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CIVIL WAR-INDIAN WAR UNIFORM COAT LAPEL FROM FORT PEMBINA

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This lapel comes from a US army coat discarded by a soldier at Fort Pembina, ND, and still has five enlisted, general service eagle buttons in place. This comes from excavations in wet, anaerobic soil that has preserved leather and cloth in remarkable condition. The fabric is soft, pliable, and displays well with the color only shifting from blue to a butternut brown and showing a few small stains and some raggedness along the inner edge.

The number and spacing of the buttons indicates it comes from an army dress coat, though the 1872 fatigue blouse is a possibility. The buttons are the standard Civil War eagles and the coat was likely a Civil War enlisted frock coat, the garrison, like other US military posts, being supplied with wartime surplus material well into the 1870s as the army drew down its huge stockpiles.

The excavations at the fort were conducted on private property with the owner’s permission. Situated in the Red River Valley in North Dakota near the Canadian border, the Fort Pembina  was established in 1870 and in operation until 1895. Trading posts existed earlier in the area as part of the fur trade, and the first U.S. military post there was temporary- manned by a detachment of Minnesota troops in 1863-1864 following the 1862 Sioux uprising. In March 1870 a new fort was established south of the Pembina River and about 200 yards west of the Red River, completed by July and named in honor of Gen. George H. Thomas. The name was changed to Fort Pembina in September and the initial garrison consisted of two companies of the 20^th US Infantry. Their main duty was to provide security for settlers worried about Sioux returning south from Canada, but the troops were more occupied with escorting boundary surveys along the Canadian border and preventing Fenian raids heading north into Canada.

The fort included enlistedmen’s barracks, officers’ quarters, guard house, ordnance storehouse, company kitchen, root house, laundress’s quarters, quarters for civilian employees, hospital and hospital servant’s house, a barn for the “hospital cow,” quartermaster and commissary offices and storehouse, stables, wagon shed, etc. The garrison reached peak strength in 1878 af 200, but the average was about 125 enlisted men and 8 officers. An October 1885 return listed 97 men, 2 field pieces, 1 mountain howitzer, 100 rifles, 19 pistols, 23 mules, and 9 wagons. By 1890 the post had just 23 men, and after an 1895 fire destroyed some 19 buildings it was decided to abandon the fort rather than rebuild, the last detachment left in September. The property was turned over to the Interior Department and later sold in 1902.

This is in remarkably good condition for an excavated piece, is very displayable, and has a tight provenance to an Indian War post garrisoned by the U.S. army for a well-defined period that encompasses the 1870s and 1880s Indian Wars, but would also be in place in a Civil War collection. We show a photo of an infantry company at Fort Pembina. They are clearly wearing Hardee hats and Civil War infantry frock coats.     [sr] [ph:m]

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