View source for Border ruffian

{{short description|Proslavery Missourian raiders within Kansas Territory}}
{{distinguish|Border reivers}}
{{Use American English|date = October 2019}}
{{Use mdy dates|date = October 2019}}
[[File:Border Ruffians Invading Kansas by F. O. C. Darley.jpg|thumb|An illustration of border ruffians entering the [[Kansas Territory]] by [[F. O. C. Darley]].]]

'''Border ruffians''' were [[Proslavery thought|proslavery]] raiders who crossed into the [[Kansas Territory]] from [[Missouri]] during the mid-19th century to help ensure the territory entered the [[United States]] as a [[Slave states and free states|slave state]]. Their activities formed a major part of a series of violent civil confrontations known as "[[Bleeding Kansas]]", which peaked from 1854 to 1858. Crimes committed by border ruffians included [[electoral fraud]], [[intimidation]], [[assault]], [[property damage]] and [[murder]]; many border ruffians took pride in their reputation as criminals. After the outbreak of the [[American Civil War]] in 1861, many border ruffians fought on the side of the [[Confederate States of America]] as irregular [[bushwhacker]]s.

==Origin==
[[File:Border ruffians invading Kansas.jpg|thumb|Armed border ruffians going into Kansas]]
[[File:Ferrying Missouri voters to the Kansas shore.jpg|thumb|Ferrying Missouri voters [across the [[Missouri River]]] to the Kansas shore, by [[Gilbert Gaul (artist)|Gilbert Gaul]]]]
[[File:Border ruffians marching on Lawrence, Kansas.jpg|thumb|Border ruffians, with a [[cannon]], marching on Lawrence, Kansas]]
[[File:Two unidentified Border Ruffians with swords) - Blackall, photographer, Clinton, Iowa LCCN2016646192.jpg|thumb|Two unidentified border ruffians with swords]]
The 1913 edition of [[Webster's Dictionary]] reflects the 19th century understanding of the word {{Wikt-lang|en|ruffian}} as a "scoundrel, rascal, or unprincipled, deceitful, brutal and unreliable person".

Among the first to use the term ''border ruffian'' in connection with the slavery issue in Kansas was the ''Herald of Freedom'', a newspaper published in [[Lawrence, Kansas]]. On October 8, 1857, it reported the following:
{{blockquote|Gov. Reeder soon after March 30 visited Washington, hoping to induce Pres. Pierce to disregard the election. On his way there he stopped at his old home, Easton, Pa., and told the story of Kansas' wrongs, in a speech to his old neighbors. In this he designated the invaders as "Border Ruffians", and said they were led by their chiefs, [[David R. Atchison]] and [[Benjamin Franklin Stringfellow (1816–1891)|B. F. Stringfellow]].<ref>{{citation
|url=http://kansasboguslegislature.org/mo/stringfellow_b_f.html
|first=Charles
|last=Clark
|publisher=kansasboguslegislature.org
|title=Benjamin F. Stringfellow
|access-date=March 11, 2021
|archive-date=April 11, 2022
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220411204345/http://kansasboguslegislature.org/mo/stringfellow_b_f.html
|url-status=live
}}</ref>}}

