Kansas Territory The Saga of

Bleeding Kansas

(Ch. 4, 66-95)

John Steuart Curry painted the mural “Tragic Prelude” in the State Capital in Topeka, depicting John Brown and the anti-slavery movement in the Kansas Territory

John Brown- Iconic Figure

University of Kansas Kansas State University

Bleeding Kansas

“God sees it. I have only a short time to live – only one death to die, and I will die fighting for this cause. There will be no more peace in this land until slavery is done for. I will give them something else to do than to extend slave territory. I will carry the war into Africa.”

~ John Brown to his son, while seeing Osawatomie burn, August 30, 1856

John Brown (1800-1859) Abolitionist willing to use

violence to end slavery

After leaving Kansas Terr., he led raid on the federal arsenal in Harper’s Ferry in Virginia

Convicted and hanged for murder, treason and slave insurrection against the state of Virginia.

Became a martyr for the abolitionist cause

Missouri Compromise of 1820

Allowed two new states to enter Union Maine become a free state; Missouri a slave state

Banned slavery in the lands of the Louisiana Purchase, including the land that would become Kansas

Missouri Compromise of 1820

Compromise of 1850

California entered Union as free state; but the Fugitive Slave Act would be adopted.

Fugitive Slave Act – all citizens were required to assist in the recovery of slaves and fugitive slaves were denied the right of jury trial.

Compromise of 1850

Stephen Douglas US Senator from Illinois

known as the “Little Giant”

Helped pass Compromise of 1850 and Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854

He was an expansionist and promoted popular sovereignty

Popular sovereignty - people who lived in the territories were given the right to decide on the issue of slavery

Expansionist - the US should expand boundaries to include much of the continent

Kansas-Nebraska Act (1854)

One of the most important documents in US history; consequences led to the Civil War (1861-1865)

Repealed the Missouri Compromise ban on slavery

Opened up the Kansas and Nebraska territories for settlement.

Those opposed to slavery opposed K-N Act.

Proslavery or Antislavery

Abolitionists - people who thought slavery immoral and should be abolished without delay

Free-Staters – people who did want slavery to expand into the territories

Proslavery settlers founded Atchison

Name Calling! Border ruffians – Missourians who crossed

over the border to influence outcome of the slavery issue in the Kansas Territory

Bushwhackers - Missourians who jumped the border to make raids on antislavery settlements

Jayhawkers - Kansans who raided Missouri

The Kansas Emigrant Song by John Greenleaf Whittier

Whittier wrote poetry to campaign against slavery

Wrote The Kansas Emigrant Song to persuade antislavery people to settle in Kansas Terr.

The Kansas Emigrant Song

We cross the prairie as of old, The pilgrims crossed the sea,

To make the West, as they the East, The homestead of the free.

We go to the rear of a wall of men On Freedom’s Southern line.

And plant beside the cotton tree, The rugged Northern pine!

The Kansas Emigrant Song

Unbearing, like the ark of old, The Bible in our van

We go to test the truth of God Against the fraud of man.

No pause, nor rest, save where the streams That freed the Kansas run,

Save where our Pilgrim [banner]Shall flout the setting sun!

Kansas Emigrant Song What imagery and symbols does Whittier use?

What are the references to North and South?

What does the word “van” mean in this context?

Assignment: Write a verse trying to persuade people to come to Kansas

Bleeding Kansas

National attention focused on the violence over slavery, giving rise to the name

Bleeding Kansas

About 50 people lost their lives during the territorial period

Bleeding Kansas The Wakarusa War and the

Siege of Lawrence

Lawrence was under siege for a week

Attack on Lawrence made national news

Bleeding Kansas

If any man or woman stand in your way, blow them to [h#**] with a cold chunk of lead!”

~ Sen. Atchison , urging on proslavery forces as they pillaged Lawrence

Bleeding Kansas The Pottawatomie Massacre

(May 24-25, 1856)

Reacting to the sacking of Lawrence by pro-slavery forces and the caning of Senator Sumner, Brown and other abolitionists killed five pro-slavery activists in Pottawatomie Creek in Franklin County by hacking them to death.

