USA > Texas > Indian wars and pioneers of Texas, Vol. I > Part 6
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On the 10th of March 1836, the disconsolate party which we are now to follow, left Dolores with the intention of reaching the coast by way of San . Patricio, on the lower Nucces. It consisted of eleven men, including Mr. Horn, his wife and two little sons, John and Joseph, and Mr. Harris, his wife and girl baby, about three months old, prob- ably the only ehild born at Dolores -- in all fifteen souls. To the Nueces, by slow marches, they traveled without a road. Santa Anna's invading hosts had but recently passed from the Rio Grande on the Laredo and Matamoras routes, to San Antonio and Goliad. The Alamo had fallen four days before this journey began and Fannin sur- rendered near Goliad nine days after their depart- ure, but these ill-fated colonists knew of neither event. They only knew that the Mexicans were invading Texas under the banner of extermination to the Americans, and they dreaded falling into their hands almost as much as they dreaded the wild savages. They remained on the Nueces, near a road supposed to lead to San Patricio, several days, protected by thickets, and while there saw the trains and heard the guns of detachments of Mexican soldiers, doubtless guarding supply trains following Santa Anna to San Antonio.
They resumed their march from the Nueecs, on the San Patricio trail, on the 2d of April. Early in the afternoon of the 4th, they encamped at a large lake, containing fine fish. Not long after- wards, while the men were occupied in various ways and none on guard, they were suddenly attacked by fifty or sixty mounted Indians, who, meeting no resistance, instantly murdered nine of the men, seized the two ladies and three children, plundered the wagons and then proceeded to their main camp, the entire party being about 400, in an extensive chaparral, two or three miles distant. Here they remained till next morning, tying the ladies' hands. feet and arms, so tight as to be extremely painful. Next morning, before starting, a savage brute amused his fellows by tossing the infant of Mrs.
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Harris in the air and letting it fall to the ground till it was killed. Next they brought into the pres- ence of the ladies, Mr. Harris and a young Ger- man, whom they had supposed to be dead, but who were only wounded. Compelling the heart- broken wife, and the already widowed Mrs. Horn to look on, they shot arrows and plunged lanees into the two men until they were dead, all the while yelling horrid shouts of exultation. The mind direeting the pen recording this atrocious exercise of savage demonism, as it has recorded and yet has to record innumerable others, involuntarily reverts with inexpressible disgust to the sickening twaddle of that sehool of self-righteous American humani- tarians, who utter eloquent nonsense about the noble savage and moral suasion, and dainty food at public expense, as the only things needful to render him a lamb-like Christian. In New York in 1870, I wrote for Putnam's Magazine an article exposing the misapplied philanthropy on that subject - then upheld for gain by many villainous Indian agents, contractors and licensed traders, and many misinformed good people - contending that the only road to civilization to these inhuman monsters, was to whip them into fear of American power ; then concentrate them into communities ; and after this to treat them with humanity, honesty and fair- ness. The magazine in question, while admitting the correctness of the positions assumed, had not the courage to publish an article so in antagonism to the mistaken and oftentimes mock philanthropy, just then holding high carnival in the eastern section of the Union.
For some time before her capture Mrs. Harris had been suffering greatly from a rising in her breast, from which her infant was denied nourish- ment, and had been tenderly cared for by Mrs. Horn. Though the little innocent was now dead, the mother, in addition to brutal treatment other- wise, suffered excruciatingly in her breast, the heartless wretches for days not allowing Mrs. Horn to dress it. But finally she was permitted to do so and had the sagacity to dress and cover it with a poultice of cactus leaves, than which few things are better. Its effeet was excellent. Both ladies almost, and the little boys entirely, denuded of clothing, their bodies blistered and the skin peeled off, causing intense suffering.
From the scene of slaughter the savages traversed the country between the lower Nueces and the lower Rio Grande, killing all who came within their power.
