The Mormon Battalion - Boise City, OK
Posted by: 
YoSam.
N 36° 43.781 W 102° 30.774
13S E 722093 N 4067769
The only religious based military unit in US history
Waymark Code: WMNK2A
Location: Oklahoma, United States
Date Posted: 03/26/2015
Views: 3
County of monument: Cimarron County
Location of monument: Main St. Circle, courthouse lawn, Boise City
Plaque erected by: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and the Oklahoma State Historical Society
Monument erected: 1983
Plaque Text:
The Mormon Battalion
in the Oklahoma
Panhandle
From September 23 through 27, 1846, the Mormon Battalion crossed the northwestern portion of the Oklahoma Panhandle. The little army's 500-plus volunteers, recruited for the Mexican War, were enlisted near Council Bluffs, Iowa, from among the first company of Mormon pioneers, who were then enroute to the Rocky Mountains.
The Battalion's 2,000 mile journey from Ft. Leavenworth, Kansas, to San Diego, California, then the longest march by infantry in U.S. military history, traversed for a lengthy distance the Santa Fe Trail. Sixty miles of that famous route passed through the Panhandle. It followed the Cimarron River southwesterly into Oklahoma to the Cimarron Crossing, then west-southwest past Cold Springs into New Mexico at McNees Crossing. Battalion members viewed the Oklahoma Panhandle as part of the "Great American Desert." The challenges of this portion of the march helped forge the Battalion into a disciplined force.
History of the battalion as recorded on Wikipedia