addition to my Mo. guerrilla book collection.

 

[archieclement]

The massacre is a separate site in town, nothing really period is left there so didn't take pictures, theres a marker next to the RR and another in a park a block away

Has anyone ever read the personal account of Sergeant Thomas M. Goodman? He survived the Centralia Massacre at the RR station and was forced to be a captive hostage of Anderson. He eventually was able to escape and make it back to the Federal base at Fayette. This interesting account gives light to life in Anderson's band. This is an interesting addition to my Mo. guerrilla book collection.

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I unfortunately haven't, just the snippets from it it in other works, curious does it add a lot, and was it hard to find?

 

[Boonslick]

It's quite interesting. I first read this at the Missouri State Historical Society in 1980 and have been looking for 18th. century printing to no avail. Recently I came across the 1860 limited reprint, in which each copy is numbered, mine is #438. Even these are a little pricey- check out abebooks.com. There are 'print on demand' books available but I would never want one.

https://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=28809360

 

[SWMODave]

The book Boonslick mentioned is online at https://archive.org/details/thrillingrecordf00good

 

[archieclement]

The book Boonslick mentioned is online at https://archive.org/details/thrillingrecordf00good

ty SWMO

 

[mofederal]

I haven't been to Centralia in a long time. It was about a 25 to 30 minute drive from my house. I know some about the battle. I had a relative killed there, a guerrilla killed in the charge. I have read Goodman's account. It is an interesting read. The 39th Mo. was mostly recruited in Northeast Missouri. An interesting fact about the original mass grave of the 39th is they were originally buried with all of their equipment. When the remains were dug up to be reburied in Jefferson City they found them still wearing their accoutrements, I would think they were not buried with their rifles. Nothing is said of that, but it makes you wonder. I had a friend who walked the field and woods and said he found rust old railroad spikes driven into some trees in the woods to tie their horses to. I only have his word for that. He said it was an old guerrilla habit. It makes sense though.

 

[AUG]

Somehow that bronze marker plate talking about valor and patriotism is not justified when remembering a guerrilla massacre. Executions are not worthy of that honor. Maybe in an other area, but not together.

I believe its for the CS regular soldiers that came from Boone County.

 

[Patrick H]

I somehow missed this thread a few days ago. I'm thankful I saw it just now.

archieclements is correct that the massacre was a separate affair from the battle. What happened on the field in the photos was a battle made brutally unfair by the ineptitude and poor training of the militia hunting for Anderson, and by the merciless aftermath. But it was a legitimate, if unwise, battle. Anderson's boys showed no hesitation about riding men down and killing them even when their rifles were empty. However, the militia would most likely have shown equal viciousness to the guerrillas, had the tables been turned. The militia was under orders not to take prisoners from among the guerrillas. Rather, they were supposed to summarily execute any guerrilla they captured.

The summer of 1864 would also see the practice of scalping and mutilating corpses become the calling card of Anderson's band. That was uniquely disturbing to the newspapers, the public, and the soldiers who had to face these guys in battle.
Once cannot help being outraged by some of the mutilations that occurred here and elsewhere. Heads were cut off and switched to new bodies. Heads were placed on victims' chests or fence posts. Headless bodies were tied to trees. Noses were cut off. ...and worse.

When Anderson came to Boonville a short time later to meet with Price, his men had Centralia scalps hanging from their bridles. One can barely imagine the terror that Sgt. Goodman felt during his captivity.

Fortunately, Anderson ran into a seasoned, well-trained militia soon after, and they beat him at his own tricks.

Ironically, when Sgt. Goodman finally mustered out of his service, he most likely passed through Centralia again on another train. Can you imagine what ran through his mind?

 

[KansasFreestater]

I somehow missed this thread a few days ago. I'm thankful I saw it just now.

archieclements is correct that the massacre was a separate affair from the battle. What happened on the field in the photos was a battle made brutally unfair by the ineptitude and poor training of the militia hunting for Anderson, and by the merciless aftermath. But it was a legitimate, if unwise, battle. Anderson's boys showed no hesitation about riding men down and killing them even when their rifles were empty. However, the militia would most likely have shown equal viciousness to the guerrillas, had the tables been turned. The militia was under orders not to take prisoners from among the guerrillas. Rather, they were supposed to summarily execute any guerrilla they captured.

The summer of 1864 would also see the practice of scalping and mutilating corpses become the calling card of Anderson's band. That was uniquely disturbing to the newspapers, the public, and the soldiers who had to face these guys in battle.
Once cannot help being outraged by some of the mutilations that occurred here and elsewhere. Heads were cut off and switched to new bodies. Heads were placed on victims' chests or fence posts. Headless bodies were tied to trees. Noses were cut off. ...and worse.

When Anderson came to Boonville a short time later to meet with Price, his men had Centralia scalps hanging from their bridles. One can barely imagine the terror that Sgt. Goodman felt during his captivity.

Fortunately, Anderson ran into a seasoned, well-trained militia soon after, and they beat him at his own tricks.

