The Missouri in the Civil War Message Board

Krekel's battalion dismantled

But can we specifically place Windmuller at the Givens farm? And in charge of a 34 man force. I haven't been able to so far but I'm still working on tracking that down.

In analyzing actions and events I generally try to determine what else was going on and who all were involved. So I put the Callaway County killings and the dismantling of Krekel's battalion under the microscope.

Note that Krekel's battalion was dismantled in the immediate aftermath of the congressional election. The election was November 4, the order breaking the battalion up was issued out of St. Louis on November 11. I would suspect Union command did not want to be antagonizing a United States Congressman in case he won and waited until after the votes came in to clamp down on him.

I've pulled the vote count and as it turns out it wasn't even close. In the 9th Congressional District the overall count was 2440 for Radical Unionist Krekel; 7866 for Conservative Unionist Rollins. In Callaway County the count was 163 Krekel, 821 Rollins. Probably not a good idea to have your men rampaging around a county killing civilans right before an election if you want them to vote for you.

Other counties in the Ninth District were Boone, Callaway, Lincoln, Monroe, Ralls, Audrain, St. Charles, Pike, Warren and Montgomery. Krekel won his home county of St. Charles 1112 to 312. The only other county he took was Warren with it's heavy German population -- still, it was close -- 548 to 493.

Rollins won overwhelmingly everywhere else. Boone 63/1024; Lincoln 128/617; Monroe 5/743; Ralls 5/642; Audrain 47/539; Pike 36/1890; Montgomery 325/448; 10th MSM Cavalry based at Paris: 3/137.

These returns tend to show the Radicals were pretty weak in the district at the time, and that there would not be a serious pushback regarding sacking Krekel -- so with returns like that, Krekel and his battalion were doomed. He would make a big comeback when the Radicals took control of Missouri and the U.S. Congress two years later -- four months after the November 1864 election Abraham Lincoln nominated Krekel to a Missouri federal judgeship, and within 72 hours the Radical Congress confirmed that nomination.

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Federal Capt. Henry Windmuller at Massacre?
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Krekel's battalion dismantled
Re: Krekel's battalion dismantled
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Re: Krekel's battalion dismantled
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Re: Krekel's battalion dismantled
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