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The FReeper Foxhole Remembers Bloody Bill Andersonthe Centralia Massacre (9/23/1864)-Feb 16th, 2005
www.millersparanormalresearch.com ^

Posted on 02/15/2005 10:05:11 PM PST by SAMWolf



Lord,

Keep our Troops forever in Your care

Give them victory over the enemy...

Grant them a safe and swift return...

Bless those who mourn the lost.
.

FReepers from the Foxhole join in prayer
for all those serving their country at this time.


.................................................................. .................... ...........................................

U.S. Military History, Current Events and Veterans Issues

Where Duty, Honor and Country
are acknowledged, affirmed and commemorated.

Our Mission:

The FReeper Foxhole is dedicated to Veterans of our Nation's military forces and to others who are affected in their relationships with Veterans.

In the FReeper Foxhole, Veterans or their family members should feel free to address their specific circumstances or whatever issues concern them in an atmosphere of peace, understanding, brotherhood and support.

The FReeper Foxhole hopes to share with it's readers an open forum where we can learn about and discuss military history, military news and other topics of concern or interest to our readers be they Veteran's, Current Duty or anyone interested in what we have to offer.

If the Foxhole makes someone appreciate, even a little, what others have sacrificed for us, then it has accomplished one of it's missions.

We hope the Foxhole in some small way helps us to remember and honor those who came before us.

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William "Bloody Bill" Anderson


One of the most feared of all Missouri guerillas was William T Anderson who actually considered himself a Kansan. It was said that he carried a silk cord on which knots were tied for every Yankee killed and that he sometimes frothed at the mouth during battle. His was also known to scalp his Federal victims, which is probably one reason why he received the name of "Bloody Bill." Bill was described as being tall, sinewy and lithe with long black hair that curled and fell to his shoulders. He had prominent cheekbones and small angry eyes.


William "Bloody Bill" Anderson


William was born in Randolph County, Missouri in 1840. His parents were William and Martha (Thomason) Anderson. Bill was one of six children who included Ellis, James, Mary C, Josephine and Martha. Also living with them were his grandparents, William and Martha Thomason. His father was a hatter and the family moved from Palmyra, Missouri to Huntsville, Missouri between 1847-1848.

In 1850, the father went to California to join the gold rush leaving the family in Huntsville. During this time, Bill and his brothers were the heads of the family and their relationship with their sisters were both brotherly and fatherly. The father returned in 1854 and the family relocated to Breckinridge Co, Kansas (which is now Lyon County) in 1857.

In March of 1862, his father was murdered while Bill and his brother, Jim were on a trip to Fort Leavenworth. The murders were either Pro-Northern neighbors or a squad of Union soldiers. There are several accounts of the murder. One account claims that Union soldiers hanged him because his name appeared on a list of southern sympathizers. Another account says that a neighbor who accused him of horse theft murdered him. Bloody Bill later killed this same neighbor.



When Bill and his brother returned home that evening and found their father dead, his campaign of revenge began that same evening when he sneaked up behind a Union picket and broke his neck. The next night he killed another Union soldier and was almost caught by a federal calvaryman and had to shoot him in order to escape. He left that same night for the Missouri border and joined up with Quantrill.

In August of 1863, Federals arrested his three sisters along with other some other women in an attempt to draw out the guerilla soldiers. They imprisoned the women in a makeshift prison located in a building in Kansas City. Mysteriously, this building collapsed killing his sister Josephine and maiming Mary for life. This event was the reason cited behind the attack on Lawrence and intensified Bill’s hatred of the Federals.

Bill was content to ride with Quantrill, being a follower instead of a leader until a quarrel with Quantrill in 1864 caused him to form his own band of guerillas. This band included 16 year old Jesse James and they became the most feared band of all guerillas. Bloody Bill showed no mercy to Union soldiers and killed them on sight. He showed no sympathy to Pro-northerners and raided their homes and stores, murdering those that offered resistance. There is only one known case of when he spared the life of a union officer and he did so because he admired his bravery. There are other accounts of his band robbing southern sympathizers and returning the loot with apologies when their loyalties were revealed.