They came upon the body of a man apparently dead for about a month, which, from Mrs. Horn's statement, I have no doubt was that of Dr. James
Grant, the Scotchman, previously mentioned as associated with Dr. Beales, who was killed by Mexican cavalry, near the Agua Dulce creek, 20 or 30 miles beyond the Nueces, March 2, 1836, some distance from the spot where his men were slain, he and Col. Reuben R. Brown, having been chased four or five miles, from their party, Grant killed and Brown captured, to be imprisoned in Matamoras till the following December, when he and Samuel W. McKneely, who was captured in San Patricio by the same party, escaped and made their way into the settlements of Texas - Brown ever since living at the mouth of the Brazos and commanding a Confederate regiment in the eivil war, and MeKneely deceased in 1889 at Texarkana, Texas. They also passed the bodies of those killed at the original point of attack, the Indians saying they were " Tivos," or Americans. This event, together with the night surprise at San Patricio, the killing of some, the capture of others and the escape of Col. Frank W. Johnson, Daniel J. Toler, John H. Love and James M. Miller, was the dis- astrous termination of what is known in Texian history as the Johnson and Grant expedition, part of a wild and disorganizing series of measures set on foot or countenanced and encouraged by the faction-ridden council of the provisional govern- ment of Texas, against the wise and inflexible opposition of Governor Henry Smith and Gen Sam Houston, and culminating in the surrender and subsequent slaughter of Fannin and nearly 400 noble and chivalrous men,
During this raid in that seetion the Indians caught and killed a very genteel, well-dressed Mex- ican, then surrounded and entered his house, kill- ing his young wife and two little children, and then rushed upon a neighboring house, killing two men near it and one inside. At another time along a road, they waylaid and murdered a handsomely dressed Mexiean and his servant. At another a portion of them rushed across a creek when, through the timber, Mrs. Horn saw them advanc- ing upon a man, who exelaimed " Stand back ! stand back! " but seemed to have no arms. Numerous guns fired, all apparently by the Indians, when all the party, four or five in number, lay dead upon the ground. So far as Mrs. Horn could determine they were all Americans. This occurrence and the surrounding facts, considering the locality and the fact that no party of Americans could bave been there from choice, can only be explained on the hypothesis that these men had escaped from prison in Matamoras, and, without arms, were endeavor- ing to return to Texas. If so, their fate was never known in Texas, for only through these two eap-
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tive ladies could it have been made known and this they had no opportunity of doing excepting after their recovery and through the narrative from which these facts are collected. Neither was ever afterwards in the settled parts of Texas, and indeed never were before, excepting on the trip from Copano, via Goliad and San Antonio, to the Rio Grande.
On another occasion. after traveling for a short distance on a large road, evidently leading to Matamoras, they arrived near a rancho, near a lake of water. The main body halted and a part advanced upon the house which, though near, eoukl not be seen by the captive ladies, but they heard the fight going on, firing and defiant shouts, for a considerable time, when the Indians returned, bearing two of their comrades severely wounded, and showing that they had been defeated and feared pursuit. They left the road and traveled rapidly till night, and then made no fire. On the following day they moved in haste, as if apprehensive of attack. They made no halt till night, and then for the first time in two days, allowed the prisoners water and a sinall quantity of meat. After two hours' travel next morning, to the amazement of the captives, they arrived at the spot where their husbands and friends had been murdered and where their naked bodies still lay, untouched since they left them, and only blackened in appearance. The little boys, John and Joseph, at once recognized their father, and poured forth such wails as to soften any but a brutal, savage heart. They soon passed on to the spot where lay the bodies of Mr. Harris and the young German, who, Mrs. Horn says, fell upon his face and knees and was still in that position, being the only one not stripped of his clothing.
Starting next morning by a different route from that first pursued, they traveled rapidly for three days and reached the spot near where they had killed the little Mexican and his family and had secreted the plunder taken from his house and the other victims of their barbarity. This, Mrs. Horn thought, was on the 18th day of April, 1836, being the fifteenth day of their captivity. This being but three days before the battle of San Jacinto, when the entire American population of Texas was on, or east of the Trinity, abundantly accounts for the fact that these bloody tragedies never become known in Texas; though, as will be shown farther on, they accidentally came to my knowledge in the year 1839, while in Missouri.
