2021 is the bicentennial birthday of Missouri

A Story of Missouri

Mark Twain (pen name of Samuel Langhorne Clemens) was born in Florida, Missouri.
Lived in Hannibal, Missouri, a river town, from age 4.
Experiences: riverboat pilot, newspaperman, humorist, writer, and storyteller.
History is an expensive, popular, and interesting topic.
People are interested in their own family, local stories, and what they call home.
2021 is Missouri's bicentennial birthday (America's 24th state).
Missouri is known as the "Show Me State."

Travel and the State of Missouri

Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness.
The story of Missouri involves many peoples, individuals, and lands.
Missouri's geography: nearly 70,000 square miles.
Missouri is the heart of the nation; a melting pot where east meets west, and north meets south.
The history of Missouri is complex, unique, and has impacted the nation.

Early Inhabitants and Exploration

Missouri began as an unsettled wilderness inhabited by indigenous people.
Native American tribes: Chickasaw, Illini, Ioway, Otoe, Missouria, Osage, Quapaw, and others.
The waterways (Mississippi, Missouri, Osage) were attractive to indigenous peoples.
Rivers were major highways utilized by Native Americans and French fur traders.
They were attracted by game and the fertility of the soil.
In the 1600s, European explorers (French) began arriving and establishing settlements, often joined by Catholic missionaries.
Early explorers: French explorers Joliet and Marquette.
In 1673, Louis Joliet and Jacques Marquette explored the Mississippi River, providing the first accurate details of the river's course.
The name "Missouri" is said to have Native American origin, meaning "wooden people, a wooden canoe people" or "muddy water".

Colonization and Territorial Control

European colonization didn't occur right away after the 1600s explorations.
By the 1700s, foreign countries (French, England, Spain) showed increasing interest in Missouri.
European nations sought to colonize the region.
The British controlled territory east of the Mississippi River, and the Spanish controlled the Southwest and West.
The French aimed to claim the land between the Mississippi River and the Rocky Mountains.
French fur traders and missionaries significantly impacted early Missouri settlement and culture.
Missionaries hoped to convert the Indigenous people to Catholicism.
Catholic missionary presence and French explorers influenced the naming of eastern Missouri settlements (Saint Louis, Ste. Genevieve, St. Charles).
Ste. Genevieve is acknowledged as Missouri's oldest settlement.
In 1752, Ste. Genevieve had a population of 23 (white and Black, free and slave).
20 years later, the population grew to 691.

St. Louis and Fur Trade

St. Louis was founded in 1764 by Frenchman Pierre Laclede and his stepson, Auguste Chouteau.
Laclede named the city St. Louis in honor of King Louis IX.
In 1770, the population of St. Louis was under 600 people (French, Spanish, Native Americans).
St. Louis was primarily a trading center dealing in furs.
Fur traders intermarried with Native Americans for business purposes.
Commerce with the fur trade changed dynamics in Indigenous cultures, creating competition among neighboring tribes.

St. Charles and Territorial Ownership

St. Charles was established in 1769 as a fur trading post by Louis Blanchette.
Originally known as Les Petites Cotes (The Little Hills), it is Missouri's third oldest city.
The Lewis and Clark expedition began here in 1804.
St. Charles would later be the location of Missouri's first capital.
Ownership of the land that would become Missouri would undergo wars between France and Spain.
France controlled the Louisiana Territory between 1699 and 1762, then ceded it to Spain.
France regained control in 1800 under Napoleon Bonaparte, who aimed to renew French colonial presence in North America.

Louisiana Purchase

President Thomas Jefferson had long-term interest and plans for the Louisiana Territory.
Napoleon sold the land due to troubles in Haiti and the burden of managing it.
Jefferson rushed to close the deal and explore the Trans-Mississippi West to secure American land.
James Monroe and Robert Livingston signed the Louisiana Purchase in Paris on May 2, 1803.
The U.S. acquired approximately 828,000 square miles at about $18$ per square mile.
The purchase price was $15 million$ total, roughly $0.04 per acre.
At the time of transfer, there were a little over 10,000 people living in what would become Missouri.
The Louisiana Purchase expanded U.S. sovereignty across the Mississippi River and nearly doubled the country's size.

