 During the lead up to the Battle of Wilson's Creek, as the various troops were moving around Missouri, one Confederate volunteer from Louisiana pointed to an odd piece of equipment they were marching by and asked his captain, and I swear I'm reading these lines as they are written phonetically and everything, he asked his captain, I say maester, what is this year a thing, his captain smiled and answered, a cannon, the soldier responded, a cannon hey what in thunder is that fur I should like to know, after his officer explained it to him he said, well that's the dirtiest gun ever I seed, I say maester, how much might that year cannon cost, the captain held out two coins and said, oh about two dimes like these, the soldier was surprised again, is them here dimes, well I declare, then he walked off mumbling to himself about the revelatory new knowledge about dimes and cannons. This anecdote is funny and for those of you who listen to this podcast regularly, you know I like stories like this that give us a different picture of what people were like in the context of these major events but putting the amusement aside, this illustrates the ignorance of the typical soldier, not stupidity mind you, just ignorance, photography was really just becoming a thing so it's not like these people could have seen pictures of these items like we would today and in the south most people lived in very rural areas, although there were standardized units of money that were nationally recognized competing currencies exchanged all over the place and a lot of southern transactions were conducted on credit without any coins actually changing hands, this was a very different world than we live in today which sounds like an obvious truism until you start homing in on anecdotes like this one but this was the state of many of the soldiers who are about to face battle north and south, this young man from Louisiana had no idea what a cannon was when he saw it but he and thousands of other young men would quickly learn what it was when they had to face artillery fire for the first time, the world these guys lived in was small, it was local and it was rapidly changing as the war spread throughout the country, first in the battle of Bull Run and now in the second large-scale battle of the war, the battle of Wilson's Creek also known as the battle of Oak Hills and sometimes the battle of Springfield. I'm Chris Calton and this is the Mises Institute podcast Historical Controversies and the previous three episodes we've looked at the operations to control Missouri, the primary character in this story has been a union officer named Nathaniel Lyon who first upset many unionists by establishing martial law in the city of St. Louis, a majority unionist city and then marching his army through the state to suppress the rebellious Missourians in the state guard. He had already gained effective control of the state but his goal at this point was to punish the secessionists. I have not found a single book on this history, a biographer of Lyon who presents the man in a redeemable light and many of the officers both above and below him despised and distrusted him because of his rash temper and one example of this was his decision to attack the Confederates who had the advantage of numbers before retreating back to St. Louis. Elias and Rebecca Short and their six children were relatively new to Missouri though they moved there from Tennessee. They were unionists and their unionism was only reinforced when Sterling Price's army marched by helping themselves to the honey from the short's beehive as well as forcing Rebecca and her two teenage daughters to fix the meals. After the southern troops had helped themselves to whatever they liked from the short farm the family only had one chicken remaining on the morning of August 10th which Rebecca killed to prepare breakfast. As the family was eating their property started to swarm with union soldiers the children ran to the door to watch the movement of troops. They only just realized that the battle of Wilson's Creek had started at 5 a.m. with the rear of the union line forming right outside their home. The short stayed and watched the battle until bullets started to hit their house at which point Elias made the decision to take his family to a neighbor who lived five miles away where the family waited out the battle in safety. When they returned home after the battle they would find wounded union soldiers being transported back to Springfield their wounds having been bandaged with strips of cloth torn from the bedding of the short's home. A little way south Joseph and Mary Sharp along with their three children were similarly surrounded by the Confederate camps. During the coming battle they would hide out in their cellar while their home was used as a Confederate hospital but the hospital was evacuated once the fighting started and cannonballs destroyed their house while they hid below. When they emerged their home their barn and their outhouse were all devastated. Much of their crops had already been eaten by soldiers but anything that had been left was now trampled by soldiers and horses during the battle. The shorts and the sharps were hardly the only families whose livelihoods were destroyed during the battle of Wilson's Creek and the Missouri campaign. Nathaniel Lyon gave his signal to fire the first shot