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Border ruffians wereproslavery raiders who crossed into theKansas Territory fromMissouri during the mid-19th century to help ensure the territory entered theUnited States as aslave state. Their activities formed a major part of a series of violent civil confrontations known as "Bleeding Kansas", which peaked from 1854 to 1858. Crimes committed by border ruffians includedelectoral fraud,intimidation,assault,property damage andmurder; many border ruffians took pride in their reputation as criminals. After the outbreak of theAmerican Civil War in 1861, many border ruffians fought on the side of theConfederate States of America as irregularbushwhackers.
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The 1913 edition ofWebster's Dictionary reflects the 19th century understanding of the wordruffian as a "scoundrel, rascal, or unprincipled, deceitful, brutal and unreliable person".
Among the first to use the termborder ruffian in connection with the slavery issue in Kansas was theHerald of Freedom, a newspaper published inLawrence, Kansas. On October 8, 1857, it reported the following:
Gov. Reeder soon after March 30 visited Washington, hoping to induce Pres. Pierce to disregard the election. On his way there he stopped at his old home, Easton, Pa., and told the story of Kansas' wrongs, in a speech to his old neighbors. In this he designated the invaders as "Border Ruffians", and said they were led by their chiefs,David R. Atchison andB. F. Stringfellow.[1]
Armed with revolvers andBowie knives, border ruffians forcefully interfered in the Kansas row over slavery.[2][3] A correspondent for theLondon Times while visiting Kansas in 1856 reported many occurrences of the so-calledbowie-knife voting in Kansas when voters were heckled and harassed by border ruffians.[4] In response, theNew England Emigrant Aid Company shippedSharps rifles to theKansas Territory, in crates said to have been labeled "Bibles".[5][6]
At that time, many Kansas settlers opposed slavery. However, slavery advocates were determined to have their way regardless. When elections were held, bands of armed border ruffians seized polling places, preventedFree-State men from voting, and cast votes illegally, falsely stating they were Kansas residents.[7][8]
Border ruffians operated from Missouri. It was said that they voted and shot in Kansas, but slept in Missouri.[9] They not only interfered in territorial elections, but also committed outrages onFree-State settlers and destroyed their property. This violence gave the origin of the phrase "Bleeding Kansas". However, political killings and violence were exercised by both warring sides.[10][11][12]
The federal government did not interfere to stop the violence.[13] Hence, episodes asthe sacking of Lawrence, Kansas, in May 1856 became possible.U.S. SenatorDavid Rice Atchison (D-Missouri) personally incited the assembling mob:
Gentlemen, Officers & Soldiers! This is the most glorious day of my life! This is the day I am a border ruffian! ... Spring like your bloodhounds at home upon that d--d accursed abolition hole; break through every thing that may oppose your never flinching courage! Yess, ruffians, draw your revolvers & bowie knives, & cool them in the heart's blood of all those d--d dogs, that dare defend that d--d breathing hole of hell.[14][15]
Border ruffians contributed to the increasingly violent sectional tensions, culminating in theAmerican Civil War.[16]
Border ruffians did not constitute an organized group. They never had meetings, had no designated leaders, and no one ever directed any message to them as a body.
