Like all the other Arkansas regiments raised in the first wave of recruiting in 1861, they were taken into Confederate armies east of the Mississippi River, and only the few survivors made it back home after the war.

It fought gallantly at Shiloh, charging repeatedly upon the "Hornet's Nest" where it lost Lieutenant Colonel Dunlop.

It was through this regiment that General Albert Sidney Johnston rode from the rear to the front, with a tin cup he had appropriated earlier that morning, saying "Men of Arkansas, the enemy is stubborn.

The regiment went forward with a cheer and passed him at a run; in five minutes 130 men of their ranks were killed or wounded, but they did not falter.

It closed up and disappeared into the thicket in front, followed by the whole Confederate line, and the enemy was silenced in twenty minutes.

[4] The unit was assigned under Generals Rust, Buford, and Beall in the Department of Mississippi and East Louisiana and in the Vicksburg Campaign in the spring and summer of 1863, where they served briefly in the garrisons of Port Hudson, Louisiana, and Jackson, Mississippi, then fought in the Battle of Champion Hill on May 15, 1863.

Johnston had been gathering troops at Jackson, intending to relieve pressure on Lt. Gen. John C. Pemberton's beleaguered garrison.

Johnston hastily withdrew his force across the Big Black River and Champion's Hill battlefields with Sherman in pursuit.

The heaviest fighting in the Siege of Jackson came on July 11 during an unsuccessful Union attack, which resulted in heavy casualties.

[14] After the Meridian Campaign, the unit was assigned to Brigadier General D. H. Reynold's Brigade in the Army of Tennessee, where it would remain for the rest of the war.

They continued service with the Army of Tennessee to the close of the war, fighting at Sugar Creek on December 26, 1864, and in the Carolinas Campaign in February to April, 1865.

Research now indicates that this flag most likely belonged to the 11th Arkansas Volunteers and was found, along with the regiment's baggage in Fort Thompson after the unit evacuated Island No.

[18] After the surrender, the men were offered free rail transportation (where available) in the direction of their homes, by what was left of the Southern railway companies.

A large number of men were killed or seriously injured in a railroad accident at Flat Creek Bridge, Tennessee, on May 25, 1865.