Armed with revolvers and [[Bowie knives]], border ruffians forcefully interfered in the Kansas row over slavery.<ref>{{citation
|first=Jason
|last=Phillips
|url=https://longreads.com/2018/12/17/bowie-knives-concealed-rifles-and-caning-charles-sumner/
|title=Bowie Knives, Concealed Rifles, and Caning Charles Sumner
|year=2018
|others=Adapted from ''The Looming Civil War: How Nineteenth-Century Americans Imagined the Future'', [[Oxford University Press]]
|access-date=March 11, 2021
|archive-date=February 28, 2021
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210228222211/https://longreads.com/2018/12/17/bowie-knives-concealed-rifles-and-caning-charles-sumner/
|url-status=live
}}</ref><ref>Cecil-Fronsman, Bill. 'Death to All Yankees and Traitors in Kansas': The Squatter Sovereign and the Defense of Slavery in Kansas, ''Kansas History'' 16 (Spring 1993): 22–33.</ref> A correspondent for the [[The Times|London Times]] while visiting Kansas in 1856 reported many occurrences of the so-called ''bowie-knife voting'' in Kansas when voters were heckled and harassed by border ruffians.<ref>{{citation
|last=Phillips
|first=Jason
|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=A1VuDwAAQBAJ&dq=Thomas%20Gladstone%20correspondent%20for%20the%20London%20Times&pg=PA29
|title=Looming Civil War: How Nineteenth-Century Americans Imagined the Future
|location=New York
|publisher=[[Oxford University Press]]
|year=2018
|page=29
|isbn=978-0-19-086817-8
|access-date=March 11, 2021
|archive-date=May 14, 2022
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220514124740/https://books.google.com/books?id=A1VuDwAAQBAJ&lpg=PA29&ots=l2DmPNg1rB&dq=Thomas+Gladstone+correspondent+for+the+London+Times&pg=PA29
|url-status=live
}}</ref> In response, the [[New England Emigrant Aid Company]] shipped [[Sharps rifle]]s to the [[Kansas Territory]], in crates said to have been labeled "Bibles".<ref>{{citation
|url=https://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/search/object/nmah_414959
|title=Sharps Carbine
|publisher=[[National Museum of American History]]
|access-date=March 16, 2021
|archive-date=May 14, 2022
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220514124741/https://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/search/object/nmah_414959
|url-status=live
}}</ref><ref>{{cite book
|first=Jeremy
|last=Prichard
|url=https://civilwaronthewesternborder.org/encyclopedia/new-england-emigrant-aid-company
|publisher=New England Emigrant Aid Company
|title=Civil War on the Western Border: The Missouri-Kansas Conflict, 1855–1865
|access-date=March 11, 2021
|archive-date=December 4, 2020
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201204215236/https://civilwaronthewesternborder.org/encyclopedia/new-england-emigrant-aid-company
|url-status=live
}}</ref>

At that time, many Kansas settlers opposed slavery. However, slavery advocates were determined to have their way regardless. When elections were held, bands of armed border ruffians seized polling places, prevented [[Free-Stater (Kansas)|Free-State]] men from voting, and cast votes illegally, falsely stating they were Kansas residents.<ref name="ushistory"/><!-- paragraph 7 --><ref name="nps">
{{cite web
 |url=https://www.nps.gov/fosc/learn/historyculture/bleeding.htm
 |title=Bleeding Kansas
 |publisher=Fort Scott National Historic Site
 |access-date=November 19, 2007
 |at=paragraph 1
 |url-status=dead
 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080621032028/http://www.nps.gov/archive/fosc/bleeding.htm
 |archive-date=June 21, 2008
}}</ref>

Border ruffians operated from Missouri. It was said that they voted and shot in Kansas, but slept in Missouri.<ref>{{cite journal
|first=Harvey R.
|last=Hougen
|url=https://www.kshs.org/p/kansas-history-summer-1985/15209
|title=The Marais des Cygnes Massacre and the Execution of William Griffith
|journal=Kansas History
|volume=8
|number=2
|date=Summer 1985
|page=76
|access-date=March 8, 2021
|archive-date=April 16, 2021
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210416180041/https://www.kshs.org/p/kansas-history-summer-1985/15209
|url-status=live
}}</ref> They not only interfered in territorial elections, but also committed outrages on [[Free-Stater (Kansas)|Free-State]] settlers and destroyed their property. This violence gave the origin of the phrase "[[Bleeding Kansas]]". However, political killings and violence were exercised by both warring sides.<ref>{{citation
|url=https://www.kshs.org/kansapedia/bleeding-kansas/15145
|title=Documented political killings in Bleeding Kansas
|publisher=[[Kansas Historical Society]]
|access-date=March 13, 2021
|archive-date=January 16, 2021
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210116180705/https://www.kshs.org/kansapedia/bleeding-kansas/15145
|url-status=live
}}</ref><ref>Watts, Dale. How Bloody was Bleeding Kansas? Political Killings in Kansas Territory, 1854–1861, ''Kansas History,'' Vol. 18, Summer 1995, pp. 116–129</ref><ref>Welch, G. Murlin. ''Border Warfare in Southeastern Kansas, 1856–1859''. Pleasanton, Kans.: Linn County Publishers, 1977.</ref>

