CHAPTER XXVII. THE CROSSING OF CANE RIVER.
Banks broke camp at Grand Ecore at five o'clock in the afternoon of the 21st of April and turned over the direction and control of the march to Franklin.
The cavalry corps, now commanded by Arnold, was separated by brigades. Gooding took the advance; Crebs, who had succeeded to Robinson's command, rode with Birge; E. J. Davis, with Dudley's brigade, covered the right flank; and Lucas, reporting to A. J. Smith, formed the rear-guard.
Birge led the main column with a temporary division formed of the 13th Connecticut and the 1st Louisiana of his own brigade under Fiske, the 38th Massachusetts and the 128th New York of Sharpe's brigade under James Smith, and Fessenden's brigade of Emory's division. Next were the trains, in the same order as the troops. Emory followed with the brigades of Beal and McMillan and the artillery reserve under Closson. Then came Cameron, and last A. J. Smith, in the order of Kilby Smith and Mower.
Crossing Cane River about two miles below Grand Ecore, the line of march traversed the length of the long island formed by the two branches of the Red River, and recrossed the right arm at Monett's Ferry. For the whole distance the army was once more separated from the fleet.
It was half-past one on the morning of the 22d before the last of the wagons had effected the first crossing of Cane River. By three o'clock Emory was on the south bank, and A. J. Smith at five.
As early as the 14th of April, at Mansfield, Kirby Smith had withdrawn Churchill and Walker from Taylor and sent them to aid in driving Steele back into Arkansas. This left Taylor only the infantry of Polignac, reduced to 2,000 muskets, and the reorganized cavalry corps under Wharton, comprising the divisions of Bee, Major, and William Steele. With this handful, Taylor undertook to hurry Banks by blocking his communications and beating up his out-posts; but just at that moment Banks moved and thus, by the merest chance, brought Bee and Major, with four brigades and four batteries, directly across his path, on the high ground at Monett's bluff, commanding the ford and the ferry. At three o'clock in the afternoon of the 22d, Wharton with Steele's division, supported by Polignac, engaged Lucas sharply, compelling A. J. Smith to deploy and the rest of the column to halt for an hour; and thus began a series of almost continuous skirmishes that lasted nearly to Alexandria, yet without material result.
At seven o'clock in the evening of the 22d of April, Birge halted for the night two miles beyond Cloutierville. Under orders inspired by the urgency, he had been pushing on at all speed to seize the crossing; in spite of the heat and the dust, he had led the column at the furious pace of thirty-eight miles, perhaps forty, in twenty-six hours; but Gooding had already found the Confederates in strong possession, and now it seemed clear that the passage must be forced. At nine o'clock Emory and Cameron closed on Birge and halted, and at three in the morning A. J. Smith came up.
At daylight on the 23d of April, Franklin moved down to the ferry and began to reconnoitre. His wound had now become so painful as to disable him; accordingly, after maturing his plans, he turned over his command to Emory, with orders to dislodge the enemy and to open the way. With equal skill, care, and vigor, Emory instantly set about this critical task, upon which the fate of the army may almost to have said depended, and with this the safety of the fleet.
The grounds on which the Union army found itself was, like the whole island, low and flat and largely covered with a thick growth of cane and willow. Near the river the soil was moreover swampy and the brakes were for the most part impenetrable. On the high bluff opposite, masked by the trees, stood Bee with the brigades of Debray and Terrell, Major with his two brigades under Baylor and Bagby, and the twenty-four guns of McMahon, Moseley, West, and Nettles. The position was too strong and too difficult of approach to be taken by a direct attack save at a great cost. Through the labyrinthine morass that lay between the ferry and the river's mouth Bailey and E. J. Davis searched in vain for a practicable ford. Nothing remained but to try the other flank.
Birge with his temporary division augmented by Cameron's, without artillery and with no horsemen save a few mounted men of the 13th Connecticut, was to march back, to ford Cane River two miles above the bluff, and by a wide detour to sweep down upon the Confederate left.
