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by a small force, under
General E. B. Brown, of the
Missouri militia.
1 The attack was sharp and heavy, but
General Brown gallantly fought the assailants with his little band from ten o'clock in the morning until dark, when
Marmaduke withdrew, with a loss of two hundred men, and a gain of one cannon, which he carried away.
2 Brown lost one hundred and sixty-four men, of whom fourteen were killed.
The general himself was severely wounded, and lost the use of his right arm.
From
Springfield Marmaduke marched eastward, and at dawn on the 10th,
his advance encountered, at
Wood's Fork, near
Hartsville, in
Wright County, the Twenty-first Iowa,
Colonel Merrell, whom
General Fitz-Henry Warren had ordered to
Springfield.
After a skirmish, the Unionists were flanked, and
Marmaduke's whole force pushed on toward
Hartsville.
But
Merrell was there before him, re-enforced by the Ninety-ninth Illinois, and portions of the Third Iowa and Third Missouri Cavalry, supported by a battery commanded by
Lieutenant Wald Schmidt.
A sharp engagement ensued, when
Marmaduke was repulsed, with a loss of about three hundred men, including a brigadier-general (
McDonald) and three colonels, killed.
Merrell's loss was seventy-one men, seven of them killed.
His ammunition was running low, so he fell back on
Lebanon, while
Marmaduke, having no spirit for further fighting in
Missouri, fled swiftly southward that night, and escaped into
Arkansas.
With a part of his force he took post at
Batesville, on the
White River, where he was attacked
by the Fourth Missouri Cavalry,
Colonel G. E. Waring, and driven across the stream, with the loss of a colonel and several men made prisoners.
At about the same time a small force, under
Major Reeder, broke up
a band of guerrillas at
Mingo Swamp, and killed their leader,
McGee; and, on the 28th of the same month,
Lieutenant-Colonel Stewart, scouting from
Fayetteville (the
National outpost in
Northwestern Arkansas), with one hundred and thirty cavalry, captured, near
Van Buren, on the
Arkansas River, a Confederate steamer, with about three hundred prisoners. A month later,
the steamer
Sam Gaty, on the
Missouri River, was captured at Sibley's Landing by a gang of guerrillas, led by
George Todd, who committed great atrocities.
They robbed the boat and all persons on board, and then murdered several of the white passengers, and about twenty negroes, who, with sixty others (who escaped), were flying from bondage.
An attempt to gain freedom was a heinous crime in the eyes of the ruffians, and the poor fugitives were placed in a row alongside of the boat, and one after another was shot through the head.
In the spring of 1863,
Fayetteville was occupied by some Union cavalry and infantry, under
Colonel M. L. Harrison, and, on the 18th of April, they were attacked by nearly two thousand mounted Confederates and two guns, led by
General W. L. Cabell.
He had marched rapidly over the
Boston mountains from
Ozark, with the intention of surprising
Harrison at dawn,
