Second Fort Crawford Military Hospital | |
Location | Rice Street and South Beaumont Rd Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin |
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Coordinates | 43°2′37″N91°8′49″W / 43.04361°N 91.14694°W |
NRHP reference No. | 66000121 [1] |
Significant dates | |
Added to NRHP | October 15, 1966 |
Designated NHL | October 9, 1960 [2] |
Fort Crawford was an outpost of the United States Army located in Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin, during the 19th century.
The army's occupation of Prairie du Chien spanned the existence of two fortifications, both of them named Fort Crawford. The first of was occupied from 1816 to 1832, the second from 1832 to 1856. Both of the forts formed part of a string of fortifications along the upper Mississippi River that also included Fort Snelling near Saint Anthony Falls in Minnesota, and Fort Armstrong in Rock Island, Illinois. Fort Crawford was also associated with a string of forts built along the Fox-Wisconsin Waterway, which included Fort Winnebago in Portage, Wisconsin and Fort Howard in Green Bay, Wisconsin.
The site of the second fort has been preserved and holds the Fort Crawford Museum, located in the Second Fort Crawford Military Hospital. This is a 1930s reconstruction of the hospital serving the second fort. This building contains the only surviving building fragments of either fort, and it was designated a U.S. National Historic Landmark in 1960. [2]
The U.S. Army established a presence in Prairie du Chien during the War of 1812, when it built Fort Shelby on St. Feriole Island in the Mississippi River, which was part of the town separated by a marshy bayou. On July 19, 1814, Fort Shelby was captured by British forces and renamed Fort McKay. The British would continue to occupy Prairie du Chien until 1815, after the Treaty of Ghent restored the pre-war border between the United States and British Canada. When the British retreated from the city, they burned Fort McKay rather than give it back to the Americans.
To protect Prairie du Chien against future invasion, U.S. forces returned in June 1816, with orders to construct a new fort on the site of Fort McKay. This fort was named Fort Crawford in honor of William H. Crawford, the Secretary of War under James Madison. Built entirely of wood except for the magazine, the fort measured 343 ft on each side and included Blockhouses at its northwest and southeast corners. Construction of the fort lasted through the summer of 1816.
Following the completion of Fort Crawford, the garrison was engaged primarily in peacekeeping between the new white settlers arriving in the region and the region's historic Native American tribes. Lieutenant Colonel Henry Leavenworth, a former U.S. Indian Agent, was among the early commanders at the fort. The United States conducted several negotiations with American Indians at Fort Crawford during the 1820s. One of the largest Indian councils in U.S. history was held at the fort in 1825, when over 5000 representatives of nearly a dozen Native American nations gathered to discuss and sign the first Treaty of Prairie du Chien.
Because of the first Fort Crawford's location alongside the Mississippi River, diseases such as malaria and dysentery were common among the troops. They did not understand the role of mosquitoes and sanitation in these diseases. In addition, the fort's wooden walls rotted because of seasonal flooding that took place nearly every spring. The post took meteorological observations in 1822. In 1826, after a major flood, the garrison at Fort Crawford was ordered to leave Prairie du Chien and reinforce Fort Snelling in Minnesota.
During 1827, while no troops remained in Prairie du Chien, a group of hostile Winnebago Indians led by chief Red Bird murdered a family of settlers near the abandoned fort. This incident was the start of the Winnebago War of 1827. The federal government ordered the return of soldiers to Prairie du Chien. Shortly afterward, the Army decided that the first Fort Crawford was no longer habitable. In 1828 a decision was made to build a new fort on higher ground. Maj. Stephen W. Kearny, commanding officer at the time, surveyed the area and chose a site for the new fort upon a hill near the Mississippi River's eastern bank.
The construction of the second Fort Crawford began in 1829 under the direction of the new commander, Col. Zachary Taylor, later elected as President of the United States. The new fort's location on the mainland in Prairie du Chien was much more floodproof. In addition, to make the fort more weather-proof, it was decided to construct the structure using quarried limestone rather than wood. Use of this material and delays in federal funding resulted in delays to complete the new fort; it was not finished until 1835. Troops in Prairie du Chien were unable to fully occupy the new fort's barracks until 1832, and in the meantime remained at the first Fort Crawford.
Army surgeon Dr. William Beaumont did his best to keep the troops healthy. Beaumont would later achieve fame for a series of experiments on human digestion which he conducted at locations across the United States. Fifty-six of these experiments were conducted at Fort Crawford hospital, and allowed Beaumont to draw conclusions on the effects of temperature and emotion on the digestive process.
As the second fort's barracks were being completed in 1832, the Black Hawk War broke out in Illinois, and the troops at Fort Crawford were called to defend pioneer settlements. After the Battle of Bad Axe near present-day Victory, Wisconsin, Chief Black Hawk surrendered to Col. Zachary Taylor at Fort Crawford. Black Hawk was imprisoned at the fort until he was escorted by Lt. Jefferson Davis to St. Louis, Missouri. Davis, who had been assigned to Fort Crawford in 1831, was later elected as President of the Confederate States of America during the American Civil War.
