Battle of Blair's Landing
The Battle of Blair's Landing saw a Confederate cavalry-artillery force commanded by Brigadier General Tom Green attack several Union gunboats led by Rear Admiral David Dixon Porter and soldiers in river transports under Brigadier General Thomas Kilby Smith in Red River Parish, Louisiana. Green's force attempted but failed to stop the retreat of Porter's and Smith's forces downstream in an action that was part of the Red River Campaign of the American Civil War. The only significant casualty during the fighting was Green, who was killed by an artillery round.
Wartime sketch shows the fight at Blair's Plantation.
T. Kilby Smith
Thomas Green
T. O. Selfridge Jr.
Thomas Green was an American soldier and lawyer, who took part in the Texan Revolution of 1835–36, serving under Sam Houston, who rewarded him with a land grant. Green was clerk of the Texas Supreme Court until the outbreak of the Civil War, when he became a Confederate cavalry leader. After winning several victories, including the Battle of Valverde and the recapture of Galveston, he was promoted brigadier and assigned command of the cavalry division of the Trans-Mississippi Department. In the Red River Campaign, he was mortally wounded while charging a fleet of Federal gunboats. The Union naval commander David Dixon Porter paid tribute to Green as a serious loss to the Confederacy.
Thomas Green (general)