D.R. Compton moved his family to from Tennessee to Arkansas during a tumultuous time. After the 1860 election of Abraham Lincoln, pro-slavery southern states began seceding from the United States, even before the new president’s inauguration. By the end of April 1861, eight southern states had joined the rebellious Confederate States of America (CSA), and the first shots fired at Fort Sumter signaled the beginning of the Civil War.

On May 6, 1861, an Arkansas state convention voted to join the Confederacy. Wealthy plantation owners dominated the push for succession, which never had widespread popular support, especially in the northern part of the state. But once the fighting began, most Arkansas citizens, rich and poor, cast their lot with the South.

Even before Arkansas officially seceded, some men in Jackson County began volunteering for the Confederate cause. As in most wars, the first to enlist were young unmarried men, eager for glory and adventure. In April 1861, local volunteers formed a unit called the Jackson Guard. They were quickly sent east of the Mississippi, where the fighting had already commenced. On their arrival in Memphis, Tennessee, the Jackson Guard became Company G of the 1st Arkansas Infantry Regiment. They went on to see action in Virginia, Tennessee, Kentucky, Georgia, Alabama, and North Carolina, but never in their home state.

Back in Jackson County, war fever and rumors were rampant in the spring and summer of 1861. On June 2, news spread that the Union Army had invaded from Missouri and was on the way to Pocahontas, Arkansas, a town 60 miles northeast of the Jackson County seat of Jacksonport. About 3,000 local men grabbed their weapons, boarded steamboats, and set off up the Black River to confront the invaders. On reaching the mouth of the Strawberry River, they learned that the invasion story was a false alarm and turned back.

Throughout 1861, Jackson County citizens remained on edge, fearful that the Yankees might arrive at any moment. Strangers were viewed with suspicion, and everyone was on the lookout for Union spies. In response to the perceived threat, volunteer Home Guards were organized in every Arkansas county. In Augusta, a group of women even drilled and practiced the use of firearms so that they might defend their homes.

We can only speculate how D.R. and Tabitha may have reacted to the unfolding events. In 1861, they were just getting settled in Arkansas. As a family man in his early 30s who did not own slaves, D.R. may have felt that his duty to protect and provide for family far outweighed any obligation to fight for a questionable cause far from home.

Records show that D.R. did eventually serve in two separate Confederate military units. He also may have participated in some of the more spontaneous local actions or Home Guard activities. We can’t know precisely what D.R. experienced, but looking at his regimental histories may give us some idea of his actions. It is worth noting that both times D.R. formally enlisted were immediately preceded by Union Army incursions near his home and intense Confederate recruitment campaigns. It is even harder to imagine what life was like for Tabitha at home trying to provide and care for an infant and toddler while her husband was away fighting. While for most northerners, the war was a distant conflict, in border areas like Northeastern Arkansas, every family was personally impacted by the fighting. Military control of Jackson and Woodruff counties was in contention for much of the war. The lack of consistent civil and military authority created uncertainty and anxiety for local civilians.

As the Confederate and Union armies passed through the area, they frequently relied on local farmers and townspeople to feed both soldiers and horses. In the beginning, the combatants often paid for provisions. But as the war progressed, Confederate paper money devalued, hard currency was scarce, and desperate soldiers resorted to simply taking what they needed. All of Northeastern Arkansas soon became a lawless area with bands of armed men marauding freely and preying on the local population.

The shooting war first arrived in Arkansas in February 1862 when Federal troops under Gen. Samuel R. Curtis entered the northwestern corner of the state pursuing Confederate skirmishers. As Curtis’ army crossed the tableland of Pea Ridge near present-day Avoca, they encountered strong Confederate resistance. The ensuing Battle of Pea Ridge on March 7 and 8 was the first Civil War battle fought entirely on Arkansas soil. The Confederates, led by the impulsive Gen. Earl Van Dorn, were forced into a disorganized retreat. Federal forces also withdrew back to Missouri.In April 1862, Gen. Van Dorn moved the entire Confederate Army under his command out of Arkansas to join the defense of Shiloh, Mississippi. They arrived too late to assist in that famous battle, but their exit left Arkansas completely undefended against the anticipated Union invasion from Missouri. Arkansas Gov. Henry M. Rector protested to Confederate President Jefferson Davis, threatening to pull the state out of the CSA unless the situation was addressed. In response, Davis replaced Van Dorn with Maj. Gen. Thomas C. Hindman, a prominent Helena businessman.

