View source for Thomas Conlan

Thomas Conlan who was enlisted under that name in the United States Army on 18 September 1875, at Boston, Massachusetts, by Lt. Henry W. Lawton. The U.S. Army, Register of Enlistments tells us that Conlan was born in Ayrshire,1 Scotland; had blue eyes, brown hair, and a dark complexion, was 21 years 11/12 months,2 previously employed as a marble cutter.

Armed with such precise personal details it should be a simple matter to trace his place and date of birth but, as is so often the case with men who served in the 7th Cavalry in June 1876, it proved not to be so. A diligent search of Scottish birth and baptismal records, census returns and ships’ passenger lists covering the period 1845-75 failed to identify anyone who matched the description given at enlistment.

Conlan is a very common Irish surname [much rarer in Scotland] but there is an outside chance that the future cavalryman was the Thomas Conlan, age 8, born Renfrewshire ca. 1853. The Census of Auchinleck, Ayrshire (1861) records a Patrick Conlan, his wife, Catherine [Connor], and four children, living in the town. All four [one deceased] of Thomas’ known siblings were born in Auchinleck between the years 1849-57 and, in the absence of a birth or baptism certificate, he may have genuinely believed that Ayrshire was the county of his own nativity. However, until further information comes to light the true identity of Private Thomas Conlan must remain uncertain. Someone out there may know what happened to the Conlans of Auchinleck and, if so, I’d be delighted to hear from them.

We do know with certainty that someone who claimed to be Thomas Conlan, from Ayrshire, was assigned to the 7th Cavalry and joined his new comrades in Company D at Fort Abraham Lincoln, Dakota Territory on 21 October 1875.  Being a relatively raw recruit he did not participate in the Battle of the Little Big Horn and was on detached service at the Powder River Depot guarding the wagon train. He would have served with his company in the field during the rest of the summer of 1876 before returning to barracks at the end of that year’s campaign.

For whatever reason Conlan went absent without leave from Fort Rice, Dakota Territory on 16 December 1876 but was apprehended five days later. He was subsequently found guilty of desertion by a General Court Martial, held on 12 March 1877, dishonourably discharged and sentenced to “two years confinement at station of company.”

But that is not quite the end of the story because on 20 June 1877 [together with Private John Sims3] he escaped from the guardhouse at Fort Rice [Military Register of Custer's Last Command, p.69] and “rode off into the sunset” never to be heard of again!