1st Arkansas Infantry ( Union ) The 1st Regiment Arkansas Volunteer Infantry ( 1863 – 1865 ) was an infantry regiment that served in the Union Army during the American Civil War . Although Arkansas joined the Confederate States of America in 1861 , not all of its citizens supported secession . Arkansas formed some 48 infantry regiments to serve in the Confederate Army , but also formed another 11 regiments that served in the Union Army . Organization . Because it was utterly impossible to form a Union unit in Arkansas in the first two years of the war , most Union supporters traveled elsewhere to join . However , by 1863 Union forces were knocking at the door of Arkansas , and many Arkansans still loyal to the Union flocked to them to join . As early as the summer of 1862 bands of Union men similar to that relieved by Captain Parker had , in various potions of western Arkansas , consorted together , and , though compelled oppression and violence to leave their homes , were accustomed to take refuge among the hills and in the woods , and no extent of persecution succeeded in driving them from the State . Commonly known as " Mountain Feds , " they were true to the Union under the most discouraging circumstances , and from time to time save valuable assistance to the organized forces operating in various portions of the State . Many of them entered various Arkansas regiments , including the 1st Arkansas Infantry . In November , 1862 , Major General Schofield , then commanding the " Army of the Frontier , " gave authority to Dr . James M . Johnson , of Huntsville , Madison County , Arkansas , to raise infantry troops from the State . This authority initially included only one regiment . Early in the war Dr . Johnson ' s displayed Union sentiments by April , 1862 he was no longer able to remain at home in safety . He left Huntsville with future Arkansas Governor Isaac Murphy and traveled to the outpost of the Army of the Southwest at Keutsville , Missouri . He promptly reported to General Curtis , then in command and was placed on Curtis staff as a volunteer aid . Subsequently he rendered services to Generals Schofield , Totten , and Herron , and accompanied the " Army of the Frontier , ' on its march into northwestern Arkansas , in October 1862 , under the command of General Schofield . Returning with this army to Elkhorn Tavern , he received the authority to raise the 1st Arkansas and marched with the army in the campaign that terminted in the Battle of Prairie Grove . Following the battle , he opened a recruiting office at Fayetteville for the 1st Arkansas infantry volunteers . Recruiting proceeded and on the 25th day of March , 1863 , the regiment was organized and Dr . Johnson was enlisted into the service as its colonel . The 1st Arkansas Infantry was organized at Fayetteville , Ark . , and mustered in March 25 , 1863 . At the time of the muster in this regiment , it numbered thirty - six commissioned officers and eight hundred enlisted men , recruited in the previous sixty days in Madison , Washington , Newton , Benton , Searcy , and Crawford counties . The greatest aggregate was in November , 1863 totalling nine hundred and seventy - nine , ( 979 ) officers and men ; the lowest strength was in March , 1865 , when the regiment reported on ly seven hundred and seventy - four , ( 774 ) present aggregate , seven hundred and eighty - eight , ( 788 , ) thirty - one ( 31 ) commissioned officers and seven hundred amid fifty - seven ( 757 ) enlisted men . The 1st Arkansas Infantry was attached to District Southwest Missouri , Dept . Missouri to December , 1863 . The 1st Arkansas was attached to 2nd Brigade , District of the Frontier , Dept . Missouri , to January , 1864 . The regiment was attached to 2nd Brigade , District of the Frontier , 7th Army Crops , Dept . of Arkansas , to March , 1864 . The regiment was attached to 1st Brigade , District of the Frontier , 7th Army Corps , to February , 1865 . 1st Brigade , 3rd Division , 7th Army Corps , to August , 1865 . Service . The regiment participated in the Battle of Fayetteville , under the immediate command of Lieutenant Colonel E . J . Searle and Major E . D . Ham , on the 18th day of April , 1863 . The regiment marched to Springfield , Mo . , April 25 - May 4 , and was on duty there till July . On the 6th day of July it was ordered to Cassville , Missouri , where it shortly afterwards arrived , and on the 17th day of August joined the Army of the Frontier , under command of Major General Blunt Fort Gibson , Cherokee Nation , pursued the rebels under Cooper and Stanwatie to Perryville , in the Choctaw Nation . The regiment was in the skirmish at Perryville August 26 and the Battle of Devil ' s Back Bone , Back Bone Mountain , Fort Smith , September 1 . The regiment participated in the capture of Fort Smith September 1 , was the first regiment to enter the garrison , and remained on duty there till March , 1864 . In September , 1863 it became known at Fort Smith that several hundred union men had gathered together from the surrounding country , upon and near the Magazine mountain , they were hiding for security , and though generally having arms of their own were in much need of ammunition . To relieve them , Captain William C . Parker of the 1st Arkansas infantry was directed to proceed , with sixty men , to their location which he did accomplishing the object for which he was sent . On his return , while crossing Haguewood prairie , in