Sycamore Promises

by Paul Colt

  “By playing the ends to the middle to your advantage. What leads you to betray that side to ours?”

  “Times change. With the election of that Negro sympathizer, it is time to choose a side. I believe I have more sympathies on the side of states’ rights than on the side of the bloody abolitionists.”

  “Curious the prospect of a little blood should turn you squeamish.”

  “There’s blood spilled on both sides. I simply feel more akin to the cause of free white men than the moralizing preachers of Negro equality.”

  “And so, you come to us with a warning. I should be grateful for that.”

  “Can I count on you to afford me sanctuary from Jayhawk retribution if I help you?”

  “You may. Now when is this raid to take place?”

  “Tonight.”

  “How many men?”

  “Five, not counting me, though I shall be with them to lead them into a trap of your making.”

  “Tonight . . . then we shall have to move swiftly. We’ve neighbors we can summon to assist. Come let’s ride over to Father’s farm and lay our plan.”

  Morgan Walker Farm

  When they arrived at the farm, they learned the elder Walker was away and not expected to return before evening. Armed neighbors answered Andrew’s call, beginning to arrive by late afternoon. Men were stationed in an outbuilding and at the side of the house where they had clear fields of fire in the area of the front yard and porch. As the sun drifted toward the horizon, Quantrill took his leave to rejoin the raiders. Morgan Walker returned home in lengthening purple shadow. Andrew greeted him on the front porch.

  “Andrew, what are you doing here?”

  “Mounting a defense, Father.”

  “Defense for what?”

  “The farm is to be raided tonight. Stewart’s Jayhawks plan to free your slaves.”

  “How do you know?”

  “A friend came in warning.”

  “How does this friend know?”

  “He rides with them.”

  “He rides with them, and you call him friend?”

  “He warned us, Father. He will lead them into our ambush.”

  “Where have you set this ambush?”

  “Johnson, Taylor, and Travis are there in the shed. Mather, Jethro, and Tucker are there.” He nodded to dark shadows beyond the end of the porch. “Now come inside, lest we give ourselves away.”

  “You’ve done well, Andrew. With luck, we shall kill them all.”

  “Not our friend. I’ve given my word.”

  “To a Jayhawker.”

  “He’s not a Jayhawker, Father. He is a man who has traveled between the sides of this dispute. With the election of the Negro sympathizer he has taken to our side.”

  “Can you be sure?”

  “I have his word on it. If he holds true to this plan, his life will be forfeit to the other side.”

  Cold rain drizzled out of a rumpled sky. The wagon creaked up the road to the Morgan Walker drive. Quantrill drew a halt. Lamp light could be seen in the windows across the front of the house.

  “We’ll ride on into the yard. Sedgwick, you and Dean stay with the wagon. Morrison, you’ll stand guard on the porch while Ball and Lipsey accompany me into the house. We will secure the occupants and undertake a search for the gold. When the situation is under control, Lipsey and Ball will handle the stock in the barn. Make sure you saddle horses for yourselves and Morrison. When Lipsey and Ball attend to the stable, that will be the signal to release the slaves and load them in the wagon. Is that understood?”

  The men nodded.

  “Good. Follow me.”

  Quantrill led the way up the drive to the house. He drew rein a few yards from the house and stepped down. Ball, Lipsey, and Morrison scrambled down from the wagon box. Morrison took his place at the porch step while Quantrill led the others up the steps. He rapped at the door. Andrew opened in response.

  “William, what brings you here at this hour?”

  Quantrill raised his gun. “We’ve come for your Negroes. Now inside.”

  Andrew stepped away from the door. Morgan Walker stood in the parlor, calm in the face of three armed intruders.

  “What is the meaning of this?”

  “We’ve come for your Negroes, your stock, and your gold.”

  “Have you asked my Negroes if any of them wish to go with you?”

  “We have. They do.”

  “See they are treated well. Now, if you take slaves to freedom, that would seem to satisfy your misguided moral purpose. Why must you take my stock and my money? That makes you little more than a common thief.”

