LT. POOLE'S BUTTON

This U.S. Artillery button was found by the Oxbow Archaeologists at the Ponton site on August 30, 2003. It is a two-piece brass button. The front shows an eagle with the letter "A" on a shield (left in the picture). The back has the maker's name - "·SCOVILLS· / WATERBURY" (right in the picture). Various manifestations of this company were present in Waterbury, Connecticut from before the War of 1812 till about 1970. William F. McGuinn and Bruce S. Bazelon (American Military Button Makers and Dealers; Their Backmarks & Dates, 2001, page 110) date this backmark to 1840-1850 after John Buckingham joined the firm as a partner (Scovills & Co.). However, Warren Tice (1997:28) has convincingly argued that this backmark dates to 1827-1840 when James Mitchell Lamson Scovill and William Henry Scovill were sole owners of the company. This is based on several buttons that can be identified in Scovill Company papers including an 1837 order to the Republic of Texas, a button made for the U.S. Military Academy in 1828, and correspondence about a Virginia State button dated 1835 (for further details on the history of this company and its backmarks see Warren K. Tice, Uniform Buttons of the United States 1776-1865, 1997, pages 25-39). The Ponton site button adds to the evidence that this backmark was used in the 1830's.

Oxbow Archaeologist Conrad Latuszek has identified an early account by trader, Benjamin O. Williams, that mentions a Lieutenant Poole surveying a road about five miles from the Ponton site in 1834. Through historical research he has been able to ascertain that Lt. Poole was an artillery officer. We now believe that this button once belonged to Lt. Poole! Below Conrad tells the story of Lt. Poole. [S. G. Beld]

THE STORY OF LIEUTENANT BENJAMIN POOLE, 3RD ARTILLERY, UNITED STATES ARMY

by Conrad G. Latuszek

The Oxbow Archaeologists of Midland are currently examining the site of an early settler family in Midland County. Thomas Ponton and a relative, James, were planning a water mill project north of the Oxbow (at CNC) from December 1833 till June 1835, what we now call the Ponton site. During the 2003 excavation season they uncovered a U.S. Army artilleryman's button. The make and style of the button was used from the 1820's into the early 1840's. It couldn't have come from Fort Saginaw (closest Great Lakes fort to the Ponton site, active 1822-23) because it was only manned by infantry. At the time of the Ponton occupation (1830's), the nearest fort to station artillery was Fort Gratiot. So why was this button found at the Ponton site?

The answer began to come to me with an account in the Michigan Historical Collections (Michigan Pioneer and Historical Collections 2 (1878), pages 462-470). A Saginaw Valley pioneer named Benjamin Williams stated that he met an army officer, "Lieutenant Benjamin Poole, of the Topographical Engineers Corps of the United States Army, then near the Indian village on the Tittabawassee river, Ar-be-toh-wach-e-wan, at or near the forks of said river." This was in 1834, the same time that Thomas Ponton was settling on the lower Chippewa river about one and a half miles west of this village. But, wouldn't Lt. Poole have lost an Engineers button instead? Would the Topographical Engineers have employed an artillery officer as a surveyor? Another Historical Collection story says that a Lt. Poole was in an artilleryman's uniform with fellow officers in 1834 Detroit. This was enough to prompt me to conduct further research.

A look into the history of the Army's Topographical Engineers provided insight into a miltary service in conflict with the Army Corps of Engineers. At this time, the Corps of Engineers thought that army time and money was best spent on fortifications in the East and not on surveying and road building in the under populated Great Lakes. Because of these differences the Topographical Engineers preferred any officers (and especially artillery officers) to army engineers. This is confirmed by Lt. Poole's West Point graduate biography which shows the he was indeed and artillery officer and that between 1832 and 1836 he was assigned to the Topographical Engineers (Sheila H. Biles, personal communication).

Lt. Poole's Topographical Service

The general nature of Lt. Poole's assignments with the Topographical Engineers can be gathered from their monthly "Returns." These are lists of army officers and their duties with the Engineers. This includes locations of their service and such activities as surveying, drafting maps, and writing reports.

How Lt. Poole came to enter topographical service in July of 1832 is not entirely known. However, his first recorded project, August 1832, was surveying a proposed canal route in eastern Massachusetts. The canal from Weymouth to Taunton seems not to have been constructed. Surveying, cartography, and report work continued for Lt. Poole into October. That November was spent in surveying the harbor of his hometown of Portland, Maine. Until May of 1833 he was completing additional report material for both projects in Massachusetts and Maine.

Lt. Poole's Great Lakes assignment began in June of 1833 when he was sent with infantry Lieutenants Heintzleman, detached from Fort Gratiot, and Lea, to Detroit. How often they worked on the same lakeshore projects is unknown. However, in 1834 and 1835 Lt. Poole was detached from the lakeshore projects to survey the route of a military road from Saginaw to Mackinac. The Returns state he was relieved from Topographical service in September of 1835. The survey report he penned in Detroit was dated September 30, 1835. The most current research indicates he was ordered to rejoin his regiment on January 21, 1836. Congress, who approved funds for his survey, did not request his final report until 1838. Neither the federal nor state legislatures ever appropriated funds for the road's construction.

The road Lt. Poole was surveying would have expedited military and postal transportation. The road was to be an extension of the Detroit to Saginaw Road and would have connected Saginaw to Mackinac as well as Sault Sainte Marie. At this time, transportation north of Detroit during the winter was extremely difficult, and expensive, when the lakes iced over. This made a road very important for the defense of Michigan Territory's frontier with British Canada where unrest threatened American security.

