Ft. Reno

[Diane Merkel]

The following is courtesy of Markland:

This is Ben Clark's gravestone at Ft. Reno, Oklahoma, which is just across the Canadian river from the Darlington Indian reservation. Ft. Reno, as most frontier posts not engulfed by suburbs, emphasizes how barren the surroundings were for soldiers posted there.

Ben Clark was one of the white scouts for GAC at Washita. His first wife was Cheyenne and, during Washita, legend has it that he rescued two young sisters. Several years later he married one, I believe her name was Mocha or something similar. They had eight kids, most of whom died in childhood. In 1914, old, disspirited, alone, he shot himself.

Some put him in the same class as frontiersmen such as Bill Comstock and Bill Cody.

[elisabeth]

in Eyewitnesses to the Indian Wars: The Army and the Indian,, p. 380, Sheridan says unequivocally that "he was the best scout I ever had".

Gorgeous photo, Billy.

[markland]

elisabeth said:

in Eyewitnesses to the Indian Wars: The Army and the Indian,, p. 380, Sheridan says unequivocally that "he was the best scout I ever had".

Gorgeous photo, Billy.

It is now gorgeous thanks to the editing skills of Ms. Merkel. Some idiot (who will remain nameless) had included a candid view of one his fingers when taking the shot.

I wish I had had time to travel over to Darlington but maybe next time. Unfortunately I did not take any shots of the post itself due to having a practically dead battery and having left my fully charged spare in Kansas. All-in-all, not one of my better days!

Billy

[crzhrs]

Didn't Clark have some bad things to say about the Washita Battle and Custer? I believe he stated that it was soldier's wild firing that caused the death of a white woman and her child and was later covered up as an Indian woman who did it, plus assorted other derrogatory statements about Custer's command.

[gary]

Clara Blinn and her son Willie died at the Washita. The accounts of their deaths are contradictory and there are indications that the military was keen to avoid any suggestion that they were the victims of so called friendly fire.