General Richard Taylor, C.S.A.
Post-war image of Richard Taylor from the Library of Congress
Major General Richard Taylor was a subordinate of Lt. Gen. Edmund Kirby Smith in the Trans-Mississippi Department of the Confederacy in the spring of 1863, and he would be tasked with trying to break through to relieve Vicksburg from the west. Both generals recognized that it was a futile effort, but as Taylor put it later, “public opinion would condemn us if we did not try to do something.” Thus he chose Walker’s Texas Division to advance against Federal outposts on the River, including Milliken’s Bend and Young’s Point.
Taylor was the brother-in-law of Confederate President Jefferson Davis and the son of former U.S. president Zachary Taylor. As a young man, he had served briefly with his father during the Mexican War. He attended both Harvard and Yale, graduating from the latter in 1845. Before the Civil War, Taylor had been a Louisiana sugar planter for about ten years. In the late 1850s, he served in the state legislature, and was a delegate to the secession convention in 1861.
Taylor quickly joined the Confederate army, and moved up rapidly in rank from a general’s aide to brigadier general in the space of less than six months. In the summer of 1862, he was sent west to command the District of Western Louisiana (comprising the area of the state west of the Mississippi River). Just a few weeks after Walker’s failure at Milliken’s Bend, Taylor shocked the Yankees when he made a surprise raid on Brashear City. Taylor’s most noteworthy effort was to defeat general Nathaniel Banks in the Red River campaign in 1864, thwarting a Union thrust toward Shreveport and Texas.
By 1864, constant disagreements with his superior over strategy resulted in his being reassigned, and he was among the last Confederate generals to surrender his forces, not doing so until May 8, 1865.
He had a variety of positions and jobs after the war, and wrote his memoirs, Destruction and Reconstruction in 1879, the same year he died.
Read more: Dictionary of Louisiana Biography (Louisiana Historical Association); biography at Civil War Trust.
The Texas “greyhounds” drove a mixed bag of Federals, white and black, on banks of the Mississippi before Union gunboats, loaded with reenforcements, came up and shelled the Southerners. The Texans, having to attack in open ground, inflicted over twice as many casualties as they received. Only the gunboats saved the blue coats this day.
Thanks, Scott. I appreciate your comment. This must be in response to my phrase “Walker’s failure at Milliken’s Bend.” To be sure, the Confederate forces overwhelmingly carried the field – at first. And the gunboats were absolutely the deciding factor in preventing annihilation of the Union garrison. But everyone at Milliken’s Bend thought their own side had won, and that their enemy had been soundly defeated. Taylor, in particular, criticized both McCulloch and Walker for failing to take the outpost; certainly, in his view, Walker had failed in his mission.
I talk about this issue in more detail on my post about “Who Won at Milliken’s Bend?” https://www.millikensbend.com/who-won-at-millikens-bend/