6/17/2009:
It was in the late spring of 1867 that General Terry discovered the perfect site from which to protect the overland trail connecting the stream of settlers from Minnesota to Montana. On a little hillock, named Bear's Den, which overlooked the Sheyenne River in the southeast corner of present day North Dakota, Terry established Fort Ransom; naming it in honor of brevet Major General Thomas E.G. Ransom of the U.S. Volunteers. While Terry established the fort, he left the construction and command to others. On this date in 1867, a battalion of the Tenth United States Infantry lead by Brevet Major George H. Crosman arrived at the fort, pitched camp and set to work building the post.
The two companies of infantrymen worked hard throughout the summer, enclosing the outer breastworks by August of the same year. By the time they were finished, the fort, 350 feet by 400 feet, boasted barracks, a dry moat, guardhouse, hospital, magazine, stables, and separate housing for officers and married men.
Like many other posts established throughout the upper plains, daily life at Fort Ransom was difficult under the best of circumstances. Even after two years of construction, the hospital remained unfinished, uninsulated and poorly stocked. The barracks were inadequately ventilated; especially considering that the latrines were located adjacent to the housing and the only time the soldiers could bathe was when the Sheyenne River wasn't frozen. There was a large garden, but the soldiers' grain and vegetables were under constant threat from grasshoppers that would descend in cloud-like swarms and devour a summer's worth of work in a matter of hours. Winters were treacherous as well, cutting off contact with the outside world and annually presenting the soldiers with a six-month challenge to keep warm.
After only five years, Fort Ransom was decommissioned in 1872 as the Army decided the troops and supplies could be better used in protecting the construction of the Northern Pacific Railway near the James River crossing. Fort Ransom was dismantled and its materials recycled in the construction of Fort Seward at Jamestown. Today nothing but the dry moat, some cellars and a marker remain of Fort Ransom; a small token of the once flourishing post.
Dakota Datebook written by Lane Sunwall
Sources:
Billings, John Shaw, A Report on Barracks and Hospitals, with Descriptions of Military Posts, 1870.
Snortland, J. Signe, ed. A Traveler's Companion to North Dakota State Historic Sites. Bismarck, ND: State Historical Society of North Dakota, 2002.