USA > Texas > Wise County > Pioneer history of Wise County; from red men to railroads-twenty years of intrepid history > Part 16
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31
The first raid made in the extreme south part of the county occurred in 1863, and for some strange reason no more depreda- tions were perpetrated there until after the war. But when the Indians resumed operations, they came thick and fast and in all seasons; almost every light of the moon for a number of years brought with it an Indian depredation. .
The first fight after the war occurred in the winter of 1865. Thirty-two Indians were first seen above Springtown, Parker County, after which they came over into Wise County. About sundown they went into the field of Mrs. Lydia Gore and drove out some horses. Several neighbors had collected to follow and attack them. Shortly after dark the men had a mild en- counter with the Indians, but withdrew because of the dark-
202
PIONEER HISTORY OF WISE COUNTY.
ness. A heavy snow fell after dark, and the Indians camped for the night. The next morning they left, and were followed as far as Sandy Creek, west of Decatur, where the trail was abandoned. Captain George Stevens soon got on the trail of these Indians, and it is stated that his scouts found the bodies of three dead Indians, supposed to have been wounded in the fight in the south part of the county. Some of the settlers men- tioned as having participated in the chase and fight are Frank Holden, negro Sang, Sol Hines, John Stack, T. J. Norville, Sam Copeland, Uriah Perkins, John Morris, Lycurgus Tackett, John Hill, Jack and Andy Gore, Jim Curley, Polk Mathews, Jack Smith, Elmore Blackwell.
On Sunday, March 4, 1866, the citizens of the settlement of which Opal is now the center had collected at the home of Anderson Smith for the purpose of religious worship. Parson Vernon was the preacher, and a large crowd of people had con- gregated. The minister had taken the stand, and for some time had been preaching, when a breathless rider named Brown dashed upon the quiet scene with a pack of Indians at his heels. Brown was on his way to church and was charged by the In- dians, whom he outran to Smith's. The Indians had camped the previous night at Earp's crossing, eight miles north of Smith's.
The Indians ran Brown up to the very doors of the house, and of course his sudden appearance under circumstances so exciting precipitated a mild panic. Men began to pour out of the house and run to their horses. As soon as their minds were cleared of confusion they arranged their defensive arms, and with one accord, started off in hot pursuit of the Indians, who fled in a northern direction. The chase lasted for about a mile, when the Indians, numbering about eight in the band, suddenly halted in a swag and began to form to receive the attack. The halting of the Indians found the men on a high rise south of the point at which the Indians had stopped. Seeing the Indians extending wings in preparation for battle, the men stopped,
RAIDS AND KILLINGS-SOUTH AND SOUTHWEST WISE COUNTY. 203
and observing that the Indians were maneuvering to surround them, two or three men, headed by Jim Kearly, charged one of the wings, and at the same time all the settlers opened fire on the enemy. The Indians fought in a kind of circular retreat until the white men had been worked into their fore. A settler by the name of Jim Sanders had already been shot and killed. The fight had now changed into a series of running assaults and .. retreats, both sides moving all the while toward the north. Another settler, John Mathews, received two arrows in the shoulder, while the neck of one of the Indians' horses had been creased by a settler's bullet, which put the Indian afoot. The men poured a hot fire after him but he very swiftly overtook his comrades and was remounted. In the thick of the fight two settlers, Polk Mathews and a man named Gore, ran their horses together in a violent collision which threw Mathews to the ground, and while afoot a dog-wood switch arrow, projected by the Indians, penetrated the side of his head. The point was not metaled, and John Andrews had no trouble in removing it in the same fashion that Polk had before taken two from John's shoulder.
During all this fight the Indians were laboring desperately to evade the repeated attacks of the settlers, and were fighting and running all the while. The settlers were now anxious about the death of Sanders and the injuries of the wounded, and drew away from the assault. The Indians took the oppor- tunity to flee the country. A depreciated number of them passed out by Waggoner's ranch, which is substantive of the settlers' claim that one or more of the Indians had been fatally wounded in the fight.