Meanwhile, the long-feared Yankee invasion began on April 29, when Union Gen. Curtis reentered the state with approximately 17,000 soldiers. From that moment until the end of the war, Federal troops would be a continuous presence on Arkansas soil. Curtis marched his troops south to Batesville and across the White River, planning to continue to Little Rock. But, running short of provisions and with his supply line from Missouri stretched thin, he stopped on May 19 at the Red River near Searcy, 40 miles from Little Rock. He then pulled back to Batesville and requested that a flotilla of supplies be sent from Memphis, which had recently come under Union control.

The Federal supply flotilla was shortly dispatched. It traveled down the Mississippi and turned up the White River but was halted by low water near the mouth of the Cache River. Seeing no way to continue, the flotilla reversed course and returned to Memphis. These events would bring the war’s blunt force down hard on Northeastern Arkansas and to the Compton’s very doorsteps.

Following the Union Army’s incursion into Arkansas in the spring of 1862, Confederate Gen. Hindman ordered an intense recruitment effort. He appointed Col. Charles H. Matlock to establish a recruiting headquarters at Camp Cache, about eight miles east of Augusta, near the Cache River. Hindman used a new conscription law enacted by the Confederate Congress that April to pressure able-bodied men like D.R. into “volunteering” for the Southern cause.

In June, while the Union Army was still camped in Batesville awaiting supplies, Confederate Capt. Robert J. Anthony began enlisting men in Company E of the 32nd Arkansas Infantry Regiment. Capt. Anthony was the son of Robert Anthony Sr., the Augusta area farmer who had called for the separation of Woodruff County the previous year. Muster rolls show that D.R. Compton enlisted in Company E on June 18, 1862. He joined along with his brothers-in-law, Benjamin F. Lax and George W. Lax. It was common practice on both sides for family members to join the same regiment.On June 22, still with no supply line established, Gen. Curtis began moving the Union Army from Batesville into Jackson County. They first encamped near Jacksonport, at the confluence of the White and Black rivers about three miles northwest of Newport, the present-day county seat. The Yankees began foraging around the nearby countryside, especially along both banks of the White River, where they met with sporadic resistance from Confederate irregulars.

On June 25, Curtis wrote to his superiors in desperation, “If you cannot send reinforcements and supplies immediately, I may be able to fight my way to Helena.” Within a few days, Curtis began to do just that, departing Jacksonport in late June, hoping to intercept a second supply flotilla sent from Memphis.

For the next two weeks, Curtis marched his frustrated and hungry army down the Jacksonport-Augusta Road, pillaging and foraging along the way. [See Map 5] Historian William L. Shea wrote of the Union advance through Jackson and Woodruff counties:

The Federals gobbled up provisions, freed thousands of slaves (six months before the Emancipation Proclamation), and destroyed an enormous amount of public and private property. “Such scenes cannot be described, but will last with me while times last,” wrote a Federal soldier. “Fields all burned out, houses, barns, cotton gins, and fences burned, and the smoke mingling with the dust darkens the heavens.” Economic devastation, social upheaval, and the collapse of local institutions were the legacy of Curtis’s march across eastern Arkansas. The state felt the impact of “total war” long before it was visited upon Georgia or other parts of the Confederacy.

The Confederate response was equally destructive. Hoping to deprive Federal troops of forage, Gen. Hindman urged citizens along the White River to burn their crops, destroy their food stores, drive away their cattle and hogs and poison their wells.

