Fort Morgan, Colorado: General Pope

Saturday, December 9, 2017

Artist Thomas Worthington Whittredge at Fort Morgan

In 1866, General John Pope, commander of the Military Division of the Missouri which then included the Colorado Territory, set off on a tour of the Plains, the Rocky Mountains and New Mexico. During his trip he would stay at Fort Wardwell on June 22nd through the 24th. The expedition was recorded by Colonel James Meline in his book Two Thousand Miles on Horseback. Meline wrote eloquently about the fort (see post "In View of the Mountains").

Also accompanying General Pope on this expedition was the landscape painter Thomas Worthington Whittredge. He was as enthralled as Meline with the plains and a number of his landscapes are set along the Platte River.

Monday, April 9, 2012

Desertions from Fort Morgan

At times, desertion was a major problem in the military. By no means a daily occurrence, monthly reports note how many soldiers – generally enlisted men – deserted during the month.

Notes were also made of soldiers captured and placed under arrest, sometimes court martialed, sometimes placed back into service. As can be seen on the following chart, desertions were relatively rare with occasional spikes (one of which, that of January, 1867, was detailed in the book In View of the Mountains).

Historic Overview

From my youth I brought with me only a vague impression of the history of the small town in which I was raised. Fort Morgan, Colorado, built on the site of a short-lived military fort in the heart of the great American desert; a fort that had never been attacked, never seen a battle. On little more than a whim I went in search of the fort’s operational dates (1864-1868), expecting this information would come readily to hand and that would end my curiosity - the fort once again fading into the midst of vague memory. To my surprise, I instead found a door opening to the history of the west.

The history of Fort Morgan will never rival that of Denver or glisten with the same gold dust of the mountain mining towns, but this little town on the plains of Colorado was central to the story of the Romantic west; it's story connecting with the major events of the age. Everyone has a history and every place is central to a story. What follows is the story from the land - of the land - on which Fort Morgan would rise.