<P> Many Unionists were executed . Conscription into the Confederate Army was unacceptable to many Unionists and some attempted to flee from Texas . Capt . James Duff, Confederate provost marshal for the Hill Country, executed two Unionists, prompting flight . In August 1862, Confederate soldiers under Lt. Colin D. McRae tracked down a band of German Texans headed out of state and attacked their camp in a bend of the Nueces River . After a pitched battle that resulted in the deaths of two Confederates and the wounding of McRae and eighteen of his men, the Unionists were routed . Approximately 19 Unionists were killed in the fighting . After the battle 9 to 11 of the wounded Unionists were murdered with shots to the head in what became known as the Nueces massacre . Another nine Unionists were pursued and executed in the following weeks . Future Republican congressman Edward Degener was the father of two men who were murdered in the massacre . The German population around Austin County, led by Paul Machemehl, was successful in reaching Mexico . </P> <P> In October 1862, approximately 150 settlers in and around Cooke County on the Red River were arrested by the 11th Texas Cavalry led by Colonel William C. Young on the orders of Colonel James Bourland, Confederate Provost Marshal for northern Texas . A court was convened in Gainesville to try them for allegedly plotting to seize the arsenals at Sherman and Gainesville and to kill their Confederate neighbors, seize their property, and to cooperate with Union army forces poised to invade northern Texas from Arkansas and / or Indian Territory . Several of the settlers were hanged in what is now downtown Gainesville during the first week of October . Nineteen additional men were found guilty and hanged before the end of the month . A total of about forty Unionists were hanged in Gainesville, two were shot while trying to escape, and two more were hanged elsewhere after being turned over to a military tribunal . Under the primitive conditions on the Texas frontier during the Civil War, evidence against the accused was questionable, and the legal proceedings were highly imperfect . A granite monument in a small park marks the spot where the hangings took place . </P> <P> The Confederacy's conscription act proved controversial, not only in Texas but all across the South . Despite the referendum result, some opponents argued that the war was being fought by poor people on behalf of a few wealthy slave owners . The Act exempted from the draft men who owned fifteen or more slaves . Draft resistance was widespread especially among Texans of German or Mexican descent; many of the latter went to Mexico . Potential draftees went into hiding, Confederate officials hunted them down, and many were shot or captured and forced into the army . </P> <P> Sam Houston was the premier Southern Unionist in Texas . While he argued for slave property rights and deplored the election of the Lincoln Administration, he considered secession unconstitutional and thought secession at that moment in time was a "rash action" that was certain to lead to a conflict favoring the industrial and populated North . He predicted: "Let me tell you what is coming . After the sacrifice of countless millions of treasure and hundreds of thousands of lives, you may win Southern independence if God be not against you, but I doubt it . I tell you that, while I believe with you in the doctrine of states rights, the North is determined to preserve this Union . They are not a fiery, impulsive people as you are, for they live in colder climates . But when they begin to move in a given direction, they move with the steady momentum and perseverance of a mighty avalanche; and what I fear is, they will overwhelm the South ." </P>

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