Today in History:

695 Series I Volume VIII- Serial 8 - Pea Ridge

Page 695 Chapter XVIII. CORRESPONDENCE, ETC.- CONFEDERATE.

for twelve months unless already fully armed and equipped, and as the State cannot arm and equip more than one regiment, only one will be enlisted.

13th. The artillery will be organized as light batteries and not as regiments.

14th. The Confederate States Government will accept and fully arm and equip as many troops as may volunteer for the war, either as cavalry, artillery, or infantry.

By order of Major General Sterling Price:

HENRY LITTLE,

Colonel and Asst. Adj. General, Mo. S. G.

Proclamation to the People of Central and North Missouri.

MARSHALL, MO., November 26, 1861.

FELLOW-CITIZENS: In the month of June last I was called to the command of a handful of Missourians, who nobly gave up home and comfort to espouse, in that gloomy hour, the cause of your bleeding country, struggling with the most causeless and cruel despotism known among civilized men. When peace and protection could no longer be enjoyed but at the price of honor and liberty your chief magistrate called for 50,000 men to drive the ruthless invader from a soil made fruitful by your labors and consecrated by your homes.

To that call less than 5,000 responded; out of a male population exceeding 200,000 men, one in forty only stepped forward to defend with their persons and their lives the cause of constitutional liberty and human rights.

Some allowances are to be made on the score of a want of military organization, a supposed want of arms, the necessary retreat of the army southward, the blockade of the river, and the presence of an armed and organized foe. But nearly six months have now elapsed; your crops have been tilled; your harvests have been reaped; your preparations for winter have been made; the Army of Missouri, organized and equipped, fought its was to the river; the foe is still in the field; the country bleeds, and our people groan under the inflictions of a foe marked with all the characteristics of barbarian warfare; and where now are the 50,000 to avenge our wagons and free our country? Had 50,000 men flocked to our standard with their shot-guns in their hands there would not now be a Federal hireling in the State to pollute our soil. Instead of ruined communities, starving families, and desolated districts, we should have had a people blessed with protection and with stores to supply the wants and necessities and comforts of life. Where are those 50,000 men? Are Missourians no longer true to themselves? Are they a timid, time-serving, craven race, fit only for subjection to a despot? Awake, my countrymen, to a sense of what constitutes the dignity and true greatness of a free people. A few men have fought your battles; a few men have dared the dangers of the battle-field; a few have borne the hardships of the camp, the scorching suns of summer, the frosts of winter, the malaria of the swamps, the privations incident to our circumstances, fatigue, and hunger, and thirst, often without blankets, without shoes, with insufficient clothing, with the cold, wet earth for a bed, the sky for a covering, and a stone for a pillow, glad only to meet the enemy on the field, where some paid the


Page 695 Chapter XVIII. CORRESPONDENCE, ETC.- CONFEDERATE.