Sterling Price Sterling Price ( September 20 , 1809September 29 , 1867 ) was a lawyer , planter , and politician from the U . S . state of Missouri , who served as the 11th Governor of the state from 1853 to 1857 . He also served as a United States Army brigadier general during the Mexican - American War , and a Confederate Army major general in the American Civil War . Price is best known for his victories in New Mexico and Chihuahua during the Mexican conflict , and for his losses at the Battles of Pea Ridge and Westport during the Civil War – the latter being the culmination of his ill - fated Missouri Campaign of 1864 . Following the war , Price took his remaining troops to Mexico rather than surrender , unsuccessfully seeking service with the Emperor Maximillian there . He ultimately returned to Missouri , where he died in poverty and was buried in St . Louis . Early life and career . Sterling " Old Pap " Price was born near Farmville , in Prince Edward County , Virginia , into a family of Welsh origin . His mother was Elizabeth Williamson , and his father was Pugh Price , whose ancestor John Price was born in Brecknock , Wales , in 1584 and settled in the Virginia Colony . Price attended Hampden - Sydney College in 1826 and 1827 , where he studied law and worked at the courthouse near his home . He was admitted to the Virginia bar and established a law practice . In the fall of 1831 , Price and his family moved to Fayette , Missouri . A year later , he moved to Keytesville , Missouri , where he ran a hotel and mercantile . On May 14 , 1833 , Price married Martha Head from Randolph County , Missouri . They had seven children , five of whom survived to adulthood ; Edwin Williamson , Herber , Celsus , Martha Sterling , and Quintus . During the Mormon War of 1838 , Price served as a member of a delegation sent from Chariton County , Missouri to investigate reported disturbances between Latter Day Saints and anti - Mormon mobs operating in the western part of the state . His report was favorable to the Mormons , stating that they were not guilty , in his opinion , of the charges levied against them by their enemies . Following the Mormon capitulation in November 1838 , Price was ordered by Missouri governor Lilburn Boggs to Caldwell County with a company of men to protect the Saints from further depredations following their surrender . He was elected to the Missouri State House of Representatives from 1836 – 1838 , and again from 1840 – 1844 , and was chosen as its speaker . He was then elected as a Democrat to the 29th United States Congress , serving from March 4 , 1845 , to August 12 , 1846 , when he resigned from the House to participate in the Mexican - American War . Mexican - American War . Price raised the Second Regiment , Missouri Mounted Volunteer Cavalry and was appointed its colonel on August 12 , 1846 . He marched his regiment with that of Alexander Doniphan to Santa Fe , where he assumed command of the Territory of New Mexico after his superior , Gen . Stephen W . Kearny , departed for California . Price served as military governor of New Mexico , where he put down the Taos Revolt , an uprising of Native Americans and Mexicans in January 1847 . President James K . Polk promoted Price to brigadier general of volunteers on July 20 , 1847 . Price was named as military governor of Chihuahua that same month , and commanded 300 men from his Army of the West at the Battle of Santa Cruz de Rosales on March 16 , 1848 , where he defeated a Mexican force three times his size . The battle was the last battle of the war , taking place days after the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo had been ratified by the United States Congress on March 10 . Although reprimanded by Secretary of War William L . Marcy for his action and ordered to return with his army to New Mexico , Price was never court - martialed or otherwise punished ; he was honorably discharged on November 25 , 1848 , and went home to Missouri a hero . Governor of Missouri . Back in his home state , Price became a slave owner , and farmed tobacco on the Bowling Green prairie . Popular due to his war service , he was easily elected Governor of Missouri in 1852 , serving from 1853 to 1857 . During his tenure , Washington University in St . Louis was established , the state ' s public school system was restructured , the Missouri State Teachers Association was first initiated , the railroad network was expanded and a state geological survey was created . Although the state legislature passed an act during his tenure to increase the governor ' s salary , he refused to accept any more remuneration than he had been receiving prior to the law ' s adoption . After the expiration of his term , Price became the state ' s Bank Commissioner from 1857 to 1861 . He also secured construction of a railroad through his home county , which now forms part of the Norfolk and Western Railway . Civil War service . Early months . At the beginning of the Civil War , Price was personally opposed to secession . He was elected presiding officer of the Missouri State Convention on February 28 , 1861 , which voted against the state leaving the Union . Things changed drastically , however , when Francis Preston Blair , Jr . and Brig . Gen . Nathaniel Lyon seized the state militia ' s Camp Jackson at St . Louis . Outraged by this act , Price threw