The Tennessee in the Civil War Message Board

Nashville CWRT - October 2014 meeting

Hello,

October 20th, 2014 – Our 68th Meeting!! We continue our sixth year!

The next meeting of the Nashville (TN) Civil War Roundtable will be on Monday, October 20th, 2014, in the visitor’s center of Ft. Negley Park, a unit of Metro Parks, Nashville, TN. This is located off I-65 just south of downtown between 4th Avenue South and 8th Avenue South on Edgehill Avenue/Chestnut Avenue. Take Exit 81, Wedgewood Avenue, off I-65 and follow the signs to the Science Museum. The meeting begins at 7:00 PM and is always open to the public. Members please bring a friend or two – new recruits are always welcomed.

Our Speaker and Topic - “The Civil War In Northeast Missouri and the Palmyra Massacre”

The Civil War in the Trans-Mississippi is too often overlooked by most students of the war today. Sadly, this overlooks not only some very important battles and campaigns but also very interesting events. One such case is the Civil War in Northeast Missouri and the massacre at Palmyra. Missouri, like some other parts of the South, featured a civil war within the Civil War. These events began in the 1850s and carried on into the 1860s. Brutality was more the norm than not and with names like William Quantrill, “Bloody” Bill Anderson and others, the reputation continues today.

Confederate Colonel Joe Porter has been lumped in with these others by some. His campaign to take northeast Missouri for the Confederacy has only one earlier book to document it written by a participant. Taking place in mid-1862, Porter, who was from this part of the state, waged a campaign against Federal Missourians who branded him an outlaw, bandit, etc. Yet he was a Confederate Army officer who raised a unit under the 1862 Partisan Rangers Act and fought under the command of superiors according to their strategic planning for the state. Porter fought a series of battles across this part of the state and also gathered thousands of recruits for the Confederate Army. The campaign ended with the shooting at Palmyra of several Confederate prisoners by the Federals, by far the most controversial event and yet so typical of the war in Missouri.

Our speaker this month, who will inform us of these events, is Scott Sallee. In addition to being a member of the Nashville CWRT, for which we are indeed very happy, he is also a former staffer at Blue & Gray Magazine for whom he has written three General’s Tour articles on the Trans-Mississippi. He has also been published in other magazines and his book, Joe Porter’s War – Colonel Joseph C. Porter and the Civil War in Northeast Missouri, 1862, was released in 2013. Scott earned degrees in history at Truman State University in Missouri and Western Kentucky University in Bowling Green.