Immediately on assuming command Banks ordered Grover to take all the troops that were in condition for service at once to Baton Rouge, under the protection of the fleet, and there disembark and go into camp. Augur was specially charged with the arrangements for the despatch of the troops from New Orleans. Before starting they were carefully inspected, and all that were found to be affected with disease of a contagious or infectious character were sent ashore and isolated.
On the morning of the 16th the advance of Grover's expedition got under way, under convoy of a detachment of Farragut's fleet, led by Alden in the _Richmond_. Grover took with him about 4,500 men, but when all were assembled at Baton Rouge there were twelve regiments, three batteries, and two troops of cavalry. The Confederates, who were in very small force, promptly evacuated Baton Rouge, and Grover landed and occupied the place on the 17th of December. After sending off the last of the troops, Augur went up and took command. The lines constructed by Paine in August were occupied and strengthened, and all arrangements promptly made for the defence in view of an attack, such as might not unnaturally be looked for from Port Hudson, whose garrison then numbered more than 12,000 effectives. The two places are but a long day's march apart. Since the occupation in August, the Confederate forces at Port Hudson had been commanded by Brigadier-General William N. R. Beall. On the 28th of December, however, he was relieved by Major-General Frank Gardner, who retained the command thenceforward until the end. While the war lasted, Baton Rouge continued to be held by the Union forces without opposition or even serious menace.
An attempt to occupy Galveston was less fortunate. This movement was ordered by Banks a few days after his arrival at New Orleans, apparently under the pressure of continued importunity from Andrew J. Hamilton, and in furtherance of the policy that had led the government to send him with the expedition, nominally as a brigadier-general, but under a special commission from the President that named him as military governor of Texas. On the 21st of December, three companies, D, G, and I, of the 42d Massachusetts, under Colonel Isaac S. Burrell, were sent from New Orleans without disembarking from the little _Saxon_, on which they had made the journey from New York. With them went Holcomb's 2d Vermont battery, leaving their horses to follow ten days later on the _Cambria_, with the horses and men of troops A and B of the Texas cavalry. Protected by the flotilla under Commander W. B. Renshaw, comprising his own vessel, the _Westfield_, the gunboats _Harriet Lane_, Commander J. M. Wainwright; _Clifton_, Commander Richard L. Law; _Owasco_, Lieutenant Henry Wilson; and _Sachem_, Acting-Master Amos Johnson; and the schooner _Corypheus_, Acting-Master Spears, Burrell landed unopposed at Kuhn's Wharf on the 24th, and took nominal possession of the town in accordance with his instructions. These were indeed rather vague, as befitted the shadowy nature of the objects to be accomplished. "The situation of the people of Galveston," wrote General Banks, "makes it expedient to send a small force there for the purpose of their protection, and also to afford such facilities as may be possible for recruiting soldiers for the military service of the United States." Burrell was cautioned not to involve himself in such difficulty as to endanger the safety of his command, and it was rather broadly hinted that he was not to take orders from General Hamilton. In reality, Burrell's small force occupied only the long wharf, protected by barricades at the shore end, and seaward by the thirty-two guns of the fleet, lying at anchor within 300 yards.