Confederates in Virginia: Lyon and Sigel

The Confederates anxiously sought rest and refreshment, but Lyon would not grant them the boon. Before the dawn the next morning he marched against them in two columns, one led by himself to fall upon their front; the other, under Sigel, twelve hundred strong, with six field-pieces, to attack their rear. A battle began at an early hour. Lyon's column bore the brunt of the conflict. His words and deeds inspired his men to fight valinatly. Wherever the storm of battle was raging fiercest, there Lyon was seen. Very early in the severe engagement, his horse was shot under him. Then he received a wound in the leg. Another in the head soon followed and partially stunned him. Mounting the horse of one of Major Sturgis's orderlies, and placing himself at the head of Kansas troops, he swung his hat over his head, and called upon the men to follow. While dashing forward with a determination to gain the victory, a rifle-ball passed through his body, near his heart, and he expired in a few minutes. The conflict continued about two hours longer, and at eleven o'clock it ceased, the Confederates, discomfited, withdrawing from the field. The loss of Nationals in the battle was between twelve and thirteen hundred, and of the Confederates full three thousand. The former fell back to Springfield, and the next morning (August 11) the whole Union force, under the general command of Sigel, retreated from Springfield to Rolla, one hundred and twenty-five miles in the direction of St. Louis, safely conducting a Government train valued at $1,500,000.

When Governor Jackson set up the standard of revolt at the capital of Missouri, the loyal men of the Commonwealth tried to stay the hand of secession. They had held a State Convention in February, at which no openly avowed disunionist appeared. That Convention reassembled at Jefferson City, on the 22d of July, and declared the government of which Jackson was the head, to be illegal. They organized a provisional government for service until a permanent one might be established by the people. The Convention issued an address to the inhabitants, in which the treason of the governor was exposed. Meanwhile General Pillow, by invitation of the governor, had entered the Commonwealth at the head of Tennessee troops to act in concert with M. Jefferson Thompson, the leader of the State militia. The shallow Pillow, vain as he was incompetent, assumed the pompous title of "Liberator of Missouri," and dated his orders and despatches, "Headquarters Army of Liberation." Missouri was not annexed to the Confederacy; but persons claiming to represent that State, sat in the Confederate Congress at Richmond during a greater part of the period of the Civil War.