The Hunter-Hagler letters provides a rare look at how women endured the Civil War in the Ozarks. The letters were written by Elizabeth Hunter and her daughters, Priscilla A. Hunter and Charlotte Elizabeth (Hunter) Hagler. The Hunters corresponded with Margaret Hunter Newberry, who had married and left the family farm. The letters describe relatively mundane matters such as how the Hunter family survived harsh winters and sold goods at market, but also provide graphic details of murder, theft and destruction caused by bushwhackers in Jasper and Lawrence counties. Perpetual violence caused the Hunter family to leave their beloved homestead and flee to Illinois in late 1864. Elizabeth often wrote her daughter, and through these letters related the brutal conditions in which the family endured.
Well Mag… we had hard times here before you left but it is ten times as hard now ther is men being killed every little while, there was four or five men killed over on Spring river about a week ago. The bushwhackers burnt Carthage a few days ago the Malitia was called off from there we heard that there was five hundred rebels at Carthage last friday … the bushwhackers came though this neighborhood last week they robed old Drawin badly then came to Mrs Clarks and cut up at a trrible rate made her give them what money She had and took a good many things. … they went to Loves and took some Things from him he said and then went to Mrs Seymores and robed her gain they are death on the widow woman
