最新杏吧原创

鈥淭he streets were alive with processions marching and countermarching, and musical with the sweet melody of many bands,鈥� wrote the Daily Missouri Democrat.

Somehow, the rival parades didn鈥檛 collide. That kind of luck wouldn鈥檛 keep.

The Daily Missouri Democrat was all for Abraham Lincoln, Republican for president. (In fine irony, the Missouri Republican newspaper backed Stephen Douglas, the Northern Democratic candidate and Lincoln鈥檚 old Illinois rival.)

最新杏吧原创, a city with Southern roots in a slave state, had tipped for the Union. German immigrants and transplant Yankee businessmen opposed slavery. While steamboats still linked 最新杏吧原创 to Dixie, railroads and bank credit tied its industrial future to the Northeast.

Pro-slavery sentiment remained strong in Missouri, which had just elected Claiborne Fox Jackson as governor. Jackson, a planter and slaveholder, had his heart in the South.

On Election Day, Lincoln narrowly carried 最新杏吧原创 with 40 percent of the vote 鈥� the same as his national result among four candidates. But he was a distant fourth statewide. Missouri went for Douglas, who still yearned to find a middle ground with the increasingly strident South.

As Southern states began seceding, Jackson called for a state convention to consider joining them. But voters overwhelmingly chose Unionist delegates, most of whom were slaveholders with little stomach for secession.

On March 4, Lincoln鈥檚 inauguration day, delegates met at the Mercantile Library, 510 Locust Street. They voted decisively against joining the rebellion.

Jackson鈥檚 intrigues then turned toward seizing the large inventory of weapons at the federal arsenal on the Mississippi River at Arsenal Street.

Events unfolded quickly. Congressman Francis Blair Jr., Lincoln鈥檚 point man in 最新杏吧原创, gathered his armed marching club, the Wide Awakes 鈥� many of them German immigrants 鈥� and worked with Army Capt. Nathaniel Lyon, a Yankee firebrand who was determined to save the arsenal for the Union.

At Jackson鈥檚 urging, the Legislature created the 最新杏吧原创 Police Board to keep a lid on the Germans. He mustered the state militia at Lindell Grove (present-day 最新杏吧原创 University). The secession-minded formed the Minute Men, which marched in dangerous competition with the Wide Awakes.

On May 10 鈥� a month after Fort Sumter 鈥� Lyon鈥檚 army forced the state militia to surrender. But 35 civilians and soldiers died in a battle between troops and a pro-Southern mob on Olive Street at Compton Avenue. Nine more died the next day in a clash at Broadway and Walnut Street.

One month later, Jackson met with Blair and Lyon at the Planters House Hotel. It was too late for talk.

鈥淭his means war,鈥� Lyon said, ending the meeting. Jackson took a train to Jefferson City, wrecking bridges behind him to delay Union pursuit. Lyon鈥檚 troops soon chased the governor from the capitol.

Lyon was killed Aug. 10 in the Battle of Wilson鈥檚 Creek, near Springfield. Jackson joined the rebellion as governor in exile and died in Arkansas in 1862.

The Union held 最新杏吧原创, despite dogged resistance from Southern-minded citizens. Missouri burned with guerrilla war.

Basil Duke, soldier for the South

A native of Kentucky, he moved here in 1858 to practice law and enter politics. He couldn't abide the election of Abraham Lincoln.

Duke worked closely with Gov. Claiborne Jackson in an attempt to maneuver Missouri into the Confederacy. He helped create the Minute Men, a pro-Southern militia in 最新杏吧原创, and defiantly raised a secessionist flag over the 最新杏吧原创 County (Old) Courthouse the day before Lincoln's inauguration.

Jackson appointed Duke to his new 最新杏吧原创 Police Board, which the governor intended as a counter to the city's unionist forces. Jackson then sent Duke on a secret mission to Montgomery, Ala., to get cannon for the cause. Confederate President Jefferson Davis ordered artillery pieces sent by steamboat in boxes stamped "marble," but Union forces here confiscated them.

Duke then headed south to join the Confederate cavalry. After the war, he settled in Louisville, Ky., and was a state legislator and railroad attorney.

Francis Blair saves 最新杏吧原创 for the Union, opposes Reconstruction

Francis Blair Jr. spent his boyhood in Washington, D.C., where his father was a confidant of President Andrew Jackson and Missouri Senator Thomas Hart Benton. At age 26, he moved to 最新杏吧原创 to make his own mark in politics.

In 1852, Blair helped establish the Missouri Democrat newspaper, which opposed the spread of slavery and championed Abraham Lincoln. In 1856, Blair was elected as a Republican congressman from 最新杏吧原创.

After Lincoln's election in 1860, Blair was instrumental in holding 最新杏吧原创 for the Union. He left Congress two years later, became a Union army general and took part in Gen. William Sherman's march through Georgia.

Returning to Missouri, he opposed the Republican state constitution of 1865 that limited the rights of his former Confederate enemies. He helped revive the Democratic Party and was its vice-presidential nominee in 1868. But聽his campaign rants against Black people embarrassed the ticket, which lost to his former commander, Republican Ulysses S. Grant.

Elected to the U.S. Senate, Blair loudly opposed Reconstruction in the South. He died in 最新杏吧原创 in 1875.