Dwindling supplies for his army at Camden forced Major General Fred Steele to send out a foraging party to gather corn that the Confederates had stored about twenty miles up the Prairie D’Ane-Camden Road on White Oak Creek.
The party loaded the corn into wagons, and on April 18, Col. James M. Williams started his return to Camden. Brig. Gen. John S. Marmaduke’s and Brig. Gen. Samuel B. Maxey’s Confederate forces arrived at Lee Plantation, about fifteen miles from Camden, where they engaged Williams. The Rebels eventually attacked Williams in the front and rear forcing him to retreat north into a marsh where his men regrouped and then fell back to Camden.
The Union lost 198 wagons and all the corn. The estimated casualties for this battle was 417 men most of which were colored Union soldiers belonging to the First Kansas Colored Infantry. This battle became known as the Battle at Poison Springs.
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