April 1, 1832

MERCER, Illinois

Black Hawk War, Native-Americans, Indian Removal Act of 1830

  “I fought hard. But your guns were well aimed. The bullets flew like birds in the air, and whizzed by our ears like the wind through the trees in the winter. My warriors fell around me; it began to look dismal,” said Sauk chief Black Hawk upon his surrender to the U.S 6th Infantry in August of 1832. He had fiercely resisted the continuing encroachment of white settlers into his lands and had...