Major-General Nathaniel P. Banks commanded the Federal Department of the Gulf, headquartered at New Orleans. Banks had been urged by the Lincoln administration to move into Texas. Banks’s Army of the Gulf had gained a foothold on the Texas coast last November but achieved little else. Banks would now finally do what the administration had urged all along: advance toward Texas via the Red River.
The Federal high command wanted Banks to work in conjunction with both Rear-Admiral David D. Porter’s Mississippi River Squadron and Major-General Frederick Steele’s Army of Arkansas. The mission had five objectives:
- Destroy all remaining Confederate resistance in Louisiana
- Capture the vital cotton producing city of Shreveport and then continue west into eastern Texas
- Confiscate as much cotton as possible to sell to starving northern markets
- Stop the Confederate importation of supplies from Mexico
- Form Unionist state governments in Louisiana and Arkansas according to President Abraham Lincoln’s “Ten Percent Plan”
Major-General William T. Sherman, commanding the Federal Army of the Tennessee at Vicksburg, met with Banks at New Orleans in early March to discuss the plans. Most of Banks’s Army of the Gulf consisted of the Nineteenth Corps, which was stationed at Opelousas under Major-General William B. Franklin. Banks explained that he planned to have Franklin advance on Alexandria, but first Banks needed to attend the inauguration of Michael Hahn, the new Unionist governor of Louisiana. According to Sherman:
“General Banks urged me to remain over the 4th of March, to participate in the (inauguration) ceremonies, which he explained would include the performance of the ‘Anvil Chorus’ by all the bands of his army, and during the performance the church-bells were to be rung, and cannons were to be fired by electricity. I regarded all such ceremonies as out of place at a time when it seemed to me every hour and every minute were due to the war.”
Sherman agreed to loan Banks 10,000 troops under Brigadier-General Andrew J. Smith. These troops were to be transported from Vicksburg up the Red River to link with Banks’s army at Alexandria by the 17th. But Sherman warned that Banks had to return them within 30 days because Major-General Ulysses S. Grant (Sherman’s superior) wanted them to participate in Sherman’s impending drive on Atlanta. Sherman declined to attend the inauguration and instead returned to Vicksburg on the night of March 3.
Sherman was skeptical of Banks’s abilities (Banks had been a politician prior the war), but he trusted Porter, having worked with his naval flotilla during the successful Vicksburg campaign. On the 6th, Sherman ordered A.J. Smith to “… proceed to the mouth of the Red River and confer with Admiral Porter; confer with him and in all the expedition rely on him implicitly, as he is the approved friend of the Army of the Tennessee, and has been associated with us from the beginning…”
Porter, who acted independent of Banks’s command, sent gunboats to reconnoiter the Black and Ouachita rivers on March 1. Confederate sharpshooters fired on the vessels on the Black until they were driven off by grape, canister, and shrapnel. The next morning, the flotilla passed Trinity and bombarded Harrisonburg. Confederate shore batteries responded with heavy fire, disabling the starboard engine of the U.S.S. Fort Hindman.
After silencing the batteries, the ships continued upriver to Catahoula Shoals and then turned back. Federal crewmen seized cotton and guns before anchoring at the confluence of the Red and Mississippi rivers. The reconnaissance was successful, but Porter worried that the low level of the Red might upset the timetable. He wrote Navy Secretary Gideon Welles, “I came down here anticipating a move on the part of the army up toward Shreveport, but as the river is lower than it has been known for years, I much fear that the combined movement can not come off without interfering with plans formed by General Grant.”
By the 9th, Porter had nearly every ship in his squadron at the mouth of the Red. The armada included 13 ironclads, 13 tinclads, two large steamers, four small paddle-wheelers, Brigadier-General Alfred W. Ellet’s Marine Brigade, and various other transports, tugs, and supply ships. At 60 ships and 210 guns, this was the largest flotilla ever assembled in the region. Such a large squadron would struggle to navigate the low, winding Red River, but Porter needed the ships to grab as much cotton as possible along the way.
