Work for Giants: The Campaign and Battle of Tupelo/Harrisburg, Mississippi, June-July 1864

During the summer of 1864 a Union column, commanded by Maj. Gen. Andrew Jackson Smith, set out from Tennessee with a goal that had proven impossible in all prior attempts - to find and defeat the cavalry under the command of Confederate major general Nathan Bedford Forrest. Forrest's cavalry was the greatest threat to the long supply line feeding Sherman's armies as they advanced on Atlanta.

Smith marched at the head of his "gorillas," veteran soldiers who were fresh from the Red River Camp...