Border Ruffians

  Today the kiddos and I went with a few of our friends to Missouri Town 1855 in Lee's Summit, Missouri.  Missouri Town contains furnished buildings from the period, as well as actors who display some of the activities that common folk would have done during the time.  What a wonderful experience for our kiddos to be able to see history in action.

  We took a lunch and ate at an area with picnic tables.  When we were mostly through, the kids wandered down the hill to explore.  They came back running: "there's tombstones down there!".  Well, I just had to investigate.  What we found was a cemetery along the side of a brushy area where 5 stones were still standing with a handful of stone bases.  Since I had my camera, I took shots of all that I could.  The following is one of the stones:

    I later found out that the stones were ones acquired from the local police and had been victims of vandalism or ones that had been abandoned.   
    Once we got home, I loaded up ancestry.com and did some research.  Colby Cowherd Twyman was a slave owning farmer who moved to Missouri before 1840 from Kentucky.  The tombstone lists his death date as July 5, 1863.  To give some background on the hostility of the time, in late August of 1863, Quantrill burned Lawrence, KS, and Order 11 was put into affect.  Order 11 said that the four counties of Bates, Cass, Jackson and Vernon had to be evacuated - and this meant whatever force necessary.  Due to the border tension in the area and the time that he died I am assuming that he was killed by Free-Staters.  Some of the Twymans in the area had ties to William C. Quantrill as well as the Younger Gang, which reinforces this hypothesis. 
  Even though these stones came from sad circumstances, you can still gain alot of history from them.  Look for history everywhere, you never know what you'll find!