Battle of Palmito Ranch

In May 1865, more than a month after Lee surrendered at Appomattox, Union troops at the mouth of the Rio Grande advanced inland toward Brownsville to strike Confederate camps at White's Ranch and Palmito Ranch. They skirmished with Confederate cavalry at Palmito Ranch on 12 May and took the ranch. The next day Colonel John Salmon Ford brought up more cavalry and artillery and counterattacked, driving the Union force back toward the coast with the loss of more than a hundred prisoners. Neither side had received reliable news that the war was ending in the east. The Union soldiers included men of the 62nd United States Colored Infantry, who covered the retreat.

Palmito Ranch is routinely called the last land battle of the Civil War, a label that depends on how one counts: the Confederate armies in the Trans-Mississippi surrendered later in May and June, and there were brief clashes after Palmito, so most careful writers say last major engagement or among the last. It was a Confederate victory that changed nothing, since the war was already decided. Union losses were mostly prisoners, and figures differ between the commander's report and later summaries. The Confederates reported almost no losses.