Davenport Democrat Davenport, Scott, Iowa July 20, 1924 BATTLE OF CAMPBELL'S ISLAND OVER A CENTURY AGO ONE OF FAMOUS LOCAL HISTORY EVENTS Few of the Davenporters to whom Campbell's Island is a familiar place realized that one of the most important events of the city's history took place there when Lieutenant Campbell, traveling up the river to Prairie Du Chien, was attacked by Indians under the command of Chief Black Hawk. The battle was one of the most exciting in the long record of those early encounters, when the settlers warred with an unfriendly race besides with the unfriendly elements. Early in July, 1814, and expedition under the command of Captain John Campbell, First United States infantry, left St. Louis and proceeded to Prairie Du Chien to strengthen the garrison at that place. The expedition, consisting of 42 regulars, 66 rangers and about 21 other persons, including boatmen, women, and the sutler's establishment, went up the river in three jeel-boats as far as Rock Island, near which place the expedition was attacked by the Indians and nearly destroyed. Expedition Reaches Rock Island. Lieutenant Campbell commanded the boat with the regulars, and Captain Stephen Rector and Lieutenant Riggs the other two barges manned by the rangers. The expedition reached Rock Island in peace, but the Sac and Fox Indians, in great numbers, swarmed around the boats while still professing peace. The barge commanded by Rector was navigated by the French of Cahokia, who were good sailors and soldiers. During the night while the boats lay still at Rock Island, the Indians were making hollow professions of friendship. Many of the French, knowing the Indians too well, informed Lieutenant Campbell of their treachery. But the Lieutenant could not be convinced that the Indians were anything but friendly. Not without reason were the fears of the French; the Indians wanted them to leave the Americans and go home. They would squeeze the hands of the French, pulling their hands down the river, indicating to leave. The Indians disliked to fight their old friend the French. "Campbell's Island" When the fleet set sail in the morning the wind above Rock Island blew so hard that Campbell's boat was forced on a lee shore and lodged on a small island near the mainland known from this circumstance as "Campbell's Island." Commanded by Black Hawk the Indians began an attack on the boat as soon as it hit the shore. Ahead, the boats of Rector and Riggs could see the smoke of the fire arms but could not hear the report of the guns. The two ships returned to assist Campbell, but the wind was so high that their barges were almost unmanageable; they were forced to anchor at some distance from Campbell, unable to help him because the storm raged so severely. Driven ashore by the wind, Campbell's men began cooking their breakfast. But despite the sentinels that Campbell had placed out, the enemy rushed in on them by the hundreds, killing many on the spot. The survivors took rescue in the boat where, on and around it, the warriors kept up a continuous attack until they succeeded setting the boat on fire. Rector to the Rescue. Campbell's men had almost ceased firing when Rector and his men came to the rescue. The bottom of the burning boat was covered with the dead and wounded; Campbell himself lay wounded in the midst of his dying men. Rector and his men, unable to remain inactive spectators to the destruction of Campbell and his men, had raised their anchor in a tempest of wind and in the face of almost a thousand Indians, had imperiled their lives to rush to the scene of action. During the rest of the war in the west, no act of daring and bravery surpassed the rescue of Campbell. The French rangers under Rector were well acquainted with managing a boat in such a crisis, while neither the commander nor his men lacked in chivalry and patriotism. Rector's boat had first been lightened by casting overboard quantities of provisions. Many of the crew then actually got out of the boat into the water, and leaving the vessel between them and the fire of the enemy, pushed their boat against the fire the entire distance to Campbell's boat, which was in the possession of the Indians. Rector and his 40 men made a steady advance until, forging their barge to the burning boat, they faced nearly a thousand of the enemy and carried the wounded and living soldiers, together with their commander, to safety. Return to St. Louis. By his superior knowledge of the management of a vessel, a saltwater sailor by the name of Doadley did gallant service in the daring enterprise. Rector took all the live men from Campbell's boat into his while his men, in the water, hauled their own boat out into the stream. The Indians fasted on the abandoned boat of Campbell. With his boat crowded with wounded and dying, Rector rowed night and day until they reached St. Louis. The boat of Riggs was supposed to have been captured by the enemy, but the vessel, strongly fortified lay in the hands of the enemy for several hours, the enemy in possession of the outside, the whites the inside. In the evening the wind subsided so that Riggs got his boat off, leaving the Indians in the lurch. There was a general jubilee in St. Louis when Riggs, without losing many men, arrived to safety. But Rector and Riggs, with their troops, presented a distressing sight; those who were not wounded were worn down to skeletons by labor and fatigue.