Battle of Wilson's Creek

• 1. Desperate at Dawn

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  The Battle of Wilson's Creek began at around 5:00 in the morning on the 10th of August 1861. Union artillery opened fire on Confederate camps near Springfield, Missouri. The man who ordered that attack, Brigadier General Nathaniel Lyon, commanded 5,431 men against an estimated 12,125 enemy troops. He attacked knowing he had no prospect of reinforcements. Many of his soldiers' enlistment terms were about to expire. Lyon had one realistic option left: withdraw east to Rolla, Missouri, and live to fight another day. He rejected it. His army marched out to attack instead, moving through rain in two separate columns. By afternoon, Lyon was dead. He was the first Union general to die in battle during the entire war. His men retreated, and the Confederates held control of southwestern Missouri. The questions Wilson's Creek raises are not just about tactics. They concern what pushed an outnumbered commander to attack rather than retreat. They concern how a confusion over uniform colors shattered half of Lyon's assault. And they concern what the day's outcome meant for a state still deciding where its loyalties lay. That chain of events reaches back to the 20th of April, 1861. On that day, a secessionist mob seized the federal arsenal at Liberty, Missouri, and a border state began sliding toward open war.

• 2. Missouri's Fracture Lines

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  Governor Claiborne Fox Jackson of Missouri publicly stopped short of calling for secession, but his private sympathies lay with the Confederacy. He had secretly obtained two cannons from the Confederate government. His plan was to use the state militia to seize the federal arsenal at St. Louis. The militia companies that gathered at Lindell's Grove formed a camp called Camp Jackson. They numbered close to 900 men under Brigadier General Daniel M. Frost. Most were pro-Confederate.

  Lyon, then a captain in the United States Army, was aware of the plan. According to later accounts, he had scouted the camp in person, disguised as an old blind woman riding in a carriage. On the morning of May 10, he moved against Camp Jackson in converging columns. Frost surrendered under protest. Lyon then paraded the captured militiamen through the streets of St. Louis.

  After an altercation along the parade route, a drunk fired a shot at the soldiers. Some of the German troops in Lyon's force opened fire on the crowd. Three prisoners, two soldiers, and twenty-eight civilians were killed. Roughly seventy-five more were wounded. The episode became known as the Camp Jackson affair, and its political fallout reshaped Missouri's course.

  On May 14, the state legislature passed the military bill, creating the Missouri State Guard, a new militia organized into nine divisions. Sterling Price, a former moderate who had openly objected to Lyon's actions at Camp Jackson, was placed in command with the rank of major general. The divisions ranged from roughly 400 to over 2,000 men, organized by geography rather than by military convention.

  With Missouri tipping toward open conflict, the federal commander William S. Harney negotiated an agreement with Price on May 21. Known as the Price-Harney Truce, it called for cooperation between federal troops and the Missouri State Guard to maintain order. In practice, it required the federal government to remain neutral. Missouri Unionists complained. Harney was relieved of command. Lyon was promoted to brigadier general. On June 11, Lyon and Francis Preston Blair Jr. met with Jackson and Price at the St. Louis Planter's House Hotel. It was a last effort to avoid resumed fighting. Jackson offered to disband the militia if federal troops agreed to stay within the St. Louis metropolitan area. Lyon refused. In a book published in 1886, Colonel Thomas Snead, by then the only surviving witness to those talks, wrote that Lyon's parting words were: "...rather than concede to the State of Missouri for one single instant the right to dictate to my government in any matter however unimportant, I would see you, and you, and you, and you, and every man, woman, and child in the State, dead and buried. This means war." Those words ended the meeting. Lyon had already built a force of five Home Guard regiments in Union service. Four of them were predominantly German. He had authorization to raise five more under Thomas W. Sweeny. Within four days, Union forces captured Jefferson City, the Missouri state capital.

• 3. Lyon's March South

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  Lyon personally routed a portion of the Missouri State Guard at the Battle of Boonville on June 17. Price, Jackson, and the guard withdrew south. Sigel was dispatched to southwestern Missouri but was defeated at the Battle of Carthage on July 5. In late July, a reconvened constitutional convention declared the offices of governor, lieutenant governor, and secretary of state vacant. Hamilton Rowan Gamble was selected as the new provisional governor. The government Jackson led was effectively in exile.

  Lyon consolidated his forces at Springfield. On July 7, he was joined at Clinton, Missouri by Major Samuel D. Sturgis, who brought troops from Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. The combined force reached the Springfield area on July 13. Lyon held his men outside the city until they could be resupplied, as a precaution against looting.

  Confederate Brigadier General Benjamin McCulloch was meanwhile preparing to join Price for an assault on Springfield. McCulloch was cautious. He doubted the reliability of Price's Missouri State Guard. Those doubts deepened after August 2, when Lyon's vanguard routed James S. Rains's forces at the Battle of Dug Springs. Lyon then withdrew to Springfield on August 4, short on supplies, following a council of war. By August 6, the combined Confederate force had encamped at Wilson Creek, ten miles southwest of Springfield.

