The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1899-03-04
QUANTRILL THE GUERILLA
IFrom the New York Snn-1

X AOAA4 Inc new L DIX
To the Editor of the Sun-Sir: 1t would
be difficult for me to tell the amount of
time have consumed during the last
thlrty-hve years in exposing the I'M
mitigated men of evil that ever
breathed-Charles William QuantrilI
Chat is the proper way of spelling the
name). the Missouri guerilla OF all
the tales, for pure, unadulterated mis-
representation, the story told by an old
MisSourian in the Sun, February 10. is
the most notable. This Missourian does
his best, or worst, to make QuantriI
hero, in the border ruffian style. But
he was not that. He was simply an
miugated. cauSelesS marauder, thief
and assassin, with the deSperado's cour-
age-thats all there is of it.
Il is said with truth that they
the Quantrin gang-'shot and hanged
and harried and burned over four
OF the states was Kansas Union
state to the core; the others were Mis-
souri,, Arkansas and Kentucky. two di-
Vided between the north and south,
while Arkansas was in the confederacy.
1t did not make much difference to
Quantrill where he did his numbering,
though he preferred to kill a Union
man. Your Missouri contributor says
Quantrin fought for the stars and
bars" but mot under them Yet L
have in my possession commission
signed by the Confederate president and
secretary of war which made the muir
derer a lieutenant colonel in a regi-
ment of partisan rangers" That is a
small matter, however, seeing that the
Confederate Generals Douglas and
Cooper and Sterling Price drove him
out of their lines The first did so be-
cause Quantrin entered them in 1862
red-handed from a butchery of Gen.
James G. Blunts escort near Bakers
Spring, Kan.
My special excuse for writing now is
the following, among other statements,
of the AIissOurian story teller, made
when he starts out to tell how it came
about that this man, Quantrill, a
quiet, unassuming country schoolmas-
ter. of literary taste, developed into
red-handed monster" etc. Our MiSsou-
ri friends, having been painted pretty
black because of their own actions from
1854 to 1860 along the line and over the
border of Kansas have been kept busy
ever since in trying to show that an
unadulterated fiend had some justif1able
motive for his villainies because of
wrong done to him by some Kansas
free man or men. There is not a grain
of truth in any such yarn, and in say
ing that L am by no means seeking to
show how spotless all of the Kansas
boys were because they happened to be
on the right side. 1t was said by this
AIissourian that Quantrill was born in
Maryland and lived in Cleveland, o.,
till he was 16; that he had older
brother in Kansas, and that this broth
er sent for the coming guerilla in 1855
to go with him to California and was
murdered by Lanes men. All of this
is as true as the yarn that the border
butcher was ever a ''schoolmaster' and
of literary tastes" Here are the real
facts as to QuantrfI and Kansas. The
fellow came of a South Maryland fam
lily, who were mainly, by the way, on
the Union side during the civil war.
One of his cousins lives in Washington
and holds some small government place.
The guerilla was born, however, at
Canal Dover, Tuscarora county, Ohio.
1t was his father who was a school
master and possessed literary tastes.
The son first came to Kansas when
about II. At an Indian land sale he
hired himself out to a man in Paola,
which was the seat of the United States
land office, to do job of perjury. No
one was allowed to bid at these sales
but actual settlers To get around this
little houses were put together and
placed on wheels. A man occupied one
Of these houses on one lot, swore in his
title and then went to another lot and
did the same thing again. How many
0athS the boy took do not now remem-