As the spring of 1862 was waning and the Civil War entered its second year, the Confederacy appeared on the verge of collapse. New Orleans had fallen, Union forces were knocking at the gates of Richmond, and only Vicksburg prevented the fledgling nation from being split in two by Federal warships on the Mississippi River. The fortunes of war turned quickly, however, and Confederate armies were soon taking the war to the enemy in Kentucky and Maryland, while Maj. Gen. Earl Van Dorn attempted to regain northern Mississippi and southeastern Louisiana.

“Ho! For New Orleans,” the handsome general wrote President Jefferson Davis on July 15, and twelve days later Van Dorn detached Brig. Gen. John C. Breckinridge with part of the Vicksburg garrison to attack Baton Rouge. The campaign proved a logistical nightmare, and the failure of the CSS Arkansas to drive off the Union vessels that provided covering fire for their comrades ashore forced the politician turned general to call off the attack. Though vanquished at Baton Rouge, Breckinridge did secure the town of Port Hudson, about 27 river miles north. The Confederacy would soon have a second Gibraltar on the Mississippi every bit as formidable as Vicksburg.

Though 30,000 bales of cotton and 2,000 hogsheads of sugar were shipped through Port Hudson annually, the town boasted of only a Methodist church, two hotels, and about 200 residents. Nonetheless, it was an ideal location for the Confederates to build a bastion to control traffic on the Mississippi River. From atop an 80-foot bluff, cannon could deliver a plunging fire on passing vessels that had to slow to navigate a 150-degree turn. The town was also the western terminus of the Port Hudson & Clinton Railroad. Most significantly though, Port Hudson sat below the mouth of the Red River. If the Confederates could maintain control of the Mississippi between Vicksburg and Port Hudson, vital foodstuffs and recruits could continue to move east while small arms, cannon, munitions, and currency traveled westward.

To secure the river batteries, fortifications were erected to guard against a land attack. Again nature aided the Confederates. A ravine approximately 300 yards wide and 80 feet deep running northeast from the river formed the southern border of the plateau east of the town. North of the town 40- to 60-foot deep ravines cut across nearly level fields and stretched for hundreds of yards to Little Sandy Creek. And on the northwest, above the bend in the river, stood a marsh, bounded on the north by Sandy Creek and on the west by Thompson’s Creek, while beyond the Mississippi a vast alluvial plain stretched off to the west.

The first Confederate soldiers entered Port Hudson on August 17, 1862, under the command of Massachusetts-born Brig. Gen. Daniel Ruggles. Work soon commenced on the river batteries and then, to guard their rear, a series of detached lunettes that stretched from the Mississippi River four miles below the town to Little Sandy Creek northeast of Port Hudson. Nothing was done to strengthen the northern flank, since the Confederates expected any attack to come from Baton Rouge to the south. Fortune smiled on the Confederates during their initial months at Port Hudson. The Federals abandoned Baton Rouge on August 21, and did not return until December 17, leaving only an occasionally passing gunboat to bother the garrison. Cannon were in short supply, but Ruggles managed to capture two 32-pounders from the USS Sumter, which had run aground on August 14 and was abandoned by her crew. Ruggles had experienced heavy artillerists available to serve them—the crew of the recently destroyed CSS Arkansas.

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