You must go to the files of the newspapers, documents of the period and extensive histories, if you desire to “get the atmosphere” of St. Louis during the Civil War. It was a place of indescribable ferment, torn by conflicting opinions, opposing loyalties, hatreds, fears and anxieties. From innumerable memoirs of that terrible time, I shall recite only a few that throw new light on obscure, or now forgotten, incidents, which touched me in a personal way.

Few, who have not had the experience, can tell or imagine conditions in families where there is a division of sentiment, as there always is along a border line. It became so intense in most instances that nearly all agreed among themselves to not mention the war at all. As I shall mention later, opinion was divided in our family, and partly for that reason, as well as because I had a beautiful young bride, I did not care to enter the armed conflict. Moreover, I was engaged in quite a large business, and it would have been very inconvenient for me to be drawn as a conscript. It was so with most business men, and substitutes were in demand. The so-called “substitute brokers,” in collusion with officers in the Provost Marshal’s department, got up a “corner” on substitutes, and were charging $1,300 each for them. I avoided the brokers and advertised for a substitute. A very likely looking man, who had an honorable discharge from the regular army, applied. I asked him his price. He offered to go for one hundred dollars. I took him to the Provost Marshal’s office, the old Berthold mansion, northwest corner Pine and Fifth streets. Dr. Julian Bates examined him, giving him a certificate of his fitness. When I applied to have him entered, I was sent from one office to another until my patience was gone. At last I went to the Provost Marshall and told him the trouble, with the remark if I could not enter the man here, I would go to higher authority. That saved the day and an officer was called to enter the man. The next day the papers published details of the affair and substitutes were obtainable at $100 instead of $1,300. My substitute corresponded with me for quite a while, but was either killed or became tired of writing.
At the beginning of the Civil War, my father’s family and I lived on Walnut street, north side, west of Fifth street. On April 10, 1861, your grandfather Matthews and I walked south on Second street to the Post Office, southeast corner Chestnut and Second streets, where we dropped some letters. As we were walking thence to Walnut street, we saw a body of troops marching west on Walnut and a moment later heard a volley of rifles. The shooting killed six men and wounded many. This, I believe, was the first bloodshed in the Civil War. One gentleman running into our vestibule, had his arm shot off. Your cousin, Sue (Mrs. Charles W. Levering), was upstairs, where balls passed through the walls, and she lay flat on the floor for safety. Miss Bertha Malloy, afterward Mrs. George S. Drake, was visiting my sister, Leonora, and was in the parlor when the firing occurred. She ran to the cellar and took refuge in the coal-pit, under the pavement. Your Aunt ran upstairs, and as she was going up she felt something pressing her hoops. Afterward, when we saw a large minie rifle ball hole over the transom, she said she knew where that ball was, and going to the stairs picked it up. Captain Miller and Captain Reilly lived two doors east of us. At the inquest men swore that they saw Captain Reilly standing in his shirt sleeved, shooting at the troops, out of the second story window, and saw the smoke of his gun. The fact was, he was standing in his shirt sleeves in the window but had no gun. The smoke testified to (truthfully as far as the deponent knew) was powdered brick dust where the minie balls struck the wall. I relate this to illustrate Professor Munsterberg’s theory of the psychological effect of excitement. Testimony under such conditions is unreliable.