I referred to William Frayne Amann, editor, "Personnel of the Civil War," vol. 2, New York: A. S. Barnes & Co., Inc., 1961. On page 137 under "List of Synonyms of Organizations in the Volunteer Service of the United States" under the Missouri heading I find:

"Black Hawk Cavalry, William Bishop's Battalion, Companies A, C, D, E, and H, F, G, and I...........7th Regiment Cavalry (Companies A, B, late C, C, late D, D, late E and H; E, late F, F, late G; and G, late I)." There is one other entry under "Black Hawk Cavalry" with much the same information and two other entries under "Bishop's Battalion," with the same information. I deduce from this that early in the war William Bishop gathered enough men under him to later form several companies and partial companies that were later mustered in to form a large portion of the 7th Missouri Volunteer Cavalry Regiment.

I have no idea about the origin of the name, unless William Bishop was a veteran of the Black Hawk War and named the unit to commemorate that service with the hope that this new unit in this new war would do as well as his old unit did. Of course, this is only conjecture.

I know, I know, you asked for the time and I told you how to make a watch.

On another note, the more modern village of Odessa was probably not far from Annie Fickel's original home also in about that same part of Lafayette County. At a junkyard called "Wind-up Salvage" in Odessa during 1972 I purchased for $75 a 1954 coral red and white Pontiac DeLuxe Catalina hardtop, which was not running but nearly all there. I had high hopes for this "Last of the Pontiac Straight Eights" that was in such good condition, finally got the title straightened out, but married not long after and sold it to a First Sergeant stationed at Whiteman AFB so my wife and I could buy furniture. If some of you know Odessa on Interstate 70, Wind-up Salvage was beside the car racetrack (good placement if you think about it). I suppose both are long gone, but I wonder how the 1st Sgt managed with the Pontiac. The good folks at Wind-up Salvage explained to me the name in that when they started all their friends warned them they would "wind up broke." I hope that was not true. As my wife says, "It's a small world, you have to behave everywhere."

Bruce Nichols