Bluecoat and Pioneer: The Recollections of John Benton Hart, 1864-1868
Missouri Valley Sundays
Starting in 1918, at the urging of his son Harry, John Benton Hart began telling stories of a colorful three-year period of his youth. The native Kansan, a member of the 11th Kansas Cavalry, had clashed with Confederate Gen. Sterling Price’s army in the Battle of Westport and elsewhere in Missouri. He’d crossed the Plains as a bullwhacker, carrying mail between the Indian-besieged forts on the Bozeman Trail. He was a friend of scout Jim Bridger and Chief Blackfoot of the Mountain Crow.
The old cavalryman described events with an almost cinematic vividness as Harry, an aspiring writer, recorded them in a series of family manuscripts now compiled in Bluecoat and Pioneer: The Recollections of John Benton Hart, 1864–1868. Its editor, great-grandson John Hart, discusses the book and its rare, ordinary soldier’s view of historical events.
The old cavalryman described events with an almost cinematic vividness as Harry, an aspiring writer, recorded them in a series of family manuscripts now compiled in Bluecoat and Pioneer: The Recollections of John Benton Hart, 1864–1868. Its editor, great-grandson John Hart, discusses the book and its rare, ordinary soldier’s view of historical events.
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