The Army of Missouri was an independent military formation during the American Civil War within the Confederate States Army, created in the fall of 1864 under the command of Maj. Gen. Sterling Price to invade Missouri. Price's Raid was unsuccessful, and his army retreated to Arkansas, where it was broken up and absorbed into the Confederate Army of the Trans-Mississippi. After the war, Price, accompanied by his subordinate Brig. Gen. Jo Shelby and several members of his former command, relocated to Mexico where they unsuccessfully sought service with the Emperor Maximilian prior to returning to civilian life in the United States. Origin and formation The Army of Missouri traces its roots to the Missouri State Guard, which was created in 1861 under Sterling Price to enforce Missouri's official stance of "armed neutrality" in the conflict, while formally remaining in the Union. The Guard eventually became part of the Confederate States Army after engaging in skirmishes with the Union troops under Nathaniel Lyon who successfully removed elected Governor Claiborne Jackson and replaced him with a pro-Union governor. As the Missouri State Guard, they would win victories over the Union at the First Battle of Lexington and Wilson's Creek, where Lyon himself was killed. Price and his State Guard troops were subsequently incorporated into Maj. Gen. Earl Van Dorn's Army of the West, where they suffered defeats at Pea Ridge, Arkansas, Iuka, Mississippi and Corinth, Mississippi. Following the Battle of Corinth, Price was sent back to Missouri by Confederate President Jefferson Davis but without any of the troops he previously commanded, who remained with Van Dorn. He raised a new force, and conducted operations in Arkansas in support of Southern efforts there. By the late summer of 1864, a good portion of the Union Army in Missouri had been reassigned eastward to aid in efforts to seize Atlanta and to help in other campaigns. The Confederacy ordered Gen. E. Kirby Smith, commander of the Trans-Mississippi Department, to send his infantry across the Mississippi River to reinforce beleaguered Southern troops in the east. However, Smith had alternative plans. He desired to "liberate" Missouri from Federal control, seizing the key cities of St. Louis and the state capital at Jefferson City, reinstating the Confederate governor and his supporters. Smith decided to send a large force of mounted infantry and cavalry under former Missouri governor Sterling Price to carry out this plan, which he also