Pea Ridge Campaign Timeline

Union major general Samuel Ryan Curtis’s Army of the Southwest invaded Arkansas on February 16, 1862, beginning a campaign that would include the largest Civil War battle to take place in the state as Curtis fought Major General Earl Van Dorn’s Confederate Army of the West. The Union army would move within striking distance of the capital at Little Rock (Pulaski County) before a lack of supplies led them to march cross-county to establish a base at Helena (Phillips County) on July 12, 1862, where they were joined by a division out of Missouri commanded by Brigadier General Frederick Steele. The Pea Ridge Campaign, which included all of the operations of the Army of the Southwest, witnessed dozens of confrontations between Union and Confederate troops.

TIMELINE

For additional information:
Akridge, Scott A., and Emmett E. Powers. A Severe and Bloody Fight: The Battle of Whitney’s Lane & Military Occupation of White County, Arkansas, May & June 1862. Searcy, AR: White County Historical Museum, 1996.

Bearss, Edwin C. “The White River Expedition, June 10–July 15, 1862.” Arkansas Historical Quarterly 21 (Winter 1962): 205–262.

Christ, Mark K., ed. Rugged and Sublime: The Civil War in Arkansas. Fayetteville: University of Arkansas Press, 1994.

Schultz, Robert G. The March to the River: From the Battle of Pea Ridge to Helena, Spring 1862. Iowa City: Camp Pope Publishing, 2014.

Shea, William. “The Confederate Defeat at Cache River.” Arkansas Historical Quarterly 52 (Summer 1993): 129–155.

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

Mark K. Christ
Little Rock, Arkansas