"About four AM on the 15th, a band under Bill Anderson entered Huntsville. They came in on the Keytesville road, those in advance having Federal coats. They road in quietly and proceeded to picket the town. They went to the hotel, arrested the landlord and demanded the travelers stopping with him. There was but one -- Mr. George Damon, of the firm of E.A. Damon & Co., of St. Louis. They asked to be shown his room, and following the landlord, they demanded entrance at his door. Mr. Damon opened the door, when they rushed in and placing their pistols at his head, demanded his arms and money. These he surrendered. They then told him to go with them as prisoner. He went with them to the store of Mr. S.T. Morehead in front of which a portion of the gang were breaking open the safe of the County Treasury, which they had pulled out on the side walk. He had on a belt with a U.S. buckle, and they accused him of being a Federal officer and repeatedly threatened to shoot him. While the work of breaking the safe was going on, Mr. Damon, against the entreaties of his fellow prisoners, attempted to escape. He ran to Coate's corner and turned down the plank road, when Anderson (who was on horseback) wheeled and fired on him; others ran to the corner and fired, saying, "Now, d--n you, stand when we tell you." Mr. Damon fell at the first fire but recovering, ran around the houses on the opposite side of the street attempting to gain the rear of the hotel. Anderson followed, and as Mr. Damon was climbing the fence, shot again, inflicting a wound that proved fatal. Mr. D. fell into the yard calling for water. Mr. Sauvinet, the landlord started to minister to the dying man when he was confronted by Anderson who said, "If you don't go away and let that man alone, I'll shoot you." Mr. D. succeeded in crawling into the dining room when some citizens went to the "captain" and asked permission to call a physician to the wounded man. His only reply was, "Is he still alive?" and turning to two of his men, he said, "go and finish him!" Two men then went to the hotel when Mrs. Sauvinet, the landlady, implored them not to shoot him anymore, assuring them that he would die of his wounds. "Shoot!" he said, "why, we would shoot Jesus Christ or God Almighty if he ran from us" Seeing no signs of life in the bleeding body which lay before them, one of them put his head down to the breast of the dying man, but the heart had ceased to beat and life was gone. Seeing a ring on the finger of the corpse, the guerrilla removed it and placed it on his own.
During all this time the work of robbery went on. The clerks in some of the stores had been sleeping on their arms in anticipation of a raid, but these fellows were not only in the stores but in one instance were upstairs before the inmates were aroused. When they entered they promptly demanded the safe keys, abused the clerks and in one or two instances, struck them on their heads with pistols. After two hours in this place the scoundrels left on the Renick road. They stopped at the house of Mr. Joel Smith, some six miles south, from whom they took one or two horses. One struck the old gentleman on the head with his pistol, hurting him seriously. They left for Warfield's store. A company of Federal troops was sent from Sturgeon in pursuit, but we have no intelligible account of what was done.
The characteristic of this band was the studied method of their madness--their discipline. The commander placed and relieved sentinels at a distance of two hundred yards by a simple wave of the hand, which seemed as perfectly understood and obeyed as the gestures of the actors in a pantomime upon the stage. Their almost total abstinence from liquor was a subject of remark by all. Two of them indulged in a glass of liquor, while the others took lemonade.
Anderson lived in this place when he was a boy and showed some favors to one or two of his old schoolmates whom he recognized. His father, who was very poor, removed to California at an early day, and some of the men who befriended the father when he left here were repaid by the son by being robbed of thousands of dollars. He says his father returned from California to Kansas where he was murdered. He said that he was a captain under Quantrill, who is at present sick on the south side of the river. His men are principally from Jackson County, and are veteran scoundrels, the most of them having participated in the sacking and burning of Lawrence. They were the best armed men we have seen during the war, some of their belts swinging as high as eight navy revolvers, while the most of them were provided with revolving rifles. Although they pretended to be confederate soldiers while here, yet they made no distinction between parties --all men who had money sharing alike.
Intense. I like that they don't spare you the vicious details. It's more ralistic. Kinda morbid, but oddly real.
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