Doll, Jacob W.
Place of Birth: Russel
Date of enlistment: 21 March 1876
Age given at enlistment: 26
Rank: Private
Company: B
Location on 25 June 1876: Powder River Depot
An Unidentified Trooper from Who Knows Where?
- No one matching Jacob Doll’s personal details has been identified as being born anywhere in the United Kingdom. Also, there is no village, town or city in England with the name of ‘Russel’ or ‘Russell’, which compounds the mystery. There is however a ‘Russell Town’ district of Bristol; a ‘Russel’s Green, Suffolk,’ a ‘Russell Green, Sussex,’ ‘and a ‘Kingston Russell, Dorset’? Did he mean ‘Rushall,’ (some pronounce ‘Rus-al) in Herefordshire, Norfolk, Wiltshire and Walsall? Or was it none of these places!
- A man, who said his name was Jacob W. Doll, told Lt George Wallace, that he was a 26 year-old baker from Russel, England. Records show he had brown eyes, black hair, a fair complexion and stood 5′ 7″ tall.
- He was sent to the St Louis Depot and from there transferred to the 7th Cavalry and assigned to Company B, which he joined at St Paul, Minnesota, on 27 April 1876.
- Doll was on detached service as a teamster with the Quartermaster’s Department in May and remained at the Powder River Depot during the Little Big Horn campaign. He deserted from Fort Abraham Lincoln 19 November 1877 and was never apprehended.
- So, who was Jacob Doll? Where did he really come from?
- His true identity and his fate remain unknown to this writer.
Comments:
Name, date and place of birth not yet verified.