The Sharps Rifle Episode in Kansas History 565 Date Furnished By Articles Cost May, 185s New England Emigrant Aid Co. 100 Sharps rifles and a mmunition S3,ooo.oo August, " New England Emigrant Aid Co. 100 " " " " 2,670.00 Abbott 17 " " " 425.00 Sept., Olmsted I howitzer 400.00 Thayer 40 Millbury " 1,000.00 1855 and 1856 Cabot Account ' Sharps rifles, revolvers etc. 1.2,443.63 Feb., 1S56 Thayer and others 23 Sharps rifles 575-00 March, " Beecher " " 51 " 1,275.00 11 11 Thayer " " 4 breech-loading can non 1,330.00 April, New York Kansas Corn- 25 Sharps rifles and a mmunition 643.37 July and Au- National Kansas Com- Arms and ammunition 10,000.00 gust, 1 8 ^6 mittee August, " T. W. Higginson2 Arms 364-38 « Massachusetts Kansas 200 Sharps rifles 4,947.88 Committee , Sept., " State of Iowa 200 muskets (value estimated) 4,000.00 Total, 843,074.26 The above list is far from complete. It probably contains some duplication : but it is under, rather than above, the true amount. Arms were furnished from 'isconsin and also probably by associa- tions in Ohio ; the town of Grinnell, Iowa, raised sufficient funds to purchase fifteen rifles ;" similar reports were announced from other „ centres, but not on evidence sufficiently definite to be here included. The total ainount raised for arms by the various Northern associa- tions must have exceeded fifty thousand dollars. To this amount should then be added the value of arms carried to Kansas by private individuals ; but the determination of such amounts does not come within the limits of this paper. An examination of all the data herein given shows how exten- sively every section of the North was involved in supplying arms to the free-state forces in Kansas. In recent years various persons have been credited with the first honors in this business, but there is only one association that can claim first place — the directors an(i officers of the New England Emigrant Aid Company. These officers under oath denied that the company had ever sent arms to the territory.^ Technically, this was probabl}- true, as none of the funds subscribed for the company's stock was thus expended: but practically the company was directly responsible for arming Kansas emigrants. It was the company's agent, Robinson, who applied to its chief director for arms ; it was the company's executive committee ' From Cabot account-book. ' From personal account-book of Colonel T. W. Higginson. = AV«' York Tribune, July i6, 1856. < Serial 869, 34 Cong., i Sess., House Report 200, pp. 884. 886.
