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I am seeking information on a place called Camp On Wea Reservation, K.T.  The information regarding this place and my ancestor is listed on US Returns from Military Posts 1806 to 1916, Soldiers, Veterans, Prisoner Rolls and Lists for 1862. I have found other Camp On Wea places in Annapolis, Maryland and also Lykens County, Kansas Territory.

I would appreciate any information you can give me on these types of camps. Thank you in advance.

Barbara Vatovec

Marion, Illinois

 

???

 

Dear Ms Vatovec,

The only reference to Camp on Wea I have found is the one in Lykens County, Kansas Territory, which in 1860 was on a reserve for the Wea Indians with a missionary’s quarters and facilities for a company of the 2nd U.S. Artillery Regiment, commanded by 2nd Lt. William B. Butler. At this time the soldiers’ presence was more aimed at trying to keep the peace between pro and anti secession factions in “Bleeding Kansas.”

Attached is some further reference on the Wea nation.

http://www.wea-indian-tribe.org/EnterHome.html

More is known of the base’s commander than the camp itself. Born in Greenville, S.C. on February 1, 1831, William B. Butler enlisted in 1855 and served dutifully enough until on February 1, 1861, when his personal convictions overcame his oath to the U.S. Army. On that date he resigned his commission and returned to his home state to accept a first lieutenancy in the South Carolina Regular Engineers on March 16. On January 19, 1862 he rose to captain in command of Company A, 1st South Carolina Regulars and the 3rd South Carolina Artillery, jumping to lieutenant colonel on July 22 and colonel on November 8. In 1864 he was ordered to Richmond to supervise its artillery defenses, then returned to South Carolina to command a brigade against Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman’s forces. At the Battle of Bentonville on March 19-21, 1865, he led Rhett’s Brigade, comprised of the 1st S.C. Regulars, 1st S.C. Heavy Artillery and 15th S.C. Battalion, attached to Brig. Gen. William B. Taliaferro’s Division of the Department of South Carolina, Georgia and Florida under Lt. Gen. William J. Hardee, on the right wing of General Joseph E. Johnston’s Army of the South, in the unsuccessful attempt to take the Harper House and environs. He survived the war, became an insurance agent and librarian for the U.S. House of Representatives. Butler died in Greenville on November 20, 1910.
Sincerely,

 

Jon Guttman

Research Director

World History

www.historynet.com

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