BLACK HAWK WAR
The episode known in history under the name of "The Black Hawk War" was the most formidable conflict between the whites and Indians as well as the most far-reaching in its results that ever occurred upon the soil of Illinois. It takes its name from the Indian Chief, of the Sac tribe Black Hawk (Indian name, Makatai Meshekiakiak, meaning "Black Sparrow Hawk"), who was the leader of the hostile Indian band and a principal factor in the struggle. Black Hawk had been an ally of the British during the War of 1812-1815., served with Tecumseh when the later fell at the battle of the Thames in 1813, and after the war continued to maintain friendly relations with his "British father."
The outbreak in Illinois had its origin in the construction put upon the treaty negotiated by Gen. William Henry Harrison with the Sac and Fox Indians on behalf of the U. S. Government, November 3, 1804 under which the Indians transferred to the Government nearly 15,000,000 acres of land comprising the region lying between the Wisconsin River on the north, Fox River of Illinois on the east and southeast, and the Mississippi on the west, for which the Government agreed to pay to the confederated tribes less than $2, 500 in goods and the insignificant sum of $1,00 per an mum in perpetuity.
While the validity of the treaty was denied on the part of the Indians on the ground that it had originally been entered into by their chiefs under duress, while held as prisoners under a charge of murder at Jefferson Barracks during which they had been kept in a state of constant intoxication it had been repeatedly reaffirmed by parts or all of the tribe, especially in 1815, in 1816, in 1822 and in 1823 and finally recognized by Black Hawk himself in 1831. The part of the treaty of 1804 which was the immediate cause of the disagreement was that which stipulated that so long as the lands ceded under it remained the property of the United States (that is, should not be transferred to private owners), "the Indians belonging to the said tribes shall enjoy the privilege of living or hunting upon them."
Although these lands had not been put upon the market or even surveyed as squatters multiplied in this region little respect was paid to the treaty right of the Indians, particularly with reference to those localities where, by reason of fertility of the soil or some other natural advantage the Indians had established something like permanent homes and introduced a sort of crude cultivation. This was especially the case with reference to the Sac village of "Saukenuk" on the North bank of Rock River near its mouth, where the Indians when not absent on the chase had lived for over a century, had cultivated fields of corn and vegetables and had buried their dead. In the early part of the last century, it is estimated that some five hundred families had been accustomed to congregate here, making it the largest Indian village in the West. As early as 1823 the encroachments of squatters on the rights claimed by the Indians under the treaty of 1804 began; Their fields were taken possession of by the intruders their lodges burned and their women and children whipped and driven away during the absence of the men on their annual hunts. The dangers resulting from these conflicts let Governor Edwards, as early as 1828 to demand of the general government the expulsion of the Indians from Illinois which resulted in an order from President Jackson in 1829 for their removal west of the Mississippi. On application of Col. George Davenport, a trader of much influence with the Indians the time was extended to April 1, 1830. During the preceding year Colonel Davenport and the firm of Davenport and farmham bought from the United States Government most of the lands on Rock River occupied by Black Hawk's band, with the intention, as has been claimed, of permitting the Indians to remain.
This was not so understood by Black Hawk, who was greatly incensed, although Davenport offered to take other lands from the Government in exchange or cancel the sale -- an arrangement to which President Jackson would not consent. On their return in the spring of 1830 the Indians found whites in possession of their village. Prevented from cultivating their fields, and their annual hunt proving unsuccessful the following winter proved for them one of the great hardship.
Black Hawk, having made a visit to his "British father" (the British Agent) at Malden, Canada, claimed to have received words of sympathy and encouragement, which induced him to determine to regain possession of their fields. In this he was encouraged by Neapope, his second in command and by assurance of support from White Cloud, a half Sac and half Winnebago -- known also as "The Prophet" -- whose village (Prophet's Town) was some forty miles from the mouth of Rock River, and through whom Black Hawk claimed to have received promises of aid in guns, ammunition and provisions from the British. The reappearance of Black Hawk's band in the vicinity of his old haunts, in the spring of 1831, produced a wild panic among the frontier settlers Messages were hurried to Governor Reynolds, who had succeeded Governor Edward's in December previous, appealing for protection against the savages.