The death of Alvin Clark in this section of the county was deplored as one of the sad occurrences of the period of troubles. Young Clark was generally well liked and was known to be one of the most courageous men in the community. His death of- curred in June, 1866, and was as follows:
A band of fifteen or twenty Indians passed down the region parallel with the Parker and Wise County line, going west.
1
204
PIONEER HISTORY OF WISE COUNTY.
They came to Dry Branch in Garret Valley, where they found Mrs. Frank Holden, Mrs. Mary Kirby and negro Sang's mother doing the family washing. Near at hand were some horses, and the Indians took these and passed on. A little further on the following citizens joined in an attempt to overtake the Indians and recapture the horses: Alvin and Tom Clark, Tom Howard, Jim Keasly, Frank Holden, negro Sang and others. The Indians ran by J. B. Thomas' farm, and here, cutting oats in the field, was another party of citizens who joined in the chase. These were Bob Thompson, Andy and Jack Gore, Louis Hutchin- son, Lige Keeling, J. B. Thomas and Soney Thomas. In about a mile and a half the men gained on the Indians and the latter stopped for fight in a black-jack grove swag in the flat woods country, near the corner of Ben Gilland's field. At the com- mencement of the fight Alvin Clark jumped from his horse for better shooting; at the same time it occurred to the settlers that the Indians had chosen an advantageous position from which it would be fatal to attempt to drive them, whereupon they withdrew to await more favorable surroundings. Alvin Clark had been detained on account of the unmanageableness of his horse, and it was while trying to control his steed that the ' Indians charged him. By this time he had mounted and fled down a fence row, entirely cut off from his comrades. Two Indians were at his horse's heels shooting with gun and bow. Finally Clark reeled from his saddle and fell dead. He had already dropped his gun and pistol, having emptied both in the fight. He was shot seven times, with four arrows and three balls. Very quickly the Indians scalped their victim, then fled in a northwest direction. A short distance away they ran into a bunch of cowboys and began shooting and running immedi- ately. In this second melce George Buekhanan, one of the cowboys, was wounded, but afterwards recovered. The In- dians made rapid progress until they had departed the country.
No single exciting act culled from the scenes of the most realistic drama could be more thrilling than the following true
RAIDS AND KILLINGS-SOUTH AND SOUTHWEST WISE COUNTY. 205
occurrence, which the writer attempts to describe in language befitting the occasion. Pioneer citizen J. B. Thomas' farm lay over the line of Parker and Wise Counties in the community of which the present village of Opal is the center. On November 3, 1866, threshing was in progress on this farm, the merry hun of the machine and the occasional shouts of the workers being the only- noises to break the stillness. J. B. Thomas and his son, Soney Thomas, were on the stack pitching bundles to the feeder when they happened to glance across the field to see six Indians stealthily lay down the fence, come inside and approach the horses which the men had turned loose to graze in the field. Thomas and his son immediately gave the alarm and the elder Thomas slid off the stack, grasped the pistol of Jack Gore, one of the helpers, and started toward the Indians afoot. The other men quickly mounted horses about the thresher and set off after the Indians, who had by this time driven the horses through the gap in the fence. Those in pursuit were Jack and Andy Gore, Brice Mann, John and Bill Mathews, Soney Thomas and the latter's father. After passing through the gap the horses set for J. B. Thomas' home, a distance of three-quarters of a mile, the Indians pursuing and the men dashing after the Indians. In order to reach the house the horses traversed a circuitous route, and the Indians, in maneuvering to head off their course, worked around so far in the rear as to come up some distance behind the men. The latter were still going in the direction of the house when they came upon Uncle Johnnie Montgomery, an aged citizen of Parker County, to whom they quickly explained the object of their haste, imploring him to join them and ride to the house for safety. Uncle Johnnie was seventy-five years of age and was mounted on a very fine horse which he had just taken off the grass. Apparently he was more conscious of the danger of running his horse than he was of the danger to himself from Indian attack. Anyhow, he refused to accelerate his speed and jogged on toward the house alone. In a twinkling the Indians were upon him, shooting and yelling and brandishing arms. Uncle Johnnie now set off rapidly toward the house, but he had made the start too late. He was shot through the back, the ball penetrating the heart. His
206
PIONEER HISTORY OF WISE COUNTY.
horse dashed on up to the yard gate and the rider reeled and fell dead at the fence. The horses had reached the lot, but when the men and Indians ran up, which was about the same time, they took fright and ran away again. The Indians, seeing them leave, followed and succeeded after all in capturing them. . The men were occupied with the dead man who had fallen at their feet. This all happened in less time than it takes to tell it. The men could have doubtless done more effective work if the successive movements had not been so quick and electrical. As it was, they were flushed out of a quiet scene and on to a swift and tragie climax before their senses could be roused to proper action.