While assigned to Fort Crawford, Davis met and fell in love with Sarah Knox Taylor, the daughter of his commanding office Zachary Taylor. Colonel Taylor disapproved of the relationship between Davis and his daughter, as he felt the life of an Army officer was too hard on wives and families. In 1834 Davis was reassigned to Fort Gibson in Oklahoma. Shortly afterward, Davis resigned his commission in order to pursue his relationship with Sarah in Prairie du Chien. Upon discovering that Zachary Taylor still would not consent to their marriage, the couple eloped to Kentucky, where Davis married Sarah Taylor in 1835.
In 1835-1836 the garrison at Fort Crawford was assigned to build a road between Fort Crawford and Fort Winnebago in Portage. The route they chose for the road is now followed by U.S. Highway 18 eastward from Prairie du Chien towards Madison, Wisconsin over Military Ridge, which is so named because of the military road which followed its crest. After the road was completed and the Ho-Chunk people were relocated from Wisconsin to Minnesota, the fort had little use. It was abandoned in 1849. In 1855 Fort Crawford was reoccupied when rumors circulated of an impending uprising among the remaining Native Americans, but no such event occurred. Troops left the fort for the last time on June 9, 1856.
During the American Civil War, the fort housed part of the Swift United States Army General Hospital. [3]
Except during the American Civil War, when the fort was used as both a recruitment center and hospital for Union soldiers, Fort Crawford was left unoccupied between 1856 and 1933. In 1933, the Daughters of the American Revolution began work on reconstructing a portion of the fort's hospital, while clearing away the remaining parts of the dilapidated fort to allow for other development.
In the 1960s, the reconstructed fort hospital was transformed into a museum of medical history called the Fort Crawford Museum of Medical Progress. The museum featured exhibits on the experiments by Dr. Beaumont and other medical innovations. It was operated by the Wisconsin Medical Society until 1995. In 1996, the museum was donated to the Prairie du Chien Historical Society. It was converted into a museum of local history, called the Prairie du Chien Museum at Fort Crawford. While the fort's hospital, which is registered as a National Historic Landmark, still houses exhibits related to Dr. Beaumont and medical history, adjacent buildings are now filled with exhibits on other aspects of Prairie du Chien history. [4]
The Black Hawk War was a conflict between the United States and Native Americans led by Black Hawk, a Sauk leader. The war erupted after Black Hawk and a group of Sauks, Meskwakis (Fox), and Kickapoos, known as the "British Band", crossed the Mississippi River, to the U.S. state of Illinois, from Iowa Indian Territory in April 1832. Black Hawk's motives were ambiguous, but he was apparently hoping to reclaim land that was taken over by the United States in the disputed 1804 Treaty of St. Louis.
Prairie du Chien is a city in and the county seat of Crawford County, Wisconsin, United States. The population was 5,506 at the 2020 census. Its ZIP code is 53821.
Sarah Knox Davis was the daughter of the 12th U.S. president Zachary Taylor and part of the notable Lee family. She met future Confederate president Jefferson Davis (1808–1889) when living with her father and family at Fort Crawford during the Black Hawk War in 1832. They married in 1835 and she died three months later of malaria.
The Bad Axe Massacre was a massacre of Sauk (Sac) and Fox Indians by United States Army regulars and militia that occurred on August 1–2, 1832. This final scene of the Black Hawk War took place near present-day Victory, Wisconsin, in the United States. It marked the end of the war between white settlers and militia in Illinois and Michigan Territory, and the Sauk and Fox tribes under warrior Black Hawk.
During the War of 1812, the Illinois Territory was the scene of fighting between Native Americans and United States soldiers and settlers. The Illinois Territory at that time included the areas of modern Illinois, Wisconsin and parts of Minnesota and Michigan.
The Winnebago War, also known as the Winnebago Uprising, was a brief conflict that took place in 1827 in the Upper Mississippi River region of the United States, primarily in what is now the state of Wisconsin. Not quite a war, the hostilities were limited to a few attacks on American civilians by a portion of the Winnebago Native American tribe. The Ho-Chunks were reacting to a wave of lead miners trespassing on their lands, and to false rumors that the United States had sent two Ho-Chunk prisoners to a rival tribe for execution.
Fort Howard was a 19th-century fortification in the north central United States, built by the U.S. Army. It was located along the west bank of the Fox River in Green Bay, Wisconsin.
