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US ARMY SHIRT CUFF FROM FORT PEMBINA, NORTH DAKOTA

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A relic from a small U.S. Army frontier post of the Indian Wars- part of a soldier’s shirt. This is the shirt cuff, still showing a small button near the corner, and a portion of the lower sleeve. The fabric shows as gray with brown stripes, now with some thin brown stains. The fabric was most likely made of white and black threads originally to create an army gray, with black shifting to brown from the soil conditions and oxidation of iron elements in the black dye.

Situated in the Red River Valley in North Dakota near the Canadian border, Fort Pembina was established in 1870 and in operation until 1895. Excavations at the site have produced a remarkable assortment of uniforms and gear from the garrison is surprisingly good shape due to the anaerobic conditions of the dig at what was clearly a dump for the camp, with some material being fragmentary or showing substantial damage, some showing repairs before finally being discarded, and some remarkably complete. The material runs the gamut from the Civil War material used by the army well into the 1870s to very up-to-date issues near the end of the fort’s occupation and everything in between including material issued for trial, very short-lived patterns, as well as commercial and privately purchased pieces a soldier might use in preference to army issue or to preserve it so as not exceed his clothing allowance, etc.

Trading posts existed earlier in the area as part of the fur trade, and the first U.S. military post there was temporary- manned by a detachment of Minnesota troops in 1863-1864 following the 1862 Sioux uprising. In March 1870 a new fort was established south of the Pembina River and about 200 yards west of the Red River, completed by July and named in honor of Gen. George H. Thomas. The name was changed to Fort Pembina in September and the initial garrison consisted of two companies of the 20^th US Infantry. Their main duty was to provide security for settlers worried about Sioux returning south from Canada, but the troops were more occupied with escorting boundary surveys along the Canadian border and preventing Fenian raids heading north into Canada.

The fort included enlistedmen’s barracks, officers’ quarters, guard house, ordnance storehouse, company kitchen, root house, laundress’s quarters, quarters for civilian employees, hospital and hospital servant’s house, a barn for the “hospital cow,” quartermaster and commissary offices and storehouse, stables, wagon shed, etc. The garrison reached peak strength in 1878 af 200, but the average was about 125 enlisted men and 8 officers. An October 1885 return listed 97 men, 2 field pieces, 1 mountain howitzer, 100 rifles, 19 pistols, 23 mules, and 9 wagons. By 1890 the post had just 23 men, and after an 1895 fire destroyed some 19 buildings it was decided to abandon the fort rather than rebuild, the last detachment left in September. The property was turned over to the Interior Department and later sold in 1902.

Shirts and underclothing are among the uniform items least likely to survive- being neither of much sentimental value to a veteran or visual appeal to his descendants. This would make a good study piece, but also shows well enough on its own to give an idea of daily life at a small frontier US army post, where it was not all dress parades, scouting patrols and major campaigns.  [sr][ph:L]

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