The map Lt. Poole filed with his report shows that the coarse of the road paralleled the Titabawassee River for several miles and passed about four miles northeast of the Little Forks (that's in the Waldo - Wheeler Road area of Midland County). After Williams met Poole, the lieutenant left for Detroit to consult his superior officer, Quartermaster Henry Whiting. It is possible that he traveled by river, meeting Ponton at the time and losing one of his uniform buttons at the Ponton site (see the map at the bottom of this page). Another possibility is that he may have stayed with the Pontons during an illness that Williams mentions, although previous cholera outbreaks may have prevented such hospitality.

Poole's road survey ended its first season (1834) when the survey party began running low on food at the Au Sable river. The remainder of the trek to Mackinac, though full of observations, was uncontrolled. After resupplying along the way, and again at Mackinac, Poole and his party backtracked in an attempt to complete the survey. Part way south the quest was postponed until the following year. Presently, little is known about the conclusion of the survey in 1835. Lt. Poole's assignment with the Topographical Engineers ended in September 1835 and he did not return to Michigan for further surveys.

Lt. Poole's Early Military Experience

Benjamin Poole's military history began one month before his 16th birthday when his father, James Poole, sent him to the United States Military Academy at West Point on July 1st, 1826. His hometown was Portland which was Maine's capitol until 1832.

Lt. Poole was commissioned with the brevet rank of 2nd lieutenant upon graduation from West Point in July 1830 and was assigned to the 3rd Artillery Regiment. His first assignment was to Fort Sullivan at Eastport, Maine. While this may seem like safe duty for a young officer, being so close to home, it was not unimportant. At this time the border with Canada contested and Fort Sullivan was America's most northern coastal fortification.

Lt. Poole's Life after Michigan

After serving with the Topographical Engineers, Lieutenant Poole was sent to the Second Seminole War (at that time called "the Florida War") where he received his promotion to 1st Lieutenant on August 31, 1836. The war had begun just eight months earlier. Normally the 3rd Artillery was spread along the Atlantic coastal states but the war in Florida changed this. The first time the regiment had been in one place at the same time since its creation came on December 31, 1837 at Fort Christmas, Florida. The fort was located half way between present-day Orlando and the Atlantic Ocean. Lt. Poole's first recorded combat took place on January 24th, 1838. The battle of Locka Hatchee occurred near Florida's southeast coast, about 60 miles north of Fort Lauderdale near present-day Jupiter.

During the war Lt. Poole accompanied the entire 3rd Artillery Regiment to assist in rounding up the Cherokee and their slaves prior to removal, probably throughout northwest Georgia and east Tennessee. This was done between May 26 and June 19 of 1838 in accordance with the contested 1835 Treaty of Echota. This was a short-term assignment for most of the regiments involved because few troops were required for escort duty following the collection. However, the 4th Infantry and Lt. Poole's 3rd Artillery remained to protect the Cherokee from unruly locals.

In 1839 1st Lieutenant Poole was assigned duty as Acting Assistant Adjutant General under Lieutenant Colonel William Harney. However, he contracted yellow fever and died of it on November 9th, 1839. He was 29 years old. He was buried in St. Augustine National Cemetery in the section for Seminole War casualties.

This is a section of Lt. Poole's map showing the Little Forks of the Tittabawassee. The approximate locations of the Ponton site and the Ar-be-toh-wach-e-wan village have been added (north is roughly to the right).

Acknowledgments. I'd like to thank Sheila H. Biles (Library Technician, Special Collections and Archives Division, United State Military Academy, West Point) for her assistance and making Lt. Poole's West Point biography available for this research.

SOURCES USED:

George C. Bates, 1894a, "The Beginning of the Michigan Central Railroad: By-gones of Detroit," Michigan Pioneer and Historical Collections, Vol. 22, pages 344-354 (mentions seeing Lt. Poole among a group of officers seeing off another officer on a stage coach).

George C. Bates, 1894b, "Early Hotels of Detroit," Michigan Pioneer and Historical Collections, Vol. 22, pages 354-361 (mentions seeing Lt. Poole with a group including judges, politicians, and fellow officers on the porch of the Mansion House).

Mark Derr, 1989, Some Kind of Paradise: A Chronicle of Man and the Land in Florida.

John Grant, James Lynch, and Ronald Baily, 2002, West Point: The First 2000 Years.

Edwin Jerome, 1877, "First Social Reunion," Michigan Pioneer and Historical Collections, Vol. 1, pages 18-22 (mentions the lakeshore survey and relates a story about the rescue of Lt. Poole's dog from Charity Island).

Journal of the House of Representatives, January 26, 1835 and February 6, 1835.

Richard J. Procyk, Forgotten Florida, Webpage on "Jupiter History Web" describing the Battle of Loxahatchee. http://history.jupiter.fl.us/Fflorida2.htm

Francis Paul Prucha, 1968, The Sword of the Republic: The United States Army on the Frontier 1783-1846.

Returns of the Corps of Topographical Engineers, November 1831-February 1863. Washington: National Archives and Records Service, General Services Administration, 1972.

Saint Augustine National Cemetery Website - www.rootsweb.com/~flstjohn/resources/StANationalCem.html

Frank N. Schubert, ed., 1988, The Nation Builders: A Sesquicentennial History of the Corps of Topographical Engineers, 1838-1863.

JT Sprague, 1842, The Origin, Progress, and Conclusion of the Florida War.

Territorial Papers of the United States, Vol. XII Michigan Territory 1829-1837. Department of State, Washington, GPO, 1945.

Benjamin O. Williams, 1880, "Pioneer Life in Michigan: Survey of the State Military Road from Saginaw to Mackinaw," Michigan Pioneer and Historical Collections, Vol. 2, pages 462-470 (account of Lt. Poole's survey).

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