CHAPTER XVIII. GEN. EARL VAN DORN TAKES COMMAND.
Jefferson Davis carried out his determination to appoint an officer superior in rank to both Gens. McCulloch and Price. After first appointing Gen. Harry Heth, and then offering the appointment to Gen. Braxton Bragg, he selected another of his favorites, Gen. Earl Van Dorn, who had been a fiery partisan among the officers of the Regular Army for States Rights and Secession, was a native of Mississippi, and had graduated from West Point in 1842, 52d in a class of 56. Whatever his intellectual qualities may have been, he was a man of great force and energy, and had won two brevets for distinguished gallantry in the Mexican War. He gained still more distinction by his successful expeditions against the fierce Comanches, a tribe then in the hight of its power. In one of these his small command killed 56 Indians. In his engagements with the Comanches he had received four wounds, two of which were quite serious. He had been very active in bringing about Gen. Twiggs's disgraceful surrender of his command in Texas.
When Jefferson Davis, as Secretary of War, organized the additional regiments for the Regular Army he took particular pains to promote into them men of his way of thinking on States Rights, and who would be useful in the coming contest which he foresaw.
One of these new regiments,—then called the 2d U. S. Cav., later changed to the 5th U. S. Cav., was quite remarkable for this selection, as it showed Mr. Davis's thorough acquaintance with the character of the Regular officers, and what they could be relied upon to do when Secession should be brought about. He made Colonel of the regiment Albert Sidney Johnston, later General, C. S. A.; Lieutenant-Colonels, Robert E. Lee, afterward General, C. S. A.; W. J. Hardee, Lieutenant-General, C. S. A., and E. Kirby Smith, General, C. S. A., and the Majors were George H. Thomas, W. H. Emory, Major-Generals, U. S. A., and Earl Van Dorn, Major-General, C. S. A.
Mississippi seceded Jan. 9,1861. Earl Van Dorn promptly tendered his resignation and became active, if he had not been before, in bringing about the surrender by Gen. Twiggs of the United States troops, stores and munitions of war in Texas, by which we lost nearly half of the entire strength of the Regular Army, besides some $2,000,000 of supplies, the control of the Mexican frontier, and a large portion of Indian frontier. Van Dorn had been commissioned Colonel in the Confederate army, and hoped to add the surrendered troops to the military establishment of the Southern Confederacy. He put a great deal of pressure upon the officers and men to induce them to change their allegiance, but was remarkably unsuccessful in the latter, not a single enlisted man accepting his offers of promotion and increased pay. Only those officers went over whose course had been predetermined. None of previous loyalty wavered for an instant.
Gen. Twiggs had made a capitulation with Gen. McCulloch, of Texas, as if treating with another Nation. The terms were that the troops should be conveyed to the nearest seaport, and thence sent home. The steamer "Star of the West," which had come into notoriety as being the object at which the first gun of the rebellion was aimed, had been sent to Indianola, Tex., to receive Twiggs's troops. Van Dorn, enraged by his failure to accomplish his purpose, violated the terms of the capitulation. He marched his forces upon the unarmed troops gathered near Indianola, compelled them to surrender, and captured the "Star of the West." The officers and men were kept prisoners in Texas for months afterwards, and subjected to much hardship.
Halleck wrote to Curtis: "Beware of Van Dorn. He is an energetic officer."
Van Dorn was not to justify the high expectations entertained of him, and after several failures to improve great opportunities he finally fell, in 1863, at the age of 42, before the pistol of an injured husband.