Battle of Peralta, Apr. 15,1862

(Bill Manley - Researcher)

Description of the area of Peralta before the battle:
The village of Peralta was a two-mile stretch of adobe houses, thick adobe fences, raised ditches, and groves of large cottonwood trees. Governor Connelly's residence, where Col. Green had set up his temporary headquarters, was surrounded on all sides for a half mile by a low, heavy growth of trees. Only the main road leading to the house could be used for wagons or artillery. Numerous wide irrigation canals ran parallel to, and across the road, while adobe walls enclosed the cultivated fields.
The Confederates near Peralta were actually Col. Thomas Jefferson Green's Fifth Texas Mounted Volunteers, approximately five hundred men, or about one-third of Sibley's Force. Green found himself near the Governor's house at nightfall on 14 April and decided to camp there and cross the following morning.
The Federal Troops assumed that there would be an immediate assault by infantry and cavalry, supported by the artillery posted to the east and north of the governor's mansion. The ditch banks and low adobe walls enclosing fields around the Connely residence and outbuildings formed strong natural fortifications. Several Confederate cannons were within this maze of fields.
Excerpt from Lt. Bell's Diary: "Our attention was almost immediately diverted to the north, however, where a Confederate supply train approached Peralta from the direction of Albuquerque. Consisting of seven heavily laden wagons, the train was escorted by a detachment of Texans with a mountain howitzer. The Texans had to stop and defend themselves where the Federal troops charged to within fifty feet of the wagons and cannon. One Union man was mortally wounded, and four Confederates were killed. Canby at midday, he sent separate columns under Colonels Gabriel and John Chivington around to the north and west of Peralta to prevent reinforcements. Outnumbered and outgunned, Green stuck to his position in and around Governor Connelly's mansion and fields. One Fifth Texas Soldier recalled being "taken from one position to another several times during the day, and that our position was a strong one."
At about two o'clock in the afternoon during a dust storm headed out to the southwest and ended the Battle of Peralta. The Confederates left behind a shambles of buildings and groves in and north of Peralta.

Battle of Peralta, N.M., Apr. 15,1862
Confed.: 5th Texas Mounted Vols., Commanding: Col. Thomas Green; Elements, 2nd and 7th Texas Mounted Vols.; Battery B, 1st Texas Artillery, Company of 800 men, Commanded by Col. Green.
Confederate Casualties:
5th Regiment: Private John J. Wells, 18, Co. I