From Fort Henry to Corinth. M. F. Force
General Fremont learned of the battle of Wilson Creek on August 13th, and resolved at once to fortify St. Louis as his permanent base, and also fortify and garrison Jefferson City, Rolla, Cape Girardeau, and Ironton. Price marched leisurely up through the western border of the State. Unorganized bands springing up in the country attacked Booneville and Lexington, but were easily repulsed by the little detachments guarding those places. Colonel Mulligan was sent to Lexington with additional troops, making the entire force there 2,800 men and eight field-pieces, and with orders to remain until relieved or reinforced.
On September 11th, Price arrived before Lexington. There is no authentic report of his strength; indeed, a large part of his following was an unorganized assemblage. He must have numbered 14,000 men at the beginning of the siege; and reinforcements daily arriving swelled the number to, at all events, more than 20,000. Colonel Mulligan took position on a rising ground close to the river, east of the city, forming a plateau with a surface of about fifteen acres, and fortified.
Judging by the despatches of General Fremont, he seems to have felt no apprehension as to the fate of Mulligan, and made no serious effort to relieve him. The force at Jefferson City remained there. The troops at St. Louis were not moved. General Pope, who, under orders from General Fremont, had advanced from Hannibal to St. Joseph along the line of the railroad, driving off depredators, repairing the road, and stationing permanent guards, heard on September 16th, at Palmyra on his return, something of the condition of affairs at Lexington. He had sent his troops then in the western part of the State toward the Missouri River in pursuit of a depredating body of the enemy. He immediately despatched an order to these troops to hasten to Lexington upon completing their present business. They were not able, however, to arrive in time.
Price, having organized his command into five divisions, each commanded by a general officer, did not push his siege vigorously till the 18th. On that day, a force proceeding through the city of Lexington and under cover of the river-bank, seized the ferry-boats, cut Mulligan off from his water-supply, and carried a mansion close to Mulligan's works and overlooking them. A sortie and a desperate struggle regained possession of the house. Another assault and another desperate struggle finally dispossessed the garrison of the house. Price closed in upon the beleaguered works and firing became continuous and uninterrupted. On the 20th, Price, having a footing on the plateau, carried up numbers of bales of hemp and used them as a movable entrenchment. By rolling these forward, he pushed his line close to Mulligan's works. The besieged were already suffering from want of water, and surrender could be no longer postponed.
Fremont, hearing of the surrender on September 22d, began to bestir himself to look after Price. He left St. Louis for Jefferson City on the 27th, and sent thither the regiments that had been kept at St. Louis. Price on the same day moved out of Lexington and marched deliberately to the southwest corner of the State. On September 24th, Fremont published an order constructing an army for the field of five divisions, entitled right wing, centre, left wing, advance, and reserve—under the command, respectively, of Generals Pope, McKinstry, Hunter, Sigel, and Ashboth; headquarters being respectively at Booneville, Syracuse, Versailles, Georgetown, and Tipton. The regiments and batteries assigned to the respective divisions were scattered all over the State, many of them without wagons, mules, overcoats, cartridge-boxes, or rations. Orders were issued to advance and concentrate at Springfield. Sigel arrived there on the evening of October 27th, and Ashboth on the 30th. Fremont was convinced that Price was on Wilson's Creek, ten or twelve miles from Springfield. Despatches were sent urging McKinstry, Hunter, and Pope to hasten. Pope, having marched seventy miles in two days, arrived on November 1st, and McKinstry arrived close behind him.
On November 2d an order came from Washington relieving Fremont from command of the department, and appointing Hunter to the command. Hunter having not yet come up, Fremont held a council of war, exhibited his plan of battle at Wilson Creek, and ordered advance and attack to be made next morning. General Hunter arrived in the night and assumed command. He sent a reconnoissance next day to Wilson Creek, and learned that no enemy was there or had been there. It was soon ascertained that Price was at Cassville, more than sixty miles off. The army being without rations and imperfectly supplied with transportation, General Hunter, acting upon his own judgment and also in accordance with the wish of President Lincoln expressed in a letter to him, refrained from any attempt to overtake Price, and withdrew his army back to the railroads.
