ity. The upshot of it all was, the organization of
the Trans-Mississippi District of Department No. 2 and the appointment
of Earl Van Dorn as major-general to command it. Whether or no, he was
the choice[25] of General A.S. Johnston, department commander, his
appointment bid fair, at the

[Footnote 18: _Official Records_, vol. liii, supplement,
816-817.]

[Footnote 19: Ibid., 762.]

[Footnote 20:--Ibid., vol. viii, 725.]

[Footnote 21:--Ibid., 701.]

[Footnote 22: Wright, _General Officers of the Confederate Army_,
33, 67.]

[Footnote 23: _Official Records_, vol. viii, 702.]

[Footnote 24: _Journal of the Congress of the Confederate
States_, vol. i, 637.]

[Footnote 25: Formby, _American Civil War_, 129.]

time it was made, to put an end to all local disputes and to give
Missouri the attention she craved. The ordnance department of the
Confederacy had awakened to a sense of the value of the lead mines[26]
at Granby and Van Dorn was instructed especially to protect them.[27]
His appointment, moreover, anticipated an early encounter with the
Federals in Missouri. In preparation for the struggle that all knew
was impending, it was of transcendent importance that one mind and one
interest should control, absolutely.

The Trans-Mississippi District would appear to have been constituted
and its limits to have been defined without adequate reference to
existing arrangements. The limits were, "That part of the State of
Louisiana north of Red River, the Indian Territory west of Arkansas,
and the States of Arkansas and Missouri, excepting therefrom the tract
of country east of the Saint Francis, bordering on the Mississippi
River, from the mouth of the Saint Francis to Scott County,
Missouri...."[28] Van Dorn, in assuming command of the district,
January 29, 1862, issued orders in such form that Indian Territory was
listed last among the limits[29] and it was a previous arrangement
affecting Indian Territory that was most ignored in the whole scheme
of organization.

It will be remembered that, in November of the preceding year, the
Department of Indian Territory had been created and Brigadier-general
Albert Pike assigned to the same.[30] His authority was not explicitly

[Footnote 26: _Official Records_, vol. liii, supplement, 767,
774.]

[Footnote 27: Van Dora's protection, if given, was given to little
purpose; for the mines were soon abandoned [Britton, _Memoirs of the
Rebellion on the Border, 1863_, 120].]