Throughout late June and early July, D.R.’s regiment cut trees to block roads and fords in the Union army’s path and otherwise harass the Federals without mounting an outright assault. These actions may have been among D.R.’s first wartime activities.

When it became clear that the Yankees’ southern march would not be easily deterred, Hindman dispatched Brig. Gen. Albert Rust to block a ford on the Cache River, the only major obstacle in the Union Army’s path. Gen. Rust took about 5,000 men—five Texas cavalry regiments and three Arkansas infantry regiments—to pursue Gen. Curtis’ Union Army. It is not known which Arkansas regiments were involved, but the 32nd Infantry could have been one of these. Rust failed to reach the Cache in time but caught up with the Federals at Parley Hill’s plantation three miles south of the river and four miles north of the town of Cotton Plant.

The ensuing Battle of Hill’s Plantation (also known as the Battle of Cotton Plant or the Battle of Cache River) took place on July 7, 1862. It was the largest Civil War battle fought in Jackson and Woodruff counties. Not only did Rust fail to stop the Federal advance, but his force suffered 250 casualties, including at least 123 dead. By contrast, the Union side lost six killed and 57 wounded. It was perhaps the most one-sided Union victory in Arkansas.

Afterward, Curtis continued to Clarendon in Monroe County only to find that the second supply flotilla had given up and departed the previous day. Curtis then turned his army east toward Helena. During their trek through Northeastern Arkansas, the Federals freed any enslaved people they encountered, declaring them “contraband of war.” By the time Union Army reached Helena on July 12, they were followed by a contingent of former slaves who set up camps outside the town. The Federals retained control of Helena for the duration of the war. If D.R.’s family was already living in the White River area during these events, they would have been directly in the Union army’s path as it marched from Jacksonport to Claredon. Curtis’s application of “total war,” coupled with Hindman’s harsh response, would have made anything like normal life impossible for them and their neighbors.

D.R.’s 32nd Regiment took part in the Campaign of Northwest Arkansas led by Gen. Hindman, culminating in the Battle of Prairie Grove on December 7, 1862. While the actual battle was a tactical stalemate, Hindman’s failure to recapture Northwest Arkansas resulted in a net loss for the Confederacy. As Hindman’s forces retreated toward Little Rock, Northwest Arkansas was left under Union Army control. After his failure at Prairie Grove, Thomas Hindman was replaced by Gen. Theophilus Holmes as commander of Confederate forces in Arkansas. Most of the Confederate Army encamped near Little Rock that winter and early spring. Many men were furloughed to visit their homes, where they could plant a crop. On May 20, 1863, the 32nd Regiment reassembled at Bayou Meto, 12 miles east of Little Rock, near present-day Jacksonville. On June 1, they marched 90 miles northeast to Jacksonport, bringing D.R. and his fellow soldiers near their homes once again.

Two weeks later, on June 21, the D.R.’s regiment joined Gen. Sterling Price’s army marching 100 miles southeast through swamp country to Helena. There they participated in an attack on the heavily entrenched Union garrison. The Confederates only were able to overrun one fort on Graveyard Hill and failed to capture the town. The battle left 206 casualties on the Union side and 1,636 for the Confederates. The 32nd Regiment alone reported 17 killed, 46 wounded, and 26 missing in Helena.

The Confederate defeat at Helena was soon followed by another at Vicksburg, Mississippi, which left the Union Army in control of the entire Mississippi River supply line, effectively cutting off Arkansas from the eastern Confederate states. From Helena, D.R.’s regiment slogged back toward Little Rock, losing many men along the way to disease and desertion. The 32nd Infantry again encamped at Bayou Meto outside the city on July 23.

D.R.’s regiment participated in the defense of Little Rock beginning on August 23. But the Confederates didn’t put up much of a fight. This was due in part to a simmering feud between two brigadier generals, L.M. Walker and John Marmaduke, that ended in a duel on the morning of September 6. With more than 14,000 Union troops bearing down on the city, the two officers exchanged pistol shots at ten paces. The gunfight left Walker dead and Marmaduke disgraced. With Confederate leadership in such disarray, Little Rock soon fell to Union forces on September 10, 1863. On that date, his muster roll reported that D.R. was “Absent sick left near Little Rock.”

