Brig. Gen. Henry McCulloch’s men, part of Walker’s Texas Division, had been marching and countermarching, embarking on boats, disembarking, then re-embarking to go back from whence they came, over the course of several weeks. On the last day of May, 1863, they had sent the Yankees scrambling at Perkins’ Landing, and were confident that the bluecoats guarding the Union outposts along the Mississippi River posed no substantive threat. By the time they reached Richmond, Louisiana, they were relieved to have time to rest. In early June 1863, the heat of summer had already arrived, with temperatures into the mid-90s, made worse by the Delta humidity.

Therefore, Gen. Richard Taylor ordered Walker to make a night march, and begin his two-pronged assault on Milliken’s Bend and Young’s Point just before dawn. Walker sent McCulloch’s brigade against Milliken’s Bend, while Brig. Gen. James Hawes was to take Young’s Point. (He didn’t, and came in for severe censure, so we will leave his story behind, for now.) Horace Randal’s brigade would stay in reserve, ready to assist wherever needed.

It was still dark when a detachment of Maj. Isaac F. Harrison’s cavalry came under fire from the Union pickets. The horsemen turned and galloped back through their own lines – and were met with sudden fire from that direction, too. Two horses were killed, but no troopers were injured. They had been fired upon by their own troops.

Once the Confederates regrouped, they moved forward. McCulloch found his advance hampered by a number of hedges and viney ground cover that frequently tripped up his men. Union pickets fired a volley at the first hedge, then retreated, pausing occasionally to try to slow the Rebel advance.

McCulloch’s troops came on, then found themselves confronted by a tall levee that the Union troops – mostly black men – were using as a formidable breastwork. But the Confederate assault barely halted. They charged forward into a vortex of fury. Bayonet met clubbed musket. Some rifle stocks were shattered – leaving only the barrel to be used as a devastating club. Some men who still had a round in their musket fired at point blank range. Men began falling in heaps, and some on both sides seemed to revel in the killing.

The 19th Texas Infantry soon flanked the Union left and began pouring a murderous enfilading fire into the blue line. The 9th Louisiana Infantry, African Descent – the Union unit charged with holding the left – crumbled. Their collapse began a cascading effect all along the Union line, as subsequent regiments found their positions untenable.

(to be continued…)