Brown emerged as national figure

This brutal act plunged the Kansas Territory further into civil war

Bleeding Kansas and John Brown

“He [John Brown] said if a man stood between him and what he considered right, he would take his life as coolly as he would eat his breakfast. His actions show what he is. Always restless, he seems never to sleep. With an eye like a snake, he looks like a demon.”

~ Affidavit quote of Mahala Doyle, widow of James P. Doyle

Timeline1820 – Missouri Compromise bans slavery in

what would be the Kansas Terr. 1850 – Compromise of 1850 allows California to

enter Union as a free state . The Fugitive Slave Act is passed.

1854 – Kansas- Nebraska Act creates two new territories and allows settlers to choose whether slavery will be allowed there

1855 – Bogus Legislature meets. The Wakarusa War erupts. The Topeka Constitutional Convention is held

1856 – Attack on Lawrence and Pottawatomie Massacre

1857 – Dred Scott Decision. Supreme Court rules slaves are not citizens of the US. Lecompton Constitutional Convention is held.

Slavery in KansasUnderground Railroad - a series of secret

safe houses that assisted escaping slaves

Ann Clark – a slave from Lecompton who escaped on the Underground Railroad.

•Proslavery forces captured 11 men and shot them. Five died, five were wounded and one escaped by pretending to be dead

•Last major violent act in Kansas Territory

Pony Express

Ran between St. Joseph, MO, and Sacramento, CA, for about 2,000 miles; 11 stations in Kansas Territory

Each rider rode about 33 miles

Lasted 18 months, from April 1860 until October 1861. (Closed days after transcontinental telegraph connected Omaha to Sacramento)

Pony Express Hollenberg Station (near Hanover)

James Lane (1814-1866) Antislavery supporter

who organized 400 settlers from northern states to come to Kansas Terr.

Lane’s Army of the North

One of the first U.S. senators from Kansas

James Lane

Before moving to Kansas Territory, Lane voted for the Kansas-Nebraska Act as a U.S. representative from Indiana

Lane called slave owners “wolves, snakes, devils”

David Rice Atchison (1807-1886)US senator from Missouri who

encouraged proslavery forces to come to the Kansas Terr. and vote illegally

Namesake of Atchison, Kansas, a town originally settled by slaveholding pioneers

He said, “The prosperity of the whole South depends on the Kansas struggle.”

Charles Robinson (1818-1894)Antislavery advocate; led

settlers to Kansas from Massachusetts with the New England Emigrant Aid Company

Elected governor at Topeka and Wyandotte conventions

First Governor of the state of Kansas

Charles Robinson“It is for us to choose for ourselves, and for

those who shall come after us, what institutions shall bless or curse our beautiful Kansas. Shall we have freedom for all her people, and consequent prosperity, or slavery for a part, with the blight and mildew inseparable from it?”

~ Charles Robinson

Samuel Jones (1820-1880) Proslavery sheriff of Douglas

County attacked Lawrence and burned down newspaper offices and other buildings

Referring to the destruction of Lawrence, Jones was quoted as saying, “This is the happiest day of my life, I assure you.”

Clarina Nichols (1810-1885) Abolitionist who fought for the

rights of women

Came to Kansas Terr. with the New England Emigrant Aid Society

Guest of the Wyandotte Constitutional Convention

Helped women get right to vote in local school board elections

Andrew Reeder (1807-1864) President Franklin Pierce

appointed him first governor of Kansas Territory

Believed in popular sovereignty

Sided with the free-staters, which angered proslavery forces

Enemies charged him with treason and forced to escape in disguise

Topeka Constitution (1855)First Constitution

Written by Free-Staters and prohibited slavery

Approved by large majority; (Proslavery forces refused to vote)

Failed to pass in the U.S Senate by two votes

Lecompton Constitution (1857)Second Constitution

Written by proslavery people; (Free-Staters refused to vote)

President James Buchanan submitted Lecompton Const. to U.S. Congress and recommended Kansas be admitted as a slave state

U.S. Congress voted against

Leavenworth Constitution (1858)

Third constitution

Written by Free-State forces opposed to slavery

All men (white, black, Indian) would have the right to vote but not women

Passed in Kansas Terr., but U.S. Congress voted against

Wyandotte Constitution (1859) Fourth and final Constitution

Wyandotte Const. made Kansas a free state

Restricted voting rights and militia service to white men (but women gained property rights)

Kansas did not (could not) join Union until southern states began seceding prior to the Civil War.