On March 2, 1864, Bloody Bill married Bush Smith, a young girl from Sherman, Texas but this did nothing to curtail his taste for blood and his need for revenge. They moved to a small farmhouse in Ray County, Missouri.

In a letter sent to a local newspaper, Bloody Bill wrote, "I have chosen guerilla warfare to revenge myself for the wrongs that I could not honorably avenge otherwise. I lived in Kansas when the war commenced. Because I would not fight the people of Missouri, my native state, the Yankees sought my life but failed to get me. Revenged themselves by murdering my father, destroying all my property, murdered one of my sisters and have kept the other two in jail for 12 months. But I have fully glutted my vengeance. I have killed many, I am a guerilla. I have never belonged to the Confederate Army, nor do my men."

On Oct 26, 1864, just south of Richmond in Ray County, Missouri, Bill and his guerilla band was ambushed by Captain Samuel P Cox and his union troops. They were caught completely unaware. A skirmish ensued and it is said that Bill and another of his men rode right through the Federal line. When his comrade was shot from his horse, Bill turned around to assist him and it was at this time that he was riddled with bullets and killed. Upon examining the personal items found on his body, he had seven pistols, $600 in cash and 2 watches. Private papers found in his saddlebags from General Price identified him as William T Anderson.


Partisan Ranger Memorial in Albany, Missouri (North of Orrick)


Bill’s body was taken to Richmond, Missouri where it was propped up in a chair and a pistol was placed in the dead mans hand for photographs. A short time later, the Union troopers decapitated him and placed his head on a telegraph pole at the entrance to the town. His torso was roped and tied to a horse where it was dragged through the streets of Richmond before being buried in an unmarked grave outside of town.

Years later, Cole Younger visited the site of Bloody Bills grave and requested that a funeral procession be held for him, in which is was. His grave was marked years later.

As with the other legendary guerillas, it is claimed that another man who resembled Bloody Bill was riding Bill’s horse on that fateful night near Richmond and that he was the one whom they identified as "Bloody Bill." One claim is that Bill Anderson changed his name and escaped to Erin Springs, Oklahoma where he ran a saloon. Another report was that Bill settled in Salt Creek, Brown County, Texas where he lived for about sixty years under an assumed name. There may be some truth to this last report as a man resembling "Bloody Bill" died there on November 2, 1927 and found on his bedside table was a photograph of three young women who were later identified as the sisters of William T "Bloody Bill" Anderson.







TOPICS: VetsCoR
KEYWORDS: bloodybill; bushwackers; civilwar; cnetraliamassacre; freeperfoxhole; jayhawkers; missouri; veterans; warbetweenstates
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To: Victoria Delsoul

Not bad. Getting ready for our Grand Opening Ad campaign. That and spring is coming


81 posted on 02/16/2005 7:47:39 PM PST by SAMWolf (What goes around usually gets dizzy and falls over.)
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To: SAMWolf
Good for you, Sam. Glad to hear that. :-)

Soon, you'll be stinky rich, lol.

82 posted on 02/16/2005 7:50:14 PM PST by Victoria Delsoul
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To: Colt .45
AND Sherman had the US Government's tacit blessing to wage war on civilian lives and property.

In a letter to General Hood, Sherman wrote that he considered "it to be to the interest of the United States that all citizens now residing in Atlanta should remove," to which Hood replied: "This unprecedented measure transcends in studied and ingenious cruelty all acts ever before brought to my attention in the dark history of war."

83 posted on 02/16/2005 7:58:09 PM PST by w_over_w (Never sell your Mule to buy a plow. That's good advice . . .)
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To: Victoria Delsoul

LOL! I wish.


