Col. George Boyd was Indian agent at Green Bay in the summer of 1832; he replaced Col. Samuel C. Stambaugh early in June. Stambaugh, although superseded, did not immediately leave Green
Bay and was very popular with the Menominee tribe. During the course of the war, when all trace of the whereabouts of the Sauk band had been lost, Gen. Henry Atkinson, encamped on Whitewater River in Wisconsin, sent Col. William S. Hamilton (son of Alexander Hamilton) to Colonel Boyd at Green Bay. Atkinson feared that Black Hawk and the Sauk hostiles would attempt to escape to the British at Malden, and he therefore ordered Boyd to enlist and equip as large a body of Menominee Indians as possible to try to intercept them. Boyd at once called the Menominee together. They were willing to go to war against the Sauk if they might have officers of their own choosing. Col. S. C. Stambaugh was thereupon made commander-in-chief. The second place was offered to Col. W. S. Hamilton, but he declined the honor. The Menominee turned out about three hundred warriors, who were organized into two companies commanded by the following officers: 1st Company; Augustin Grignon, captain, Charles A. Grignon Jr., first lieutenant; 2d. Company; George Johnston, captain, James M. Boyd, first lieutenant, William Powell, second lieutenant and interpreter. Alexander J. Irwin was charged with the commissariat with rank of first lieutenant.
There is every reason to suppose that Osh-ka-he-nah-niew was a member of the first company. Augustin Grignon told Doctor Draper that this Indian was in the war, and in all probability he named members of his own command. Robert Grignon of this company received a wound in action, and was in receipt of a pension until his death.
The documentary material in the Wisconsin Historical Library includes the official papers of Col. George Boyd, Indian agent. Those relating to the Menominee contingent under Stambaugh in the Black Hawk War are published in Wisconsin Historical Collections, XII, 270-98. It will be noticed that August 12, 1832, Boyd wrote that Stambaugh had informed him that he had arrived at Fort Winnebago with his command, three hundred Menominees, and was on his way to report to General Scott. September 2, 1832, Boyd wrote to G. B. Porter, governor of Michigan territory, enclosing Stambaugh’s report of the expedition and the Muster Rolls of the Menominee. These should be in the War Department at Washington.
The well-known fact that Osh-ka-he-nah-niew took part in the Black Hawk War, that he was part of Stambaugh’s band, probably under Capt. Augustin Grignon, seems to us established by the historical evidence. His name on a muster roll must be sought in the documentary material at Washington.
SURVEY OF HISTORICAL ACTIVITIES
THE SOCIETY AND THE STATE
Since the sixty-fourth meeting in October, 1916, four life and twenty-four annual members have been enrolled in the State Historical Society. The new life members are: R. C. Ballard-Thruston of Louisville, Kentucky, John Strange of Neenah, Chester Lloyd Jones of Madison, and Harry W. Bolens of Port Washington. The annual members are Dr. James S. Reeve and Henry L. Tinker of Appleton; John T. Durward of Baraboo; John J. Wood of Berlin; Leland S. Kemnitz of Detroit, Michigan; Amasa J. Edminster and R. C. Rodecker of Holcombe; Oscar G. Boisseau of Holden, Missouri; Walter M. Atwood, William H. Faust, Clarence B. Lester, Edwin C. Mason, Mary Oakley, Frederic A. Ogg, and Mrs. Jessie Russell Skinner of Madison; Clarence R. Falk and Arthur G. Santer of Milwaukee; Ruth Thompson of Minneapolis, Minnesota; Mrs. L. T. Hill of Sparta; Katherine A. Rood of Stevens Point; John S. Roeseler of Superior; Arthur T. Leith of Washington, D. C.; E. P. Winkelman of Waterloo; and Philip B. Gordon of White Earth, Minnesota.
In the same period the Society has lost by death five of its members: David J. Ryan of Appleton; William N. Merriam of Duluth, Minnesota; Hon. John A. Aylward, Gen. Benjamin F. Cram, and Justice William H. Timlin of Madison. Probably the list should include names of other members, of whose deaths the administration of the Society has not yet been apprised.