Lewis and Clark Expedition

President Thomas Jefferson assembled the Lewis and Clark expedition to explore the newly acquired land.
The expedition was commissioned as a "voyage of discovery."
In May 1804, the Corps of Discovery (about 40 individuals) began to ascend the Missouri River.
The Corps included literate individuals who could draw maps and identify flora, fauna, and Indigenous peoples.
The goals were to establish relationships with Indigenous peoples for trade and find a quicker trade route to the Far East.
On May 14, 1804, the expedition left St. Charles, Missouri.
York, William Clark's enslaved person, accompanied the expedition and was treated like any other member.
York became the first African-American to cross the unsettled lands and reach the Pacific Ocean.
Sacajawea, a Shoshone Indian woman, joined as an interpreter and guide.
They documented 120 varied animals and 200 botanical examples.
The expedition provided invaluable maps and forged peaceful relationships with many Native American tribes.
Tribal leaders were presented with a special peace medal bearing President Jefferson's likeness and symbols of peace and friendship (a tomahawk and a peace pipe) with the inscription, "peace and friendship".

Discoveries and Conclusion of the Expedition

Clark observed ancient burial mounds near Jefferson City.
The Lewis and Clark Expedition concluded September 23, 1806, in St. Louis.
It lasted 2.5 years and encompassed over 8,000 miles.
Only one member of the party was lost.
Lewis and Clark each received double pay and 1,600 acres of land.
Meriwether Lewis became governor of the Louisiana Territory, and William Clark became Brigadier General of Militia and later governor of the Missouri Territory.
Their journals documented their findings, plotted locations for forts, and are still with us today.

Territorial Government and Native American Removal

Following the Louisiana Purchase and the Lewis and Clark expedition, a Louisiana territorial government was established.
The U.S. began considering creating additional states out of the area, with Missouri being one of the first states considered.
Challenges included managing the Indigenous tribes and Native Americans who lived on the land.
A number of removal treaties were executed with tribes like the Osages, Missourias, Shawnees, Delawares, and Sac and Fox.
The goal was to develop the state for white settlement.
Western settlement and permanency became increasingly a goal.
Ste. Genevieve was formally incorporated in 1808.

Missouri Gazette and Missouri Territory

Missouri's first newspaper, The Missouri Gazette, was founded by Joseph Charles in 1808.
In June 1812, President James Madison promoted the Louisiana Territory to the second grade status and renamed it the Missouri Territory.
This was the first usage of the name Missouri to eventually describe the state.
A few months later, the first General Assembly of the Territory of Missouri met and organized Missouri's five original counties: Cape Girardeau, New Madrid, St. Charles, St. Louis, and Ste. Genevieve.
The following year, President James Madison appointed William Clark as the first governor of the Missouri Territory.

War of 1812 and Indigenous Peoples

Settlement of the territory that would become Missouri remained sparse until after the War of 1812, which ended in 1815.
The War of 1812 solidified American control over the Trans-Mississippi West and opened up settlement in a way that hadn't existed before.
Many of the Indigenous peoples sided with the British in the War of 1812.
Many Missourians in the early 19th century saw Indigenous peoples as an obstacle to their own ability to control the land and desired to remove them.

Missouri Compromise and Statehood

Many events were converging to become an unmistakable prelude to a looming and desired statehood.
The Missouri Compromise was an unquestionably significant event in American history, certainly for Missouri.
It consisted of debate and legislation that would lead to statehood, and in ways, set the stage for America's historic and unforgettable Civil War.
The effort at Missouri becoming a state really began in a serious way in late 1817, when the first petition for statehood was drafted.
At the time, the minimum requirement for population was that 65,000 people in the state, or in the territory.
There was a significant slave population. Probably in excess of 10,000 slaves. So, roughly, one out of six, or so people in Missouri was an African-American slave.
Missouri's formal petition for statehood was presented to Congress on January 8, 1880, by Speaker of the House of Representatives, Henry Clay.
But a fight broke out when a New York representative proposed an amendment to the Missouri state bill.
It suggested that there would be no more slavery north of the $36^\circ 30'$ line, which is the Missouri-Arkansas state line.
The question of whether Missouri would come into the Union as a slave state or a free state was, of course, a very divisive issue, resulting in the Missouri Compromise.
The Missouri Compromise allowed for Maine to come in as a free state and Missouri is a slave state, so that the balance of free and slave states in the United States Senate would remain the same.
The free states already controlled the House of Representatives because of their greater population.

