Indian wars and pioneers of Texas, Vol. I, Part 14

Author: Brown, John Henry, 1820-1895
Publication date: 1890
Publisher: Austin : L.E. Daniel]
Number of Pages: 922

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dead chief, apparently heedless of their own dan- ger, while our elated heroes poured among them awful bavoc, every ball telling upon some one of the huge and compact miass. This struggle was short, but deadly. They bore away the martyred chief, but paid a dear reekoning for the privilege.

It was now sunset. The enemy had counted our men - they knew their own force - and so confident were they of perfect victory, that they were careful not to kill our horses, only one of which fell. But they were sadly mistaken - they were defeated with great loss, and as the sun was closing the day, they slowly and sullenly moved off, uttering that peculiar guttural howl -that solemn, Indian wail - which all old Indian fighters understand.

Brookshire, having no provisions and his heroic men being exhausted from the intense labors of the day, thought it prudent to fall back upon the fort the same night. Hall, Allen and Hensell were carried in, the former dying soon after reaching there. The next day Brookshire sent a runner to Nashville, fifty miles. On the second day, his provisions exhausted, he moved the company also to Nashville. Mr. Thompson received them with open arms and feasted them with the best he had. Brookshire made a brief report of the battle to the Government, and was retained in command till their three months' term of service expired, with- out any other important incident. " Bird's Vic- tory," as this battle has been termed, spread a gloom among the Indians, the first serious repulse the wild tribes had received for some time, and its effect was long felt.

I have before me copies of the muster rolls of both Bird's and Evans' companies, in which are designated those who were in the battle, excepting one person. The list does not show who composed the prisoners or guard. Lieut. Irvine and L. M. H. Washington, however, were two of the guards. As the muster rolls have been burnt in the Adjutant- General's office, these rolls are the more important and may be preserved in this sketch. The names are classed and hereto appended.

BIRD'S COMPANY.

Those known to be in the fight were: John Bird, Captain ; Wm. R. Allen, Second Lieutenant ; Wm. P. Sharp, Second Sergeant; Win. P. Bird, First Corporal. Privates: Nathan Brookshire (Captain after Bird's death), William Badgett, James Brookshire, Tillman C. Fort, James Hensley, William Hensley, IT. M. C. HIall, J. H. Hughes, A. J. Ivey, Edward Jocelyn, Lewis Kleberg, Green B. Lynch, JJesse E. Nash, Jonathan Peters, William

GEN. BEN. McCULLOCH.

INDIAN WARS AND PIONEERS OF TEXAS.

Peters, E. Rector, Milton Bradford, Warren Hast- ings, T. W. Lightfoot, G. W. Pentecost, Eli Fore- man, A. G. Parker, Daniel Bradley, Geo. W. Hensel, Benj. P. Kuyger, John D. Thompson, Joseph H. Slack, Thomas Bradford - 32 and one omitted - say 33. Left in charge of the fort, Joseph S. Marsh and F. G. Woordward - 2. Ab- sent (as before stated, including the man in the fight not remen.bered ), James Irvine, First Lieuten- ant. Privates: Bela Vickery, Wm. Blair, Second Corporal, George Allen, Wm. Ayres, Joshua O. Blair, Lewis L. Hunter, W. Hickson, Neil Mc- . company, 35. Crarey, J. D. Marshall, James Martin, J. W. Stoddard, Henry Verm, Joseph H. Barnard, Stephen Goodman, M. J. Hannon, C. Beisner, Evans' " Jackson E. Burdick, James M. Moreton, Joseph JIcGuines, Wm. J. Hodge, Charles Waller, L. M. Il. Washington, John Atkinson, Joshua O. Blair -- 25.

LIEUT. EVANS' COMPANY.

