Theater of a Separate War

Thomas W. Cutrer

Description

Though its most famous battles were waged in the East at Antietam, Gettysburg, and throughout Virginia, the Civil War was clearly a conflict that raged across a continent. From cotton-rich Texas and the fields of Kansas through Indian Territory and into the high desert of New Mexico, the trans-Mississippi theater was site of major clashes from the war's earliest days through the surrenders of Confederate generals Edmund Kirby Smith and Stand Waite in June 1865. In this comprehensive military history of the war west of the Mississippi River, Thomas W. Cutrer shows that the theater's distance from events in the East does not diminish its importance to the unfolding of the larger struggle.

Theater of a Separate War details the battles between North and South in these far-flung regions, assessing the complex political and military strategies on both sides. While providing the definitive history of the rise and fall of the South's armies in the far West, Cutrer shows, even if the region's influence on the Confederacy's cause waned, its role persisted well beyond the fall of Richmond and Lee's surrender to Grant. In this masterful study, Cutrer offers a fresh perspective on an often overlooked aspect of Civil War history.

Sujets

• Tom Green
• John Charles Frémont
• Nathaniel Prentice Banks
• Stand Watie
• Richard Taylor
• Edmund Kirby Smith
• John C. Frémont
• Nathaniel P. Banks
• Battle of Prairie Grove
• Battle of Pea Ridge
• Battle of Mansfield
• Samuel Curtis
• Battle of Glorieta Pass
• Battle of Wilson's Creek
• John Schofield
• Battle of Milliken's Bend
• Red River Campaign
• Battle of Galveston
• Battle of Pleasant Hill
• Battle of Sabine Pass

Informations

• Publié par: The University of North Carolina Press
• Date de parution: 16 mars 2017
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781469631578
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 4 Mo

