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At Monett's Ferry on the 29th, Cloutierville on the 30th, and again at Natchitoches he encountered slight opposition from the enemy's skirmishers. Franklin, marching by the same road, encamped at Natchitoches on the 2d of April. Embarking on his transports as they came, A. J. Smith set out from Cotile Landing on the 2d of April in company with Porter's fleet, and landed at Grand Ecore on the 3d.
Twenty miles above Cotile Landing the Red River divides, and, for sixty miles, until Grand Ecore is reached, the waters flow in two unequal channels; the most southerly of these, along which the road runs, is known as Cane River, or Old Red River.
By two o'clock on the afternoon of April 24th, Beal's men being on the south bank of Cane River, the bridge was taken up and the march continued without further molestation by Cotile and Henderson's Hill, the head of the column resting at night near the Bayou Rapides.
Before leaving Alexandria, Weitzel, on the 14th May, sent two companies of cavalry to reconnoitre a small force of the enemy said to be near Boyce's Bridge on Bayou Cotile. The Confederates were found in some force.
Taylor, quitting his headquarters at Alexandria, called in Polignac's brigade from the line of the Tensas and concentrated his force at Carroll Jones's plantation, on the road between Opelousas and Fort Jesup, distant forty-six miles in a south-southeasterly direction from Natchitoches, twelve miles south from Cotile, and twenty miles southwesterly from Alexandria.
Then Taylor sent Vincent with his regiment and Edgar's battery to watch the crossing of Bayou Jean de Jean and to hold the road by which Banks was expected to advance on Shreveport. Vincent encamped on the high ground known as Henderson's Hill, commanding the junction of the Bayou Rapides and Cotile twenty-three miles above Alexandria.
Two weeks remained until the earliest date set for A. J. Smith to be at Vicksburg; twenty-nine days to the latest day allowed for the taking of Shreveport. In his dilemma Banks decided to run these chances. After seeing the first of the gunboats safely over the falls, on the 26th of March Banks set his column in motion. A. J. Smith marched on Cotile Landing to wait for his boats.
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