Doyle,

You make good points, as always, and perhaps things would have been different had Van Dorn remained in Arkansas, especially since he arrived in Mississippi too late for the climatic battle of Shiloh.

Another viewpoint could be that this was occurring in the first 12 months of a rapidly escalating war. Beauregard had taken virtual control of concentrating troops from various commands in the weeks leading up to Shiloh.

A S Johnson had apparently allowed Beauregard to take such actions. Maybe this is a reflection of Beauregard's experience at 1st Manassas where he saw first hand the value of bringing together separate armies or commands.

Perhaps since A S Johnson had virtually no experience in dealing with such issues this early in the war, he deferred to Beauregard.

It is interesting to note that a similar situation was occurring at that very same time at Richmond. Davis and Lee were stripping the coastal areas of troops and arms to forge a concentration to counter McClellan's huge army moving up the Peninsula against the Southern capitol city.

Over the protests of the North Carolina and South Carolina Governors, most of the veteran troops in those states [particularly North Carolina] were stripped in spite of growing pressure along the sea coast from the enemy.

The N C Governor was left with a few new recruit regiments, but had no means to arm them. Even these new troops were ultimately called to the Richmond concentration, leaving North Carolina virtually undefended.

A fledgling government, with little or no military experience at this unprecedented scale of activity in the Spring of 1862, was overwhelmed with calls for troops, and the guns to arm them. And, faced with huge Northern armies in West Tennessee [Shiloh] and at the very doorsteps of Richmond.[Seven Pines & Seven Days].

Its no wonder that some areas were stripped or ignored, or both, in what was becoming a panic situation rapidly developing in two separate areas of the new Confederacy.

And, the mistake of accepting 12 months regiments was about to make these situations untenable, as their terms of enlistments were expiring in the midst of this chaos.

Most any administration, civilian or military, would be hard pressed under these conditions. And, mistakes were likely to be made, but sheer survival seemed to be the primary motivation at that particular point in time in the war. Kind of like amputation to save the patient.

Were it not for Hindman, the situation in Arkansas could have become irreversible.