The federal government did not interfere to stop the violence.<ref>{{cite journal
|last=Ewy
|first=Marvin
|title=The United States Army in the Kansas Border Troubles, 1855–1856
|journal=[[Kansas Historical Quarterly]]
|volume=32
|date=Winter 1966
|pages=385–400}}</ref> Hence, episodes as [[Sacking of Lawrence|the sacking of Lawrence, Kansas]], in May 1856 became possible. [[United States Senate|U.S. Senator]] [[David Rice Atchison]] (D-Missouri) personally incited the assembling mob:{{blockquote| Gentlemen, Officers & Soldiers! This is the most glorious day of my life! This is the day I am a border ruffian! ... Spring like your bloodhounds at home upon that d--d accursed abolition hole; break through every thing that may oppose your never flinching courage! Yess, ruffians, draw your revolvers & bowie knives, & cool them in the heart's blood of all those d--d dogs, that dare defend that d--d breathing hole of hell.<ref>[https://territorialkansasonline.ku.edu/index.php?SCREEN=show_transcript&document_id=103035SCREEN=search&subm Territorial Kansas Online – Transcripts] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220514124741/https://territorialkansasonline.ku.edu/index.php?SCREEN=show_transcript&document_id=103035SCREEN%3Dsearch&subm= |date=May 14, 2022 }}, ''Kansas State Historical Society''</ref><ref>[https://www.kansasmemory.org/item/90822 Copy of David R. Atchison speech to proslavery forces] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201101133158/https://www.kansasmemory.org/item/90822 |date=November 1, 2020 }}, ''Kansas State Historical Society''</ref>}}

Border ruffians contributed to the increasingly violent sectional tensions, culminating in the [[American Civil War]].<ref>Monaghan, Jay. ''Civil War on the Western Border''. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1955.{{ISBN?}}{{page needed|date=March 2023}}</ref>

==Leaders and followers==
Border ruffians did not constitute an organized group. They never had meetings, had no designated leaders, and no one ever directed any message to them as a body.

Border ruffians were driven by the rhetoric of politicians such as [[David Rice Atchison]], [[Benjamin Franklin Stringfellow (1816–1891)|Benjamin Franklin Stringfellow]], [[John H. Stringfellow]], editor of the pro-slavery newspaper ''Squatter Sovereign'' ([[Atchison, Kansas]]), and Speaker of the House in the First Kansas Territorial Legislature, the so-called [[Bogus Legislature]].<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://kansasboguslegislature.org/members/stringfellow_john.html |title=Kansas Bogus Legislature: J. H. Stringfellow, Speaker of the House |access-date=March 11, 2021 |archive-date=July 24, 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110724102641/http://www.kansasboguslegislature.org/members/stringfellow_john.html |url-status=live }}</ref> and Rev. [[Thomas Johnson (Kansas politician)|Thomas Johnson]], a Methodist preacher.<ref>[https://newsantafetrailer.blogspot.com/2018/03/96-normal-0-false-false-false-en-us-x.html Pious Preacher or Radical Hypocrite? The Reverend Thomas Johnson] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211108144823/https://newsantafetrailer.blogspot.com/2018/03/96-normal-0-false-false-false-en-us-x.html |date=November 8, 2021 }}, ''The New Santa Fe Trailer''</ref> [[Samuel J. Jones]], and [[Daniel Woodson]], a proslavery newspaper editor.<ref>Matthew E. Stanley. [https://civilwaronthewesternborder.org/encyclopedia/woodson-daniel Woodson, Daniel] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181010233012/http://www.civilwaronthewesternborder.org/encyclopedia/woodson-daniel |date=October 10, 2018 }}. ''Civil War on the Western Border: The Missouri-Kansas Conflict, 1855–1865''</ref><ref>Etcheson, Nicole. ''Bleeding Kansas: Contested Liberty in the Civil War Era''. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2004, p. 116</ref> In particular, Atchison called Northerners "negro thieves" and "abolitionist tyrants". He encouraged Missourians to defend their institution "with the bayonet and with blood" and, if necessary, "to kill every God-damned abolitionist in the district".<ref>{{cite web
|title=Copy of David R. Atchison speech to proslavery forces
|first=David R.
|last=Atchison
|author-link=David R. Atchison
|url=http://www.kansasmemory.org/item/90822
|website=www.kansasmemory.org
|date=May 21, 1856
|language=en
|access-date=March 8, 2021
|archive-date=November 1, 2020
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201101133158/https://www.kansasmemory.org/item/90822
|url-status=live
}}</ref>

