Van Dorn promptly repaired to his command, and seems to have been welcomed with entirely loyal subordination by both Price and McCulloch, though both were much older than he, and had held higher commands, Gen. Price having been a Brigadier-General at a time when Van Dorn was only a First Lieutenant.
At first Van Dorn meditated moving into Missouri by the Pocahontas route, intermediate between the Mississippi route and that by the way of Springfield. He began assembling troops at Jacksonport, Ark., to move directly up through the Ozark Mountains. Then the isolated situation of Gen. Curtis's little army, with scattered detachments thrown out in every direction, tempted him to concentrate suddenly his forces and make the effort to cut off the outlying Union detachments and finally crush the main body. Therefore, he hastened to the Boston Mountains, sending messages to the scattered Confederates to meet him there, and was welcomed on a chilly, snowy March 3 with the Major-General's salute of 40 guns, which were heard by Gen. Curtis at Cross Hollow.
After driving Gen. Price off into the Boston Mountains and successfully flanking Gen. McCulloch out of his "Gibraltar" at Cross Hollow, Gen. Curtis prudently halted his army there to consider his next move. The line of Sugar Creek offered fine opportunities for defense, and from there he could hope to maintain his communications along the great road leading to Springfield and Holla. Not having been able to force either McCulloch or Price to a decisive battle in which he might destroy or at least cripple them, it did not seem discreet to venture further forward where every step made them stronger and him weaker.
Halleck had relied upon Gen. Hunter sending down a flanking column from Leavenworth by the way of Fort Scott, but this had not materialized, owing to the disputes between Gens. Hunter and Jas. H. Lane. Thus 5,000 men who should have been effectively employed, either in menacing Van Dorn's flank or increasing Curtis's strength, were held idly, at Leavenworth.
[Transcriber's Note: The print copy has a
two page error in numbering.]
Halleck had also relied upon the effect of Gen. Grant's startling victory at Fort Donelson, which shattered the first Confederate line, to withdraw a large portion of the forces west of the Mississippi, and relieve pressure upon Curtis. Nor had this at that time resulted. Though the general Confederate the roads leading northward crossed Sugar Greek, and several of them came together some two or three miles north of a country hostelry known as Elkhorn Tavern on the main road to Springfield, at the northeastern end of Pea Ridge.