Indian raids continued in this section of the county during all the period of troubles, but the following is recalled as about the last depredation, in which an unusually large number of Indians participated. In July, 1866, several hundred Comanches entered the county, first being observed in a region five miles northwest of Springtown. In Parker they massacred a settler by the name of Briscoe, and his wife and four children, after which they robbed and phin- (lered the house. Then they passed on to Lycurgus Tackett's and plundered his home, the women and children having escaped to the brush. Further on, at Unele Johnnie Mont- gomery's, they stole the horse off of which he had previously been killed. Shortly after noon they entered Wise County, passing a place where Soney Thomas and Andy and James Elkins were hunting horses. The boys fled to places of safety. Soney Thomas ran to the Blackwell house, to which the Indians came soon after. Thomas then ran to the Mathews home, and here the Indians came also in full force. Upwards of fifty of the relatives and neighbors had collected here for a social gathering, and many had left their horses tied at the fence. When the Indians appeared on the scene, great confusion fol- lowed, the children screamed and the women trembled. The Indians ran up and seized several horses. Some of the men started to retake the horses when the Indians began shooting.
207
BRIEF COMMENTS ON THE TIMES AND INDIAN MARAUDING.
After getting the stock, the redskins passed out. About 200 yards away they stopped, and probably 100 turned back. The people of the household thought their time had come, but that which had enticed the fiends to return was a large sugar-cane patch, which they entered and helped themselves, after which they left the country, greatly to the relief of the imprisoned citizens.
A FEW BRIEF COMMENTS ON THE TIMES AND INDIAN MARAUD- ING CHARACTERISTICS.
The freedom and openness of pioneer life began to vanish with the initiation of hostilities between the North and South. The bands of restriction tightened as Indian warfare grew fiercer and more bold. The people were now forced into the observ- ance of a narrow routine, out of which they went at the cost of their lives. Their daily occupations were retarded and rendered extremely difficult, while social intercourse was carried on under the most trying circumstances. The people could not now come and go as they willed, and were harassed with the ever immi- nent need of watchfulness and defense. Men became the stal- wart guardians of their homes and loved ones; their silent atti- tudes and stern, serious faces, with the ever-ready Winchester clasped for defense, making pictures worthy of being fashioned in bronze.
The deadly weight of responsibility falling upon pioneer manhood, centering in the protection of wives, mothers and children, made the home life a beautiful and entrancing picture to contemplate. Standing between their families and death, men grew stalwart in character and increasingly affectionate in impulse. Forced to a life approximate to the threshold, men came under the refining influences of women and children and grew in love and tenderness thereby. Exterior danger strength- ened his arm and heart, while enforeed contact with intimate softening influences swelled his soul; the result was an en- nobled character and an elevated type of man. Mark the pioneer remaining with us, and these characteristics will be plainly obvious.
208
PIONEER HISTORY OF WISE COUNTY.
Everywhere in the homes and in the fields it was a time of great dread and apprehension. Men plowed in the fields with arms buckled to their bodies, not daring to leave them even at the farther end of the rows; and as they trod the furrows a watchful eye was over cast in the direction of home, anticipating that at any moment despairing screams would call them to the prevention of one of those dastardly crimes visited by the sneak- ing savage on defenseless women and children. Mothers kept their children huddled at the door-step, denying them the free range of the adjoining fields and timber. Too many sudden captures of children strolling away from home had intervened for the little ones to be granted the freedom which their youthful impulses craved.
