True grit: How I survived my visit to Lone Jack (Mo.) battlefield

Somehow I managed a smile after birds destroyed my soul at Lone Jack (Mo.) battlefield.
(CLICK ON IMAGES TO ENLARGE.)

The small museum on the battlefield was dedicated by former president Harry S. Truman in 1963.

A severe storm in the Kansas City area toppled trees at Lone Jack the night before my visit.

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My short visit to the Lone Jack (Mo.) battleground Saturday morning began inauspiciously. While photographing the battlefield cemetery, vicious birds targeted me for mischief. After a string of expletives nearly tied me in a knot, I found myself in the small Lone Jack museum, where a kindly docent explained the battle, urged me to visit the excellent Negro Leagues Baseball Museum in nearby Kansas City and suggested where to eat tremendous BBQ. (Even U.S. presidents have eaten at Arthur Bryant's!) Then he pointed where I could wash the mess, courtesy of my fine-feathered enemies, off my hand and iPhone.

Confederates attacked Union lines (behind camera) 
through a field across the road on Aug. 16, 1862.

But I digress.

Here's what you need to know about the Trans-Mississippi Theater site: The battle, fought August 15-16, 1862, resulted in a Confederate victory. Estimated casualties: about 300. Confederates charged through a hemp field to attack Union soldiers in a cornfield, now long gone. The dead were buried on the battlefield and, according to the docent, some may lie in a trench that extends beyond the boundary of the small cemetery.

Former President Harry S. Truman, who lived in nearby Independence, Mo., dedicated the museum, housed in a circular stone and cement building, in 1963. "I tried to more than 42 years ago to erect a monument to the Lone Jack battle," Truman said on the 101st anniversary of the fighting. "They didn't think the battle was important then."

The battle lives on in popular culture -- well, at least for those who recall an actor named John Wayne. Asked in the movie True Grit how he lost his eye, Wayne -- who played Rooster Cogburn -- replied: "It was in the war. The Lone Jack, a scrap outside Kansas City." (You can't find this stuff almost anywhere else. Here's a clip from the 1969 movie.)

For at least one Union soldier, the battle was unforgettable. Wrote Stephen Benton Elkins, a captain of militia in the 77th Missouri and later Secretary of War and a U.S. Senator from West Virginia:

Elkins

"I saw one battle while in the service, that of Lone Jack, and a most awful battle it was. Col. Emory S. Foster had a Union regiment which was attacked by the brother of Senator Cockrell, but Foster thought the Confederates were the guerrilla hands who raised the black flag, and never gave any quarter. So he refused to surrender, and every one of his officers was picked off. 

"The guerrillas were victorious. I went over the battlefield afterward, the blood, the cries for water and death, the naked bodies stripped of their clothing, the dead horses which served for ramparts, gave me a disgust for war, which makes it seem strange that I am here at the head of the war department of this great government."

              PANORAMA: A view of the battlefield cemetery and museum at Lone Jack.
                                        (Click at upper right for full-screen experience.)

A Confederate memorial in the small battlefield cemetery.

A  Union memorial (left) steps from the Confederate memorial at Lone Jack Cemetery.

Gravestone for Union corporal who was killed at the Battle of Lone Jack.

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SOURCES:

-- Stevens, Walter Barlow, Centennial History of Missouri, S.J. Clarke Publishing. 1921.

-- The Kansas City Times, Aug. 17, 1963.