A search of Tim Reeves turned up this interesting little tidbit.
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The Massacre of the Third
Missouri State Militia Cavalry
Second Battalion
Union
On September 23, 1864, a wagon train moving headquarters of the Second Battalion, Third Missouri State Militia Cavalry was ambushed between Sturgeon and Rocheport, Missouri. This event came to be referred to as The Massacre of the Third. The following is a Confederate account.
KILLED IN THE MASSACRE
Union Confederate
Company E Jo Davis
Samuel Kingston
Lewis O. Igo
Company F
Frederick C. Drunert
Henry Dryer
Charles Hanley
Company G
Isaac Graham
Elemuel Kinion
Joseph Martinek
John H. Monroe
Reuben Presley
(name illegible)
Companies E, F, and G, of the Second Battalion, Third M.S.M. Cavalry were involved in this affair. Companies E and F were from Warren County Missouri, while G was from Lincoln County Missouri. It is my studied opinion that the "infantry" referred to was Company G. The military dispatches published in the Official Record referred to the unmounted men as footmen. The Second Battalion was reporting a critical shortage of horses at the time.
With some editing, this is John N. Edwards' account written eleven years after the event and published in 1877. Edwards was adjutant for Confederate General John S. Marmaduke.
"Day dawned, cold and raw. At intervals an east wind brought rain in torrents. Nevertheless, it was to be a day of murder. Todd moved camp only a few miles, when the muddy roads and the inhospitable weather drove him into it again. Lieutenant Shepherd, taking with him Kinney, Andy McGuire, Harrison Trow, Lafe Privin, Jesse and Frank James, went scouting along the Sturgeon road until Federals were met escorting seventeen wagons. The column was approaching Rocheport, with cavalry in advance, infantry divided up among the wagons, and in the rear the balance of horsemen. It was probable that one of Todd's charges would make of the march a massacre. He was four miles to the left of the enemy's line of travel when Jesse James carried to him swiftly the news of the situation, but by the rapid movment of half an hour he threw himself across the main road and dashed at the cavalry in front with the old yell and the old result. Todd killed the first Federal in the fight, a handsome trooper well ahead of the men and striving to hold them for a grapple. Then the on-going tide inundated everything. Those first to the wagons, after breaking through the covering cavalry as though it had been tissue paper stretched across a race-course, were Todd, raging like a lion, Thrailkill, the two Jameses, Gordon, McGuire, Hulse, Oll Shephered, William and Hugh Archie, Mead, Kinney, Tom Todd, Privin, Glasscock, De Hart, and Vaughn. Death came to men so quickly there that something superhuman seemed to be inflicting it. Corduroyed with corpses, the muddy road in a measure became firm. Inextricably entangled, men and mules fell together. Past the infantry, or rather the remains of it, dashed the two Jameses, De Hart, Kiney, Hulse, Mead, and Vaughn, Jesse James killing as he galloped a Federal two hundred yards from the road. This shot was a most remarkable one, and for some time was the talk of the command. The Federal was in the act of firing, having just lifted a carbine to his face, when James put a dragoon pistol ball into his head. The rout, if, indeed, it were not better called a butchery, lasted until dark. All the wagons were burnt, together with fifty-four Ballard rifles, abandoned by the enemy in their frantic efforts to escape. Each of the seventeen wagons had six spendid mules to it, but every mule was killed. In burning the wagons three negro drivers were burned up with them, the Guerrillas not taking the trouble to drag them out from the flames. Driving another wagon was a well known Southern citizen who had been pressed into service and forced to accompany the expedition. Before he could either explain the surroundings or make himself known to the Guerrillas, he was shot dead.
The wagons were loaded with ammunition and clothing, and Todd, ordering each of his men to help himself to a suit, the line looked as blue after the metamorphosis as any Federal line in Missouri. He had but one man hurt in the fight, Bart Lewis, of Platte county, and he only slightly in the leg. Dick Glasscock had a horse killed. Tom Todd had two men wounded, Jo Davis, of Randolph county, who afterwards died of his wound, and John M. Taylor. The Federals did not fight. After the first volley, a volley fired at long range and with scarcely the semblance of steadiness, everything was flight or panic. Ere the infantry knew the nature of the attack they were overridden. The cavalry in the rear ran away while thier comrades in the front were being butchered. The scene after the conflict was sickening. Charred human remains stuck out from the mouldering wagon heaps. Death, in all forms and shapes of agony made itself visible. Limbs were kneaded into the deep mud of the roadway, and faces, under the iron feet of the horses, crushed into shapelessness. "
This page is attributed to the research of Kirby Ross. If you wish to contact Kirby, he can be reached at this email address. KDRossEsq@aol.com
"I am seeking stories and anecdotes related to the Third Missouri State Militia Cavalry and their activities in Arkansas and Missouri."
"One particular story I am interested in concerns the attack by the Third on Col. Tim Reeves recruiting camp southwest of Doniphan, Missouri, near the Arkansas/Missouri state line on December 25, 1863. Reeves had just captured an entire company of 100+ men of the Third at Centerville, Missouri, and had transported them back to his camp. Instead of posting his men in preparation for a possible counter attack, he had them making pants and shirts out of tents that had been obtained in the capture of the Federal company. Major
James Wilson took full advantage of this lapse, attacked the camp, and annihilated the Confederate force, humiliating Reeves in the process. This event likely proved to be instrumental in Reeves' execution of Wilson and his men nine months later."
After Wilson and six of his men were executed, Union authorities in St. Louis chose six Confederate enlisted men and one major to be shot in retaliation. At 2:00 p.m. on October 29, 1864, Asa Ladd, James W. Gates,
John A. Nichols, Charles W. Minnekin, George T. Bunch and Harvey Blackburn were executed. Major Enoch O. Wolf was scheduled to be shot November 18, 1864, but had his execution halted on order of Abraham Lincoln.
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