During the American Civil War, Confederate forces under Generals Richard Taylor and Henry Sibley 
withdrew from Franklin and on April 14, 1862, reached Jeanerette, twelve miles (19 km) south of 
New Iberia. A soldier, Arthur W. Hyatt, describes the difficult march:

"Thus we had marched about twenty-six miles in fifteen hours and fought a battle in the bargain. 
But such terrible hard marching I never witnessed before. Our feet are all blistered and swollen, 
and we have had scarcely anything to eat -- what with hunger, thirst, mud, rain, marching, fighting, 
dust, etc., etc., we are perfectly worn out."[3] The night after Hyatt's report, the "weather turned 
unusually cool, and the men got very little sleep."[4]