The National tribune. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1877-1917, 1895-10-03
OLD GUERRILLA DAYS.
Kansas Fighter Tells of 0uantren and
His Fiends.

OLD GUERRILLA DAYS.
A Kansas Fighter Tells of 0uantren and
His Fiends.
EDITOR NATIONAL TRIBUNE: In your
| issue of July % | found an intensely Inter
esting article on the guerrilla war on the
Missouri border, written by my old friend
and army comrade, Wiley Britt0n, 9th Kan.
Cav. 1t was my privilege to be acquainted
with him at Fort Smith, Ark, during the
| years 1S63-'64 where we were on detached
service at Headquarters of Frontier Division,
Seventh Army Corps, under Gen. McNeal,
and afterwards under Gen. John M. Thayer.
During this time he kept daily diary of
events, but lost many of his valuable manu-
scripts at Fort Smith when the Arkansas
expedition, under Thayer, started southeast
to reinforce Gen. Steeles army, leaving Col.
Judson to hold Fort Smith with 9th Kan.
| Cav. and some other forces.
Britton was native of southwest Mis-
souri,, where anarchy and confusion then
regned supreme, caused largely by guerril-
| las of the most violent and desperate char
acter, who conducted their operations along
the border-line of Counties up TO the Mis-
souri, River. Their principal leaders were
Quantrell, Bill Anderson, Todd, Livingston,
| and other minor leaders whom the writer
remembers.
So, the genus homo known as the guerrilla
was not mythical person, but living re-
atty, as Britton and myself well know.
The western border Counties of Missouri to
| this day carry the marks of the devastation
caused by this gentry at the time when
"war spread its wide desolation."
After he terrible affair at Lawrence, Kan,
in the Summer of 1863, Gen. Lane, who had
escaped their clutches, rallied force with
marvellous rapidity, and pursued Quantrell
and his gang 10 their retreats on the Sni
Bar and the Blue, in Jackson County, Mo-
/ was at that time member of the Paola
| Home Guards, who performed active duty
on tie border and assisted in the pursuit and
expulsion OF these desperadoes " from the
sac ed soil of Kansas" as Gen. Lane ex
pressed ii.
was well acquainted with Charles Will
| liam Quantrell, the leader of them all, as
early as 1859, when he was acting as De-
partment Superintendent of Schools in the
absence of II. NJ. Hughes, then County
Superintendent of Miami County, Kan, and
examined Quautrell, who stood an excellent
| examination, so the writer gave him a first
class certificate He taught term at STAN
ton Kan four miles from Osawatomie of
John Brown fame.
His picture is wildly photographed in
my memory. He was of light complexion,
blue eyes that seemed at times TO change to
gray, restless in his manner yet of good adj
dress and gentle bearing; or, as SHAKESPEARE
puts ii, "He was mild a hammered man
as ever scuttled ship or cut throat"
He gave no signs then of the desperate
character he proved to be after be fled from
Kansas and joined and led the guerrillas in
Missouri and elsewhere until he was shot to
death at Smiley, KY.
/ have seen a book written by one J. Fl.
Edwards, called Guerrilla Warfare on the
Border This book extols the bravery of
all these Missouri desperadoes, and paints
pictures of their superhuman valor. 1t is
full OF exaggeratiOn, magnifying all their
exploits. Britton in his article hits it right
where he accounts for some of their victories
over raw militia, badly armed, or raw Re-
cruits.
Here is the philosophy of most Of the
guerrilla victories Well armed. Gen. Ben
Mccullough, Of Texas, who was killed at
Pea Ridge once said: take coward and
arm him well, and he will fight the world.
Arms make the brave man."
But this gentry met their Waterloo when,
under Quantrell's leadership, they took the
reins in their teeth and revolvers in both
hands, and made charge on Col. Burris's
troops, who were well drilled, near Kansas
City. Out of the 200, about 100 of their sad
dies were emptied. They were never very
quick to attack disciplined troops after that.
But want to write little more about
my old friend, Wiley Britton. When we
were at Headquarters in 1864, at Fort Smith,
Ark. Wiley went out with scouting party
down on the Boggy or the Canadian River,
west of that place, and fell afoul of rowing
regiment of Texas Rangers.
Shots were exchanged, and in the fracas
Wiley was hit in the wrist with a pistol
ball. He made good his escape along with
most of the party, and came back to Fort
Smith with his arm in sling. He suffered
intensely for a month or more. / advised
him to get discharge, as he was practically
disabled from the performance of his cleri-
cal duties at Headquarters. He reluctantly
consented, and, knowing that / had been q
disciple Of Blackstone, and had clerked for
a court-martial, and showed some symptoms
Of being a lawyer, i wrote out paper. 1t
went through the usual red-tape channels
from the Captain up to the Colonel. OBJ
tanned the certificate also of the Regimental
Surgeon, which was couched, of course, in
the technical terms descriptive of the in
jury.
Thus equipped, 1 took the papers to Gen.
Thayer in triumph. The General read over
the company and regimental Endorsements,
then remarked:
"Britton is most too valuable q man to
lose--a good man. But let me see the medi-
cal certificate"
showed it TO him. He read: Necrosis
Of the right radius of the forearm.
"Well," said lie, that's the d-dest term
for shot through the wrist ever heard of
Adiuiant, mark it granted."-SAMUEL ID.
IRWIN, Co. /, 10Th Kan, New Tionesta, Pa
A Fatal Aim.
John w. Ford, Dover, N. j., says he was
one of the men who put Gen. Sedgwick into
the ambulance when he was killed Mt Snott.