Pleasanton, who with Federal cavalry was hard behind the Confederate raiders, had marched seventy-eight miles in twenty-eight hours, but this wonderful gait still left him in Stuart’s rear, and now that the point at which Stuart was to cross was revealed, every Federal soldier that could be reached was pressed forward to dispute the passage. Whit’s Ford was guarded, but not sufficiently well to impede the rush of the Confederates, and the Federals at the crucial moment retired, and the way was opened for the escape and safety of the valiant Confederate corps.
Twenty-seven hours and eighty-one miles. No sleep. No rest.
Galloping, fighting, scouting and ready to assail any enemy, with human endurance tested to the greatest possible limit—what think you, reader, of the conduct of these riders, when, out of those three brigades, only two men, either by sleep, illness, hunger, weariness or straggling, were missing when, at noon, on the 12th of October, on Virginia’s soil, Stuart called his roll to calculate losses?
Measured by any human formula for patience or endurance, courage, loyalty and chivalry, this service of Stuart and his command stands with but few parallels in military history. They did all men could do, and the Divine Judge himself requires nothing more than this at man’s hands.
Chapter XXII
GENERAL JOHN B. MARMADUKE’S “CAPE
GIRARDEAU RAID,” APRIL, 1863
General John B. Marmaduke was a thoroughly born and reared Southern man. Descended from Virginia ancestry, he first saw the light on March 14th, 1833, at Arrow Rock, Missouri. Possessed of a splendid physique, with a common school education, he entered Yale. He was there two years and one year at Harvard, and then he was appointed to the United States Military Academy from whence he graduated when twenty-two years of age. As a brevet second lieutenant he went with Albert Sidney Johnston and aided in putting down the Mormon revolt in 1858. He remained in the West for two years and at the opening of the Civil War was stationed in New Mexico. Fond of military life, it involved much sacrifice for him to resign his commission in the United States Army, but he did not hesitate an instant and on the 17th of April, 1861, he severed his connection with the regular army and at once raised a company of Missouri State Guards. His West Point education gave him prominence at once and he was made colonel of a Missouri military organization. Brave and proud-spirited, he disagreed with his uncle, Claiborne F. Jackson, then governor of Missouri, and left the service there and reported at Richmond, to the Confederate government. He had five brothers in the Confederate Army or Navy. His father, Meredith Miles Marmaduke, was governor of Missouri in 1844.
With General Hardee, in Southeast Missouri, he was made colonel of the 3d Confederate Infantry. Crossing the river to aid General Albert Sidney Johnston destroy Grant’s army, he participated in the Battle of Shiloh, and was signally honored by his grateful government for his splendid service and was made a brigadier general while he was yet an inmate of the hospital from wounds received on that field. There was a great call at that time in the West for brave and experienced men, and four months after the Battle of Shiloh he was transferred to the trans-Mississippi Department, and from August, 1862, to January, 1863, he commanded the Confederate cavalry in Arkansas and Missouri. Vigilant, active and enterprising, he made a number of raids into Missouri. He was a fierce fighter, and never hesitated to attack his enemy when prudence justified an assault. Ordered to break Federal communication between Springfield and Rolla, Missouri, he inflicted great loss upon his enemies, but after a most valiant attack, through the failure of some of his troops to come on time, he was compelled to withdraw and retreat. He held a conspicuous place in the attack upon Helena, Arkansas, in July, 1863, and was successful in capturing the Federal camps at Pine Bluff. In the defense of Little Rock he played a notable part and covered General Price’s retreat after the evacuation of the capital of Arkansas.
He fought a duel with General Lucien M. Walker which shadowed his life. Under the terms arranged by the seconds, the two men were placed ten feet apart. The weapons were revolvers, and they were to advance and continue firing until the weapons were empty. Walker was mortally wounded at the second shot. Marmaduke was placed under arrest and relieved of his command. The exigencies of the hour made his services so important that he was permitted to resume his command during the pending operations. He was finally released by General Holmes. All through Missouri and Arkansas and Louisiana he was in many engagements, and for his magnificent service in 1864 in delaying Steele and preventing his union with General Banks, and for his valor in the Battle of Jenkins Ferry, he was made a major general. He was with Price in his ill-fated campaign in the fall of 1864. Dauntless and gallant in the protection of Price’s rear, while making vigorous battle he was captured near Fort Scott, Kansas. He was carried to Fort Warren and remained there until August, 1865, and when released went abroad, but returned to engage in business in St. Louis. For two years he was active in journalism. He served as secretary of the Missouri Board of Agriculture, was railroad commissioner four years, elected governor of Missouri in 1884, in which office he died in his fifty-fourth year, in Jefferson City, on December 24th, 1887.
Brave, of great resource, intensely loyal, few men of the war had as many wide experiences. The South had no more loyal son. His three and a half years of military service were marked with incessant and constant activities, and he had no rest, unless while in the hospital recovering from wounds received in battle. Although connected with the cavalry, in an engagement where some Missouri infantry were falling back before a sudden and terrific fire, General Marmaduke, with an aide-de-camp, William Price, rode in among the hesitating infantry, and violently taking from two standard bearers their colors, rushed into the midst of these troops and lifting the banners aloft pleaded with the men to stand firm. His noble example restored order to the line, and out of retreat they moved forward with conspicuous gallantry, and won victory.
In March, 1863, General Holmes was relieved of the command of the Trans-Mississippi Department, and General E. Kirby Smith, who had made such a brilliant reputation in the Kentucky campaign with the army of Tennessee, was assigned to the full charge of the territory. He established his headquarters at Shreveport, Louisiana, and General Holmes was placed in command of the district of Arkansas, which included Arkansas, Indian Territory and the state of Missouri.