James Montgomery (colonel)

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James Montgomery (December 22, 1814 – December 6, 1871) was a notorious Jayhawker during the Bleeding Kansas Affair and a controversial Union colonel during the American Civil War. Montgomery was a staunch abolitionist and used extreme measures against pro-slavery populations.

Contents

[edit] Early life and Bleeding Kansas

James Montgomery was born to James and Mary Baldwin Montgomery in Austinburg, Ashtabula County, Ohio on Dec. 22, 1814.[1] He migrated to Kentucky in 1837 with his parents and eventually taught school there. He married, but his first wife died shortly after the wedding, so he married again to Clarinda Evans.[2] They moved to Pike County, Missouri in 1852, then to Jackson County and finally Bates County while awaiting the organization of Kansas for settlement. In 1854 he purchased land near present day Mound City, Kansas where he became a leader of local Free-state men and was a fervent abolitionist.[3][4] In 1857 he organized and commanded a "Self-Protective Company", using it to order pro-slavery settlers out of the region. Conflict with other pro-slavery elements led territorial governor James W. Denver to dispatch United States soldiers in to restore order. Montgomery at times even cooperated with the fanatical abolitionist John Brown and considered a raid to rescue Brown after his capture in Virginia, but snow in Pennsylvania upset his plan.[5]

[edit] Civil War

On July 24, 1861, Montgomery was commissioned colonel of the 3rd Kansas Infantry Regiment of Senator James H. Lane's Kansas brigade with Montgomery as second in command of the brigade.[6] Discipline was lacking under Montgomery and both the 3rd and 4th Kansas would be consolidated into the 10th Kansas in April of 1862.[7] Lane's Kansas brigade was notorious for its Jayhawker style raids into Missouri at the start of the war and particularly the Sacking of Osceola. Noted historian Albert Castel describes Montgomery as a "a sincere, if unscrupulous, antislavery zealot." [8]

Montgomery was authorized to raise a regiment of African-American infantry in January of 1863 that would become the 2nd South Carolina (African Descent).[9] Throughout 1863 and part of 1864, Montgomery practiced his brand of warfare in South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida.

On June 11, 1863 Colonel Montgomery commanded a brigade including his own 2nd South Carolina and the 54th Massachusetts under Colonel Robert Gould Shaw. Montgomery's operations along the coast resemble his earlier Jayhawking raids. Montgomery led a raid on the coastal town of Darien, Georgia which he ordered looted and burned even though it was not defended and had not offered any resistance. Shaw condemned the action and in a private letter gave Montgomery's reason for burning the town as "that the Southerners must be made to feel that this was a real war, and that they were to be swept away by the hand of God, like the Jews of old." Montgomery stated to Shaw, "We are outlawed, and therefore not bound by the rules of regular warfare." [10]

Colonel Montgomery commanded a brigade in the Battle of Olustee. In 1864 he resigned his commission and returned to Kansas. He ended his military career as colonel of the Sixth Kansas State Militia, active in October of that year during Confederate General Sterling Price's raid.[11]

[edit] Postwar

After the war, Montgomery returned to his Linn County, Kansas farm, where he died on December 6, 1871.[12]

[edit] References

  1. ^ Clan Montgomery Society International Genealogical Database
  2. ^ Clan Montgomery Society International Genealogical Database
  3. ^ Cutler, William G., History of the State of Kansas, A. T. Andreas, 1883, "The Era of Peace", Part 43
  4. ^ Castel, Albert, Civil War Kansas: Reaping the Whirlwind, University Press of Kansas, 1997, page 42
  5. ^ Cutler, William G., History of the State of Kansas, A. T. Andreas, 1883, "The Era of Peace", Part 43
  6. ^ Cutler, William G., History of the State of Kansas, A. T. Andreas, 1883, "The Era of Peace", Part 43
  7. ^ Dyer, Frederick H., A Compendium of the War of the Rebellion, Part 3, Dyer Publishing, 1908, page 1187
  8. ^ "Kansas Jayhawking Raids into Western Missouri in 1861", Missouri Historical Review, Vol. 54 No. 1, October 1959
  9. ^ The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, Series III, Volume III, page 14
  10. ^ [[1]] Shaw's June 12 description in a letter to his wife, Annie
  11. ^ The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, Series I, Vol 81, page 520
  12. ^ Cutler, William G., History of the State of Kansas, A. T. Andreas, 1883, "The Era of Peace", Part 43

[edit] External Links