Capt. Elijah Parsons Petty

Petty's regiment, the 17th Texas Infantry, was organized in March 1862 under Colonel Robert T. P. Allen, a West Point graduate. It marched to Arkansas that August and lost many men to disease at Camp Nelson over the winter. Assigned to Walker's Texas division, it fought at Milliken's Bend in June 1863, against a Union garrison that included Black regiments, and in 1864 at Fort DeRussy, Mansfield, Pleasant Hill and Jenkins' Ferry. It marched back to Texas and surrendered in June 1865. Its motto was Trust In God.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Mansfield State Historic Site — steps away
  A 1957 museum and three-quarter-mile trail on the ground where Confederate troops broke a Union line on April 8, 1864, in a park begun by the United Daughters of the Confederacy.
• Los Adaes State Historic Site — 30 mi
  The Spanish presidio that was the capital of Texas from 1729 to 1770, some 15 miles from French Natchitoches, now an archaeological site where Native pottery is the most abundant find.

More markers nearby

• Texas Monument — steps away
• Louisiana Monument (Battle of Mansfield) — steps away
• James H. Beard Monument — steps away
• General Dick Taylor Monument — steps away