D.R.’s brother-in-law Benjamin Lax, who had risen to the rank of lieutenant in the 32nd Regiment, suffered a much worse fate. He was captured in Little Rock and later died in a Union prison far from home.

For Arkansas Confederates, the loss of Little Rock without much of a fight “…produced intense indignation, resulting in great demoralization, and the men in great numbers abandoned their colors and returned home,” Confederate Brig. Gen. Dandridge McRae wrote years later. “…[the] loss was greater than it would have been had a battle been fought.”

After taking Little Rock, the Union Army dominated most of Northern Arkansas. The Federals now controlled the railroads as well as the rivers, severely limiting Confederate supply lines in the state. Remnants of the 32nd Regiment retreated to Southwestern Arkansas and consolidated with the 30th Infantry Regiment, which continued to fight for the remainder of the war.

It is unlikely, however, that D.R. rejoined his regiment after the defeat at Little Rock. I believe he probably made his way home in the fall of 1863 and stayed there recuperating until the spring or summer of 1864. This is evidenced by the fact that Tabitha gave birth to another child in November of that year.

Fitzhugh’s Woods: “A hard little fight”

While D.R. was at home convalescing after the fall of Little Rock, events once again brought the war to his doorsteps. In the late winter and early spring of 1864, Confederate Brig. Gen. Dandridge McRae began recruiting in the area between the White and Mississippi rivers. McRae was aided by 46 commissioned officers who were left without troops to command after the fall of Little Rock. They sought to press former soldiers like D.R. to rejoin the Confederate Army for attacks against Federal targets such as the railroad between Memphis and Little Rock.

Seeking to disrupt Confederate recruiting efforts, Col. Christopher C. Andrews, commander of the Little Rock Federal Garrison, set out with 186 men of the 3rd Minnesota Regiment on March 30, 1864. They traveled to DeValls Bluff on the White River, where they were joined by 45 horsemen from the 8th Missouri Cavalry. This combined force boarded the steamer Dove and headed upriver, accompanied by the gunboat Covington. Disembarking at Gregory’s Landing south of Augusta around dusk, the Federals marched three miles in rain and darkness to Cache Bayou. They found the Confederate camp there abandoned. On the morning of April 1, Andrews entered Augusta, where he heard that McRae’s main camp was located near the Anthony plantation, about seven miles to the north. Leaving a small detachment to guard the Dove, Andrews headed up the Jacksonport-Augusta Road with 180 men. A few miles up the road, they sighted a small party of mounted Confederate troops who quickly disappeared into the woods. After passing the Rufus King Fitzhugh plantation, they found a Confederate camp that appeared to have been recently abandoned. A few miles further up the road at around 12:30 pm, Andrews halted his men for lunch. In his report, he described the spot as “…rather a wild place some twelve miles above Augusta, near a church, and where the ground was hilly and wooded.”

The church in Andrews report was the old White Church, also mentioned in Gen. McRae’s account of this incident. It was located about a mile east of D.R.’s farm. The “hilly and wooded” ground was where the cemetery was established next to the church. In 1864 it would have held only a handful of graves. Today, the old church building is long gone, but the cemetery still sits on a low hill, the last resting place of more than 500 souls, including D.R. Compton and other family members.

From White Church, Andrews turned back toward Augusta. A few miles down the road, the Federals were suddenly attacked from the east by about 400 Confederate cavalrymen under Col. Thomas W. Freeman and Capt. John Bland. Repelling the attack, Andrews’ men resumed their march toward Augusta. Then, as they skirted an area known as Fitzhugh’s Woods, they were attacked again by an onslaught of almost 600 Confederates as Gen. McRae’s men also joined the fight. At one point, Andrews found his troops nearly encircled. But, the highly disciplined 3rd Minnesota soldiers stood their ground. Though outnumbered three to one, they fended off their attackers in a lengthy firefight that left both sides low on ammunition.

