Volume 17 , Issue 36

NW Okie's Journey

Have you ever heard the story of the "Battle At Ingalls" that happened on 1 September 1893, where 14 deputy U.S. Marshals entered Ingalls, Oklahoma Territory, to apprehend the Doolin-Dalton outlaw gang? This was only a little over two weeks before the third land rush of Oklahoma & Indian Territory (16 September 1893).



During the shootout that followed at Ingalls, three marshals were killed, two bystanders were killed and one wounded. Three of the gang members were wounded, and gang member "Arkansas Tom Jones" was wounded and captured. Doolin was thought to be the one that shot and killed deputy marshal Richard Speed during that shootout, but news articles we have transcribed in this weeks newsletter showed it was someone else.

Have you noticed that the outlawry shootouts and the opening of the Oklahoma land run of 1893 happened just within a few weeks of the other? Were the U. S. Marshals trying to clear the Oklahoma Territory of the outlaws before the land run of 16 September 1893, at high noon?

At precisely twelve noon, 16 September 1893, a cannon's boom unleashed the largest land rush that America ever saw. They came on horses, wagons, trains, bicycles and foot (best. 100,000) racing to claim plots of land in an area of land in northern Oklahoma Territory known as the Cherokee Strip.

But did you know that in 1828 Congress designated that land as Oklahoma and Indian Territory. It appears white settlers were required to leave, and a number of tribes from the East and South were forcibly moved into the area from their ancestral lands. Among those were the five civilized tribes: Cherokee, Choctaw, Chickasaw, Creek and Seminole, who allied themselves with the South during the Civil War.

After the Civil war, the US government looked upon these tribes as defeated enemies. The animosity combined with increasing pressure to open up the Indian Territory to white settlement prompted the first land rush in 1885 with a second to follow in 1889, and then the biggest land rush in 1893.

The Oklahoma land rush of 1893 occurred when America was in the grip of the worst economic depression it had ever experienced. This factor swelled the number of expectant land seekers on that day, 16 September 1893. There were only 42,000 parcels of land available, too few to satisfy the hopes of all those who raced for land that day. Many of the "Boomers" who had waited for the cannon's boom before the rushing to claim, found that a number of the choice plots had already been claimed by "Sooners" who had snuck into the land claim area before the race began. The rush of 1893 transformed the land almost overnight. Here is a link to an eye witness to history of the Oklahoma Land Rush of 1893.

Good Night! Good Luck!
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