The Governor issued a call for 700 volunteers "to remove the band of Sac Indians" at Rock Island beyond the Mississippi. Although Gen. E. P. Gaines of the regular army commanding the military district, thought the regulars sufficiently strong to cope with the situation, the Governor's proclamation was responded to by more than twice the number called for. The volunteers assembled early in June, 1831, at Beardstown, the place of rendezvous named in the call, and having been organized into two regiments under command of Col. James D. Henry and Col. Daniel Lieb, with a spy battalion under Gen Joseph Duncan, marched across the country and after effecting a junction with General Gaines, having learned that the Pottqawatomies, Winnebagos the Kickapoos had promised to join the Sacs in their uprising, asked the assistance of the Battalion of mounted men previously offered by Governor Reynolds. The combined armies amounted to 2, 500 men, while the fighting force of the Indians was 300. Finding himself overwhelmingly outnumbered, Black Hawk withdrew under cover of night to the West side of the Mississippi.
After burning the village, General Gaines notified Black Hawk of his intention to pursue and attack his band, which had the effect to bring the fugitive chief to the General's head quarters, where on June 30 a new treaty was entered into by which he bound himself and his people to remain west of the Mississippi unless permitted to return by the United States. This ended the campaign, and the volunteers returned to their homes, although the affair had produced and intense excitement along the whole frontier and involved a heavy expense.
The next winter was spent by Black Hawk and his band on the site of old Fort Madison, in the present State of Iowa. Dissatisfied and humiliated by his repulse of the previous year, in disregard of his pledge to General Gaines, on April 6, 1832 at the head of 500 warriors and their families, he again crossed the Mississippi at Yellow Banks about the site of the present city of Oquawka, fifty miles below Rock Island, with the intention as claimed if not permitted to stop at his old village, to proceed to the Prophet's Town and raise a crop with the Winnebagoes, Here he was met by the Prophet with renewed assurances of aid from the Winnebagoes, which was still further strengthened by promises from the British Agent received through a visit by Neapope to Malden the previous autumn. An incident of this invasion was the effective warning given to the white settlers by Shabona, a friendly Ottawa Chief, which probably had the effect to prevent a widespread massacre. Besides the towns of Galena and Chicago the settlements in Illinois North of Fort Clark (Peoria) were limited to some thirty families on Bureau Creek with a few cabins at Hennepin, Peru Lasalle, Ottawa, Indian Creek, Dixon, Kellogg's Grove, Apple Creek, and a few other points.
Gen. Henry Atkinson commanding the regulars at Fort Armstrong (Rock Island), having learned of the arrival of Black Hawk a week after he crossed the Mississippi, at once took steps to notify Governor Reynolds of the situation with a requisition for an adequate force of militia to cooperate with regulars. Under date of April 16, 1832, the Governor issued, a Militia" to meet by April 22 Beardstown again being named as a place of Rendezvous. The call resulted in the assembling of a force, which was Organized into four regiments under command of Col. John DeWitt, Jacob Fry, John Thomas and Samuel M. Thompson, together with a spy battalion under Maj. James D. Henry and odd battalion under Maj. Thomas James and a foot battalion Under Maj. Thomas Long. To these were subsequently added two independent Battalions of mounted men, under command of Majors Isaiah Stillman and David Bailey, which were finally consolidated as the Fifth regiment under command of Col. James Johnson. The organization of the first four regiments at Beardstown was completed by April 27, and the force under command of Brigadier-General Whiteside (but accompanied by Governor Reynolds, who was allowed pay as Major General by the General Government) began its march to Fort Armstrong, arriving there May 7 and being mustered into the United States service. Among others accompanying the expedition who were then or afterwards became noted citizens of the State, were vital Jarrot, Adjutant-General; Cyrus Edwards, Ordnance Officer; Murray McConnel, Staff Officer, and Abraham Lincoln, Captain of a company of volunteers from Sangamon County in the Fourth Regiment.
Col. Zachary Taylor, then commander of a regiment of regulars, arrived at Fort Armstrong about the same time with reinforcements from Fort Leavenworth and Fort Crawford. The total force of militia amounted to 1,935 men and of regulars about 1,000. An interesting story is told concerning a speech delivered to the volunteers by Colonel Taylor about this time. After reminding them of their duty to obey an order promptly, the future hero of the Mexican War added; "The safety of all depends upon the obedience and courage of all. You are citizen soldiers; some of you may fill high offices, or even be Presidents some day but not if you refuse to do your duty. Forward, march!" A curious commentary upon this speech is furnished in the fact that while Taylor himself afterwards became President at least one of his hearers a volunteer who probably then had no aspiration to that distinction (Abraham Lincoln) reached the same position during the most dramatic period in the nation’s history.