  “Shut up, old man, and fetch the gold.”

  Walker pursed his lips in a frown. “This way.”

  Quantrill followed across a hall from the parlor to a library. Walker handed him a small chest.

  “You’ll find no gold in there.”

  “We need only the appearance. Now back to the parlor.”

  They rejoined Andrew and the other two raiders. “Gentlemen, have a seat.” Quantrill waved Andrew and his father to a settee with his gun. He turned to Ball and Lipsey. “We have the gold. I can see to these two. Now, off you go to the stock and the slaves.”

  The door no more than closed behind the two raiders when the night beyond blossomed a bouquet of muzzle flash and a tympani of small-arms reports. Morrison fell dead in the volley. Ball and Lipsey bolted for the wagon, trailed by blast and ball. Lipsey went down with an agonized scream. Dean wheeled the wagon and lashed the team for home.

  “Dean! Wait, man, for God’s sake!” Ball cried in vain.

  “Agh!” Lipsey rolled in the yard.

  Ball returned to his fallen friend. “Here let me help you. Can you make it to those trees?”

  Guttural groaning through clenched teeth accompanied his effort to rise.

  Ball encircled the man with a supporting arm and led a labored way across the yard to the shelter of brush.

  Dawn

  Fog muted early morning light. Ball and Lipsey made slow progress, pausing often for Lipsey to rest or staunch a wave of pain. At length he crumpled to his knees in the ditch beside the wagon road.

  “I can’t go no further, Ball. You go on.”

  “We’ve come this far. We’re only in need of a horse.”

  “Horse don’t do no good.” Lipsey coughed. “I couldn’t ride a lick.”

  They hid in a thicket a short way off the road.

  Morgan Walker led Andrew and his men out at first light. Quantrill rode along. Fresh blood left a trail leading west. Less than two miles from the farm it led to a thicket north of the road. Morgan Walker paused, full sun at their back.

  “You figure they holed up there, Father?” Andrew said.

  “Aye, that’s how I make it. Spread out lest they run for it.” He drew his revolver and rode on at a walk. Andrew and his men spread out in a line, advancing on the thicket. Quantrill followed the old man.

  The two fugitives huddled in the undergrowth. One blood spattered and ashen. The other drew his gun and rose at the riders’ approach.

  Morgan Walker leveled his Colt and shot Ball in the breast.

  Quantrill rode up to Lipsey and stepped down. The raider’s eye lit in recognition, realization, and alarm. Quantrill cocked his gun and blew out the light. His part in the affair would remain unknown.

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  * * *

  Sycamore

  January 29, 1861

  A warm, cheery fire crackled on the hearth, beating back bitter wind howling outside. Miriam folded the newspaper in her lap, studying her friend in thought.

  “It happen just like Missa Nichols said.”

  “It did.” Clare nodded.

  “We maybe had a little hand in that, too, didn’t we?”

  “We did. Kansas is admitted to the Union as a free state under a constitution that gives women a voice in some things.”

  “It’s a free state for black folks like me. ’Cept for
them fugitive slave laws.”

  “It’s a step in the right direction.”

  “I reckon it is. Be nice if all peoples got free. Be nice if women got even with menfolk.”

  “It would. These things take time. Not long ago women had no standing to own property. Now we do.”

  “White women do. Black folk can’t own no property. Dred Scott seen to that.”

  “That, too, will change. All in good time, my dear. All in good time.”

  “Newspaper says folks in the south is upset about us havin’ a free-state vote in the Senate. They say that comes on the heel of electing Massa Lincoln. Some’s talkin’ ’bout secs-cession.”

  “Secession.”

  “What’s that?”

  “They’re threatening to leave the Union.”

  Miriam gazed at the fire. “Them slave states do that, what happen to them fugitive slave laws?”

  “Good question.”

  “You think Massa Lincoln gonna put things to right?”

