I found online at the State of Missouri, Secretary of State's Office, Missouri State Archives, the brief mention of a military record of a Private George W. Harvey who was a member of Atkinson's Bates County Volunteer Missouri Miliita Company (VMM) during May and June 1865. Private Harvey served 47 days active duty between 22 May and 16 June 1865 at the town of Johnstown in east-central Bates County, immediately after he enrolled into this local unit. First Lieutenant John Atkinson, formerly of the Union 7th Cavalry Missouri State Militia (MSM), was also the current sheriff of Bates County. In essence, the Atkinson's Bates County VMM Company served as a sort of law enforcement unit in the days before civil law was firmly re-established in Bates County at the end of the Civil War. As you may know, Bates County was one of the three-and-one-half counties along the Kansas border that was depopulated by order of the Union military in autumn 1863 by the notorious General Orders Number 11 in the false hope that by sending the population away, the southern guerrillas would be denied their primary source of support. Later in the war the Union miitary allowed families that could assert their loyalty to the northern side to settle in this area.

Incidently, Lieutenant Atkinson and 16 members of his unit during middle April 1865 fought a running battle with a traveling band of southerners returning home at the end of the war near the Grand River at the border of Bates and Cass Counties. Members of this traveling band stole horses from farms they passed in south Bates County and shot at residents, and Atkinson and his men set out in pursuit. They cornered nine armed southerners who were afoot and abandoned by their mounted comrades who rode on north. During the fighting that followed one of Adkinson's men was severely wounded and they apparently killed seven of the nine southerners who sought refuge on high ground in a copse of trees in the flooded plain of the Grand River. Even though Wash Harvey's record says he did not join the unit officially until 22 May, he may have been along in this action unofficially, because it served as an "ad hoc" posse. The best source for this action is S. L. Tathwell's 1897 "The Old Settlers' History of Bates County," Amsterdam, MO: Tathwell and Maxey, pages 180-3. I should mention that although the war ended in most places during April and early May 1865, it did not end until late May in Missouri, and some fighting took place as late as June 1865, and even later.

I found the household of Wash Harvey, age 25, farmer, born in Missouri in the 1870 census, but I did not find him in the 1860 census of this area. The rest of his household in 1870 included wife, 23, born MO Triphina, and sons Lewis R., 5, Julian 3 and George 1, all born in Missouri. This was in Pleasant Gap Township of southeast central Bates County. Nearby to Wash Harvey's household is that of 48 year old Tennessee-born James Harvey and Lydia Harvey also born in Tennessee and a couple of other young Harvey families.

Regarding the use of the term "scout," it has changed in military usage since the Civil War. Back then, a "scout" or "scouts" would search for the enemy, something beginning in the 20th century we tend to call a "patrol," or in this instance, a "reconnaissance patrol" to refer to a patrol that scouts for the enemy to determine their location, strength, etc. So, if Wash Harvey says in his biography that he was a scout, applying this to his war record, I would guess that he kept a lookout or actively rode through the Bates County area that spring looking for mounted groups of Rebels that could pose a threat. Since he worked as a "scout" actually "scouting" during the Civil War, that is the way he would phrase it in his biography.

I hope that helps.

Bruce Nichols