Black Hawk's own account, though he was not present at the battle's second day, termed the incident a massacre. Later histories continued to assail the actions of the whites at Bad Axe. The 1887 Perry A. Armstrong book, "The Sauks and the Black Hawk War", called Throckmorton's actions "inhuman and dastardly" and went on to call him a "second Nero or Calligula ". In 1898, during events honoring the 66th anniversary of the battle, Reuben Gold Thwaites termed the fight a "massacre" during a speech at the battle site. He emphasized this theme again in a 1903 collection of essays.