Colonel Charles E. Hovey of the 33rd Illinois was appointed a Brigadier General of Volunteers on September 5, 1862 after having seen little action. However, the U.S. Senate did not to act on his nomination within the statuary period and it expired by law on March 4, 1863. In the interim, Hovey did play a key role in the capture of Arkansas Post in January 1863, where William T. Sherman reported that Hovey had been “wounded in his arm by a shell, but continued and still continues to command his Brigade.” Suffering lingering effects from his injury, Hovey soon left the field service. With the close of the war, he was given a brevet promotion to major general “for gallant and meritorious conduct in battle, particularly at Arkansas Post, January 11, 1863.”
However, what has been missed or ignored by historians is the true reasons for his promotion, and why Congress justifiably refused to approve it.
On August 2, 1862 a skirmish took place on a plantation in Mississippi, 10 miles from the river. It turned into a fairly lively affair requiring Hovey to file a short report in which he wrote: “Hearing that a regiment of cavalry was at or back of this point, about 10 miles below my camp, I came down with a force of infantry and cavalry…”
According to a soldier who was a member of that party, their purpose was solely for cotton confiscating. The day before, their party came across a plantation where they discovered “300 bails of cotton,” but they where only able to carry off “100 bales.” This would require that they return the next day, August 2nd. Hovey’s trip on the 2nd hand nothing to do with Confederate cavalry, but cotton.
On the 2nd they arrived at the plantation and the Negroes helped load it into wagons. “Col. Hovey gave him [the owner] a claim on U.S. for the cotton, to be paid after the war closes…” They got the cotton back to the river and then heard about another plantation. Hovey decided to check it out. “We immediately went to the plantation,” wrote this soldier and at which point they encountered 80 rebels who were trying to destroy the cotton. A fight broke out, one that cost the 11th Wisconsin 3 wounded.
Hovey then took his cotton and returned to camp where he create a false report about enemy cavalry as a justification for his actions that cost several soldiers serious wounds. On other such trips soldiers would not be so lucky, they would lose their lives for Hovey and his cotton gathering.
So the question still begs, What did Curtis know and was he facilitating this “Cotton Brigade” in order to profit from it or was he aloof to it?
