Birch Coulee EarthCache
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In order to count this Earthcache as a find, you must complete the following tasks and email the answers to me.
1. What is the elevation at the posted coordinates?
2. Estimate the height of the coulee.
Proceed to Wamditanka’s Knoll at N44º 34.587, W094º 58.742.
3. What is the elevation?
4. Describe how the landscape has changed since the 1862 battle and today.
This Earthcache is located just three miles north of Morton, MN at Birch Coulee County Park--the site of the 1862 Birch Coulee battle. Take time to walk the self-guided trail and read about the battle from the perspectives of Joseph Anderson, captain in the US Army, and Wamditanka (Big Eagle), a Mdewakanton soldier. Within the park, camping is available as well as picnic shelters for lunch. Enjoy!
The majority of Minnesota’s geological history lies in glacial activity. The glaciers that covered this area between 12,000 and 20,000 years ago drastically changed the landscape. They smoothed the earth in some places; in others, they left behind piles of glacial debris more commonly known as “hills” today. Glaciers were also responsible for creating streams and lakes and diverting some rivers from their original channels.
In the area just north of Morton, glaciers left behind huge rivers and lakes in a broad valley when they receded from the region. Over time, the valley became filled with tallgrass prairies, small lakes, and the waterway known today as the Minnesota River. The most prominent landscape feature of the Birch Coulee Battlefield site and park is the coulee. “Coulee” is a French word for a deep streambed with steep sides that is either dry or filled with water. Coulees--particularly this coulee--was formed during the rapid melting of the glaciers at the end of the last ice age. The meltwater from the glacier eroded away at the built up pile of debris and help to shape in into the sight it is today. The glacial melt water that ate away at the earth, collected at the bottom of the coulee and turned into a stream that still runs through the park. “Birch Coulee” acquired its name due to the fact that paper birch trees were once abundant in this area. Dakota people call this place “tannpa yukan,” or “place of the white birch.”
The Battle of Birch Coulee was a 36 hour battle that began on 2 September 1862. This was one of the bloodiest battles of the US-Dakota war. More than twenty men and ninety horses were killed here.
The battle that took place here in the fall of 1862 was only one of many outbreaks and wars between the Native Americans and the US government. The causes of this war had been brewing for decades. The Dakota nation ceded much of its land to the US government by signing numerous treating between 1805 and 1858. By 1862, the year of the battle, the Dakota people were confined to a narrow strip of reservation land along the Minnesota River. These people, who had once lived throughout the Upper Midwest, had lost the majority of their land. Because of a reduction in land, the hunting and fishing lands of the Dakota people became limited, and families increasingly relied on the cash and goods promised by the treaties they had signed. Crop failures the year before in 1861, followed by heavy snowfall, left the Dakota poor and hungry. US government agents were convinced that if Dakota people learned to farm like Euro-American settlers, their food and hunger problems would be solved. The tension between the Dakota people and the US government, which had been building up for years, finally peaked when some of the treaty provisions were not honored. War first broke out at the Lower Sioux Agency and spread throughout southwestern Minnesota--Redwood Ferry, New Ulm, Fort Ridgely, Birch Coulee, and Wood Lake. At the end of the US-Dakota more, hundreds of people were dead.
Since nobody had settled on the area near Birch Coulee by the time of the 1862 battle, the area was still covered with prairie grass and dotted with wetlands. These natural features--and the coulee itself--were an advantage to the Dakota forces. The tall grass in this area obscured long views, and the wetlands to the south and north of the US Army’s campsite provided excellent hiding places for Dakota men. During the battle, the coulee provided a natural hiding spot for the Dakota warriors. The knoll on the battlefield (known as Wamditanka’s knoll) was also advantageous to the Dakota force. This small hill kept the Dakota soldiers out of view from the US Army, and so Wamditanka (Dakota leader) and his band took cover behind this knoll during the battle.
NOT A LOGGING REQUIREMENT: Feel free to post pictures of your group at the area or the area itself - I love looking at the pictures.
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