Louisiana secession Orleans. Two days before the city surrendered in April 1862, Moore and the legislature abandoned Baton Rouge as the state capital, relocating to Opelousas in May 1, 1862. Governor Moore began to organize military resistance at the state level, ordered the burning of cotton, cessation of trade with the Union forces, and heavily recruited troops for the state militia. However, despite a brief check at Baton Rouge, Union forces continued to advance into Louisiana and up the Mississippi, and the capital was moved again to Shreveport. New Orleans, Louisiana, the largest city in the entire South, was strategically important as
Louisiana State Guard the crisis without meeting any resistance. After the end of World War II, the federal government rescinded the right of states to maintain military forces separate of the National Guard. Although many states disregarded such a directive at the time, the Louisiana State Guard was disbanded on June 30, 1947. Louisiana later began rebuilding the Louisiana State Guard to a cadre-level organization throughout the 1980s. As of 2003, the Louisiana State Guard was organized as teams of soldiers and desk officers, trained as experts in operations and logistics, and organized for deployment to each parish (county) emergency operations center during