Author: Dan Elliott
Date: 5/28/2010 6:35 pm EDT
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I found no list of Fort Hawkins dead and any reference to people dying while at Fort Hawkins was gleaned from an assortment of records. As for guestimates, I can offer some wild speculation based on what I have seen from my research on military sites in Georgia and beyond.Being on a hilltop, Fort Hawkins was healthier than many other U.S. Army forts of the 18th and early 19th centuries. But a certain percentage of the normal population in a garrison would have died from natural causes (excluding all the battle wound related deaths). General James Wilkerson lost more than 700 U.S. Army soldiers in a three month period of 1809 from sickness in the New Orleans vicinity, or about 1/6 of the entire U.S. Army at that time. But that was an epidemic and no epidemics are mentioned at Fort Hawkins. Assuming an average population of 200 soldiers through the life of the fort (15 yrs or so) and an annual death rate of 2 percent among the population, that suggests 30 deaths. That is a low estimate in my opinion. Assuming a higher average population and a higher death rate, that number could be more than 200. If you lump in the militias and troops temporarily posted in the Fort Hawkins vicinity, the latter number is probably more accurate. Also, Fort Hawkins did have a U.S. Army hospital, so sick and wounded would have been brought there and some would have died. That would probably increase the count from the low estimate of 30. So if I was to be pinned down, I am guessing the number of U.S. Army soldiers that died while in service at Fort Hawkins is between 30-200. Truth is we really do not know, unless we go dig them up!
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