Lecompton - Bleeding Kansas Program Series
“Suffer and Be Strong”, The Wakarusa War of 1855 
This program will be presented by Eric Smallwood, Site Administrator of Constitution Hall State Historic Site. Five years before South Carolina seceded from the Union, military units of northern and southern Americans faced off against one another on the field of battle over the political issue of slavery for the first time, in the opening act of what we now call “Bleeding Kansas”. Though it was nearly bloodless, the “Wakarusa War”, as it would come to be known, was a dark omen of things to come for the next decade of American history and was where many of the leading figures of Bleeding Kansas began to gain their fame.
