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Continued...Part 5

As the 3rd Texas was now under Van Dorn’s Cavalry Corps and the entire command was ordered to Corinth, Mississippi to stop a Yankee advance. Many of the Confederate troops had never been far for home and were still in their late teens. Some of the 3rd Texas boys took a ride on a train for the first time in their lives.

As the army assembled near Corinth disease again began to over take the troops. Some 50 men of the 3rd Texas Cavalry perished from lethal fevers and infections contracted at Corinth. General Beauregard realized that he could not hold Corinth and planned a deception to fool the enemy into thinking he was still there with his army while he was secretly pulling them all out. The 3rd Texas played an important roll in this. Beauregard ordered Van Dorn to mount a demonstration against the enemy to mask the retreat. Van Dorn detached Col. Lane and the 3rd Texas to advance at sunrise toward the enemy’s earthworks and draw out the Yankee skirmishers. With hundreds lying ill, Lane could only muster 246 men. He led this little band on a double-quick several hundred yards though the abatis of felled timber to with in fifty paces of the union Picket line. They were placed in a position to either do or die since retreat would trap them in the labyrinth of the abatis. "Drawing fore from the entrenched Yankee Pickets, the Texans dodged behind whatever cover the ground afforded. Each man took a tree, and after discharging his firearms and reloading from that position, would advance to the next cover and repeat the performance." Lane then ordered a charge, " Screaming like demons, the Texans drove the union pickets out of their holes and into their own earthworks some four hundred yards to the rear."

All day long, Lane’s little detachment held this position against three regiments of the enemy, while Beauregard evacuated Corinth. Before it was finished the 3rd Texas Cavalry lost eight killed and nine wounded. By nightfall Lane ordered his exhausted men hold their position until midnight while Beauregard completed his evacuation. Utterly spent the 3rd Texas Cavalry finally left and walked down the then deserted streets toward Tupelo.

Walter Page Lane was born in Ireland on February 18, 1817. He immigrated to the United States in 1821. Lane came to Texas and fought at the battle of San Jacinto on April 21, 1836 in Henry W. Karne’s cavalry unit.

After the War for Texas Independence, Lane fought the Indians and was wounded in 1838. Lane served in the Mexican war of 1847 as a 1st Lieutenant in Kit Archland’s Texas Ranger Company. Lane was commissioned a Lt. Colonel of the 3rd Texas Cavalry in 1861 and fought with them through 1862. He was later transferred and fought in Louisiana as a brigade commander. He received his commission to Brigadier General as one of the last acts of the Confederate Government. General Lane died in Marshal Texas on January 28, 1892.

By the summer of 1862, the 3rd Texas had only 388 men fit for duty on its rolls. Many of the men suffered from chronic diarrhea. All the surgeon had to offer for any illness was opium. At sick call he would carve out a lump of opium, "as big as a cannon ball" and was then mix down into little pills. These "pills" were given for such thinks as a "hurting in my stomach," "a misery in my head" and "a chill". Whatever the symptoms the cure was the same.

Iuka, Mississippi

On September 5, 1862 the order was given by General Price to move forward. Marching day and night the 3rd Texas Cavalry entered Iuka, Mississippi on September 14th. The 3rd Texas was assigned to Major General Henrys Little’s Division and on September 19th they were ordered to deploy as skirmishes by Brigadier General Price. As they deployed forward they were hit by cannon fire. Captain Will Green of Company I told his men to be steady and at that moment, he was decapitated. As his Lieutenant took command he too was hit and killed by grapeshot. The order was given to charge the Yankee artillery.
" Unhindered, the Yankee cannoneers poured grape shot and canister into the gray masses. Private John Sherrod died instantly and Will Bonner, the regimental color bearer, was cut down a few feet in front of a Federal battery, the Confederate Battle flag sill clutched in his hands. At the head of the charge, Lieutenant Dan Alley pressed on. With sabres, ramrods and gun butts, the attacker grappled fiercely with the enemy artillerymen on the crest of the hill. Most conspicuous on the field was Private Rush Wallace, son of a San Augustine Judge. Hopelessly surrounded at one point in the action, he refused to surrender but fought his way out of the trap and back to his own lines." The Texans sustained their assault and drove the enemy some six hundred yards to the rear. The 3rd Texas lost 33 killed out right, 74 wounded and out of 388, one out of every four fell that day. The then Colonel of the 3rd Texas, Mabry was wounded three times. The Colonel was captured and was offered a chance to sign a letter of exchange. He didn’t like the wording and refused to sign it. He was placed in a Yankee prison camp but later released on an exchange.

General Sterling Price was born in Virginia in 1809. He led a regiment of Missouri troops during the Mexican War in 1847. He was Governor of Missouri from 1853 to 1857. Price was not considered a highly skilled General and though promoted to Major General in 1862, his career was unimpressive. He is credited with defeats at Iuka and Corinth. He did better during the Red River campaigns in 1864.

He lead an unsuccessful cavalry raid into Missouri in 1864 and was turned back. He went into Indian Territory and at the war end, refused to surrender. He exiled himself and some of his command to Mexico immediately after the war. In 1866 he returned to Missouri and died in 1877.