[277] Marmaduke's retreat. The partisan bands which had devastated the former of these two States seem to have likewise disappeared. The last of them, after retiring to Bloomfield, among the impenetrable swamps lining the right bank of the Mississippi, was dislodged from this village on the 27th of January, and then dispersed by a bold stroke on the 3d of February in the vicinity of one of those marshes, called Mingo Swamp. It was only at the end of April that Hindman felt at last the necessity of taking advantage of the mild season to harass his adversaries, who passed their time in trying to amuse him by means of insignificant demonstrations. He was probably in hope of obliging them to send beyond the Mississippi some of the new regiments intended to augment Grant's army; but he did not think it expedient to bring his army into the field, leaving the offensive role to be played by his cavalry alone. Whilst General Cabell, with two thousand men, leaving the Boston Mountains, where he had spent the winter, should advance toward the encampments of the Federal army on the frontier, and endeavor to surprise some of its detachments, Marmaduke, taking an opposite direction, was again to invade Missouri, this time by following the line of marshes along the Mississippi, and carrying fire and sword among the depots located near the great river between St. Louis and Cape Girardeau, the richest section of the State.
Cabell, having only a short distance to travel, is the first to encounter the enemy. On the morning of the 18th of April he arrives suddenly before Fayetteville, a village occupied by Colonel Harrison with two regiments raised in Arkansas, one of cavalry, the other of infantry—less than one thousand men in all. The Confederates penetrate into the town before the Federals have been able to assemble to defend its approaches; the combat opens in the streets, but the assailants, being greatly exposed, sustain serious losses, and when, at last, finding themselves in possession of the houses, they emerge into the open country on the other side, they find the small Federal force re-formed, well posted, and steadily waiting for them. Their first attack is repulsed, and Cabell, dreading, no doubt, the arrival of Union reinforcements, decides upon a speedy retreat. That very evening he disappeared in the direction of the Boston Mountains,
