BIOGRAHY of Chauncey H. COOKE
Born May 15, 1846 Died May 11, 1919
Civil War soldier, schoolteacher, and farmer
Born in Columbus, Ohio, the son of Samuel Shattuck Cooke, a harness and saddlemaker, and Loduskey Gardner. The Cooke family moved to Winchester, Indiana, when Chauncey was very young. In 1855 Samuel Cooke and his brother, Chauncey, visited Buffalo County, Wisconsin, and bought two quarter sections of land and moved there two years later. The land proved unsuitable for farming, so Samuel purchased land along what came to be called Cooke Creek. Samuel and his family were the first European settlers in Dover Township.
When the call to arms came in the summer of 1861 young Cooke, although barely turned 15, was eager to respond. Waiting a year, he resolved to enlist with a lie about his age. In Setember 1862 he went to La Crosse and was enrolled in Company G, 25th Wisconsin Infantry, and shortly thereafter, instead of being sent to Dixie, was on his way northward to share in the campaign of General Pope against the Sioux of Minnesota. He mustered out in May, 1865 on his 19th birthday after nearly three years campaigning.
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| Samuel Shattuck Cooke, FATHER |
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| Lodusky Gardner Cooke, MOTHER |
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Civil War Enlistment
Assigned To The Indian Wars In Minnesota
Letters Excerpted From "Badger Boy In Blue: The Civil War Letters of Chauncey E Cooke"
from Gilmanton, Buffalo County, Wisconsin
Chauncey Cooke was just 16 when he ran away from his home in Dover, Buffalo County, Wisconsin, to fight in the Civil War. Instead, he was assigned to Minnesota in order to help quell the Sioux Uprising of 1862. These letters date from the fall of that year, and describe his life in camp, food, becoming sick with measles, growing his first beard, and similar events.
Cooke had grown up playing with Sioux boys in his wilderness homestead in Buffalo County, Wisconsin, and the letters reveal his anti-war and pro-Indian stance: "When they took up arms in desperation for their homes and the graves of their sires, they are called savages and red devils. When we white people do the same thing, we are written down in history as heroes and patriots. Why this difference? I can see into it." Shortly after the last letter was written in this section his unit was assigned to the South, and the correspondence will pick up in the next installment with his Civil War experience.
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| Sept 15, 1862 |
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Induction & Camp Soloman |
| Sept 20, 1862 |
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Life at Camp Soloman |
| Sept 21, 1862 |
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Travel to Fort Snelling |
| Oct 2, 1862 |
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Up the Mississippi to St Cloud |
| Oct 20, 1862 |
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Measles & St Cloud Hospital |
| Oct 28, 1862 |
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Recuperating In New Richmond |
| Nov 4, 1862 |
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Recuperating In New Richmond |
| Nov 10, 1862 |
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Fort Wildcat |
| Nov 20, 1862 |
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Diary From New Richmond |
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| Fort Snelling, Round Tower |
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Life At Old Camp Randall
Letters Excerpted From "Badger Boy In Blue: The Civil War Letters of Chauncey E Cooke"
from Gilmanton, Buffalo County, Wisconsin
Chauncey Cooke
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| Dec. 16, 1862 |
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| Dec. 25, 1862 |
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| Camp Randall, Wisconsin 1862 |
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Civil War Engagement
Letters Excerpted From "Badger Boy In Blue: The Civil War Letters of Chauncey E Cooke"
from Gilmanton, Buffalo County, Wisconsin
Chauncey Cooke
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