of the battle right around 5 a.m. The idea was to conduct an early morning unexpected attack on the Confederates to inflict enough damage to make the union retreat back to Springfield safe from Confederate pursuit. Lyon's total forces amounted to roughly 5,600 men while the Confederate forces the Missouri State Guard under the command of Sterling Price combined with the Confederates from other states under the command of Ben McCulloch amounted to about twice that size. Lyon's plan depended on his ability to stay on the offensive prevent the Confederates from ever effectively organizing a response and to inflict a disproportionate amount of damage before falling back to Union controlled areas of the state. Needless to say it was a pretty ambitious plan but Lyon was confident as he moved south past the short farm and took position on Bloody Hill as it later became known he told one of his subordinate officers John Shofield quote in less than an hour they'll wish they were a thousand miles away end quote at the top of Bloody Hill Lyon had a wide view of the battlefield although the first cannon fire came at five o'clock the first hour or so of the battle was largely spent maneuvering troops even though Lyon's force was small he divided it up and spread his men thinly out over the battlefield trying to protect all vulnerable areas he first directed an infantry battalion of US regulars along with two cavalry regiments to protect his left flank to the east he divided another small force of infantry and artillery to cover the union right moving southwest Lyon stayed with the front line which consisted of just over 1600 men which was to push forward directly toward the Confederates and finally on the far other side of the battlefield all the way to the south behind the Confederates was Franz Siegel's brigade of about 1200 men so the Union forces were heavily divided as they attempted to press against the Confederates from both the north and the south in addition to having his forces divided it's also worth mentioning that Lyon had no way of communicating with Siegel on the other side of the battlefield but the 1650 who formed the Union's front line with Lyon moved slowly until they reached to the top of Bloody Hill at around 5 30 a.m where they had a good view of the Confederate forces part of Lyon's plan rested on the element of surprise and he had it the Confederates were not prepared in fact general McCulloch had been given a warning from James Reigns about the impending attack but McCulloch didn't take the warning seriously in the previous episode I talked about the small skirmish at Doug Springs in which Reigns had sent word of an impending attack that had fizzled out before reinforcements arrived so when Reigns brought word of another attack on the morning of August 10th McCulloch saw him as the boy who cried wolf this was probably just another Reigns scare as the Doug Springs fiasco was being called but after more people brought word of a possible attack McCulloch decided to go have a word with Sterling Price so by 5 30 as the Union frontline was reaching the top of Bloody Hill the Confederates were lagging far behind in their organization of a response part of the surprise also came from the fact that the noise from the moving troops and early morning cannon fire was apparently unheard by the Confederates historians William Garrett Piston and Richard W. Hatcher the third explain this as an acoustic shadow which is apparently just the name for when people fail to hear noises that they should have been able to detect I don't know the acoustic science behind all this suffice it to say that the Confederate forces failed to hear the initial artillery that seemingly should have been very noticeable so after 5 30 a.m. some of the Union troops were in range of Confederates who were called largely unprepared on the Union right flank the artillery under the command of Captain James Totten started firing on some of the Confederate cavalry from the Missouri State Guard and the Union infantry sending their own volleys of musket fire the advantage of surprise though is countered by the fact that the Union aim was poor only two Confederates were killed in this barrage with the Southern leaders caught off guard the junior officers had to make their own independent decisions as to how to react to the Union attack this meant that without central command dictating troop position the Confederate forces would not necessarily be very strategically divided around the battlefield to meet the Union's various divisions of soldiers but because of their superior numbers this potential problem amounted to very little as the Southerners jumped into action numerous regiments of infantry moved forward to face the Union front supported by a small number of cavalry and artillery and they were able to successfully stop the Union advance other forces moved into place to meet the Union left flank as the Confederates moved in place to stop the Union advance Lion maneuvered his troops so that he had a frontline set up on Bloody Hill of around 2800 men nearly half his force by 6 30 a.m. having called his rear line up from the short farm to join the line being consolidated at the top of the hill although the Confederate reaction was still lagging behind the Union organization Sterling Price by this time was starting to organize his men at the base of