Missouri Population and the Missouri Compromise

On the eve of statehood, in 1820, the population had grown to 66,000.
The newcomers came from Virginia, the Carolinas, Kentucky, and Tennessee.
In the Missouri Compromise of 1820, the national concern was over the division between free and enslaved states.
Missouri was contemplating entering the Union as a slave state.
Bringing in Maine and Missouri would maintain the balance in the U.S. Senate between slave and free states.

Missouri's Defining Physical Characteristics

One of Missouri's most defining physical characteristics is the "boot heel" along its southeast border.
The initial southern boundary as established by Congress in 1818, was a straight line across the upper Arkansas Territory.
Cattleman and large landowner, John Hardeman Walker successfully petitioned lawmakers for his land, and his neighbors', to be within Missouri when the new lines were drawn in 1820.
Congress continues moving forward and authorizes Missouri to establish a government in March of 1820.
On July 19, Missouri's first Constitution was adopted, and Alexander McNair elected as governor on August 28, during the state's first elections.
The first General Assembly began its first session at the Missouri Hotel in St. Louis on September 18.
President James Monroe admits Missouri into the Union as America's 24th state on August 10, 1821, with St. Charles serving as the site of the first capital until a permanent location is determined.
Missouri joins the Union in 1821 as the next state with slavery, and Maine joins as a free state, maintaining the balance in the US Senate.
Fifteen more years passed before another state joined the United States.

Gateway to the West

Missouri became the new Western border of the United States.
Missouri becoming the celebrated Gateway to the West-- the beginning points of the Oregon and Santa Fe trails that would support and link the United States movement west.
The Oregon Trail was created by traders and fur trappers beginning around 1811, and only traveled on foot or by horseback.
Wagon trains and large groups of settlers began leaving from Independence, Missouri by 1836, on their way to the trail's terminus of Oregon City.

The Santa Fe Trail

The Santa Fe Trail began later, in 1821, and pioneered by Missouri trader, William Becknell.
He puts an announcement in the newspaper, anybody who wants to go, let's meet on this date in the fall of 1821. And bring whatever you think you can sell-- horses, and mules, and other products.
Participants were brave, often heroic and resilient. They demonstrated characteristics and qualities that have since been reflected as an American spirit.
You see them fulfilling government contracts because you see forts being constructed further west out of Missouri.
Missouri was a really important provisioning point for those individuals who had contracts, or the folks wanting to go further into the west.
The trailhead was Franklin, Missouri, and it would end in modern day Santa Fe, New Mexico.
Along the route, Arrow Rock, Missouri, originally called Philadelphia when it was founded in 1829, would grow in significance.
Arrow Rock became a really important place. And begins to rival St. Louis in terms of political-- and to a certain extent-- a little bit economic influence.
The Santa Fe trade became an important part of Missouri's overall economy.
Independence, Missouri would also later become the eastern terminus for the Santa Fe Trail, and the jumping off point for both the Oregon and Santa Fe Trails.

