volunteer regiments, and they were rapidly mustered into the service.

While Camp Jackson was being formed, the Union men of St. Louis were
arming and drilling with such secrecy that the Secessionists were
not generally aware of their movements. Before the close of the day
Captain Lyon received permission for mustering volunteers; he placed
more than six hundred men into the service. Regiments were organized
under the name of "Home Guards," and by the 9th of May there were six
thousand armed Union men in St. Louis, who were sworn to uphold the
national honor.

Colonel Francis P. Blair, Jr., commanded the First Regiment of
Missouri Volunteers, and stood faithfully by Captain Lyon in all
those early and dangerous days. The larger portion of the forces then
available in St. Louis was made up of the German element, which was
always thoroughly loyal. This fact caused the Missouri Secessionists
to feel great indignation toward the Germans. They always declared
they would have seized St. Louis and held possession of the larger
portion of the State, had it not been for the earnest loyalty of "the
Dutch."

In the interior of Missouri the Secessionists were generally in the
ascendant. It was the misfortune of the time that the Unionists were
usually passive, while their enemies were active. In certain counties
where the Unionists were four times the number of the Secessionists,
it was often the case that the latter were the ruling party. The
Union people were quiet and law-abiding; the Secessionists active
and unscrupulous. "Peaceably if we can, forcibly if we must," was the
motto of the enemies of the Republic.