Gathering and packing their secreted spoils, the savages separated into three parties of about equal
numbers and traveled with all possible speed till about the middle of June, about two months. Much of the way was over rough, stony ground, pro- visions searce, long intervals without water, the sun on the bare heads and naked bodies of the captives, very hot, and their sufferings were great. The ladies were in two different parties.
The.narrative of Mrs. Horn, during her entire captivity, abounds in recitals of cruelties towards herself, her children and Mrs. Harris, involving hunger, thirst, menial labor, stripes, etc., though gradually lessened as time passed. To follow them in detail would become monotonous repetition. As a rather extreme illustration the following facts transpired on this long march of about two months from extreme Southwest Texas to (it is supposed) the head waters-of the Arkansas.
Much of the route, as before stated, was over rough and stony ground, "cut up by steep and nearly impassable ravines, with deep and dangerous fords." (This is Mrs. Harris' language and aptly applies to the head waters of the Nueces. Guadalupe, the Conchos and the sources of the Colorado, Brazos and Red rivers, through which they neces- sarily passed. ) At one of these deep fords, little Joseph Horn slipped from his mule while ascending the bank and fell back into the water. When he had nearly extricated himself, a burly savage, en- raged at the accident, pierced him in the face with a lance with such force as to throw him into deep and rapid water and inflict a severe wound just be- low the eye. Not one of the demons offered remon- strance or assistance, but all seemed to exult in the brutal scene. The little sufferer, however, caught a projecting bush and sneeeeded in reaching the bank, bleeding like a slaughtered animal. The distracted mother upbraided the wretch for his eon- duct, in return for which he made the child travel on foot and drive a mule the remainder of the day. When they halted for the night he called Mrs. Horn to him. With a knife in one hand and a whip in the other, he gave her an unmerciful thrashing, but in this as in all her afflictions, she says : " I have cast myself at His feet whom I have ever been taught to trust and adore, and it is to Him I owe it that I was sustained in the fiery trials. When the savage monster had done whipping me, he took his knife and literally sawed the hair from my head. It was quite long and when he completed the oper- ation, he tied it to his own as an ornament, and, I suppose, wears it yet. At this time we had tasted no food for two days, and in hearing of the moans of my starving children, bound, as on every night, with cords, I laid down, and mothers may judge, if they can, the measure of my repose. The next day
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a wild horse was killed and we were allowed to par- take of the flesh."
The next day, says the eaptive lady, they came to a deep, rapid stream. The mules had to swim and the banks were so steep that the riders had to dismount in the edge of the water to enable them to ascend. They then soon came to the base of a mountain which it was difficult to ascend. Arriv- ing at the summit, they halted, when a few of the Indians returned to the stream with the two little boys and enjoyed the barbarie sport of throwing the little creatures in till life would be almost extinct. Reviving them, they would repeat the torture and this was done time and again. Finally they rejoined the party on the mountain, the chil- dren being unable to stand, partially unconscious and presenting a pitiable spectacle. Their bodies were distended from engorgement with water and Joseph's wounded face was terribly swollen. Water came from their stomachs in gnrgles. Let Eastern humanitarians bear in mind that this was in the spring of 1836, before the Comanches had any just pretense for hostility towards the people of Texas (however much they may have had in regard to the Mexicans), and that this narrative comes not from a Texian, but from a refined En- glish lady, deeply imbued with that spirit of reli- gion whose great pillars are "Faith, Hope and Charity." My soul sickens in retrospective eon- templation of that (to the uninformed) somewhat plausible gush of philanthropy, which indulges in the pharisaical " I am holier than thou " hypocrisy at home, but soars abroad to lift up the most inferior and barbaric races of men ! - a fanaticism which is ever blind to natural truth and common sense on such subjects - ever the fomentor of strife rather than fraternity among its own people - and which is never enjoying the maximum of self- righteousness unless intermeddling with the affairs and convictions of other people.
Referring to the stream and mountain just de- seribed and the probable time, in the absence of dates, together with a knowledge of the topography of the country, and an evidently dry period, as no mention is made in this part of the narrative of rain or mud, it is quite certain that the stream was the Big Wichita (the Onichita of the French. ) The description, in view of all the facts, admirably applies to it and to none other.
