Confederate Brigadier-General W. L. Cabell departed Ozark, Arkansas with 900 cavalry, intending to retake Fayetteville, Arkansas, which had been occupied by the United States Army after its victory months earlier at the Battle of Prairie Grove. Approaching the town from the south, Cabell's men captured a nine-man Federal picket near West Fork, Arkansas on the night of April 17. The following morning, Cabell lost the element of surprise when his men skirmished with dismounted Federal pickets in east Fayetteville. The Confederates climbed East Mountain and Hughey's Battery opened fire on the garrison with its artillery. Federal Colonel M. La Rue Harrison deployed three companies of the 1st Arkansas Infantry to counter the threat.