Federal official reports.) On the 13th, under cover of
a part of the fleet, the troops debarked at Simmsport, on the
Atchafalaya near the Red, other vessels ascending the latter stream, and
on the 14th, under command of General A.J. Smith, marched to De Russy,
thirty miles, which they reached about 5 P.M. As stated, the work was
incomplete, and had time been given me would have been abandoned.
Attacked in the rear, the garrison surrendered after losing ten killed
and wounded. Byrd's two hundred men were in rifle pits on the river
below, where gunboats, under Commander Phelps, were removing
obstructions in the channel. A number of Byrd's men and a few gunners
escaped to the swamps and rejoined their commands; but we lost a hundred
and eighty-five prisoners, eight heavy guns, and two field pieces. Thus
much for our Red River Gibraltar.

Cut off from direct communication by the sudden appearance of the enemy
on the 12th, the three mounted companies east of the Atchafalaya were
forced to cross at Morgan's Ferry, below Simmsport, and did not rejoin
Walker until the 15th. This officer was thereby left without means of
information; but, judging correctly of the numbers of the enemy by a
personal observation of his transports and fleet, he fell back from his
advanced position to the Boeuf, forty miles, where he was united with
Mouton and Polignac. His division at this time was reduced to some
thirty-three hundred muskets, too weak to make head against A.J. Smith's
column.

On the afternoon of the 15th of March the advanced boats of Porter's
fleet reached Alexandria, whence all stores had been removed; but, by
the mismanagement of a pilot, one steamer was grounded on the falls and
had to be burned.

In the "Report on the Conduct of the War," vol. ii., page 192, Colonel
J.S. Clarke, aide-de-camp to General Banks, states that Banks's army in
this campaign was twenty-eight thousand strong, eighteen thousand under
Franklin, ten thousand under A.J. Smith. General Steele, operating from
Arkansas, reports his force at seven thousand; and the number of
gunboats given is taken from the reports of Admiral Porter to the
Secretary of the Navy.

To meet Porter and A.J. Smith, Major-General Franklin had left the lower
Teche on the 13th for Alexandria, with eighteen thousand men. My entire
force on the south side of Red River consisted of fifty-three hundred
infantry, five hundred horse, and three hundred artillerymen; and
Liddell, on th