The Battle of Blair's Landing (April 12, 1864) saw a Confederate cavalry-artillery force commanded by Brigadier General Tom Green attack several Union gunboats led by Rear Admiral David Dixon Porter and soldiers in river transports under Brigadier General Thomas Kilby Smith in Red River Parish, Louisiana. Green's force attempted but failed to stop the retreat of Porter's and Smith's forces downstream in an action that was part of the Red River Campaign of the American Civil War. The only significant casualty during the fighting was Green, who was killed by an artillery round.
President Abraham Lincoln and Major General Henry Halleck wanted a Union army to establish a foothold in Texas by way of the Red River. Major General Nathaniel P. Banks, commander of the Department of the Gulf was ordered to organize an expedition in cooperation with Major Generals William T. Sherman and Frederick Steele. While Steele moved south from Little Rock, Arkansas, with 15,000 troops, Banks moved in two columns. A 17,000-strong column ascended Bayou Teche and joined 10,000 men that came up the Red River under Major General Andrew Jackson Smith to occupy Alexandria, Louisiana on March 18. The Red River force was on loan from Sherman and was accompanied by 13 ironclad and 7 light-draft gunboats from Porter's Mississippi River Squadron.
After A. J. Smith's force won two minor actions at Fort DeRussy (March 14) and Henderson's Hill (March 21), Banks' army started marching upriver and reached Natchitoches on April 2. Porter started upriver with 6 gunboats and T. K. Smith's division of the XVII Corps aboard transports. They planned to meet with Banks' army at Springfield Landing, 110 mi (177 km) below Shreveport. However, Major General Richard Taylor drubbed the Union army at the Battle of Mansfield on April 8, forcing Banks to retreat. Reinforced, Taylor attacked Banks again at the Battle of Pleasant Hill on April 9, but was repulsed. Nevertheless, Banks withdrew to Grand Ecore near Natchitoches on the Red River.
On April 7, Porter and T. K. Smith left Grand Ecore and headed upstream on the Red River. Porter commanded the gunboats USS Cricket, USS Chillicothe, USS Fort Hindman, USS Lexington, USS Neosho, and USS Osage, the last two being monitors. There were also several auxiliary vessels. T. K. Smith led 2,500 Union soldiers on 20 river transports. Water level in the river was low, causing the naval vessels to proceed at a slow pace. That day, the expedition reached Campti where it briefly landed a regiment to clear the town and anchored for the night.
On April 8, the expedition reached Coushatta Point where it anchored for the night. Colonel Lyman M. Ward's brigade was sent ahead by land to chase away a Confederate force reported 3 mi (4.8 km) farther ahead at Coushatta Chute. On April 9, the vessels advanced as far as Nine-Mile Bend before anchoring for the evening. On April 10, the expedition reached the mouth of Loggy Bayou near Springfield Landing where they found the Confederates sank the riverboat New Falls City loaded with bricks and mud athwart the channel. While they pondered what to do, a courier arrived from Banks saying his army was defeated and falling back to Grand Ecore. Porter and T. K. Smith decided to obey Banks' verbal instructions to return to Grand Ecore.
The American Civil War (1861–1865) was the deadliest conflict in American history, killing an estimated 620,000 to 750,000 soldiers and an unknown number of civilians. The Confederate States of America, formed by eleven seceding Southern states, faced the Union in four years of warfare across 23 states and territories. Major engagements included First and Second Bull Run, Antietam (the bloodiest single day in American history, September 17, 1862), Chancellorsville, Gettysburg (July 1–3, 1863), Vicksburg (surrendered July 4, 1863), and Sherman's March through Georgia and the Carolinas (1864–1865). President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, transforming the war's stated purpose to include the abolition of slavery and enabling the enlistment of approximately 180,000 Black men in the United States Colored Troops. Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House on April 9, 1865. The war resolved the question of secession and ended American slavery, though Reconstruction would face sustained resistance in its attempt to secure civil rights for formerly enslaved people.
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