John White Geary was an American lawyer, politician, Freemason, and a Union general in the American Civil War. He was the final alcalde and first mayor of San Francisco, a governor of the Kansas Territory, and the 16th governor of Pennsylvania.
Bleeding Kansas, Bloody Kansas, or the Border War was a series of violent civil confrontations in Kansas Territory, and to a lesser extent in western Missouri, between 1854 and 1859. It emerged from a political and ideological debate over the legality of slavery in the proposed state of Kansas.
The Topeka Constitutional Convention met from October 23 to November 11, 1855 in Topeka, Kansas Territory, in a building afterwards called Constitution Hall. It drafted the Topeka Constitution, which banned slavery in Kansas, though it would also have prevented free blacks from living in Kansas. The convention was organized by Free-Staters to counter the pro-slavery Territorial Legislature elected March 5, 1855, in polling tainted significantly by electoral fraud and the intimidation of Free State voters.
Delos Bennett Sackett was a career officer in the United States Army, and served in the American Civil War as a colonel in the Union Army. Later he became the Inspector General of the U.S. Army.
Charles Lawrence Robinson was an American politician who served in the California State Assembly from 1851-52, and later as the first Governor of Kansas from 1861 until 1863. He was also the first governor of a US state to be impeached by a state legislature, although he was found not guilty during subsequent State Senate impeachment trial and was not removed from office. After his time as governor he served in the Kansas Senate from 1873 to 1881. To date, he is the only governor of Kansas to be impeached.
Lecompton Constitution Hall, also known as Constitution Hall, is a building in Lecompton, Kansas, that played an important role in the long-running Bleeding Kansas crisis over slavery in Kansas. It is operated by the Kansas Historical Society as Constitution Hall State Historic Site.
Kansas has always been home to many forts and military posts.
Barnesville's Post located near Barnesville, in Bourbon County, Kansas, was the site of military camps for stretches of time during the American Civil War. The first mention of a camp there came from a report written on September 4, 1861, by Sen. James Lane. This was during the time Lane had evacuated Fort Scott and moved his forces to areas north of that post. A post was established at Barnesville. Lane wrote to Capt. W. E. Prince, then commanding Fort Leavenworth, "I am holding Barnesville. .. with an irregular force of about 250 men, stationed in log buildings, and am now strengthening their position with earth entrenchments."
Samuel Dexter Lecompte was an American jurist best known for his extreme pro-slavery views, his involvement in the events of Bleeding Kansas, and for being the founder and namesake of Lecompton, the erstwhile capital of the Kansas Territory.
The site of Fort Dodge in the U.S. state of Kansas was originally an old campground for wagons traveling along the Santa Fe Trail, just west of the western junction of the Wet and Dry Routes and near the middle or Cimarron Cutoff. On March 23, 1865, Major General Grenville M. Dodge, who commanded the 11th and 16th Kansas Cavalry Regiments, wrote to Colonel James Hobart Ford to propose establishing a new military post west of Fort Larned. On orders of Col. Ford, Captain Henry Pearce, with Company C, Eleventh Cavalry Regiment, and Company F, Second U.S. Volunteer Infantry, from Fort Larned, occupied and established Fort Dodge on April 10, 1865.
Mound City's post was established by 1860 in Mound City, Kansas, United States. In August 1861 U.S. Senator James H. Lane reported to the commander of Fort Leavenworth that the post was to be fortified. In fact, Mound City's post became one of the important posts guarding against Confederate guerrilla attacks along the Kansas-Missouri border. Through the War usually 200 to 300 troops at a time were stationed at the post.
Paola's post, sometimes called Post Paola, in Miami County, Kansas, was located on the west side of Bull Creek, just west of Paola, Kansas. It was probably established in December 1861, as that was the first time it was mentioned. This post became one of the more important posts along the Kansas-Missouri border during the Civil War. It became a district headquarters in 1863. Later, in September 1864, it was designated a subdistrict headquarters, when the district headquarters was moved to Lawrence, Kansas. The military road from Fort Leavenworth to Fort Gibson ran through Paola, thus ensuring the post always had some importance.
In 1842 a large log fort was built at Trading Post by the United States Army, upon the order of Gen. Winfield Scott. This fort was on the Fort Leavenworth-Fort Gibson Military Road. The completed fort was fairly elaborate. It included space to house a company of dragoons and their horses. Also, it contained a hospital and store houses. Gaps along the outside walls of buildings were filled in with stockade walls. The buildings were built around a large interior open area.
The construction of Fort Plymouth began in summer 1856. The site was settled by a group of free-state partisans who entered Brown County from Nebraska Territory. This site was also meant to become a free-state town, but possibly only one house was constructed on the site. The fort, named after Plymouth Rock by surveyors from Massachusetts, was located on or near the top of a high hill north of Pony Creek. Fort Plymouth was 3 miles (4.8 km) south of the Nebraska border.
The Battle of Fort Titus was a battle that occurred during conflicts in the Kansas Territory between abolitionist and pro-slavery militias prior to the American Civil War. The era is known as Bleeding Kansas.
Fort Atkinson, 2 miles (3.2 km) west of Dodge City, had two lives. One life occurred before Kansas became a territory in 1854. The original Fort Atkinson was established August 8, 1850, by the U.S. Army in an attempt to prevent Indians in the area from attacking travelers on the Santa Fe Trail. Even before this, a site nearby was occupied in July 1850 by Lieut. Col. Edwin Vose Sumner, Who served as a Union major general in the Civil War. This first site was called Camp Mackay or Fort Mackay. Later the camp was moved to the site where it was permanently established. Sod buildings with canvas roofs were constructed. This post was abandoned in September 1853 and the buildings were torn down so Indians could not hide inside them and surprise travelers on the Trail.
Fort Saunders, 4 miles (6.4 km) southeast of Clinton, Kansas, and 12 miles (19 km) southwest of Lawrence, Kansas, was owned by James D. Saunders, a militia captain. What little was left of Clinton disappeared during construction of the Clinton Lake in the 1960s; only an outbuilding that was converted into a museum remains.
New Georgia's Fort was located in Miami County, Kansas, southeast of Osawatomie. During the partisan warfare in Kansas Territory in 1856 commonly known as Bleeding Kansas, a colony of Southerners, possibly all Georgians, established New Georgia. This colony was located on the Marias des Cygnes River. A blockhouse fort was constructed there and entrenchments were begun but the fort destroyed before the entrenchments could be completed. Northern settlers in the area claimed settlers at New Georgia harassed them. In reality, some settlers from both the North and South had groups who caused trouble with their neighbors.
John Allen Wakefield and his family was one of the first settlers to come to the newly created Kansas Territory. Free soilers, they arrived in western Douglas County, Kansas, in July 1854, one month after the territory was opened to settlement. They built a large log house to serve primarily as their living quarters. It had six rooms and was 6 miles (9.7 km) west of the free-state stronghold of Lawrence, Kansas. For protection the family built loop holes for guns into the sides of the house.
Fort Titus was the fortress residence of pro-slavery advocate Henry T. Titus, built in Kansas in April 1856, during a period when forces aligned with Titus came into conflict with free-state settlers. The wider conflict, which emerged from a political and ideological debate over the legality of slavery in the proposed state of Kansas, became known as Bleeding Kansas.
