I normally work just with the irregular southern units in Missouri, which is how I am familiar in a general sense with Major William I. Preston's and Colonel John Q. Burbridge's 1862 efforts recruiting for the Confederacy far behing Union lines in Missouri. The best source I know for regular Confederate units is James E. McGhee's 2008 "Guide to Missouri Confederate Units, 1861-1865, published by the University of Arkansas Press. McGhee's book on pages 146 and 147 details Major Preston's efforts recruitng three companies in roughly the Stoddard County area of southeast MO during mostly the summer of 1862 and cites three sources in his bibliography. Preston's three companies were not enough to form a regiment, so his unit was officially called Preston's Battalion, Missouri Cavalry. McGhee wrote that Preston's battalion served with Colonel Burbridge's and Colonel Colton Greene's troops during the autumn of 1862 along the Missouri and Arkansas border.

The Confederate Trans-Mississippi Department on 23 January 1863 issued Special Orders Number 23 which ordered the consolidation of Preston's three mostly Stoddard County companies with Burbridge's six companies to form Burbridge's 4th Missouri Cavalry Regiment with Preston as his lieutenant colonel. McGhee tells this regiment's story and the campaigns in which they participated on pages 68 through 72 with breakdowns on companies as to who commanded them, where in general each company was recruited, and a bibliography at the end of the section. Preston's three companies became Companies A, B, and C in the 4th. From my own sources, I see that Preston's men of Companies A, B, and C were active in Stoddard, Dunklin, Reynolds, and Wayne Counties in southeast Missouri, during January, March, May, and August 1863, probably recruiting to build up unit strength.

I hope that helps.

Bruce Nichols