ARKANSAS HISTORICAL QUARTERLY, Volume 41 (Winter 1982), p.318   The Camden Fortifications By WILLIAM L. SHEA* Department of Social Science, University of Arkansas at Monticello Monticello, Arkansas 71655   WHEN FEDERAL FORCES captured Little Rock in September 1863, Confederate troops withdrew southward in haste and disorder. Lieutenant General Edmund Kirby Smith, commander of the Trans-Mississippi Department, feared that the Federals might continue advancing until his own position at Shreveport was overrun. After studying the situation Smith concluded that the likeliest overland invasion routes from central Arkansas converged at Camden in the southern portion of the state. He therefore ordered Lieutenant General Theophilus Holmes of the District of Arkansas to concentrate his scattered , demoralized forces at Camden. Smith apparently expected that Holmes would be able to do little more than delay the anticipated advance, for he pointed out to the elderly general that "your line of retreat toward Shreveport" would be secure from Camden. But as the weeks passed and the Federals busied themselves with occupying the Arkansas River valley, Smith took heart and instructed Holmes to go into winter quarters at Camden and hold "the line of the Washita" until spring. In this manner Camden became the new headquarters of the District of Arkansas and the focal point of one of the last major military campaigns west of the Mississippi (1). ___________________ * The author is associate professor of history at the University of Arkansas at Monticello. He wishes to thank Townsend Mosley of Camden for his generous assistance, and the UAM Faculty Research Committee for its financial support. 1. The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies (70 vols. in 128, Washington, 1880-1901), Ser. I, Vol. XXII, Pt. II, 1034-35, 1110-11; hereinafter cited as O.R.; Albert Castel, General Sterling Price and the Civil War in the West (Baton Rouge, 1968), 162, 176; Robert L. Kerby, Kirby Smith's Confederacy: The Trans-Mississippi South, 1863-1865 (New York and London, 1972), 231-37.           Contents  Words  Study Questions  Related Sites Next