08/18/2008

By TERRY ROMBECK  / Associated Press

"You'll want to know about Lawrence, of course. Everybody does. If they don't ask outright, they will make some oblique reference in hopes of sparking a conversation or perhaps an argument."

These are the opening lines of "I, Quantrill," a novel told through the eyes of William Clarke Quantrill, a Confederate guerrilla warrior best known for his 1863 attack on Lawrence.

The fictionalized story, as told by Emporia author Max McCoy, is an attempt to remind readers that Quantrill was, in fact, a man and not the demon some have made him out to be.

"The challenge was how do you tell the story of this monster and make him sympathetic," said McCoy, who published the book earlier this summer.

Given his somewhat sympathetic views toward Quantrill, McCoy expects there might be some vigorous debate in Lawrence.

"Sometimes I run into that when I do book signings," he said. "The Civil War has never really died in this area you see that every time there are Kansas and Missouri sports, with that rivalry. People have long memories."

McCoy grew up in Baxter Springs in southeastern Kansas, the site of another 1863 massacre by Quantrill.

"Kids are fascinated by monsters," McCoy said. "Quantrill was a monster."

A former journalist, McCoy now teaches English at Emporia State University. He's wondered for years how to write a novel narrated by Quantrill.

Finally, after months of reading books on Quantrill and letters and poems written by him, McCoy was able to pen "I, Quantrill."

The book is told by Quantrill on his deathbed he died in 1865 in Kentucky after being shot by Union supporters.

McCoy said Quantrill was a bad man no doubt about it. But he said people and especially those in Kansas forget that he had a human side.

For instance, McCoy thinks Quantrill's strained relationship with his mother helped lead him to his life of violence. And he said claims in earlier books, especially "Quantrill and the Border Wars" by William Connelley, that Quantrill was a coward certainly aren't true in fact, McCoy said there are several accounts of his bravery in battle.

"I think he could have gone either way," McCoy said. "History is told by the winners, but I'm not trying to justify what he did. I'm just making him human."

Even in the novel, though, Quantrill is an unreliable narrator, sometimes exaggerating and lying to make his case.

Though the book opens with the guerrilla talking about his sacking of Lawrence, it's hardly the focus of the 244 pages.

Still viewed as a hero among some Confederate sympathizers, Quantrill is sometimes compared with John Brown, an abolitionist leader who also used violence to help his cause.

Quantrill and his band of bushwhackers skirmished often with pro-Union forces and militias, but his legacy remains most associated with the burning of Lawrence.

"The Lawrence raid certainly eclipsed anything else that he did, and it is the event that made him a household name," McCoy said. "I think the attention is certainly justified. I don't think it was the kind of notoriety that he would have sought."

Jonathan Earle, a Civil War historian at the University of Kansas, said he hasn't read "I, Quantrill." But he's intrigued.

"It's a great topic for this type of a psychological novel," Earle said.

While Earle thinks Quantrill's life probably is more complicated than many in Lawrence have been led to believe, he said one thing is for sure: Quantrill's overall reputation is "unrehabilitatable."

"William Clarke Quantrill is not a savory character," Earle said. "Not only was he on the wrong side the side that wanted to preserve slavery he turned up the violence a notch. ... But I'm sure it's a complicated story. He thought he was doing the right thing, as most people do."

McCoy's other books include thrillers and westerns, and his novel "Hellfire Canyon" won a Spur Award, a top honor for western writing.

He knows some people here still feel passionately about the Kansas-Missouri Border War history.

"I get caught up a little in that, too," he said. "It's fun to talk to people on the border because they know the history."

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Information from: Lawrence Journal-World, http://www.ljworld.com