the hill many of the southern volunteers were unarmed so they were ordered to stay in the rear but most of them refused choosing instead to hold firm on the front line where they could retrieve a weapon from a fallen comrade and maintain the fight these men the unarmed infantry were under the command of John T. Hughes who is also a great example of the type of person that often gets overlooked in the classification of civil war and antebellum figures he was a slave owner and a native Southerner but he was also a former wig and a Unionist who opposed Missouri's secession even after Lincoln's call for 75000 troops it wasn't until Nathaniel Lyon took his army into Camp Jackson in St. Louis and then ceremoniously marched his prisoners through the streets of the Unionist city leading to the St. Louis massacre which I talked about a few episodes ago that Hughes became a secessionist as well as a vocal critic of both Lyon and President Lincoln so when we're trying to understand why southern men thought for the confederacy these kinds of motivations are very relevant by 6 30 price had roughly 2000 men as well as one battery of artillery meeting Lyon's front line on the far other side of the battlefield Fran Siegel watched the Confederates scramble chaotically to react to the start of the battle at 5 30 a.m. the soldiers with him were amused by the sight of the confused Confederates as the Confederates tried to organize the lack of discipline became quickly apparent the men had been ordered to sleep with their firearms but many of them ignored this order other men were already awake but they'd wandered off in search of breakfast Siegel and his men started to move in with their own attack hoping to exploit the Southern Disorder as they started to come under fire some of the Confederates panicked and fled never rejoining the battle one volunteer BL Thomas had chained and pat locked his horse to a tree the night before and he tried to get the animal unlocked but he was panicking under the Union fire and he finally gave up and fled leaving the horse chained to the tree in the wigfall cavalry company D the commander Stephen Hale later wrote about two of his volunteers who had earned a reputation for their braggadocio behavior constantly talking about all the things they would do to the Yankees when they finally got to fight them but as company D started to move towards Siegel's artillery the two braggarts suddenly started singing a different tune captain Hale they cried where must we go we are sick go to hell you damned cowards Hale replied you were the only two fighting men I had until now we are in battle and you are both sick I don't care where you go the element of surprise created a decided advantage for Siegel the Confederates here had the advantage of numbers but their ability to defend against the attack was weakened by the disorder and confusion of the men as the various companies tried to form with whatever men could be found officers took command of forces that weren't their own for the time being just to establish some semblance of order for the time since not every regimental leader was near his men Colonel Elkhana Greer's adjutant Matthew Ector was busy trying to locate his 13 year old son who had wandered somewhere around Sharps farm prior to the attack forcing Greer's cavalry regiment to be split up and partially put under the command of other officers the entire Confederate situation was a mess not far away from Greer's regiment the first Arkansas mounted rifles and the first Arkansas cavalry were camped out in the open completely exposed to Siegel's opening fire as cannonballs started throwing up dirt around them the men scattered many of them abandoned their horses and left the battle completely never returning to the fight some stayed on horseback and even though they fled as well they did return to the battle but it was more than an hour before these two Arkansas regiments were able to even partially reform even where the men remain disciplined many of the horses were so upset by the explosions going off around them that mounted regiments had difficulty organizing with their animals all in all Siegel's surprise attack was very effective in dealing with the Confederate numerical advantage as the ability to respond to the bombardment was sporadic disorganized and cut down by missing and disorganized soldiers from the early portion of the battle as the Union men pressed against the Confederates they came across quite a few soldiers who were by now too demoralized to give any resistance when they were taken prisoner more than 100 prisoners were taken and as they came upon the abandoned Confederate camps with breakfast still cooking in the fires they also found a wagon full of rifles muskets and sabers and we can only speculate as to why these weapons had never been distributed to some of the unarmed Confederates by 8 a.m Siegel had broken the Confederate line and forced the Southerners to retreat toward Nathaniel Lions frontline had taken prisoners and had found some much needed weapons all with an outnumbered force on the Union left the infantry regulars who were under the command of Captain Joseph Plummer were delayed as they tried to cross Wilson Creek by the way the creek itself is called Wilson Creek but the early records of the battle referred to it as Wilson's Creek with the possessive form and that