Two days after the arrival at Fort Armstrong the advance up Rock River began, the main force of the volunteers proceeding by land under General Whiteside, while General Atkinson, with 400 regular and 300 volunteer foot soldiers, proceeded by boat, carrying with him the artillery, provisions and bulk of the baggage. Whiteside, advancing by the east bank of the river, was the first to arrive at the Prophet’s Town, which finding deserted, he pushed on to Dixon’s Ferry (now Dixon), where he arrived May 12. Here he found the independent battalions of Stillman and Bailey with ammunition and supplies of which Whiteside stood in need. The mounted battalions under command of Major Stillman, having been sent forward by Whiteside as a scouting party, left Dixon on the 13th and, on the afternoon of the next day, went into camp in a strong position near the mouth of Sycamore Creek. As soon discovered, Black Hawk was in camp at the same time, as he afterwards claimed, with about forty of his braves, on Sycamore Creek, three miles distant while the greater part of his band were encamped with the more war like faction of the Potawatomies some seven miles farther north on the Kishwaukee River. As claimed by Black Hawk in his autobiography, having been disappointed in his expectation of forming an alliance with the Winnebagoes and the Pottawatomies, he had at this juncture determined to return to the West Side of the Mississippi.
Hearing of the arrival of Stillman’s command in the vicinity, and taking it for granted that this was the whole of Atkinson’s command, he sent out three of his young men with a white flag, to arrange a parley and convey to Atkinson his offer to meet the latter in council. These were captured by some of Stillman’s band regardless of their flag of truce, while a party of five other braves who followed to observe the treatment received by the flagbearers, were attacked and two of their number killed, the other three escaping to their camp. Black Hawk learning the fate of his truce party was aroused to the fiercest indignation. Tearing the flag to pieces with which he had intended to go into council with the whites and appealing to his followers to avenge the murder of their comrades, he prepared for the attack. The rangers numbered 275 men, while Black Hawk’s band has been estimated at less than forty. As the rangers caught sight of the Indians, they rushed forward in pell-mell fashion. Retiring behind a fringe of bushes, the Indians awaited the attack. As the rangers approached, Black Hawk and his party rose up with a war whoop, at the same time opening fire on their assailants. The further history of the affair was as much of a disgrace to Stillman’s command as had been their desecration of the flag of truce. Thrown into panic by their reception by Black Hawk’s little band, the rangers turned and, without firing a shot, began the retreat, dashing through their own camp and abandoning everything, which fell into the hands of the Indians. An attempt was made by one or two officers and a few of their men to check the retreat, but without success, the bulk of the fugitives continuing their mad rush for safety through the night until they reached Dixon, twenty-five miles distant, while many never stopped until they reached their homes, forty or fifty miles distant. The casualties to the rangers amounted to eleven killed and two wounded, while the Indian loss consisted of two spies and one of the flag-bearers, treacherously killed near Stillman’s camp.
This ill-starred affair, which has passed into history as "Stillman’s defeat," produced a general panic along the frontier by inducing an exaggerated estimate of the strength of the Indian force, while it led Black Hawk to form a poor opinion of the courage of the white troops at the same time that it led to an exalted estimate of the prowess of his own little band thus becoming an important factor in prolonging the war and in the bloody massacres which followed. Whiteside, with his force of 1,400 men, advanced to the scene of the defeat the next day and buried the dead, while on the 19th, Atkinson, with his force of regulars, proceeded up Rock River, leaving the remnant of Stillman’s force to guard the wounded and supplies at Dixon. No sooner had he left than the demoralized fugitives of a few days before deserted their post for their homes, compelling Atkinson to return for the protection of his base of supplies, while Whiteside was ordered to follow the trail of black hawk who had started up the Kishwaukee for the swamps about Lake Koshkonong, nearly west of Milwaukee with in the present State of Wisconsin.