84 posted on 02/16/2005 8:12:54 PM PST by SAMWolf (What goes around usually gets dizzy and falls over.)
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To: SAMWolf; snippy_about_it; Aeronaut; Iris7; GailA; U S Army EOD; The Mayor; alfa6; E.G.C.; ...
1943 Sign on Munich facade: "Out with Hitler! Long live freedom!" was posted by the "White Rose" student group.
They were caught on 2/18 and beheaded on 2/22.

In this slim book, Inge Scholl chronicles the heroism of her brother and sister, Hans and Sophie Scholl, and their friends in Germany during World War II. The Scholls were students at the University of Munich who had slowly become aware of the horrors their government was perpetrating. They decided that they had to do something, anything to stop the Nazis, and so they printed leaflets denouncing the government and providing information about atrocities. They distributed these leaflets throughout the University and the city, and created a network to distribute them even farther. They identified themselves only as The White Rose. The Nazis eventually tracked down the Scholls and their collaborators and executed them.

Inge Scholl tells the story beautifully, in spare and simple prose. She wrote the book originally for German youth after the war, so it is not a scholarly book, but it is even more affecting because of that. After Scholl's narrative are the texts of the six leaflets themselves, as well as a series of fascinating documents -- the Nazi indictments and sentences of the White Rose group, contemporary newspaper accounts ("Just Punishment of Traitors to the Nation at War"), and some deeply affecting testimonials, including a powerful letter written by a fellow prisoner of Sophie Scholl. There are also a number of photographs of the primary members of the White Rose group.

~~~


Hans Scholl (left), Sophie Scholl (center), and Christoph Probst (right),
leaders of the White Rose resistance organization. Munich, Germany, 1942

The White Rose: A Lesson in Dissent
by Jacob G. Hornberger

The date was February 22, 1943. Hans Scholl and his sister Sophie, along with their best friend, Christoph Probst, were scheduled to be executed by Nazi officials that afternoon. The prison guards were so impressed with the calm and bravery of the prisoners in the face of impending death that they violated regulations by permitting them to meet together one last time. Hans, a medical student at the University of Munich, was 24. Sophie, a student, was 21. Christoph, a medical student, was 22.

This is the story of The White Rose. It is a lesson in dissent. It is a tale of courage, of principle, of honor. It is detailed in three books, The White Rose (1970) by Inge Scholl, A Noble Treason (1979) by Richard Hanser, and An Honourable Defeat (1994) by Anton Gill.

Hans and Sophie Scholl were German teenagers in the 1930s. Like other young Germans, they enthusiastically joined the Hitler Youth. They believed that Adolf Hitler was leading Germany and the German people back to greatness.

Their parents were not so enthusiastic. Their father, Robert Scholl, told his children that Hitler and the Nazis were leading Germany down a road of destruction. Later, in 1942, he would serve time in a Nazi prison for telling his secretary: “The war! It is already lost. This Hitler is God's scourge on mankind, and if the war doesn't end soon the Russians will be sitting in Berlin.” Gradually, Hans and Sophie began realizing that their father was right. They concluded that, in the name of freedom and the greater good of the German nation, Hitler and the Nazis were enslaving and destroying the German people.

They also knew that open dissent was impossible in Nazi Germany, especially after the start of World War II. Most Germans took the traditional position, that once war breaks out, it is the duty of the citizen to support the troops by supporting the government. But Hans and Sophie Scholl believed differently. They believed that it was the duty of a citizen, even in times of war, to stand up against an evil regime, especially when it is sending hundreds of thousands of its citizens to their deaths.

The Scholl siblings began sharing their feelings with a few of their friends, Christoph Probst, Alexander Schmorell, Willi Graf, as well as with Kurt Huber, their psychology and philosophy professor.

