Freedom by the Sword - US Army Center Of Military History

Along the Mississippi River, 1863–1865 199
orders to withdraw the African Brigade from Goodrich’s Landing, Louisiana,
and move downstream to Haynes’ Bluff on the Yazoo River about twenty miles
north of Vicksburg. Sherman wanted Hawkins’ troops to patrol west of the Big
Black River, behind the leased plantations that fronted on the Mississippi, and
to stamp out “the bands of guerrillas that now infest that country.” Hawkins was
to commandeer as many as fifty skiffs, rowboats that could carry five or six men
each, so that his force could navigate the bayous in parties two or three hundred
strong. All the regiments in the African Brigade had mustered in at river towns
and steamboat landings between Memphis and Natchez, and most of the soldiers
were used to life along the Mississippi and its tributaries. Local knowledge
that the men had gained as civilians would be valuable in antiguerrilla operations,
and Sherman intended to use it. “Such expeditions will suit the habits of
[Hawkins’] troops,” he wrote, “and will effectually prevent the smaller bands
of guerrillas from approaching the river plantations. . . . The whole country between
the Yazoo and Mississippi Rivers is one labyrinth of creeks connecting
each other, making it very favorable to parties in boats, and soon the officers and
men will get a knowledge of these that will give them every advantage over parties
on horseback.” 21
While Hawkins and his men were to scour the country between the rivers, a
small force would strike northeast up the Yazoo “by way of diversion, to threaten
Grenada,” Sherman explained to Halleck, in order to draw Confederate attention
from the main Union force’s march toward Meridian. This expedition’s commanding
officer was to notify plantation owners along the Yazoo that they would
be held responsible, under threat of reprisals and confiscation, for any guerrilla
incursions in the region. He was to collect one thousand bales of cotton for sale
in order to indemnify loyal shipowners and merchants who had suffered from
guerrilla raids. As the senior commanding officer present, Col. James H. Coates
of the 11th Illinois led the expedition. It included his own regiment as well as
the 8th Louisiana Infantry (AD) and Colonel Osband’s 1st Mississippi Cavalry
(AD). 22
Many in the 8th Louisiana were glad to go. The regiment had “had every
available man working on the fortifications at Vicksburg, and detailed to unload
stores for white regiments for nearly the whole of the last three months,” according
to a muster roll for December 1863. “In consequence of which, in spite
of every effort of the officers, [the regiment] is rapidly deteriorating in morale
and discipline. . . . General fatigue duty, and the handling of spades, shovels
and picks, will certainly prevent us from ever acquitting ourselves creditably as
soldiers.” Except for an enemy raid on one of its company’s outposts the previous
May that had inflicted eight casualties and another company’s involvement
Southern Civilians, 1861–1865 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1995), pp. 112–19, discuss
Union retaliation against Southern communities for their support of guerrillas.
21 OR, ser. 1, vol. 32, pt. 2, pp. 125, 181, 310 (quotation). Col G. M. Zeigler to Brig Gen L.
Thomas, 17 Aug 1863, 52d USCI, Entry 57C, RG 94, NA, outlines one commanding officer’s
difficulties in organizing his regiment.
22 OR, ser. 1, vol. 32, pt. 1, p. 183, and pt. 2, p. 360 (quotation). Coates’ appointment dated from 8
July 1863; Osband’s, from 10 October 1863. Francis B. Heitman, Historical Register and Dictionary
of the United States Army, 2 vols. (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1903), 1: 312, 761.