John,
No, the master sergeant didn't cite his source for this on page 368, did he? His source is Major John N. Edwards' "Noted Guerrillas" which on page 236 states:
"Poole brought to Todd a reinforcement of thirty additional Guerrillas, making seventy in the aggregate, and with this force he captured Tipton, Moniteau county, putting to the sword its garrison of forty militia, and destroying some valuable government property. From Moniteau county to Cooper county was an easy march, and Todd swooped down by Boonville..."
The Tipton raid occurred 1 September 1864, while I think the Lamine bridge of northwest Cooper County was torched a month later about 7 October while Price's raid was trying to conquer Jefferson City. Edwards wrote on page 313 about Todd's early October 1864 foray into Cooper County, but he didn't credit Todd and company with burning the bridge. I haven't dug around enough yet to determine who actually burned the Lamine bridge or an exact date. I am still researching 1864 for an upcoming work, and I haven't sorted out all the details yet.
Besides Edwards these are some of my resources for the 1 Sep 64 Tipton raid:
--period newspaper "A Raid on Tipton, Missouri," Kansas City "Daily Journal," 5 Sep 64;
--(no headline), Kansas City "Daily Journal," 11 Sep 64;
--period newspaper "Guerrilla Doings," Columbia "Missouri Statesman, 9 Sep 64, from the Jeff City "Missouri State Times.";
--period newspaper "Peace and Quiet in Missouri," St. Louis "Daily Missouri Democrat," 7 Sep 64;
--James F. Thoma, "This Cruel Unnatural War: The American Civil War in Cooper County, Missouri, pub. by author in Kingsport, TN, 2003, p. 106 (source is period newspaper "The Sedalia Advertizer," 3 Sep 64);
--"O.R." series 1, vol. 41, part 3, pages 11, 58;
--Eakin, "Warren Welch Remembers," Shawnee Mission, KS: Two Trails Pub., 1997, p. 7 (guerrilla memoir).
In summary, Todd's 88 guerrillas made a quick raid on the Pacific Railroad town of Tipton at 6 am, and dashed out again before passing Union troops could swoop down on them or pin them down awaiting reinforcements by railroad. I seem to recall from reading that nearly all Union troops present took off and hid. The raiders smashed the telegraph battery and cut the line. They raided all the stores in quick fashion taking watches, jewelry, and an assortment of other goods. The residents did not resist so many heavily armed bushwhackers.
The guerrillas did kill Private Robert Stevens of 4th Cavalry MSM. They also shot down a Joseph Fuller and a Mr. Gabriel (1860 census shows some Gabriel households in Morgan County). One of those two died, because nearly all sources state the raiders killed two men in the Tipton raid. Todd's men also took along as hostage 1st Sgt Hannibal B. Davis of Co. K, 4th Cav MSM (who had resigned 4 Apr 64) whom the Jeff City paper stated was taken to guarantee humane treatment of one of Todd's men who was too sick to ride and left at Tipton ("to the clemency of the enemy" quoting John Wayne's "The Horse Soldiers"). Later that day in Cooper County George Todd had Davis killed, for reasons unknown.
So you see that Edwards wasn't far from the truth, except he didn't give the date (good thing, too, since many dates Edwards gave or even month were not correct; he also tended to switch exact events out of order or get two events in the same place confused) and, as was his custom, he had the raiders leaving heaps of bodies of dead Yankees in Rambo fashion instead of the two unfortunates who actually died plus one or two wounded and one hostage.
Bruce Nichols