Ft

Ft. Arbuckle's Lost Troops

In about 1867, a troop of cavalry was in route from Ft. Gibson, near Muskogee, to Ft. Arbuckle. It was said that at that time there was not a single house between Stonewall and Ft. Arbuckle. Somewhere between the present day sites of Sulphur and Davis, the troop stopped to camp for the night. When morning came, some of the troops were quite ill. A runner was sent on to Ft. Arbuckle to retrieve the post doctor.

The troop had camped somewhere along Guy Sandy Creek. The post doctor brought the post ambulance with medical supplies and began taking care of the afflicted soldiers. The doctor diagnosed the troops as having cholera, a highly contagious and almost untreatable disease at that time. The troops were ordered to remain in the camp on Sandy Creek until the crisis passed. By the time the illness had passed, twenty six soldiers had died.

As was the custom for the time, a common grave was dug. Each of the soldiers were wrapped in a blanket and laid side by side. Their clothing and personal belongings were then placed in the grave with them and all the bodies were burned. The soldiers were buried in the camp. After several weeks of recovery, and evidence that the epidemic was abated, the surviving troops continued their journey to Ft. Arbuckle.

In the Indian Pioneer Paper of Bird Ashton, he states....

West of my ranch which is northwest of Sulphur, there are eighteen or twenty graves, where soldiers are buried. When I came here, there were the remains of their old rock ovens and the timber was scarred where they had used the trees for target practice.

When the troops at Ft. Arbuckle were moved to Ft. Sill in 1870, the graves, that could be located in the post cemetery at Ft. Arbuckle, were moved to the Ft. Gibson military cemetery. One can suppose that the troops buried on Guy Sandy Creek were left where they were since they had recently died of cholera. The troops graves have never been found again.