Prairie Grove Campaign Timeline

Confederate major general Thomas Hindman’s Army of the Trans-Mississippi was based on the south side of the Arkansas River near Van Buren (Crawford County) in the winter of 1862 while the Union’s Army of the Frontier had two divisions in Missouri and one in northwestern Arkansas. The latter, under Brigadier General James G. Blunt, would attack Brigadier General John S. Marmaduke’s cavalry at Cane Hill (Washington County) in late November. Hindman moved against Blunt in early December, leading the Federal officer to request reinforcements from Springfield, Missouri. This resulted in Brigadier General Francis J. Herron’s Union division making one of the epic forced marches of the Civil War to take part in the December 7 Battle of Prairie Grove. The two Union divisions would later attack Hindman’s troops at Van Buren. The Prairie Grove Campaign was the last concentrated Confederate attempt to invade Missouri through northwestern Arkansas.

For additional information:
Banasik, Michael E. Embattled Arkansas: The Prairie Grove Campaign of 1862. Wilmington, NC: Broadfoot Publishing Company, 1996.

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

DeBlack, Thomas A. With Fire and Sword: Arkansas, 1861–1874. Fayetteville: University of Arkansas Press, 2003.

Montgomery, Don, ed. The Battle of Prairie Grove. Prairie Grove, AR: Prairie Grove Battlefield Historic State Park, 1996.

“The Prairie Grove Campaign: A Sesquicentennial Retrospective.” Special issue, Arkansas Historical Quarterly 71 (Summer 2012).

Sallee, Scott E. “The Battle of Prairie Grove: War in the Ozarks, April ’62–January ’63.” Blue & Gray Magazine 21 (Fall 2004): 6–23, 45–50.

Shea, William L. Fields of Blood: The Prairie Grove Campaign. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2009.

———. War in the West: Pea Ridge and Prairie Grove. Abilene, TX: McWhiney Foundation Press, 2001.

Mark K. Christ
Little Rock, Arkansas