van doren is very lucky to get away in the retreat. he is -- he needs to retreat south and he is on the northern side of the battlefield. the union, doesn't know the roads any better than the confederates -- and van dorn goes around the union flag -- he gets very lucky. -- van dorn writes richmond that if they will leave him and command, he will be willing to go back on the offensive, he would have no problem doing that. the next up is the confederate government is finding out that you can't offend everywhere along 1000-mile front of the confederacy. and arkansas is going to be sacrificed. so, after the battle of p ridge, johnson starts consolidating all the forces, including the confederate forces from the west of the mississippi and so, van dorn and his command are going to march east and cross the river. they will not make it in, time though, for the battle of shiloh. they will get there like, i believe, two or three days after the battle. i would love to have known what would have happened if 10,000 men had crossed the river. -- bu

this is what van doren is going to do. now, one half of this army it's going to be under mccullough, and they're going to meet, and they are going to is going to get to focus solely on mccullough's half of the confederate army. and this is near the town of leaves town, arkansas. mccullough has 18,000. a lot more veterans of wilson creek -- they marched out. mccullough gets killed. his second in command, james mcintosh, gets killed. shortly thereafter -- and basically, everything goes to pieces after that. is that concise enough? the remaining confederates try to stand them off, which included the indians, under albert pike. but they eventually are checked by the arrival of fresh union reinforcements, even though seesaw battle is what i'm saying, and jefferson davis, not f davis, davis, arrives with his division and turns the tides. and so, mccullough's half is defeated. as a side note, i just can't resist putting his picture up here as we go through it. these are -- veterans, confederate veterans, and american indians. tho