name stuck so you'll hear the battle referred to as the Battle of Wilson's Creek but the creek itself is called Wilson Creek in case any of that seems confusing or inconsistent in any case Wilson Creek was shallow enough to cross but the men picked a particularly poor spot to wade through they were held up when they ran into in the words of one soldier quote a jungle of willows and reeds and had to push and pull each other through our shoes being filled with water and sand end quote so much for their advantage of surprise as this delay gave the Confederate responders plenty of time to organize on the other side of the creek when the Union soldiers finally made it out of the creek they found themselves in a cornfield and they were moving up hill so they didn't exactly have a very good view of what they were moving toward before they were out of the cornfield they were already facing Confederate fire and they couldn't even see the shooters the Confederate bullets clipped at the corn around them but the soldiers were unharmed we don't actually know who fired at them but it was probably just a scattering of Confederate soldiers at this point rather than any kind of organized attack but by the time they reached the middle of the cornfield they could see a small battery of four Confederate cannons led by Captain William Woodruff and they started to move directly toward it the Union men fired as they moved with the first Confederate artillery casualty coming when a mini-ball cut through a young lieutenant right where his chest met with his right arm nearly tearing his arm completely off and leaving him mortally wounded Woodruff sent word to General McCulloch that the Union was attacking from the east when McCulloch received Woodruff's message he was trying to deal with the Union forces under Siegel attacking from the south near Sharps farm but he immediately sent the second Arkansas mounted rifles a regiment of Arkansas infantry volunteers and the third Louisiana infantry regiment to reinforce Woodruff before turning back to the matter of Siegel's attack but the Louisianans and Arkansas troops quickly made their way to Woodruff's position to reinforce him the Arkansas volunteers are interesting by the way they served under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Dandridge McCray and they were some of the most poorly equipped Confederate soldiers they had antiquated firearms and they had no tents or blankets so they were forced to sleep on the ground completely exposed to the elements but McCray was strict and he said that he would quote unquote shoot like a dog any of his men that dared to even utter any kind of word against a woman let alone loot anybody's property nonetheless he commanded their respect and by the Battle of Wilson's Creek they were one of the most disciplined group of volunteers in the Confederate army and they were fiercely loyal to McCray as they started to move past Woodruff's battery the southern reinforcements could see the Union men on the other side of the fence that marked the edge of the cornfield they set up against the fence to use it as cover from the Union gunfire but accompanying the third Louisiana was a stray dog they'd adopted and named Sergeant and he ran down the line barking while the Louisianans tried to call for him to come back where it was safe but it was to no avail as they saw him take a Union bullet killing the poor dog on the spot one of the soldiers in the third Louisiana said that he was quote the victim of his own fearless temerity end quote the Union soldiers were ordered to lie down but this was easier said than done as reloading a musket was far more difficult to do while lying on your belly even while lying on the ground several Northerners took bullets as his men faced a swarm of musket fire from the Confederates plumber remained standing walking back and forth among the men encouraging them quote keep cool my boys you are doing well you are mowing them down end quote this isn't unlike Stonewall Jackson's bravery at Bull Run which as I mentioned then was part of the training for officers at West Point and like it did with Jackson plumber's willingness to face fire had the desired effect of encouraging his men one of his men later said quote in the beginning we felt nervous and confused like anyone suddenly exposed a danger but we became warmed up with the excitement and most of the men acted as if they had found an agreeable employment end quote but as the skirmish continued the Union soldiers began to fight amongst themselves the men in front started to complain that their cheeks were being burned by the gunfire of their comrades behind them other soldiers helped themselves to the ramrods left on the ground by others and failed to return them leaving some people without the ability to load their own weapons they also had an oversized estimate of the opposing force with one Union soldier writing a letter to his sister after the battle telling her that he faced a force of around 6000 Confederates while fighting in the cornfield all of this along with the predictable casualties of battle chipped away at the good spirits of plumber's men the Confederates faced their own discouragement one volley of Union fire took a dozen Louisiana's at least according to one of the men who witnessed it men were being shot down before they could even get into position