Bicentennial Story #18-Hell with the Fires Out

Bicentennial Story #18-Hell with the Fires Out

General Alfred Sully's description of the North Dakota badlands.

5/26/1975

1/30/1976

Father Louis Pfaller
Jack Hjort

This recording cannot be copied or reproduced without the written permission of the Dickinson Museum Center. This recording may be freely used for education uses, so long as it is not altered in any way. No commercial reproduction or distribution of this recording file is permitted without written permission of the Dickinson Museum Center.

mp3

audio reel, analog, 1/4 inch polyester tape

English

BS-018

Dakota Territory

Copyright Stark County Historical Society and Dickinson Museum Center

Saturday, August 6, 1864, Sully's army descended twelve miles into the rugged and steep gullies of the Badlands and went into camp near present Medora. The campsite was on an eerie flat covered with piles of black vitreous furnace slag and klinkers which was surrounded by red-burnt peaks, Major Brackett leaned against a huge tower of klinkers and asked General Sully what he thought of the country. Drawing a long breath, Sully answered: "I think it is hell burnt out!" In his own official report the General wrote: "It was grand, dismal, majestic. . . . Viewed in the distance at sunset it looked exactly like the ruins of an ancient city."

This is Bicentennial Story No. 18, prepared by Father Louis Pfaller, for the Stark County Historical Society.

Pfaller, Sully Expedition, 35

Sound recordings

1:18

128kbps

1970 1979

Bicentennial tape #1, Bicentennial stories 1-22