Emory. While Taylor was encamped on the outskirts and preparing for his attack against the city, he learned that Port Hudson had fallen. He withdrew his forces all the way up Bayou Teche to avoid the risk of being captured. Red River Campaign In 1864, Taylor defeated Union General Nathaniel P. Banks in the Red River Campaign with a smaller force, commanding the Confederate forces in the Battle of Mansfield and the Battle of Pleasant Hill on April 8–9. He pursued Banks back to the Mississippi River and, for his efforts, received the thanks of the Confederate Congress. At these two battles, the two commanders whom Taylor had come to rely on: Brigadier Generals Alfred Mouton and Thomas Green, were killed while leading their men into combat. On April 8, 1864, Taylor was promoted to lieutenant general, despite having asked to be relieved because of his distrust of his superior in the campaign, General Edmund Kirby Smith. The Congress of the Confederate States issued a joint resolution, which officially thanked Taylor and his soldiers for their military service during the Red River Campaign. Last days of the war Taylor was given command of the Department of Alabama, Mississippi, and East Louisiana. After General John Bell Hood's disastrous campaign into Tennessee and near destruction of his army at the Battle of Franklin, Taylor was briefly given command of the Army of Tennessee, until most of its remnant was sent to contest Sherman's march further north through the Carolinas from Savannah. He surrendered his department at Citronelle, Alabama, the third and last major Confederate force remaining east of the Mississippi, to Union General Edward Canby on May 4, 1865, almost a month after Appomattox Courthouse and was paroled three days later. The rest of his command was paroled on May 12, 1865, in Gainesville, Alabama. In his memoir "Destruction and Reconstruction," Taylor told of what happened as he surrendered his troops. General Canby informed him that now that the War had ended, Southerners would be instructed about "the true American principles." General Taylor responded that he was sorry that his grandfather, an officer in the revolution, and his father, president of the United States, had not passed on to him true American principles. Military prowess Taylor did not have any military experience until the Civil War broke out. However, most of Taylor's contemporaries, subordinates, and superiors spoke many times of his military