Chapter 12:
- Arkansas brigades east of the Mississippi -- battle of Shiloh -- Richmond and Perryville -- Murfreesboro -- Iuka and Corinth -- Vicksburg and Port Hudson -- Chickamauga -- Missionary Ridge -- Ringgold Gap -- the Atlanta campaign -- Franklin and the death of Cleburne.
General Albert Sidney Johnston, on the 10th of September 1861, was assigned to the command of ‘the department of the West,’ which included the States of Tennessee, Missouri, Arkansas, the western part of Mississippi, and Indian Territory. On taking command he immediately occupied Bowling Green, Ky., with 5,000 men, under Brig.-Gen. S. B. Buckner, as a defensive countercheck to the enlistment and intrusion of Federal forces in the State. General Polk was at Columbus, and at Cumberland ford, Gen. Felix K. Zollicoffer had taken position with 4,000 men. Fort Henry, Fort Donelson and Hopkinsville were garrisoned by small bodies of Confederates. The general position of Bowling Green, Johnston wrote, was good and commanding. ‘There is no position equally as defensive as Bowling Green, nor line of defense as good as the Barren river. So it cannot be abandoned without exposing Tennessee and giving vastly the vantage ground to the enemy.’ Brig.-Gen. W. J. Hardee, having crossed the Mississippi with his Arkansas command, arrived at Bowling Green, October 11th, and in a few days was sent forward to Cave City. His force there was reported on the 23d as follows: First regiment Arkansas volunteers, Col. P. R. Cleburne; Second regiment, Maj. J. W. Scaife; battalion attached to Second, Lieut.-Col. J. S. Mannaduke; [327] Fifth regiment, Col. D. C. Cross; Sixth regiment, Col. A. T. Hawthorn; Seventh regiment, Col. R. G. Shaver; Eighth regiment, Col. W. K. Patterson; battalion of Ninth, four companies, Lieut.-Col. S. J. Mason; battalion of artillery, Maj. F. A. Shoup—batteries of Capts. George [Charles] Swett, John T. Trigg, George T. Hubbard; five companies of cavalry, Maj. Charles W. Phifer. When General Johnston assumed immediate command of the central army of Kentucky, October 28th; Hardee, promoted to major-general, was given command of the First division, the component brigades of which were, Brigadier-General Hindman's—Second (LieutenantCol-onel Bocage) and Sixth Arkansas regiments and Marmaduke's battalion; Colonel Cleburne's—First and Fifth Arkansas regiments, Seventh Mississippi and Tennessee Rifles; and Col. R. G. Shaver's—Seventh, Eighth and Ninth Arkansas and Twenty-fourth Tennessee. The Arkansas artillery and cavalry were also in Hardee's division. Other Arkansas commands in Kentucky were the Thirteenth with Polk at Columbus, and the Ninth, Colonel Dunlop, and Tenth, Colonel Merrick, at Camp Beauregard, in Col. J. S. Bowen's brigade. The returns in December showed the strength of Hindman's brigade to be 1,969, aggregate present, Cleburne's brigade 2, 187, Shaver's brigade 2,548, cavalry regiment 614, Shoup's artillery battalion 205, Dunlop's Ninth Arkansas 611, and Tenth Arkansas 649. December 5, 1861, Major-General Hardee, in obedience to orders of General Johnston, assumed command of the central army of Kentucky, announcing as his staff, Lieut. D. G. White, adjutant-general; Maj. John Pope, of Arkansas, chief quartermaster; Capt. W. E. Moore, chief commissary; Captain Chambliss, chief of ordinance; dol. St. John R. Liddell, aide; Col. Hardin Perkins, aide. In November, Colonel Cleburne was ordered by General Hardee with his regiment, the First Arkansas State (or [328] Fifteenth Arkansas Confederate), a squadron of Terry's Texas Rangers, and one piece of Shoup's artillery, against a Federal force at Jamestown, which retired on his approach, abandoning some supplies. He was soon afterward promoted to brigadier-general. The fall of Forts Henry and Donelson on the ad and 14th of February, 1862, was a lamentable disaster which changed the situation in Kentucky.