Border ruffians were driven by the rhetoric of politicians such asDavid Rice Atchison,Benjamin Franklin Stringfellow,John H. Stringfellow, editor of the pro-slavery newspaperSquatter Sovereign (Atchison, Kansas), and Speaker of the House in the First Kansas Territorial Legislature, the so-calledBogus Legislature.[17] and Rev.Thomas Johnson, a Methodist preacher.[18]Samuel J. Jones, andDaniel Woodson, a proslavery newspaper editor.[19][20] In particular, Atchison called Northerners "negro thieves" and "abolitionist tyrants". He encouraged Missourians to defend their institution "with the bayonet and with blood" and, if necessary, "to kill every God-damned abolitionist in the district".[21]
Few of the ordinary border ruffians actually owned slaves because most were too poor. Their motivation was hatred ofYankees andabolitionists, and fear of free Blacks living nearby.Kansas slavery was small-scale and operated mainly at the household level.[22] Most of the Kansans, according to historianDavid M. Potter, were concerned primarily about land titles. He pointed out that, "the great anomaly of 'Bleeding Kansas' is that the slavery issue reached a condition of intolerable tension and violence ... in an area where a majority of the inhabitants apparently did not care very much one way or the other about slavery."[23]
Frank W. Blackmar's encyclopedia of Kansas history summarizes how the rank-and-file among border ruffians took pride in both how they were called and what they were doing:
While the main objects of the Border Ruffian chiefs were the overthrow and destruction of free-state men and the establishment of slavery in Kansas, the ruffian border bands delighted in raiding towns, ransacking houses, stealing horses, and doing whatever they could that was annoying, exciting, and rough. The towns and country along the eastern tier of counties were raided with uncomfortable frequency. Free-state men holding claims were driven from them, elections were molested and crimes of violence committed. When the crash came between north and south many of these men became bushwhackers or guerrillas.[24]
The presence of violent bands of both Kansan and Missourian combatants made it difficult for settlers on the Kansas–Missouri border to remain neutral.[7]
The history of border ruffians is woven into the historical context ofBleeding Kansas, or the border war, a series of violent civil confrontations in Kansas in 1854–1859.[25]Kansas Territory was created by theKansas–Nebraska Act of 1854. The Act repealed the previous Federal prohibition on slavery in that area. Instead, the locally elected territorial legislature was to decide on the slavery issue.[7]
The first territorial census, taken in January–February 1855, counted 8601 people; 2905 were deemed eligible to vote; there were 192 enslaved in the Territory.[26][page needed][27]
After the Kansas–Nebraska Act repealed theMissouri Compromise of 1820 and allowed Kansans to vote on slavery, the opponents from both sides of the slavery debate started to recruit settlers to increase support of their causes.
Proslavery immigrants aided by the Lafayette Emigration Society, and anti-slavery settlers, established their own territorial enclave (such asAtchison andLeavenworth), andFree-State immigrants aided by theNew England Emigrant Aid Company established theirs (such asLawrence,Topeka).[28][29][30] This circumstance resulted in a deep partisan divide in regard to the slavery question among settlers and their civic and business leaders. Then extremists on both side resorted to arms. On the pro-slavery side violence was committed by the border ruffians and on the free-state side by thejayhawkers.[24][31][32][33]
On November 29, 1854, border ruffians elected a pro-slavery territorial representative to Congress,John W. Whitfield. It was determined after a Congressional investigation that 60% of the votes were illegal.[23]
On March 30, 1855, border ruffians elected a pro-slavery Territorial Legislature, which introduced harsh penalties for speaking against slavery.[34] It was called the Bogus Legislature by Free-Staters due to the fact that border ruffians arriveden masse and there were twice as many votes cast than there were eligible voters in the Territory. Failure to ensure fair elections led to establishment of two territorial governments in Kansas, one pro-slavery and another Free State, each claiming to be the only legitimate government of the entire Territory.[23]
Despite all border ruffians' attempts to push anti-slavery settlers out of the Territory, far more Free-State immigrants moved to Kansas than pro-slavery.[citation needed] In 1857, the pro-slavery faction in Kansas proposed theLecompton Constitution for the future state of Kansas. It tried to get the Lecompton Constitution adopted with additional fraud and violence, but by then there were too many Free-Staters there and theU.S. Congress refused to confirm it.[8]
Border ruffians also engaged in general violence against Free-State settlements. They burned farms and sometimes murdered Free-State men. Most notoriously, border ruffians twice attackedLawrence, the Free-State capital of the Kansas Territory. On December 1, 1855, a small army of border ruffians laid siege to Lawrence, but were driven off. This became the nearly bloodless climax to the "Wakarusa War".