At this point the really active stage of the campaign began. Black Hawk, leaving the women and children of his band in the fastness of the swamps, divided his followers into two bands, retaining about 200 under his own command, while the notorious half-breed, Mike Girty led a band of one hundred renegade Pottawatomies.Returning to the vicinity of Rock Island, he gathered some recruits from the Pottawatomies and Winnebagoes, and the work of rapine and massacre among the frontier settlers began. One of the most notable of these was the Indian Creek Massacre in LaSalle County, about twelve miles north of Ottawa, on May 21, when sixteen persons were killed at the Home of William Davis and two young girls Sylvia and Rachel Hall aged, respectively, 17 and 14 years were carried away captives. The girls were subsequently released, having been ransomed for $2,000 in horses and trinkets through a Winnebago Chief and surrendered to sub-agent Henry Gratiot. Great as was the emergency at this juncture, the volunteers began to manifest evidence of dissatisfaction and, claiming that they had served out their term of enlistment, refused to follow the Indians into the swamps of Wisconsin. As the result of a council of war the volunteers were ordered to Ottawa, where Lieut mustered them out on May 28. Robt. Anderson, afterwards General Anderson of Fort Sumter fame. Meanwhile Governor Reynolds had issued his call (with that of 1831 the third,) for 2,000 men to serve during the war. Gen. Winfield Scott was also ordered from the East with 1,000 regulars although owing to cholera breaking out among the troops, they did not arrive in time to take part in the campaign. The rank and file of volunteers responding under the new call was 3,148, with recruits and regulars then in Illinois making an army of 4,000. Pending the arrival of the troops under the new call and to meet an immediate emergency, 300 men were enlisted from the disbanded rangers for a period of twenty days, and organized into a regiment under command of Col. Jacob Fry, with James D. Henry as Lieutenant Colonel and John Thomas as Major. Among those who enlisted as privates in this regiment were Brig-Gen. Whiteside and Capt. Abraham Lincoln. A regiment of five companies, numbering 195 men, from Putnum County under command of Col. John Strawn, and another of eight companies from Vermilion County under Col. Isaac R. Moore, were organized and assigned to guard duty for a period of twenty days.
The new volunteers were rendezvoused at Fort Wilbourn, nearly opposite Peru, June 15, and organized into three brigades, each consisting of three regiments and a spy battalion. The First Brigade (915 strong) was placed under command of Brig-Gen Alexander Posey, the Second under Gen. Milton K. Alexander, and the third under Gen. James D. Henry. Others who served as officers in some of these several organizations, and afterwards became prominent in State history, were Lieut.-Col. Gurdon S. Hubbard of the Vermilion County regiment; John A McClernand, on the staff of General Posey; Major John Dement; then state Treasurer; Stinson H. Anderson, afterwards Lieutenant-Governor; Lieut.-Gov. Zadoc Casey; Major William McHenry; Sidney Breese (afterwards Judge of the state supreme Court and United States Senator); W. L. D. Ewing (as Major of a spy battalion, afterwards United States Senator and State Auditor); Alexander W. Jenkins (afterwards Lieutenant-Governor); James W. Semple (afterwards United States Senator); and William Weatherford ( afterwards a Colonel in the Mexican War), and many more. Of the Illinoiis troops, Posey’s brigade was assigned to the duty of dispersing the Indians between Galena and Rock River, Alexander’s sent to intercept Black Hawk up the Rock Tiver, while Henry’s remained with Gen. Atkinson at Dixon. During the next two weeks engagements of a more or less serious character were had on the Pecatonica on the southern border of the present State of Wisconsin; at Apple River Fort fourteen miles east of Galena, which was successfully defended against a force under Black Hawk himself, and at Kellogg’s Grove the next day (June 25), when the same band ambushed Maj. Dement’s spy battalion, and came near inflicting a defeat, which was prevented by Dement’s coolness and the timely arrival of reinforcements. In the latter engagement the whites lost five killed besides 47 horses, which had been tethered outside their lines, the loss of the Indians being sixteen killed. Skirmishes also occurred with varying results, at Plum River Fort, Burr Oak Grove, Sinsiniwa and Blue Mounds. The last two within the present State of Wisconsin.
