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The 1st Kansas Colored had prevailed a second time, but victory against such
odds carried a high price. To Colonel Williams, it looked like half of the men
in Ward’s right wing were dead or wounded, and three of those six companies had
lost all their officers. The black soldiers had also depleted their ammunition,
and they searched the cartridge boxes of slain comrades for a few more rounds.
Over on the left wing, the 2nd Indiana’s other gun had expended all its
projectiles except solid shot, which was of limited use against enemy
personnel-especially at close range. Williams directed Lieutenant Haines to
retire both of his James rifles and report to Captain Duncan at the rear of the
train.
As Williams fretted over the weakened state of the 1st Kansas Colored, the
Confederates brought up reinforcements for a third attack. Two sharp repulses
had shown General Maxey that he required more weight to make any headway against
such stubborn opposition. He was also tired of not receiving stronger support
from the other friendly units on the field. Asserting his status as senior
Confederate commander, Maxey summoned Greene’s Missouri brigade to fall in on
DeMorse’s right and strike the 1st Kansas Colored’s center during the next
advance.
Watching the approach of Greene’s Missourians, Colonel Williams knew that the
1st Kansas Colored was in no shape to beat off another heavy thrust. He shouted
to Major Ward to hold the 1st Kansas in place while he rode to the rear to
redeploy the 18th Iowa to cover the black regiment’s retreat. Just as Williams
applied spurs to his horse, a Confederate bullet slammed into the animal, and it
crumpled to the ground. Major Ward offered the colonel his own mount, and
Williams galloped off on his urgent errand. Before Williams could reposition the
18th Iowa, however, a massive gray wave swamped the decimated 1st Kansas
Colored.
The third Confederate attack at Poison Spring was a model of tactical
coordination. First, DeMorse’s Texans tramped forward to trade volleys with
Ward’s right wing. Minutes later, Greene’s Missourians threw themselves at the
Federals. “The left and center were hotly pressed,” Greene commented, “when I
advanced at the double-quick with loud cheers, passed the line, delivered
several well-directed volleys, and charged the enemy through burning woods and
dense smoke.” A grateful Colonel DeMorse testified that the Missourians joined
the fight “in the very moment when most effective.” With DeMorse and Greene
warmly engaged, Maxey sent word to General Cabell to drive west along the
Camden-Washington Road with his Arkansas division. As Maxey’s battle plan came
together, he noted happily: “The whole line moved forward like a sheet of living
fire carrying death and destruction before it.”22
The 1st Kansas Colored had no hope of withstanding the combined power of four
brigades. The first elements of the regiment to give way were the two leftmost
companies, C and I, stationed north of the Camden-Washington Road. Lieutenant
William C. Gibbons, Ward’s adjutant, sensed these companies were about to be
outflanked by Cabell’s Arkansans and pulled them back to the head of the forage
train. This move exposed the rest of the 1st Kansas Colored’s left flank even as
the regiment sustained increasing pressure all along its front. Major Ward
ordered the eight companies still under his control to retire on the train. At
the same time, he changed front to the left to refuse his vulnerable flank.
Ward tried to make a stand in front of the train, but the momentum had
shifted to the Confederates. DeMorse’s Texans pounced on Ward’s right flank and
raked the 1st Kansas with a telling enfilade fire. The Rebels drove the Federals
through the train with heavy loss. As they swirled around clumps of fallen
blacks, some Arkansans paused to see if any were still breathing. “If the negro
was wounded,” recounted one of Cabell’s troopers, “our men would shoot him dead
as they passed.” Lieutenant Stafford of Krumbhaar’s battery witnessed the same
behavior among DeMorse’s Texans. “No black prisoners were taken,” he recorded in
his journal. One wounded African American refused to die meekly and sank his
teeth into a Rebel’s calf until someone crushed his skull with a rifle butt.
Catching glimpses of these atrocities, uninjured 1st Kansas personnel began
leaving the firing line to help wounded comrades to the rear, which undercut
Major Ward’s efforts to maintain resistance. Other black soldiers lost their
nerve entirely and bolted.23
At length, Ward bade the 1st Kansas to quit the train and regroup behind
Captain Duncan’s 18th Iowa Infantry, which had taken shelter among the buildings
and fences of Lee’s plantation. Williams, Ward, and other 1st Kansas officers
rallied a portion of their men and formed a ragged line on the 18th Iowa’s left,
but nothing could stem the Rebel tide. Bellowing “Here’s your mule!” and raising
cheers for Missouri, Greene’s brigade bulled forward and evicted the Federals
from the plantation grounds. The Iowans reformed in the thick brush beyond the
Lee place, but the Missourians charged and bludgeoned them back again. This
scene repeated itself five more times as the 18th Iowa would retreat a short
distance and then turn around to pepper the Confederates with musketry. In this
way, Duncan delayed his opponents for more than an hour. The 18th Iowa might
have been cut off and annihilated had Tandy Walker kept a tighter rein on his
Choc-taws. Rather than pursue the beaten Federals, the Indians raced toward the abandoned forage wagons in a mad scramble for food and plunder.
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