One day in 1942, copies of a leaflet entitled “The White Rose” suddenly appeared at the University of Munich. The leaflet contained an anonymous essay that said that the Nazi system had slowly imprisoned the German people and was now destroying them. The Nazi regime had turned evil. It was time, the essay said, for Germans to rise up and resist the tyranny of their own government. At the bottom of the essay, the following request appeared: “Please make as many copies of this leaflet as you can and distribute them.”

The leaflet caused a tremendous stir among the student body. It was the first time that internal dissent against the Nazi regime had surfaced in Germany. The essay had been secretly written and distributed by Hans Scholl and his friends.

Another leaflet appeared soon afterward. And then another. And another. Ultimately, there were six leaflets published and distributed by Hans and Sophie Scholl and their friends, four under the title “The White Rose” and two under the title “Leaflets of the Resistance.” Their publication took place periodically between 1942 and 1943, interrupted for a few months when Hans and his friends were temporarily sent to the Eastern Front to fight against the Russians.

The members of The White Rose, of course, had to act cautiously. The Nazi regime maintained an iron grip over German society. Internal dissent was quickly and efficiently smashed by the Gestapo. Hans and Sophie Scholl and their friends knew what would happen to them if they were caught.

People began receiving copies of the leaflets in the mail. Students at the University of Hamburg began copying and distributing them. Copies began turning up in different parts of Germany and Austria. Moreover, as Hanser points out, the members of The White Rose did not limit themselves to leaflets. Graffiti began appearing in large letters on streets and buildings all over Munich: “Down with Hitler! . . . Hitler the Mass Murderer!” and “Freihart! . . . Freihart! . . . Freedom! . . . Freedom!”

The Gestapo was driven into a frenzy. It knew that the authors were having to procure large quantities of paper, envelopes, and postage. It knew that they were using a duplicating machine. But despite the Gestapo's best efforts, it was unable to catch the perpetrators.

One day, February 18, 1943, Hans' and Sophie's luck ran out. They were caught leaving pamphlets at the University of Munich and were arrested. A search disclosed evidence of Christoph Probst's participation, and he too was soon arrested. The three of them were indicted for treason.

On February 22, four days after their arrest, their trial began. The presiding judge, Roland Freisler, chief justice of the People's Court of the Greater German Reich, had been sent from Berlin. Hanser writes:

He conducted the trial as if the future of the Reich were indeed at stake. He roared denunciations of the accused as if he were not the judge but the prosecutor. He behaved alternately like an actor ranting through an overwritten role in an implausible melodrama and a Grand Inquisitor calling down eternal damnation on the heads of the three irredeemable heretics before him. . . . No witnesses were called, since the defendants had admitted everything. The proceedings consisted almost entirely of Roland Freisler's denunciation and abuse, punctuated from time to time by half-hearted offerings from the court-appointed defense attorneys, one of whom summed up his case with the observation, “I can only say fiat justitia. Let justice be done.” By which he meant: Let the accused get what they deserve.

Freisler and the other accusers could not understand what had happened to these German youths. After all, they all came from nice German families. They all had attended German schools. They had been members of the Hitler Youth. How could they have turned out to be traitors? What had so twisted and warped their minds?

Sophie Scholl shocked everyone in the courtroom when she remarked to Freisler: “Somebody, after all, had to make a start. What we wrote and said is also believed by many others. They just don't dare to express themselves as we did.” Later in the proceedings, she said to him: “You know the war is lost. Why don't you have the courage to face it?”

In the middle of the trial, Robert and Magdalene Scholl tried to enter the courtroom. Magdalene said to the guard: “But I'm the mother of two of the accused.” The guard responded: “You should have brought them up better.” Robert Scholl forced his way into the courtroom and told the court that he was there to defend his children. He was seized and forcibly escorted outside. The entire courtroom heard him shout: “One day there will be another kind of justice! One day they will go down in history!”

