I just now found this. Thank you so much for this well-documented history! My gg-grandfather's younger brother, James Newton "Newt" Simmons, was the quartermaster sergeant of McNally's Arkansas Artillery. The family has his parole from Vicksburg as the only proof that he served with this unit. We don't know if Newt had moved to Arkansas before the war, but the rest of the family was concentrated in the Saulsbury, Tennessee/Hopewell, Mississippi area shortly before the war started. My gg-grandfather, Hardeman Simmons and his wife had relocated to Tunica County, Mississippi, so it's not a stretch to think that Newt was either living in Arkansas, or at least doing some business there when the war broke out. After his furlough following the surrender at Vicksburg, his brother evidently convinced Newt to "jine the cavalry", as he enlisted in Co. K, 5th Mississippi Cavalry, Hardeman's unit, on 20 Sep 1863. Eventually he was captured at the Battle of Nashville, and died of pneumonia in the federal prison camp at Camp Chase, Ohio.