"Stones in the Wall For Texas" - Panola County, TX Submitted by East Texas Genealogical Society P O Box 6967, Tyler, TX 75711 24 August 2002 Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm ***************************************************************** All documents placed in the USGenWeb Archives remain the property of the contributors, who retain publication rights in accordance with US Copyright Laws and Regulations. In keeping with our policy of providing free information on the Internet, these documents may be used by anyone for their personal research. They may be used by non-commercial entities so long as all notices and submitter information is included. These electronic pages may NOT be reproduced in any format for profit. Any other use, including copying files to other sites, requires permission from the contributors PRIOR to uploading to the other sites. The submitter has given permission to the USGenWeb Archives to store the file permanently for free access. ***************************************************************** Originally published in the East Texas Family Records, Volume 14, Number 2, Winter, 1990, by East Texas Genealogical Society. PANOLA COUNTY - "Stones In The Wall For Texas" by Leila B. LaGrone, Carthage, Texas The Red River Campaign of 1864 was a fierce effort made by the Union Troops to occupy Louisiana and Texas. In April of that year the Battles of Mansfield and Pleasant Hill, Louisiana, caused considerable excitement in northeast Texas. Citizens living in Carthage, thirty miles away as the crow flies, could hear the distant roar of the artillery. General Richard Taylor, a native of Louisiana, was in command of the Rebels; and though the Union Forces had occupied New Orleans, Taylor had been successful in preventing federal occupation of the central and northern parts of the state. When Union re-enforcements began to build up in the New Orleans area, General Nathaniel Banks, Commander, said, "There won't be a Rebel left in either Louisiana or Texas by the end of April." He expected to be in Shreveport by April 10. Taylor meant to fight Banks, but he delayed for a more favorable position; and Rebel re-enforcements were due to arrive within a few days. He had retreated when Banks had sent a probe toward Alexandria. General A. L. Lee, with Banks' Cavalry, moved northward in early March. At the same time, some 10,000 re-enforcements from General Sherman's army at Vicksburg marched westward across Louisiana to join Banks. This action cost Taylor a heavy price; and it struck a fatal blow to the Stone Family. Peter Wynn Stovall Stone, unmarried, youngest son of John Stone of Panola County, Texas, was with the "best artillery battery in Taylor's army", according to David Hawkins. This battery was at Fort De Russy, near Marksville, Louisiana. Banks' Cavalry captured Fort De Russy, taking the personnel prisoners, along with 250 of Taylor's limited Cavalry. Taylor was forced to retreat northward toward Shreveport. The remaining weeks of his life, Peter Stone was to fight a losing battle. He was confined as a Rebel Prisoner of War, March 14, 1864, and was sent to New Orleans Prison Camp March 20. The following eight weeks he spent fighting malnutrition and disease. He had only recently rejoined his company after a 45- day recovery leave from battle wounds, and doubtless he was still in weakened health. With 44 men his company had been stationed at Fort De Russy attempting to halt the approach of 4,000 recruits for the Federal Army. Within a few days, he was sent to the Prison Hospital with pneumonia, and his record shows that he was out of that hospital for only three days when he was sent back with a deadly case of typhoid fever, which had evidently been contracted at the hospital. Finally, he lost the battle, May 29, 1864; and his fate was not known by his family for over [a] hundred years, until this writer made a thorough investigation of the Civil War records. In the meantime, Peter Stone's cousins and friends gathered along the Sabine River to ride to the defense of their very homes. Taylor was in grave need of horsemen, especially after the loss of 250 Cavalrymen to Banks. As the long- prayed-for re-enforcements began arriving, Taylor set his men on the road to Nachitoches; and there the Texans began gathering on the road toward Nacogdoches. As the Union Army advanced, Taylor pulled out of Nachitoches, sending the Texans North to join Mouton and