Those in the fight were: William H. Weaver, First Sergeant ; Samuel A. Blain, Second Corporal ; Privates : Thomas Gay, Charles M. Gevin, W. W. Ilanman, Robert Mills, Thomas S. Menefec, H. A. Powers, James M. Robinett, John Romann, William

Winkler, Thos. Robinett - 12. Those left at Fort Milam were: Wm. G. Evans, First Lieutenant ; J. O. Butler, Second Sergeant; Thos. Brown, First Corporal ; A. Bettinger, Musician ; Privates : Charles Ball, Littleton Brown, Grafton H. Boatler, D. W. Collins, Joseph Flippen, Abner Frost, James Hickey, Hezekiah Joner, John Kirk, Laben Mene- fee, Jarrett Menefee, Thomas J. Miller, Frederick Pool, Washington Rhodes, Jarrett Ridgway, John St. Clair, John Weston, Thomas A. Menefee - 22. Joseph Mayor crippled and left in Houston - total

RECAPITULATION.

Bird's men in the battle. 33

12-45

Bird's men not in the fight. 26

Evans' " is 22-48

---

Aggregate force of both commands. 93

The classification of the names was made by one of those in the battle, from memory. It may pos- sibly be slightly incorrect in that particular; but the rolls of each company as mustered in are official.

Ben McCulloch's Peach Creek Fight in 1839.

Among the survivors of that day, it is remem- bered as a fact and by those of a later day, as a tradition, that in February, 1839, there fell through- out South and Southwest Texas, the most destruc- tive sleet ever known in the country. Great trees were bereft of limbs and tops by the immense weight of ice, and bottoms, previously open and free of underbrush, were simply choked to impassa- bility by fallen timber. The cold period continued for ten or twelve days, while ice and snow, shielded from the sun, lay upon the ground for a much longer period. This occurred in the latter half of February, 1839, in the same year but several wsonths before Austin, or rather the land upon which it stands, was selected as the future seat of government.

A: that time Ben McCulloch, who had entered Texas just in time to command a gun at San Jacinto, was a young man in his twenty-eighth year itWing at Gonzales, having been joined by his wother, Henry E., his junior by several years,

during the preceding year. At the same time the Toncahua tribe of Indians were encamped at the junction of Peach and Sandy creeks, about fifteen miles northeast of Gonzales.

Just prior to this great sleet Ben McCulloch had made an agreement with a portion of the Toncahnas to join him and such white men as he could secure in a winter expedition against the hostile Indians above. The sleet postponed the enterprise and, when the weather partially resumed its usual temperature, it was difficult to enlist either whites or Indians in the contemplated enterprise. Both dreaded a recurrence of the storm. But following Moore's San Saba trip and in hope of recovering Matilda Lockhart and the Putman children, Mc- Culloch deemed that an auspicious time to make such a trip, and about the first of March left the Toncahna village for the mountains. The party consisted of five white men - Ben McCulloch, Wil- son Randall, John D. Wolfin, David Henson and Henry E. McCulloch -- and thirty-five Toncahua

INDIAN WARS AND PIONEERS OF TEXAS.

warriors commanded by their well-known and wily old chief, "Capt. Jim Kerr," a name that he assumed in 1826 as an evidence of his friendship for the first settler of Gonzales, after that gentle- man had been broken up by other Indians in July of that year. The medieine man of the party was Chieo.

On the second day out and on the head waters of Peach ereek, they struek a fresh trail of foot Indians, bearing direetly for Gonzales. This, of course, changed their plans. Duty to their threat- ened neighbors demanded that they should follow and break up this invading party.