Ironically, when Sgt. Goodman finally mustered out of his service, he most likely passed through Centralia again on another train. Can you imagine what ran through his mind?

Patrick, thank you for your insightful and informative comments.

Missouri "black flag" guerrilla warfare (on both sides) always gives me the heebie-jeebies. We see similar tactics in drug-cartel-war Mexico, the Middle East, and anywhere else that the rule of law has broken down or, in some cases, never existed. The bozos running around recently (on both left and right) in our own country beating their chests and blithely throwing around threats of another civil war make me want to knock their heads together. They have no idea what they are conjuring. Missouri made the rest of the Civil War look like a picnic, and any future civil war would make Missouri look like a picnic. God have mercy!

 

[archieclement]

After the guerrillas decoy force lead them to the field, and the guerrillas sprang their trap and moved up to the edge of the treeline, as in the first photo, you can almost hear John Koger saying "The fools are going to fight us on foot.......God help them"

 

[Patrick H]

After the guerrillas decoy force lead them to the field, and the guerrillas sprang their trap and moved up to the edge of the treeline, as in the first photo, you can almost hear John Koger saying "The fools are going to fight us on foot.......God help them"

So true. And I can almost see Dave Poole jumping from one body to another yelling: "This is the only way I can count them!"

The inexperienced militia either fired high or low, as the case might be--hitting very few guerrillas. A few cool heads managed to reload and pop another shot before being overrun. In my view, these poor militia guys were more the victims of their officer than of Anderson's guerrillas.

We must remember, too, that these guerrilla boys had suffered innumerable outrages against their neighbors and their own families by this day, including relatives and neighbors tortured and murdered and homes burned. This fact doesn't earn them a free pass into barbarity and terrorism, but it explains a few things about their collective mindset on this and a few other horrible days.

 

[mofederal]

http://www.centraliabattlefield.com/archaeological-perspective.html

Major Andrew V.E. Johnston in my opinion had never really dealt with guerrillas in any form before. According to Guerilla Hunters in Civil War Missouri By James W. Erwin on page 113, Johnston served as an officer of the Missouri State Guard under Sterling Price. He joined the State Militia in either September or December of 1861. He joined the 53rd EMM in July or August of 1862 in Ralls County. It was said he was known as a very aggressive guerrilla fighter. Unfortunately the brave could also be very stupid. His men were supposedly training to be mounted infantry. You read that the 39th was newly formed, only 2 weeks, if so why were they rushed into war. The only answer is that they were nearby. They were mounted on a combination of horses and mules, seized from " disloyal citizens" of nearby counties. They were armed with Enfield rifles. The rest does not take much imagination to understand. Johnston did not really understand or comprehend the warfare he was trained to fight Poor thinking and training can lead to disaster. In this case it did.

The link above is for an archaeological assessment of the Centralia Battlefield. It contains a lot of information regarding the battle, and pictures of the finds.

 

[Patrick H]

http://www.centraliabattlefield.com/archaeological-perspective.html

Major Andrew V.E. Johnston in my opinion had never really dealt with guerrillas in any form before. According to Guerilla Hunters in Civil War Missouri By James W. Erwin on page 113, Johnston served as an officer of the Missouri State Guard under Sterling Price. He joined the State Militia in either September or December of 1861. He joined the 53rd EMM in July or August of 1862 in Ralls County. It was said he was known as a very aggressive guerrilla fighter. Unfortunately the brave could also be very stupid. His men were supposedly training to be mounted infantry. You read that the 39th was newly formed, only 2 weeks, if so why were they rushed into war. The only answer is that they were nearby. They were mounted on a combination of horses and mules, seized from " disloyal citizens" of nearby counties. They were armed with Enfield rifles. The rest does not take much imagination to understand. Johnston did not really understand or comprehend the warfare he was trained to fight Poor thinking and training can lead to disaster. In this case it did.

The link above is for an archaeological assessment of the Centralia Battlefield. It contains a lot of information regarding the battle, and pictures of the finds.

Many thanks for the link to the archaeological study. I remember reading the newspaper story about it when it was being conducted, but this is the first time I've actually seen the report.

 

[mofederal]

The report is very interesting and it contains some surprises. It has a huge amount of information about the battle. Some new info from sources not previously used in books. In places people would not expect.

 

[Lost Cause]

Has anyone ever read the personal account of Sergeant Thomas M. Goodman? He survived the Centralia Massacre at the RR station and was forced to be a captive hostage of Anderson. He eventually was able to escape and make it back to the Federal base at Fayette. This interesting account gives light to life in Anderson's band. This is an interesting addition to my Mo. guerrilla book collection.

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A copy of the book can be downloaded to Kindle for a couple of dollars. I found it to be a short, but interesting read, particularly Goodman's fairly cordial treatment by Anderson.

The following link has additional information described by Centralia residents:

http://www.usgennet.org/usa/mo/county/audrain/war/witness_centralia.htm