Political conflict is not new in America -- or Jackson County, for that matter.
After the Confederate鈥檚 successful attack on Fort Sumter in 1861 touched off the Civil War, tempers in Southern Oregon exploded. Jesse Applegate remarked at the time that much of the state 鈥渟tinks with an element foul and corrupt, bordering鈥n actual treason.鈥�
The Oregonian reported that 鈥溾�� in the forks of the Umpqua, down Cow Creek and along Bear Creek in Jackson County鈥� pro-slavery and secessionist attitudes were 鈥渄isgustingly common.鈥�
A flag raising in the Democrat stronghold of Jacksonville on the Fourth of July met with a 鈥渄runken rabble of rebel sympathizers鈥� who wanted to tear down the flag.
When pro-Union Republicans bought the pro-Confederacy Jacksonville Sentinel newspaper in May 1861, a gunfight broke out. Sentinel newspaperman James O鈥橫eara, an Irish immigrant and Confederate supporter, threatened the newspaper鈥檚 new Republican owner, James Denlinger with a gun. Shots were fired, but no one was injured.
When news arrived by the Pony Express mail service in October that Union Capt. James Lingenfelter had been killed while leading a scouting party near Fort Monroe in Virginia, Union sympathies increased the tension.
Source: Lalande, J. (Spring, 1999). 'Dixie' of the Pacific Northwest: Southern Oregon鈥檚 Civil War. Oregon Historical Quarterly, 100 (1), 32.
