McCulloch was necessarily delayed in arraying the disorganized detachments which choked the narrow roads— General Pike with his Choctaws, Cherokees and Creeks, Stand Watie's regiment on foot, D. N. McIntosh's Creeks on foot, Drew's Choctaws, pony-mounted, and a ‘squadron,’ as General Pike named it, of mounted whites —in all only 1,000 men. Gen. Douglas Cooper's Indian command contained Chilly McIntosh, the Creek war chief, and John Jumper, Boudinot, and other celebrated Cherokees, all of whom had come up late on the 6th.
‘It was about 10:30 a. m.,’ says Col. Evander McNair, of the Fourth Arkansas, on the extreme right of Hebert's (Second) brigade, ‘before that brigade, under the lead of McCulloch, was ordered into action.’ The brigade was composed of the Arkansas regiments of Colonel McIntosh, Colonel McNair and Colonel Mitchell, Hebert's Third Louisiana, and McRae's battalion. There were nominally attached to the brigade, Brooks' Arkansas battalion, Good's, Hart's and Provence's Arkansas batteries, Gaines' Texas battery, the Third (Greer's) Texas cavalry, and Whitfield's battalion Texas cavalry. The other brigade, called the First brigade, sometimes led by McIntosh, was commanded by Col. Elkanah Greer, of the Third Texas, and was composed of Churchill's Arkansas rifles, the Second Arkansas regiment, the South Kansas-Texas regiment and three commands of Texas cavalry. Colonel McIntosh usually left the command of his regiment to Lieutenant-Colonel Embry, and forming a brigade of mounted men from the five regiments, led them as cavalry, which was the arm of the service preferred by that dashing soldier. The-colonels of Arkansas regiments, in both of these brigades, had already greatly distinguished themselves.