To amuse the enemy and to draw his attention away from Birge, Emory, who had yielded his division to McMillan, caused him to deploy the First and Second brigades under Beal and Rust, and to threaten the crossing directly in front, while Closson advanced his guns and kept up a steady and well judged fire against the Confederate position on the hill.
Birge took up the line of march at nine o'clock. His progress was greatly delayed not only by the passage of Cane River, where the water was waist-deep, but also by the swampy and broken ground, and by the dense undergrowth through which he had to force his way. Thus the afternoon was well advanced before he found the position of the Confederates on a hill, with their right flank resting on a deep ravine, and their left upon a marsh and a small lake, drained by a muddy bayou that wound about the foot of the hill. Up to this point Fiske had led the advance. Now, in deploying, after emerging from the thicket, he found himself before the enemy's centre, while Fessenden confronted their left. Fiske formed his men in two lines, the 13th Connecticut and the 1st Louisiana in front, supported by James Smith with the 38th Massachusetts and the 128th New York. To Fessenden Birge gave the duty of carrying the hill.
Behind a hedge and a high fence Fessenden deployed his brigade from right to left in the order of the 165th New York, the 173d New York, the 30th Maine, and the 162d New York. Directly before them, on the other side of the fence, was an open field inclining toward the front in a gentle slope, and traversed at the foot by a second and stouter fence, beyond which a sandy knoll arose, covered with trees, bushes, and fallen timber. On the crest the enemy stood, Bee having changed front to the left and rear as soon as he made out the movement of Birge.
Stopping but to throw down the fence, at the word Fessenden's whole line ran across the field to the foot of the hill. There the brigade quickly re-formed for the ascent, and then, with Fessenden at the head, charged stiffly up the difficult slope straight in the teeth of the hot fire of Bee's dismounted troopers. Many fell, among them Fessenden with a bad hurt, the 165th New York found itself hindered by the marsh, but gallantly led on by Hubbard, by Conrady, and by Blanchard the 30th Maine, the 173d New York, and the 162d New York won the crest and opened fire on the retreating foe. Once more halting to re-form his lines, Birge swept on, gained the farther hill without much trouble, and moving to the left uncovered the crossing. Birge's loss in this engagement was about 200, of whom 153 were in Fessenden's brigade, and of these 86 in the 30th Maine. In leading the charge across the open ground Fessenden was severely wounded in the leg, and the command of his brigade fell to Lieutenant-Colonel Blanchard.
As soon as Emory, on the north bank of Cane River, heard the noise of the battle on the opposite heights, he posted five guns under Closson (two of Hinkle's twenty-pounder Parrotts, one gun of Nields' 1st Delaware, one of Hebard's 1st Vermont, and one of the 25th New York battery), to silence the Confederate artillery on their right, in front of the crossing, well supported by the 116th New York, and deployed his skirmishers as if for an assault. Tempted by the exposed position of these guns, Bee sent a detachment across the river to capture them, but Love easily threw off the attack; and, seeing this, Chrysler, whose regiment, the 2d New York Veteran Cavalry, was dismounted in skirmishing order on the left, at once led his men in pursuit and seized the crossing.
Bee retreated rapidly to Beasley's, thirty miles away to the southward on the Fort Jesup road, without making any further effort to stay or trouble the retreat of Banks.
Word coming from Davis that he had been unable to find a crossing below, Emory, when he saw the enemy in retreat, sent Chrysler and Crebs in pursuit, supported by Cameron. However, this came to nothing, for Chrysler naturally enough followed the small Confederate rear-guard that held to the main road toward Alexandria.
The pontoon bridge was at once laid, and being completed soon after dark, the march was continued by night, McMillan, with Beal and Rust, moving six miles to the reversed front to cover the trains.
About ten o'clock on the same morning Wharton charged down on Kilby Smith, who was moving up to the rear of A. J. Smith's command and of the army, but was driven off after a fight lasting an hour.