Robert Freisler pronounced his judgment on the three defendants: Guilty of treason. Their sentence: Death.

They were escorted back to Stadelheim prison, where the guards permitted Hans and Sophie to have one last visit with their parents. Hans met with them first, and then Sophie. Hansen writes:

His eyes were clear and steady and he showed no sign of dejection or despair. He thanked his parents again for the love and warmth they had given him and he asked them to convey his affection and regard to a number of friends, whom he named. Here, for a moment, tears threatened, and he turned away to spare his parents the pain of seeing them. Facing them again, his shoulders were back and he smiled. . . .

Then a woman prison guard brought in Sophie. . . . Her mother tentatively offered her some candy, which Hans had declined. “Gladly,” said Sophie, taking it. “After all, I haven't had any lunch!” She, too, looked somehow smaller, as if drawn together, but her face was clear and her smile was fresh and unforced, with something in it that her parents read as triumph. “Sophie, Sophie,” her mother murmured, as if to herself. “To think you'll never be coming through the door again!” Sophie's smile was gentle. “Ah, Mother,” she said. “Those few little years. . . .” Sophie Scholl looked at her parents and was strong in her pride and certainty. “We took everything upon ourselves,” she said. “What we did will cause waves.” Her mother spoke again: “Sophie,” she said softly, “Remember Jesus.” “Yes,” replied Sophie earnestly, almost commandingly, “but you, too.” She left them, her parents, Robert and Magdalene Scholl, with her face still lit by the smile they loved so well and would never see again. She was perfectly composed as she was led away. Robert Mohr [a Gestapo official], who had come out to the prison on business of his own, saw her in her cell immediately afterwards, and she was crying. It was the first time Robert Mohr had seen her in tears, and she apologized. “I have just said good-bye to my parents,” she said. “You understand . . .” She had not cried before her parents. For them she had smiled.

No relatives visited Christoph Probst. His wife, who had just had their third child, was in the hospital. Neither she nor any members of his family even knew that he was on trial or that he had been sentenced to death. While his faith in God had always been deep and unwavering, he had never committed to a certain faith. On the eve of his death, a Catholic priest admitted him into the church in articulo mortis, at the point of death. “Now,” he said, “my death will be easy and joyful.”

That afternoon, the prison guards permitted Hans, Sophie, and Christoph to have one last visit together. Sophie was then led to the guillotine. One observer described her as she walked to her death: “Without turning a hair, without flinching.” Christoph Probst was next. Hans Scholl was last; just before he was beheaded, Hans cried out: “Long live freedom!”

Unfortunately, they were not the last to die. The Gestapo's investigation was relentless. Later tried and executed were Alex Schmorell (age 25), Willi Graf (age 25), and Kurt Huber (age 49). Students at the University of Hamburg were either executed or sent to concentration camps.

Today, every German knows the story of The White Rose. A square at the University of Munich is named after Hans and Sophie Scholl. And there are streets, squares, and schools all over Germany named for the members of The White Rose. The German movie The White Rose is now found in video stores in Germany and the United States. Richard Hansen sums up the story of The White Rose:

In the vogue words of the time, the Scholls and their friends represented the “other” Germany, the land of poets and thinkers, in contrast to the Germany that was reverting to barbarism and trying to take the world with it. What they were and what they did would have been “other” in any society at any time. What they did transcended the easy division of good-German/bad-German and lifted them above the nationalism of time-bound events. Their actions made them enduring symbols of the struggle, universal and timeless, for the freedom of the human spirit wherever and whenever it is threatened.

Mr. Hornberger is founder and president of The Future of Freedom Foundation.

