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Iowa State Historical Society verified this photo is the true
Captain then Lt. Col. James Allen,
1st U.S. Dragoons
Researched by Retired Army Colonel Sherman Fleek who has written a book on the military aspects of the Mormon Battalion, entitled "History May Search In Vain . . "
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Sherman Fleek felt the image above was too clear, too modern for 1846 and that the fellow looked too young for Captain Allen as a 40 year old man in above daguerreotype of Captain James Allen (of Mormon Battalion fame). Iowa SHS determined the above image is of James Allen, a captain that served with an Ohio regiment of volunteers during the Civil War.
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NOTE: I was looking through Sherman Fleek's book and he has grouped Captain Brown, James S. Brown, and possibly James Polly Brown of the Mormon Battalion into just one Index entry on page 404. He also has a photo on page 168 identified as James S. Brown, age 30, that I have never seen. Based on that error I am holding reservations regarding the James Allen photo Fleek received from the Iowa State Historical Society. There is a possibility it could be misidentified, again.
Abner Blackburn:
July 1846
"Arrived at Council Bluffs. Here Coronel Allen, a goverment officer, was enlisting volunteers for the Mexican War. Brighams folks did not want me to enlist for I had been with them as chief cook and bottle washer, or as a necessary evil. . . . I told them I was going and all the kings oxen could not hold me. There was five hundred enlisted in this place. [They were] called [the] Mormon Battalion and started to Ft Leavenworth to fit out for the war" (Frontiersman: Abner Blackburn's Narrative, ed. Will Bagley [1992], 39).
Sources:
PAF - Archer files = Captain James Brown + (7) Phebe Abbott > Orson Pratt Brown > Descendants
Photos and information from
http://www.mormonbattalion.com/gallery/bios/james_allen.html
http://www.jlindquist.com/allen.html
Additions, bold, [bracketed], some photos, etc., added by Lucy Brown Archer
Copyright 2001 www.orsonprattbrown.com
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