The evolution of Harry S. Truman (Part 1)
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Sponsored by a history buff and admirer of President Truman.
It intrigues me when you look at accomplished peoples lives how impactful their early years were on who they became.
Harry S. Truman, born in 1894, revered his grandparents, basically growing up on his mother and grandmother's knee.
Before radio, storytelling and reading were the main source of knowledge. Oh boy, the tales he heard.
All four of Truman’s grandparents were born in Kentucky, very southern in sentiment. They migrated to Jackson County, Missouri, in the 1840’s and brought their slaves with them.
One of Truman's grandparents received slaves as a wedding present.
His grandmother’s “life changing” story took place in 1861 when her husband was away. Jim Lane with his scraggly band of Jayhawks rode onto the Truman farm and demanded breakfast.
Lane’s men ate, killed her chickens and slaughtered on site all the family’s livestock including over 400 hogs. Then ransacked the house for valuables, carting off furniture, the family silver, then set the barns on fire.
These stories of terror were ingrained into Harry’s head leaving a disdain for not only the “Red Legs,” but Lincoln and his policies.
Quantrill and his Missouri bushwhackers were heroes to those who suffered under Lane.
Along with Truman inheriting his grandmother’s view on Jayhawkers, he absorbed a white man’s superior attitude towards Blacks. It was the Southern way.
After Quantrill’s guerrillas slaughtered 150 men in reprisal for years of Jayhawk tyranny, Grandma Truman rejoiced, “They finally got what was coming to them.”
Later, Harry Truman would be quoted as defending bushwhackers, “But Quantrill and his men were no more bandits than the men on the other side. I’ve been to reunions of Quantrill’s men two or three times. All they were trying to do was protect the property on the Missouri side of the line.”
After Quantrill’s Lawrence raid, the unforgivable Order # 11 was issued. Union officers in blue uniforms demanded everyone in Jackson County and other counties along the Kansas border, known to be a safe haven for Missouri raiders, off their own land.
The Trumans, once prosperous and proud along with their neighbors, now followed an oxen cart holding all their earthly belongings on a dusty long march to a Federal fort. Their farmsteads and all structures in the now vacated rural counties were then torched. Walking alongside their ox on that dismal dusty trail was Truman’s mother Martha. She was 11 years old.
In later years, when Harry told his mother he was heading to Lawrence to give a speech, she said, “Good, see if they're done with our silver!” Martha later wrote, “I thought it was a good thing Lincoln got shot.” That was the staunch southern reckoning held by many who suffered on the Missouri – Kansas border.
These stories are what future President Truman was raised on, where slavery, white supremacy, independence and oppression was a part of their understanding of life in the 1860s.
Truman, like Lincoln, changed his attitudes towards Blacks, but it took politics and life’s revelations to do so.
In 1911, at the age of 27, Truman was still inflicted and unrepentant with the white supremacy attitude when he wrote a letter to his future wife filled with racial slurs.
Wow, talk about being politically incorrect, and this came from a person who went on to champion Civil Rights after being elected with the help of the Black vote for President of the United States. It’s comments like those that tell you how much a thinking person in life can live, learn and change.
In 1905, Truman joined the National Guard, wanting to show off his new uniform to his grandmother. Entering her house, she was shocked. “Harry, I haven’t let a blue uniform into this house since 1863, never come back here again wearing that!”
In the same vein, when Harry’s mother visited the White House four decades later, she was told the only unoccupied bed in the place was in the Lincoln bedroom. She recoiled, “Tell Harry if he tries to put me in Lincoln's bed I’ll sleep on the floor!”
Truman learned bigotry and superiority as a child. When life exposed him to the world he gained a greater obedience to something else than the South’s “Lost Cause,” it was to our nation and the constitution.
While still young, now being from Independence, Missouri, Truman realized the focus of the nation was also on the development of the West. He had played on the first railroad track laid in the county.
Learning about western migration, he saw the parallels about the post-reconstruction migration the country was experiencing, freed Blacks and their descendants moving north for jobs. It was a massive shift in population and industry that would drive our country into better economic but still oppressive times for Blacks.
There were national struggles coming off of reconstruction that needed to be stopped. From 1885 to 1940, an average of one lynching a week took place in the United States. The KKK ruled politics and policing in much of the South. Jim Crow’s segregationist laws were repressive and non-unifying to say the least.
All challenges for Truman who experienced but now realizing, again like Lincoln, there were greater issues to consider and action in the civil rights arena needed to be addressed on a national level. The future leader of the country would have to face these societal faults politically in his own way but first, he had to change himself.
Next, we’ll cover what altered Truman’s views as he leaves home to become a leader of men joining the army and fighting in World War I.
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Source Materials: American Heritage, The Conversation of Harry Truman and the Truman Presidential Library.
Bob Ford's History will run in each edition of the Weekender, Midweek and Corner Post. You can find more of Bob’s work on his website bobfordshistory.com and videos on YouTube and TikTok. He can be reached at robertmford@aol.com
