It has come to my attention a good number of Civil War researchers are of the belief the home owned by Confederate Brig. Gen. Nathaniel W. Watkins in Jackson, Cape Girardeau County, was burned to the ground by Union soldiers during the war.
The assumption seems to be based on a statement made decades ago by Henry Blanton, United States district attorney at St. Louis, at the unveiling of a picture of Watkins at the Scott County Courthouse in Benton. One or more of the accounts say the fire, in 1862, was originally reported in an unidentified newspaper article. If documented evidence is available to support the claim I would very much appreciate hearing of it. I don’t believe it happened.
As I understand it, Watkins was encouraged by Union authorities to return to his Jackson home after he’d resigned his post as commanding general of the Missouri State Guard’s first division (and replaced by M. Jeff Thompson). But after he’d reoccupied the home in July of 1862 he was driven out of it in November of that same year by Union Col. Albert Jackson. It prompted Watkins to complain to President Lincoln in a letter dated November 30, 1862. That the home, occupied by Union soldiers during the winter, was still standing in early 1863 is proven in a letter Union Brig. Gen. Leonard F. Ross wrote to Watkins January 21, 1863, to encourage him to return to it. I have no information about what happened to the home after that, but Watkins spent the rest of his life in his home near Morley, Missouri, in Scott County.
One of the published accounts attributes the alleged fire to soldiers under the command of Union Col. Albert Jackson. But if it had happened and he or his men had been involved it surely would have arisen during the course of an exhaustive investigation into Jackson’s service record shortly before he was kicked out of the army late in 1862. It was not mentioned, although Jackson was blamed for the uncalled-for burning of Dallas (now Marble Hill) November 6, 1862.