previous next

Doc. 76 1/2.-battle at Monroe Station, Mo., July 10, 1861.

The following particulars of the affair at Monroe, being gathered from parties that were present, may be considered substantially correct. On Monday, Colonel Smith, hearing that the State troops, under General Harris, were encamped near Florida, left Monroe Station with a force of 500 men, to disperse them. After passing Florida, and when a short distance north of one of the fords of Salt River, on the other side of which the State troops were encamped, his force was suddenly fired upon from the roadside by about 200 of Harris's command. At this spot there was an open field, lying to the right of the road, and about eighty yards in width. The State troops, who were a mounted scouting party, had left their horses a short distance back in the woods, and fired in ambush from the opposite side of the field.

The only person injured by the fire was Capt. McAllister, of the 16th Illinois Regiment, who was mortally wounded. The Federal forces returned the fire without effect, and retired to Monroe Station to await reenforcements, the balance of Harris's command having crossed the ford and commenced a system of guerilla warfare. After retreating a few miles, the Federal forces encamped until the next day, when they again retired toward Monroe Station. A short skirmish was here engaged in, without loss to either side. In the mean time, no guard having been left at Monroe, Capt. Owen entered the place with about 200 of the State forces, and burned the depot and some cars.

The officers on the Hannibal and St. Joseph road report thirteen passenger and seventeen freight cars destroyed, and another station-house burned a short distance from Monroe. Col. Smith, as soon as he reached the latter place, threw his entire force into a large building used as an academy. Harris's command, some 2,500 in number, surrounded him and brought two six-pound cannon to bear on the building. Owing to the distance at which they were placed and the unskilful working, they did no execution.

During the constant interchange of shots that took place, two men, not connected with either side, but residents of Monroe, were killed. The name of one was Hotchkiss.--St. Louis Republican, July 13.

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.

An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.

hide People (automatically extracted)
Sort people alphabetically, as they appear on the page, by frequency
Click on a person to search for him/her in this document.
Isham G. Harris (4)
Caleb B. Smith (2)
W. M. Owen (1)
Thomas B. Monroe (1)
McAllister (1)
Hotchkiss (1)
Doc (1)
hide Dates (automatically extracted)
Sort dates alphabetically, as they appear on the page, by frequency
Click on a date to search for it in this document.
July 10th, 1861 AD (1)
July 13th (1)
hide Display Preferences
Greek Display:
Arabic Display:
View by Default:
Browse Bar: