“Old Age,” written by Clinton Owen Bates in 1949, reflects on the life of a young boy growing up in Arkansas during the Civil War, and his career as a teacher. Bates was born in 1857, and grew up on a farm in Fayetteville. The Bates family had split loyalty among the North and South, and even as a young child, Bates remembered the tension that the War brought into their home. Bates recalled the bloody conflict along the border of Missouri and Kansas, encounters with runaway slaves, and various Trans-Mississippi Theater battles. After the War, Bates began his career as a teacher. He taught at the Cherokee Headquarters on the Tahlequah Indian Reservation and later held a position in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

Douglas R. Bushnell was born 17 June 1824 at Norwich, Connecticut. He was educated as a civil engineer, and moved to New Hampshire as a young man to begin a career in railroad engineering in that state and in Vermont. Bushnell moved to Illinois in 1855 with his wife and family. In May 1861, Bushnell enlisted in Company B of the 13th Illinois Infantry. Bushnell participated in campaigns in Missouri, Arkansas, Louisiana, Alabama and Tennessee.

Jane Page’s postwar letter notes family affairs and struggles during the Civil War. Jane lived with her husband, David Page, in Kingsriver, Arkansas until he was killed in March 1865 while Federal troops raided their home. She discussed the major battles and engagements in the Ozarks, and mentioned her difficulties during the postwar period.

John M. Weidemeyer was born January 10, 1834, in Charlottesville, Virginia. By 1850, John and his parents moved to Osceola, St. Clair County, Missouri. Weidemeyer married Lelia V. Crutchfield in 1856, and the couple resided in Osceola until the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861. Weidemeyer and his family supported the Confederacy and Missouri’s secession from the Union. Weidemeyer recorded in his diary and letters to his wife, Lelia, the struggles of military life for a Confederate soldier. He also gave a first-hand account of the raid and burning of Osceola by James H. Lane and Charles Jennison’s Jayhawkers. John M. Weidemeyer was Captain of Company F of the 6th Missouri Infantry CSA and served in Missouri, Arkansas, but the regiment primarily assisted the Confederate Army on the East coast. After the war, Weidemeyer rejoined his family in Texas, before moving them to Clinton, Missouri, where they lived the remainder of his life. John M. Weidemeyer died on January 12, 1911, at 77 years old.

Lemuel Amzi Donnell was a Tennessee native who had traveled with his family in 1850 to Missouri in search of new land. Donnell live on his family’s farm with his parents until 1860 when he decided to join the Missouri State Guard, Company F, 4th Infantry Regiment, 8th Division. Donnell served for four years fighting for the Confederate cause across Northwest Arkansas and Southwest Missouri. He recorded his life as a solider in his personal diary, along with his own original poetry. Donnell participated in numerous military campaigns, and reported obtaining multiple furloughs for long periods of time; which was highly unusual for a soldier to receive during a time of conflict.

Lyman Gibson Bennett enlisted in the 36th Illinois Infantry in 1861. Prior to the War he trained as a surveyor and civil engineer, working for the railroad. The military utilized Bennett’s skills as a cartographer, and assigned him to survey battlefields, road systems, and fortifications. Bennett’s diaries document his daily duties as both a soldier and an engineer for the military. His regiment participated in the Battle of Pea Ridge, which he describes in vivid detail. Bennett was discharged from the military in August 1864.

In 1865, Bennett joined the engineering department of General Samuel R. Curtis as a civilian. He mapped the 1864 battlefields of Sterling Price’s Missouri Expedition. Bennett was then assigned to survey fortifications in Nebraska and Colorado, and eventually served as an engineering officer on the Powder River Expedition of 1865. Bennett’s diaries provide colorful insight to his perception of the Ozarks and its inhabitants.

The Stirman Davidson Collection is a spirited group of letters written to Rebecca Stirman Davidson, of Fayetteville, Arkansas. The bulk of the letters are from her brother Erasmus “Ras” Stirman, while serving in the Civil War. The letters tell the story of Erasmus service in the Confederate Army, his fears and doubts about winning the War, and leading his company of sharpshooters into certain death. Erasmus loved meeting new women, and his letters to Rebecca are full of candor and humor, often telling a larger tale of the social and cultural customs of the era to which he opportunistically flaunted. Erasmus’ successes in the military, coupled with his family’s access to political and societal privilege, combine to tell a wonderful story of upper class life in the Civil War of the Ozarks.

Wright C. Schaumburg came from a very prominent family in St. Louis, Missouri. With the outbreak of the Civil War he joined the Confederacy and became a captain in the Army Artillery Group of the 1st Division of the 1st Brigade of the Army of the West, 2nd Missouri Infantry. He fought at the Battle of Corinth and Pea Ridge, where he was captured briefly by Union forces. In this letter, Wright offered his friend, Paul, a position as “Aide-de-Camp” on the staff of the brigadier general. Schaumburg described the horrific experience he encountered during the Battle of Pea Ridge, Arkansas, on March 7-8, 1862, and the carnage he witnessed the following day when he and other men returned to bury the dead.

Schaumburg survived the war and went on to serve in the Cuban Army and was appointed Colonel in 1869.