~~~


85 posted on 02/16/2005 8:41:57 PM PST by PhilDragoo (Hitlery: das Butch von Buchenvald)
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To: PhilDragoo

Thanks for this.
Do you have a link?


86 posted on 02/16/2005 8:58:36 PM PST by Valin (DARE to be average!)
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To: PhilDragoo
Evening Phil Dragoo.

Thanks for all the info on the "White Rose" I had read some brief accounts of them in a book on the German Resistance, this adds some more detail.

A picture taken in 1943 of the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Haj Amin el-Husseini reviewing Bosnian-Muslim troops - a unit of the "Hanjar (Saber) Division" of the Waffen SS which he personally recruited for Hitler.

Some things never change.

87 posted on 02/16/2005 9:13:32 PM PST by SAMWolf (What goes around usually gets dizzy and falls over.)
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To: SAMWolf

Have to admit nylons are a lot sexier than poantyhose.


I suppose, if a person is interested in THAT sort of thing. I'm only interested in women for their minds.





that's my story and I'm stickin with it!


88 posted on 02/16/2005 9:21:28 PM PST by Valin (DARE to be average!)
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To: Valin
The White Rose: A Lesson in Dissent by Jacob G. Hornberger
89 posted on 02/16/2005 9:22:23 PM PST by PhilDragoo (Hitlery: das Butch von Buchenvald)
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To: SAMWolf

What a moron! If Hiler had won he would ended up in the ovens.


90 posted on 02/16/2005 9:23:39 PM PST by Valin (DARE to be average!)
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To: PhilDragoo

Thanks!


91 posted on 02/16/2005 9:24:52 PM PST by Valin (DARE to be average!)
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To: SAMWolf
Out of a nation, a handful rebelled.

In further delving, it is revealed She Who Must Be Oyveyyed tried to hide a campaign donation from Hamas-front American Muslim Council as having come from "American Museum Council".

Imagine the smartest woman in the world expecting that to fly.

92 posted on 02/16/2005 9:25:35 PM PST by PhilDragoo (Hitlery: das Butch von Buchenvald)
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To: Valin

LOL! I may be old but I'm not dead. ;-)


93 posted on 02/16/2005 9:38:08 PM PST by SAMWolf (What goes around usually gets dizzy and falls over.)
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To: Valin

What do you expect from a people that are stuck in the 11th Century?


94 posted on 02/16/2005 9:39:08 PM PST by SAMWolf (What goes around usually gets dizzy and falls over.)
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To: PhilDragoo
Imagine the smartest woman in the world expecting that to fly.

The sad part is that is does with a lot of people.

95 posted on 02/16/2005 9:40:34 PM PST by SAMWolf (What goes around usually gets dizzy and falls over.)
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To: stand watie
I think you are correct. The tactics you describe could have worked. The 1864 election was quite close as it was. The Federal victory at Gettysburg was enough to re-elect Lincoln, looks to me.

Lee wrote a letter to Davis after the Seven Days saying that it was time to negotiate. Seems to me that an offer of a cease fire in place would have interested McClellan and would get into the Northern papers. This could have brought great pressure on the Administration. The English were very close to coming in at that time, also.

General Jackson advocated attacks on northern cities, by the way.
96 posted on 02/17/2005 12:59:14 AM PST by Iris7 (.....to protect the Constitution from all enemies, both foreign and domestic. Same bunch, anyway.)
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To: stand watie

Thanks for the tip on the Fellman book. Hit a number of books including Fellman's at

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0195064712/qid=1108631033/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/103-9436917-2827852?v=glance&s=books


97 posted on 02/17/2005 1:06:14 AM PST by Iris7 (.....to protect the Constitution from all enemies, both foreign and domestic. Same bunch, anyway.)
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To: PhilDragoo

The virtue I respect most is courage. The Scholl kids died very well. The White Rose project was certain death, of course, and they well knew it.


98 posted on 02/17/2005 1:23:45 AM PST by Iris7 (.....to protect the Constitution from all enemies, both foreign and domestic. Same bunch, anyway.)
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To: PhilDragoo

BTTT!!!!!!


99 posted on 02/17/2005 5:58:33 AM PST by E.G.C.
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To: PhilDragoo

Thank you Phil for the story of the "White Rose". Very moving story I hadn't known.


100 posted on 02/17/2005 6:33:46 AM PST by snippy_about_it (Fall in --> The FReeper Foxhole. America's History. America's Soul.)
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