Few of the ordinary border ruffians actually owned slaves because most were too poor. Their motivation was hatred of [[Yankee#Damn Yankee|Yankees]] and [[Abolitionism in the United States|abolitionists]], and fear of free Blacks living nearby. [[History of slavery in Kansas|Kansas slavery]] was small-scale and operated mainly at the household level.<ref>Cory, Charles Easterbrook. Slavery in Kansas, ''Kansas Historical Collection'' 7 (1901–1902): 229–242.</ref> Most of the Kansans, according to historian [[David M. Potter]], were concerned primarily about land titles. He pointed out that, "the great anomaly of 'Bleeding Kansas' is that the slavery issue reached a condition of intolerable tension and violence ... in an area where a majority of the inhabitants apparently did not care very much one way or the other about slavery."<ref name="Assumption University"/>

[[Frank W. Blackmar]]'s encyclopedia of Kansas history summarizes how the rank-and-file among border ruffians took pride in both how they were called and what they were doing:
{{blockquote|While the main objects of the Border Ruffian chiefs were the overthrow and destruction of free-state men and the establishment of slavery in Kansas, the ruffian border bands delighted in raiding towns, ransacking houses, stealing horses, and doing whatever they could that was annoying, exciting, and rough. The towns and country along the eastern tier of counties were raided with uncomfortable frequency. Free-state men holding claims were driven from them, elections were molested and crimes of violence committed. When the crash came between north and south many of these men became bushwhackers or guerrillas.<ref name="cyclopedia">[https://web.archive.org/web/20071206193758/http://skyways.lib.ks.us/genweb/archives/1912/b/border_ruffians.html Kansas: A cyclopedia of state history, embracing events, institutions, industries, counties, cities, towns, prominent persons, etc. ... / with a supplementary volume devoted to selected personal history and reminiscence]. Chicago: Standard Pub. Co., 1912.</ref>}}

The presence of violent bands of both Kansan and Missourian combatants made it difficult for settlers on the Kansas–Missouri border to remain neutral.<ref name="ushistory">Newlon, Jack, Rob Spooner, and Alicia Spooner. [http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h84.html Bleeding Kansas: Mid 1850s – Precursor to the Civil War] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170630234913/http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h84.html |date=June 30, 2017 }}, in U-S-History.com. Online Highways, 2021</ref>
[[File:Liberty, the fair maid of Kansas in the hands of the border ruffians, c1856.jpeg|thumb|center|700px|Liberty, the fair maid of Kansas, in the hands of the border ruffians, {{circa|1856}}]]

==History==
{{Main|Bleeding Kansas}}
The history of border ruffians is woven into the historical context of [[Bleeding Kansas]], or the border war, a series of violent civil confrontations in Kansas in 1854–1859.<ref>Goodrich, Thomas. ''War to the Knife: Bleeding Kansas, 1854–1861.'' Mechanicsburg, PA: Stackpole Books, 1998.</ref> [[Kansas Territory]] was created by the [[Kansas–Nebraska Act]] of 1854. The Act repealed the previous Federal prohibition on slavery in that area. Instead, the locally elected territorial legislature was to decide on the slavery issue.<ref name="ushistory"/>

The first territorial census, taken in January–February 1855, counted 8601 people; 2905 were deemed eligible to vote; there were 192 enslaved in the Territory.<ref>Cutler, William G. [http://www.kancoll.org/books/cutler/terrhist/terrhist-p8.html#THE_FIRST_TERRITORIAL_ELECTION ''History of the State of Kansas: Containing a Full Account of Its Growth from an Uninhabited Territory to a Wealthy and Important State; of Its Early Settlements; Its Rapid Increase in Population; and the Marvelous Development of Its Great Natural Resources''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220408145526/http://www.kancoll.org/books/cutler/terrhist/terrhist-p8.html#THE_FIRST_TERRITORIAL_ELECTION |date=April 8, 2022 }}. Chicago: A. T. Andreas, 1883.</ref>{{page needed|date=August 2021}}<ref>[https://www.kshs.org/kansapedia/kansas-territory/14701 Kansapedia: Kansas Territory] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210416112803/https://www.kshs.org/kansapedia/kansas-territory/14701 |date=April 16, 2021 }}, ''Kansas Historical Society''</ref>

After the Kansas–Nebraska Act repealed the [[Missouri Compromise]] of 1820 and allowed Kansans to vote on slavery, the opponents from both sides of the slavery debate started to recruit settlers to increase support of their causes.

