Edward Alfred Pollard, The lost cause; a new Southern history of the War of the Confederates ... Drawn from official sources and approved by the most distinguished Confederate leaders.

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[166] a cavalry assault was made by the Illinois mounted men upon one of the Missouri batteries; but the assailants were terribly cut up with grape and buckshot, and retreated in confusion to the entrenchments.

Col. Mulligan had received two painful wounds. After having once ordered down a white flag which some of the “home guards,” had displayed, he, at last, convinced of the hopelessness of his situation, determined on a surrender. He did so, only after fifty-two hours of continuous fighting. Immediately Gen. Price issued an order, that the forces under Col. Mulligan, having stacked their arms, “were not to be insulted by word or act, for they had fought like brave men.” Mulligan, having given up his sword, had it immediately returned to him by Gen. Price, who said he “could not see a man of his valour without his sword.” The brave captive was afterwards treated with true chivalric courtesy by Gen. Price, who induced him and his wife to become his guests, and entertained them with all the hospitality at his command.

The entire loss of the Missourians in this series of engagements was but twenty-five killed and seventy-two wounded. The enemy's loss was considerably larger, and, though never officially reported, was estimated by their own narratives as amounting to five hundred in killed and wounded. The visible fruits of the victory were considerable. The Missourians captured five colonels, a hundred and nineteen other commissioned officers, and thirty-five hundred non-commissioned officers and privates, five cannon, two mortars, over three thousand muskets, rifles and carbines, about seven hundred and fifty horses, a quantity of ammunition, and more than one hundred thousand dollars worth of commissary stores. There was also recovered about $900,000 of coin of which the Lexington Bank had been robbed, in accordance with Fremont's instructions, which Gen. Price ordered to be immediately restored to its owners.

The capture of Lexington and the bold and brilliant movements of the Missouri patriots in other parts of the State-among them the operations in Southeastern Missouri of the partisan Jeff. Thompson and his “Swamp Fox brigade” --excited rage and alarm in the Washington administration. Gen. Fremont, who was severely censured for not having reinforced Mulligan, hoped to recover his position by activity and success; he put himself at the head of the army, and advanced towards Jefferson City, sending back the promise that he would overwhelm Price. It was at this period that Gen. Price found his position one of the greatest emergency. He had received intelligence that the Confederate forces, under Gens. Pillow and Hardee, had been withdrawn from the southeastern portion of the State. Gen. McCulloch had retired to Arkansas. Gen. Price was left with the only forces in Missouri to confront an enemy sixty thousand strong; he was almost entirely without ammunition: and he was beset with other difficulties and embarrassments. A large number of his men