[Footnote 809:  (cont.) [Duval to W.H.  Scott, Commanding Post at Clarksville, Ark., July 8, 1863, Confederate Records, p. 133; Steele to Blair, July 10, 1863, Official Records, vol. xxii, part ii, 917; same to same, July 13, 1863, Ibid., 925].]

[Footnote 810:  See Blunt’s official report, dated July 26, 1863 [Ibid., part i, 447-448].]

[Footnote 811:  Anderson, Life of General Stand Watie, 21.]

[Footnote 812:  With respect to the number of white troops engaged on the Federal side there seems some discrepancy between Blunt’s report [Official Records, vol. xxii, part i, 448] and Phisterer’s statistics [Statistical Record, 145].]

[Footnote 813:  See Cooper’s report, dated August 12, 1863 [Official Records, vol. xxii, part i, 457-461].  The following references are to letters that substantiate, in whole or in part, what Cooper said in condemnation of the ammunition:  Duval to Du Bose, dated Camp Prairie Springs, C.N., July 27, 1863 [Confederate Records, chap. 2, no. 268, p. 159]; Steele to Blair, dated Camp Imochiah, August 9, 1863 [Ibid., 185-187; Official Records, vol. xxii, part ii, 961].]

flight across the Canadian; but enough of those more self-contained went thither in an easterly or southeasterly direction so as to create the impression among their enemies that they were retiring to meet the expected reinforcements from Fort Smith.[814]

But the reinforcements were yet far away.  Indeed, it was not until all was over and a day too late that Cabell came up.  A tragic sight confronted him; but his own march had been so dismal, so inauspicious that everything unfortunate that had happened seemed but a part of one huge catastrophe.  He had come by the “old Pacific mail route, the bridges of which, in some places, were still standing in the uninhabited prairies."[815] The forsaken land broke the morale of his men—­they had never been enthusiastic in the cause, some of them were conscripted unionists, forsooth, and they deserted his ranks by the score, by whole companies.  The remnant pushed on and, in the far distance, heard the roaring of the cannon.  Then, coming nearer, they caught a first glimpse of Blunt’s victorious columns; but those columns were already retiring, it being their intention to recross to the Fort Gibson side of the Arkansas.  “Moving over the open, rolling prairies,"[816] Nature’s vast meadows, their numbers seemed great indeed and Cabell made no attempt to pursue or to court further conflict.  The near view of the battle-field dismayed[817] him; for its gruesome records all too surely told him of another Confederate defeat.

[Footnote 814:  Cooper intended to create such an impression [Official Records, vol. xxii, part i, 460] and he did [Schofield to McNeil, July 26, 1863, Ibid., part ii, 399-400].]

[Footnote 815:  Confederate Military History, vol. x, 199.]