An important mission
•On December 22nd, they were ordered to escort some 23 supply wagons into the hands of General Edmund Kirby Smith. They plodded north toward Arkansas. By January 1, 1864 the rain began to pour and they became bogged down in mud. The rain turned to snow and ice formed an inch and a half. The men had to physically remove the cargo of weapons from the wagons and carry them by hand. At the end of a forty-mile trek in the blinding snow they reached the river on January 5th. They found flat boats and crossed the river and were able to deliver the weapons to the Arkansas Confederates.