  Clare shrugged. “I think he will move things in the right direction. It’ll likely take time, but things do change for the right.” She added a log to the fire in a shower of sparks.

  “Paper says Massa Charles Robinson be our new governor and our Massa James Lane be senator now. I don’t know about Massa Robinson, but them slave-state folks ain’t gonna like Massa Lane much.”

  “Charles Robinson is a good man. James Lane . . . he’ll fight for what’s right.”

  “So it’s like you say, all in good time.”

  “All in good time.”

  Lawrence

  April, 1861

  A grave mood lay thick and dark on Eldridge House, matching the gray skies and chill spring drizzle outside. James Lane and Charles Robinson sat hunched in conversation.

  “News reports are scarce, telegrams terse,” Robinson said.

  “Aye, but the consequences plain enough. South Carolina has fallen. They are shelling Fort Sumter. The secession dam has broken. The south is in revolt.”

  “Not all as yet. The border states have yet to declare. That will be a dicey walk for Mr. Lincoln’s first test. Which brings us to our neighbor.”

  “And now we come to your test, Governor. What of Missouri? There is no shortage of slavery sentiment there as we well know.”

  Robinson gazed into the fire. “Have Missourians the conviction to leave the Union?”

  “That remains to be seen. Leave or not, we are bound to face another round of southern sympathies across our border.”

  “The president has begun calling for troops. I expect his call will come.”

  “My advice: make your response spare. Your counterpart in Missouri is raising a militia. His sympathies are well known. War will come to the West. When it does, westerners must be here to meet it.”

  “I agree, James. We must prepare. Your Jayhawks along with Montgomery and Jennison’s men must organize into our militia. Then we shall be ready, should Jackson and his ruffians come to call.”

  “Or we pay them a call.”

  “I’m not the military man you are, James. Diplomacy suggests we not provoke our neighbors’ southern sympathies. The bond of union may be sufficient to hold them in check.”

  “I defer to you in that, Governor, though I fear such thinking may prove wishful.”

  “It may. If it does, at least war should not be of our making.”

  Sycamore

  For a warm spring day, a somber mood hung over Sunday supper at the Mason house. Micah carved buffalo roast and passed the platter to Miriam.

  “Will it last long?” Clare asked.

  “Talk is the South will be whipped pretty quick,” Micah said. “I’m not so sure. With Virginia on Washington’s front doorstep, the capital is threatened by the mere outbreak of hostilities. We know how stubborn slaveholders can be.”

  “Gonna be a bloody fight,” Caleb said. “Pass the potatoes.”

  “We gonna have us a stake in it?” Miriam asked.

  “James Lane has put out his call to the Jayhawks. He’s raising a militia at Governor Robinson’s request.”

  “Den we gotta go,” Caleb said.

  “Not we. Me.”

  “I told Mr. Lane he could count on me.”

  “I know you did, and you meant it. But we need you here more. We can’t both go off to war. You need to stay by and take care of these womenfolk and the girls. War or no war, we still got a farm to run.”

  “Why me? I could just as well go an’ let you stay by.”

  “Time may come for that but not now.”

  “Why, cause I’m black?”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “I know you didn’t. Not everybody thinks like you.”

  “So you see my point. Our women and children need a man around. It’s every bit as important as runnin’ off chasin’ Johnny Rebs.”

  “Why does anybody have to go?” Clare said.

  “We’ve known for a long time slavery was headed for bloodshed. Now it’s come. The South picked this fight. Freedom lovin’ folks can’t just walk away. I have to go.”

  The table fell silent for a spell.

  Clare rose. “There’s apple pie for dessert.”

  Once more dark clouds gather on the horizon, threatening the season’s tranquility. Plantings succumb to matters of worldly weight. Thunder rumbles in the east. Lightning flash sizzles. Powder burns. Plow shears set aside to favor saber and ball. Men rally to furled standards. They march. They ride. They engage in blood, death, and tears. She spread her shelter over hearth and land and hopes in prayer.

