Palmito Ranch Battlefield

More than one month after Lee's surrender to Grant at Appomattox, the battle of Palmito Ranch represented the last known land engagement fought as part of the Civil War and the ongoing conflict between the Confederacy's Trans-Mississippi Department and the Union army. Fought May 12-13, 1865, the Confederates were protecting the center of their clandestine cotton shipping operation with Mexico and European mills. The battle was the Union's last unsuccessful attempt to seize control of the Lower Rio Grande region.