On the night of this day, after traveling through the afternoon, for the first time Mrs. Horn was allowed the use of her arms, though still bound around the ankles. After this little unusual hap- pened on the journey, till the three parties again united. Mrs. Harris, when they met, seemed barely
to exist. The meeting of the captive ladies was a mournful renewal of their sorrows. Mrs. H.'s breasts, though improved, were not well and her general health was bad, from which, with the want of food and water, she had suffered much. The whole band of four hundred then traveled together several days, till one day Mrs. Horn, being in front and her children in the rear, she discovered that those behind her were diverging in separate parties. She never again saw her little sons together, thoughi, as will be seen, she saw them separately. They soon afterwards reached the lodges of the band she was with, and, three days later, she was taken to the lodge of the Indian who claimed her. There were three branches of the family, in separate tents. In one was an old woman and her two daughters, one being a widow ; in another was the son of the old woman and his wife and five sons, to whom Mrs. Horn belonged; and in the third was a son- in-law of the old woman. The mistress of Mrs. H. was the personification of savagery, and abused her captive often with blows and stones, till, in des- peration Mrs. Horn asserted her rights by counter- blows and stones and this rendered the cowardly brute less tyrannical. She was employed con- stantly by day in dressing buffalo robes and deer skins and converting them into garments and moc- casins. She was thrown much with an old woman who constituted a remarkable exception to the general brutality of the tribe. In the language of the captive lady: "She contributed generally by her acts of kindness and soothing manners, to reconcile me to my fate. But she had a daughter who was the very reverse of all that was amiable and seemed never at ease unless engaged in some way in indulging her ill-humor towards me. But, as if by heaven's interposition, it was not long till I so won the old woman's confidenee that in all matters of controversy between her daughter and myself, she adopted my statement and decided in my favor."
Omitting Mrs. Horn's mental tortures on ac- count of her children, she avers that the sufferings of Mrs. Harris were much greater than her own. That lady could not brook the idea of menial service to such demons and fared badly. They were often near together and were allowed occa- sionally to meet and mingle their tears of anguish. Mrs. Harris, generally, was starved to such a degree that she availed herself of every opportunity to get a mite of meat, however small, through Mrs. Horn.
In about two months two little Mexican boy prisoners told her a little white boy had arrived near by with his captors and told them his mother was a prisoner somewhere in the country. By per-
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mission she went to see him and found her little Joseph, who, painted and his head shaven except- ing a tuft on the crown, recognized her at a distance and ran to her overflowing with cries and tears of joy. She was allowed to remain with him only half an hour. I draw the veil over the heartrending scene of their separation.
It was four months before she heard of John, her elder son, and then she saw him passing with a. party, but was not allowed to go to him. But some time later, when the different bands congre- gated for buffalo hunting, she was allowed to see him. Time passed and dates cannot be given, but Mrs. Horn records that " some of Capt. Coffee's men came to trade with the Indians and found me." They were Amerieans and made every effort to buy her, but in vain. On leaving, they said they would report to Capt. Coffee and if any one eould assist these captives he could and would. Soon afterwards he came in person and offered the Indians any amount in goods or money ; but with- out avail. Mrs. Horn says: " He expressed the deepest eoneern at his disappointment and wept over me as he gave me clothing and divided his scanty supply of flour with me and my children, which he took the pains to earry to them himself. It is, if possible, with a deeper interest that I record this tribute of gratitude to Capt. Coffee be- eanse, since my strange deliverance, I have been pained to learn that he has been charged with supineness and indifferenee on the subject; but I can assure the reader that nothing ean be more un- just. Mrs. Harris was equally the object of his solicitude. The meeting with this friend in the deep reeesses of savage wilds was indeed like water to a thirsty soul; and the parting under such gloomy forebodings opened anew the fountain of grief in my heart. It was to me as the icy seal of death fixed upon the only glimmering ray of hope, and my heart seemed to die within me, as the form of him whom I had fondly anticipated as my deliv- ering angel, disappeared in the distance."
