![]() ![]() Four hours of bloody fighting resulted in little more than high casualties for both sides. Union counterattacks gradually regained the ground lost during the early stages of the battle. Federals Counterattacks Regain Lost Ground What Taylor did not know was that Banks had more infantrymen at his disposal who were not engaged the previous day. ![]() The flanking movement on the Union left succeeded, but the right held. Rebel Evening Assault on All FrontsĪt approximately 5 p.m., Taylor attacked the Union center as he simultaneously tried to flank both ends of the federal line. After marching to Pleasant Hill, Taylor rested his men before engaging the Federals. Taylor pursued the next day, hoping to destroy the Union army. After inflicting heavy casualties on the Federals and capturing vast stores of supplies, Taylor called off the assault at nightfall to rest his men and to prepare for battle the next day.ĭuring the night, Banks ordered his army to fall back nearly fourteen miles and to regroup at the village of Pleasant Hill. The Battle of Mansfield (also called the Battle of Sabine Crossroads) was an astonishing Confederate victory that sent the Yankees reeling back down the road. When Lee did not attack, Taylor’s men advanced. ApRebel Victory at the Battle of Mansfield Throughout the morning, Lee probed the Confederate lines, while Taylor hoped for a Union assault. Lee, approached Sabine Crossroads on April 8, they encountered about 14,000 Rebels, commanded by Major General Richard Taylor. As the Union cavalry, led by Brigadier General Albert L. ![]() On April 6, Banks left the Red River and the protection of Porter’s fleet to travel up an inland road toward Shreveport. At last united, the combined federal forces moved upriver to Grand Ecore. Banks himself did not arrive until the next day. Banks was behind schedule, and the forward elements of his army did not reach Alexandria until March 23. The next day, Porter and Smith moved upriver and occupied Alexandria unopposed. On March 14, Smith’s soldiers overran Fort DeRussy and captured a Rebel garrison of about 300 men. Events went well for the Federals initially. The campaign began on March 12, as Porter’s fleet entered the mouth of the Red River from the Mississippi River. After Banks and Porter joined forces and continued upriver toward Shreveport, Major General Frederick Steele would lead another 10,000 Union soldiers out of Little Rock, Arkansas and approach Shreveport from the north or east.Sherman’s Army of the Tennessee, commanded by Brigadier General Andrew Jackson Smith would protect Dixon’s flotilla. A detachment of 10,000 soldiers from William T. Rear Admiral David Dixon Porter would ascend the Red River and join Banks at Alexandria with over thirty warships and an accompanying supply fleet.Banks would march 20,000 troops from the area around New Orleans across southern Louisiana and occupy Alexandria, Louisiana near the center of the state, before moving on to Shreveport. Named the Red River Campaign, Halleck’s plan comprised a three-pronged assault. At the urging of Union Army Chief-of-Staff Henry Halleck, President Abraham Lincoln approved an offensive against the remaining Confederate forces in Louisiana in the spring of 1864. The capital had moved to Opelousas in 1862 and then to Shreveport in the spring of 1863. By the spring of 1864, Confederate Louisiana had shriveled to the northwestern area of the state. ![]()
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