Post by keogh on Nov 18, 2009 12:56:39 GMT -5
Please respond directly to Jeff at
jjeffersonbroome@comcast.net
I have a research inquiry I would appreciate you sending out to the troops to see if anyone can help me. Thanks.
Hi friends:
I am writing a book detailing the Indian war on the three trails that came to Denver (South Platte River, Smoky Hill, and Santa Fe Trail), and am using a few hundred Indian depredation claims that I have copied at the National Archives over the last 9 years in 60 days of visits. A very interesting story is emerging.
One of the things I have tried to do is find first hand sources that verify the information in the depredation claims. E.g., Theodore Davis published an article in Harper’s Monthly chronicling a stage trip he took in November 1865 on the newly opened Smoky Hill Trail, and he tells a story there of an Indian attack at Downer Station where several men were killed. The man who shared the story with Davis was Lewis Perrin, whose depredation claim I found in the NA (Davis spelled it Mr. Perine).
I have two questions I hope someone might be able to help me with, by directing me to another source(s) for confirmation.
1) There was an attack on the Platte River near Alkali Station (east of Julesburg) on October 22, 1865. In one depredation claim (I have three detailing this attack), the freighter tells of soldiers coming to the scene of the depredation shortly after the attack, staying with the corralled wagons for a few hours and then 4 soldiers and an officer began to go back the two miles to Alkali Station when the Indians attacked them and killed them all. I cannot find anything in the Official Records or other books I have covering this period of history (Guarding the Overland Trail (there is a footnote in this book about a diary saying 21 soldiers were killed), Circle of Fire, etc.), and yet I have no doubt that these 5 soldiers were killed. Any help with other sources confirming this?
2) Concerning this same incident, two men were left with their wagons when over 100 Indians descended upon them to kill them, got within 30 feet of them but they let the men walk away a mile back to another train where other men were corralled and where they could be relatively safe. One of the freighters said his partner had thick fiery red hair and he believed the Indians did not shoot at them because of fears/superstitions about his red hair. I have a memory of reading something about Indians fearing men with such red hair and leaving them alone, but I couldn’t find it in the Bent book. Does anyone know about that and where that source might come from? I would like to add it to my book. Bent, by the way, admits to being in these raids in October 1865.
Thanks to one and all.
Jeff
jjeffersonbroome@comcast.net
I have a research inquiry I would appreciate you sending out to the troops to see if anyone can help me. Thanks.
Hi friends:
I am writing a book detailing the Indian war on the three trails that came to Denver (South Platte River, Smoky Hill, and Santa Fe Trail), and am using a few hundred Indian depredation claims that I have copied at the National Archives over the last 9 years in 60 days of visits. A very interesting story is emerging.
One of the things I have tried to do is find first hand sources that verify the information in the depredation claims. E.g., Theodore Davis published an article in Harper’s Monthly chronicling a stage trip he took in November 1865 on the newly opened Smoky Hill Trail, and he tells a story there of an Indian attack at Downer Station where several men were killed. The man who shared the story with Davis was Lewis Perrin, whose depredation claim I found in the NA (Davis spelled it Mr. Perine).
I have two questions I hope someone might be able to help me with, by directing me to another source(s) for confirmation.
1) There was an attack on the Platte River near Alkali Station (east of Julesburg) on October 22, 1865. In one depredation claim (I have three detailing this attack), the freighter tells of soldiers coming to the scene of the depredation shortly after the attack, staying with the corralled wagons for a few hours and then 4 soldiers and an officer began to go back the two miles to Alkali Station when the Indians attacked them and killed them all. I cannot find anything in the Official Records or other books I have covering this period of history (Guarding the Overland Trail (there is a footnote in this book about a diary saying 21 soldiers were killed), Circle of Fire, etc.), and yet I have no doubt that these 5 soldiers were killed. Any help with other sources confirming this?
2) Concerning this same incident, two men were left with their wagons when over 100 Indians descended upon them to kill them, got within 30 feet of them but they let the men walk away a mile back to another train where other men were corralled and where they could be relatively safe. One of the freighters said his partner had thick fiery red hair and he believed the Indians did not shoot at them because of fears/superstitions about his red hair. I have a memory of reading something about Indians fearing men with such red hair and leaving them alone, but I couldn’t find it in the Bent book. Does anyone know about that and where that source might come from? I would like to add it to my book. Bent, by the way, admits to being in these raids in October 1865.
Thanks to one and all.
Jeff