What was part of the Savanna Military Reservation was is now located on the eastern bank of the Mississippi River?
Savanna Army Depot Savanna Army Depot was a 13062 acre installation, located on the eastern bank of the Mississippi River, in Carroll and Jo Daviess counties, around 7 mi north of Savanna, Illinois. It was opened in 1917 as a proving and testing facility for weapons developed at Rock Island Arsenal. In 1921 it became a weapons depot. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) listed the depot as a Superfund site in 1989. The depot was selected for closure through the Base Realignment and Closure process in July 1995 and was officially closed on March 18, 2000. The Jo-Carroll Local Redevelopment Authority (LRA) was established to redevelop a portion of the property for commercial and business usage referred to as the Savanna Depot Park. On September 26, 2003, the United States Department of Defense agreed to transfer 9404 acre of land to become the Lost Mound Unit of the Upper Mississippi River National Wildlife and Fish Refuge. 3022 acre were initially transferred with the rest to be transferred following environmental cleanup. The portion near Lock and Dam No. 12 was transferred to the United States Army Corps of Engineers and a small part to the Illinois Department of Natural Resources.
Fort Trempealeau Fort Trempealeau was founded in 1685 by Nicholas Perrot and a groupe of Canadiens. In the fall of 1685, Perrot and his men arrived at Mont Trempealeau by canoe. The Winnebagos called this mountain, "Hay-nee-ah-cheh", or the mountain in the water. That is why Perrot called it in French, "la montagne qui trempe à l'eau," or Trempealeau mountain. There, Perrot and his men built a protective shelter in preparation for winter. Several weeks earlier they had left La Baye Green Bay and crossed Wisconsin via the Fox and Wisconsin Rivers to reach the Mississippi Valley. The purpose of this expedition was to establish alliances with the Ioway and Dakota Indians in order to expand French interests in the fur trade market. Although Perrot's venture was not the first French excursion into the upper Mississippi Valley, his was the first attempt to establish a foothold in this region. In the spring of 1686 the Trempealeau site was abandoned for a more advantageous location along Lake Pepin where Perrot built Fort Saint Antoine. Over the next thirty-five years French economic fortunes in the upper Mississippi Valley waxed and waned. It was not until 1731, and the end of the Fox Indian wars, that the French under the command of René Godefroy, sieur de Linctot returned to Trempealeau and established another trading post.