Mills County, Iowa

1881 Mills County History
Name and Position

Frederick Mills

      The county of Mills is so named in memory of Frederick Mills, a brave young officer, of Burlington, Iowa, who was killed in one of the battles of the Mexican war. Foremost in the conflict he was seen, among the first to fall. The battle-field was searched and researched by his comrades, but his body was never found. The heroic bravery of young Mills, and the mysterious disappearance of his remains excited general interest and sympathy, and when the county came to be organized, the tragic story of the gallant officer readily suggested a name, and thus will the memory of Frederick Mills be perpetuated when monuments of marble have yielded to the ravages of time.

      The county to which the name of Mills is given, lies in the extreme west of the second tier, with the Missouri river for its western boundary. The counties bounding it are Pottawattamie on the north, Montgomery on the east, and Fremont on the south. It comprises two hundred eighty-eight thousand acres, or about four hundred forty square miles, thus classing it among the smallest counties in the state. From the northern to the southern boundary it is but eighteen miles, and in its widest part about twenty-four miles from west to east. Its western boundary is irregular, rendered so by the sinuous course of the great river which there bounds it.

Transcribed by Roseanna Zehner and Jennifer Miller; Copyright 2005 All Rights Reserved

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