By two o'clock on the afternoon of April 24th, Beal's men being on the south bank of Cane River, the bridge was taken up and the march continued without further molestation by Cotile and Henderson's Hill, the head of the column resting at night near the Bayou Rapides.
Marching thence at six o'clock on the morning of the 25th of April, the head of the column arrived at Alexandria at two o'clock that afternoon, and on the following day A. J. Smith brought up the rear. Here the fleet, with the exception of the ill-fated Eastport, was found lying in safety, yet unfortunately above the falls.
Here, too, early on the 27th came Hunter, with fresh and very positive orders from Grant to Banks, bearing date the 17th, requiring him to bring the expedition to an immediate end, to turn over his command at once to the next in rank, and to go himself to New Orleans. In truth, this was but the culmination of an earnest and persistent wish on Grant's part, shown even as far back as the beginning of the campaign, to replace Banks in command by Hunter or another. When, afterward, Grant came to learn of the perilous situation of the fleet, and moreover perceived that none of the troops engaged in the expedition could be in time to take part in the spring campaigns east of the Mississippi, he suspended these orders, and, without recalling that portion of them that required Banks to go to New Orleans, directed the operations for the rescue of the navy to go on under the senior commander present. In any case, however, it was now clearly impossible to abandon the fleet in its dangerous and helpless position above the rapids, with the river falling, and an active enemy on both banks.
And Steele,—where was Steele all this time? Having rejected Banks's advice to join him near Alexandria, marching by way of Monroe and so down the Ouachita, Steele set out from Little Rock on the 24th of March, moved by his right on Arkadelphia, and arrived there on the 28th. His object in preferring this direction was, not only to avoid the heavy roads in the low lands of the Ouachita, but to take up Thayer, who was already on the march from Fort Smith, thus making a fourth concentration in the enemy's country. The exigencies of the wretched farce called a State election in Arkansas had reduced Steele's effective force by fully 3,000, so that he now moved with barely 7,000 of all arms, and six batteries. Opposed to Steele was Price, with the cavalry divisions of Fagan and Marmaduke, the former at Spring Hill to meet the advance from Arkadelphia, and the latter at Camden, to guard the line of the Ouachita. To strengthen himself, Price drew in Cabell and Maxey, who with three brigades were at first engaged in watching Thayer.
On the 1st of April, hearing nothing from Thayer, Steele advanced from Arkadelphia, crossed the Little Missouri at Elkin's Ferry on the 3d, was joined by Thayer on the 6th, and on the 10th had a sharp engagement with an outlying brigade, under Shelby, of Price's army. Price was then at Prairie d'Ane, covering the crossing of the roads that led to Camden and to Shreveport, but on the evening of the 11th he drew back beyond the prairie to a strong position eight miles north of Washington. To have followed Price would have been to put Steele's long and lengthening line of communication at the mercy of Marmaduke. This was what Price wanted; but when, on the 12th, Steele saw the road to Camden left open, he promptly took it, and, harried by Price in his rear, and not seriously impeded by Marmaduke in his front, he marched into Camden on the 15th, and occupied the strong line of the Confederate defences. This was four days after the return of Banks to Grand Ecore, which of course put an end to any farther advance of Steele in the direction of Shreveport, and while he was waiting for authentic news, Price was busy on his line of communication with Pine Bluff, and Kirby Smith, with Churchill and Walker, was moving rapidly to join Price. On the 20th of April Kirby Smith appeared before the lines of Camden; but Steele had already begun his inevitable retreat a few hours earlier, and having destroyed the bridge across the Ouachita, gained so long a start that he was enabled make good the difficult crossing of the Saline at Jenkins's Ferry, but only after a hard fight on the 30th of April with the combined forces of Smith and Price. Finally, the 2d of May saw Steele back at Little Rock with his army half starved, greatly reduced in men and material in these six ineffectual weeks, thinking no longer of Halleck's wide schemes of conquest, or even of Grant's wish to hold the line of the Red River, but rather hoping for some stroke of good fortune to enable him to defend the line of the Arkansas and to keep Price out of Missouri.