Immigration and German Settlement

During this period of Missouri development, and beginning soon after Missouri statehood, immigrants from other countries, most notably Germans, increasingly joined resident American settlers.
There were Germans here very early. But most historians agree that the bulk of the German settlement in Missouri came in the 18-- after the 1820s, into the 1830s.
Prior to the American Civil War you see a larger German population come living in and around St. Louis and other small communities across the state.
On the eve of the American Civil War, at least in the state of Missouri in 1860, there were 88,487 individuals of German ancestry in the state of Missouri.
German interest and settlement in Missouri is largely attributed to Prussian lawyer, Gottfried Duden, who purchased a farm near St. Louis in 1824. And who traveled the country documenting his experiences and observations.
Then Gottfried Duden began to write letters back to Germany.
He was describing Missouri as the Garden of Eden.
And in 1829, self-published 1,500 copies of a book, Report on a Journey to the western States of North America, encouraged German immigration to Missouri.
A resulting unique area of the state is the Missouri Rhineland with the first German settlement being Dutzow in 1832.
By 1837, German immigrants form the town of Hermann.

Missouri Wine Industry

The town of Hermann established in 1837 was the beginning of Missouri's legendary wine industry and legacy.
It's estimated that just 20 years later, more than 100,000 gallons of wine was being produced annually.
And in the 1870s, Stone Hill Winery produced more than 1 million gallons annually, making it the second-largest wine producer in America, and the third largest in the world.
Missouri would continue its role as a leading American wine producer up to prohibition.
The Missouri wine industry was renewed in 1965, by Stone Hill Winery and Hermann, and production now spreads across the state.
Missouri's western border would take different shape in 1837, as a result of the Platte purchase.
President Martin Van Buren approved the annexation of the new border that became six additional counties, and including, nearly two million acres of land.
Really in topography, much more similar to parts of Iowa than to, certainly, the Ozarks or southern Missouri.
Prior to the Platte purchase, this land was thought to be unnecessary due to population. It was, instead, reserved for Native American relocation.
Following acquisition, several treaties and negotiations led to Native American tribes being relocated to make room for increasing white settlement.
Many tribes would be forced to relocate to the newly formed Indian territory-- present-day Oklahoma-- as part of the Federal Indian Removal Act signed by President Andrew Jackson in 1830.
This authorized the president to grant lands west of the Mississippi, in exchange for tribal lands within existing state borders.

Settlement Growth and the Cherokee Trail of Tears

As population and settlement in Missouri grew, Native Americans were consistently, and forcibly, pushed farther west.
A noted part of this history is the Cherokee Trail of Tears crossing through Missouri that occurred between 1837 and 1839.
The year 1838, continued a period of displacement, and sometimes tensions. This time from intolerance and the growing population of Mormons to Missouri.

The Mormon Conflict

During the 1830s, Joseph Smith's Mormon Church is the rapidly growing denomination that comes to Missouri.
Prophecy has told Joseph Smith that, what is Missouri holds a special place in the church's future. And so, they come to Jackson County-- present day where Kansas City area is-- but Independence, and they quickly thrive.
But they draw the ire of their non-Mormon neighbors because of their religious beliefs, antislavery feelings in an area where slavery is legal. And this competition, and suspicion, eventually erupts into violence. The state of Missouri will carve out a new county for the Mormons to be resettled in up to the north.
Caldwell County is established as a refuge for the Mormons to be put, and where they can continue to grow in number. But, eventually, there are so many Mormons in Caldwell County that it can't contain them all.
In 1838, tensions explode and violence erupts between the Mormons-- officially the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, and their non-Mormon neighbors.
Leading to Governor Lilburn Boggs issuing his historic Extermination Order on October 27 against all Mormons living in Missouri.
Forcefully relocating them to Nauvoo, Illinois, which became church headquarters prior to Salt Lake City, Utah.
That marks the end of the Mormon settlement in the state.
It would be almost 25 years after the Extermination Order but Mormons, following their faith and beliefs, would begin returning and remain an important presence in Missouri.
Building the Kansas City, Missouri Temple in Clay County, and dedicating it on May 6, 2012.
Surprisingly, Missouri Executive Order 44 remained on the books until rescinded with formal apology by Governor Christopher Bond on June 25, 1976.

