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Captain Jack Crawford
Captain Jack Crawford - Scout, Poet, Trail Guide, Author, and Adventurer.
By Thadd Turner
John Wallace Crawford, known as the 'Poet Scout of the Black Hills', was born in Donegal County, Ireland. Jack
came to the United States as a young boy in 1854. His mother, Susan Wallace Crawford, was a descendent of Sir William Wallace,
the famous Scotch hero who waged war to gain Scotland's freedom in the early 14th century. Crawford was a Union Civil War
veteran, frontier scout, poet, author, newspaper correspondent, government agent, and lecturer who remained popular until
his death in 1917.
Jack was appointed the first 'Captain' of the newly appointed Black Hills Rangers militia in August of 1875. He would
replace Buffalo Bill Cody as chief of scouts for the 5th Cavalry near Sage Creek, just south of the Black Hills on August
24, 1876, only three short weeks after the shooting of Wild Bill Hickok in the No. 10 Saloon in Deadwood. Immediately, in
the first part of September, he would make his famous horseback ride from the Battle of Slim Buttes, almost 150 miles north
of the Black Hills in western Dakota Territory, carrying urgent dispatches to Fort Laramie, Wyoming Territory, 200 miles south
of Deadwood, covering this distance of over 350 miles in just four days. He rode to death two horses to carry out this remarkable
feat.
Captain Jack Crawford would eventually relocate his family to the Socorro area of New Mexico Territory, but would continue
to travel frequently across America as an actor, lecturer, special government agent, and adventurer to the silver and gold
strikes of the later part of the 19th century.
Copyright Thadd Turner 2001
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