The Yankee Invasion of Texas

By Stephen A. Townsend
Illustrated, index, bibliography, 189 pp., 2006. Texas A & M University Press Consortium, John H. Lindsey Building, Lewis Street, 4354 TAMU, College Station, TX 77843-4354, $25 plus shipping.

Reviewer: Paul Taylor
Paul Taylor is the author/editor of four books on the Civil War. His most recent is a 100-copy deluxe, fine press collection of unpublished Civil War letters entitled "Give My Love to All Our Folks." Visit www.paulrtaylor.com for details.

Review:
The Union's four separate overland expeditions undertaken to secure Texas are about as obscure as any Civil War campaigns could possibly be. They are long neglected and even ignored due in part to Texas' isolated Civil War-era locations.

Historian Stephen A. Townsend has chosen to focus on the third of the four campaigns. Known as the Rio Grande expedition, it was led by Gen. Nathaniel Banks and commenced at New Orleans on Oct. 26, 1863, following earlier failed attempts to take Galveston and Sabine Pass.

Its primary mission as envisioned by Lincoln was political in nature. Banks, commander of the Department of the Gulf at New Orleans, was ordered by the president to "plant the flag in Texas" as a warning to the French, who, at the time, were attempting to reestablish notions of empire in Mexico.

Stopping a potential Franco/Confederate alliance was at the fore of the president's thinking, prompting his desire that Banks make his mark somewhere in southwest Texas along the Mexican border. At the same time, suppressing the flow of cotton down the Rio Grande River and through the Gulf town of Brownsville was an additional goal.

Banks, however, received conflicting objectives from his military superior, General-in-Chief Henry Halleck. As Banks was a political general, and not a military professional, the General-in-Chief probably felt he could easily intimidate his subordinate. He advised Banks that he only need show the flag "at some one point in Texas."

Halleck, while acknowledging the political sensitivities of the mission, felt it best that a strike take place in northeast Texas, near the Red River Valley. Offering only suggestions to Banks, and never delivering any actual orders, Halleck left himself plenty of wiggle room in case the mission went sour.

Attempting to please both masters, Banks' armada consisting of 20 troop transports and three warships entered Texas at the mouth of the Rio Grande and soon thereafter captured Brownsville after facing almost no resistance.

Townsend presents the various affairs and skirmishes of Banks' force with the capture of Brownsville and their march as far north as Corpus Christi. Diplomatic relations, the expedition's effects on the morale of Texas' Confederate and pro-Union population, and the campaign's impact on the cotton trade are also presented along each step of the way.

Despite some initial success, the expedition ultimately ground to a halt when those earlier triumphs were not built upon. In March 1864, Ulysses S. Grant ordered that all of Texas be abandoned except for Brownsville, thereby ending Bank's five-month campaign.

Rounding out the narrative is a chapter that describes the final year of the Civil War in Texas and a summary of the war's impact on the lower Rio Grande valley.

The book features acid-free paper, a sewn cloth binding and contains one steel engraving of Banks along with three maps. A few more images of the book's leading participants, assuming they exist, would only have improved an already excellent work.

The maps illustrate south Texas' cotton routes, a crucial coastline perspective and an overview of the skirmishes that occurred in the Rio Grande valley. As with the images, several more maps would have improved the reader's understanding of the area.

The Yankee Invasion of Texas is a reworking of the author's 2002 doctoral dissertation and was a solid choice for formal publication. Since its release, it has been awarded the 2006 Kate Brooks Bates Award for Historical Research presented annually by the Texas State Historical Association.

Well-researched, well-written, and reasonably priced, this slender volume documenting a little-known military campaign in the American Southwest is a welcome and highly recommended addition to the Civil War canon.