I have to agree that there is no valid way to measure all the deaths caused by Missouri's guerrilla war.

Too much of it was private, or was treated as private by families of victims. Too many people and families who were victims of that violence moved away along with their tragic stories about what happened to them.

Revolutions in printing starting in the 1880's in some counties brought county histories with robust Civil War chapters, but way too many decided not to stir up those old hatreds again and opted for small CW sections or mere lists and omitted much of that local history. Those omissions left big holes in our knowledge of Missouri's guerrilla war. The same was true of period newspapers. Many of the rural weeklies ceased printing to avoid those terror-filled nighttime visits by groups who disliked the editorial policy enough to pay a destructive visit. Some of these prewar papers started up again late in the war, but look at all the local news they missed. The KC, STL, and St. Joe dailies were good to reprint the storiesby the rural weeklies, but there was not always much to chose from, especially in the cold weather months when things tended to quiet down.

Huge losses were few and far between on all the sides, thank goodness, but it was the large number of solitary incidents and the killing of ones and twos that tend to slip by without notice. Add to this the disappeared ones, like they used to call such things in Argentina a few decades ago, and the death toll mounts. The disappeared ones were men who were in either army and simply never came home, or were captured and sent to prison and were never heard from back home. There were even stories of soldiers from either side who took leave or took "French leave" and headed home and never arrived. Basically, any man of any loyalty who traveled alone or just by twos and threes took a great hazard. If you think I exaggerate, ask me about local guerrilla bands who specialized in preying on travelers in Taney County, in Benton County, and many other places. Nobody inquires about travelers who disappear, and those killers and robbers just kept doing it. There was law only in the barrel of a gun if someone was there to use it. Some of this killing was by deserters or renegades not interested in loyalty to one side or another.

Further, do we count all the deaths of women and children who starved or were so malnourished that in their weakened condition they caught something and died? Just how exaggerated were such stories? How do we measure that? You say, how can somebody starve to death in such a productive land? It's easy when everybody who rides by takes something from your larder or a cow here and a pig there or some chickens. After a while it's Old Mrs. Hubbard time and the cupboard is bare. Then you eat acorns and so forth. Or, do we count only the deaths caused by direct and not indirect guerrilla acts or the acts of those hunting guerrilas?

I sheepishly admit that once I figured that if I worked this enough over time I could get a handle of the number of deaths. I say now that I was naive. Truly a dark period in Missouri's history that holds onto its secrets all too well.

Bruce Nichols