Kansas-Nebraska Act and Dred Scott Case

The success and foundation of 1821, was not without additional growing pains in future years.
The historic and impacting Missouri Compromise would remain relevant for about 33 years before being challenged and repealed by the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854.
And the 1857 Supreme Court ruling in the far reaching Dred Scott case.
The two rendering the Missouri Compromise as unconstitutional.
These two events would clearly be catalysts to America's inevitable, and nation shaking, Civil War.
A war of unprecedented division, horror, and lingering effect, and perhaps, no more so than in Missouri.
Missouri was very much involved in the Kansas-Nebraska Act.
By the 1850s there was need and interest to organize new western territories and states.
On May 30, 1854, President Franklin Pierce signed the Kansas-Nebraska Act.
Legislation reflecting the territory of Nebraska, that included present-day states Kansas, Nebraska, Montana, and the Dakotas.
Questions of slavery would remain prominent in the development of America, and this legislation proposed by Illinois Senator, Stephen Douglas, promoted "popular sovereignty" as an effort to resolve these questions.
Allowing territory settlers to choose whether slavery would exist within these borders.
It also, in effect, overturned the Missouri Compromise, and would inflame the fiery question and practice of slavery as pro and anti-slavery supporters entered these territories in an effort to influence voting and outcome.
Bloody border wars would consequently occur, further fueling divisions and the flames of inevitable war.
When Congress voted to allow the citizens of the Kansas Territory to vote-- on whether or not they're going to be a slave territory or free territory-- what happens is bunches of people from Missouri-- bunches of pro-slavery people from Missouri-- flood across the line into Kansas and vote illegally in those votes that they have.
This causes a lot of strife, and there's bloodshed in Kansas.
Missouri plays an outsized role in that whole saga that leads up to the Civil War.

Dred Scott Case

A complicated and contested court case involving African-American, Dred Scott, would earn national attention and become one of Missouri history's most impacting and landmark events.
The Dred Scott case is, certainly, one of the benchmarks on the trail to the Civil War.
The Dred Scott case centered on a Missouri enslaved person who originally belonged to the Blow family, and who was born into slavery in Virginia, around 1799.
In 1832, he arrived in St. Louis with his owner, Peter Blow.
Dred Scott would be sold to a physician, Dr. John Emerson, who relocated to Illinois, and later Wisconsin.
Both of these being slavery free states.
Following Dr. Emerson's death, his wife Eliza Sanford, returned to St. Louis accompanied by Scott and his wife, Harriet.
The Scotts would later sue for their freedom based on two Missouri statutes.
One, allowing a person of any color to sue for wrongful enslavement. And another stating, that any enslaved person taken to a free territory would become automatically a free person, and could not be re-enslaved if they return to a slave state.
In April, 1846, proceedings would begin in the now historic Old St. Louis Courthouse.
Trials would continue in a decade-long series of reversed and appealed decisions, during which, the Scotts would win and lose their freedom.
Hearings would, ultimately, reach federal court where on May 15, 1854, Scott and his family were judged to remain enslaved people.
Dred Scott appealed to the United States Supreme Court where hearings began on February 11, 1856. And where, ultimately, he would lose his fight for freedom.
Chief Justice Roger B. Taney ruled that Dred Scott was not a free man.
Taney made the assertion that no Black person had any rights that any white person was obligated to acknowledge.
The issue of slavery would remain central to Missouri, and increasingly, to the country.
And increasingly, to the flaming nerve that would help open the wound of a Civil War.

Missouri and the Civil War

As the United States neared the point of rupture and disunion, Missouri, as a border state, represents both the geographical, but the political middle.
In the 1860 election-- which is going to result in Abraham Lincoln becoming president-- Missourians generally preferred the preservation of the status quo.
They wanted to keep the union together. But Missourians also hoped, white Missourians to preserve slavery.
Most Missourians did not own slaves, but they accepted the legality and the constitutionality of slavery.
The most influential Missourians, most of them did own slaves, especially in the Missouri River Valley.
A lot of people were Conditional Unionists or someone who wanted to stay in the Union, but, if the fighting starts, they change their mind.
They will blame the war on Abraham Lincoln, on the North, and all of a sudden they're in favor of leaving the Union and joining the Confederacy.
Some may have Southern heritage, and own slaves.
Missouri had this deeply divided population.
Missourians hoped that war could be averted.
In February 1861, they organize a convention in St. Louis to decide the question of secession.
They vote, overwhelmingly, to stay within the Union.
It will remain a Union state, but a Union state that-- for many of its leaders, would rather remain one where slavery is legal.
Missouri is a true border state in the United States. Missouri is a state where slavery is legal.
Just under 10% of the population in 1860, in Missouri, was enslaved.
But again, these individuals are considered their property. So when you look at the census records, which is so powerful, and you look at the census schedules, and you look at slave schedules, these folks are enumerated.
They are enumerated without their names.
The wealth of that plantation owner, or whoever owned them, was bound up in the number of slaves that they owned.

