ALEXANDRIA, ON THE RED RIVER. From a war-time photograph.
THE CONFEDERATE FORT DE RUSSY, ABOUT TEN MILES BELOW ALEXANDRIA.
From a sketch made soon after it was captured.
ville, whilst a detachment under Bee held the Federal advance in check at Monette’s Ferry. General Taylor’s force was, however, too weak to warrant the hope that he could seriously impede the march of Banks’s column. After the latter reached Alexandria, General Taylor transferred a part of his command to the river below Alexandria, and with unparalleled audacity and great ability and success operated on the enemy’s gun-boats and transports.
The construction of the dam, aided by a temporary rise in Red River, enabled Admiral Porter to get his fleet over the falls. Had he delayed but one week longer, our whole infantry force would have been united against him.
Banks evacuated Alexandria on the 12th and 13th of May, the fleet quitted the Red River, and the campaign ended with the occupation of all the country we had held at its beginning, as well as of the lower Teehe. . _ .
Note.—The Confederates remained in almost undisturbed possession of Texas until May 26, 1865, when General Smith surrendered the forces in the Trans-Mississippi Department to General Canby. Meanwhile, in Missouri and Arkansas the war continued throughout the year 1861. Steele retired from Red River toward Little
Rock,followed by Generals Smith andPrice,who attacked him at Jenkins’s Ferry, the crossing of Saline River, April 30. After the battle Steele continued his march northward, and Price assembled a formidable column under Generals John S. Marmaduke, J. F. Fagan, and J. O. Shelby, to make an extensive raid into Missouri. He attempted to capture St. Louis, Jefferson City, and Lexington, successively, but was repulsed at every point. The Department of Missouri was then under Rosecrans, who had assumed command in January, 1861. General Pleasonton commanded the cavalry corps under Rosecrans, and General S. R. Curtis, with the Army of Kansas, took part in the campaign against Price, which extended over the months of September and October.
In General Price’s report occurs the following summary of the campaign:	“I marched 1434 miles, fought
43 battles and skirmishes, captured and paroled over 3000 Federal officers and men, captured 18 pieces of artillery, 3000 stand of small-arms, 16 stand of colors, . . . a great many wagons and teams, large numbers of horses, great quantities of subsistence and ordnance stores, ... and destroyed property to the cost of $10,000,000. ... I lost 10 pieces of artillery, 2 stand of colors, 1000 small-arms, while I do not think I lost 1000 prisoners. ... I brought with me at least 5000 recruits.”
ize at Mansfield and get into condition to advance over the fifty-five miles of wilderness that separated our armies, the enemy had been reinforced and intrenched at Grand Ecore. The enemy held possession of the river until he evacuated Grand Ecore.
Steele was still slowly advancing from the Little Missouri to the Prairie d’Ane. I deemed it imprudent to follow Banks below Grand Ecore with my whole force, and leave Steele so near Shreveport. Even had X been able to throw Banks across the Atehafalaya, the high water of that stream would have arrested my farther progress. An intercepted despatch from General Sherman to General A. J. Smith, directing the immediate return of his force to Vicksburg, removed the last doubt in my mind that Banks would withdraw to Alexandria as rapidly as possible, and it was hoped the falls would detain his fleet there until we could dispose of Steele, when the entire force of the department would be free to operate against him. I confidently hoped, if I could reach Steele with my infantry, to beat him at a distance from his depot, in a poor country, and with my large cavalry force to destroy his army. The prize would have been the Arkansas Valley and the powerful fortifications of Little Rock. Steele’s defeat or retreat would leave me in position promptly to support Taylor’s operations against Banks.
Leaving Taylor with his cavalry, now under Wharton, and the Louisiana division of infantry under Polignac, to follow up Banks’s retreat, and taking the Texas, Arkansas, and Missouri divisions of infantry, I moved against Steele’s column in Arkansas. Steele entered Camden, where he was too strong for assault, but the capture of his train at the battle of Marks’s Mill, on the 25th of April, forced him to evacuate Camden on the 28th, and the battle of Jenkins’s Ferry on the Saline, April 30th, completed his discomfiture. He retreated to Little Rock. Churchill, Parsons, and Walker were at once marched across country to the support of Taylor, but before the junction could be effected Banks had gone.