The Federals then returned to Augusta without further opposition. The 3rd Minnesota suffered eight dead and 21 wounded. The Confederates listed losses as 20 to 25 dead or mortally wounded and 60 to 75 wounded. Some of the Confederate dead were buried in the White Church cemetery. One Rebel officer described the action as “a hard little fight,” and another called the 3rd Minnesota, “the hardest lot of men.” The Action at Fitzhugh’s Woods took place just outside the present-day community of Fitzhugh. There are few records of the Confederate soldiers who took part in this action, so we can not know if D.R. was directly involved. Still, he lived nearby and certainly fitted the profile of those Gen. McRae was trying to recruit in the area—former Confederate soldiers who had given up the fight and returned to their homes. Even if he didn’t see action that day, he would soon rejoin the Confederate Army, either voluntarily or under duress.

To War Again: “You shall not remain idle spectators…”

The Action at Fitzhugh’s Woods was a relatively minor skirmish that temporarily disrupted Confederate recruitment in Northeast Arkansas. On May 31, 1864, Brig. Gen. J. O. Shelby assumed command of all Confederate forces north of the Arkansas River and gave his superiors the following bleak assessment:

“I found the entire country overrun with able-bodied men; recruiting officers quarreling or sunk in total apathy; predatory bands of thieves roaming over the country at will, killing some, burning the feet of others, and all hungering with the lust of robbery; one officer refusing to report to another, no organizations, no discipline, no arms, no leader, no desire to fight, no anything.”

Gen. Shelby immediately implemented an aggressive conscription program. His proclamation gave able-bodied men until June 10 to choose a side in the conflict:

“You shall fight for the North or South. I will enlist you in the Confederate army, or I will drive you into the Federal ranks. You shall not remain idle spectators to a drama enacted before your eyes.”

Records indicate that D.R. Compton joined Company F of 46th Regiment Arkansas Infantry, one of a half-dozen units hastily organized in Northeast Arkansas in the spring and summer of 1864. Company F was mustered in Jacksonport by Capt. J.T. Spring. The 46th Regiment operated without formal recognition until July when it was mounted and granted official status under the Confederate Partisan Ranger Act. Col. William O. Coleman led the 46th, but field command was so often delegated to Lt. Col. John W. Crabtree that it also became known as Crabtree’s Regiment.

There are no surviving enlistment or muster rolls for the 46th. The only accounts of this regiment are in battle reports from Price’s Missouri Campaign and parole records for soldiers who surrendered at the end of the war. D.R. Compton’s parole card shows he was a private, age 34, birthplace Virginia, who enlisted in the 46th at Jacksonport. No enlistment date was recorded. However, he probably joined between June and August 1864. The parole record also gives us a physical description of D.R as 5 feet 10½ inches tall with blue eyes, light hair, and a fair complexion.

The 46th Regiment was initially assigned to Col. Thomas H. McCray’s brigade and operated as part of Gen. Shelby’s division in Northeastern Arkansas in the summer of 1864.

On July 25, Gen. Shelby ordered McCray to move south and attack a railroad line near Brownsville, in present-day Lonoke County. The purpose of these attacks was to cut off supplies destined for the Union Army Garrison in Little Rock. In response to McCray’s movements, Union Brig. Gen. Joseph R. West led an expedition from Little Rock to the Little Red River, where they encountered some of McCray’s men at Hickory Plains on August 7 and captured seven prisoners. Shelby reported that McCray had succeeded in tearing up 10 miles of track and burning several railroad trestles.

In late August 1864, the 46th Regiment accompanied Gen. Shelby in a raid against Federal hay cutting operations west of DeValls Bluff in Prairie County. This operation's strategic purpose was to draw Union forces east from Little Rock, providing a diversion for Confederate Gen. Sterling Price to cross the Arkansas River west of the city. Gen. Price was able to make the crossing near Dardanelle on September 7, 1864, on the way to prepare for his Missouri Campaign.