to fire back at one point the smoke was so thick from the gunfire that both sides stopped shooting at the same time and started yelling taunts to each other instead finally colonel James Macintosh commander of the second Arkansas mounted rifles ordered his men and those of the third Louisiana to charge but since the order came from a commander other than their own the Louisiana's fell to join the charge and in the confusion of battle only about half of Macintosh's own Arkansas troops apparently heard the order and convinced the charge as well but at the edge of the cornfield there were now roughly 900 Confederates facing only 300 Union men plumber had two cavalry regiments with him but for whatever reason he had ordered the cavalry to stay back in the cornfield where they were unable to join the fight and potentially even the odds so even with the bungled charge the Confederates were able to overwhelm the Yankees at the side of the charging Confederates the federal started a retreat a handful of men stayed and met with the Southerners in close combat one Louisiana named Bob Henderson was taken down by the butt of a Union musket but while his attacker tried to flee Henderson was able to recover and shoot him in the back another Confederate sergeant Watson tried to take the flag from a Union soldier only to receive a slice to his wrists from the man's saber but as Watson wrote later quote I closed with him but found the poor fellow was already sorely wounded and he fell fainting to the ground still holding on to the flag end quote as the Union retreated back through the cornfield the Confederates followed pursuing them all the way to the other side this put them dangerously close to the Union left flank and the only thing that prevented them from pressing the attack was artillery fire that had been positioned as part of lion's front line but was now turned to cover plumber's retreat the cannon fire effectively prevented the Confederate pursuit for most of these men this was their first time facing cannon fire as I illustrated in the opening anecdote many of these men had probably never even seen a cannon until very recently and although the artillery only took out two Southerners the explosions going off around them must have been terrifying and the Southerners beat a hasty retreat moving once again through the cornfield which was now littered with dead and injured soldiers from both sides seagull had won a quick victory on the south side of the battle and even though the Confederates had won their skirmish on the Union left flank they were prevented from carrying their attack up the east side of bloody hill where lions still held a large front line while plumber and seagull were fighting their own small scale battles lion remained on bloody hill holding the front line and around 6 30 a.m. they had about 2800 men and six cannons and seagull's attack from the other side of the Confederates was going very well driving panicking Confederates either away from the battle altogether or right into the consolidated Union forces at the top of bloody hill at the bottom of the hill sterling price was doing everything he could to rally his own men like those Southerners who were facing seagull's attack not far away many of the men here were in a panic as they faced their first real battle some had been involved in the previous skirmishes at carthage boonville or dug springs but even those who did probably only saw a few minutes of fighting so wilson's creek was an entirely new game for them but enough of the men held their ground and price was able to form a line of 2000 Missouri state guardsmen to face lion from the bottom of the hill at this point lion cut his force in half sending about 1200 of his troops down the hill while holding the rest at the top the two regiments he sent were the first Missouri being the Missouri Unionists obviously under the command of lieutenant colonel George Andrews and several companies of the first Kansas under the command of colonel George Dietzler but lion didn't delegate leadership for the advance to either men so the two regiments moved with no coordination the first Missouri moving ahead of the first Kansas the lack of coordination in the advance effectively meant that lion's forces were divided even further since prices men had limited arms and ammunition price ordered them to hold their fire until the union soldiers were within close range the Southerners were ordered to wait until they could quote see the whites of their eyes then aim at their belt buckles end quote once they got close enough to the Confederates gunfire started erupting from all sides and men began to fall when one teenage volunteer named Robert Tanner took a bullet to his thigh his company sergeant tried to carry him off the field until Tanner yelled put me down put me down I want to kill some more Yankees as the Confederate captain Daniel McIntyre leader of the Callaway guards fell to a union bullet his first lieutenant John Haskins took command and seeing his troops bunch too close together he yelled quote scatter boys you are making a target for their cannon end quote but these were his last words as soon as he said this in a bitter vindication of his warning a cannonball shot through the Confederate line beheading two of his men and then nearly tearing him in half but even as the Callaway guards started to scatter