To Confederate authorities, Union-controlled Helena not only posed a threat
to slavery, but was a military menace as well. Helena functioned as a convenient
supply depot and a staging ground for all sorts of Federal operations in the
Mississippi Valley-ranging from raids throughout eastern Arkansas to Major
General Ulysses S. Grant’s campaign against Vicksburg. Retention of Helena also
furnished the Union army with a toehold for a second attempt at taking Little
Rock and subduing the rest of Arkansas. Constant harassment by Confederate
cavalry and bushwhackers kept the Federals from forgetting that they lived in
hostile territory, and they took appropriate precautions to ensure their hold on
Helena remained unbroken.6
During the first half of 1863, the Union high command’s shifting strategic
priorities caused the size of Helena’s garrison to fluctuate between 1,600 and
10,000 men. With troop levels governed by Grant’s needs downriver, the officers
charged with defending Helena placed their trust in fortifications.7
Nature admirably fitted Helena for defense in depth. Behind the town rose
four tall hills that dominated its western approaches. The two southernmost
hills sloped so steeply that it was impossible to climb to the top of either one
standing up. Principal Musician Andrew F. Sperry of the 33rd Iowa noted that all
four eminences were furrowed “by numerous deep and narrow gorges” choked with
brush, “where in many places a man could walk with difficulty.” At the summit of
each hill, the Federals constructed a square, two-gun redoubt with thick dirt
walls reinforced by sandbags. For simplicity’s sake, Helena’s defenders named
these batteries (from north to south) A, B, C, and D. Black labor gangs and
military fatigue parties toiled through the spring and into the heat of summer
to screen the batteries with lines of rifle pits and primitive abatis. To render
the gorges more difficult to negotiate, soldiers and former slaves filled them
with barriers fashioned from felled timber. The work crews next turned their
attention to the roads leading into Helena. Yankee axes bit into more Southern
trees, and soon broad belts of felled timber blocked most of these routes. With
the countryside west of Helena so rough and hilly, these obstructions offered a
daunting challenge to any foe intent on bringing artillery to bear on the city’s
fortifications.8
Several hundred yards to the east of the hilltop batteries, the Federals
erected their main defensive work on the outskirts of Helena. They called it
Fort Curtis and armed it with two 32-pound and five 24-pound siege guns. A staff
officer from Iowa described the massive earthwork as “a formidable....redoubt
commanding and protecting the rear of the advanced batteries.” The Union army
had no heavy artillery regiments available to station at Helena, but the 33rd
Missouri Infantry underwent training to serve the guns in Batteries A, B, C, and
D and Fort Curtis.9
Work on Helena’s defenses accelerated dramatically once Major General
Benjamin Mayberry Prentiss assumed command of the District of Eastern Arkansas
in February 1863. A Mexican War veteran turned lawyer and politician, Prentiss
had been employed the previous spring leading a division in Grant’s Army of the
Tennessee. When the Confederates surprised Grant’s camps at Shiloh, Tennessee,
on April 6, 1862, Prentiss rallied fragments of his own and other divisions and
conducted a stubborn defense of the celebrated “Hornet’s Nest.” The Rebels
eventually overran Prentiss’ position and took him prisoner, but his gallant,
six-hour stand saved Grant from defeat. Exchanged in October 1862, Prentiss came
to Helena determined never again to be caught off guard by the enemy.10
Although Prentiss’ subordinates cursed him for making them spend so much time
wielding shovels and axes, the sight of their handiwork left them feeling much
safer. “The town is now strongly fortified,” boasted Charles Musser, now a
corporal in the 29th Iowa. “Fifty thousand men could not take this town by
attacking it.” Private George Washington Towne of the 33rd Iowa offered a
slightly more conservative opinion: “I do not believe 20,000 rebels could take
the place . . . so if they want to get well whipped let them come to Helena.”
While Helena’s defenders faced the future with confidence, they resisted the
temptation of lapsing into complacency. “We do not feel much danger,” explained
the 29th Iowa’s Sergeant Ira Seeley. “But vigilance is the price of safety, and
it is proper to be ready, for in an hour that we think not, they may come.” That
hour would arrive ten days after Seeley penned those prophetic sentiments.11
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