Palmyra Massacre

The Palmyra massacre is an incident that took place in Palmyra, Missouri on October 18, 1862, during the American Civil War, when ten Confederate prisoners of war were executed in reprisal for the abduction of a local Union supporter, Andrew Alsman. The officer who ordered the execution, Colonel John McNeil, was later known as the "Butcher of Palmyra". He left the army in 1865, after receiving the customary promotion to brevet rank of Major General of Volunteers in recognition of his faithful service to the Union.

Andrew Alsman was a carpenter, sixty years old, and a Union patriot in a largely pro-Confederate area. A Union source describes him as a highly respected and conscientious man who did his duty by leading Union forces to arrest local Confederate sympathizers. Palmyra City's website describes him as "a Union sympathizer who had the reputation of betraying neighbors sympathetic to the Confederacy".

Alsman was taken prisoner by Colonel Porter's forces when Porter raided Palmyra on 12 September 1862. After several skirmishes, Porter decided that Alsman was a liability and set him free. Alsman was hesitant to leave the camp as there were several men who had family members that Alsman had informed on, so Porter allowed him to choose a detail that would see him safely to the city limits of Palmyra or to the nearest Union lines.

Alsman departed camp and was never seen again. Speculation is that he was taken into the woods in northern Marion County or southern Lewis County and shot.

On October 8, Provost Marshal William R. Strachan, acting for Colonel McNeil, published a notice in the local Union newspaper, the Palmyra Courier (see below) to Confederate Colonel Joseph C. Porter. McNeil threatened that unless Alsman was returned within ten days, ten of Porter's men held as prisoners in Palmyra and Hannibal would be executed.

Porter may never even have seen the notice, and most writers agree that Alsman had already been the victim of personal enemies among Porter's men. The Confederate colonel was therefore powerless to return him. Nevertheless, the presumed murder of Alsman was viewed as part of a pattern of extralegal behavior regarded by Porter's enemies as typical of his command, tolerated if not encouraged by the Rebel leader.

On the evening of 17 October ten prisoners were selected (five from the jail in Hannibal, five from the jail in Palmyra). None of them had any connection with the disappearance of Alsman; Willis Baker was in the Palmyra jail because his sons were said to be riding with Colonel Porter. He was also reported to have killed a Union neighbor in the previous year. All ten were executed on 18 October by a firing squad of thirty soldiers from the Second Missouri State Militia.

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