They followed the trail rapidly for three or four bours and then came in sight of the enemy, who promptly entered an almost impenetrable thicket bordering a branch and in a post oak country. The hostiles, concealed from view, had every advantage, and every attempt to reach a point from which they could be seen or fired upon was ex- posing the party attempting it to the fire of the unseen enemy. Several hours passed in which ocasional shots were fired. From the first Capt. Jim refused to enter or allow his men to enter the thicket, saying the danger was too great and Ton- cahuas too searee to run such hazards. One of his men, however, from behind the only tree well situated for defense, was killed, the only loss sus- tained by the attacking party. Finally, impatient of delay and dreading the approach of night, McCulloch got a promise from Capt. Jim to so place his men around the lower end of the thicket as to kill any who might attempt to escape, while he, his brother, Randall and Henson would erawl through it from the upper end. Wolfin declined a tieket in what he regarded as so dangerous a lot- tery. Slowly they moved, observing every possible precaution till - " one by one " -- each of the four killed an Indian and two or three others were wounded. The assalled Indians fired many shots and arrows, but seemed doomed to failure. In thickets nothing is so effective as the rifle ball.

Finally the survivors of the enemy (nine of an original thirteen) emerged in the branch at the lower end of the thieket and were allowed by Capt. Jim to eseape. When the white's effeeted an exit the enemy was beyond reach, sheltered in a yet larger thicket.

This closed the eampaign. The Toneahuas, sealping the four dead hostiles, felt impelled by a patriotic sense of duty to hasten home and celebrate their victory. They fleeeed off portions of the thighs and breasts of the dead and all started in ; but they soon stopped on the way and went through most of the mystic ceremonies attending a war danee, thoroughly commingling weird wails over their fallen comrade with their wild and equally weird exultations over their fallen foes. This eere- mony over, they-hastened home to repeat the savage seenes with inereased ferocity. McCulloch and party, more leisurely, returned to Gonzales, to be weleomed by the people who had thus been pro- teeted from a night attack by the discomfited invaders. Sueh inroads by foot Indians almost invariably resulted in the loss of numerous horses, and one or more - alas ! sometimes many -- lives to the settlers.

This was forty-eight and a half years ago; yet, as I write this, on the 19th day of August, 1887, Henry E. MeCulloch, hale, well-preserved and spot- less before his countrymen, is my guest at the ex-Confederate reunion in Dallas, and verifies the aecuraey of this narrative. Our friendship began later in that same year, and every sueeeeding year has been an additional record of time, attesting a friendship lacking but eighteen mouths of ha f a eentury. After 1839 his name is interwoven with the hazards of the Southwestern frontier, as Texas ranger - private, lieutenant and captain - down to annexation in 1846 ; then a captain in and after the Mexican war under the United States ; later as the first Confederate colonel in Texas, and from April, 1862, to the close of the war, as a brigadier- general in the Confederate army.

Moore's Defeat on the San Saba, 1839.

In consequence of the repeated and continued inroads of the Indians through 1837 and 1838, at the close of the latter year Col. Jolin. II. Moore, of Fayette, already distinguished alike for gallantry and patriotism, determined to chastise them. Call-

ing for volunteers from the thinly settled country around him, he succeeded in raising a foree of fifty- five whites, forty-two Lipan and twelve Toncahua Indians, an aggregate of one hundred and nine. Col. Castro, chief of the Lipans, commanded his

INDIAN WARS AND PIONEERS OF TEXAS.

warriors, assisted by the rising and ever faithful young chief, Flacco, whose memory is honored, and whose subsequent perfidious fate is and ever has been deplored by every pioneer of Texas.

Among this little troup of whites was Mr. Andrew Lockhart, of the Guadalupe, impelled by an agonizing desire to rescue his beautiful little daughter, Matilda, who had been captured with the four Putman .children near his home. Her final recovery, at the time of the Council House figlit in San Antonio, on the 19th of March, 1840, is narrated in another chapter.

The advance scouts reported to Col. Moore the . wavered. For the time being the stentorian voice discovery of a large Comanche encampment, with many horses, on the San Saba river, yet the sequel showed that they failed to realize its magnitude in numbers.

With adroit caution that. experienced frontiers- man, by a night march, arrived in the vicinity be- fore the dawn of day, on the 12th of February, 1839, a clear, frosty morning. They were in a favored position for surprising the foc, and wholly undiscovered. At a given signal every man un- derstood his duty. Castro, with a portion of the Indians, was to stampede the horses grazing in the . valley and rush with them beyond recovery. The whites and remaining Indians were to charge, with- out noise, upon the village. The horses of the dismounted men of both colors were left tied a mile in the rear in a ravine.

