GENERAL PRICE

terrible thing," said Mulligan, "to see those brave fellows, mangled and wounded, without skillful hands to find their ghastly wounds. Captain Moriarty, who had been in civil life a physician, was ordered to lay aside his sword and go into the hospital. He went, and through all the siege, worked among the wounded with no other instrument than a razor. The suffering in the hospital was horrible," continued the Federal commander, "the wounded and mangled men dying for thirst, frenziedly wrestling for water in which the bleeding stumps of mangled limbs had been washed, and drinking it with a horrid avidity."

     Despite the Federals' brave capture, the possession of the house changed hands again late in the afternoon, and the Southern forces held it for the remainder of the engagement.

     All through the nineteenth, a very hot and dry day, the firing continued incessantly. The Federal soldiers still expected help to arrive, but they "looked and listened in vain, for all day long they fought without relief and without water, their parched lips cracking, their tongues swollen, and the blood running down their chins when they bit their cartridges." In his hurry to fortify the college grounds, Mulligan had not made certain the availability of a large supply of water for his men and horses, thinking that the college wells would be sufficient. But at midday on the nineteenth, the water supply was exhausted.

     The morning of the twentieth, the final day of the battle, dawned another hot and sultry day. Price, early in the morning, decided to finish the engagement with a general assault on Mulligan's western flank, but the Northern commander, hearing of this plan from his spies, shifted the greater portion of his defenses to this sector. When the Confederate attack was launched, the Federal lines held and fought off attack after attack.

     Since his attack was being pushed back by the Union troops. Price issued an order that was to be a major factor in the Federal surrender. During this period Lexington was a large producer of hemp, and large supplies of bales were stored near the Battleground in warehouses along the river front. Price had these bales brought to the front lines, and the Confederates used them as moveable breastworks. In this way Price's men could advance uphill on the Union position under cover of the rolling hemp bales.

     Mulligan, anxiously searching for some means of halting the advance of his enemy, commanded that the shot be heated and fired at the bales in an attempt to set them afire. But Price had taken a precaution against this, for the bales were soaked in the river before being brought up for use.

     Finally the rush came, and with a wild Rebel yell, the Confederates swept over the Federals' outer breastworks to begin a hand-to-hand struggle. But the Federal line held firm, even though Mulligan had already conceded that the struggle must soon end, for this men were nearly exhausted and would soon die of thirst.

     Suddenly the firing stopped, and Price, expecting the Union surrender, sent a message to Mulligan inquiring about the cause of the sudden cease-fire. The gallant Federal commander returned the note replying, "General, I hardly know why, unless you have surrendered." Immediately the fighting resumed, but soon the Federal soldiers, after suffering through 52 continuous hours of bombardment, and without water, ammunition, or rations, gave up the hope of being reinforced. It was two o'clock in the afternoon, Wednesday, September 20, 1861, when the fighting finally ceased, the Federal soldiers laid down their arms, and the Battle of Lexington ended in a Confederate victory.

     Price reported, "The visible fruits of this victory are very great -- about 3,500 prisoners ...5 pieces of artillery...over 3,000 stands of infantry arms, a large number of sabers about 750 horses, many sets of cavalry equipment, wagons, teams..., and more than $100,000 worth of commissary stores..."

     A surprising thing is that the battle casualties were so low for such a battle. The Confederates reported 38 killed and 150 wounded, and the Federals 40 killed and 120 wounded. These figures do not include the volunteer troops. Most historians attribute these low totals to Mulligan's effective entrenchments and Price's rolling breastworks.

     "The capture of Lexington had crowned General Price's command with a brilliant victory, and so far, the Missouri campaign had proceeded step by step, from one success to another," states the Southern historian, Pollard. And, adds Wood, the loss of "Lexington was one of the two major disasters to befall the Union cause in Missouri...," but it was also "the breaking of the last Confederate waves, for, as a state, Missouri was lost to the South already."

     If Price could have kept Lexington, the effect of this battle would have been still more important, but the loss of the post by the Union was severely felt, and Fremont, resolving to recapture it, at once sent 20,000 men to drive Price and his followers out of Lexington and out of Missouri. As soon as the Federal patrol of the Missouri River was broken at Lexington, many Southern sympathizers in the northern part of the state, flocked across to join Price. Unfortunately for the Southern cause, however, Price was not able to maintain himself at Lexington, and so on September 30, after holding his hard-won position only ten days, the Southern leader set out once again for southwest Missouri, leaving the Federals to control the river for the remainder of the war.