EARLY STRUGGLES OF THE KANSAS FREE-STATE PIONEERS
Below is an excerpt from William G. Cutler's History of kansas, Douglas county, in which joshua Pike's participation in breaking Dr. John Doy out of the St. Joseph jail is detailed.
In January, 1859,
Dr. John Doy, his son Charles, and Mr. Clough, all of Lawrence, started from that city to
conduct thirteen negroes by way of the Underground Railroad, through Nebraska, and taken
refuge in Lawrence. The party was intercepted on the north bank of the Kaw, a few miles
from Lawrence, and fifty miles from the eastern boundary of the Territory, by a treaty of
Missourians and Pro-slavery Kansans and taken across the Missouri to St. Joseph, where,
after a pretended examination before a Justice of the Peace, in default of $5,000 bail,
Doy and his son were committed to prison in the Platte County Jail on a charge of stealing
negroes from Missouri- a crime punishable with death, according to the statues of that
State. On Doy's first trial, the jury failed to agree; on the second trial, which took
place at St. Joseph, June, 1859, the jury brought in verdict of guilty and Doy and his son
were sentenced to the penitentiary for five years. Gov. Shannon and Gen A. C. Davis, of
Kansas Territory, and Judge Spratt, of Platte County, Mo, had been employed as prisoners'
counsel, and in accordance with a motion made by the defense, judgment in the case was
arrested sixty days, and the prisoners remanded to the St. Joseph jail, from whence
Charles Doy effected his escape. Doy's friends in Lawrence saw that the time had now
arrived for them to attempt his rescue-before he should be removed from the jail at St.
Joseph. A party for that purpose was accordingly formed, led by Maj. James B. Abbott, now
of DeSoto, Johnson Co., Kan., and consisting, besides himself, of Silas Soule, Joshua
A. Pike, S. J. Willis, Joseph Gardner, John E. Steward, Thomas Simmons, Charles
Doy, Lenox and George W. Hays. The party organized at Lawrence, and then dispersed to meet
and arrange their plan of operations at Elwood, opposite St. Joseph. The party crossed the
Missouri during the night of Saturday, July 23, a little below the St. Joseph ferry, and
after remaining some little time in the city, under assumed characters, familiarizing
themselves with the streets and localities, and establishing communication with the
prisoner, they finally made their way to the jail on a dark night, and in the midst of a
driving storm, and on pretense of securing a horse thief whom they had caught, and who
could not well be examined before morning, induced the jailer to give them access to the
interior of the building. As soon as they had accomplished this purpose, they made their
way to the cell of Dr. Doy, and prevailed upon the jailer, by the unanswerable argument of
a loaded revolver at his heart, to offer no resistance to the consummation of their
design. The prisoner was released, and the party proceeded, unmolested to the street, and
by mingling with the crowds just leaving the theaters, and aided by the alarm and
confusion occasioned by a fire alarm, succeeded in gaining the opposite shore in safety,
where they were met by friends and conducted to Lawrence.
Please click here to Read an Account of Dr. Doy's Rescue and see a photo of the Immortal 10. In the photo Joshua (J A) Pike is standing, second from the right.
Click here to Read Dr. Doy's Own Narrative published for the author in 1860 and titled, "A plain, Unvarnished Tale".
Quantrill's Raid & Statement of Captain Joshua A. Pike who was among the first on the trail of quantrill's raiders as he trailed the band into missouri.
