But the lynx-eyed, alert Lyon thwarted that scheme. When he left the Planters’ Hotel in the evening of June 11th, he at once telegraphed the national War Department for five thousand additional stand of arms, and for authority to enlist more troops in the State.[41] What he asked was granted without hesitation or delay. The next day, with characteristic energy, he prepared his small army for an offensive campaign. A part of it, on the 13th, he ordered to Springfield, in southwest Missouri, to cut off the retreat of Price, whom he expected to drive in that direction. Knowing that he could not use the Pacific Railroad, since its main bridges had been destroyed, on the same day, with the rest of his army, he moved up the Missouri by steamboat. On the 15th, he quietly took possession of Jefferson City, and garrisoned it. On Sunday, the 16th, he was steaming on toward Boonville. On Monday, a few miles south of that city, he met and easily dispersed the rebel army, which, having been hastily gathered, was raw, undisciplined, and poorly armed. The collision between these hostile forces did not, in the sacrifice of life, reach the dignity of a battle. Only two or three on each side were killed and a few wounded. The Union army, however, took a goodly company of prisoners, together with considerable war material and camp equipage; and this comparatively bloodless conflict secured the end that from the beginning Lyon had clearly in view. By taking Camp Jackson in May, he had suppressed the open disloyalty of St. Louis and the counties adjacent to it, assuring their support of the Union; by dispersing Price’s gathering host at Boonville he cleared the Missouri River of all formidable hostile forces; isolated the counties north of the river, which were rich, populous, and largely disloyal; drove the fleeing Governor with his general and army panic-stricken into the extreme southwest of the State; and sent General Price, with several members of his staff, on a flying expedition into northwestern Arkansas, to urge General McCulloch of the Confederate army to invade Missouri and deliver him and his retreating troops from utter disaster. Lyon and his army were received with exultant gladness by the many loyal citizens of Boonville, and on the 18th he issued a proclamation, assuring all that were peaceful and law-abiding of his protection. He also paroled the prisoners that he had taken, putting them under oath not again to take up arms against the United States.