September 28, 1862 (Sunday): "Bad and Dangerous Men"

General John W. Davidson

SAINT LOUIS DISTRICT, September 28, 1862.
Colonel HARDING, Pilot Knob:
Colonel PECKHAM, Cape Girardeau:
    You will arrest all persons in the vicinity of your posts and commands who come properly under the designation of "bad and dangerous men," and send them up here under guard to be imprisoned during the war. Publish an order stating the same and circulate it around your counties. Under the President's proclamation any one advising against enlistments or speaking against the Government comes under the above category.


DAVIDSON,
Brigadier-General.

Official Records, Series II., Vol. 4, Part 1, Page 571.

It is seldom noted that Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on the 22nd of September and on the 24th issued notice of a suspension of the writ of habeas corpus.  It allowed that "..all Rebels and Insurgents, their aiders and abettors within the United States, and all persons discouraging volunteer enlistments, resisting militia drafts, or guilty of any disloyal practice, affording aid and comfort to Rebels against the authority of the United States, shall be subject to martial law and liable to trial and punishment by Courts Martial or Military Commission:"

It did not take long for hard line elements to seize on the opportunity to imprison "bad and dangerous men".  Davidson is Brigadier-General John Wynn Davidson, just arrived in the West from the Army of the Potomac.  A career Army officer, he was a native Virginian who remained loyal to the Union.  Davidson remained in service after the war, dying in 1881 while on an inspection tour.