The Rebel Jackson Women

Last time I wrote about the lynching of Mindu Cowahgee in Marshall, Missouri, in 1900. This week, I’m staying in Saline County but going all the way back to the Civil War.
On or about August 26, 1863, Lieutenant William D. Blair led a scout through Saline County in search of guerrilla leader Bill Jackson, son of former Missouri governor Claiborne F. Jackson. As Blair passed the Mary Jackson residence in the neighborhood of Saline City, a black woman near the doorway beckoned him, and he stopped to see what she wanted. The woman told the Federal officer that Bill Jackson was in the woods nearby with four men and that Mary Jackson and her family (no relation to Bill) had fed the bushwhackers earlier the same day. While Blair was still talking to the servant woman, one of Mary Jackson’s daughters, twenty-six-year old Betty, came outside and ordered the woman away, proclaiming, according to Blair’s later testimony, that no one who would report on her friends was going to stay around her.
Blair and his scouting party promptly rode to the woods and found signs that a band of men had recently been there. Convinced that the informant had told the truth, Blair set off after the guerrillas.
Unable to overtake the bushwhackers, the Federals returned to the Jackson home the same afternoon. Confronting Mary Jackson, Blair demanded to know whether she had fed Bill Jackson’s gang earlier in the day. She admitted she had, but she stressed she had declined to feed the men at her house and had, instead, sent them to the woods.
Betty Jackson’s sister Sue admitted that she and another sister had delivered the victuals to Bill Jackson in the woods. According to Blair, Sue also stated that Bill Jackson and his men were her friends and she was not ashamed of taking food to them. Betty Jackson confirmed that she was the one who had run off the black woman earlier in the day. Betty also reportedly told Blair that Bill Jackson and his guerrillas were her friends.
The three women were arrested on August 27 and taken to Marshall. Several days later they were transferred to Jefferson City, where they were paroled on September 14 under the condition that they report when called. The next day, orders were issued that the Jackson women should be tried by military commission at Marshall.
Mary Jackson’s trial began on October 6 with Lieutenant Blair as the main prosecution witness. Mary admitted she fed Bill Jackson’s men but said she did so only because he threatened her. She introduced her hired hand as a defense witness, who said he heard Mary tell Bill Jackson and his men to leave when they first came to her house but that Jackson refused to leave until she fed them. Despite her protestations of innocence, Mary Jackson was convicted of feeding and harboring guerrillas after a two-hour trial.
The trial of her daughter Betty, charged with uttering disloyal sentiments, began immediately afterwards with Lieutenant Blair again as the chief prosecution witness. Betty offered no defense except a written statement in which she pled helpless womanhood. It read, “Her being a lady, and unaccustomed to being held responsible for anything she might say, she did not really know what was loyal or disloyal.” Like her mother, Betty pleaded for leniency and expressed a willingness to take the oath of allegiance, but she, too, was convicted.
Charged with feeding and harboring bushwhackers as well as uttering disloyal language, Sue was tried after her older sister. Sue did not deny making statements to Blair and his men that might have been construed as disloyal, but she claimed she did so only because his men used insulting language toward her. Blair rebutted her claim, saying he was the only soldier to whom she talked. Sue acknowledged carrying food to Jackson but only because she was compelled to do so. She denied ever harboring bushwhackers and said she had no recollection of saying Jackson and his gang were her friends. Claiming to be only fourteen years old, when she was at least eighteen or nineteen, she, like her mother and her sister, closed with a plea for leniency. Faring no better than they, she was convicted on both charges against her.
All three women were sentenced to be banished from the state, but the sentences were later reduced. Mrs. Jackson was required to give bond as security for her “future good conduct” and to take an oath of allegiance, while her daughters were required only to take oaths.
This story is condensed from a chapter in my Bushwhacker Belles book. Main source: Trial transcript of Mary, Sue, and Betty Jackson, National Archives.