Believing the bulk of the Indians to be camped in the vicinity of Lake Koshkonong, General Atkinson left Dixon June 27 with a combined force of regulars and volunteers numbering 2,600 men the volunteers being under the command of General Henry. They reached the outlet of the Lake July 2, but found no Indians, being joined two days later by General Alexander’s brigade, and on the 6th by Gen. Posey’s. From here the commands of Generals Henry and Alexander were sent for supplies to Fort Winnebago, at the Portage of the Wisconsin; Colonel Ewing, with the Second Regiment of Posey’s brigade descending Rock River to Dixon, Posey with the remainder going to Fort Hamilton for the protection of settlers in the lead-mining region, while Atkinson, advancing with the regulars up Lake Koshkonong, began the erection of temporary fortifications on Bark River near the site of the present village of Fort Atkinson. At Fort Winnebago Alexander and Henry obtained evidence of the actual location of Black Hawk’s camp through Pierre Poquette, a half-breed scout and trader in the employ of the American Fur Company, whom they employed with a number of Winnebagos to act as guides. From this point Alexander’s command returned to General Atkinson’s headquarters, carrying with them twelve day’s provisions for the main army, while General Henry’s (600strong), with Major Dodge’s battalion numbering 150 with an equal quantity of supplies for themselves, started under the guidance of Poquette and his Winnebago aids to find Black Hawk’s camp. Arriving on the 18th at the Winnebago village on Rock River where Black Hawk and his band had been located, their camp was found deserted, the Winnebagos insisting that they had gone to Cranberry (now Horicon) Lake, a half-day’s march up the river. Messengers were immediately dispatched to Atkinson’s Headquarters, thirty-five miles distant, to apprise him of this fact. When they had proceeded about half the distance, they struck a broad, fresh trail, which proved to be that of Black Hawk’s band headed westward toward the Mississippi. The guide having deserted them in order to warn his tribesmen that further dissembling to deceive the whites as to the whereabouts of the Sacs was useless, the messengers were compelled to follow him to General Henry’s camp. The dicovery produced the wildest enthusiasm among the volunteers, and from this time-events followed in rapid succession. Leaving as far as possible all encumbrances behind the pursuit of the fugitives was begun without delay, the troops wading through swamps sometimes in water to their armpits. Soon evidence of the character of the flight the Indians were making, in the shape of exhausted horses, blankets, and camp equipage cast aside along the trail, began to appear, and straggling bands of Winnebagos, who had now begun to desert Black Hawk gave information that the Indians were only a few miles in advance. On the evening of the 20th of July Henry’s forces encamped at "The Four Lakes," the present site of the city of Madison, Wis. Black Hawk’s force lying in ambush the same night seven or eight miles distant. During the next afternoon the rear-guard of the Indians under Neapope was overtaken and skirmishing continued until the bluffs of the Wisconsin were reached.
Black Hawk’s avowed object was to protect the passage of the main body of his people across the stream. The loss of the Indians in these skirmishes has been estimated at 40 to 68, while Black Hawk claimed that it was only six killed, the loss of the whites being one killed and eight wounded. During the night Black Hawk succeeded in placing a considerable number of the women and children and old men on a raft and in canoes obtained from the Winnebagos, and sent them down the river, believing that, as non-combatants, they would be permitted by the regulars to pass Fort Crawford, at the mouth of the Wisconsin, undisturbed. In this he was mistaken. A force sent from the fort under Colonel Ritner to intercept them, fired mercilessly upon the helpless fugitives, killing fifteen of their number, whiles about fifty were drowned and thirty-two women and children made prisoners. The remainder, escaping into the woods, with few exceptions died from starvation and exposure, or were massacred by their enemies, the Menominees, acting under white officers. During the night after the battle of Wisconsin Heights, a loud, shrill voice of some one speaking in an unknown tongue was heard in the direction where Black Hawks’s band was supposed to be. This caused something of a panic in Henry’s camp, as it was supposed to come from some one giving orders for an attack. It was afterwards learned that the speaker was Neapope speaking in the Winnebago language in the hope that Poquette and the Winnebago guides might hear him. He was describing the helpless condition of his people, claiming that the war had been forced upon them, that their women and children were starving, and that, if permitted peacefully to recross the Mississippi, they would give no further trouble. Unfortunately Poquette and the other guides had left for Fort Winnebago, so that no one was there to translate Neapope’s appeal and it failed of its object.
