[Illustration: %THE UNITED STATES in 1851 SEVENTY FIVE YEARS AFTER INDEPENDENCE Showing Railroads and Overland Routes] This described the situation exactly. The free-state men of the North and the slave-state men of the South were to rush into Kansas and struggle for its possession. The moment the law opening Kansas for settlement was known in Missouri, numbers of men crossed the Missouri River, entered the territory, held squatters' meetings,[1] drove a few stakes into the ground to represent "squatter claims," went home, and called on the people of the South to hurry into Kansas. Many did so, and began to erect tents and huts on the Missouri River at a place which they called Atchison.[2] [Footnote 1: At one of their meetings it was resolved: "That we will afford protection to no abolitionist as a settler of this country." "That we recognize the institution of slavery as already existing in this territory, and advise stockholders to introduce their property as early as possible."] [Footnote 2: Called after Senator Atchison of Missouri.] But the men of the North had not been idle, and in July a band of free-state men, sent on by the New England Emigrant Aid Society,[1] entered Kansas and founded a town on the Kansas River some miles to the south and west of Atchison. Other emigrants came in a few weeks later, and their collection of tents received the name of Lawrence.[2] [Footnote 1: The New England Emigrant Aid Society was founded in 1854 by Hon. Eli Thayer of Worcester, Mass., in order "to plant a free state in Kansas," by aiding antislavery men to go out there and settle.] [Footnote 2: After Amos A. Lawrence, secretary of the Aid Society. It was a city of tents. Not a building existed. Later came the log cabin, which was a poor affair, as timber was scarce. The sod hut now so common in the Northwest was not thought of. In the early days the "hay tent" was the usual house, and was made by setting up two rows of poles, then bringing their tops together, thatching the roof and sides with hay. The two gable ends (in which were the windows and doors) were of sod.] What was thus taking place at Lawrence happened elsewhere, so that by October, 1854, that part of Kansas along the Missouri River was held by the slave-state men, and the part south of the Kansas River by the free-state men.[1] [Footnote 1: The proslavery towns were Atchison, Leavenworth, Lecompton, Kickapoo. The antislavery towns were Lawrence, Topeka, Manhattan, Waubunsee, Hampden, Ossawatomie.] In November of the same year the struggle began. There was to be an election of a territorial delegate[1] to represent Kansas in Congress, and a day or two before the time set for it the Missourians came over the border in armed bands, took possession of the polls, voted illegally, and elected a proslavery delegate. [Footnote 1: Each territory is allowed to send a delegate to the House of Representatives, where he can speak, but not vote.]