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War in James H. Lane’s brigade.
By 1860, other shipments of Sharps rifles had arrived in Kansas and blood had been spilled by both sides. The were nicknamed Beecher’s Bibles both because some shipments were disguised as books and because Reverend Henry Ward Beecher said, “the Sharps Rifle was a truly moral agency, and
that there was more moral power in one of those instruments, so far as the slaveholders of Kansas are concerned, than in a hundred Bibles. You might just as well...read the Bible to Buffaloes as to those fellows...but they have a supreme respect for the logic that is embodied in Sharp’s rifles.” Beecher also helped fund the purchase of some of the Free State Sharps carbines. On May 21, 1856, pro-slavery forces totaling around 300 men under the leadership of Douglas County Sheriff Samuel J. Jones faced off against Pomeroy and the Free Staters of Lawrence. Jones had been previously shot and wounded while trying to arrest some of the town’s residents and demanded they turn over their arms, which Pomeroy indicated he did not have the authority to compel but did turn over the town’s cannon. Jones and his men then attacked the Free State Hotel and also destroyed the Kansas Free State and Herald of Freedom newspaper offices and looted the town.
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Isely also indicates these rifles were actually stolen by border ruffians when they were being transported on the Arabia on their way to Kansas. They were escorted by Major David Starr Hoyt (1821-1856), a Mexican-American War combat veteran from Deerfield, Massachusetts. A letter by Hoyt to his mother was seized by the captain of the Arabia, and its Free State message was read to the other passengers which included Border Ruffians. The Missourians nearly tossed Hoyt and his companion William B. Parsons overboard into the Missouri River. At Lexington, Hoyt was surrounded by an armed mob who tried to force him to sign over the arms at gun point which he refused. They were seized anyways. When Hoyt arrived in Kansas City, he informed Pomeroy what had happened. While the carbines along with four breech loading cannons had been seized, the carbines were useless to the Border Ruffians.
As Deitzler had done with the nipples with the prior order, the Emigrant Aid Company had wisely had this shipment’s breechblocks removed and shipped separately. Hoyt returned to St. Louis to press his case against the captain of the Arabia and received the full value of the missing arms, but the carbines remained in Missouri. After various legal maneuvers, the carbines were finally recovered in 1859. They arrived in Kansas in 1860 and were delivered to Colonel James Montgomery who led the 3rd Kansas Infantry during the Civil
Samuel C. Pomeroy