Minnesota Spirit Quest - St. Joseph's Cemetery
The cache is not located near a grave... If you find a fallen US flag, please stick it back in the ground. As always, please be respectful, and cache in, trash out. Also, please only search for cache during daylight hours.
The coordinates will bring you to the impressive gravesite of Jacob Schaak (1840-1911). Jacob served in Company B Bracketts Minnesota Cavalry during the Civil War (more history below).
Look westward (160 feet WSW) and you will see a monument for Saint Joseph’s Catholic Church. There are two years engraved on the sign:
185A and 197B.
The Final Coordinates to the cache are:
N44 39.44A
W93 33.74B
The final is about .2 miles away.
Bracketts Battalion Minnesota Cavalry:
The battalion was mustered in at Fort Snelling, Minnesota. on December 5, 1861 as the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Companies, Minnesota Light Cavalry, and were mustered out on June 1, 1866.
After mustering, the battalion proceeded to Benton Barracks, St. Louis, Missouri and was attached to the Curtis Horse, later the 5th Iowa Volunteer Cavalry Regiment as Companies G, I, and K. For details of their service as part of the Iowa regiment, please read the article on the 5th Iowa.
The Minnesota volunteers reenlisted and achieved veteran status on January 1, 1864. The battalion returned to Minnesota on January 7, 1864, and was officially detached from the 5th Iowa Cavalry Regiment on February 25, 1864, being designated as Brackett's Battalion, Minnesota Cavalry at that time.
The battalion remained in garrison at Fort Snelling until May 1864 when it was transferred to Sioux City, Iowa. It participated in Brigadier General Alfred Sully's campaign against the Sioux west of the Mississippi River from June 4, 1864 to November 10, 1864. The battalion participated in the Battle of Tah Kah A Kuty or Killdeer Mountain, July 28, 1864, the engagement at Two Hills, Bad Lands, Little Missouri River, August 8 to 9, 1864, and the rescue of Fisk's Emigrant train, September 10 to 30,1864. The battalion spent the winter of 1864-65 at Fort Ridgley, Minnesota and then served in Sully's operations against the Sioux during the summer and fall of 1865. The Minnesotans spent the winter of 1865-66 on patrol out of Sioux City before being mustered out in June 1866.