Banks relied on Porter for success, but he also needed Steele, whose 15,000 Federals were to march from Little Rock to join the Army of the Gulf at Shreveport. Chief of Staff Henry W. Halleck had urged Steele to get moving, but Steele was not optimistic about his chances for success. He wrote Halleck that he would obey orders “against my own judgment and that of the best-informed people here. The roads are most if not quite impracticable; the country is destitute of provision.”
Steele also notified Halleck about the problem of Confederate partisans organizing in northern Arkansas and southwestern Missouri: “If they should form in my rear in considerable force I should be obliged to fall back to save my depots, &c.” Steele recommended that his army simply demonstrate against Arkadelphia or Hot Springs to divert Confederate attention from Banks. Despite Steele’s objections, the expedition would proceed:
- A.J. Smith’s Federals would move to Alexandria to join Banks’s Nineteenth Corps under Major-General William B. Franklin.
- Banks would lead the rest of his army from New Orleans via Bayou Teche to join Smith and Franklin at Alexandria.
- Porter’s squadron would move up the Red River to support Banks’s forces advancing along the waterway.
- Steele’s Federals would move south from Little Rock to meet Banks and Porter at Shreveport.
- Banks and Porter would proceed into eastern Texas while Steele held Shreveport.
All told, Banks would have some 50,000 troops under Franklin, A.J. Smith, and Steele, along with Porter’s 210 naval guns. On the 10th, Banks began withdrawing his troops from the Texas coast in preparation for this new campaign. That same day at Vicksburg, A.J. Smith’s Federals boarded transports to take them to Alexandria. According to a northern correspondent:
“The scene on the Mississippi river, opposite Vicksburg was sublime. From the deck of this steamer, the flagship of the expedition went up the long, shrill whistle, the signal for our departure, which was instantly answered by the immense fleet, each steamer’s whistle screaming a reply, ‘All ready,’ in notes ranging from C sharp to B flat. In five minutes the gigantic flotilla was in motion, the variegated lights swinging to and fro from the mastheads, while the crowded decks glistened with loyal bayonets, and the cabin windows reflected a brilliant light upon the rushing waters. Add to this picture the lively music of several brass bands, the cheering of the soldiers, eager for the approaching conflict, and their simple shelter-tents spread in miniature encampments on the upper decks of the steamers, while from the monster black chimneys the sparks fell in golden showers over the whole scene, and perhaps a slight idea will be conveyed of the romantic beauty of this rare war spectacle.”
The vast Confederate spy network in New Orleans quickly informed Major-General Richard Taylor, commanding the District of Western Louisiana, of the Federal movements. Taylor directed his men to destroy all approaches to Alexandria while he established a line of supply (and possible retreat) from Alexandria to Shreveport. Taylor also used troops and impressed slaves to strengthen Fort DeRussy on the Red. The fort was garrisoned with 3,500 Confederates.
Taylor discussed strategy with his superior, General Edmund Kirby Smith, commanding the Trans-Mississippi Department from Shreveport. Smith wanted Taylor to stay on the defensive and fall back to Shreveport if necessary, but Taylor wanted to assume the offensive and drive toward Baton Rouge, thus forcing the Federals to detour their drive up the Red.
But then Taylor received indications that Banks might turn back and instead move east toward Mobile, Alabama. He wrote E.K. Smith on the 6th, “I am more and more disposed to think that Banks will be forced to move Mobile-ward.” If so, Taylor would “throw everything forward to the Mississippi, and push mounted men (if I can concentrate enough of this arm) into the La Fourche.”
Three days later, Taylor wrote, “It can hardly be supposed that Grant will permit any forces under his command to leave the principal theater of operations, yet common sense forbids the idea that Banks would move from the (Bayou) Teche as a base with his entire force without Sherman’s co-operation.”
On the 11th, Taylor once more concluded that Banks would indeed move up the Red: “Should Banks move by the Teche and Red River, we ought to beat him, and I hope, will.” As for Sherman at Vicksburg, “I shall not believe that he will send a man this side of the Mississippi until he is actually in motion.” Taylor concluded that if Sherman did invade Louisiana, he would come from the north, via Monroe. He did not know that part of Sherman’s army under A.J. Smith was coming to reinforce Banks at Alexandria.
Bibliography
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