General Henry’s force having discovered that the Indians had escaped Black Hawk heading with the bulk of his warriors towards the Mississippi. They spent the next and day and night on the field, but on the following day (July 23) started to meet General Atkinson, who had, in the meantime, been notified of the pursuit. The head of their columns met at Blue Mounds, the same evening, a complete junction between the regulars and the volunteers being effected at Helena, a deserted village on the Wisconsin. Here by using the logs of the deserted cabins for rafts, the army crossed the river on the 27th and the 28th and the pursuit of Black Hawk’s fugitive band was renewed. Evidence of their famishing condition was found in the trees stripped of bark for food the carcasses of dead ponies, with here and there the dead body of an Indian.
On August 1st, Black Hawk’s depleted and famished band reached the Mississippi two miles below the mouth of the Bad Ax, an insignificant stream, and immediately began trying to cross the river; but having only two or three canoes, the work was slow. About the middle of the afternoon the steam transport, "Warrior," appeared on the scene, having on board a score of regulars and volunteers, returning from a visit to the village of the Sioux Chief, Wabasha, to notify him that his old enemies, the Sacs, were headed in that direction. Black Hawk raised the white flag in token of surrender, but the officer in command claiming that he feared treachery or an ambush demanded that Black Hawk should come on board. This he was unable to do, as he had no canoe. After waiting a few minutes a murderous fire of canister and musketry was opened from the steamer on the few Indians on shore who made such feeble resistance, as they were able. The result was the killing of one white man and twenty-three Indians. After this exploit the "Warrior" proceeded to Prairie du Chien, twelve or fifteen miles distant, for fuel. During the night a few more of the Indians crossed the river, but Black Hawk, seeing the hopelessness of further resistance, accompanied by the Prophet, and taking with him a party of ten warriors and thirty-five squaws and children, fled in the direction of "the Dells" of the Wisconsin. On the morning of the 2nd General Atkinson arrived within four or five miles of the Sac position. Disposing his forces with the regulars and Colonel Dodge’s rangers in the center, the brigades of Posey and Alexander on the right and Henry’s on the left, he began the pursuit, but was drawn by the Indian decoys up the river from the place where the main body of the Indians were trying to cross the stream. This had the effect of leaving General Henry in the rear practically without orders, but it became the means of making his command the prime factors in the climax, which followed.
Some of the spies attached to Henry’s command having accidentally discovered the trail of the main body of the fugitives, began the pursuit without waiting for the orders and soon found himself engaged with some 300 savages, a force nearly equal to his own. It was here that the only thing like a regular battle occurred. The savages fought with the fury of despair, while Henry’s force was no doubt nerved to greater deeds of courage by the insult, which they conceived had been put upon them by General Atkinson. Atkinson, hearing the battle in progress and discovering that he was being led off on a false scent, soon joined Henry’s force with his main army, and the steamer "Warrior," arriving from Prairie Du Chien, opened a fire of canister upon the pent-up Indians. The battle soon degenerated into a massacre. In the course of the three hours through which it lasted, it is estimated that 150 Indians were killed by fire from the troops, and equal number of both sexes and all ages drowned while attempting to cross the river or by being driven into it, while about 50 (chiefly women and children) were made prisoners. The loss of the whites was 20 killed and 13 wounded.
When the "battle" was nearing its close it is said that Black Hawk, having repented the abandonment of his people, returned within sight of the battle-ground, but seeing the slaughter in progress which he was powerless to avert, he turned and with a howl of rage and horror, fled into the forest. About 300 Indians (mostly noncombatants) succeeded in crossing the river in a condition of exhaustion from hunger and fatigue, but these were set upon by the Sioux under Chief Wabasha, through the suggestion and agency of General Atkinson, and nearly one-half their number exterminated. Of the remainder many died from wounds and exhaustion, while still others perished while attempting to reach Keokuk’s band that had refused to join in Black Hawk’s desperate venture. Of one thousand who crossed to the East Side of the river with Black Hawk in April, it is estimated that not more than 150 survived the tragic events of the next four months.