On November 9th, General Halleck was appointed commander of the new Department of the Missouri, including that portion of Kentucky west of the Cumberland River. One-half of the force which Fremont had assembled at Springfield was stationed along the railway from Jefferson City to Sedalia, its western terminus, and General Pope was put in command of this force, as well as a district designated Central Missouri. General Price advanced into Missouri as far as Osceola, on the southern bank of the Osage River, from which point he sent parties in various directions, and where he received detachments of recruits. On December 15th, Pope moved out from Sedalia directly to the south, as if he were pushing for Warsaw, and at the same time sent a cavalry force to the southwest, to mask his movement from Price's command at and near Osceola. Next day a forced march took him west to a position south of Warrensburg, and between the two roads leading from Warrensburg to Osceola. The same night he captured the pickets, and thereby learned the precise locality of a body of 3,200 men, moving from Lexington south to join Price. A flying column under Lieutenant-Colonel Brown, sent out the same night, came upon the camp, drove out the command, kept up the pursuit all night, and all the next day and night, pushing the fugitives away from Price and utterly dispersing them over the country, and rejoined Pope on the 18th with 150 prisoners, and sixteen wagons loaded with supplies captured. At the same time Major Hubbard with his detachment pushed south to the lines of one of Price's divisions, encamped opposite Osceola, on the north shore of the Osage, and captured pickets and one entire company of cavalry, with its tents and wagons. On the 18th, Pope moved to the north, to intercept another body moving south to join Price, and which he learned from his scouts would camp that night at the mouth of Clear Creek, just beyond Warrensburg. His dispositions were so made and carried out that the entire body was surrounded and captured, comprising parts of two regiments of infantry and three companies of cavalry—numbering 1,300 officers and men, with complete train and full supplies. Pope's troops reoccupied their camps at Sedalia and Otterville just one week after they marched out of them. Price broke up his camp at Osceola in haste, and fell rapidly back to Springfield.
General Samuel R. Curtis arrived at Rolla on December 27th, to take command of a force concentrating there and called the Army of the Southwest. One division, under the command of Colonel Jefferson C. Davis, detached from General Pope's district, added to three other divisions commanded respectively by General Sigel, General Ashboth, and Colonel E.A. Carr, made together 12,095 men and fifty pieces of artillery, including four mountain howitzers. Marching out from Rolla on January 23, 1862, with three divisions, he halted a week at Lebanon, where he was joined by Colonel Davis, completing organization and preparation. After some skirmishing with Price's outposts, Curtis entered Springfield at daylight, February 15th, to find that Price had abandoned it in the night. Curtis followed with forced marches, his advance skirmishing every day with Price's rear-guard. In Arkansas, Price was joined by McCulloch and they retired to Boston Mountains. Curtis advanced as far as Fayetteville and then fell back to await attack on ground of his own choice.
The position selected was where the main road, running north from Fayetteville into Missouri, crosses Sugar Creek, and goes over a ridge or rough plateau called Pea Ridge, and was near the Missouri line. For easier subsistence the divisions were camped separately and some miles apart. Davis' division was at Sugar Creek, preparing the position for defence. Sigel, with his own and Ashboth's divisions, was at Cooper's farm, about fourteen miles west; and Carr's division, with which General Curtis had his headquarters, was twelve miles south on the main Fayetteville road, at a place called Cross Hollows. Strong detachments were sent in various directions, forty miles out, to gather in forage and subsistence. The strength of the command was somewhat diminished by the necessity of protecting the long line of communication with the base of supplies by patrols as well as stationary guards, and the aggregate present in Arkansas was 10,500 infantry and cavalry, and forty-nine pieces of artillery.
To settle the continued dissension between Price and McCulloch, General A.S. Johnston, the Confederate