Political Conflict Leading to Civil War

Civil War was looming. There remained much conflict among Missouri's residents and differences between political leadership.
In 1860, Claiborne Fox Jackson is elected governor in a four-person race.
He runs a campaign that pushes back against the idea of secession. Asserts that he's a Unionist.
He gets elected and becomes governor. And he begins to veer toward open sympathies with the Confederate States of America.
In the spring of 1861, Governor Jackson begins to actively maneuver Missouri towards the Confederacy.
In the state General Assembly many are for and opposed to the Confederacy and the state is on the brink of force conflict.
There's a confrontation between Governor Jackson and the commander of U.S. forces in St. Louis, Nathaniel Lyon. Lyon asserts to Governor Jackson that he will not allow defiance, or secession, or rebellion in Missouri
Governor Jackson retreated back to Jefferson City, where he was pursued by federal soldiers.
Jackson and cessionist members of the state legislature will withdraw State from Jefferson City west towards Boonville-- which becomes the first engagement of the Civil War, really, in Missouri.
And it might be the only military engagement of the entire conflict in which a governor will lead state troops in combat.

Battle of Boonville and Confederate Government

The June 17, 1861, Battle of Boonville, while comparatively small to other Missouri fighting, was not without impact.
But it's noteworthy, that we can now see there's no turning back from open warfare in Missouri between southern sympathizers and federal forces.
Following their defeat at Boonville, Governor Jackson and southern sympathizers from the General Assembly retreated into southwest Missouri, setting up a temporary and opposing location of Confederate government.
At Neosho, they will convene and attempt to pass an ordinance of secession to withdraw Missouri from the Union.
There remains some doubt about the legality of this ordinance as there was a quorum, or a necessary number of legislators present to have duly passed this.
The U.S. Army will install a loyal provisional government in Jefferson City.
Throughout the war, Missouri will have two state governments: the government that had been elected in 1860, has now declared allegiance to the Confederacy, but which will be in exile, spending time in Arkansas and Texas; and the Unionist government, in Jefferson City, installed and protected by the U.S. Army.

Battle of Carthage and Wilson's Creek

Governor Jackson would return to fighting early the following month on July 5, in the Battle of Carthage.
Engaging veteran Union Colonel, Franz Sigel, who was committed to keeping Missouri in Union control.
Sigel was significantly outnumbered and he was, ultimately, forced to retreat.
The engagement encouraged Confederate hope for the loyalties of Missouri and becoming a prelude to the following month's August 10 and Confederate victory at the Battle of Wilson's Creek near Springfield.
The Battle of Wilson's Creek is acknowledged as the second major battle of the Civil War-- following the Battle of Bull Run in Virginia three weeks earlier.
Significantly, Wilson's Creek would be the first major Civil War battle west of the Mississippi.
Nathaniel Lyon would be the first Union General killed in the Civil War.
In 1861 when the Civil War started, Missouri was still almost on the western frontier of the United States.
Kansas was just becoming a state.
Missouri, west of the Mississippi, was way out here from Washington, D.C. and Richmond, Virginia.
Both Abraham Lincoln and Jefferson Davis were more concerned with what's happening on the east side of the Mississippi River.

Significance of Wilson's Creek

It was important, because it was the culmination of a major campaign.
Very, very significant impact in holding Missouri for the Union.
When General Nathaniel Lyon led his troops and attacked the Southerners encamped at Wilsons Creek, he was trying to preempt any ability on those who favored secession from being able to organize successfully.
And even though the Lyon lost his life, and even though the Union troops actually retreated to Rolla after the battle, the Southern cause never got firmly anchored here in Missouri.