The Wyandotte Const. passed Oct. 4, 1859, and Kansas became the 34th state on Jan. 29, 1861

From Territory to Statehood

To become the state of Kansas,

The people of the Kansas Territory had to write a constitution

The U.S. Congress had to accept the constitution.

Constitutional conventions took place in Topeka, Lecompton, Leavenworth and finally Wyandotte

Bleeding Kansas and Election Fraud

“About one thousand Missourians arrived in Lawrence to vote, and vote. Mrs. Robinson says: ‘they were armed with guns, pistols, rifles and bowie-knifes. They brought two cannon loaded with musket balls.”

~ From the Annals of Kansas, Daniel W. Wilder, 1875

Bleeding Kansas

“We will before six months rolls around have the Devil to play in Kansas…We are organizing to meet their organization. We will be compelled to shoot, burn an hang, but the thing will soon be over.”

~ Senator Atchison to U.S. Secretary of War Jefferson Davis, Sept. 24, 1854

~ Abraham Lincoln ~ Thoughts on John Brown

“ Old John Brown has just been executed for treason against the state. We cannot object, even though he agreed with us in thinking slavery wrong. That cannot excuse violence, bloodshed, and treason. It could avail him nothing that he might think himself right.”

~ Abraham Lincoln, speaking in Leavenworth , Kansas Territory, Dec. 3, 1859

Sen. Charles Sumner: The “Crime Against

Kansas” In 1856 Sen. Charles Sumner of Massachusetts spoke

about the “Crime against Kansas” - opening up the slavery issue in the Kansas Territory

He called Sen. Stephen Douglas of Illinois a “noise-some, squat, and nameless animal… not a proper model for an American senator.” Sumner also verbally attacked Sen. Andrew Butler of South Carolina for being proslavery.

Rep. Preston Brooks of South Carolina (the nephew of Butler) entered the Senate days later and hit Sumner with a cane so severely, he beat unconscious Sumner, who did not recover for nearly three years.

Caning of Sen. Sumner

Slavery and The Dred Scott Case

A slave named Dred Scott sued the US Government for his freedom

Supreme Court ruled in 1857 that Scott and others of African ancestry (free or slave) were not US citizens

Court ruled it unconstitutional for the US Gov. to prohibit slavery in the territories, incl. the Kansas Terr.

The decision alarmed mostly antislavery people

Slavery and the Underground

Railroad Underground Railroad – Network of safe

houses that helped slaves escape

Success of Underground Railroad depended on secrecy

Ann Clark – slave from Lecompton, Kansas, who escaped on the Underground Railroad

Why Emigrate to Kansas?

Isaac and Ellen GoodnowMotivated to fight against slavery, the Goodnows and their company of 200 settlers came to Kansas Territory

Isaac founded the college that became Kansas State University

Built in what became Manhattan, their house is a State Historic Site

Why Emigrate to Kansas? Most people came to Kansas for cheap land and

economic opportunities (not for pro or anti-slavery causes)

Preemption Act - a person could claim up to 160 acres; obligated to pay $1.25 per acre after public land survey

Thousands came to Kansas seeking fortunes in gold

Others came to Kansas to push their proslavery and antislavery beliefs

Why Emigrate to Kansas?

Thousands came to Kansas Territory to seek fortune in gold

Western boundary extended to the Rocky Mountains

“Pike’s Peak or Bust”

Why Emigrate to Kansas?

New England Emigrant Aid Company

Antislavery group; received financial and moral support from New England abolitionists

Under guidance from the NEEAC, Charles Robinson led settlers from Massachusetts to Kansas Territory

Clarina Nichols came to Kansas Territory with the NEEAC

“Beecher Bibles”Henry Ward Beecher –

abolitionist preacher from Connecticut

Antislavery forces used rifles sometimes called “Beecher Bibles” because the rifles were shipped to Kansas in boxes labeled “bibles”