Extrait

Theater of a Separate War
THE LITTLEFIELD HISTORY OF THE CIVIL WAR ERA
GARY W. GALLAGHER and T. MICHAEL PARRISH, editors
This book was supported by the LITTLEFIELD FUND FOR SOUTHERN HISTORY, University of Texas Libraries
This landmark sixteen-volume series, featuring books by some of today s most respected Civil War historians, surveys the conflict from the earliest rumblings of disunion through the Reconstruction era. A joint project of UNC Press and the Littlefield Fund for Southern History, University of Texas Libraries, the series offers an unparalleled comprehensive narrative of this defining era in U.S. history.
Theater of a Separate War
The Civil War West of the Mississippi River, 1861-1865
Thomas W. Cutrer
The University of North Carolina Press Chapel Hill
2017 The University of North Carolina Press All rights reserved
Manufactured in the United States of America
Set in Miller, Clarendon, and Madrone types by codeMantra
The University of North Carolina Press has been a member of the Green Press Initiative since 2003.
Cover illustration: Battle of Pea Ridge, Ark. , by Kurz & Allison. Courtesy of Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Cutrer, Thomas W., author. Title: Theater of a separate war : the Civil War west of the Mississippi River, 1861-1865 / Thomas W. Cutrer. Other titles: Littlefield history of the Civil War era. Description: Chapel Hill : The University of North Carolina Press, [2017] | Series: The Littlefield history of the Civil War era | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2016047324 | ISBN 9781469631561 (cloth : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781469631578 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH: West (U.S.)-History-Civil War, 1861-1865-Campaigns. | Southwest, Old-History-Civil War, 1861-1865-Campaigns. | United States-History-Civil War, 1861-1865-Campaigns. Classification: LCC E470.9 .C87 2017 | DDC 973.7/3-dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016047324
For Emily, as always and forever
Contents
Preface
Acknowledgments
Introduction
1. Has It Come So Soon As This? Secession and Confederate Statehood
2. I Will Gladly Give My Life for a Victory: Kansas and Missouri, June-December 1861
3. The Wolf Is Come: War in the Indian Nation, 1861-1862
4. The Only Man in the Army That Was Whipped: The Pea Ridge Campaign, February 1862
5. Charge em! Damn em, Charge, Charge, Charge! The Struggle for the Southwest, July 1861-July 1862
6. We Are Men and Braves: Indian Warfare in the Far West
7. No Feeling of Mercy or Kindness: The Prairie Grove Campaign, March 1862-January 1863
8. Hold Out Till Help Arrived or Until All Dead: The Capture of Arkansas Post, 9-11 January 1863
9. Texas Must Take Her Chances: Coastal Defense and the Battle of Galveston, April 1861-January 1863
10. All New England Men and of the Best Material: The Federal Occupation of South Louisiana, April 1862-April 1863
11. Cannot You Do Something to Operate against Them on Your Side of the River! Milliken s Bend and the Campaign for Vicksburg, Spring 1863
12. Courage and Desperation Rarely Equaled: The Rebel Assault on Helena, 4 July 1863
13. Much Unmerited Loss and Suffering: Quantrill s Lawrence Raid and the War on the Missouri-Kansas Border, 21 August 1863
14. Drive Him Routed from Our Soil: The Little Rock Campaign, July-October 1863
15. More Remarkable than Thermopylae: Texas Coastal Defense and the Battle of Sabine Pass, January 1863-June 1865
16. Our Troops Should Occupy and Hold at Least a Portion of Texas: Banks s Overland Campaign, July-November 1863
17. The Land of Coyotes, Tarantulas, Fandangos, Horn-Toads, and Jack-Rabbits: Banks s Texas Campaign, October 1863-August 1864
18. No Nobler Death: The Indian Territory, July 1863-February 1865
19. We Must Fight Them and Whip Them: Banks s Drive toward Shreveport, November 1863-April 1864
20. I Am Going to Fight Banks If He Has a Million of Men! The Battles of Mansfield and Pleasant Hill, 8-9 April 1864
21. A Brisk and Brilliant Six Weeks Campaign: Steele s Camden Expedition and Banks s Retreat from Pleasant Hill, April and May 1864
22. Destroy Property and Recruit Men: Price s Missouri Raid, August-November 1864
23. Let Come What Will, We ll Fight the Yankees Alone: Confederate Collapse in the Trans-Mississippi
Conclusion: A Sort of Botany Bay
Notes
Bibliography
Index
A map of the trans-Mississippi appears on page xvi
Preface
The trans-Mississippi theater of the American Civil War remains to a remarkable degree unknown and underappreciated. Despite the romantic allure of the New Mexico campaign of 1862, the pathos of the war in Indian Territory, the drama of the recapture of Galveston, the heroic defense of Sabine Pass, the ferocity of the Red River and Camden campaigns of 1864, and the irony of the final battle of the war-a minor Confederate victory on the Rio Grande achieved more than a month after Robert E. Lee s surrender at Appomattox-the trans-Mississippi West languishes in the backwaters of Civil War historiography. Neither the massive size and strategic importance of the region nor the dedication and hardships of the soldiers who served there in Union and Confederate armies has inspired substantial interest among historians or readers drawn to the military story of the conflict.
Soldiers at the time foretold their fate. In the autumn of 1863, for example, the Army of the Gulf and the Army of Western Louisiana were deeply engaged in the momentous Overland Campaign in south Louisiana, a series of battles that ultimately saved Texas from invasion. But, Capt. Elijah Petty commented to his wife, in comparison to the Chickamauga campaign underway in Tennessee, these little places here are of minor importance to them and will be overlooked. 1
For nearly 150 years, historians tended to disregard what one called the dark corner of the Confederacy. Early in the twentieth century, historian Nathaniel W. Stephenson wrote that a great history of the time would have a special and thrilling story of the conduct of the detached western unit, the isolated world of Louisiana, Arkansas, and Texas-the Department of the Trans-Mississippi -cut off from the main body of the Confederacy and hemmed in between the Federal army and the deep sea. But to the largest degree, this story has not yet been written. The Annals of the Civil War: Written by Leading Participants, North and South , one of the major collections of primary documents relating to the Civil War, contains not a single article on the war west of the Mississippi. The classic West Point Atlas of American Wars contains not a single map of the trans-Mississippi. Ken Burns s vastly popular and influential PBS documentary The Civil War gives the theater equally short shrift, and most of the general treatments of the war accord it at best only an occasional passing reference.
In recent years, however, the trans-Mississippi has become a fertile area for study. The letters, journals, and memoirs of those who fought there are at last being edited and published, and a number of fine monographs on the battles and leaders, strategy and tactics of the theater have been written. The bibliography and notes of this volume will readily attest to the contributions of a growing number of fine scholars doing outstanding pioneering work in this field.
This volume of the Littlefield History of the Civil War Era is an examination of military operations from the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean. As such, it goes beyond the Confederate trans-Mississippi-Arkansas, Louisiana, Missouri, Texas, Indian Territory, and the New Mexico Territory-to include events in Kansas and the wide sweep of military activity in California, Utah, and the Dakotas. In common with Earl J. Hess s Civil War in the West , it is to the largest degree an analytical military narrative. While the narrative includes some contextual attention to social, political, and economic history, my purpose in providing the military narrative is to establish the foundation and build the framework for future scholars to treat these other broad topics, as well as the compelling experiences of civilians, women, Native Americans, enslaved people, and the common soldier, who played such a vital role in the story of the Civil War in the trans-Mississippi West.
Acknowledgments
Among those scholars who are beginning to cast a full light upon the trans-Mississippi are Anne J. Bailey, Michael E. Banasik, Alwyn Barr, Norman D. Brown, Mark K. Christ, Edward T. Cotham, Joseph G. Dawson III, Donald S. Frazier, David B. Gracy II, Charles D. Grear, Richard W. Hatcher III, Earl J. Hess, Lawrence Lee Hewitt, Kenneth W. Howell, Gary D. Joiner, Richard Lowe, Richard B. McCaslin, Carl H. Moneyhon, T. Michael Parrish, William Garrett Piston, Jeffery S. Prushankin, William L. Shea, and Jerry D. Thompson, many of whom I am proud to claim as friends and to whom I am deeply indebted for many kindnesses, professional and personal.
I am also greatly indebted to Mike Parrish and Gary Gallagher for the honor of entrusting this project to me, for their careful and insightful readings of the manuscript, and for their many fine suggestions that so greatly strengthened it. I must also thank Mark Simpson-Vos, editorial director of the University of North Carolina Press. But my greatest debt of gratitude is to Emily F. Cutrer, who-in addition to being an outstanding writer and scholar of nineteenth-century U.S. history, and as such offered many welcome suggestions toward the making of a better book-is the wife whose patience, encouragement, and support through the long months of this process