one of their men passed by a severely wounded union officer who was begging for water the young Southerner didn't have any water but he did have a canteen of whiskey which he stopped on the battlefield to share with his enemy earning the thanks of the officer before he died one private who witnessed the act of kindness later wrote quote the man gently placed the captain's head on the ground stepped over him and with us who had stopped to watch the scene went on to renewed a murder end quote the fighting at the bottom of the hill continued for maybe half an hour before Lyon ordered the remaining companies from the first Kansas under the command of Dietzler subordinate officer John Halderman to go and reinforce the rest of the regiment Halderman remained horseback during the battle even when he ordered his men on their bellies to reduce their chances of being hit another example of an officer's bravery under fire to inspire his troops he also promised his men that any of them who died in battle would go straight to heaven but this promise was apparently less inspiring as one of his soldiers later wrote of this promise quote I had not made up my mind that I wanted to go that day end quote the men moved down the hill and joined the rest of their regiment as soon as they did Dietzler's first lieutenant suffered a mortal wound uttering his last words quote give it to them boys remember your promise to the Atchison folks never disgrace your town minutes later lieutenant Levant Jones was also killed after he took his bullet Jones turned to first Sergeant Joseph Guilford and told him Joe I am shot Guilford asked to where the wound was and Jones said he was shot in the hip but as he was saying this another bullet flew right by Guilford's head hitting Jones in the chest mercifully giving him a quick death the first Kansas would end the battle with the highest casualty rate of any regiment at Wilson's Creek and one of the highest casualty rates of any regiment during any battle in the entire war losing just over a third of their men this day while the first Kansas were dropping like flies on the southeast side of the hill Andrews in his first Missouri were on the southwest side of the hill where they found themselves facing general James McBride and the seventh division of the Missouri State Guard that he commanded this was probably the most undisciplined division of the Missouri State Guard and McBride himself had zero military experience previously earning his living as a circuit court judge as his men passed by another division of Missouri volunteers they received a mixture of ridicule and respect one soldier from the third division under the command of Charles Clark wrote quote I remember our boys laughing at their odd appearance all had deer rifles and they knew how to use them they couldn't stand in a straight line but all the shells that Totten's battery threw into them could not make them give back a step end quote when McBride came face to face with Andrews he was isolated from the rest of the Confederate line it was vulnerable and because he essentially represented the left flank of the southern line his vulnerability meant that the entire Confederate line was in a position to face a devastating attack from that side if McBride was driven back Andrews placed his men in position and started to move among them he later wrote about the moment quote as I passed each company I found it well up to its work both officers and men cool and determined using their arms with care and precision end quote the fighting between Andrews' Missouri Unionists and McBride's Missouri Confederates was fierce as the Union Colour Bear was killed Corporal Richard Cain picked up the flag and took over the regiment surgeon Dr. F. M. Cornyn broke procedure several times when he picked up the musket of a fallen soldier and fired on the enemy before returning to his duty of tending to the wounded while Andrews was riding around and encouraging his men his horse was shot and killed and when it fell it pinned him to the ground until several of his men were able to come and free him from the carcass at one point Captain Kerry Gratz saw a group of soldiers moving toward them holding a United States flag aloft the group led by a mounted officer this was confusing to Gratz at first because he wasn't sure if they were allies or not but they were members of the Missouri State Guard and it wasn't really that odd for them to carry a US flag and it wasn't really that odd for them to carry a US flag since technically they were still part of the Union but when Gratz realized who they were he pulled out his revolver and let off a shot knocking the officer off his horse the officer scrambled to his feet and ran to the rear of his men as Gratz fired a second shot after him and after the second shot the Confederates fired back hitting Gratz with five different bullets killing him but McBride's men held fast despite their lack of discipline and experience one soldier Lieutenant Ronaldo Barker was shot three times but he still refused to leave the battle continuing to wave his sword in the air and encourage his men while he had quote blood streaming down his face and body as one of his men later wrote the men without guns picked up weapons from the battlefield to contribute to the fight one soldier picking up a shotgun and laying into the Union soldiers