  Price was told by local civilians on August 8 that Lyon might be withdrawing. He urged McCulloch to strike immediately. McCulloch was reluctant. At a council of war in which Price threatened to attack without McCulloch's cooperation, McCulloch agreed. A Confederate assault was planned for the morning of August 10. Rain on the night of August 9 threatened to dampen the soldiers' gunpowder, making their weapons useless. The Confederates called off the attack and stood down.

  Lyon was naturally aggressive. He chose to attack. At a council of war on the afternoon of August 9, Sigel proposed striking the Confederate camp in a pincer movement. He would lead 1,200 men in a wide flanking maneuver to the south while Lyon's main body struck from the north. Lyon had previously rejected an earlier version of a divided-forces plan from Sigel. This time, over the objections of other officers, Lyon concurred. The Union army marched out late that evening, moving through the dark toward Wilson Creek.

• 4. The Wrong Gray

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  McCulloch's camp had withdrawn its pickets through the night, which allowed Lyon's columns to approach undetected. The first warning of the Union advance came not from sentinels but from foragers. A group of men from James S. Rains's division spotted the Union approach in the pre-dawn dark of August 10. Colonel James Cawthorn, commanding Rains's cavalry, sent out a patrol that made contact with Lyon's force. Around 5:00 am, Union artillery opened fire. When McCulloch received word from Rains, he dismissed it as "another of Rains's scares." An acoustic shadow had kept the sounds of the opening barrage from reaching his position. He did not act until he had seen the evidence himself.

  To the south of the main battlefield, Sigel's flanking column had already struck. Sigel had positioned artillery on a knoll overlooking the farm of Joseph Sharp. Below the knoll, roughly 1,500 cavalry from Confederate, Missouri State Guard, and Arkansas forces were camped. Nearly 2,000 unarmed Missouri militiamen and camp followers were among them. Sigel's artillery fire threw those forces into chaos. Many of the routed cavalry could not be easily rallied. Sigel's main column then forded Wilson Creek and pushed forward. It took up a position on the Wire Road, the main communication and supply line for the Southern forces. By around 8:00 am, the lead cavalry under Eugene Carr had reached the Sharp farmhouse. From there, Sigel's position looked strong.

  Backof's Missouri Light Artillery Battery faced north, away from the most likely direction of attack. The infantry supporting it, part of the 3rd Missouri, was inexperienced. Carr's cavalry was in a wooded area where it could neither see the battery nor come to its aid. McCulloch surveyed Sigel's position and recognized the vulnerability immediately. He directed part of the 3rd Louisiana Infantry Regiment, freshly available after repelling Plummer's force, to move against Sigel. He left Pearce's Arkansas troops on high ground, cautious that another Union column might appear as suddenly as Sigel's had.

  When the 3rd Louisiana appeared in the distance, its appearance matched that of the 1st Iowa, a Union regiment that wore gray. Uniform colors had not been standardized at this point in the war. Sigel's officers assumed the approaching column was friendly. They ordered their men to hold fire. Sigel sent a private down the Wire Road to verify the identity of the advancing troops. The private realized the mistake. He was shot dead by a Louisianan.

  Two Confederate officers advanced up the slope to assess the situation. They found that the 3rd Louisiana was positioned to strike Backof's battery head-on rather than on the flank. As those two men retreated, Bledsoe's Missouri Battery and Reid's Fort Smith Battery opened fire on Sigel's position. Some of Sigel's men believed Confederate forces had no grapeshot. When Reid's battery fired grapeshot, those men assumed Totten's Union battery was shooting at them in error. The confusion held Sigel's men in place.

  The 3rd Louisiana charged. Missouri State Guard troops joined the assault. Lieutenant Colonel Thomas H. Rosser struck the Union left with two infantry regiments. A battalion under Lieutenant Colonel Dandridge McRae, from Pearce's Arkansas force, also joined. Four Union guns were overrun. Sigel's brigade collapsed. His men fled toward Springfield in scattered groups. The dragoons brought one gun with them. A second was captured. Historians William Garrett Piston and Richard Hatcher concluded that Sigel was probably the first able-bodied Union soldier to reach Springfield from the battlefield. With Pearce's troops now free to act, McCulloch directed them toward Lyon's position on Bloody Hill.

• 5. Three Assaults on Bloody Hill

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  An Arkansas artillery unit, the Pulaski Light Battery, opened fire on the Union troops at Bloody Hill. It was commanded by Captain William Woodruff. James Totten, commanding the Union artillery, returned fire. The two men had a history: Totten had trained Woodruff in artillery during the years of peace. Now they were shooting at each other across the same ground.

  Price gathered his Missouri State Guardsmen and prepared to attack. Lyon spent the time until 6:30 am organizing and strengthening his position. The first Confederate push against Bloody Hill was uncoordinated. Price's divisions, under William Y. Slack, John Bullock Clark, Mosby M. Parsons, and James H. McBride, were roughly aligned across the field. McBride's division was drawn largely from the Ozarks. McBride himself was a judge, and his staff were mostly country lawyers. Their movement in the battle accidentally threatened the right flank of the 1st Missouri Infantry Regiment. About 1,000 men under Colonel Richard Weightman, of Rains's division, joined the assault. Lyon deployed the 2nd Kansas Infantry Regiment from reserve. A counterattack involving part of the 1st Kansas helped break the Confederate push. The fighting in this sector died down at around 8:00 am.

