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Companies G and K in
reserve. Haines’ second gun supported Ward’s southward-facing right wing. Warned
by Williams “to keep a sharp lookout for a movement upon his rear and right
flank,” Captain Duncan wheeled the 18th Iowa, his mountain howitzers, and his
cavalry to the right to meet the Choctaws composing Maxey’s left wing.15
Williams’ mounted reconnaissance force rode four hundred yards before it made
contact with Maxey’s labored advance. As the Kansans urged their steeds across
an open field, the bushes in front of them suddenly blossomed with the fire and
smoke of exploding musketry. Dismounted skirmishers from DeMorse’s 29th Texas
Cavalry hit one Union lieutenant and possibly emptied a few other saddles. The
shaken Federals broke to the rear, carrying away the stricken officer. The blue
cavalrymen finally rallied on Major Ward’s right wing, and he posted them to his
right to fill the gap between the 1st Kansas Colored and Duncan’s command.
No sooner had Ward completed these dispositions than he and his black
soldiers became the targets of a vicious crossfire. One thousand yards to the
east, the guns of Hughey and Harris spewed a barrage of shot and shell aimed at
suppressing Federal efforts to resist Maxey. Ensconced on a knoll six to seven
hundred yards from the 1st Kansas Colored, Krumbhaar’s four guns added their
booming voices to the din. Lieutenant William M. Stafford, Krumbhaar’s second in
command, pulled out his watch to note the time. It was 12:00 p.m. The Battle of
Poison Spring had begun.16
The three Rebel batteries concentrated their fire on the center of the 1st
Kansas Colored’s line. Colonel Williams characterized the cannonade as
“incessant and well-directed,” but the former slaves he had trained as soldiers
endured their trial with quiet fortitude. “Although this was much the severest
artillery fire that any of the men had ever before been subjected to,” Major
Ward pointed out, even the greenest recruits “were as cool as veterans and
patiently awaited the onset of the enemy.” Williams estimated the number of
Rebel guns at nine, which told him he was outnumbered. Nevertheless, he resolved
to hold his ground as long as possible, certain that General Steele would hear
the roar of battle and come racing to the rescue. It was a misplaced hope.17
After about thirty minutes, the Confederate artillery slackened its fire as
DeMorse’s brigade neared the 1st Kansas Colored’s right wing. The broken nature
of the ground between DeMorse and the black Federals made long-range shooting a
waste of ammunition, but Colonel Williams was undismayed. He allowed the Texans
to close to one hundred yards and then had the 1st Kansas Colored unleash a
fusillade of “buck and ball.” The Texans raised their rifles in reply,
punctuating their shots with shrill Rebel yells. For fifteen minutes, the
opposing lines blazed away at each other. Many of DeMorse’s men took aim at the
crew of the James rifle to their front. Major Ward later reported that the
Texans “disabled more than half of the gunners” during this phase of the battle.18
The 1st Kansas Colored was renowned for fast and deadly shooting, however,
and its stinging mixture of bullets and buckshot proved too much for DeMorse’s
brigade. Lieutenant Stafford, who had helped move Krumbhaar’s Texas Battery to
within three hundred yards of the 1st Kansas, recalled that “the engagement was
brisk, to use the mildest term-the fire was extraordinarily heavy, and we began
to believe the force against which we were contending was decidedly heavier than
was reported.” General Marmaduke and other Confederate officers present would
claim that they encountered two black regiments at Poison Spring instead of
one-an unintended tribute to the fighting prowess of the 1st Kansas Colored.
An abrupt panic seized DeMorse’s left and center, and those troops fled to
the rear. Cool and quick in a crisis, Captain Krumbhaar immediately instructed
his gunners to load with shell and cut their fuses to explode at two seconds.
Then he gave the command to fire by half battery. Two guns at a time,
Krumbhaar’s artillerists hammered the 1st Kansas Colored with devastatingly
accurate salvoes. Seeing DeMorse’s troopers recoil, the Arkansas and Missouri
batteries “again opened their infernal cross-fires,” as Major Ward put it.
DeMorse’s men observed the effects of this shelling, and they soon heeded the
rallying cries shouted by their brigade commander and his assistant adjutant
general, Captain M. L. Bell.
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