above Alexandria, which would not ordinarily be before the
month of March.

The two months of January and February were spent in inactivity in the
Department of the Gulf, but frequent communications were held between
the three generals whose forces were to take part in the movement. On
the 1st of March Sherman came to New Orleans to confer with Banks, and
it was then arranged that he should send 10,000 men under a good
commander, who should meet Porter at the mouth of the Red River,
ascend the Black, and strike a hard blow at Harrisonburg, if possible,
and at all events be at Alexandria on the 17th of March. Banks on his
part was to reach there at the same date, marching his army from
Franklin by way of Opelousas, and to conduct his movement on
Shreveport with such celerity as to enable the detachment from
Sherman's corps to get back to the Mississippi in thirty days from the
time they entered the Red River. General Steele was directed by Grant
to move toward Shreveport from Little Rock, a step to which he was
averse, and his movements seem to have had little, if any, effect upon
the fortunes of the expedition. Having finished his business, Sherman
went back at once, resisting the urgent invitation of General Banks,
whose military duties seem to have been somewhat hampered by civil
calls, to remain over the 4th of March and participate in the
inauguration of a civil government for Louisiana, in which the Anvil
Chorus was to be played by all the bands in the Army of the Gulf, the
church bells rung, and cannons fired by electricity.

General Franklin, who was to command the army advancing from Franklin
by Opelousas, did not receive his orders to move till the 10th, which
was too late to reach Alexandria, one hundred and seventy-five miles
away, by the 17th. Moreover, the troops which had been recalled from
the Texas coast, leaving only garrisons at Brownsville and Matagorda,
had just arrived at Berwick Bay and were without transportation; while
the cavalry had not come up from New Orleans. The force got away on
the 13th and 14th and reached Alexandria on the 25th and 26th.

Meanwhile, Sherman, having none but military duties to embarrass him,
was in Vicksburg on the 6th, and at once issued his orders to General
A.J. Smith, who was to command the corps detached up the Red river. On
the 11th Smith was at the mouth of the River, where he met Porter, who
had been there since the 2d, and had with him the following vessels: