SARAH JANE EDGERTON SMITH AND THE LAWRENCE MASSACRE
Sarah Jane Edgerton Smith was staying at the Eldridge House Hotel on August 21 1863, in Lawrence, Kansas, with her two young children. Thomas Edgerton Smith was two and a half years old and his sister, Lucy Bates Smith had just celebrated her first birthday. Sarah Jane’s husband, Lt Benton Smith, of the Ninth Kansas Cavalry, had been sent to Santa Fe as an escort for a government official. As Sarah Jane and Benton’s home was several miles out of town, Benton had brought his young family into Lawrence for safety.
The dawn of August 21, 1863, signaled the beginning of the raid by William Clarke Quantrill and his band of 450 Border Ruffian guerrillas. Many of them were teenagers and many were drunk. They all sought revenge for the atrocities that Kansan Jayhawkers had committed in northwestern Missouri. They charged up and down Massachusetts Ave. shooting at every man they saw. When they realized they owned the town they went from door to door searching for men and killing them. It was an attack of proslavery men against abolitionists. About 150 men were massacred.
The men who escaped the massacre had run into a corn field. The guerrillas thought there was a cannon in the field and would not chase them there. We don’t know if Sarah Jane Edgerton had kin or friends in Lawrence she could run to for safety. There was a community of Quakers in Lawrence and surely she sought shelter with them. If we could see what she saw. The violence. The devastation. The raid lasted four hours. She was twenty two years old.
Sarah Jane Edgerton was born in Henry Co, Indiana, on 23 Jul 1841, to Quaker parents, Thomas and Mary Edgerton. She was the fourth of eight children,
Thomas Edgerton was born in Belmont County, Ohio, across the Ohio River from Wheeling, West Virginia to Samuel and Elizabeth Edgerton, both from Haddonfield, Gloucester County, New Jersey. As his father was a Quaker minister, they moved frequently. Samuel Edgerton seems to have bought much property. He died 28 Nov 1836 in Fayette County, Indiana. His wife, Elizabeth, died 30 Apr 1845, across the state line, in West Elkton, Preble County, Ohio. They had nine children.
Sarah Jane’s mother, Mary Taylor, was born a Quaker in Dublin, Ireland. Her parents George and Elizabeth (O’Brien) Taylor emigrated from Dublin to Fayette County, Indiana, when Mary was three. They did not thrive in Indiana and died in 1826 and 1825, leaving six small children. Mary was the oldest at eleven years old. We do not know who raised this family but they would have been in the care of the Quakers.
The Quakers during these years had upheaval amongst their members. Many believed that their religion required action in the face of immorality. Slavery was immoral and they needed to address the problem directly. The Kansas Nebraska Act of Congress allowed the people who settled a territory to determine if slavery was to be tolerated in their state. Thus, Thomas and Mary Taylor found their way to Douglas County, Kansas with their family, to vote for freedom from slavery.
Thomas Edgerton bought a piece of property, outside of Lawrence, Kansas, near the Wakarusa River. His land was patented in 1859, but we don’t know when they arrived. Nearby lived the Samuel Smith family. Samuel Smith, shoemaker, had seven strapping young sons, all ardent abolitionists from Maine. Those old enough, fought in the militia and regular army.
Samuel Smith’s handsome fifth son, Benton, married Sarah Jane Edgerton, 22 Feb 1860, at Clinton, Douglas County, Kansas. Thomas was born the next year and Benton joined the Ninth Kansas Cavalry, Company A, and became a second Lieutenant. After the Civil War, the family traveled around Kansas and Benton worked as a brick maker.
They finally settled in southeastern Kansas, Montgomery and Chautauqua Counties. He made the first brick in the area and built the first brick buildings. He served as Justice of the Peace 1877-1881 and Police Judge in 1881.
Sarah Jane was known as “Aunt Jennie”. In the records of the time, she disappears behind her husband but for one inexplicable instance - the 1900 United States Census. She isn’t in Kansas, She’s in De Luz, San Diego County, California. This census asked many identifying questions. She is a landlady. She has a farm she owns outright, her mother was born in Ireland, her father born in Ohio, her age (Jul 1841, Indiana), how many children she bore, how many alive, married, etc.
At this time there was a rail stop in De Luz. A line was active for a while in late 1800s and early 1900s that connected De Luz with the Atcheson, Topeka and the Santa Fe rail line. This meant she was days within arriving back in south eastern Kansas. Perhaps this was a new retirement home. Evidently the area frequently flooded, the rail line was washed away more than once, and the line was abandoned.
In 1905, she is living with her son, Samuel, in Sedan, Kansas. Benton does not seem to be around. In 1900, he is in Kansas City, Missouri, living with his daughter, Grace and her husband, George Bryan.
From obituaries, she died of a nervous condition after a two month illness. Perhaps she had a stroke. Fortunately, our secrets die with us in the grave.