As light sufficiently appeared to distinguish friend from foe, the signal was given. With thirty of his people the wily old Castro soon had a thousand or more loose horses thundering over hill and dale towards the south. Flacco, with twelve Lipans and the twelve Toncahuas, remained with Moore. The combined force left, numbering seventy-nine, rushed upon the buffalo tents, firing whenever an Indian was seen. Many were killed in the first onset. But almost instantly the camp was in motion, the warriors, as if by magic, rush- ing together and fighting ; the women and children wildly fleeing to the coverts of the bottom and neighboring thickets. It was at this moment, amid the screams, yells and war-whoops resounding through the valley, that Mr. Lockhart plunged forward in advance of his comrades, calling aloud : " Matilda! if you are here, run to me! Your father calls!" And though yet too dim to see

every word pierced the child's heart as she recog- nized her father's wailing voice, while she was lashed into a run with the retreating squaws. The contest was fierce and bloody, till, as the sunlight eame, Col. Moore realized that he had only struck and well-nigh destroyed the fighting strength of the lower end of a long and powerful encampment. The enraged savages from above came pouring down in such numbers as to threaten the annihilation of their assailants. Re- treat became a necessity, demanding the utmost courage and strictest discipline. But not a man of their stalwart and iron-nerved leader was a law unto all. Detailing some to hear the wounded, with the others Moore covered them on either flank, and stubbornly fought his way back to the ravine in which his horses had been left, to find that every animal had already been mounted by a Comanche, and was then curveting around them. All that remained possible was to fight on the defensive from the position thus secured, and this was done with such effect that, after a prolonged contest, the enemy ceased to assault. Exeepting occasional shots at long range by a few of the most daring warriors, extending into the next day, the discomfited assailants were allowed to wend their weary way homewards. Imagine such a party, 150 miles from home, afoot, with a hundred miles of the way through mountains, and six of their comrades so wounded as to perish in the wilder- ness, or be transported on litters home by their fellows. Such was the condition of six of the number. They were William M. Eastland (spared then to draw a black bean and be murdered by the . accursed order of Santa Anna in 1843) ; S. S. B. Fields, a lawyer of La Grange; James Manor, Felix Taylor, - Leflingwell, and - Martin, the latter of whom died soon after reaching home. Cieero Rufus Perry was a sixteen-year-old boy in this ordeal. Gonzalvo Wood was also one of the number.

After much suffering the party reached home, pre- ceded by Castro with the captured horses, which the cunning old fox chiefly appropriated to his own tribe.

Col. Moore, in his victorious destruction of a Comanche town high up the Colorado in 1840, made terrible reclamation for the trials and adver- sities of this expedition.

INDIAN WARS AND PIONEERS OF TEXAS.

The Famous Council House Fight in San Antonio, March 19, 1840 - A Bloody Tragedy - Official Details.

From the retreat of the people before Santa Anna in the spring of 1836, down to the close of 1839, the Comanches and other wild tribes had depredated along our entire line of frontier, steal- ing horses, killing men, and carrying into captivity women and children, more especially the latter, for they often murdered the women also.

On several occasions, as at Houston in 1837, and perhaps twice at San Antonio, they had made quasi- treaties, promising peace and good behavior, but on receiving presents and leaving for home they uniformly broke faith and committed depredations. The people and the government became outraged at such perfidy and finally the government deter- mined, if possible, to recover our captives and inculcate among the hostiles respect for pledges and a desire for peace.

The seat of government in the fall of 1839 was removed from Houston to Austin, a newly planned town, forming the outside settlement on the Colo- rado. There was not oven a single cabin above or beyond the place, west, north, or east, above the falls of tlic Brazos. So stood matters when the first day of January, 1840, arrived, with Mirabeau B. Lamar as President, David G. Burnet as Vice- President, and Albert Sidney Johnston on the eve of resigning as Secretary of War, to be succeeded by Dr. Branch T. Archer.