  A second assault came shortly before 9:00 am. Lyon's force on the hill was then about 3,500 men with ten cannons. His only reserve was a portion of Plummer's United States Regulars. The 1st Kansas was pressed hard by Weightman's brigade during the second assault. Lyon's horse was shot from under him. He was also wounded in the head and right leg. Despite his injuries, Lyon personally led a counterattack by the 2nd Kansas. He was killed during that assault. Command on Bloody Hill passed to Major Samuel D. Sturgis. Weightman, who had driven the attack against the 1st Kansas, received a mortal wound in the same fighting. A cavalry charge against the Union flank, led by Colonel Elkanah Greer with the South Kansas-Texas Cavalry and Colonel DeRosey Carroll with the 1st Arkansas Cavalry, also failed.

  The third and largest Confederate assault began at around 10:30 am. Roughly 3,000 men took part, including more of Pearce's Arkansas troops than in the earlier attacks. It lasted about 45 minutes. Union artillery played a central role in stopping it. When the assault collapsed, ammunition was running low, particularly in the 2nd Kansas. Sturgis had received no information from Sigel and had no reinforcements to expect. During the lull following the failed third assault, at around 11:30 am, Sturgis ordered a withdrawal. His men pulled back from Bloody Hill. During the retreat, they encountered some of Sigel's dispersed soldiers and learned for the first time what had happened to the southern column. Sturgis's men reached Springfield at around 5:00 pm.

• 6. A Victory Without Pursuit

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  Around 1,317 Union soldiers were killed, wounded, or captured at Wilson's Creek, against an estimated 1,222 Confederate, Missouri State Guard, and Arkansas casualties combined. Nearly a quarter of Lyon's entire force had become casualties. The losses fell hardest on specific units. The 1st Missouri, the 2nd Missouri, and the 1st Kansas each suffered especially heavy Union percentage losses. The 1st Kansas's count of killed and mortally wounded ranked seventh-highest of any Union regiment over the entire war. Among the Southern forces, McCulloch's Confederates and Price's Missouri State Guard suffered far heavier losses than Pearce's Arkansas contingent.

  Price and McCulloch agreed that pursuit was impracticable. Their army was exhausted and short of ammunition. Their working relationship was also fracturing. McCulloch objected to the wording of Price's after-battle report. The report barely mentioned McCulloch's personal role in the battle. It also implied, incorrectly, that Price's Missourians had captured the artillery that the 3rd Louisiana had actually seized. On August 14, Price took back sole command of the Missouri State Guard. Pearce's troops returned to Arkansas. McCulloch returned there as well.

  At Springfield, Sturgis handed command of the retreating Union forces to Sigel. A council of war that evening agreed the army had to fall back to Rolla, beginning early the next morning. Sigel could not get his brigade ready on time, and the departure was delayed by several hours. He drove his men hard through the heat of August 11, but later allowed an unusually long halt so the troops could cook food. Concerns grew among the other officers about inequitable distribution of rations and the preferential treatment of Sigel's brigade in the line of march. Sturgis took command back during the retreat. The Union forces reached Rolla on August 19.

  Price led the Missouri State Guard north in a campaign that culminated in the First Battle of Lexington, which ended on September 20. Frémont concentrated a force far larger than Price's, and the Missouri State Guard withdrew. Union troops retook Springfield in late October. In late October, a rump session of the state legislature met at Neosho, Missouri, without a proper quorum and passed an ordinance of secession. Jackson's government in exile was admitted to the Confederacy as a Confederate state in November. The Unionist provisional government, however, retained actual control of Missouri for the rest of the war.

  By early 1862, Union Major General Samuel Ryan Curtis forced Price out of southwestern Missouri. Confederate Major General Earl Van Dorn took command of the combined Southern forces. He was defeated by Curtis at the Battle of Pea Ridge in Arkansas, a multi-day engagement that ended on the 8th of March. Jackson died in December 1862. In 1864, Price led a major expedition to reclaim Missouri for the Confederacy. It ended in a disastrous Confederate defeat. That was the last major campaign west of the Mississippi River. The war ended in 1865.

  In the 1890s, five Union soldiers who had fought at Wilson's Creek were awarded the Medal of Honor: Lorenzo Immell, John Schofield, Henry Clay Wood, William M. Wherry, and Nicholas Bouquet. The battle was known in the Confederacy as the Battle of Oak Hills; it has sometimes been called the Bull Run of the West. Today the site is preserved as Wilson's Creek National Battlefield, encompassing 1,750 acres. The Ray family home, which served as a Confederate field hospital during the battle, still stands on the grounds. It is one of only two structures from the day of the battle that remain on the park. The American Battlefield Trust has added another 278 acres to the preserved site.