On September 13, the 46th Regiment joined a Confederate force of about 15,000 men assembled in Randolph County near the Arkansas-Missouri border. Under Gen. Price, this army entered Missouri on September 19, 1864. Price’s Missouri Campaign was a strategic and tactical disaster from the start. A quarter of the troops were former soldiers like D.R., who were returning to duty, often under duress. Many were barefooted and lacked the most basic equipment, such as firearms, ammunition, and canteens. To make matters worse, Price and one of his generals, John Marmaduke, were old rivals who often worked at cross purposes during the campaign. Nevertheless, Price hoped that Confederate sympathizers in Missouri would rally to his side. Indeed a few did, including notorious Missouri bushwhackers William Quantrill and Bloody Bill Anderson. But most average Missourians wanted nothing to do with the ill-fated campaign.

At this point in the war, the tide had clearly turned against the Confederates. Price’s forces suffered multiple defeats across Missouri, from Fort Davidson on September 27 to Newtonia on October 28. Confederate casualties were severe, and desertions numerous. When Price finally began to retreat through Kansas and Indian Territory (now Oklahoma), only a few hundred soldiers remained with him.

In retreat, D.R.’s regiment was furloughed to return home with orders to rejoin the army on a prescribed date. A few members of the 46th continued as guerilla fighters raiding Federal supply lines in Eastern Arkansas until the end of the war. But most of D.R.’s fellow soldiers returned home for good.

On November 15, 1864, Union Major Harris S. Greeno filed a scouting report from DeValls Bluff in which he described capturing three deserters from the 46th Regiment. The captives told Greeno that their regiment, commanded by Lt. Col. Crabtree, was marching toward Searcy, where he intended to make his headquarters. Greeno went on to describe the condition of the 46th Regiment as follows:

“There has already returned to Batesville, Jacksonport, and Searcy three regiments, all under Colonel McCray. These regiments are Coleman’s, Crandall’s, and Baber’s. Coleman’s regiment, commanded by Lieutenant-Colonel Crabtree, when all together, numbers about 300 men… but of these two-thirds of the men have deserted, and say they will never go out again. They have thrown away their arms and are nearly all at their homes. They are all greatly demoralized and discouraged; those I saw all agree in the statement that Price’s army was badly whipped at every point, and all greatly demoralized, and large numbers are deserting.”

On December 15, 1864, Lt. Col. Crabtree himself and about 30 of his men were captured by Col. Matterson of the 3rd Minnesota near Augusta. D.R. may have been among these captives since he was listed as a “prisoner of war” on his parole card.

The war completely unraveled for the Confederacy in the spring of 1865, culminating in Gen. Robert E. Lee’s surrender at Appomattox on April 9. Confederate president Jefferson Davis was captured on May 10 in Georgia.

On May 11, the Confederate Army leader in Arkansas, Gen. M. Jefferson Thompson, finally surrendered. The terms stipulated that rebel soldiers residing west of the Cache River should gather at Jacksonport on June 5 to receive their parole.

Before the appointed day, D.R. joined the more than 5,000 Confederate soldiers who assembled in the woods and fields around Jacksonport. The night of June 4, Gen. Thompson walked among the tents and campfires, telling the men to gather at the river the following morning.

On June 5, as a brilliant sun shone down on a Union steamboat, Gen. Thompson appeared on the upper deck to survey the thousands of Rebel soldiers and civilians gathered on the riverbank. Thompson was a tall man, and that day had dressed all in white with a plumed hat and a sword belt at his side. In his rather long oration, Thompson grew visibly angry at the Confederate defeat and lashed out at the shirkers and bushwhackers he knew were mingled in the audience. After several minutes of this, the crowd became agitated and started shouting and threatening him. He roared back, “Attention!” which froze his listeners to silence. In the end, he concluded:

“The Yankees have won, and we must do as they say. You have no choice in the matter. …the general (Federal) officers who have come here to parole and feed you have acted like gentlemen, in good faith… now I want you to go home and take care of your families…”

David Reuben Compton