Old River Lake was a Civil War engagement fought in Arkansas, 1864. It was a Union victory.
Maj. Gen. A.J. Smith ordered Brig. Gen. Joseph A. Mower to demonstrate against Lake Village. Mower camped near Sunnyside Landing on the evening of June 5 and took up his line of march again the next morning. The skirmishing Confederates fell back to Red Leaf where Col. Colton Greene and his men were encamped. As the Federals advanced, Greene's men, assisted by artillery, fought a delaying action at Ditch Bayou and then withdrew to Parker's landing on Bayou Mason. The Union troops advanced to Lake Village, camped there overnight, and the next day rejoined the flotilla on the Mississippi River at Columbia. The Rebels delayed the Union advance but, eventually, allowed them to continue to their objective: Lake Village.
Fought over two days, June 5 and June 6, 1864, the engagement known as Old River Lake carried several other names as well, including Ditch Bayou, Furlough, and Fish Bayou. This modest clash pitted U.S. Army soldiers against Confederate forces as part of the wider American Civil War. The confrontation began when a Union column pushed into territory held by the Confederacy in Chicot County, Arkansas. Neither side could claim outright victory when the fighting ended, since both accomplished what they set out to do. On the Confederate side, troops managed to slow the Federal advance southward and inflicted heavier losses on their opponents than they suffered themselves. Meanwhile, the Union force still reached its intended destination, Lake Village, continuing its push forward despite the resistance encountered along the way.
Rather than seek a decisive clash, Confederate forces aimed simply to slow the Federal march southward. Their commanders understood a pitched engagement against the larger Union force offered little chance of victory, so they relied instead on hit-and-run tactics, chipping away at enemy numbers through repeated small clashes. This approach served their goal of holding back the Federal push toward Lake Village.
Orders arrived in early June from Maj. Gen. Andrew J. Smith directing Brigadier General Joseph Mower to stage a forceful demonstration revealing Federal aims regarding Lake Village. Acting on this, Mower arranged his men in conventional marching order on the evening of June 5 and into the morning of June 6, then began the advance toward the town. Confederate skirmishers soon appeared, loosing brief volleys before falling back toward cover. These withdrawing Confederates eventually reached the camp of General Colton Greene, where the bulk of his command waited.
With Greene's soldiers and their artillery in support, the Confederates worked to slow the Federal columns before finally breaking off the fight and pulling back to Parker's Landing. Meanwhile, Union forces pressed on into Lake Village, set up camp for the night, and by the following day linked back up with their flotilla on the Mississippi at Columbia. Though the Confederate delaying effort had some effect, it failed to stop the Federal troops from reaching their intended destination.
The clash at Old River Lake produced a set of fourteen numbered accounts, documenting the engagement from various perspectives and voices involved in the action.
This page covers Old River Lake. A full Aubrey report for the area pulls together this battle alongside historic sites, land records, and everything else the record holds within a few miles:
Every location is different. Not every section appears for every place, only what the historical record actually holds turns up in a report.
The account on this page is written by Aubrey Research from cited sources. Wikipedia is cited as a reference; its text is not reproduced.
Aubrey generates in-depth historical research for any location in the US, drawing on NRHP records, battlefield archives, census history and geological data to tell the full story of a place.