Duncan..... Have you read Thomas Moonlight's "Reminiscences" that are on file at the Beineke Western Manuscript Collection at the Yale University Library? Moonlight speaks to his frustration with the politicians during the early days of the Civil War by describing the two artillery companies formed in the 3rd Kansas Volunteers under Colonel James Montgomery (in General James H. Lane's Kansas Brigade). He had been placed in charge of one company and Captain Thomas Bickerton, an older man who commanded the one cannon used during the bloody Kansas Territorial days. Moonlight haggled with his superior officers as the proposal was to give two cannons (I think one was a mortar) to Bickerton's company and possibly turn Moonlight's company into infantry. He persuaded Montgomery to give him the smaller cannon. When the entire garrison at Fort Scott turned out to face Missouri State Guard General Sterling Price at Drywood Creek in early September 1861, Moonlight pushed his men forward with the cavalry. Being the only artillery piece on the field his first shot disabled the Confederate battery, severely wounding the captain of the artillery. When the brigade invaded Osceola, Missouri later in the same month, Moonlight placed a shot through the bell-tower of the town church confirming once and for all that Moonlight was an expert artilleryman.

I suspect that Thomas Moonlight, from Captain to General, was sustained by his constant Scottish nature, his self-confidence in his abilities, and his ability to demonstrate the need for his soldierly qualities.

Thanks,
Howard Mann