Franklin county , Captain Parker was suddenly confronted by Confederate General Shelby ' s command , then moving northward on a raid into Missouri . A stubborn fight ensued , Captain Parker slowly falling back until he reached the timber , where the unequal contest was still carried on until , finding himself nearly surrounded , Captain Parker directed his men to escape as best they could . In this encounter Captain Parker lost twenty - two men killed and taken prisoners , but killing and wounding nearly the same number of the enemy . Captain Parker himself succeeded with the rest of his men in arriving safely at Fort Smith , when measures being taken by Colonel Johnson to advise Colonel Harrison , then commanding at Fayetteville , of Shelby ' s march northward , the intelligence was quickly circulated through southwester Missouri , and Shelby ' s movement was in a great measure frustrated . The regiment participated in the skirminsh at Moffatt ' s Station , Franklin County , September 27 , 1863 . On the 30th of October , 1863 , while this regiment was on duty at Fort Smith , a mass meeting of Union men was held at that place , for the purpose of inaugurating measures that should lead to the restoration of civil government in the State , at which Colonel Johnson was nominated to represent the people of western Arkansas in the Congress of the United States . In November he was elected , and again in October , 1865 , for the third congressional district . Though thus a member elect of , the 38th and 39th Congresses , and necessarily called away from his regiment in his efforts to secure the recognition of the State government by Congress , he served with the regiment when not thus occupied . In November , 1863 , while this regiment was stationed at Fort Smith , about three hundred of its men were vaccinated with spurious vaccine matter , a large number of whom were permanently disabled , and many others , whose disability unfitted them for duty , it became necessary to discharge . The regiment participated in the skirminsh at Mt . Ida November 13 . The regiment participated in the scout from Waldron to Mt . Ida , Caddo Gap and Dallas December 2 – 7 . Union supporters were never entirely driven from Newton county and through their resistance , which was specially organized and directed by James R . Vanderpool , of that county , captain of company C , lst Arkansas infantry , rebel conscription therein was in a great measure defeated . In Yell county , William J . Heffington , well known in western Arkansas as “ Wild Bill , " maintained himself with a band of these men for months , when the surrounding country was held by the enemy , and repeated efforts were made by Confederate forces to capture him . Afterwards reporting to Colonel Johnson with a number of his men , who were organized into a company , with himself as captain , he again moved southward of the Boston mountains , and crossing the Arkansas river , was preparing to conduct other citizens to the federal lines , when he heard of the abandonment of northwestern Arkansas by the Union forces in April , 1863 and determined to remain in the State . This he did until the August 1863 , when he was killed by guerillas , near the Arkansas river . Captain Heffington hd been going northward to procure relief for a large number of the Union men who banded together in the vicinity of the Magazine , Short , and Petit Jean mountains . After the death of Heffington these men still held together , and on the occupation of Fort Smith and Little Rock by the Union forces , in the September 1863 most of them enlisted in various Arkansas regiments , including 1st Arknasas infantry . The regiment remained at Waldron until February , 1864 , when it was again ordered to report at Fort Smith , to take part in the movement southward , under Brigadier General Thayer as part of General Steele ' s Expedition to Camden , March 23 - May 3 , 1864 The regiment left Fort Smith with the Frontier Fivision on the 24th day of March , 1864 , forming part of the first brigade , under Colonel John Edwards participated in the battle of Moscow , losing three men killed and several wounded . The regiment entered Camden on the 16th day of April , 1864 . The regiment participated in the Battle of Prairie D ' Ane April 9 – 13 . The regiment participated in the Battle of Moscow April 13 . The regiment participated in the Siege of Camden , April 15 – 18 . The Regiment was engaged in a reconnaissance of the enemy after the battle of Poisoned Springs ; left Camden on the 6th of April , as part of the right wing of the Union army . The regiment was engaged with the enemy at the Battle of Jenkins Ferry , where it repulsed a strong flanking party with considerable loss to the enemy , and losing no men itself . On the first day of May , 1864 , the regiment arrived at Little Rock , and proceeded thence to Fort Smith , where it arrived on the 17th day of the same month . The regiment marched to Fort Smith May 1 – 16 . After returning to Fort Smith the regiment was engaged in escort and guard duty on the frontier . Detachments from the regiment were frequently sent to rescur Union men , a duty which , from their familiarity with the country , they were particularly well qualified to discharge . The regiment participated in the Skirmish , Bates Township , November 2 , and Newton County , November 15 , 1864 . Mustered out of service . The regiment was mustered out on August 10 , 1865 .