"I could have whipped them badly."~~ Gen Cabell (CSA)

                                     THE BATTLE OF FAYETTEVILLE

The northwest portion of Arkansas had mixed allegiances....some favored the south, others the north..The majority of the troops on the opposing sides were from Arkansas, many from the Ozarks, making this engagement a brother against brother or a neighbor against neighbor event.

On April 18, 1863, the Confederate forces of Gen Cabell launched a sudden attack on the Union command of Col Marcus LaRue Harrison. Taking place in the heart of the downtown, it was a Union victory, one of the last major engagements of the Civil War in Northwest Arkansas.

Union and Confederate forces had fought for control of the region in 1862 at the Battles of Pea Ridge, Cane Hill and Prairie Grove. By the spring of 1863, Fayetteville and the surrounding area were in Union hands and Fayetteville had become an important recruiting center for the Northern Army.

Active guerrilla bands continued to plunder and kill in the surrounding mountains; reports coming across the mountains blamed the Union troops. Cabell believed the removal of the Union from Fayetteville was the first step in the Confederate recovery of northwest Arkansas.

After the Battle of Prairie Grove in Dec 1862, the Union moved their wounded to Fayetteville and the seriously injured and sick to Springfield, MO. By March 1863, Fayetteville became a Union outpost. By April of 1863, the 1st Arkansas US Infantry and the 1st Arkansas US Cavalry, around 1,100 men, were in Fayetteville under the command of Col Harrison. Not a pleasing situation for the Confederate Army; the Confederates, under Gen Cabell, decided to remove them.

Leaving his camp at Ozark, a community on the Arkansas River, Gen Cabell moved north on the Mulberry and Frog Bayou Road (the approximate route of today's Pig Trail Scenic Byway east of Fayetteville) on April 16, 1863 with 900 mounted troops and 2 pieces of field artillery. The initial incident took place the night before the battle about 9 miles south of Fayetteville near West Fork. Lt James Ferguson and his men from the Arkansas Cavalry (CSA) discovered a party in a farmhouse with 9 Union soldiers; they were quickly captured.

Although Harrison had sent scouts to monitor mountain crossings, they failed to alert him to the movement of Cabell. Shortly after sunrise, April 18, 1863, Cabell's Confederates attacked Fayetteville, approaching via what is now East Huntsville Road and into the ravine. Cabell deployed his 2 field pieces on the slope of the mountain and formed his men into a north-south line along the lower ridge.

Hearing gunfire, Col Harrison formed his men into a line that ran through the heart of today's downtown Fayetteville. The line centered on the Jonas Tebbett's residence (Headquarters House), an 1858 structure that still stands. The house was Harrison's headquarters and his men took up positions in and around the house and outbuildings, as well as behind shrubbery. The men of the 1st Arkansas US Infantry had not yet received uniforms and Harrison was concerned that they might fall victim to friendly fire and moved them into a sheltered position to the rear of his main line. Most of the fighting fell to the dismounted cavalrymen.

Judge Jonas Tebbetts

Judge Jonas Tebbetts was an outspoken supporter of the Union. He was arrested in March 1862 by General Benjamin McCulloch, CSA, and taken to Fort Smith. Upon the death of McCulloch at the Battle of Pea Ridge, Tebbetts was released. He escaped to Fayetteville where he learned of a price on his head and fled to Missouri. He returned for his family later in the year, which was the last time the family inhabited the home.

Around 9 AM Col James Monroe of the 1st Arkansas Cavalry (CSA) led a mounted charge up Dickson Street against the Union at the Headquarters House and around the intersection of Dickson and College.

Although the Southerners made several charges on the Union line and fired at short range with 2 cannon, they were unable to break through Harrison's line. The fighting shifted to the center of the Union line, where men from the Arkansas Cavalry (CSA) captured the Baxter house but could not dislodge the Union from the Tebbetts house. They captured several Union soldiers and destroyed a small Union supply train in southeast Fayetteville.

At about the same time, 2 companies of dismounted Union cavalry approached the Confederate cannon and opened fire on the gunners. Confederate momentum diminished as Union troops continued to rally with their superior firepower. Realizing he couldn't break the Union lines and running low on ammunition, Gen Cabell ordered a withdrawal. The Confederates withdrew from the city at about 10:00 AM. Lacking sufficient horses, the Union soldiers did not follow.

The charge, described as "gallant and desperate" by Harrison, had been repelled. Confederates had charged into action from both the front and right flank of Harrison's troops. The Southern horsemen found themselves in a deadly crossfire, which cost them their color bearer and Harrison reported that Confederate men and horses were piled "in heaps in front of our ordnance office."
Harrison reported that Union losses included 4 killed, 26 wounded, 4 captured and 35 missing. Of the missing, at least 26 were captured and paroled at a later date by the Confederates. Southern losses in the battle were reported by Cabell to include around 20 killed, 30 wounded and 20 missing.

On April 18, Harrison wrote: “Arkansas is triumphant. The rebels, 2,000 strong, with two 6-pounder guns, attacked Fayetteville at daylight this morning, and, after four hours’ desperate fighting, they were completely routed, and retreated in disorder toward Ozark. General Cabell commanded in person....
Our stores are all safe; not a thing burned or taken from us......
Every officer and man in my command was a hero; no one flinched.”

Gen Cabell, April 18: “…I withdrew with the hope that they would follow me, and fell back slowly, hoping that I could get them out of the houses and rifle-pits, as I could have whipped them badly. They did not follow, nor evince any desire to do so...”

Although credited as a Union victory, the battle was indecisive. The Confederate forces failed to drive the Union from Fayetteville; a week after the battle, the Union abandoned the city. Harrison’s Union troops marched out of town on April 25^th. They did return in September and remained until the end of the war.