Post South Loup Fork "Fort Banishment"

Samuel Clay Bassett camped at the post in June 1871 with Gibbon colonists looking over the South Loup country, and his 1916 county history describes it. Rifle pits ran in a square from the riverbank to the south. Inside stood two buildings of oak logs, one for the soldiers and one for their horses, roofed with poles and willow brush under sod and dirt. A score or more timber-wolf feet were nailed to the outer walls. The oak seemed to come from an island below the post, reached by a beaver-dam bridge.

What the plaque says

Post South Loup Fork "Fort Banishment" On the South Loup River southwest of here was the site of the U.S. Army's Post South Loup Fork. This small outpost of Fort Kearny was established in May 1865 by Company "E," Seventh Iowa Cavalry, under the command of Capt. James B. David and consisted of a log barracks and stable enclosed by a sod wall. The post monitored the movements of Indians in the Loup River valleys. Sometimes it was called Post Connor in honor of Gen. Patrick Connor. In July 1865 the Iowa Cavalry was replaced by Company "E" of the First Nebraska Cavalry and in August the post was abandoned. In 1871 pioneer settlers from Gibbon used the log buildings for firewood. According to legend the post became known as Fort Desolation because it was about thirty miles from any settlement. It has also been termed Fort Banishment, because soldiers were sent there as punishment for stealing commissary whiskey. Military records do not confirm this. Ravenna Genealogical and Historical Society Nebraska State Historical Society

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Rowe Sanctuary — 24 mi
  Audubon's sanctuary on the Platte near Gibbon, where the river's sandbars are kept bare so that sandhill cranes, more than a million in the valley each spring, can roost safely at night.

More markers nearby

• Civilian Conservation Corps, Ravenna, Nebraska — steps away
• Solon H. Borglum "Sculptor of the Prairie" — 9.4 mi
• Austin — 13 mi
• B-17 Crash, 1943 — 17 mi