The Battle of Sabine Crossroads

The Red River Campaign was just one part of U.S. Grant's grand strategy designed ". . . to hammer continuously; against the armed force of the enemy and his resources, until by mere attrition, if by no other way, there should be nothing left to him but an equal submission with the loyal section of our country to the Constitution and the laws of the land."

In adopting such a plan, Grant hoped that the Confederacy would be overwhelmed by the task of opposing so many Federal thrusts, from so many points of the compass.

The commander given the task of launching a thrust from the southwest was Nathaniel P. Banks, a political general, with an eye on the substantial "cotton lobby" votes that would be available to him once the vast supplies of that southern staple had been "liberated" by his advance into the Louisiana hinterland.

Initially, things went well for Banks and the Federal forces, slowly winding their way up the Red River. It went so well, in fact, that on reaching Natchitoches, he telegraphed Washington with an upbeat assessment of his chances for the future. The telegram read, in part, "I do not fear concentration of the enemy. . ." and went on to state emphatically, "My fear is that they may not be willing to meet us."

Lincoln, on reading Banks' wire, felt the sense of foreboding he had all too often experienced during the three years of military disappointment, which had almost invariably followed from an enthusiastic and over-optimistic prediction. "I am sorry to see this tone of confidence," Lincoln said. "The next news we shall hear from there will be of defeat." Lincoln was a shrewd judge of "bullshit."

Major General Richard Taylor, C.S.A., son of Zachary Taylor, had inherited his father's military instincts, and was about to deliver the first of the reversals to the fortunes of Banks' ambition.

ADVANCE TO CONTACT

From Natchitoches, the Federals pushed up "The Red" facing no other resistance than the odd glimpse of Rebel cavalry patrols. On reaching the settlement of Grand Encore, Banks decided to split his joint Army and Navy force, which had already been depleted by the stationing of an infantry division at Alexandria.

While a portion of his infantry rode the transports with Admiral Porter's warships, Banks led the rest of his troops, together with one thousand wagons, along a single track through deep piney woods, well out of support range of the fleet's two hundred and ten heavy calibre naval guns.

Banks' lack of military instinct had the camp gossips quickly referring to him as "Napoleon P. Banks," or worse still, just plain old "Mr. Banks." The column of troops stretched out to around twenty miles, the cavalry in the lead followed by over three hundred wagons of their train, through which the supporting infantry would need to fight their way through before reaching the mounted troops and eventually the enemy. It may have seemed to Taylor that the Union commander was doing all in his power to throw away any advantages he had.

Yet, despite the inept handling of the Federal troops, the Confederate position was far from ideal. Having withdrawn across almost the entire width of his home state, Taylor was now just over twenty miles short of the Texas border with a numerically superior enemy force to his immediate front and a flanking amphibious one in the process of turning his left. It would still require some bold and decisive action to secure Shreveport.

Since moving out from Grand Encore, Federals riding point found the Confederate position had begun to strengthen. Rebel cavalry were prepared to exchange shots. Their artillery had been in action, and as the Union troopers drew closer to Sabine crossroads, their young commander, Brigadier Albert L. Lee sensed that a challenge was about to be thrown down.

During the afternoon of April 7, 1864, Lee ran into a strong Rebel picket line three miles north of Pleasant Hill, and despite forcing it back, he declined to follow up without infantry support.

The following day, Lee and his horsemen, backed up by Vance's infantry brigade, probed forward and made contact with Taylor's main body around noon. The Rebels, strung out behind a rail fence, just south of the crossroads, had finally stood their ground.

THE BATTLE

Taylor had been one of Jackson's lieutenants during the Valley Campaign, and his old chief would have been proud of the military acumen displayed in the selection of Sabine Crossroads as a battlefield. The enemy had been given its head, in the hope that it would present just such an opening. Like a wild animal, Taylor recognized the weakened position of his quarry, and prepared to take advantage of it.

Four roads crisscrossed the location which partially derived its name from their junction. Across half a mile of open ground lay another crossroad, known locally as Pleasant Grove. Roads leading northeast from both locations eventually joined and provided the only link from the interior of the river and the sanctuary provided by the fleet. The clearing between Sabine Crossroads and Pleasant Grove was one of the few open spaces left between Pleasant Hill and Shreveport. If Taylor was to engage the enemy before he could join with his navy, it seemed that circumstances favored this location.

Placing his cavalry on each flank, Taylor spread his infantry along the tree line, thereby hiding his exact strength and disposition from the enemy. There he waited for much of the day, inviting a reckless Federal assault which would have turned the intervening clearing into a slaughter pen.

Despite the Union advantage in manpower, Taylor's troops were already deployed, whilst the bluejackets still had to shake out into battle formation. The net result was that if the Federals failed to dash themselves against the Confederate line, when the Rebels launched their assault, they would outnumber the enemy at every point of contact.

Who was responsible for launching the Confederate assault is open to conjecture. Taylor, in his report, gave the impression that he had ordered it at a point when he felt the deploying Union line was vulnerable. Lieutenant Edward Cunningham, in command of the Rebel artillery on the field stated emphatically that General Alfred Mouton instigated the assault " . . . without the knowledge or orders of General Taylor," and all present on the field agreed it was Mouton's troops who put a stop to the lonerange skirmishing which both sides had been content with up to 4:00 PM.

Not Open to Debate

What is not open to doubt is the violence with which Mouton's Division hurled itself onto the Federal right. The action of the Louisiana troops acted as a catalyst and the whole Confederate line attacked. In front of Walker's Division, the Yankee cavalry began to give way and the pressure of Mouton's attempts to dislodge the Federal right finally told.

Falling back form one position to another through the woods, Lee's cavalry managed to maintain better order than the supporting infantry. They put up a respectable fighting withdrawal until they ran into the wagon train blocking the road some two miles from the scene of the initial engagement.

From there, things went from bad to worse as the artillery had to be abandoned to the advancing Confederates. The only road was now snarled by panic-stricken teams and abandoned wagons. It appeared that one more strike would seal the fate of the unfortunate Federals, but it was not only Union troops who had been disorganized by the day's events.

The nature of the terrain and disorganizing effects of the assault, not to mention the lure of laden Federal wagons on under-nourished, illequipped Confederates, conspired to rob Taylor of an overwhelming victory. The delay in following up allowed Federal Brigadier General Franklin to place his third division on favorable ground, where he repulsed any further Rebel attempts to exploit the situation. With the approach of darkness, the battle spluttered to a close.

At the beginning of the action on the 8th, Banks appeared to disbelieve his cavalry commander's report that the Confederate main body was blocking the road ahead. Ordering Lee to advance without delay to Mansfield, Banks was taken aback by the young cavalier's quick-tempered reply, "...We could not advance ten minutes without a general engagement, in which we would be most gloriously flogged."

It had taken considerably longer than ten minutes, but the result was very much what Lee had predicted.

More Sabine Crossroads:

The Battle of Sabine Crossroads Wargame Scenario
The Battle of Sabine Crossroads Order of Battle
The Battle of Sabine Crossroads Map

Related:

Battle of Pleasant Hill

This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web.
Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com