Texans, both from Central Texas and the counties of the Texas Hill Country. They had some evidence for that suspicion. During the statewide vote on secession, German-heavy counties represented many of those, along with the abolitionist northeast part of the state, to garner a majority vote against secession. Several reports at the beginning of 1862 even alleged that German communities celebrated U.S. Army victories. The state government also feared German-run local militias. The Union Loyal League, organized by several Forty-Eighters, was one such militia. The actual purpose of the league is still a debated issue. Historians Robert Shook and Stanley McGowen acknowledge, as German Texans maintained at the time, that the group's expressed purpose was to defend the Hill Country from Indians and outlaws. Confederates, they confirm, considered the Union Loyal League the enforcement arm of German-Unionist sentiment. Confederate officers even implicated the organization in strategies to free U.S. Army soldiers from Camp Verde. With a need for more soldiers, the Confederacy established a draft. The Germans did not want to fight against the United States and objected to being drafted. The buildup to this event began in the spring of 1862 with the Confederacy's initiation of conscription of Texans, to which many German Texans voiced their objection. The Confederate Conscription Act of 1862 turned general German objection into open opposition. Because of this opposition, General Hamilton Bee dispatched Captain James Duff to Gillespie County. In late May 1862, Captain Duff imposed martial law. While in Gillespie County, Captain Duff arrested and executed two Germans. The harsh conduct convinced several Germans to leave Texas. Frederick "Fritz" Tegener and his Union Loyal League associates planned a departure. They aimed to enter Mexico and make their way to U.S.-controlled New Orleans. Flight and battle Between August 1, and August 3, 1862, sixty-one German Texans, led by Fritz Tegener, departed from Turtle Creek and headed southwest for the Mexican border. Informed of their intentions, Captain Duff dispatched Lieutenant Colin McRae with approximately 96 men in pursuit on August 3, 1862. After six days, Lieutenant McRae and his men spied the German Texans in a small prairie along the Nueces River on August 9. Lieutenant McRae then formulated an attack plan to commence later in the evening. He divided his force into two companies to surround the camp. At approximately 1:00 a.m. on August 10, 1862, the Confederates closed into the camp. At first,