Lawrence

Lawrence was established in 1854 by the Emigrant Aid Company, a New England organization formed to prevent the new Kansas Territory from becoming a slave state. When the first legislature enacted the so-called Bogus Laws with severe penalties for opposing slavery, Lawrence became the center of Free-State resistance. Free-State newspapers there further antagonized proslavery officers. Late in 1855, fifteen hundred proslavery men gathered to attack the town, and Free-State men, including John Brown, came to its defense. Bloodshed was averted by a Peace Treaty, but the next spring a sheriff's posse of several hundred Missourians burned houses, destroyed two newspaper presses, and fired a cannon into the Eldridge Hotel on the pretext that it was an abolition fort. During the Civil War, Lawrence was a haven for runaway slaves and was held responsible for Union raids into Missouri. On August 21, 1863, Quantrill and a band of guerrillas ravaged the town and killed nearly one hundred fifty men. Lawrence is home of the University of Kansas and Haskell Indian Institute.

Lawrence, Kansas · United States