<P> Missouri abolished slavery during the war in January 1865 . </P> <P> Regular Confederate troops staged several large - scale raids into Missouri, but most of the fighting in the state for the next three years consisted of guerrilla warfare . The guerrillas were primarily Southern partisans, including William Quantrill, Frank and Jesse James, the Younger brothers, and William T. Anderson, and many personal feuds were played out in the violence . Small - unit tactics pioneered by the Missouri Partisan Rangers were used in occupied portions of the Confederacy during the Civil War . </P> <P> The James' brothers outlawry after the war has been seen as a continuation of guerrilla warfare . Stiles (2002) argues that Jesse James was an intensely political, postwar neo-Confederate terrorist, rather than a social bandit or a plain bank robber with a hair - trigger temper . </P> <P> The Union response was to suppress the guerrillas . It achieved that in western Missouri, as Brigadier General Thomas Ewing issued General Order No. 11 on 25 August 1863 in response to Quantrill's raid on Lawrence, Kansas . The order forced the total evacuation of four counties that fall within the area of modern - day Kansas City, Missouri . These had been centers of local support for the guerrillas . Lincoln approved Ewing's plan beforehand . About 20,000 civilians (chiefly women, children and old men) had to leave their homes . Many never returned, and the counties were economically devastated for years . </P>

The four border states during the civil war included maryland missouri kentucky and