===Immigration to Kansas===
[[Proslavery]] immigrants aided by the Lafayette Emigration Society, and anti-slavery settlers, established their own territorial enclave (such as [[Atchison, Kansas|Atchison]] and [[Leavenworth, Kansas|Leavenworth]]), and [[Free-Stater (Kansas)|Free-State]] immigrants aided by the [[New England Emigrant Aid Company]] established theirs (such as [[Lawrence, Kansas|Lawrence]], [[Topeka, Kansas|Topeka]]).<ref>[http://www.teachushistory.org/kansas-nebraska-act-bleeding-kansas/resources/appeal-southerners-favor-establishing-slavery-kansas Kansas Matters – Appeal to the South] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201030161127/http://www.teachushistory.org/kansas-nebraska-act-bleeding-kansas/resources/appeal-southerners-favor-establishing-slavery-kansas |date=October 30, 2020 }}, ''De Bow's Review'', Vol 20, Issue 5, May 1, 1856, pp. 635-639.</ref><ref>Barry, Louise. The Emigrant Aid Company Parties of 1854 and The Emigrant Aid Company Parties of 1855, ''Kansas Historical Quarterly'' 12 (1943): pp. 115–155, 227–268.</ref><ref>Carruth, William H. New England in Kansas, ''New England Magazine,'' Vol. 16, March 1897, pp. 3–21.</ref> This circumstance resulted in a deep partisan divide in regard to the slavery question among settlers and their civic and business leaders. Then extremists on both side resorted to arms. On the pro-slavery side violence was committed by the border ruffians and on the free-state side by the [[jayhawker]]s.<ref name="cyclopedia"/><ref>[https://www.ushistory.org/us/31b.asp Border Ruffians] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210227104338/https://www.ushistory.org/US/31b.asp |date=February 27, 2021 }}, ''U.S. History Online Textbook''</ref><ref>{{cite book | last=Phillips | first=Christopher | title='The Crime against Missouri': Slavery, Kansas, and the Cant of Southernness in the Border West | series=Civil War History | volume=48 | date=March 2002 | pages=60–81}}</ref><ref>{{cite book | last=Godsey | first=Flora Rosenquist | title=The Early Settlement and Raid on the 'Upper Neosho' | series=Kansas Historical Collection, 1923–1925 | volume=16 | date=1925 | pages=451–463}}</ref>

On November 29, 1854, border ruffians elected a pro-slavery territorial representative to Congress, [[John Wilkins Whitfield|John W. Whitfield]]. It was determined after a Congressional investigation that 60% of the votes were illegal.<ref name="Assumption University">[http://www1.assumption.edu/ahc/Kansas/ "Bleeding Kansas"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210316205720/http://www1.assumption.edu/ahc/Kansas/ |date=March 16, 2021 }}, ''The E Pluribus Unum Project: America in the 1770s, 1850s, and 1920s,'' Assumption University</ref>

On March 30, 1855, border ruffians elected a pro-slavery Territorial Legislature, which introduced harsh penalties for speaking against slavery.<ref>{{cite encyclopedia
|contribution-url=https://www.kshs.org/kansapedia/bogus-legislature/16700
|title=Kansapedia
|contribution=Bogus Legislature
|date=2013
|orig-date=2011
|publisher=[[Kansas Historical Society]]
|access-date=March 14, 2021
|archive-date=April 16, 2021
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210416111342/https://www.kshs.org/kansapedia/bogus-legislature/16700
|url-status=live
}}</ref> It was called the Bogus Legislature by Free-Staters due to the fact that border ruffians arrived ''en masse'' and there were twice as many votes cast than there were eligible voters in the Territory. Failure to ensure fair elections led to establishment of two territorial governments in Kansas, one pro-slavery and another Free State, each claiming to be the only legitimate government of the entire Territory.<ref name="Assumption University"/>

Despite all border ruffians' attempts to push anti-slavery settlers out of the Territory, far more Free-State immigrants moved to Kansas than pro-slavery.{{citation needed|date=August 2021}} In 1857, the pro-slavery faction in Kansas proposed the [[Lecompton Constitution]] for the future state of Kansas. It tried to get the Lecompton Constitution adopted with additional fraud and violence, but by then there were too many Free-Staters there and the [[United States Congress|U.S. Congress]] refused to confirm it.<ref name="nps"/>

Border ruffians also engaged in general violence against Free-State settlements. They burned farms and sometimes murdered Free-State men. Most notoriously, border ruffians twice attacked [[Lawrence, Kansas|Lawrence]], the Free-State capital of the Kansas Territory. On December 1, 1855, a small army of border ruffians laid siege to Lawrence, but were driven off. This became the nearly bloodless climax to the "[[Wakarusa War]]".

