Thanks! Yeah, this thing is huge--about the size of the 1862 and 1863 volumes together. I had no idea until I was deep within this project just how big it is. First, I underestimated how much the southerners wanted victory in Missouri in 1864. Second, during the winter of 1864 and 1865 the stay-behind guerrillas, or many of them, kept up their operational level instead of laying low which was the norm in the two previous winters. I cannot prove, but think the stay-behinders were mainly left to look after badly wounded guerrillas left with friendly families the previous two winters, but what I read for winter 64-65 was offensive war, not defensive. I figured with the defeat of Price's army, the guerrillas would lose interest in the southern cause and so would the southern regulars. Boy, was I wrong! That's why General Dodge pushed the amnesty deal with the same surrender terms Grant offered Lee. Dodge was attempting to prepare his citizen self defense forces (armed to the teeth instead of armed with left-overs and smoke sticks other commands had turned down earlier) but there was no way the citizens could cope with the killers coming back in May 1865. Once General "Swamp Fox" Thompson in NE Arkansas surrendered the few thousand he had under very humane terms on 11 May the Missouri returned-Confederate soldiers wanted the same deal and the guerrillas knew a good thing when they saw it, too. Everybody goes home and gets their life handed back to them. Who could refuse a deal like that when it had been "no quarter" thanks to General Halleck from spring 1862 with death to eveybody. Not much future in that, huh? Except for revenge-taking, this cooled the whole thing down in weeks by about the end of June. I had to wade into it and hope I could walk out again on the other side. I will leave it to readers to see if I pulled it off.

Bruce