Information Sheet

 

 

R         Skaggs, Henry Ellison, 1831-1899.

247                  Papers, 1862-1895.

                                    Three folders.

 

 

 

These are a diary and papers, 1862-1865, of Henry Ellison Skaggs, pertaining to his service in the 1st Missouri Cavalry in Missouri and Arkansas during the Civil War.  Included are a di­ary, two letters from Little Rock, Arkansas, a photograph of Skaggs in uniform, and a group of pray­ers.  There are also correspondence concerning his military pension, 1893-1895, and genea­logi­cal data.

 

Henry Ellison Skaggs was born on 28 March 1831 in Weakley County, Tennessee.  By 1854 he had located in Camden County, Missouri, where he married Narcissa George.  They moved to Cooke County, Texas, about 1859.  As a Union man during the Civil War, Skaggs was prompted by the threat of Confederate conscription to leave his family in Texas in 1862.  Inter­cepted by Confeder­ate authorities in Indian Territory and faced with enrollment in the southern army, Skaggs fled to safety inside Union lines at Mount Vernon, Missouri.  He continued to Springfield, where he enlisted in Co. C, 1st Missouri Cavalry, on 13 September 1862.  He served for the duration of the war, mustering out at Little Rock, Arkansas, on 14 June 1865.  Skaggs re­turned to his home in Cooke County, Texas, where he lived until his death in 1899.

 

Skaggs kept a diary in a small pocket notebook during most of his enlistment in the 1st Mis­souri Cavalry.  The diary was submitted as additional evidence of military service in 1895 when Skaggs petitioned the government for an increase in his pension.  The diary con­tains a par­tial in­dex, notes on financial matters, a register of correspondence, and chronologi­cal entries de­tailing service in Missouri and Arkansas, 24 October 1862—10 June 1864.  During this period, the regi­ment operated with the Army of the Frontier in southwestern Missouri and northwestern Arkan­sas, was part of Davidson’s Cavalry Division in the campaign to capture Little Rock, and served in the cavalry of the Army of Arkansas.  The diary entries are brief, occasionally summa­rizing a period of several days.  They continue through 10 June 1864, when Skaggs was on fur­lough in Miller County, Missouri.  The last page is fragmentary.  It bears the ad­dress of a St. Louis firm which sold bullet-proof vests to soldiers.

 

A group of five prayers, presumably written by Henry E. Skaggs, accompanies the di­ary.  They are written on small notebook pages similar to those of the diary.  They include prayers for morning and evening use, for wounded and dying soldiers, and for those going into battle.  Tran­scripts of the diary and prayers have been prepared by Luther R. Fruit, a descen­dant of Henry E. Skaggs.  An introduction to the typescript includes biographical information on Skaggs and the in­dividuals mentioned in his diary.  Also available is a map showing the area of operations and the itinerary of the 1st Missouri Cavalry.

 

Among the miscellaneous papers are copies of pension records at the National Ar­chives.  They include the correspondence and a deposition regarding a request for an increase in pension.  The deposition includes a brief narrative of Skaggs’s Civil War service, in which he recounted the details of his flight from Texas to Missouri, and his service in the cavalry.  He noted the hardships endured by his family during his absence, and detailed his own physical complaints, which he at­tributed to his wartime service.

 

 

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