On the 10th of January, 1840, from San Antonio, Col. Henry W. Karnes (then out of office), wrote Gen. Johnston, Secretary of War, announcing that three Comanche chiefs had been in on the previous day, expressing a desire for peace, stating also that their tribe, eighteen days previously, had held a council, agreed to ask for peace and had chosen a prominent chief to represent them in the negotia- tion. They said they had rejected overtures and presents from the hostile Cherokees, and also of the Centralists, of Mexico, who had emissaries among their people. Col. Karnes told them no treaty was possible unless they brought in all prisoners and stolen property held by thicm. To this they said their people had already assented in council. They left, promising to return in twenty or thirty days with a large party of chiefs and warriors, prepared to make a treaty, and that all white prisoners in their hands would be brought in with them.

From their broken faith on former occasions, and

their known diplomatic treachery with Mexico from time immemorial, neither the President, Secretary of War nor Col. Karnes ( who had been a prisoner among them) had any faith in their promises, bc- yond their dread of our power to punish them. Official action was based on this apprehension of . their intended duplicity.

On the 30th of January Lieut. - Col. William S. Fisher, commanding the First Regiment of Infan- try, was instructed to march three companies to San Antonio under his own command, and to take such position there as would enable him to detain the Comanches, should they come in without our pris- oners. In that case, says the order of Gen. John- ston, " some of their number will be dispatched as messengers to the tribe to inform them that those retained will be held as bostages until the (our) prisoners are delivered up, when the hostages will be released." The instructions further say : "It has been usual, heretofore, to give presents. For the future such custom will be dispensed with."

Following this military order, and in harmony with the suggestion of Col. Karnes, President Lamar dispatched Col. Hugh McLeod, Adjutant-General, and Col. William G. Cooke, Quartermaster-General, as commissioners to treat with the Comanches, should they come in, and with instructions in ac- cord with those given Col. Fisher. They repaired to San Antonio and awaited events.

On the 19th of March, in the morning, two Co- manche runners entered San Antonio and announced the arrival in the vicinity of a party of sixty-five men, women and children, and only one prisoner, a girl of about thirteen years, Matilda Lockhart. In reporting the subsequent facts to the President on the next day Col. MeLeod wrote: -

" They (the Indians) came into town. The little girl was very intelligent- and told us that she had seen several of the other prisoners at the prin- cipal camp a few days before she left, and that they brought her in to see if they could get a high price for her, and, if so, they intended to bring in the rest, one at a time.

"Having ascertained this, it became necessary to execute your orders and take hostages for the safe return of our people, and the order was accordingly given by Col. William G. Cooke, act- ing Secretary of War. Licut .- Col. Fisher, First

INDIAN WARS AND PIONEERS OF TEXAS.

Infantry, was ordered to march up two companies of his command and post them in the immediate vicinity of the council room.

" The chiefs were then ealled together and asked : ' Where are the prisoners you promised to bring in to the talk ?'

" Muke-war-ralı, the chief who held the last talk with us and made the promise, replied : ' We have brought in the only one we had ; the others are with other tribes.'

" A pause ensued because, as this was a palpa- ble lie, and a direet violation of their pledge, solemnly given scarcely a month sinee, we had the only alternative left us. He observed this pause and asked quickly: 'How do you like the an- swer?'

" The order was now given to march one com- pany into the council room and the other in rear of the building, where the warriors were assembled. During the execution of this order the talk was re-opened and the terms of a treaty, directed by your excelleney to be made with them in ease the prisoners were restored, were discussed, and they were told the treaty would be made when they brought in the prisoners. They acknowledged that they had violated all their previous treaties, and yet tauntingly demanded that new confidence should be reposed in another promise to bring in the prisoners.

