Battle of Fort Davidson

1865 map of Pilot Knob and its vicinity

Date	September 27, 1864 (1864-09-27)
Location	Iron County, Missouri
Result	Union victory

Belligerents

United States

Confederate States

Commanders and leaders

Thomas Ewing

Sterling Price

Units involved

Union garrison

Army of Missouri

Strength

1,500

12,000

Casualties and losses

184

1,500

The Battle of Fort Davidson, also known as the Battle of Pilot Knob, was the opening engagement of Price's Missouri Raid during the American Civil War. This engagement occurred on September 27, 1864, just outside Pilot Knob in Iron County, Missouri. Although outnumbered by more than ten-to-one, the Union defenders managed to repulse repeated Confederate assaults on their works, and were able to slip away during the night by exploiting a gap in the Southern siege lines. The attacking Rebels took possession of the fort the next day, but Price's profligate expenditure of men and ammunition ended his goal of seizing St. Louis for the Confederacy.

In April 1864, the Confederacy found itself in an increasingly desperate military situation. Unable to win any decisive victories or to obtain foreign recognition, its main strategy by this point was merely to hold on and hope that enormous Union casualties might result in a war-weary Northern public voting Abraham Lincoln out of office in November. The Democratic nominee, General George B. McClellan, had seen his party adopt a plank to make peace with the South if the party were successful—a plank McClellan was forced to repudiate after the Union met with military successes that summer. However, despite the many recent Union triumphs, just one significant military disaster in that shaky autumn of 1864 could still politically embarrass Lincoln and potentially doom his reelection.

As the election approached, things began to look even bleaker for the South. General Ulysses S. Grant had pinned down Robert E. Lee in Virginia, while Gen. William Sherman was locked in combat with Gen. Joseph Johnston north of Atlanta. Gen. George Crook's army held the Shenandoah Valley. The only realm that seemed to offer possibilities for a Confederate army embarrassing the Union was in the West. Accordingly, Major General Sterling Price was chosen for this task. He raised a mixed force of 12,000 cavalry and mounted infantry plus fourteen cannon, which he named the Army of Missouri, and set out to "liberate" his home state.

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