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  * * *

  Sycamore

  July, 1861

  James Lane galloped up the wagon road to the Mason place, trailing a dun dust cloud into a sun-washed pale-blue sky. He swung down in the yard, pushed back his hat, and mopped a sweat-soaked forehead on his sleeve. Micah stepped onto the porch, drawn by the sound of the lathered horse.

  “What is it, James?”

  “I’m afraid it’s time, Micah. Missouri militia clashed with the federal garrison at the St. Louis Armory. The Missouri legislature has declared a state of emergency. Governor Jackson has called out the Missouri Guard and placed Major General Sterling Price in command. General Nathaniel Lyon, federal commander in Missouri, has called for volunteers. He’s preparing to march south to put down the rebellion.”

  “That sounds like a Missouri fight.”

  “If only it were. We know, given the chance, those bushwhackers will turn on Kansas. We already hear reports that Confederate forces under General McCulloch are marching north to support Price. This is the beginning of the war in the West, and it starts with a Confederate land grab. Governor Robinson has commissioned me to organize a Kansas brigade. I’m calling out my men, as are Jennison and Montgomery. Are you with us, Micah?”

  “I am.”

  “Good. We rally in Lawrence in two days’ time for the march east to join General Lyon. Now, if you’ve water for my horse, I must be off to call the rest of my men.”

  Lawrence

  Micah sat at Lane’s side astride a long-legged bay gelding Lane loaned him after appointing him his aide. He surveyed the ragtag formation drawn up on a steamy summer morning. Fifteen hundred strong, the Kansas brigade stood ready to ride. Micah knew little of military training and tactics, but to call these recruits “irregulars” seemed more than too kind. Still, they assembled in high spirits embellished by noble purpose, confident they would be victorious under the command of General James Lane.

  “Are we fit for battle, General?”

  Lane lifted a thick brow. “Perceptive question, Micah. If you ask me as a dispassionate observer, I say no. If you ask me as their commanding officer, I say they better be. Let’s ride.”

  Ride they did. One-hundred-seventy-five miles southeast to join Lyon’s column five days later at Lebanon, northeast of Springfield.

  Morristown, Missouri

  July, 1861

 
Jennison paced the thicket like a caged animal. His men lounged among the trees, smoking, dozing, or talking softly. He sent an advance man into town to give him the lay of the place. All he had to show for it thus far was sweat, air thick with humidity, and biting flies. Pacing shed his frustration and gave pretense to keeping the flies at bay. He’d been warned not to ride into Morristown blind. Price was known to be farther north, but persistent reports said Confederate forces were moving north to support him.

  Movement on the road to town brought him up short. A rider trotted up the road. Finally, some word to report. The man known only as Ames drew rein and stepped down.

  “They’s there, Cap’n. Regular reb cavalry looks company strength. Likely an advance of the larger force we keep hearin’ about.”

  “No more than a company?”

  “If they’s any more, they got ’em hid good.”

  Jennison gave a sardonic smile. “Where are they?”

  “The green on the town square makes a natural campground for horses and men. I expect the officers is billeted in the hotel on the square.”

  “All right, boys, saddle up.”

  Jennison divided his men into three columns, approaching the town from the north, east, and west. Rebel pickets sounded the alarm, firing and falling back. The town square exploded in a frenzy as troopers scrambled to horse. Jennison led his column into town from the north. They encountered rear-guard resistance from reinforced pickets retreating house to house toward the square. His rear element rounded up livestock, food, and munitions, torching the town as they followed the captain’s advance to the town square.

  The east and west columns halted at their respective edges of town, awaiting the rebel retreat. The Confederates mounted, abandoning stores, tents, and bedrolls. The commander led his men south out of town, signaling Jennison’s east and west columns to close on his retreat.

  The north column secured the town center and rounded up elements of the rear guard abandoned in retreat. They continued sacking, looting, and burning the town until the east and west columns returned from routing the Confederate main body.