BLACK HAWK’S FOLLY

Sometimes referred to as the “Forgotten War,” the War of 1812 officially ended with the signing of the Treaty of Ghent by delegates of the United States and Britain in Belgium on Christmas Eve 1814. News traveled slowly in the Age of Sail, however. The British commander in North America had yet to learn of the cessation of hostilities when he attacked American forces under Andrew Jackson in New Orleans in January 1815. Word of the peace agreement was even slower to reach the upper Mississippi Valley.

That spring the Missouri frontier was aflame as Sauk and Fox (Meskwaki) warriors from what are today Iowa and Illinois raided isolated settlements, killing soldiers and civilians alike. Although the fighting eventually ceased, the last battle of the war did not unfold in the salons of Europe or on the field at New Orleans. The final engagement pitted Missouri Rangers against British-allied Sauk warriors atop a pitted limestone bluff overlooking the Mississippi floodplain.

After the United States declared war against Britain on June 18, 1812, the federal government could not spare Regular troops for duty on the Missouri frontier. Thus Congress authorized the formation of Ranger companies to safeguard settlers. These were active-duty Volunteers, not militia called up during an emergency. The government recruited them primarily from French settlements within Missouri Territory. Rangers were responsible for providing their own horses, weapons, ammunition and rations, and were—in theory, anyway—to be reimbursed by the federal government.

When news of the brewing war reached the Missouri frontier,