Compiled and written by David R. Schleper, 2021

Josiah Schroeder Weiser was born Aug. 17, 1832, to Samuel and Mary Schroeder Weiser in Reading, Pennsylvania. Josiah’s father was a miller near the city. After completing his normal school education in Reading, Josiah attended the Fredonia Academy in Pomfret, New York, and then enrolled in the Jefferson Medical College (now the Sidney Kimmel Medical College) in Philadelphia, according to an article by Curt Eriksmoen on May 29, 2020, in his “Did You Know That” column.

He graduated in 1855 and decided to join his two brothers, William and Joel, and his mother, who were living in Shakapee City, Minnesota Territory since 1854. His father died in 1854 while traveling to Shakopee. Josiah’s brothers and their mother began farming, and Joel found plentiful work as a mason and plasterer.

Shakapee City, located across the Minnesota River southwest of Minneapolis, was a rapidly growing community for white settlers. It was the traditional home of many of the Mdewakanton Dakota Indians, where they fished, hunted game, and gathered wild rice, nuts, berries, and roots.

Dr. Weiser (along with Dr. Wakefield) treated the wounded Dakota during the Battle of Shakopee in 1858. The Dakota had old men, boys, and even some men who were disabled in the battle, a total of 65 men. According to the History of Carver County, “There were but few good guns among them, all being common fowling pieces, some of them old and unreliable, while a dozen or more men had no guns at all. But the white men of Shakopee supplied this deficiency; they gave the Indians every gun in town.” Dr. Weiser and Dr. Wakefield helped the wounded in downtown Shakopee. Josiah had been in Shakopee since 1855, and he was a doctor to many people in Shakopee, including the Dakota, and he learned the language, so that helped.

Everything appeared to be going well for Josiah as his practice continued to grow, and in 1858, he partnered with David Lennox How in owning a drugstore in Shakopee. Dr. Weiser married Eliza Victoria Hunt on June 2, 1859, in St. Peter’s Protestant Episcopal Church, Shakopee. They had two children in Shakopee, Ada (1860) and Florence (1862).

Josiah enlisted in the First Minnesota Cavalry (Mounted Rangers) as a surgeon on Oct. 21, 1862.

“Dr. Josiah S. Weiser, regimental surgeon for the First Minnesota Mounted Rangers, was from Shakopee, Minnesota, and had lived among the Dakotas, learning their language and serving as their doctor,” said Paul N. Beck in his 2013 book, Columns of Vengeance: Soldiers, Sioux, and the Punitive Expeditions 1863-1864. An orderly, also on a horse, was an aide to Dr. Weiser. He was African American.

Dr. Weiser was assigned to the First Minnesota Mounted Rangers, which was under the command of Col. Samuel McPhail. On June 16, 1863, Sibley and his army of 3,320 men began their long journey into Dakota Territory.

Riding on horseback across the prairie in the summer heat was very taxing on the soldiers, and they were on constant lookout for a pleasant area where they could dismount and relax in comfort. One such place was six miles southeast of present-day Kathryn, in Barnes County, where they arrived on July 13, 1863. This site was later named Camp Weiser, in honor of Josiah, the company physician, according to Curt Eriksmoen.

For over a month, Sibley’s soldiers pushed westward without seeing any warriors. They were informed about a place called Big Mound, ten miles north of present-day Tappen, where there was an encampment of about 2,500 Native Americans.

Weiser was acquainted with some of the Indians, and “as he approached Big Mound to greet several Indian friends,” he was shot through the heart by a renegade who was not a member of the group.

“Believing he saw men that he knew, Weiser and his African American orderly rode out of camp to a nearby hill, where scouts were meeting with some young warriors,” said Beck, when he was unexpectedly shot. A member of Iŋkpáduta’s band suddenly pulled out a gun and shot Dr. Weiser in the back, probably thinking he was Sibley.

There have been many medical doctors from North Dakota and northern Dakota Territory killed on battlefields outside of the state, but Weiser is the only medical doctor killed inside the state’s present borders during a military conflict, according to the article “Assassination in central ND likely was the spark that ignited the Dakota War” in Curt Eriksmoen’s “Did You Know That” column, on May 29, 2020.

Soon, both sides began shooting at each other, and a battle began.

The Santee were poorly armed. Only about half had firearms and those had little ammunition. Several hundred of the Mounted Rangers pursued the Indian warriors, protecting the flight of their women and children, until nightfall. Most of Sibley’s infantry devoted themselves to destroying the large quantities of jerky, buffalo robes, cooking utensils, and other goods left behind by the Sioux in their hasty flight. According to records, “…the majority of the Santees whose villages they had destroyed and who were now economically devastated by the battle, left with no food or shelter for the winter, had had little or nothing to do with the uprising.”

Dr. Joseph S. Weiser was killed July 24, 1863, in the Battle of Big Mound, Dakota Territory. Located in Kidder County, a headstone marks the place where Dr. Weiser was shot, according to Find a Grave.