Roughshod Through Dixie by Mark Lardas

Author:Mark Lardas
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Roughshod Through Dixie: Grierson’s Raid 1863
ISBN: 9781780963440
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Published: 2011-12-12T16:00:00+00:00

Barteau’s scouts saw the fresher tracks headed north and then east. Hatch had also run his Woodruff gun back and forth, leaving four sets of tracks. Barteau and his men assumed that all the Yankee raiders had doubled back then headed east. Barteau’s command went after Hatch and caught up with the Second Iowa at Palo Alto where it had halted for lunch, eight miles from the road junction, and about five miles northwest of West Point. Barteau ordered a charge.

Hatch deployed his men and gun. A short, sharp action ensued where the firepower of the repeating rifles stopped the charge. Then the lone Woodruff gun joined in. It was the first time many of the militia troops with Barteau had been under artillery fire. They scattered and ran. Hatch took this opportunity to remount his regiment and ride north to Okolona. Over the next two days Hatch’s men rode north with Barteau following and increasing numbers of Confederate troops joining the pursuit. But the Second Iowa outran them all, burning bridges as they crossed, slowing the chase. In going through northern Mississippi swamps, they ran across slaves sent into the swamps with their masters’ horses. Slaves and horses joined the Union cause, and by the time the Second Iowa safely reached La Grange its numbers had been swelled by 200 “contrabands” leading 600 spare horses.

Yet Hatch’s biggest accomplishment was to give Grierson an open road south. The Second Iowa’s repeating rifles convinced Ruggles that Barteau had caught a full cavalry brigade, not merely a regiment. While other Confederate units reported contacts with Grierson on April 21, these were initially dismissed as diversions. Grierson pushed south, keeping to the road for speed until he reached Starkville, at 4:00 pm. There Grierson captured Confederate government mail and supplies, reading the mails and destroying the supplies. He continued south from Starkville, cutting through swamps, riding belly-deep in mud and water for five miles. It was fully dark before they found an island high enough to encamp for the night. They had traveled 25 miles under wretched conditions, and the miserable weather precluded any real chance for sleep that night, but they were now poised to accomplish their main objective.

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