On the morning of March 6, 1862, the high bluffs on Little Sugar Creek were a scene of frantic activity as Federal soldiers dug rifle pits and cut down trees for hasty field fortifications. With no hope of reinforcements from St. Louis, General Samuel Curtis had only 10,500 men to face a Confederate army of more than 16,000 marching toward him, and he ordered his men to use the creek and the line of steep hills to prepare a strong defense. Those trenches were never used in combat, because during the night the Confederates marched completely around the positions. On the morning of March 7, 1862, the Union army had to turn around and fight at Leetown and Elkhorn Tavern. Brigadier General Samuel R. Curtis, a 57-year-old West Point graduate born in New York, had first taken command of the United States Army of the Southwest in St. Louis, Missouri, on Christmas Day 1861.