In his autobiography, Black Hawk wrote, “I am now done. A few more moons and I must follow my fathers to the shades! May the Great Spirit keep our people and the Whites always at peace.” During one summer, Black Hawk and his soldiers inspired absolute terror among Illinois settlers. The United States Army, together with Illinois and Wisconsin territorial militias, caught up with Black Hawk's band of men, women, and children along the Mississippi River north of Prairie du Chien in Michigan Territory, present-day Wisconsin. In a letter dated August 1, 1832, Lieutenant Albert Johnston, adjutant to General Henry Atkinson, ordered Captain Loomis at Fort Crawford to send a steamboat up the river with a six-pounder and fixed ammunition and five thousand rounds of musket cartridges because the general expected to overtake the enemy early the next day on the banks of the Mississippi. On August 2, at the Battle of Bad Axe, this combined military force reduced the group to fewer than two hundred. John A. Wakefield wrote of “little children wounded and suffering” and called it “a horrid sight.” Henry Atkinson also recruited help from the eastern Dakota, or Sioux, people of Minnesota, longtime enemies of the Sac and Fox, who killed or captured many of Black Hawk's band when they reached the western bank of the Mississippi River. Black Hawk was captured a few weeks later, imprisoned, and eventually returned to a new settlement in Iowa, where he died on October 3, 1838, at age seventy-one.