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179 Chapter Six “He Saw the Rebellion Vanishing before Him” In the year that separated Shelby’s raid (October 1863) from Price’s expedition (October 1864), Federal forces adopted a determined effort to coordinate the activities of armies in the East and West and to carve the Confederacy into militarily disjointed sections. Ulysses Grant’s victory at Vicksburg in July 1863 was an essential first step in this direction, extending Federal control throughout the lower Mississippi valley. Grant’s subsequent victories over Braxton Bragg at Chattanooga in November 1863 opened an invasion route to Atlanta. In March 1864, Grant took command in the East and assumed overall responsibility for Federal military efforts. Confederates had never coordinated their military activities in the East and West; in this new military climate it became nearly impossible to do so. Nevertheless, powerful Confederate forces continued to operate in the trans-Mississippi theater. They posed less of a threat to Federal operations east of the Mississippi but they continued to threaten Federal control in the West. General Nathanial Banks launched the Red River campaign (March–May 1864) in an unsuccessful effort to break Confederate resistance west of the Mississippi. Banks’s efforts brought Price back to the trans-Mississippi region to strengthen Kirby Smith’s command. The collapse of the Red River campaign left a substantial rebel presence threatening Missouri from the south. This was the situation encountered by Missouri’s new Federal commander, William Rosecrans, who arrived in St. Louis late in January 1864. Rosecrans had been badly beaten by Bragg at Chickamauga and nearly defeated at Chattanooga. When Grant took over at Chattanooga, Rosecrans came to Missouri where Lincoln expected that the general ’s administrative abilities would be put to good use. Rosecrans found that his new command was the scene of constant skirmishing . With large numbers of rebel troops in northern Arkansas, southern Missouri and the Missouri River corridor remained vulnerable. Rebel raids continued and Federal cavalry scoured the countryside in repeated attempts to root out the menace. The Federal commander at Springfield reported that groups of the enemy “are constantly moving north in bodies of from 50 to 125.” Late in May, as Banks’s Red River threat evaporated, about one hundred rebels attacked the Federal garrison at Lamar. The rebels were driven off without loss on the Federal 180 The Civil War in Missouri: A Military History side but they continued to roam the countryside. The force that had attacked Lamar had skirted the Federal garrison at Neosho and passed though Granby two days earlier. Federal cavalry chased the rebels as they moved further north but without effect. The Federal commander lamented that with the limited resources available to him it was impossible “to intercept them or bring them to an engagement.”1 In May 1864, William Tecumseh Sherman launched his Atlanta campaign and captured the city early in September. As Sherman advanced into Georgia, Kirby Smith entertained with increasing sympathy Sterling Price’s proposal to return in strength to Missouri. The collapse of the Red River campaign meant that Smith faced no immediate danger in Arkansas. The concentration of Federal forces at Atlanta and the ease with which small bands of Confederates operated in southern Missouri suggested to Smith that Rosecrans’s forces were stretched thin and that St. Louis might be vulnerable to a bold attack. An invasion of Missouri might compel Federal forces to withdraw from central Georgia. Price still believed that thousands of Missourians would join his army of liberation. Union general Samuel R. Curtis, now at Fort Leavenworth, believed that Price’s successes in Arkansas “inspired him with new energies.” Curtis had been victorious over Price at Pea Ridge, and he considered himself “familiar with his purpose, often declared to his followers of making another effort to establish himself on the Missouri River.” At the very least a Confederate invasion of Missouri would embarrass the Lincoln administration and disrupt Missouri Unionists as they prepared for the fall elections. Curtis had returned to Fort Leavenworth after fighting Indians on the upper Arkansas River in Colorado. On September 17 he learned that Price had crossed the Arkansas River and had begun to assemble an army. Curtis had no doubt that an invasion of Missouri was imminent. Unfortunately most of his troops were too far west to be of use in new fighting in Missouri. But, on the positive side, Curtis found Fort Leavenworth well supplied with mountain howitzers. These lightweight guns would greatly strengthen the cavalry forces...

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