Battle of Coffeeville


The Battle of Coffeeville, fought December 5, 1862, was a military engagement of the American Civil War fought near Coffeeville, Mississippi.

Background

By November 1862, Northern Mississippi was securely in the hands of the Union army after key, yet costly, wins at Shiloh, Iuka, and Corinth. General Ulysses S. Grant began the Mississippi Central Railroad Campaign, an overland push into Mississippi with the goal of capturing Vicksburg in conjunction with General William Tecumseh Sherman, who would follow the river route South.
After being defeated at the Battle of Corinth, Major General Earl Van Dorn's Confederate Army of West Tennessee was on the retreat. At the battle of Hatchie's Bridge, Van Dorn successfully evaded the army's capture by the Union. The Confederate army kept falling back through Oxford and then Coffeeville, constantly skirmishing with pursuing Union cavalry, who were ahead of Grant's column.

Order of battle

Abbreviations used

Cavalry, Army of the Tennessee – Col Theophilus Lyle Dickey
BrigadeRegiments and Others
Cavalry
  • 4th Illinois Cavalry: Col Theophilus Lyle Dickey
  • 6th Illinois Cavalry: Col Benjamin Grierson
  • 2nd Iowa Cavalry: Col Edward Hatch
  • 7th Kansas Cavalry: BG Albert Lindley Lee
  • 3rd Michigan Cavalry: Col John Kemp Mizner
  • 5th Ohio Cavalry: Maj Elbridge G. Ricker
Artillery
  • Battery G, 2nd Illinois Light Artillery

    • Confederate

    1st Corps, Army of West Tennessee – MG Mansfield Lovell
    DivisionBrigadeRegiments and Others

    1st Division

    BG Lloyd Tilghman    		1st Brigade

    BG William Edwin Baldwin
    • 8th Kentucky Infantry: Col Hylan B. Lyon
    • 14th Mississippi Infantry: Maj Washington L. Doss
    • 23rd Mississippi Infantry: Ltc Moses McCarley
    • 26th Mississippi Infantry: Maj Tully F. Parker
    1st Division

    BG Lloyd Tilghman    		Cavalry

    Col William Hicks Jackson
    • 7th Tennessee Cavalry
    1st Division

    BG Lloyd Tilghman    		Artillery

    Cpt Culbertson
    • Cumberland Light Artillery, Kentucky : Cpt W. H. Hedden
    2nd Division

    BG Albert Rust    		2nd Brigade

    Col Albert P. Thompson
    • 9th Arkansas Infantry: Col Isaac L. Dunlop
    • 3rd Kentucky Infantry
    UnattachedInfantry
    UnattachedArtillery
    • A section of Co. A and a section of Co. B, Pointe Coupee Artillery: Cpt Alcide Bouanchaud

    The battle

    Outside of Coffeeville, the Confederate command decided to ambush the harassing enemy cavalry. On December 5, under the command of Brigadier General Lloyd Tilghman, the men of Baldwin, Tilghman and Rust's brigades with artillery and support from W. H. Jackson's units, hid on a wooded ridge alongside the Water Valley-Coffeeville Road.
    Around 2:30 pm, the Union Cavalry approached Coffeeville within one mile. When the Cavalry was within 50 yards of the Confederate positions, it was fired upon by artillery, followed by volleys of infantry fire. After a skirmish, the Confederates pushed the Union Cavalry back about three miles to the head of Grant's column. The pursuit halted and the Confederates returned to the ambush site. The Union Cavalry retreated to Water Valley. The fighting lasted from around 4 pm until dark.
    The Battle of Coffeeville brought Grant's Mississippi invasion via Tennessee to a halt. He pulled his army back to Oxford.