The news is not good, but not all bad for what you seek. May I respectfully refer you to the Kingdom of Callaway Historical Society. A few years ago their address was Westminster College, Winston Churchill Memorial and Library, 7th and Westminister Ave. Fulton, MO 65251 and turn you over to them? Maybe, just maybe, somebody there can give you some information about the southern units that contained Callaway County men.

I looked in the Missouri Secretary of State's website for the Missouri State Archives of online Civil War soldiers figuring I could at least find your Thomas Smith. No way! Not only were there over 4000 Smiths listed there on both sides, there were three pages of Thomas Smiths, too. The address is http://www.sos.mo.gov/archives/soldiers and I encourage you to try and find at least Thomas Smith. It would help a lot if you know his middle initial, but I wouldn't advise any attempt at William or John Smith. Likewise, if you know the middle initial of these three men, you would stand a better chance at ANY research. I spotted at least two Thomas Smiths from neighboring Boone County before I quit the effort as requiring more time than I have. I really sympathize, as lots of my ancestors are named Johnson, and, like yours, they liked to name their sons William and James, and so forth. Common names like that make searching records for them that much harder. Not impossible, but harder.

The 1884 Callaway County history only has a few pages about the Civil War, probably because the publishers didn't want to open up old war emotions, which were probably still fresh at that time. However, this is what it says on page 390 about southern men in Callaway County:

"We have tried in vain to obtain the number and names of the men who entered the Confederate army from Callaway county. No record of them has ever been preserved, either by the officers who commanded the men, or by the Confederate government. In all, thirteen companies entered the Southern army from Callaway county, commanded by the following officers:" [and it lists all 13 company commanders' names]. "These companies were not all full. There were, however, scores of men who left the country singly or in squads of from two to four each, and joined the Southern army further South. From the best information we can obtain, the number of men who from first to last united their fortunes with the Confederate army [it means from Callaway County], might be placed somewhere between eight and eleven hundred."

The publisher of the 1884 county history very much wanted to list the Callaway County men in the southern army, because it would have increased sales of their book, so that discovery must have been a disappointment to them.

Now, it is possible that somebody, perhaps associated with the organization I mentioned above, has written down the names of some or most of those men. Ask the Kingdom of Callaway Historical Society, and give the the most full version of those men's names that you can.

I looked in Jim McGhee's 2008 "Guide to Missouri Confederate Units, 1861-1865" in the index and Callaway County is mentioned in this book at least 18 times.

You see, recruiting for the Confederacy was against the law in Civil War Missouri--at least to the Yankee side that garrisoned the state. There was a Union garrison at Fulton, the county seat, for much of the war. Therefore, like the quote above, most of the men from there had to leave and join up many miles to the south, perhaps all the way to Arkansas. That is why Callaway County men ended up in so many different southern units. The same is true for most of the Missouri Counties. Some counties have better historical records about this than others. You just have to contact somebody there to see what they have.

I wish I had better news for you, and I wish you good hunting.

Bruce Nichols