Chapter II: Introduction

"We are coming, Father Abraham, SIX HUNDRED THOUSAND MORE!"

This was in response to the President's appeal for men to go to the front, and the vast levies this called for made men turn pale and maidens tremble.

The Union army was being defeated, and its ranks depleted by disease and expiration of terms of service--the enemy was victorious and defiant, and foreign powers were wavering. In England aristocracy wanted a confederacy--the Commoners wanted an undivided Union. The North responded to the appeal, mothers gave up their sons, wives their husbands, maidens their lovers, and six hundred thousand "boys in blue" marched away.

In August, 1862, I enlisted to serve Uncle Sam for "three years or during the war." In January, 1865, I reenlisted to serve another term; but the happy termination of the conflict made it unnecessary. I do not write this boastingly, but proudly. There are periods in our lives we wish to emphasize and with me this is the period in my life.

The years from 1861 to 1865--memorable for all time, I look back to now as a dream. The echo of the first gun on Sumter startled the world. Men stood aghast and buckling on the sword and shouldering the musket they marched away. Brave men from the North met brave men from the South, and, as the clash of arms resounded throughout our once happy land, the Nations of the World with bated breath watched the destinies of this Republic.

After four years of arbitration on many sanguinary fields, we decided at Appomattox to live in harmony under one flag. The soldiers are satisfied--"the Blue and the Gray" have joined hands; but the politicians, or at least some of them, seem to be unaware that the war is over, and still drag us into the controversy.

"The Boys in Blue?" Why, that was in 1866, and this is 1896--thirty years after we had fulfilled our contract and turned over the goods; and was ever work better done?

Then we could have anything we wanted; now we are "Old Soldiers" and it is 16 to 1 against us when there is work to do. A new generation has arisen, and the men of 1861 to 1865 are out of "the swim," unless their vote is wanted. We generally vote right. We were safe to trust in "the dark days" and we can be trusted now; but Young America is in the front rank and we must submit.

The soldier was a queer "critter" and could adapt himself to any circumstance. He could cook, wash dishes, preach, pray, fight, build bridges, build railroads, scale mountains, dig wells, dig canals, edit papers, eat three square meals a day or go without and find fault; and so with this experience of years,--the eventful years of 1861 and 1865 before me, when the door is shut and I am no longer effective and cannot very well retire--to the poor-house, have concluded to write a book. I am not so important a character as either Grant, Sherman, Sheridan or Logan; but I did my share toward making them great. I'll never have a monument erected to my memory unless I pay for it myself; but my conscience is clear, for I served more than three years in Uncle Sam's army and I have never regretted it and have no apologies to make. I did not go for pay, bounty or pension, although I got both the former when I did enlist and am living in the enjoyment of the latter now. I would not like to say how much my pension is, but it is not one hundred a month by "a large majority"--and so, I have concluded, upon the whole, to profit by a portion of my experience in the great "Sioux War" in Minnesota and Dakota in 1862 (for I campaigned both North and South) and write a book and thus "stand off" the wolf in my old age.

When peace was declared, the great armies were ordered home and the "Boys in Blue" became citizens again. The majority of us have passed over the hill-top and are going down the western slope of life, leaving our comrades by the wayside. In a few years more there will be but a corporal's guard left and "the place that knows us now will know us no more forever." The poor-house will catch some and the Soldiers' Home others; but the bread of charity can never be so sweet and palatable as is that derived from one's own earnings,--hence this little book of personal experiences and exciting events of these exciting years--1862 and 1863. In it I deal in facts and personal experiences, and the experiences of others who passed through the trying ordeal, as narrated to me. As one grows old, memory in some sense is unreliable. It cannot hold on as it once did. The recollection of the incidents of youth remains, while the more recent occurrences have often but a slender hold on our memories; often creeps in touching dates, but the recollections of August, 1862, and the months that followed, are indeed vivid; the impress is so indelibly graven on our memories that time has not effaced them.

The characters spoken of I knew personally, some for years; the locations were familiar to me, the buildings homely as they appear, are correct in size and in style of architecture and some of them I helped to build. The narrative is as I would relate to you, were we at one of our "Camp Fires." It is turning back the pages of memory, but in the mental review it seems but yesterday that the sad events occurred.

A. P. CONNOLLY.

Yours truly,

_A. P. Connolly_
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CONTENTS

Chapter Page

I. General Remarks--Death of Dr. Weiser 11
II. St. Paul and Minneapolis in 1836 and 1896--Father Hennepin. 14
III. A Pathetic Chapter--Captain Chittenden's Minnehaha. 20
IV. Origin of Indians--Captain Carver--Sitting Bull. 27
V. Fort Snelling. 33
VI. The Alarm. 38
VII. Some of the Causes of the War. 43
VIII. Little Crow at Devil's Lake. 50
IX. Fort Ridgely Besieged. 63
X. Siege of New Ulm. 67
XI. Col. Flandreau in Command. 75
XII. Mrs. Eastlick and Family. 78
XIII. The Missionaries--Their Escape. 85
XIV. The Indian Pow-wow. 87
XV. Gov. Sibley Appointed Commander. 97
XVI. March to Fort Ridgely. 103
XVII. Burial of Capt. Marsh and Men. 106
XVIII. Battle of Birch Coolie. 112
XIX. Birch Coolie Continued. 118
XX. Battle of Wood Lake. 128
XXI. Camp Release. 139
XXII. The Indian Prisoners--The Trial. 146
XXIII. Capture of Renegade Bands--Midnight March. 153
XXIV. Homeward Bound. 156
XXV. Protests--President Lincoln's Order For the Execution. 163
XXVI. The Execution--The Night Before. 169
XXVII. Squaws Take Leave of Their Husbands. 176
XXVIII. Capture and Release of Joe Brown's Indian Family. 178
XXIX. Governor Ramsey and Hole-in-the-Day. 185
XXX. Chaska--George Spencer--Chaska's Death--The "Moscow"
Expedition. 190
XXXI. The "Moscow" Expedition. 195
XXXII. Campaign of 1863--Camp Pope. 199
XXXIII. "Forward March." 205
XXXIV. Burning Prairie--Fighting Fire. 209
XXXV. Death of Little Crow. 211
XXXVI. Little Crow, Jr.--His Capture. 218
XXXVII. Camp Atchison--George A. Brackett's Adventure--Lieutenant
Freeman's Death. 221
XXXVIII. Battle of Big Mound. 232
XXXIX. Battle of Dead Buffalo Lake. 237
XL. Battle of Stony Lake--Capture of a Teton--Death of
Lieutenant Beaver. 241
XLI. Homeward Bound. 252
XLII. The Campaign of 1864. 257
XLIII. The Battle of the Bad Lands. 261
XLIV. Conclusion. 271