On May 21, 1856, an even larger force of border ruffians and pro-slavery Kansans captured Lawrence, [[Sacking of Lawrence|which they sacked]].<ref name="ushistory"/><!-- paragraph 12 -->

Free-State settlers struck back. Anti-slavery Kansan irregulars, led by [[Charles R. Jennison]], [[James Montgomery (colonel)|James Montgomery]], and [[James Henry Lane (Union general)|James H. Lane]], among others, and known as [[jayhawker]]s, attacked proslavery settlers and suspected border ruffian sympathizers.<ref>Neely, Jeremy. ''The Border Between Them: Violence and Reconciliation on the Kansas-Missouri Line.'' Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 2007.</ref> Most notoriously, abolitionist [[John Brown (abolitionist)|John Brown]] killed five proslavery men at [[Pottawatomie Township, Franklin County, Kansas|Pottawatomie]].<ref name="ushistory"/><!--paragraph 13--><ref>Oates, Stephen B. ''To Purge This Land With Blood: A Biography of John Brown''. New York: Harper and Row, 1970.</ref> In revenge, a band of border ruffians, led by [[John William Reid|John W. Reid]], sacked the village of [[Osawatomie, Kansas]] after the [[Battle of Osawatomie]].<ref>Rein, Christopher.[https://civilwaronthewesternborder.org/encyclopedia/battle-osawatomie Battle of Osawatomie] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200104064036/https://civilwaronthewesternborder.org/encyclopedia/battle-osawatomie |date=January 4, 2020 }}, ''Civil War on the Western Border: The Missouri-Kansas Conflict, 1854–1865''.</ref>

===Aid to the Free-State cause===
[[Thomas Wentworth Higginson|T. W. Higginson]], a minister, was instrumental in turning the [[Massachusetts State Kansas Committee]], a former subsidiary of the [[New England Emigrant Aid Company]], into a nationally known organization.<ref>[https://territorialkansasonline.ku.edu/index.php?SCREEN=immigration&topic_id=133&search=Massachusetts%20State%20Kansas%20Committee Emigrant Aid Organizations: Massachusetts State Kansas Committee] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220514124741/https://territorialkansasonline.ku.edu/index.php?SCREEN=immigration&topic_id=133&search=Massachusetts+State+Kansas+Committee |date=May 14, 2022 }}, ''Territorial Kansas''</ref> It worked to recruit abolitionist settlers, raised funds for them to migrate to Kansas, and equipped them with rifles to use against border ruffians.<ref>{{cite encyclopedia |last=Poole |first=W. Scott |editor-last=Finkleman |editor-first=Paul  |encyclopedia=Encyclopedia of African American History, 1619–1895: From the Colonial Period to the Age of Frederick Douglass | title=Higginson, Thomas Wentworth| year=2005 |publisher=Oxford |isbn=978-0195167771}}</ref> In 1856 it acquired 200 [[Sharps rifle]]s for $4,947.88 that were shipped to Kansas via Iowa and ended in John Brown's hands.<ref name="rifles"/> In September 1858, it invested $3,800 in 190 [[Sharps rifle]]s for Kansas.<ref>[http://www.wvculture.org/history/jbexhibit/bbsms13-0044.html Massachusetts State Kansas Aid Committee Report, September 1858] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210427172050/http://www.wvculture.org/history/jbexhibit/bbsms13-0044.html |date=April 27, 2021 }}, ''West Virginia Archives and History''</ref> Abolitionist [[Henry Ward Beecher|Henry W. Beecher]] pronounced that, {{blockquote|Sharps rifle was a truly moral agency, and that there was more moral power in one of those instruments, so far as the slaveholders of Kansas were concerned, than in a hundred Bibles. You might just as well ... read the Bible to Buffaloes as those fellows who follow Atchison and Stringfellow; but they have a supreme respect for the logic that is embodied in Sharps rifles.<ref name="rifles">W. H. Isely. [https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Journals/AHR/12/3/Sharps_Rifle_Episode*.html The Sharps Rifle Episode in Kansas History] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220514124742/https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Journals/AHR/12/3/Sharps_Rifle_Episode%2A.html |date=May 14, 2022 }}, ''The American Historical Review'', Vol. 12, No. 3 (Apr. 1907), pp. 546–566.</ref>}} It was documented that in 1855–1856 various aid organizations from free states spent at least $43,074.26 on rifles, muskets, revolvers, and ammunition, including one cannon, destined for Kansas.<ref name="rifles"/>