On May 21, 1856, an even larger force of border ruffians and pro-slavery Kansans captured Lawrence,which they sacked.[7]
Free-State settlers struck back. Anti-slavery Kansan irregulars, led byCharles R. Jennison,James Montgomery, andJames H. Lane, among others, and known asjayhawkers, attacked proslavery settlers and suspected border ruffian sympathizers.[35] Most notoriously, abolitionistJohn Brown killed five proslavery men atPottawatomie.[7][36] In revenge, a band of border ruffians, led byJohn W. Reid, sacked the village ofOsawatomie, Kansas after theBattle of Osawatomie.[37]
T. W. Higginson, a minister, was instrumental in turning theMassachusetts State Kansas Committee, a former subsidiary of theNew England Emigrant Aid Company, into a nationally known organization.[38] It worked to recruit abolitionist settlers, raised funds for them to migrate to Kansas, and equipped them with rifles to use against border ruffians.[39] In 1856 it acquired 200Sharps rifles for $4,947.88 that were shipped to Kansas via Iowa and ended in John Brown's hands.[40] In September 1858, it invested $3,800 in 190Sharps rifles for Kansas.[41] AbolitionistHenry W. Beecher pronounced that,
Sharps rifle was a truly moral agency, and that there was more moral power in one of those instruments, so far as the slaveholders of Kansas were concerned, than in a hundred Bibles. You might just as well ... read the Bible to Buffaloes as those fellows who follow Atchison and Stringfellow; but they have a supreme respect for the logic that is embodied in Sharps rifles.[40]
It was documented that in 1855–1856 various aid organizations from free states spent at least $43,074.26 on rifles, muskets, revolvers, and ammunition, including one cannon, destined for Kansas.[40]
On July 9, 1856, the Massachusetts State Kansas Committee and theNew England Emigrant Aid Company initiated the establishment of the Kansas National Aid Committee headquartered in Chicago.Thaddeus Hyatt, head of the national committee, began collecting money, arms, provisions, clothing, and agricultural supplies to aid the Free-State cause in Kansas. The goal was to transport five thousand settlers to Kansas Territory giving them a year's worth of supplies.[42]
A distributiondepot was set up atMt. Pleasant, Iowa, where immigrants were furnished not only with horses and wagons and other supplies, but also with arms; they were organized into companies and drilled. The National Kansas Committee spent in 1856–1857 aroundUS$100,000 (equivalent to $3,500,000 in 2024) on the Free State cause.[40][43]
On August 2, 1858, the pro-slaveryLecompton Constitution of 1857 was rejected at the polls, signifying the defeat of border ruffians' cause.[44] On January 29, 1861, PresidentJames Buchanan signed the bill that approved theWyandotte Constitution and Kansas came to the Union as a Free State.[45]
During theAmerican Civil War, the violence on the Kansas-Missouri border not only continued, but escalated tremendously. Many of the former border ruffians became pro-Confederate guerrillas, orbushwhackers. They operated in western Missouri, sometimes raiding into Kansas, andUnion forces campaigned to suppress them. Farms on the Missouri-Kansas state line were looted and burned. Suspected guerrillas were killed; in retaliation, bushwhackers murdered Union sympathizers and suspected informers. Confederate guerrilla leaders, such as"Bloody Bill" Anderson andWilliam Quantrill, were feared in Kansas during the war.[46]
Many of the Union troops fighting bushwackers were formerjayhawkers who held deep grudges against border ruffians.Charles R. Jennison recruited the7th Kansas Cavalry Regiment, which became known as the Jennison's Jayhawkers. In the fall and winter of 1861 and 1862, Jennison's Jayhawkers became infamous for looting and destroying the property of Missourians.[47]
Some of the jayhawkers joined a paramilitary group called the Red Legs. Wearing red gaiters and numbered around 100, Red Legs served as scouts during the punitive expedition of the Union troops in Missouri. Jayhawkers and Red Legs pillaged and burned multiple towns in 1861–1863 in Missouri.[further explanation needed][48][49] The destruction ofOsceola, Missouri, is depicted in the movieThe Outlaw Josey Wales.[50]
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