The Quantrill's Raiders were a Confederate partisan unit commanded by William Quantrill during the American Civil War. Formed in Missouri at the start of the war in 1861, the unit consisted mostly of Confederate sympathizers who took up arms spontaneously against their Unionist neighbors and became bushwhackers. After the August 1862 Battle of Pea Ridge, Missouri was free of significantCSA regular troops, but the insurgent violence continued. Quantrill's Raiders attacked Jayhawkers, Missouri state militia, and Union Army troops, as well as attempting to force Unionist civilians from the areas in which the Raiders operated. The Raiders infamously carried out the "Lawrence massacre" in the abolitionist stronghold of Larwnce in August 1863, killing 150 men and boys. After the raid, the gang wintered at Sherman, Texas, but they embarrassed the Confederate command by their often-lawless actions. By early 1864, Quantrill's Raiders had split up into multiple gangs, none being led by Quantrill. William T. Anderson and George M. Todd took charge of their own units, and Quantrill, Anderson, and Todd were killed at the end of the war in 1865.
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