Walker, his two divisional commanders. Then Taylor ordered Tom Green, Commander of the Texas re-enforcements, to send Generals Delray and Major, who had not yet crossed the Sabine with their men, North for Logansport. They were then to cross the river and "lie up at Mansfield", thus avoiding contact with Banks until the most opportune time. Gen. Banks delayed after occupying Nachitoches long enough to hold Loyalist Elections, "while Texans swarmed across the Sabine unhindered by real opposition." Gen. Taylor decided on Mansfield Moss Plantation as the crucial spot for the battle. The Confederates now had about "11,000 men to the Federals 40,000". Some sources debate this figure; but at any rate, the Rebels were badly outnumbered. The companies of men did succeed in stopping the enemy from invading East Texas and North Louisiana. Some of the men who gave their lives and others who carried scars and deformities from that time until death can now be identified. Two Barber Brothers, brothers to Cullen Andrew Barber, were killed; W. M. Corley was placed on the Confederate Roll of Honor for battle conduct; E. T. Crawford was wounded in the battle; Dave McCormack, husband of Sarah E. Leslie, was killed; Joseph N. McNeely, from Ochiltree's Co. C., was killed; William Tell Pou returned home from that battle to learn his family had heard the sounds of firing during the battle; William Ritter, of Co. F., 1Oth Texas Cavalry, was killed; William A. Norman was killed in the battle, after step-son took him 16 miles on a mule to join his unit; Peter Wynn Stone, taken prisoner, then died in Prison Camp at New Orleans; Pinkey F. Taylor was seriously wounded in the Battle of Mansfield. His father-in-law, Richard Golden, took a slave with him to the battle site to bring him home, where he died three days later; Capt. H. A. Wallace, listed on prisoners-of-war rolls was captured at Fort De Russy by the same federal troops that captured Peter Stone. This time he en- listed in 1862. Capt. Wallace lived through the year as a prisoner and was paroled at the end of the war; Robert (Bob) Wyatt was one of the older men in Panola County who, at the age of 47, enlisted specifically to fight in the Battle of Mansfield to stop the Federal approach to East Texas. He lived through the rest of the war; Ebenezer Newton, in Capt. A. W. DeBerry's Company was reported wounded; It is not easy to follow any one company, but at least five companies containing Panola County men were surely at this battle. That day, April 8, all the South was praying for victory; the men were in high spirits. Taylor's appeal to the troops to "Draw first blood in defense of homes and hearths" inflamed them to savages. By mid-morning, scouts swaying in the tips of tall pines along the Stage Road flashed word by mirror that Yankee troops were in view. The Confederates pushed the attack in extremely fierce fighting. A southern reporter wrote, "Through the woods and along the road, our Cavalry and Artillery completely slaughtered them . . . men and horses rolled down in hundreds. The road was red with their blood." The battle was from dawn to dusk. Although the rebels were outnumbered, Taylor was master of the field, losing 1,000 men to federal losses of more than 2,000. Many Texans were killed in Mouton's charge that pierced the Union line, including Mouton, himself. A terrible price was paid for that victory; pensate for the suffering. He said, "Never in war was a more complete victory won. . . . In vain were fresh troops brought in . . . your magnificent line, like a restless wave swept everything before it. . . ." Gen. Banks retreated to Pleasant Hill, ten miles back, and there another battle was fought the next day, April 9. Texas was not invaded from the Red River Campaign. The wounded and dead Rebels were removed to Keatchie where a hospital was set up in Old Keatchie College. The dead were buried in the cemetery nearby, and the gateway marks the desolate spot with the name, "Confederate Memorial Cemetery." Massive trees and underbrush make it almost impossible to locate graves. RESOURCES 1. Brown, Don, "Battle of Mansfield", The Shreveport Times April 10, 1955 2. Hawkins, David, "Battle of Mansfield", The Shreveport Times April 8, 1962 3. Keatchie Confederate Memorial Cemetery, Personal visit and study 4. Mansfield Battleground Park and Museum, Personal study 5. National Archives and Records Service, "Civil War Services Records", Washington, D. C.