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The Battle of Peralta
April 15, 1862 in Peralta, New Mexico Territory; now in Valencia County, New Mexico
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The Battle of Peralta was a small battle near the end of Brig. Gen. Henry H. Sibley's New Mexico Campaign. Retreating from the Battle of Glorieta Pass, Confederate troops of the 5th Texas Mounted Volunteers, under Col. Thomas Green, camped in the town of Peralta and planned to cross a series of irrigation canals the next day.
On April 14, Green found himself near the Governor's Connelly's house at nightfall and decided to camp there and cross the following morning. Peralta was a 2-mile stretch of adobe houses, thick adobe fences, raised ditches, and groves of large cottonwood trees. Connelly's residence, where 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 fields.
On April 15, The Union troops assumed that there would be an immediate assault by Confederate infantry and cavalry, supported by the artillery posted to the east and north of Connelly's house. Several Confederate cannons were within this maze of fields. The pursuing Union forces under Col. Edward Canby caught up to Green.
The Federals attention was diverted to the north, however, where a Confederate supply train approached Peralta from the direction of Albuquerque. Consisting of 7 heavily laden wagons, the train was escorted by a detachment of Texans with a mountain howitzer. Canby attacked the supply train and the Confederates had to stop and defend themselves where the Union troops charged to within 50 feet of the wagons and cannon.
At midday, Canby sent separate columns under Cols. Gabriel R. Paul and John Chivington around to the north and west of Peralta to surround the Confederates to prevent any more forces from joining Green.
Outnumbered and outgunned, Green stuck to his position in and around the mansion and fields.
The two armies battered each other with artillery until a dust storm blew in at about 2:00 P.M. The Confederates headed out to the southwest and ended the battle. They left behind a shambles of buildings and groves in and north of Peralta.
