Walking Into a Den of Wildcats

Major Emory Rogers

The governor of Arkansas, Henry Rector, was beyond furious.  The Confederate defeat at Pea Ridge was bad enough. Now, Major General Earl Van Dorn was taking his “Army of the West” east of the Mississippi.  Arkansas was now wide open to Union invasion.  Believing Little Rock, the state capital, was about to fall, Governor Rector moved the state archives south to Hot Springs.  He issued a public proclamation stating Arkansas would have to fight it out alone, implying Arkansas would secede from the Confederacy if it didn’t receive military assistance soon.  Desperate measures would be required to raise a new army and restore public moral.  General John Roane, a former Arkansas governor, was assigned to do the impossible.     

Victorious at Pea Ridge, Union General Samuel Curtis had Little Rock well within his grasp, possibly the whole state as well. However, terrain and distance would make it a difficult task at best.  His nearest supply base was miles away at Rolla, Missouri; miles traversed only by foot and wagon.  Then there was the weather.  The spring of 1862 brought record setting rainfall that overflowed rivers and turned roads into quagmires.  To make matters even worse, local farms and towns had been emptied of their food supplies, thoroughly scavenged by both Union and Confederate troops.  Very little was left for Curtis’ hungry troops.

Roane needed troops fast to defend Little Rock.  After Van Dorn left, there were only 1,500 troops available against a vast Union army of 23,000.  The only experienced troops available was a small Texas spy company under Captain Alf Johnson, a near legendary scout who once served under General McCulloch.  During a scouting mission near Springfield, Missouri, before the Battle of Wilson’s Creek, Johnson found himself surrounded by Union troops outside the home of a Confederate supporter.  With the blast of his shotgun, he broke out of of the encirclement and headed back to McCulloch’s camp without a scratch.   Roane stopped all Confederate units leaving Arkansas to join Van Dorn.  Heading toward Memphis, Colonel William Parsons’ 12th Texas Cavalry Regiment was ordered to promptly turn around and head toward Little Rock. 

William Parson’s family heritage is anything but Southern, much less Texan.   He was a direct descendant of New England Puritans that arrived on the second voyage of the Mayflower.  That all changed when his father opened a store in Montgomery, Alabama.  Young Parsons became fully immersed in Southern culture and habits. He attended Emory University in Georgia then abruptly left to fight in the War with Mexico.  Parsons later moved to Texas and published newspapers in Tyler and Waco.  After Texas seceded, he received a commission to organize the 12th Texas Cavalry Regiment in Hempstead.  His officers came up with rather unorthodox means to recruit members.  Captain Jeff Neal gained recruits by offering free liquor to potential recruits. Many awoke the following morning to a hangover and unknowingly pledged to serve as a cavalryman in the Confederate Army.  Parsons set up a training camp in Ellis County.  His new regiment developed a liking for their new commander; one who fought for their needs while fighting by their side in battle.  After arriving in Arkansas, the 12th Texas was later joined with the 19th and 21st Texas Cavalry Regiments, Morgan’s Texas Battalion and Pratt’s 10th Texas Field Battery.  Parson’s regiment would become Parsons’ Texas Cavalry Brigade.

The spirited Texans were welcomed by less than spirited Little Rock residents; who were resolved to a Union occupation.  The Confederate national flag was absent from the capitol dome.  The Texans were like a tonic; Parsons’ troopers quickly took charge of the situation.   One elderly gentleman asked Captain Jeff Neal how long it would be before Union troops arrived.  Neal replied brusquely, “Never! We will whip them back.” Writing his wife about the missing flag, Lt. George Ingram wrote, “We will hoist one on the dome…Hurrah for the Texans.”

Curtis, through Union scouts and spies, was aware of Van Dorn’s move east.  Fearing Van Dorn might outflank him and then head for the Missouri border, Curtis moved his army east to shadow him. East Arkansas proved anything but accommodating.  Unlike the rolling Ozark hills in the Northwest, East Arkansas was flat and swampy.  Disease was rampant and guerrilla bands began to harass Curtis’ flanks.  Consisting largely of German immigrants trained in staid European tactics, Curtis’ men were unaccustomed to the rebels’ hit and run attacks.  One such immigrant regiment was the 17th Missouri under Brigadier General Peter Osterhaus. 

At Pea Ridge, Osterhaus defeated Confederate troops under the famed Texas Ranger, Major General Benjamin McCulloch, killing McCulloch in the process.  Before immigrating to America, he was a reserve officer in the Prussian Army.  A St. Louis resident before the war, Osterhaus trained fellow immigrants for militia service.  The training would reap dividends for the Union Army in Missouri.  Rising through the Union ranks, Osterhaus would later command an army corps during Sherman’s march through Georgia and the Carolinas.  While camped at Batesville, Arkansas (fifty miles northwest of Little Rock), he sent out companies from the 17th Missouri to forage.  

Crossing the overflowing Little Red River, members of the 17th encountered 100 members of the 12th Texas Cavalry Regiment under Major Emory Rogers.  Fifty Arkansas locals arrived on the scene to help Rogers.  Dividing his command into three units, Rogers surrounded the foraging party at Whitney’s Lane near Searcy, Arkansas.  Outmaneuvered, the foragers were forced to flee back across the river, picking up support from the 4th Missouri Cavalry to help fend off the swarming Texans.   Fifty members of the foraging party became casualties.  The Rebels suffered only two.  A Union private later wrote, “Fighting the Texans was like walking into a den of wildcats.”

Lauded by the Southern newspapers, Rogers’ small victory would provide a huge moral boost for Arkansas residents while dampening the moral fortitude of Curtis.  His supply line broke down completely; he abandoned his advance on Little Rock. Instead, he opted for the capture of Helena on the Mississippi River.  His starving army would now be supplied by riverboat.  Little Rock was saved for another year.