1861 August 3rd

August 3 1861 Saturday

Galveston, TX

Confederate Invasion of New Mexico
Wilson’s Creek Campaign

USA. US Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles received approval to consider building the US Navy’s first armoured warships. Welles appointed a commission, known as the Ironclad Board, with three senior naval officers who would choose from several designs that were submitted for consideration. The three men were Captain Joseph Smith USN, Captain Hiram Paulding USN, and Commander Charles Henry Davis USN. The board considered seventeen different designs and chose to support three proposals. The first of the three to be completed, even though she was by far the most radical in design, was invented by Swedish engineer John Ericsson. When launched, it was named the USS Monitor and it represented an entirely new class of warships.

USA. The US War Department authorised the appointment of Brigadier Generals in the Regular Army to head the Adjutant-General’s Department and the Ordnance Department. This move reflected the great increase of work and responsibility required in equipping and governing the growing Army’s administration. James Wolfe Ripley was promoted immediately as Chief of Ordnance but he had been relieved of active duty for reasons of age and incapacity on 23 April 1861, so Henry Knox Craig was nominated to rank from this date while acting as his successor. Lorenzo Thomas remained as Adjutant-General.

California. A Union reconnaissance began from Fort Crook to Round Valley.

Missouri. Incident at McCulla’s Store (McCullah’s Farm). Union forces of Brigadier-General Nathaniel Lyon encountered enemy troops at McCullah’s Farm but the Confederates retired without offering resistance. As Lyon was moving dangerously beyond his base of supply, he decided to retreat back to Springfield.

South Carolina. USS Wabash, Captain Samuel Mercer, recaptured the schooner Mary Alice which had previously been taken by the privateer Dixie, and also captured the blockade-running brig Sarah Starr off Charleston.

Tennessee. Governor Isham G Harris, of Tennessee, proposed to visit the Confederate capital at Richmond, Virginia, to confer with the Confederate authorities about the precarious allegiance of the population in eastern Tennessee.

Galveston, Texas. Union vessels including USS South Carolina engaged Confederate batteries at Galveston after the Confederates had opened fire on a tender. Some stray shells hit the town but it was not deliberately bombarded. The small Confederate Galveston Naval Squadron was commanded by William W Hunter.

Virginia. John La Mountain made his first ascent in a balloon from aboard ship, the USS Fanny at Hampton Roads, in order to observe Confederate batteries on Sewell’s Point.

Virginia. Confederate General Robert Edward Lee arrived in western Virginia and attempted to coordinate the disparate and rival forces of Brigadier-General John Buchanan Floyd, Brigadier-General Henry Alexander Wise, and Brigadier-General William Wing Loring.

Union Organisation

USA: The District of Grafton was established in the Department of the Ohio, comprising the line of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad from Cumberland, Maryland, to Wheeling, Virginia, and the Northwestern Virginia Railroad from Grafton to Parkersburg, Virginia.
USA: Brigadier-General Benjamin Franklin Kelley assumed command of the District of Grafton.

USA: Henry Knox Craig, former Chief of Ordnance Department 10 July 1851 to 23 April 1861, was promoted Brigadier-General USA 3 August 1861.

USA: Lorenzo Thomas was promoted Brigadier-General USA 5 August 1861 to rank from 3 August 1861, Adjutant General of the US Army, succeeding Colonel Catharinus Putnam Buckingham.

USA: James Wolfe Ripley was promoted Brigadier-General USA 10 September 1861 to rank from 3 August 1861, Chief of Ordnance, a post he had held since 23 April 1861.

USA: William Tecumseh Sherman confirmed Brigadier-General USV 3 August 1861 to rank from 17 May 1861.

USA: George Henry Thomas promoted Brigadier-General USV 17 August 1861 to rank from 3 August 1861.

Commander in Chief: President Abraham Lincoln
Vice-President: Hannibal Hamlin
Secretary of War: Simon Cameron
Secretary of the Navy: Gideon Welles

Atlantic Blockading Squadron: Silas Horton Stringham
Gulf Blockading Squadron: William Mervine
Pacific Squadron: John Berrien Montgomery
West Indies Squadron: Garrett J Pendergrast
Western Gunboat Flotilla: John Rodgers
Potomac Flotilla: Thomas Tingey Craven

General–in-Chief: Winfield Scott

Military Division (Department) of the Potomac: George Brinton McClellan

Department of Northeastern Virginia: Irvin McDowell
- Army of the Potomac: Irvin McDowell
Department of Washington: Joseph King Fenno Mansfield

Department of the East: John Ellis Wool

Department of Florida: Harvey Brown

Department of Kentucky: Robert Anderson

Department of the Ohio: William Starke Rosecrans

Cheat Mountain District: Joseph Jones Reynolds
Cheat River District: Charles J Biddle
District of Grafton: Benjamin Franklin Kelley
Army of Occupation: William Starke Rosecrans

Department of the Pacific: Edwin Vose Sumner

District of Oregon: George Wright

Department of Pennsylvania: John Adams Dix

Army of the Shenandoah: Vacant

Department of the Shenandoah: Nathaniel Prentiss Banks

Department of Texas: Vacant

Department of Virginia: Benjamin Franklin Butler

Western Department: John Charles Frémont

District of Ironton: Benjamin Gratz Brown
District of North Missouri: John Pope
Army of the West: Nathaniel Lyon

Confederate Organisation

CSA: Brigadier-General William Joseph Hardee assumed command of Forces in Missouri in the Western Department, succeeding Brigadier-General Benjamin McCulloch.

