That is exactly right. BUT, it is an indications of the activity which was going on at the time.

These armament movements were supposed to be a military secret. Therefore they were not contained in general communications and open orders such as Hindman telegraphs et al. However, if I remember correctly two of Hindman's Telegraphs do criptically mentions the existance of a wagon supply train that was to be kept quite about and was not to stop at Pine Bluff, but was to proceed on to Little Rock. I can not quote exactly these Telegraphs because I have since lost the ability to access my copy of these Telegraphs due to technology changes.

When the Arkansas Governor Henry M. Rector threatened to seceed from the Confederacy, because of Van Dorn's withdrawel, it was a seriour threat to the Richmond Confederacy. It would have meant the lost of the entire Trans-mississippi department and the supplies and supply lines that it could provide to the eastern Theaters. That is why Vicksburg was so important. Without Little Rock and Pine Bluff in the Confederacy the Union Army would have been in Monroe, Louisiana. The rearming of the Confederate Army in Arkansas became of prime importance and began with the "Gunboat Diplomacy" of Jefferson Davis in sending the CSS Ponchartrain and CSS Maurepas to the White and Arkansas Rivers loaded to the Gunnel's with everything they could salvage and carry and not sink.

To go one step furthern this need for cross river trafficking was one of the prime reasons for the building of Fort Hindman at an exposed position like Arkansas Post. First as a deep water port for the refitted CSS Ponchartrain and second as a safe harbor for across river communications. But without the CSS Ponchartrain to keep the mouth of the Arkansas and White Rivers free of Union picket boats the Arkansas could not be easily used for such operations.

70 to 80 flatboats along with a small steamboat to tow orpush them, which were reported by the Union navy being destroyed in the area of Gaines landing, could ferry a lot of supplies and even artillery across the river. We don't know how many successful crossing these Flatboats may have made before they were discovered and destroyed.

John Bull in "Brother in Gray" talks about how such operation were conducted. About how they would lay in wait a mile from the bank of the river and wait until the Union patrol boat would pass down stream at which time they would move to the river and cross before the patrol boat could return again upstream against the current.

The "Fairplay" was only one of several boats involved in these operation and was the only one reportedly captured during such activities. An event significant enough to call for an investigation by the Confederate Government as to how it happened. For example, a breakdown in security? Treason on the part of the crew?

General Curtis did not have the reserves to commit to trying to chase down every rumor of confederate activity that was reported to him. He believed in his report that his men were chasing a reliable report of a valuable target. A target that was of extreme importance to his safety if he could capture it. I believe like he did that he was chasing just such a target.

And finally no one has ever answered the question of where all these Arkansas Artilley Batteries got their guns when all of the best that Arkansas and Missouri had went east with Gen'l Van Dorn in April 1862? When he carries even the machines in the Little Rock arsenal and every musket, percussion cap and rolling paper he could lay his hands on with him. Why would he leave even one usable artilley piece that he could lay his hands on, behind? And there is no record that he did. Were there that many cannon left in Oklahoma and Texas to equipe their batteries forts and implacements and still rebuild the Confederate army in Arkansas?

No, Gen'l Albert Pike sent only those guns he was not using the 10 Parrot guns that he had no harness for. He didn't even send Dawson's 19th Arkansas back to Little Rock with their muskets they had been carring for a year. They came home empty handed.

So in my humble opinion there is only one source for all these weapons both large and small and that is east of the Mississippi River.