On July 9, 1856, the Massachusetts State Kansas Committee and the [[New England Emigrant Aid Company]] initiated the establishment of the Kansas National Aid Committee headquartered in Chicago. [[Thaddeus Hyatt]], head of the national committee, began collecting money, arms, provisions, clothing, and agricultural supplies to aid the Free-State cause in Kansas. The goal was to transport five thousand settlers to Kansas Territory giving them a year's worth of supplies.<ref>[https://www.kansasmemory.org/item/2416 National Kansas Relief Committee, minutes] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180104071938/http://www.kansasmemory.org/item/2416 |date=January 4, 2018 }}, ''Kansas Historical Society''</ref>

A distribution [[Supply depot|depot]] was set up at [[Mt. Pleasant, Iowa]], where immigrants were furnished not only with horses and wagons and other supplies, but also with arms; they were organized into companies and drilled. The National Kansas Committee spent in 1856–1857 around {{US$|100,000|1856|round=-4}} on the Free State cause.<ref name="rifles"/><ref>Hinton, Richard Josiah. [https://books.google.com/books?id=7851ys2NXBwC&dq=%22National+Kansas+Committee%22&pg=PA122 ''John Brown And His Men: With Some Account of the Roads They Traveled to Reach Harper's Ferry''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220514124742/https://www.google.com/books/edition/John_Brown_and_His_Men/7851ys2NXBwC?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=%22National+Kansas+Committee%22&pg=PA122&printsec=frontcover |date=May 14, 2022 }}. New York: Funk & Wagnalls, 1894, p. 122.</ref>

===Outcomes===
On August 2, 1858, the pro-slavery [[Lecompton Constitution]] of 1857 was rejected at the polls, signifying the defeat of border ruffians' cause.<ref>Rawley, James A. [https://books.google.com/books?id=k5OkYwX_QyoC&pg=PR5 ''Race and Politics: "Bleeding Kansas" and the Coming of the Civil War''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220514124742/https://books.google.com/books?id=k5OkYwX_QyoC&pg=PR5&source=gbs_selected_pages&cad=2 |date=May 14, 2022 }}. Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1969.</ref> On January 29, 1861, President [[James Buchanan]] signed the bill that approved the [[Wyandotte Constitution]] and Kansas came to the Union as a Free State.<ref>O’Bryan, Tony. "Wyandotte Constitution," ''Civil War on the Western Border: The Missouri-Kansas Conflict, 1854–1865''.</ref>

===During the Civil War===
During the [[American Civil War]], the violence on the Kansas-Missouri border not only continued, but escalated tremendously. Many of the former border ruffians became pro-[[Confederate States of America|Confederate]] guerrillas, or [[bushwhacker]]s. They operated in western Missouri, sometimes raiding into Kansas, and [[Union (American Civil War)|Union]] forces campaigned to suppress them. Farms on the Missouri-Kansas state line were looted and burned. Suspected guerrillas were killed; in retaliation, bushwhackers murdered Union sympathizers and suspected informers. Confederate guerrilla leaders, such as [[William T. Anderson|"Bloody Bill" Anderson]] and [[William Quantrill]], were feared in Kansas during the war.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.legendsofamerica.com/ks-bleedingkansas/ |title=Bleeding Kansas & the Missouri Border War |access-date=March 11, 2021 |archive-date=April 12, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210412155332/https://www.legendsofamerica.com/ks-bleedingkansas/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

Many of the Union troops fighting bushwackers were former [[jayhawker]]s who held deep grudges against border ruffians. [[Charles R. Jennison]] recruited the [[7th Kansas Cavalry Regiment]], which became known as the Jennison's Jayhawkers. In the fall and winter of 1861 and 1862, Jennison's Jayhawkers became infamous for looting and destroying the property of Missourians.<ref>O’Bryan, Tony. [https://civilwaronthewesternborder.org/encyclopedia/jayhawkers "Jayhawkers,"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210109200611/https://civilwaronthewesternborder.org/encyclopedia/jayhawkers |date=January 9, 2021 }} ''Civil War on the Western Border: The Missouri-Kansas Conflict, 1854–1865''</ref>