General Scott, having arrived at Prairie du Chien early in August, assumed command and, on August 15, mustered out the volunteers at Dixon, Illinois. After witnessing the bloody climax at the Bad Axe of his ill-starred invasion, Black Hawk fled to the dells of the Wisconsin, where he and the Prophet surrendered themselves to the Winnebagos, by whom they were delivered to the Indian Agent at Prairie Du Chien. Having been taken to Fort Armstrong on September 21, he there signed a treaty of peace. Later he was taken to Jefferson Barracks (near St. Louis) in the custody of Jefferson Davis, then a Lieutenant in the regular army, where he was held a captive during the following winter. The connection of Davis with the Black Hawk War, mentioned by many historians seems to have been confined to this act. In April, 1833, with the Prophet and Neapope, he was taken to Washington and then to Fortress Monroe, where they were detained as prisoners of war until June4, when they were released. Black Hawk, after being taken to may principal cities in order to impress him with the strength of the American Nation, was brought to Fort Armstrong, and there committed to the guardianship of his rival, Keokuk, but survived this humiliation only a few years, dying on a small reservation set apart for him in Davis County Iowa, October 3, 1838.
Such is the story of the Black Hawk War, the most notable struggle with the aborigines in Illinois history. At its beginning both the State and National authorities were grossly misled by an exaggerated estimate of the strength of Black Hawk’s force as to numbers and his plans for recovering the site of his old village, while Black Hawk had conceived a low estimate of the numbers and courage of his white enemies, especially after the Stillman defeat. The cost of the war to the State and nation in money has been estimated at $2,000,000 and in sacrifice of life on both sides at not less than 1,200. The loss of life by the troops in irregular skirmishes, and in massacres of settlers by the Indians, aggregated about 250, while an equal number of regulars perished from a visitation of cholera at the various stations within the district affected by the war, especially at Detroit, Chicago, Fort Armstrong and Galena. Yet it is the judgment of later historians that nearly all this sacrifice of life and treasure might have been avoided, but for a series of blunders due to the blind or unscrupulous policy of officials or interloping squatters upon lands which the Indians had occupied under the treaty of 1804. A conspicuous blunder to call it by no harsher name was the violation by Stillman’s command of the rules of civilized warfare in the attack made upon Black Hawk’s messengers, sent under flag of truce to request a conference to settle terms under which he might return to the west side of the Mississippi an act which resulted in a humiliating and disgraceful defeat for its authors and proved the first step in actual war. Another misfortune was the failure to understand Neapope’s appeal for peace and permission for his people to pass beyond the Mississippi the night after the battle of Wisconsin Heights; and the third and most inexcusable blunder of all, was the refusal of the officer in command of the "Warrior" to respect Black Hawk’s flag of truce and request for a conference just before the bloody massacre which has gone into history under the name of the "Battle of the Bad Axe." Either of these events, properly availed of, would have prevented much of the butchery of that bloody episode which has left a stain upon the page of history, although this statement implies no disposition to detract from the patriotism and courage of some of the leading actors upon whom the responsibility was placed of protecting the frontier settler from outrage and massacre. One of the features of the war was the bitter jealousy engendered by the unwise policy pursued by General Atkinson towards some of the volunteers especially the treatment of General James D. Henry, who although subjected to repeated slight and insults, is regarded by Governor Ford and others as the real hero of the war. Too brave a soldier to shirk any responsibility and too modest to exploit his own deeds, he felt deeply the studied purpose of his superior to ignore him in the conduct of the campaign a purpose which, as in the affair at the Bad Axe, was defeated by accident or by General Henry’s soldierly sagacity and attention to duty, although he gave out to the public no utterance of complaint. Broken in health by the hardships and exposures of the campaign, he went South soon after the war and died of consumption, unknown and almost alone, in the city of New Orleans, less two years later.
Aside from contemporaneous newspaper accounts, and monographs, and manuscripts on file in public libraries relating to this epoch in State history, the most comprehensive records of the Black Hawk War are to be found in the "Life of Black Hawk," dictated by himself (1834).
Wakefield’s "History of the War between the United States and the Sac and Fox Nations" (1834);
Drake’s "Life of Black Hawk" (1854)
Ford’s "History of Illinois" (1854);
Reynolds’ "Pioneer History of Illinois; and "My Own Times"
Davidson & Stuve’s and Moses’ Histories of Illinois;
Blanchard’s " The Northwest and Chicago";
Armstrong’s "The Sauks and the Black Hawk War"
And Reuben G. Thwaite’s "Story of the Black Hawk War" (1892)
