Quantrill's FlagJust after midnight on September 7, 1862, the town of Olathe, Kansas was overrun by Confederate guerrillas under the leadership of William Quantrill.In the hours before dawn, the raiders killed several men and looted businesses and private homes. 
This flag apparently was carried by one of the raiders and dropped in the public square. It was found there after the raid by Olathe resident Jonathan Millikan. His son, Orion, donated the flag to the Kansas Historical Society in 1930. The flag's existence raises many questions. Quantrill is not known to have carried any sort of flag; this is supported by some of his men in post-war accounts. Claims that he carried a black flag with the misspelled name "Quantrell" in red appear to have originated in popular writings of the 1880s and have no basis in fact. The size of the flag pictured above is another matter for concern. It measures just seven by thirteen inches. One possible reason for the flag's small size is offered in Alan Sumrall's Battle Flags of Texans in the Confederacy, which cites a flag from the First Texas Infantry Regiment at approximately the same dimensions. It is referred to as a "streamer" flag, placed on the staff above the regimental flag. But if Quantrill carried no large flag, a companion "streamer" flag would not seem to be justified. Another explanation may be found in the use of "Bible" flags by both northern and southern families. These flags were placed in the large family Bibles of the time to mark passages of scripture. Perhaps one of the raiders carried the flag as a keepsake, only to lose it in the Olathe public square. The Olathe raid was just one of many incidents that occurred along the Kansas-Missouri border from 1854 to 1865. The "Bleeding Kansas" period erupted over the debate on whether the territory should be admitted to the Union as a free or slave state. Raids by both sides would continue after both Kansas achieved statehood and the Civil War broke out in 1861, resulting in the plundering of communities and the murder of many citizens. Kansans engaged in these activities included Charles "Doc" Jennison, whose "Jayhawkers" of the Seventh Kansas Cavalry included plundering as part of their duties as Federal soldiers, often without regard as to citizens' Northern or Southern leanings. U.S. Senator James Henry Lane led a brigade against Osceola, Missouri in September, 1861, looting and burning the town of 3,000. The best known guerrilla on the Missouri side (and perhaps of the entire war) was William Clarke Quantrill. Born at Canal Dover, Ohio in 1837, Quantrill had come to Kansas in 1857 to farm. This effort failed and he went west to the Rockies to seek adventure. Back in Kansas just before the outbreak of the war, he cast his lot with the south and joined the Missouri Confederate troops led by Sterling Price. Dissatisfied with a lack of aggressiveness after the battle of Lexington, Missouri in September, 1861, he left the army to take a more active role--bringing guerrilla warfare to Kansas. Quantrill first raided Aubry, Kansas in March, 1862, with thirty men in his command. Raids continued throughout the year, including the one at Olathe. But Quantrill's most famous--or infamous--successes came the following year. At dawn on August 21, 1863, he led over three hundred men in a raid against the city of Lawrence, Kansas. When they were done, over 150 men were dead and over 200 homes and businesses destroyed. This illustration of the raid (pictured) appeared in Harper's Weekly, a popular 19th-century magazine. 
In early October Quantrill struck at Baxter Springs, Kansas, first attacking a fortification, then a column which included Major General James G. Blunt, eight wagons, a brass band, and 100 soldiers as an escort. Blunt escaped, but 90 soldiers were killed. Quantrill left Kansas and headed east in 1864. On May 10, 1865, one month after Lee's surrender at Appomattox, Virginia, he was mortally wounded in a skirmish with Union soldiers in Kentucky. William Quantrill died at Louisville on June 6, a month short of his twenty-eighth birthday. Save the Flags!The Society's collections include 80 more flags from the Civil and Spanish-American wars. The Society currently is raising funds for flag conservation and preservation through the Save the Flags! project. Interested in other Civil War flags in the collections of the Kansas Museum of History? Check out these links:
The Museum Store sells the following books on William Quantrill and the Border War:
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