Fort Winnebago was a 19th-century fortification of the United States Army located on a hill overlooking the eastern end of the portage between the Fox and Wisconsin Rivers east of present-day Portage, Wisconsin. It was the middle one of three fortifications along the Fox-Wisconsin Waterway that also included Fort Howard in Green Bay, Wisconsin and Fort Crawford in Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin. Fort Winnebago was constructed in 1828 as part of an effort to maintain peace between white settlers and the region's Native American tribes following the Winnebago War of 1827. The fort's location was chosen not only because of its proximity to the site of Red Bird's surrender in the Winnebago War, but also because of the strategic importance of the portage on the Fox-Wisconsin Waterway, a heavily traveled connection between the Great Lakes and the Mississippi River. Fort Winnebago's location near the portage allowed it to regulate transportation between the lakes and the Mississippi.
The Villa Louis is a National Historic Landmark located on St. Feriole Island, in Prairie du Chien, southwestern Wisconsin. The villa and estate are a historical museum operated by the Wisconsin Historical Society. The site has been restored to its appearance during the late 19th century, when it was the estate of the prominent H. Louis Dousman family, descendants of a fur trader and entrepreneur.
The Siege of Prairie du Chien was a British victory in the far western theater of the War of 1812. During the war, Prairie du Chien was a small frontier settlement with residents loyal to both American and British causes. By 1814, both nations were anxious to control the site because of its importance to the fur trade and its strategic location at the intersection of the Mississippi River and the Fox-Wisconsin Waterway, a transportation route linking the Mississippi with the Great Lakes.
The Old Military Road was a road built by the U.S. Army in 1835–36, connecting Fort Howard Wisconsin with Fort Crawford via Fond du Lac, Fort Winnebago (Portage), and Dodgeville. This first military road was a beginning of government planning for overland travel, which eventually led Wisconsin, first as a territory and later as a state, and its localities to finance its own system of roadways for various purposes. Remains of the road that exist today are listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Shabbona, also known as Shabonee and Shaubena, was an Ottawa tribe member who became a chief within the Potawatomi tribe in Illinois during the 19th century.
The Black Hawk Tree, or Black Hawk's Tree, was a cottonwood tree located in Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin, United States. Local legend held that Sauk leader Black Hawk used it to elude his pursuers, though there are differing details and versions of the story. One version puts Black Hawk's presence in the tree during the 1790s, while another states it was after the conclusion of the 1832 Black Hawk War and involved a young Lieutenant Jefferson Davis. In reality, it is unlikely that Black Hawk ever used the tree to hide, though he was probably in Prairie du Chien once after his surrender at the end of the 1832 Black Hawk War. The tree was felled by a windstorm during the 1920s.
Warrior was a privately owned and constructed steamboat that was pressed into service by the U.S. government during the Black Hawk War to assist with military operations. Warrior was constructed and launched in 1832 at Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania by Joseph Throckmorton who also served as the vessel's captain. Once constructed the vessel traveled to St. Louis and into the war zone. Warrior played a key role in the decisive Battle of Bad Axe. Following the war the steamboat continued its service under Throckmorton along the Upper Mississippi River.
Joseph Throckmorton was an American steamboat builder and captain during the 19th century. He was born in Monmouth County, New Jersey, and first worked in a mercantile business. His first steamboat was Red Rover, purchased on the Ohio River around 1830. In 1832 he built and skippered the steamboat Warrior. The vessel and Captain Throckmorton played a key role in the decisive battle of the 1832 Black Hawk War. Following the war, he built and owned several more steamboats, and worked for a short time as an insurance representative in St. Louis. Throckmorton died in December 1872 while employed by the United States government.
The Astor Fur Warehouse is a historic fur warehouse located at Bolvin and Water Streets on St. Feriole Island in Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin. Jean Joseph Rolette, an agent of the American Fur Company, built the warehouse in 1828. The warehouse was used until the mid-19th century; it has since been incorporated into the Villa Louis museum. The building, now a National Historic Landmark, is the only known surviving fur trade warehouse in the upper Mississippi valley.
General Joseph Montfort Street was a 19th-century American pioneer, trader and US Army officer. During the 1820s and 1830s, he was also a U.S. Indian Agent to the Winnebago and later to the Sauk and Fox tribes after the Black Hawk War. His eldest son was Joseph H. D. Street, the first appointed registrar of the Council Bluffs Land Office in western Iowa.
This is a list of the National Register of Historic Places listings in Crawford County, Wisconsin. It is intended to provide a comprehensive listing of entries in the National Register of Historic Places that are located in Crawford County, Wisconsin. The locations of National Register properties for which the latitude and longitude coordinates are included below may be seen in a map.
Wabasha II, also known as Wapahasha, Wapasha, or "The Leaf," succeeded his father as head chief of the Mdewakanton Dakota tribe in the early 1800s. He led the Dakota forces fighting with the British in the War of 1812, but sided with the United States in the Black Hawk War of 1832. Chief Wabasha II signed the Treaties of Prairie du Chien in 1825 and 1830.
James Henry Lockwood was an American merchant, lawyer, and Wisconsin pioneer. He was the first permanent resident to practice law within what is now the state of Wisconsin.