It's good to have you back, and I appreciate your input with the pioneer and Civil War background of the Odneal families of Cole, Moniteau, and Cooper Counties. Some of the information you provided made me think of other possibilities in the killings at the Good farm.

John, I have another mission for you. (With apologies to "Saving Private Ryan.")

I read in Kirby Ross' edition of Sam Hildebrand's war journal that during May 1865 Hildebrand hurried back to southeast Missouri a couple more times specifically to seek personal revenge against men who wronged him and his family before the war actually stopped and the return of peace made his acts of personal justice (as he saw them) to be criminal acts. Many of Hildebrand's earlier retribution raids on SE MO throughout the war were to avenge the wrongs done other people who were unwilling or unable to ride through all the Yankees and assassinate villains cloaked in the protection of being good northerners. As he saw it, Hildebrand was performing a public service, and the rise of the radical Republicans in the November 1864 Missouri elections ensured many of the culprits would be in power and untouchable to southerners and to civil law after hostilities stopped. After all, from his viewpoint, these men were among the victors, which gave them power of protection.

I'm thinking that could be what happened in the killings of the two men at the Good farm on Saturday, 27 May 1865. I think these five men or some of them were returning Confederates who took advantage of the chaotic times and lack of civil law to "take care of unfinished business" about something that happened to one of their friends or family members earlier in the war. After all, those five unidentified riders placed their own lives in hazard in the vengeance raid on the Good farm, and the Good survivor is pretty sure he wounded one of them when they came in the door of the house after killing his father and brother in the barnyard. The killers stopped at Jacob Good's body on the ground just long enough to leave the note:

"Done in revenge for Buck Odeal. For every bushwhacker that is killed, I will kill fifty."

I think they wrote that note ahead of time, and stopped just long enough to place it on Jacob's chest where the surviving son later found it, then left quickly after the son in the house blasted one of them in the doorway.

You said William P. Odneal was "killed in Tipton, Mo in 1862, Family lore says Dec. 22, 1862." I don't have any record of any war-related killing in or near Tipton anytime in December 1862. Are there any more Odneal details in this "family lore," that may give me some clues about what happened to William at Tipton that December? Are there any cemetery records for William P. Odneal that may give more details or verify his date of death?

What makes me think this is that one of Jacob Good's sons not present at the farm that Saturday was Private J. W. Good who served in the local Company F, 52nd Enrolled Missouri Militia of Cooper County. His active duty service in this unit included a term between 1 January and 1 April 1863. His starting date of duty was only about a week after William P. Odneal was killed in nearby Tipton on 22 December 1862.

I checked the Union troop disposition record for 31 December 1862 and found no regular active duty Union troop units serving at Tipton, but I know for a fact that Union authorities had some northern troops guarding the Pacific Railroad infrastructure at Tipton and along the right-of-way. I guess guarding that stretch of railroad and Tipton itself were men of the local 52nd EMM from Cooper County and/or the Moniteau County 43rd EMM.

My guess is that one or more of those five riders at the Good farm knew what happened at Tipton and somehow knew that one of the Goods maybe had something to do with the death of William P. Odneal on 22 December 1862.

John, your mission--if you choose to accept it--is to discover that connection between the death of William P. Odneal at Tipton in December 1862 and the Good family of Saline Township of nearby northeast Cooper County (with apologies to "Mission Impossible"). Seriously, please see if you can find anything. This should be child's play for you.

John, I really am glad to have you back.

Bruce Nichols