in his lot with the Southerners , and was assigned by pro - Confederate Governor Claiborne Fox Jackson to command the newly reformed Missouri State Guard in May 1861 , leading his young recruits ( who affectionately nicknamed him " Old Pap " ) in a campaign to secure Missouri for the Confederacy . One of the major engagements in this endeavor was fought at Lexington , where Price defeated Colonel James A . Mulligan ' s Union force in the " battle of the hemp bales " and secured the city for the South — albeit only temporarily , as it turned out . An even greater victory was won by Price at the Battle of Wilson ' s Creek , August 10 , 1861 , which resulted in Lyon ' s death and temporary Confederate ascendancy in southwestern Missouri . However , growing Union numbers and power in the state ultimately negated his triumph . Pea Ridge , Iuka , and Corinth . Still operating as a Missouri militia general ( rather than as a commissioned Confederate officer ) , Price was unable to agree with his Wilson ' s Creek colleague , Brigadier General Benjamin McCulloch , as to how to proceed following the battle ; this led to the splitting of what might otherwise have become a sizable Confederate force in the West . Price and McCullough became bitter rivals , leading to the ultimate appointment of Maj . Gen . Earl Van Dorn as overall commander of the Trans - Mississippi district . Van Dorn reunited Price ' s and McCullough ' s formations into a force he named the Army of the West , and set out to engage Unionist troops in Missouri under the command of Brig . Gen . Samuel R . Curtis . Now under Van Dorn ' s command , Price was commissioned in the Confederate States Army as a major general on March 6 , 1862 . Outnumbering Curtis ' s forces , Van Dorn attacked the Northern army at Pea Ridge on March 7 – 8 . Although wounded in the fray , Price pushed Curtis ' s force back at Elkhorn Tavern on the March 7 , only to see the battle lost on the following day after a furious Federal counterattack . Price next crossed the Mississippi River to reinforce Gen . P . G . T . Beauregard ' s army at Corinth , Mississippi . Price was able to seize the Union supply depot at nearby Iuka , but was driven back by Maj . Gen . William S . Rosecrans at the Battle of Iuka on September 19 , 1862 . A few weeks later , on October 3 – 4 , Price ( under Van Dorn ' s command once more ) was defeated with Van Dorn at the Second Battle of Corinth . Van Dorn was replaced by Maj . Gen . John C . Pemberton , and Price , who had become thoroughly disgusted with Van Dorn and was eager to return to Missouri , obtained a leave to visit Richmond , the Confederate capital . There , he obtained an audience with Confederate President Jefferson Davis to discuss his grievances , only to find his own loyalty to the South sternly questioned by the Confederate leader . Price only barely managed to secure Davis ' s permission to return to Missouri — minus his troops . Unimpressed with the Missourian , Davis pronounced him " the vainest man I ever met . " Arkansas and Louisiana . Price was not finished as a Confederate commander , however . He contested Union control over Arkansas in the summer of 1863 , and while he won some of his engagements , he was not able to dislodge Northern forces from the state . In early 1864 , Confederate General Edmund Kirby - Smith , in command of the Western Louisiana campaign , ordered General Price in Arkansas to send all of his infantry to Shreveport . Confederate forces in the Indian Territory were to join Price in the endeavor . General John B . Magruder in Texas was instructed to send infantry toward Marshall , Texas , west of Shreveport . General St . John R . Liddell was instructed to proceed from the Ouachita River west toward Natchitoches . With a force of five thousand , Price reached Shreveport on March 24 . However , Kirby - Smith detained the division and divided it into two smaller ones . He hesitated to send the men south to fight Union General Nathaniel P . Banks , whom he believed outnumbered the Confederate forces , a decision which drew the opposition of General Richard Taylor . But the western campaign was nearing its conclusion . Price ' s Missouri Raid . Despite his disappointments in Arkansas and Louisiana , Price managed to convince his superiors to permit him to invade Missouri in the fall of 1864 , hoping to yet seize that state for the Confederacy or at the very least imperil Abraham Lincoln ' s chances for reelection that year . Confederate General Kirby Smith agreed , though he was forced to detach the infantry brigades originally detailed to Price ' s force and send them elsewhere , thus changing Price ' s proposed campaign from a full - scale invasion of Missouri to a large cavalry raid . Price amassed 12 , 000 horsemen for his army , and fourteen pieces of artillery . The first major engagement in Price ' s Raid occurred at Pilot Knob , where he successfully captured the Union - held Fort Davidson but needlessly slaughtered many of his men in the process , for a gain that turned out to be of no real value . From Pilot Knob , he swung west , away from St . Louis ( his primary objective ) and toward Kansas City , Missouri and nearby Fort Leavenworth , Kansas . Forced to bypass his secondary target at heavily - fortified Jefferson City , Price cut a swath of destruction across his home state , even