The whole thing about this is that the siege of the Little Rock starting Jan 28th and ending Feb 8th, seem to be a reaction to something and not under the control of the State authority, Seemingly especially Governor Rector. I don't know if Rector was playing some sort of game in his dispatches or if he honestly did not have control over these troops assembling in Little Rock. If we take his dispatches at their word then this was a popular uprising.
If it was a popular uprising then something, an event, a rumor, or something else triggered this. I don't buy the popular explaination that these people were acting just on "War Fever" alone. I think that the people were well aware of why all of a sudden a company of Artillery showed up at the Little Rock Arsenal when it hadn't been necessary for there to have been a garrison there before. Especially arriving on the heels of the News that a black republican candidate who was not even on the ballot in Arkansas had been elected as President of the United States.
But what was this triggering event that caused this exodus to Little Rock in late January 1861?