A week before Col. Mulligan's arrival, on Sept. 9, Gov. Jackson had briefly set up his Capital there, and held a session of that portion of the Legislature which adhered to him. The approach of Col. Pea-body caused a precipitate adjournment, and there was left behind $800,000 in coin, which was buried in the cellar of the college, with the great seal of the State of Missouri.
At dawn on Sept. 12, Gen. Price, riding with his advance, Rains's Division, struck the Union pickets stretching through the cornfields outside of Lexington, but though he brought up all his infantry within reach, and McDonald's, Guibor's, and Clark's batteries, his heads of columns were beaten back everywhere by the stubborn Union soldiers, who had been waiting three days for him, and he wisely decided to withdraw two or three miles and wait for the rest of his forces and ammunition wagons to come up.
Col. Mulligan telegraphed to Col. Jeff C. Davis, at Jefferson City--120 miles away--the fact of Price's advance and his need for help, and Davis sent the news to Fremont, who ordered forward three regiments and two batteries to Davis, and directed him to reinforce Mulligan, which he could do by rail and river. Fremont also sent orders to Pope and Sturgis to help Mulligan out, but there was not much urgency in the orders, and each of his subordinates seems to have taken his own time and way of obeying or not obeying.
Jeff C. Davis had at that time something over 5,000 men at Jefferson City, and subsequent reinforcements raised this number, it was claimed, to 11,000--certainly to 8,000. Davis afterward became a valuable division and corps commander, but he certainly did not show up well in this transaction. He, also, had too much of the "Regular" in him. He complained of a lack of wagons and harness, commissary supplies and ammunition, to enable him to make a forward movement. He had none of the spirit of Lyon and Price, to impress teams and supplies and make means to do what ought to be done.
It was harvest time in that fertile part of Missouri, and his army need not have suffered for food, wherever he went. But all that he did was to send forward a couple of regiments to occupy points and prevent the Secessionists from crossing the river at those places. They had all either crossed or found other unguarded places.