Some of the jayhawkers joined a paramilitary group called the Red Legs. Wearing red gaiters and numbered around 100, Red Legs served as scouts during the punitive expedition of the Union troops in Missouri. Jayhawkers and Red Legs pillaged and burned multiple towns in 1861–1863 in Missouri.{{explain|date=May 2022}}<ref>O'Bryan, Tony. [https://civilwaronthewesternborder.org/encyclopedia/red-legs "Red Legs,"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210302235709/https://civilwaronthewesternborder.org/encyclopedia/red-legs |date=March 2, 2021 }} ''Civil War on the Western Border, The Missouri-Kansas Conflict, 1854–1865''</ref><ref>Cheatham, Gary L. [https://www.kshs.org/publicat/history/1991autumn_cheatham.pdf 'Desperate Characters': The Development and Impact of the Confederate Guerrilla Conflict in Kansas], ''Kansas History'' 14 (Autumn 1991): 144–161. [https://web.archive.org/web/20210317051809/https://www.kshs.org/publicat/history/1991autumn_cheatham.pdf Archived]</ref> The destruction of [[Osceola, Missouri]], is depicted in the movie ''[[The Outlaw Josey Wales]]''.<ref>{{citation
|last=Gilmore
|first=Donald L.
|url=http://canteymyerscollection.com/download/redleg.pdf
|title=The Kansas 'Red Legs' as Missouri's Dark Underbelly
|access-date=March 16, 2021
|archive-date=March 16, 2021
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210316220300/http://canteymyerscollection.com/download/redleg.pdf
|url-status=live
}}</ref>

== See also ==
* [[Sacking of Lawrence]]
* [[Sacking of Osceola]]
* [[Wakarusa War]]
* [[Pottawatomie massacre]]
* [[Battle of Osawatomie]]
* [[Marais des Cygnes massacre]]

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==Further reading==
* Williams, Robert Hamilton. [https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.32044004376919&view=1up&seq=7 ''With the border ruffians; memories of the Far West, 1852–1868'']. New York: John Murray, 1907.
* Cutler, William G. [http://www.kancoll.org/books/cutler/terrhist/terrhist-p1.html ''History of the State of Kansas: Containing a Full Account of Its Growth from an Uninhabited Territory to a Wealthy and Important State; of Its Early Settlements; Its Rapid Increase in Population; and the Marvelous Development of Its Great Natural Resources'']. Chicago: A. T. Andreas, 1883. 
* Gladstone, Thomas H. ''[https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=miun.afk1368.0001.001&view=1up&seq=1 The Englishman In Kansas: Or, Squatter Life and Border Warfare]''. New York: Miller & Company, 1857. 
* {{cite news
|author=Anonymous
|title=Song of the border ruffian
|newspaper=[[Montreal Gazette]]
|date=June 11, 1857
|page=2
|via=[[newspapers.com]]
|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/83540941/song-of-the-border-ruffian/}}
* [[Greeley, Horace]]. [https://books.google.com/books?id=fL8goOKl0aUC&pg=PP7 ''A History of the Struggle for Slavery Extension or Restriction in the United States'']. New York: Dix, Edwards and Company, 1856.
* Phillips, William Addison. [https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=pst.000014400247&view=1up&seq=7 ''The conquest of Kansas, by Missouri and her allies. A history of the troubles in Kansas, from the passage of the organic act until the close of July 1856'']. Boston: Philips, Sampson and company, 1856.

==External links==
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20090526083321/http://www.kcpt.org/badblood/ ''Bad Blood, the Border War that Triggered the Civil War''], DVD documentary. Kansas City MO: Kansas City Public Television (KCPT) and Wide Awake Films, 2007. {{ISBN|0-9777261-4-2}}
* [https://sites.google.com/g.emporia.edu/center-great-plains-studies/publications-archive/tales-out-of-school/bleeding-kansas Time Line: Bleeding Kansas], {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210313063733/https://sites.google.com/g.emporia.edu/center-great-plains-studies/publications-archive/tales-out-of-school/bleeding-kansas |date=March 13, 2021 }} ''Center for Great Plains Studies, Emporia State University''

{{Territories of the United States}}
{{History of slavery in the United States}}
{{Kansas in the Civil War}}

{{Authority control}}

[[Category:Bleeding Kansas]]
[[Category:Irregular forces of the American Civil War]]
[[Category:Politically motivated migrations]]
[[Category:Kansas Territory]]
[[Category:Expansion of slavery in the United States]]
[[Category:Electoral fraud in the United States]]