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Banks began his movement from Grand Ecore to Pleasant Hill on the 6th, with an estimated force of twenty-five thousand. Though lateral roads existed, his column marched by the main one, and in the following order: Five thousand mounted men led the advance, followed by a large wagon train and much artillery. Infantry succeeded, then more wagons and artillery, then infantry again.
Evidently, these burnings were against the orders of General Banks, who appears to have lost authority over some of his troops. Moreover, in their rapid flight from Grand Ecore to Monette's Ferry, a distance of forty miles, the Federals burned nearly every house on the road. In pursuit, we passed the smoking ruins of homesteads, by which stood weeping women and children.
The admiral brought up his pump boats and after removing the guns got the Eastport afloat on the 21st. As Banks realized that his campaign was ruined, he grew earnest in trying to meet Grant's expectations and orders, requiring him to be on the Mississippi by the first of May. For ten days he had been waiting at Grand Ecore, only to see the last of the fleet pass down in safety.
During the night, General Banks continued his retrograde movement to Grand Ecore, and thence to Alexandria, which he reached on the 27th of April. Here a serious difficulty arose in getting Admiral Porter's fleet which accompanied the expedition, over the rapids, the water having fallen so much since they passed up as to prevent their return.
As anticipated, the enemy left Grand Ecore during the night of the 21st and marched without halting to Cloutierville, thirty-two miles. With Steele's brigade, Wharton drove his rear guard from Natchitoches on the morning of the 22d, capturing some prisoners, and continued the pursuit to the twenty-four-mile ferry.
But representations subsequently received from General Franklin and all the general officers of the 19th corps, as to the condition of their respective commands for immediate active operations against the enemy, caused a suspension of this order, and a conference of the general officers was held in the evening, in which it was determined to retire upon Grand Ecore the following day.
By the 26th, General Banks had assembled his whole army at Alexandria, and pushed forward to Grand Ecore. On the morning of April 6th he moved from Grand Ecore. On the afternoon of the 7th, he advanced and met the enemy near Pleasant Hill, and drove him from the field. On the same afternoon the enemy made a stand eight miles beyond Pleasant Hill, but was again compelled to retreat.
Shortly after leaving Natchitoches the main road, with which the road from Grand Ecore unites, strikes off from the river toward the west to avoid Spanish Lake, and, traversing a barren wilderness, affords neither position nor resting-place until Shreveport is reached.
The nearest point on the river was Blair's Landing, distant sixteen miles from Pleasant Hill by the road and forty-five miles by water above Grand Ecore. Though a good place to fight a battle, Pleasant Hill was not a position that could be held for any length of time, even if there had been an object in holding it.
For this action neither cause nor occasion has ever been made known. Then Banks recalled his own order and published this instead, and on the following day he made Dwight his chief-of-staff, the command of Dwight's brigade falling to Beal. Banks broke camp at Grand Ecore at five o'clock in the afternoon of the 21st of April and turned over the direction and control of the march to Franklin.
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