The Battle of Cotton Plant (also known as the Battle of Hill's Plantation or the Battle of Cache River) occurred on July 7, 1862, in Woodruff County, Arkansas, during the American Civil War.
During the summer of 1862, Union Maj. Gen. Samuel R. Curtis planned to move his army toward Helena, Arkansas, in search of supplies to replace those that had been promised but never delivered by the US Navy. The Confederates skirmished with Union troops as the Federals marched south along the White River toward the supply flotilla waiting at Clarendon. On July 7, 1862, Confederate Maj. Gen. Thomas C. Hindman ordered Brig. Gen. Albert Rust to stop them at the Cache River. Rust moved too slowly, so the forward elements of his force did not strike until 4 miles south of the river on Parley Hill's plantation near Cotton Plant. The outnumbered Illinois and Wisconsin infantry commanded by Union Col. Charles E. Hovey repulsed repeated, poorly organized attacks by Confederate Col. William H. Parsons's two Texas cavalry regiments. The Confederates fled when Federal reinforcements arrived. On July 8, the 2nd Wisconsin Cavalry, under the command of newly promoted Brig. Gen. Cadwallader C. Washburn, pursued the Confederates to the Cache River, destroying two ferry boats and capturing several prisoners.
Curtis proceeded to Clarendon, only to find that the flotilla had departed the previous day. He turned east toward Helena and occupied it on July 12. Federal forces controlled the town for the duration of the war. Nevertheless, Hindman, despite suffering defeat, remained between Curtis and Little Rock, his objective.
Read more about Battle Of Cotton Plant: Battlefield Today
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“The militancy of men, through all the centuries, has drenched the world with blood, and for these deeds of horror and destruction men have been rewarded with monuments, with great songs and epics. The militancy of women has harmed no human life save the lives of those who fought the battle of righteousness. Time alone will reveal what reward will be allotted to women.”
—Emmeline Pankhurst (1858–1928)
“A battle won is a battle which we will not acknowledge to be lost.”
—Ferdinand Foch (1851–1929)
“The white American man makes the white American woman maybe not superfluous but just a little kind of decoration. Not really important to turning around the wheels of the state. Well the black American woman has never been able to feel that way. No black American man at any time in our history in the United States has been able to feel that he didn’t need that black woman right against him, shoulder to shoulder—in that cotton field, on the auction block, in the ghetto, wherever.”
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“The average parent may, for example, plant an artist or fertilize a ballet dancer and end up with a certified public accountant. We cannot train children along chicken wire to make them grow in the right direction. Tying them to stakes is frowned upon, even in Massachusetts.”
—Ellen Goodman (b. 1941)