January 2026 Meeting Summary

At our dinner meeting on January 21st, Mr. Ralph A. Monaco II gave a very interesting program about his book titled: Scattered to the Four Winds: General Order
No. 11 and Martial Law in Jackson County Missouri, 1863. Attendance at the dinner meeting was 64.

Mr. Monaco said the springboard that started the Civil War was the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854. The Act repealed the Missouri Compromise of 1820 and created
the territories of Kansas and Nebraska. In his opinion, slavery and economics blend together as the cause of the Civil War. The Confederate constitution was all about slavery. The Kansas-Nebraska Act was also about railroads. The transcontinental railroad was going to go through Nebraska. It was decided that the area from Nebraska to the end of the Louisiana Purchase territory was going to be free. Since Kansas was next to Missouri, it was thought that Kansas would be a slave state. However, the Kansas-Nebraska Act left the issue of slavery in Kansas to be decided on the basis of popular sovereignty. Bad blood between the north and the south permeated long before Fort Sumter.

Order No. 11 was issued by Union General Thomas Ewing, Jr. on August 25, 1863. It forced the evacuation of residents from the rural areas in western Missouri (Jackson, Cass, Bates, and the northern part of Vernon Counties). They had to leave in 15 days. However, residents of Kansas City, Westport, and Independence MO did not have to leave. Mr. Monaco said Order No. 11 was the worst violation of civil rights in the United States up until the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II.

Quantrill decided to attack Lawrence KS on August 21, 1863 because of everything that had gone on before. It was not in response to the collapse of the Union prison that killed several pro-southern women on August 13, 1863. In fact, the rallying cry of the Confederate raiders at Lawrence was: “Remember Osceola!” Order No. 11 was issued in response to Quantrill’s raid on Lawrence. It was an effort to suppress Bushwhackers in the region.

According to the 1860 U.S. Census, there were approximately 40,000 people living in the affected counties. It is not known how many people were required
to leave their homes in 1863 or how many people returned to their homes after the Civil War ended in 1865.

Mr. Monaco said Order No. 11 was a military war measure imposed against everyone, loyal or disloyal. It especially impacted women, senior citizens, the disabled, and children. It was a war on civilians. They even put up signs that said: “If you are entering our county because of Order No. 11, don’t enter.” After the war, people returned to find their home burned to the ground, leaving only a chimney. Mr. Monaco said his book was written based on the lives of the following six people:

Brigadier General James Lane: Leader of the Kansas Jayhawkers during the Bleeding Kansas period and a U.S. Senator (1861-1866).
George Caleb Bingham: Landscape artist. One of the most important American artists of the 19th Century. Bingham did not like General Ewing.
William Clarke Quantrill, Confedrate guerrilla leader. Led raid on Lawrence, Kansas.
Major General John Schofield: Commander of the U.S. Army Department of Missouri (May 24, 1863 to January 30, 1864).
Abraham Comingo: Two term mayor of Independnce MO. Elected to the Missouri Convention and voted not to secede.
Brigadier General Thomas Ewing, Jr: He issued the infamous General Order No. 11