To return to Taylor, after the enemy left Grand Ecore, General Taylor attacked his rear at Cloutier-
pulsed and drove back Franklin’s advance and opened the battle of Mansfield, which, when Taylor came to the front, with his accustomed boldness and vigor he pushed to a complete success.
Churchill, with his infantry under Tappan and Parsons, joined Taylor that night. The next morning Taylor, advancing in force, found the enemy in position at Pleasant Hill. Our troops attacked with vigor and at first with success, but, exposing their right flank, were finally repulsed and thrown into confusion. The Missouri and Arkansas troops, with a brigade of Walker’s division, were broken and scattered. The enemy recovered cannon which we had captured the day before, and two of our pieces with the dead and wounded were left on the field. Our repulse at Pleasant Hill was so complete, and our command was so disorganized, that had Banks followed up his success vigorously he would have met but feeble opposition to his advance on Shreveport.
Having ridden forward at 2 A. M. on receipt of Taylor’s report of the battle of Mansfield, I joined Taylor after dark on the 8th, a few yards in rear of the battle-field of that day. Polignac’s (previously Mouton’s) division of Louisiana infantry was all that was intact of Taylor’s force. Assuming command, I countermanded the order that had been given for the retreat of Polignac’s division, and was consulting with General Taylor when some stragglers from the battle-field, where our wounded were still lying, brought the intelligence that Banks had precipitately retreated after the battle, converting a victory which he might have claimed into a defeat. Our troops in rear rallied, and the field was next day occupied by us.
Banks continued his retreat to Grand Ecore, where he intrenched himself and remained until the return of his fleet and its safe passage over the bars, made especially difficult this season by the unusual fall of the river.
Our troops were completely paralyzed and disorganized by the repulse at Pleasant Hill, and the cavalry, worn by its long march from Texas, had been constantly engaged for three days, almost without food or forage. Before we could reorgan-
forming a junction above Natchitoches, and if they advanced I hoped, by refusing one of them, to fight the other with my whole force.
It seemed probable at this time that Steele would advance first. When he reached Prairie d’Ane, two routes were open to him: the one to Marshall, crossing the river at Fulton, the other direct to Shreveport. I consequently held Price’s infantry, under Churchill, a few days at Shreveport. Steele’s hesitation and the reports of the advance of Banks’s cavalry caused me, on the 4th of April, to move Churchill to Keachie, a point twenty miles in rear of Mansfield, where the road divides to go to Marshall and Shreveport. He was directed to report to G eneral Taylor. I now visited and conferred with General Taylor. He believed that Banks could not yet advance his infantry across the barren country lying between Natchitoches and Mansfield. I returned to Shreveport and wrote General Taylor not to risk a general engagement, but to select a position in which to give battle should Banks advance, and by a reconnois-sance in force to compel the enemy to display his infantry, and to notify me as soon as he had done so and I would join him in the front.
The reeonnoissance was converted into a decisive engagement near Mansfield, on the 8th of April, with the advance of the enemy (a portion of the Thirteenth Corps and his cavalry), and by the rare intrepidity of Mouton’s division resulted in a complete victory over the forces engaged. The battle of Mansfield was not an intentional violation of my instructions on General Taylor’s part. The Federal cavalry had pushed forward so far in advance of their column as to completely cover its movement, and General Taylor reported to me by despatch at 12 meridian of the day on which the battle took place, that there was no advance made from Grand Ecore except of cavalry. In fact, however, General Franklin with his infantry was on the march, and at once pushed forward to the support of the cavalry. When General Mouton with his division drove in the cavalry, he struck the head of Franklin’s troops, and by a vigorous and able attack without waiting for orders from Taylor, re-