Note (return) — Chapter IX

Those who desired to preserve peace in Missouri had just cause to be gratified at the favorable prospect now presented. Those who desired war had equal ground for dissatisfaction. A few days after the promulgation of the agreement between General Price and General Harney, the latter was removed from command, as many believed, because of his successful efforts to allay excitement and avoid war. Rumors had been in circulation that the Missourians were driving the "Union men" from their homes, and many letters purporting to be written in different parts of the State represented the persecution of Union men. It was suspected that many of them were written in St. Louis, or inspired by the cabal. An incident related in confirmation of the justice of this suspicion is, that General Harney received a letter from St. Joseph, stating that ex-Governor Stewart and a number of the most respectable men in St. Joseph had been driven from their homes, and that, unless soldiers were soon sent, the Union men would all have to leave. He called upon the Hon. F. P. Blair, an influential citizen of St. Louis, and asked him if he knew the writer of the letter. The reply was: "Oh, yes, he is perfectly reliable; you can believe anything he says."183 General Harney said he would write immediately to General Price. Dissatisfaction was then manifested at such delay; but, two or three days later, a letter from ex-Governor Stewart was published in the "St. Joseph News," in which was a marked paragraph of the copy sent to General Harney: "Neither I nor any other Union man has been driven out of St. Joe."184 An attempt has been made to evade the conclusion that General Harney was relieved from command because of his pacific policy. The argument is, that the order was dated the 16th of May, and his agreement with General Price was on the 21st of the same month, an argument more specious than fair, as it appears from the letter of President Lincoln of May 18, 1861, to Hon. F. P. Blair, that the order sent from the War Department to him was to be delivered or withheld at his discretion, and that it was not delivered until the 30th of the month, and until after General Harney had not only entered into his agreement with General Price, but had declined to act upon sensational stories of persecution, on which applications were made to send troops into the interior of Missouri. During the days this order was held for his removal, with discretionary power to deliver or withhold it, the above-recited events occurred, and they may fairly be considered as having decided the question of his removal from that command.