Joined: Nov 2002 Gender: Male Posts: 800 Location: McHenry Illinois
Yellow Creek « Thread Started on Mar 16, 2004, 12:54am »
Yellow Creek is located on the east side of Jo Davies County, and is crossed by highway 20 to the south Howardsville road towards the north and Tiger Road to the east (ref an official Jo Davies County road map approved by the county board).
On June 18th, (there is some confusion over the exact date of this battle) Capt. James W. Stephenson had reported that ten horses had been stolen from the Galena area, (by indians)"within 30 yards of the fort".
With approximately 12 men, plus additional men from the Fort, Stephenson pursued the indians to the area of Yellow Creek, where they located, in Stephensons words " The d**ned Scoundrels".
They approached the indians as quietly as possible and engaged the in close quarter combat. And Stephenson's report states; "We got into such close quarters as to be constrained to use the bayonet and butcher knife".
Three militiamen were killed at Yellow Creek; George Eames, L.P. Howard and Michael Lovel, they were killed by musket fire. Approximately five or six indians were killed.
Yellow Creek or Waddam's Grove? « Reply #1 on Mar 18, 2004, 8:57am »
Hmmm... while I've never heard of this fight described as "Yellow Creek," several contemporary and modern commentators refer(ed) to it as "Waddam's Grove."
The archaeology at Apple River Fort, while hardly exhaustive, did reveal post holes not far from the fort that may indeed indicate location of the horse corral raided by the Sauk war-party.
Joined: Nov 2002 Gender: Male Posts: 800 Location: McHenry Illinois
Re: Yellow Creek « Reply #2 on Mar 18, 2004, 12:44pm »
Waddam Illinois, appears only once in Whitney's "The Black Hawk War" The general index lists the various Battles of the Black Hawk War in alphabetical order as follows;
Apple River June 24th
Bad Axe River August 1st
Bad Axe River August 2nd
Buffalo Grove (Durley Murder) May 19th
Horse Shoe Bend (east Pecatonica River) June 16th
Indian Creek May 21st
Kelloggs's Grove June 16th
Kellogg's Grove June 25th
St Vrain party attacked May 24th
Spafford's Farm June 14th
Stillmans Run (Old Mans Creek) May 14th
Wisconsin Heights July 21st
Yellow Creek June 18th
On another note, according to Stephenson's report about the Battle of Yellow Creek, he had departed from "Galena" where ten horses had been stolen. Not Apple River Fort, unless there is some misinformation here.
But another note in Whitney's tell us that in 1886 the bodies of three men were disinterred and removed to the burial plot at the Kelloggs Grove monument. The original graves had been located on a roadside between Waddams and McConnell in present northwest Stephenson county.
Yellow Creek crosses the border of both Stephenson and Jo Davies County. So it's a fairly good assumption that Yellow Creek and Waddams Grove are one in the same. It would only make sense, due to the information that tells us about the disinterrment of the three Militiamen who were taken to Kellogg's grove, which is located Stephenson's County.
« Last Edit: Mar 18, 2004, 12:55pm by Gene Stevens »
Re: Yellow Creek « Reply #3 on Mar 19, 2004, 10:32am »
Gene,
Besides the interesting thought of assigning the battle name of "Yellow Creek," to this Stephenson/Sauk skirmish another one of your comments caught my attention. I would like to discuss it here in the interest of clarification.
Gene wrote: On another note, according to Stephenson's report about the Battle of Yellow Creek, he had departed from "Galena" where ten horses had been stolen. Not Apple River Fort, unless there is some misinformation here.
If I can assume the "report" you refer to is Stephenson's letter to The Galenian newspaper that is published in Whitney's Vol II. pp 633-34 I would suggest that the ten horses were in fact, stolen from near the Apple River Fort and not Galena.
Stephenson's letter was wrote at Apple River, therefore when Stephenson wrote:Dear Sir: -- The night we left Galena ten more horses were stolen from this place; some of them from the stables within 30 yards of the fort.from this place is the key, which is Apple River.
Joined: Nov 2002 Gender: Male Posts: 800 Location: McHenry Illinois
Re: Yellow Creek « Reply #4 on Mar 19, 2004, 12:52pm »
Yes, thus comes the confusion! A few years ago, I put together a report writing class at my place of employment, coincidentally, I used many of the historic military reports that I had run accross over the years. Many of these reports lacked clear and concise information that made it very difficult to interpret what happened. Stephenson's report is a prime example of the type of confusion that can occur when a bad report is allowed into the record.
Looking at the information closer, your probably correct. It appears that the report was written from Apple River Fort, though I'm not about to swear on it, but if you look in the notes on page 634, there seems to be a lot of confusion over when the skirmish took place, look under notes 1 & 2 on page 634 of Whitney's.
But if this report were taken into a court of law, it would certainly be impeached as bad evidence and a clear misrepresentation of facts due to lack of clarity. Though I'm sure that it might not be too difficult to track the action in this incident with a little more research (thats me keeping an open mind).
And by the way, I did not assign the name Yellow Creek, Ellen M. Whitney did!
On another note (s), thanks for posting here. It's great to hear from you. AND you might want to take a look at another post in the militia segment of the board from Sharon, she had some questions pertaining to the second seminole war, I thought you might be a good person to help her out.
« Last Edit: Mar 19, 2004, 12:54pm by Gene Stevens »
Joined: Nov 2002 Gender: Male Posts: 800 Location: McHenry Illinois
Re: Yellow Creek in the area of Waddams Grove? « Reply #5 on Apr 13, 2004, 1:25am »
Clarification From the "History of Jo Davies County" Originally published in 1878;
On the night of June 08th, the indians stole horses just outside of the stockade on Apple River (Elizabeth) and on the night of the 17th ten more were stolen. The next morning Capt. J.W. Stephenson, with twelve of his men and nine from Apple River Fort, started on the trail of the red thieves, and overtook them about twelve miles east of Kelloggs Grove, southeast of Waddam's Grove and pursued them until a little northeast of Waddams (in Stephenson County).
The remainder of this paragraph tells about the battle, but makes an interesting note about a piece of indian scalp which was retained by William H Sayder of Galena Illinois!
« Last Edit: Apr 13, 2004, 1:27am by Gene Stevens »
Re: Yellow Creek « Reply #6 on Jun 5, 2007, 12:45am »
Sorry to bring up a very old post, but I would like to add that when I was a kid, I used to hear the storys of the Black Hawk war specificaly the battle that had happened in the grove up the old dirt road from the house we were sitting in. My Family has owned the land around the Monument where the fallen soldiers were burried. I was just doing some looking around (I have not been there in years, and have been "home sick" and was looking for a good picture of the area and stumbled here) this is in Stephenson county at the Kellogs Grove Monument
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