until an enemy bullet knocked the ramrod from his hand and through his shirt barely missing his chest in pretty stark contrast to the men who fled the battle under seagulls attack McBride's men showed a pretty impressive degree of courage and managed to drive back Andrews and the Missouri Unionists seeing his advance failing Nathaniel Lyon ordered another regiment the second Kansas to advance and join the fight then he ordered the first Kansas to fix their bayonets and charge the enemy the Kansans had probably faced the worst of the fighting though and confusion and disorder had started to take over so only about 200 of them actually conducted the bayonet charge Deitzler led the charge and they caught the Southerners off guard pushing them back quite some distance but Deitzler suffered a wound that didn't kill him but did remove him from the battle it was only a small success for Lyon when Lyon called for the Kansans to fall back many of them couldn't hear the order and continued to move forward as they did they happened upon a group of gray clad soldiers that they assumed were part of seagulls force joining them from the south side of the battlefield in fact these men were from the fifth Missouri state guard infantry regiment under the command of James Clarkson but they themselves mistook the blue clad Kansans for a different division of their own army it wasn't until Deitzler's subordinate who is now in charge Powell Clayton noticed that the other soldiers the gray clad soldiers were all wearing red badges on their shoulder which let him know that they were confederates but he kept his poker face up and he ordered his men to move to the right putting some distance between the two groups this aroused the suspicion of Clarkson's adjudant Michael Buster who rode up to the Kansans and ordered them to identify themselves Clayton responded by pulling Buster off his horse and pressing his revolver against the man's chest he shouted to Buster now sir god damn you order your men not to fire on us or you are a dead man but while Clayton may have shown himself to be something of a badass Buster demonstrated that he wasn't going to be intimidated he looked back to see Clarkson who had obviously realized what was going on at this point turning the Southerners to face the Kansans and Buster said there sir is my colonel and with that the confederates let loose a volley at the Kansans Clayton fired his revolver point blank at Buster's chest and another man stuck him with his bayonet but both men were thrown off by the attack and neither of the wounds were enough to kill Buster Clayton then yelled for the Kansans to run for their lives as one soldier later put it and the men fled back up the hill Clarkson did not pursue them but they gained back the ground lost to the bayonet charge when the men of the second Kansans joined the fight many of them saw this as the culmination of the border war they'd been fighting since 1856 if you haven't listened to the episodes I did several months ago on bleeding Kansans you might enjoy the context that those episodes provide for the Kansans and Missouri soldiers fighting at Wilson's Creek one soldier wrote quote some thought of our once happy country of the institutions we were bound to perpetuate some thought of Kansas of the blood of brothers spilled in 56 during that short quick march we thought of everything but fear and defeat end quote one of the volunteers Robert Friedrich was only 14 years old and he was flabbergasted at the use of a language by his commander Thomas Sweeney as he encouraged his men give them hell boys give them hell Sweeney yelled aim at the damn scoundrels right below their belts give them hell I tell you Friedrich later wrote that Sweeney was quote the most hardened and reckless man I had ever known else he would not dare to use such profanity under circumstances so serious end quote the second Kansas took up against McBride's men as the first Missouri retreated back up the hill many of the men were using antiquated weapons old large bore flintlock muskets that had been altered so that they could fire buck and ball which was a cartridge that had one musket ball and then three buck shot making it work more like a shotgun hardly suitable for the long-range fighting that was just starting to become a thing during the civil war but right here on bloody hill these weapons were very effective during the close range combat the men of the second Kansas were able to keep McBride and his men from pursuing the Missouri Unionists up the hill it was now eight a.m. about the same time that Siegel was relishing in his early morning surprise victory around the abandoned Confederate camps but lion was struggling to hold the hill and he was waiting for Siegel to join them with still no word of what was going on with the German he didn't know it yet but the Union offensive was over from this point until the end of the battle lion and his men would be reacting to Confederate attacks we will pick up the story in the next episode historical controversies is a production of the ludwig von mesis institute if you would like to support the show please subscribe on itunes google play or stitcher and leave a positive review you can also support the show financially by donating at mesis.org slash support hc if you would like to explore the 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