Four regiments were organized, and to them
were joined four hundred regulars. One of the first persons to
come forward with an offer of his services was a tall, ungainly,
but powerful young man from Sangamon County, who had but two
years before settled in the State, and who was at once honored
with the captaincy of his company. This man was Abraham Lincoln.
Other men whose names loom large in American history were with
the little army also. The commander of the regulars was Colonel
Zachary Taylor. Among his lieutenants were Jefferson Davis and
Albert Sidney Johnston, and Robert Anderson, the defender of Fort
Sumter in 1860, was a colonel of Illinois volunteers. It is said
that the oath of allegiance was administered to young Lincoln by
Lieutenant Jefferson Davis!
Over marshy trails and across streams swollen by the spring thaws
the army advanced to Dixon's Ferry, ninety miles up the Rock,
whence a detachment of three hundred men was sent out, under
Major Stillman, to reconnoitre. Unluckily, this force seized
three messengers of peace dispatched by Black Hawk and, in the
clash which followed, was cut to pieces and driven into headlong
flight by a mere handful of red warriors.
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