The secession convention also authorized each county to organize Home Guard units made up of men too young or too old or otherwise exempt from conscription or militia service.
In the fall of 1861, Governor Rector called up the 45th Militia Regiment to deal with a potential threat to the Confederate government from the anti-war "peace societies".
Governor Rector ordered Colonel Solon F. Borland to form a provisional battalion of militia in Pulaski County in April 1862 for the purpose of seizing the federal installation at Fort Smith, Borland's Arkansas Infantry Battalion consisted of three volunteer infantry companies and a volunteer artillery battery from the 13th Arkansas Militia Regiment.
Borland's Battalion marched on Fort Smith, only to discover the military post had been abandoned by Federal Troops the day before.
Following the battle of Wilson's Creek, the western division was marched back to Arkansas and given the opportunity to vote on whether or not they would be transferred into Confederate Service.
The Secession Convention appointed a new state military board to organize the new regiments and coordinate their transition into Confederate service.
Governor Harris Flanagin (who had defeated Governor Rector in his re-election bid of 1862) issued a proclamation on August 10, 1863, just a month before the capitol fell, announcing that he had been authorized to raise new regiments of state troops and that by special agreement these new units could not be transferred out of the state by Confederate authorities.
The constant transfer of Arkansas troops into the eastern theater of the war, across the Mississippi River from their homes, was a major objection by the remaining population of men eligible for military service.
6 from Arkadelphia, which called into service the militia regiments of the counties of Clark, Hempstead, Sevier, Pike, Polk, Montgomery, La Fayette, Ouachita, Union, and Columbia in order to resist the Federal army.
[6] These new units of Arkansas State Troops were placed under the overall command of Col. William H. Trader who was detailed to Governor Flanagin by General E. Kirby Smith.
The unit participated in the battle of Marks Mill on April 25, 1864, as a part of Brigadier General William L. Cabell's Brigade.
[9] In August 1864 when the term of enlistment for these state troops was about to expire, Adjutant General Peay issued an order which directed that companies be allowed to vote on the subject of being transferred into Confederate service.
Additional duplications occurred when parts of various regiments were captured, only to be paroled, exchanged and returned to active status at some later point.
Among the newly organized regiments authorized by the State Military Board were the 34th (Col. William H. Brooks), 35th (Col. Frank A. Rector) and 36th (Col. Samuel W. Peel).
True to form, these designations were ignored, and they were mustered into service as the 1st (Rector), 2nd (Brooks) and 3rd (Peel) Regiments, Northwest Division, District of Arkansas.
Given the great distance involved, even before Union forces established effective control of the Mississippi River, many duplications occurred.
McRea's unit was originally designated as the 3rd Arkansas Infantry Battalion, because it lacked the required number of companies to organize as a full regiment.
Some of the men, including the regimental commander, Colonel Dawson, were absent from Arkansas Post at the time it surrendered.
It had been intended to create a pool of replacements for the regiments which were already in Confederate service but had been depleted by disease and battle filed losses.
It may also have to do with the fact that several of these new units at least initially contained companies of men from Missouri and Texas who were in Arkansas when the organization began.
The 44th through the 48th Arkansas infantry regiments were raised in the summer of 1864, were mounted in order to accompany Price's 1864 Missouri Expedition, which was planned as an all-cavalry affair.
Many of these ad hoc organizations, like McRea's, eventually gained enough companies and received recognition as a full regiment.
Logistically a mounted force was much more costly to sustain and the units themselves tended to be less effective in the actual war effort than standard infantry formations.
[85] Due to severe drought in Arkansas in 1862 and 1863, forage for horses became increasing scares and led to calls from multiple Confederate commanders to dismount the mounted units.
Confederate commanders, especially in the Department of the Trans-Mississippi regularly bemoaned the fact that most recruits wanted to "jine the cavalry" as opposed to infantry.
is unable to furnish cavalry armed educated and equipped as above I am strongly of the opinion that all with shotguns and rifles in their hands should be dismounted excepting enough for scout and picket duty and put the remainder in the line as infantry.
[127] The site contains several alleged Arkansas Confederate units for which no other information exists other than short list of names, probably developed from prisoner of war rosters.
The home guard was intended to provide a military-style, regulated, accountable organization to keep an eye on the slave population and the activities of suspected abolitionists and Union sympathizers.
A new generation of home guards came on line in Arkansas in 1863, pursuant to an Act of the Congress of the Confederate States adopted on October 13, 1862.
Alternately referred to as "home guard" or "local defense" companies, these organizations were less concerned with civil order than with military duties.