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...including the the 2nd, 4th, 5th, and 7th Texas Mounted Rifles...
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FWIW - 4th, 5th and 7th were Regiments of Texas Mounted
Volunteers - 2nd was the only Regiment of Texas Mounted
Rifles you listed.
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But, Sibley did send some "troops" into what is now "The People's Republic of Tucson" to scout out the column of Union troops coming from what is now the "Bankrupt People's Republic of Kalifornia"! They "clashed" at the famous Battle of Picacho Pass,
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Yep - he sent
Company A, Baylor’s Regiment of Arizona Rangers commanded by Captain Sherod Hunter. Despite being labeled as such by nearly every historian who has written of the Confederate campaign in Arizona, the men of Hunter's command were
not Texans, but rather residents of the Confederate Territory of Arizona. The
erroneous identification of Hunter's men as "Texans" may stem from the fact that the company was attached to the Second Texas Mounted Rifles. However, they were
never an organic part of that regiment, and
in Confederate records are always listed as "Independent Arizona Volunteers, attached to the Second Texas Cavalry."
Boyd Finch, a historian who is probably the single most knowledgeable expert on the history of Sherod Hunter and his command, offers another explanation...Unionist propaganda.
Among the native Mexican population of the United States Territory of New Mexico there was a deep suspicion and distrust of Texans, going back many years.
Wishing to rally these people to the Union cause, the Unionist authorities, especially Governor Henry Connelly, sought to capitalize on this distrust by labeling all Confederates as "Texans."
Here's an ironic bit of Arizona history - it was on the fiftieth anniversary of the creation of the Confederate Territory of Arizona (14 Feb 1862) that the State of Arizona was formally admitted into the Union (14 Feb 1912).
And so it...went...and still goes...
Richard's $.02