as his army steadily dwindled due to battlefield losses , disease , and desertion . Although he defeated inferior Federal forces at Glasgow , Lexington , the Little Blue River and Independence , Price was ultimately boxed in by two Northern armies at Westport , located in today ' s Kansas City , and forced to fight against overwhelming odds . This unequal contest , known afterward as " The Gettysburg of the West " , did not go his way , and he was forced to retreat into hostile Kansas . A new series of defeats followed , as Price ' s battered and broken army was pushed steadily southward towards Arkansas , and then further south into Texas , where Price remained until the war ended . Price ' s Raid would prove to be his last significant military operation , and the last significant Confederate campaign west of the Mississippi . Notable battles . Some of Price ' s notable battles during the Civil War include ( listed in order of occurrence , and indicating whether he was in overall command and where the battle was won or lost ) : Post - war activities . Instead of surrendering at the war ' s end , Price led what was left of his army into Mexico , where he unsuccessfully sought service with the Emperor Maximilian . This episode of Price ' s life later became an inspiration for the John Wayne and Rock Hudson film " The Undefeated " . Price became leader of a Confederate exile colony in Carlota , Veracruz , but when the colony proved to be a failure , he returned to Missouri . While in Mexico Price started having severe intestinal problems , which grew worse in August 1866 when he contracted typhoid fever . Impoverished and in poor health , Price died of cholera ( or " cholera - like symptoms " ) in St . Louis , Missouri . The death certificate listed the cause of death as " chronic diarrhea " . Price ' s funeral was held on October 3 , 1867 in St . Louis , at the First Methodist Episcopal Church ( on the corner of Eighth and Washington ) , and the funeral precession , with his body carried by a black hearse drawn by six matching black horses , was the largest funeral precession in St . Louis up to that point . He was buried in Bellefontaine Cemetery . Modern assessment of Price ' s Missouri campaign . In his paper " Assessing Compound Warfare During Price ' s Raid " , written as a thesis for the U . S . Army Command and General Staff College , Major Dale E . Davis postulates that Price ' s Missouri Raid failed primarily due to his inability to properly employ the principles of " compound warfare " , which requires an inferior power to effectively utilize regular and irregular forces in concert ( such as was done by the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong against the French and Americans during the Vietnam War ) to defeat a superior army . He also blamed Price ' s slow rate of movement during his campaign , and the close proximity of Confederate irregulars to his regular force , for this outcome . Davis observes that by wasting valuable time , ammunition and men in his relatively meaningless assaults on Fort Davidson , Glasgow , Sedalia and Boonville , Price offered Union General Rosecrans time he might not otherwise have had to organize an effective response . Furthermore , he says , Price ' s insistence on guarding an ever - expanding wagon train of looted military supplies and other items ultimately became " an albatross to [ his ] withdrawal " . Price , said Davis , ought to have used Confederate bushwhackers to harass Federal formations , forcing the Unionists to disperse significant numbers of troops to pursue them over wide ranges of territory — which in turn would have reduced the number of effectives available to fight against Price ' s main force . Instead , Price kept many guerrilla s close to his army , even incorporating some into his ranks , largely negating the value represented by their mobility and small , independent formations . This in turn allowed Union generals to ultimately concentrate a force large enough to trap and defeat Price at Westport , effectively ending his campaign . While the scope of Davis ' research is necessarily limited to Price ' s Missouri expedition , it does provide some overall insight into his tactical and strategic mindset , together with a sense of some of his strengths and weaknesses as a general . While devoted to the Southern cause , Price generally saw Confederate military operations solely in terms of liberating his home state of Missouri . Although he achieved victories during all phases of the war , his strategically most important battles ( other than Wilson ' s Creek ) all ended in defeat . The CSS / USS General Sterling Price . During the Civil War , a wooden river steamer built at Cincinnati , Ohio , in 1856 as the " Laurent Millaudon " was taken into Confederate service and renamed the " CSS General Sterling Price " . Participating in actions near Fort Pillow , Tennessee on May 10 , 1862 , she damaged two Federal gunboats before being temporarily put out of action . The " General Price " was sunk during the Battle of Memphis , raised , repaired , and served in the Union Navy under the name " USS General Price " although she was still referred to as the " General Sterling Price " in Federal dispatches . As a Union ship , she served in the Vicksburg and Red River campaigns . " Price " was sold for civilian use after the war .