Re: Picture of Col. George B. Currey
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In reply to:
Re: Picture of Col. George B. Currey
mike curtis 11/17/05
Here is what I have on him.
Two simultaneous expeditious were ordered One column started south in April from Fort Dallas under Captain John M. Drake; the second, commanded by Captian George B. Curry, was out of Fort Walla,Walla, moving south through the Grand Ronde Valley, then slicing southeast along the emigrant trail.
A little over two weeks later, Curry was still looking for Indians, and going through some of the roughest,driest country in the West. After days of forced marches without food and water, he reached a certain spot where he wrote:
"I arrived (at this place) on the morning of the 25th about 10 a.m. This creek, which I named Gibbs Creek in honor of his excellency Governor Gibbs, is a smallcreek which, wandering through traprock canyons a distance of about twelve miles from its headspring to the southwest, falls into the Owyhee about five miles below the mouth of Jordan creek. As I found good grass and water here I halted, and sent Captain Rinhart with twenty men back to the camp of Captain Barry, at the mouth of Owyhee one hundred miles downstream with orders for Barry to come.
The camp established on May 25 was named Camp Henderson, for an Oregon Congressman. On June 13, 1864, scouts from Camp Henderson were fired upon by Snakes who chased them to within eight miles of the camp. The troopers had at last made contact with skirmish and the troopers got the worst of it. Henderson was never used again, for on Jun 16, Curry struck the camp, marching south toward the Steens Mountain. Yet the site is easily located today where U.S.Highway 95 crosses Crooked Creek southwest of Jordan Valley. The First Volunteers carved their names along with Curry and Rinehart on the red sandstone bluffs. Other travelers later added their names in what has become a permanent record of the past, having withstood more then a century of weathering.
Hope this information will help you...Donna