Later Battles and the End of the War

There would be other significant fighting in Missouri at Westport (modern-day Kansas City, Missouri).
The Battle of Westport in the fall of 1864, is known as the Gettysburg of the West.
It marked the culmination of a long-anticipated struggle for the fate of Missouri.
Earlier that fall, in September, former Missouri Governor Sterling Price, now a Rebel commander, decides that he is going to invade Missouri from Arkansas, with the hope of liberating Missouri from federal control.
Price's army was not well supplied and armed.
He believed that his army would be greeted by Missourians relieved to have them there.
Confederate forces were decisively defeated by Union Major General Samuel R. Curtis and his troops.
Final battle scale fighting in Missouri would end with the second Battle of Newtonia, located in southwest Missouri, on October 28, 1864.
On April 9, 1865, Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered his troops to Union General Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House, Virginia, ending the war.
The ultimate impact at the Civil War in Missouri is that it destroyed slavery.

Aftermath and Lingering Effects of the Civil War

But wounds from the Civil War in Missouri would be deep and lasting.
The Civil War in Missouri does not have the kind of finality that we sometimes associate.
In Missouri, the war is dominated by guerilla violence.
Missouri ranks third amongst the states that have the most Civil War engagements, behind Virginia and Tennessee.
It's a conflict that slowly burns itself out.
You can see the embers of that conflict continuing to run hot, well past 1865.

Missouri's Contribution to the Civil War

Thousands of Missourians became participants in the horrific and bloody fighting.
There are about 111,000 soldiers who enlisted in the Union Army at one time or another.
A low figure would be 30,000 supporting the Confederacy, while some people believe it to be as high as 65,000. Instead, something on the order of 40,000 to 50,000 at least supporting the Confederacy sounds right.
Missouri also contributed Black troops to the Civil War.
The 62nd, 67, 68, and 64th United States Colored Troops here in Missouri.
About 8,000 African-Americans fought for the Union in Missouri.
An unknown number enlisted the United States Navy in the riverine navies that fought along the Mississippi River.

Politics in Missouri

To understand the state, its people, and evolution, it's important to understand its politics.
Preparing for statehood, Missouri's first Constitution was adopted on July 19, 1820.
Missouri's seat of government was temporarily St. Charles, Missouri.
There was a lot of competition to become the permanent capital for example Potosi wanted to be the capitol.
The Constitution of 1820 decided that the permanent seat of government will be in the interior of the state, accessible to all people, on the Missouri River (major artery of travel and trade), within 40 miles of the mouth of the Osage River (trade and traffic artery into the Ozarks), four sections of land not whose ownership is not contested (over 2,500 acres of land).
On December 31, 1821, Governor Alexander McNair signed a bill for the new and permanent site for Missouri's capital.
An original name of "Missouriopolos" was considered by the state legislature before it became Jefferson City and named in honor of President Thomas Jefferson, who championed the Louisiana Purchase
The city is laid out in 1821, but it's five more years before there's enough there, to accommodate the legislature.
Jefferson City is laid out in 1821, and incorporated in 1825.
Construction of the capitol would take place between 1823 and 1826.
On October 1, 1826, the Great Seal, previously adopted January 11, 1822, and all state records were moved to Jefferson City.
The first capitol building was destroyed by fire in November of 1837.
A second one was completed in 1840, but it too was destroyed by fire after a lightning bolt struck the dome on February 5, 1911.
The present capitol was constructed between 1913 to 1917 on the former site, one that majestically overlooks the Missouri River.
Inside the current state capitol is a remarkable and museum-quality collection of art, Depicting Missouri history through paintings, and bronze and stone works.

Constitutional Amendments

Multiple amendments to its founding 1820 Constitution were ratified, with subsequent constitutional conventions occurring in 1865 and 1875.
The state's present Constitution being drafted in 1942, and ratified in 194