(The noble-hearted gentleman thus embalmed in the pure heart of that daughter of sorrow. was Holland Coffee, the founder of Coffee's Trading House, on Red river, a few miles above Denison. He was a member of the Texian Congress in 1838, a valuable and courageous man on the frontier and, to the regret of the country, was killed a few years later in a difficulty, the particulars of which are not at this time remembered. Col. Coffee, formerly of Southwest Missouri, but for many years of Georgetown, Texas, is a brother of the deceased. )
Soon after this there was so great a scarcity of ineat that some of the Indians nearly starved.
Little Jolin managed to send his mother small portions of his allowance and when, not a great while later, she saw him for the last time, he was rejoiced to learn she had received them. He had been siek and had sore throat, but she was only allowed a short interview with him. Soon after this little Joseph's party camped near her and she was permitted to spend nearly a day with him. He had a new owner and said he was then treated kindly. His mistress, who was a young Mexican, had been captured with her brother, and remained with them, while her brother, by some means, had been restored to his people. Ile was one of the hired guard at the unfortunate settlement of Dolores, where Joseph knew him and learned the story of his captivity and that his sister was still with the savages. By acci- dent this woman learned these faets from Joseph, who, to convince her, showed how her brother walked, he being lame. This coineidenee estab- lished a bond of union between the two, greatly to Joseph's advantage. As the shades of evening approached the little fellow piteously elung to his mother, who, for the last time, folded him in her arms and commended his soul to that beneficent God in whose goodness and merey she implicity trusted.
Some time in June, 1837, a little over fourteen months after their capture, a party of Mexican traders visited the camp and bought Mrs. Harris. In this work of mercy they were the employes of that large-hearted Santa Fe trader, who had pre- viously ransomed and restored Mrs. Rachel Pinmmer to her people, Mr. William Donoho, of whom more will hereafter be said. They tried in vain to buy Mrs. Horn. Although near each other she was not allowed to see Mrs. Harris before her departure, but rejoiced at her liberation. They had often mingled their tears together and had been mutual comforters.
Of this separation Mrs. Horn wrote: " Now left a lonely exile in the bonds of savage slavery, haunted by night and by day with the image of my murdered husband, and tortured continually by an undying solicitude for my dear little ones, my life was little else than unmitigated misery, and the God of Heaven only knows why and how it is that I am still alive."
After the departure of Mrs. Harris the Indians traveled to and fro almost continually for about three months, without any remarkable occurrence. At the end of this time they were within two days' travel of San Miguel, a village on the Pecos. in eastern New Mexico. Here an Indian girl told Mrs. Horn that she was to be sold to people who lived in bouses. She did not believe it and eared
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but little, indeed dreaded lest thereby she might never see her children, but hope suggested that as a prisoner she might never again see them, while her redemption might be followed by theirs. A great many Indians had here congregated. Her old woman friend, in reply to her questions, told her she was to be sold, wept bitterly and applied to her neck and arms a peculiar red paint, symbolic of nudying friendship. They started early next morning and traveled till dark, encamping near a pond. They started before day next morning and soon reached a river, necessarily the Pecos or Ancient Puerco, which they forded, and soon arrived at a. small town on its margin, where they encamped for the remainder of the day. The inhabitants visited the camp from curiosity, among them a man who spoke broken English, who asked if Mrs. Horn was for sale and was answered affirmatively by her owner. He then gave her to understand that if he bought her he expected her to remain with him, to which, with the feelings of a pure woman, she promptly replied that she did not wish to exchange her miserable condition for a worse one. He offered two horses for her, how- ever, but they were declined. Finding he could not buy her, he told her that in San Miguel there was a rich American merchant, named Benjamin Hill, who would probably buy her. Her mistress secmed anxious that she should fall into American hands, and she was herself of course intensely anxious to do so.
They reached San Miguel on the next day and encamped there. She soon conveyed, through an old woman of the place, a message to Mr. Hill. He promptly appeared and asked her if she knew Mrs. Harris, and if she had two children among the Indians. Being answered in the affirmative, he said: " You are the woman I have heard of," and wIded, " I suppose von would be happy to get away from these people." "I answered in the affirmative, when he bid the wretched captive . Good morning,' ad deliberately walked off without uttering another word, and my throbbing bosom swelled with unut- terable anguish as he disappeared."
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