The First Dragoon Expedition of 1834 (also known as the Dodge-Leavenworth Expedition) was an exploratory mission of the

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land warfare, land military branch, service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight Uniformed services of the United States, U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army o ...

into the southwestern Great Plains of the

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. It was the first official contact between the American government and the Southern Plains Indians.

History

The United States Dragoon Regiment left

Fort Gibson Fort Gibson is a historic military site next to the modern city of Fort Gibson, in Muskogee County Oklahoma. It guarded the American frontier in Indian Territory from 1824 to 1888. When it was constructed, the fort was farther west than any ot ...

Indian territory The Indian Territory and the Indian Territories are terms that generally described an evolving land area set aside by the United States Government for the relocation of Native Americans who held aboriginal title to their land as a sovereign ...

, on 20 June 1834, under the command of General Henry Leavenworth. In addition to the troops, there were 30

Cherokee The Cherokee (; chr, ᎠᏂᏴᏫᏯᎢ, translit=Aniyvwiyaʔi or Anigiduwagi, or chr, ᏣᎳᎩ, links=no, translit=Tsalagi) are one of the indigenous peoples of the Southeastern Woodlands of the United States. Prior to the 18th century, t ...

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, Osage, and Seneca tribesmen who served as guides. The expedition entered the

Cross Timbers The term Cross Timbers, also known as Ecoregion 29, Central Oklahoma/Texas Plains, is used to describe a strip of land in the United States that runs from southeastern Kansas across Central Oklahoma to Central Texas. Made up of a mix of prairie ...

region on July 10. The difficult terrain of the Cross Timbers region, together with summer heat, sickness, and death slowed the progress of the expedition; one hundred fifty of the five hundred men died on the march. The expedition stopped at Camp Leavenworth, where General Leavenworth, sick and injured from a buffalo hunt, sent the troops onward under the command of Colonel

Henry Dodge Moses Henry Dodge (October 12, 1782 – June 19, 1867) was a Democratic member to the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate, Territorial Governor of Wisconsin and a veteran of the Black Hawk War. His son, Augustus C. Dodge, served a ...

. On July 16, 1834, the expedition left 75 sick men, including American traveling artist

George Catlin George Catlin (July 26, 1796 – December 23, 1872) was an American adventurer, lawyer, painter, author, and traveler, who specialized in portraits of Native Americans in the Old West. Traveling to the American West five times during the 183 ...

, at Camp Comanche; Colonel Dodge and the rest of his men continued onward. General Leavenworth died on July 21, 1834. On July 21, 1834, Colonel Dodge and the remaining men reached a village of Wichita Indians at Devils Canyon. One of the Wichita men was the father of a woman travelling with the expedition. The reunion resulted in easing Dodge's negotiations with the tribe on the next day, during which Dodge invited the tribe to send representatives to Washington, D. C. He also won the release of a white boy that the Washitas had captured during the previous Spring. Dodge also met with some Kiowas, who had arrived with some Comanches. Another woman traveling with the Leavenworth-Dodge group was a Kiowa, who had been kidnapped by Osages in 1833. Dodge returned her to her tribe, winning their friendship. He urged the three tribes to avoid attacking white and Eastern Indian people. A few days later, the main body of the expedition left for Fort Gibson which they reached on August 15, 1834. General Henry Leavenworth

Notable expedition members

In addition to Dodge, Leavenworth and Catlin, notable members of the expedition included: * Stephen W. Kearny, lieutenant colonel and second in command of the dragoons. Kearny led the conquest of California in the

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, and died from

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he contracted in Veracruz. * Richard B. Mason, major. Like Kearny, Mason was a one-time military governor of California, and in that capacity reported the gold discovery to president Polk in 1848. * Edwin Vose "Bull" Sumner, captain of Company B. Sumner later became a Civil War commander, retiring with the rank of major general. *

David Hunter David Hunter (July 21, 1802 – February 2, 1886) was an American military officer. He served as a Union general during the American Civil War. He achieved notability for his unauthorized 1862 order (immediately rescinded) emancipating slaves ...

, captain company D. Hunter became a Civil War general, who promoted the idea of recruiting freed slaves as soldiers. He retired with the rank of major general. *

Nathan Boone Nathan Boone (1780–1856) was a veteran of the War of 1812, a delegate to the Missouri constitutional convention in 1820, and a captain in the 1st United States Regiment of Dragoons at the time of its founding, eventually rising to the rank of lie ...

, captain company H. Boone was the youngest son of Daniel Boone and served with Dodge in the

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. * Philip St. George Cooke, first lieutenant company G. Cooke became a Civil War general, and wrote the army's first cavalry manual. He retired as a brevet major general. * Jefferson Davis, first lieutenant company F. Davis became Secretary of War, and later was President of the

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. * John Burgwin, second lieutenant company B. He died at the

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in 1847. *

Enoch Steen Enoch Steen (February 22, 1800 – January 22, 1880) was a United States military officer and western explorer. He joined the United States Army in 1832, serving at posts throughout the United States, including many remote locations in the w ...

, second lieutenant company D. Steen held a number of posts throughout the United States, mostly in the western parts. He was a lieutenant colonel in the 2nd United States Cavalry during the Civil War. *

Jesse Chisholm Jesse Chisholm (''circa ''1805 - March 4, 1868) (Cherokee) was a Cherokee fur trader and merchant in the American West. He is known for having scouted and developed what became known as the Chisholm Trail, later used to drive cattle from Texas to ...

, guide and interpreter. Chisholm was the namesake of the famous Texas-Kansas cattle trail.

George Catlin paintings

All of the following are produced from Catlin's paintings and other published images, which originated with sketches that he made on the expedition. File:KiowaBrotherSister.png, Wun-pan-to-mee (the white weasel) and Tunk-aht-oh-ye (the thunderer), Kiowa brother and sister rescued by the expedition. Shortly after this sketch was taken, the boy was killed in a stock yard accident. File:DodgeComancheEmissary.png, Colonel Henry Dodge first meets a Comanche emissary, July 14, 1834. Note the leather dragoon helmets of the soldiers and Dodge's buckskin outfit. File:ComancheVillageResidents.png, Residents of the Comanche village, approximately July 16, 1834. Catlin notes in his text, and depicts in the drawing, the fear of the dogs and children. File:ComanchesWildHorses.png, Comanches capturing wild horses with lassos, approximately July 16, 1834.

References

Sources

* * * *Perrine, Fred S.
The Journal of Hugh Evans
" ''Chronicles of Oklahoma'' 3:3 (September 1925) 2-215 (retrieved August 16, 2006). * * Shirk, George H.
Peace on the Plains
" ''Chronicles of Oklahoma'' 28:1 (January 1950) 2-41 (retrieved August 16, 2006). * *

Notes

{{notelist

External links

* ttps://web.archive.org/web/20121024013411/http://www.library.okstate.edu/okmaps/ Oklahoma Digital Maps: Digital Collections of Oklahoma and Indian Territory Pre-statehood history of Oklahoma American frontier