Conflict: American Civil War
Combatants: Confederates vs. Federals
Location: Missouri (USA)
Outcome: Federal victory
On this day in 1864, Confederate troops under the command of Major General Sterling Price launched an attack the Major General Samuel R. Curtis' Federal lines near Westport, Missouri. The attack was repulsed and the Federals followed with a counterattack. Meanwhile, Federal cavalry broke through the Confederate rear and the outnumbered Southerners were forced to withdraw. Twenty thousand Federal and eight thousand Confederate soldiers were involved in the battle. Each side lost approximately 1500 troops.
Major General Sterling Price by an unknown artist
Points of Interest:
The defeat at the Battle of Westport ended any serious threat by the Confederacy in Missouri.
Curtis died in Council Bluffs, Iowa just one year after the end of the Civil War while serving as an Indian commissioner.
Price died in St. Louis two years after the war, following a failed attempt to start a colony of Confederate veterans in Mexico.
Gen. Samuel R. Curtis by Mathew Benjamin Brady