"The troops being now posted, the (twelve) chiefs and captains were told that they were our prisoners and would be kept as hostages for the safety of our people then in their hands, and that they might send their young men to the tribe, and as soon as our friends were restored they should be hberated.

"Capt. (George T. ) Howard, whose company was stationed in the council house, posted sentinels at the doors and drew up his men across the room. We told the chiefs that the soldiers they saw were their guards, and descended from the platform. The chiefs immediately followed. One sprang to the back door and attempted to pass the sentinel, who presented his musket, when the chief drew his knife and stabbed him. A rush was then made to the door. Capt. Howard col- lared one of them and received a severe stab from him in the side. He ordered the sentinel to fire upon him, which he immediately did, and the Indian fell dead. They then all drew their knives and bows, and evidently resolved to fight to the last. Col. Fisher ordered: 'Fire, if they do not desist!' The Indians rushed on, attacked us des- perately, and a general order to fire became necessary."

"After a short but desperate struggle every one of the twelve chiefs and captains in the council house lay dead upon the fioor, but not until, in the hand-to-band struggle, they had wounded a num- ber of persons.

" The indoor work being finished, Capt. Howard's company was formed in front to prevent retreat in that direction ; but, in consequence of the severity of his wound, he was relieved by Capt. Gillen, who commanded the company till the elose of the action.

"Capt. Redd,* whose company was formed in the rear of the council house, was attacked by the warriors in the yard, who fought like wild beasts. They, however, took refuge in some stone houses, from which they kept up a galling fire with bows and arrows and a few rifles. Their arrows, wher- ever they struck one of our men, were driven to the feather. A sinall party escaped across the river, but were pursued by Col. Lysander Wells with a few mounted men and all killed. The only one of the whole band who escaped was a renegade Mexican among them, who slipped away unob- served. A single warrior took refuge in a stone house, refusing every overture sent him by squaws, with promise of security, and killing or wounding several till, after night, when a ball of rags, soaked in turpentine and ignited, was dropped through the smoke escape in the roof onto his head. Thus, in a blaze of fire, he sprang through the door and was riddled with bullets.

" In such an action - so unexpected, so sudden and terrific - it was impossible at times to distin-

* NOTE. Cap. Redd and Col. Wells fought a duel in San Antonio later the same year and killed each other. Judge Robinson died in San Diego, California, in 1853. Judge Hemphill died during the Civil War, a member of the Confederate Senate. Capt. Matthew Caldwell, then of the regulars and a famous Indian fighter, died at his home in Gonzales in the winter of 1842-3. Col. MeLeod, commanding a Texas regiment, died at Dumfries, Virginia, during the Civil War. Col. William S. Fisher, afterwards commander at Mier and a "Mier prisoner," died in Galveston in 1845, soon after his release. Col. Wni. G. Cooke died at Navarro ranch, on the San Gero- nimo, in 1847. He came as Lientenant of the New Orleans Grays in 1835. succeeded Burleson as Colonel of the regnlars in 1840. He married a daughter of Don Luciano Navarro. He was Quartermaster-General, a commis- sioner to Santa Fe and a prisoner, and was a noble man. Col. Henry W. Karnes died in San Antonio, his home, in the antnmn of 1840. Henry Clay Davis was a volunteer in the fight on horseback. An Indian sprang up behind him and, while trying to kill him with an arrow used as a dirk, Davis killed him with one of the first lot of Colt's revolvers ever brought to Texas. Davis settled at Rio Grande. City, married a Mexican lady, was once in the Senate, and was killed accidentally by his own gun while out hunting.

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Indian wars and pioneers of Texas, Vol. I, Part 14

Author: Brown, John Henry, 1820-1895 Publication date: 1890 Publisher: Austin : L.E. Daniel] Number of Pages: 922

Author: Brown, John Henry, 1820-1895
Publication date: 1890
Publisher: Austin : L.E. Daniel]
Number of Pages: 922