Commander in Chief: President Jefferson Finis Davis
Vice-President: Alexander Hamilton Stephens
Secretary of War: Leroy Pope Walker
Secretary of the Navy: Stephen Russell Mallory

Military Adviser to the President: Robert Edward Lee

Department No 1: David Emanuel Twiggs

“Forces in New Orleans” “Army of Louisiana”: Braxton Bragg

Department of Fredericksburg: Daniel Harvey Hill

District of Aquia: Daniel Ruggles

Department of Norfolk: Benjamin Huger

Department of North Carolina: Theophilus Hunter Holmes

Defences of North Carolina: Theophilus Hunter Holmes

Department of the Peninsula: John Bankhead Magruder

Army of the Peninsula: John Bankhead Magruder

Department of the Potomac: Joseph Eggleston Johnston

Army of the Potomac: Joseph Eggleston Johnston

Department of South Carolina: Daniel Harvey Hill

Department of Southwestern Virginia: William Wing Loring

Department of Texas: Earl Van Dorn

Defences of Galveston: John Creed Moore

Department of West Florida: Braxton Bragg

“Forces in Pensacola”: Braxton Bragg

Western Department: Leonidas Polk

District of Upper Arkansas: William Joseph Hardee

District of East Tennessee: Felix Kirk Zollicoffer

Defences of Savannah: Alexander Robert Lawton

Indian Territory: Benjamin McCulloch

Forces in Richmond: Thomas Turner Fauntleroy

Army of the Kanawha: Henry Alexander Wise

Army of Liberation: Gideon Johnson Pillow

Army of the Northwest: William Wing Loring

Union Generals

Note: Italics, awaiting confirmation of the commission

Major-General USA

Winfield Scott
George Brinton McClellan
John Charles Frémont

Major-General USV

John Adams Dix
Nathaniel Prentiss Banks
Benjamin Franklin Butler

Brigadier-General USA

John Ellis Wool
William Selby Harney
Edwin Vose Sumner
Joseph King Fenno Mansfield
Irvin McDowell
Robert Anderson
William Starke Rosecrans

Brigadier-General USV

Samuel Peter Heintzelman
David Hunter
Erasmus Darwin Keyes
Andrew Porter
Fitz-John Porter
William Buel Franklin
William Tecumseh Sherman
Charles Pomeroy Stone
Don Carlos Buell
Thomas West Sherman
Nathaniel Lyon
John Pope
George Archibald McCall
William Reading Montgomery
Philip Kearny
Joseph Hooker
John Wolcott Phelps
Ulysses Simpson Grant
Joseph Jones Reynolds
Samuel Ryan Curtis
Charles Smith Hamilton
Darius Nash Couch
Rufus King
Jacob Dolson Cox
Stephen Augustus Hurlbut
Franz Sigel
Robert Cumming Schenck
Benjamin Mayberry Prentiss
Frederick West Lander
Benjamin Franklin Kelley
John Alexander McClernand
Alpheus Starkey Williams
Israel Bush Richardson
James Cooper
James Brewerton Ricketts
Orlando Bolivar Willcox
Michael Corcoran
George Henry Thomas

Brigadier-General USA (Staff)

Montgomery Cunningham Meigs (Quartermaster-General)
Henry Knox Craig
Lorenzo Thomas (Adjutant-General)
James Wolfe Ripley (Ordnance)

Confederate Generals

Note: Italics, awaiting confirmation of the commission

General ACSA

Samuel Cooper
Albert Sidney Johnston
Robert Edward Lee
Joseph Eggleston Johnston
Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard

Major-General PACS

David Emanuel Twiggs
Leonidas Polk

Brigadier-General ACSA

Braxton Bragg

Brigadier-General PACS

Alexander Robert Lawton
Milledge Lake Bonham
Benjamin McCulloch
William Wing Loring
Charles Clark
John Buchanan Floyd
William Henry Talbot Walker
Henry Rootes Jackson
Theophilus Hunter Holmes
Henry Alexander Wise
Earl Van Dorn
William Joseph Hardee
Richard Stoddert Ewell
David Rumph Jones
Benjamin Huger
John Bankhead Magruder
James Longstreet
Edmund Kirby Smith
John Clifford Pemberton
Thomas Jonathan Jackson
Henry Hopkins Sibley
John Henry Winder
Richard Caswell Gatlin
Daniel Smith Donelson
Samuel Read Anderson
Gideon Johnson Pillow
Benjamin Franklin Cheatham
Felix Kirk Zollicoffer
Daniel Harvey Hill
Jones Mitchell Withers
Richard Heron Anderson
Robert Augustus Toombs
Samuel Jones
Arnold Elzey
William Henry Chase Whiting
Jubal Anderson Early