Pea Ridge Sesquicentennial

Today is the Sesquicentennial of the first day of the battle of Pea Ridge. From March 9 through March 11th, the anniversary will be marked by several special events in Bentonville as well as at the Pea Ridge National Military Park. The events include a cavalry reenactment in Bentonville, firing demonstrations, talks, guided hikes, and a memorial service at the battlefield. For further details, click on the link in this posting.

A Bookstore Find

While perusing the Gardner’s Used Books and Music store in Tulsa, Oklahoma, yesterday, I happened across a booklet titled Proceedings of the Twenty-Fourth Annual Convention Of The Oklahoma State Division of the United Daughters of the Confederacy (1932). Intrigued, I purchased the item for an amazingly low price of $1.95. The Proceedings includes reports from many chapters and lists the officers for the 37 United Daughters of the Confederacy chapters in Oklahoma. Of particular interest to me were items relating to the U. D. C. chapters in Shawnee (where I grew up), in Pryor (where I live now), and Elk City (where my great-grandparents were living). After purchasing it, I discovered that my great-grandmother was listed as the chaplain for the chapter in Elk City. What a surprise to purchase an item that listed one of my ancestors!

The Proceedings mentions a number of projects that these ladies were involved in including some that related to remembering the war in the trans-Mississippi.

For example, Mrs. Helen Mann Gorman, the Oklahoma Division president, wrote a letter to the Division Presidents in Arkansas, Missouri, and Texas that read in part:

“’I had the good fortune to visit the battlefield of Pea Ridge or Elk Horn Tavern—as my father who participated in that battle—always called it. The particular plot where stands the monuments to Generals McColloch [sic] and McIntosh was in a rather neglected condition. The thought came to me would it not be well at some future time for the Divisions of Texas, Arkansas, Missouri and Oklahoma to form an association to see that this historic battlefield is well marked and given perpetual care. Every thing has to have a beginning and perhaps the consumation [sic] of this dream would not be realized in our administrations, but we could sow the tiny seed and the ‘harvest would come later.’”

Did the U.D.C. play an active role in the preservation of the Pea Ridge battlefield? If anyone has the answer, please leave a comment.

Pea Ridge Battlefield Archeology

Today is the 148^th anniversary of the first day of major fighting at Pea Ridge (or Elkhorn Tavern). Recently, while surfing the net I came across a publication written by Carl G. Carlson-Drexler, Douglas D. Scott, and Harold Roeker titled "The Battle Raged...With Terrible Fury": Battlefield Archeology of Pea Ridge National Military Park. This 170 page document was published in 2008 by the Midwest Archeological Center of the National Park Service. To read the report click on this link for the Midwest Archeological Center and then scroll down until you find the title listed above. There is also a lengthy report listed on the MWAC's website about the investigation at the Wilson's Creek battlefield. Battlefield archeology has become an important supplement to the traditional work of researching written sources, and this publication documents a recent survey of parts of the Pea Ridge National Military Park. The publication includes a history of the battle, an explanation of the field survey, a detailed discussion of the artifacts discovered (with photographs included), and an interpretation of the findings. There are also some tables included that detail the weapons carried by various Union and Confederate units at the battle. All in all, it provides fascinating insights into the value of using archeological techniques to document battle actions.

Outstanding book about the battle of Pea Ridge

Shea, William L. and Earl J. Hess. Pea Ridge: Civil War Campaign in the West. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 1992.

If you haven’t read this yet, then you are in for a reading treat! Over the years I have read many, many campaign histories and this is a top-tier book. In many ways, this is the best campaign history that I have ever read. Every time I visit the Pea Ridge National Military Park, I take this book with me with all the maps marked with post-it notes. Did I mention maps? So often you read a campaign history and wish for more maps. This is one of the few campaign histories that I have read that helpfully includes all of the maps that you will need.

Dr. Shea and Dr. Hess walked the battlefield many times; this familiarity with the battlefield’s terrain adds much to their analysis. They focus on Earl Van Dorn, a flamboyant soldier with few organizational skills; he led his Confederate army to disaster. By sharp contrast, his opponent was Samuel Ryan Curtis, a reserved, older gentleman who had all the organizational skills that Van Dorn lacked. Although the book’s treatment of the events leading up to the battle and the battle itself are extremely well done, my attention was most caught by the section that details what happened after the battle. Curtis’s army battled the elements and the terrain to march 500 miles to Helena, Arkansas, in a little more than three months. Much of Van Dorn’s army crossed the Mississippi and went on to fight in campaigns in the western theater.

The Pea Ridge campaign is quite a story, and this book does full justice to its importance. Check it out.

NOTE: William L. Shea’s book Fields of Blood: The Prairie Grove Campaign will be published by the University of North Carolina Press this fall. The release date, according to the University of North Carolina Press’ website, is November 2009. I am counting down the days to publication!

Fayetteville's Confederate Cemetery

Fayetteville, Arkansas, is a town that I enjoy touring. Visiting the main library of the University of Arkansas is a treat as is a visit to the Dickson Street Bookstore; the bookstore has a nice selection of used Civil War books. On one of my visits, I took along Wilson’s Creek, Pea Ridge & Prairie Grove: A Battlefield Guide with a Section on Wire Road by Earl J. Hess, Richard W. Hatcher III, William Garrett Piston, and William L. Shea. Following their directions, I drove into a neighborhood in Fayetteville, up a steep hill, and to the Confederate Cemetery. According to the guidebook, “There are 622 Rebel soldiers buried here—only 121 are known. Several of them died as a result of the battle of Pea Ridge, but records are far too scanty to accurately estimate how many. William Y. Slack, who was mortally wounded on March 7 while leading his Missouri brigade into action near Elkhorn Tavern, is buried here. His remains were removed from their original resting place and reinterred here on May 27, 1880, with his widow, sister, and two sons in attendance. The youngest son had been born six months before Pea Ridge; Slack never saw him.” (p. 249)

Here is a photograph that I took of Slack’s headstone:

The cemetery is a quiet place tucked into a residential neighborhood, and I enjoyed visiting it.