Northwest historian tells story of the 'Honey War'

An article by Dr. Thomas Spencer, associate professor of history and director of the Northwest Honors Program, appears in the October 2008 issue of the “Missouri Historical Review,” the official journal of the State Historical Society of Missouri.

“‘Demand Nothing but what is Strictly Right and Submit to Nothing that is Wrong’: Governor Lilburn Boggs, Governor Robert Lucas, and the Honey War of 1839’” describes events surrounding a border dispute that nearly sparked armed conflict between militias from the state of Missouri and what was then the Territory of Iowa.

According to Spencer, the seeds of the crisis were sown in flawed surveys conducted following passage of the Missouri Enabling Act of 1820, the law that authorized Missouri to form a government and become a state.

The Honey War gets its name from an incident supposed to have happened in the fall of 1839, when an unknown Missourian is said to have cut down “bee trees,” prized for their honey and wax, in the disputed region claimed by both the Iowa Territory and the state of Missouri.

When tensions were at their highest, hundreds of armed men from both sides faced each other in camps only a few miles apart. Fortunately, cooler heads among local Missouri officials and the Iowa territorial legislature prevailed, and bloodshed was avoided.

Spencer joined the Northwest faculty in 1997 after earning a Ph.D. in history at Indiana University. He teaches courses in United States history, U.S. foreign relations and the history of the U.S. Constitution.

Return to Previous Page

Northwest Missouri State University

Northwest historian tells story of the 'Honey War'