Bob

One thing I think I forgot to mention in all of this is the reason why these companys were at Pine Bluff.

In April 1862 when Van Dorn left Gen. Roane who refused to go with Van Dorn because Roane believed that Arkansas Troops should defend their state. Van Dorn detached Roane and left him in command of all military forces in Arkansas. But he then did not leave Roane any organized body of troops to command.

Roane goes to the Governor of the State Henry M. Rector. This was late April 1862. Rector tells Roane to stop any troops then within the state for the states defence. There were 4 companies of the 12th Texas Cavalry at Pine Bluff at the time waiting on a steamboat to take them to Memphis when their Col Parsons was wait for them with the two companies of the regiment going to join Van Dorn per Van Dorn's orders. The remainer of the 12th Texas Cav. were at Little Rock and Benton heading to Pine Bluff for transportation.

In the mean time about the 1st of May Governor Rector feeling that Union General Samuel Curtis' army was on the way to capture Little Rock, abandons Little Rock and moves the state Government to Hot Springs, Arkansas. So for the first three weeks of May 1862 there was NO military or State Government at Little Rock.

Roane at Pine Bluff enlisted the help of Major General James Yell commander of the Arkansas State Militia and began recruiting for a new Army of the Southwest in the Department of Arkansas. Yell was another "States Defence first" advocate and lent his power to aiding Roane along with Arkansas Confederate State Senator Col. R. Johnson also of Pine Bluff. These three men were the backbone of the newly reconstituting Army of the Trans Mississippi Department. Of Course the companies which became the 26th Arkansas had started the recruiting process before Van Dorn left and had just been organized when Roane moved his Headquarters to Pine Bluff from Little Rock.

Governor Rector in the meantime sent dispatches to President Jefferson Davis threatening to secede from the Confederacy unless he sent some sort of support. Which Davis did in the form of the CSS Gunboat Ponchartrain and Maurepaus. The State Government did not return to Little Rock until the Ponchartrain arrived and a week later Gen T.C. Hindman arrived to take command from Roane, and ordered all troops at Pine Bluff to Little Rock as his first communications in his Copybook of Telegraphs.

So in reality the entire military structure in Arkansas in May 1862 was out of Pine Bluff. So the idea that these organizations did not exist prior to going to Little Rock is a bit of a misconceptions. They were being organized together at Pine Bluff. But Hindman brought his own sence of direction with him when he took overall command the last of May.

I know that this is all clear as mud. But what I am trying to get across is that there was an army being organized prior to Hindman's arrival and issing of these June 1st orders.