So great was the tension of the times that any unusual and weird noise was sufficient to precipitate alarm and fright. A bellowing bull in the woods by throwing a rasping note into his clarion voice could rouse a household into a state of palpitating fear or start a lone rider in the woods carcering for safety. Any citizen who would not go constantly armed was looked upon by his more prudent brothers with suspicion and it was a man- date of the times that every settler carry defensive weapons. Those beautiful lights of the moon, so pleasurable in this gentle time of peace, were periods of the sublimest suffering to the pioneers, for all those bright occasions were darkly shadowed by the fear of the visits of the Indians, who invariably chose them for their time of descent upon the settlements. The great glimmering calcium poured forth its rays on many a sad and realistic drama enacted by its aid and under the influence of its existence.
Trained as are our imaginations and broad as is our knowl- edge of history, we of this gentle hour can entertain no concep- tion adequate to the appreciation of the degree of anguish and suffering which our fathers and mothers experienced during these dragging years of danger and pain.
Advertence to a page of description and notes of savage char- acteristies and marauding practices will be appropriate at this juncture.
The tribes mostly addicted to depredating here were the
209
BRIEF COMMENTS ON THE TIMES AND INDIAN MARAUDING.
Comanches, Kiowas, Caddos and certain others, but the first named were the most brutal and most dreaded. They came in small and large bands, in all seasons of the year, but always during the full brilliance of the moon; the latter agency assist- ing them to locate live stock and to see their way of rapid escape out of the country when pursued. On many occasions they came afoot, bringing a few worthless ponies used as pack ani- mals. After they had stolen enough horses to mount them- selves, these pack animals were abandoned on the trail. So sparse were the settlements that the Indians could advance well into the heart of them without being observed. If arriving in the day time, seeluded places would be sought for hiding until the sleeping shadows of night made a cover for their nefarious work. Many a citizen whose daily occupation led his way un- warily by a band of ambuscaded Indians has paid the penalty with his life. The redskins were very partial to sugar-cane, melons, fruit and green corn, and often left evidences of their stolen visits in the patches or orchards of the settlers.
By virtue of former occupancy, the Indians were intimately acquainted with the topography of the country and were thus not hindered by unfamiliarity on their visits. They possibly know more of the country than the settlers themselves, having led a roving life over it for so many years. This advantage gave them many favorable points in their fiendish warfare.
The Indians rarely attacked at night, knowing the darkness placed the odds against them in possible encounters with the pioneer marksmen. They shot arrows with unerring aim and great force, the arrow sometimes passing through the body of the victim. After they began to exchange horses and Indian ware with ruthless speculators for guns, they became a more disastrous foe than ever. Their fiendish delight was to murder white men and take their scalps for trophies, and their object in taking women and children into captivity was to hold them for ransom. A beautiful woman captive would be spared by them because of the excitation of their barbarous lusts. An aged or irregularly featured woman would be murdered.
The Indians were strangers to pity, controlled by the instincts of beastliness, and were dirty, greasy and sullen. The cruelty 14
.
210
PIONEER HISTORY OF WISE COUNTY.
of their warfare on the people of this section is unsurpassed in any history of any country.
EPOCH-MARKING EVENT IN SAVAGE DEPREDATION HISTORY-LAST RAID IN WISE COUNTY-ASSASSINATION OF THE HUFF FAMILY.
Changing events centering around the early seventies indicate that the pressure of the white civilization on the frontier was on the eve of surging beyond the boundaries which the red man had established and guarded with fiendish retaliation for so many years. A decade of prostration and apathy had brought renewed strength to the frontier, and its people arose with new courage and energy to confront the foe who for so long had been the victor.
There is no evidence that the Indian warfare had abated in the least; in fact as the years retreated from the early years of the war, danger from the Indian gradually grew in volume and proportion until it became by far the most momentous question of the forward settlements. But in 1870 and thereabout, the Anglo spirit was again manifesting itself; it arose from a slum- brous period to challenge the sway of an inferior race who, for some incomprehensible reason, had been permitted to tyrannize and dominate. But just at this juncture a very significant series of events were in a state of transpiration which in their final results aided materially in bringing ultimate peace to the harried land.
Early in the spring of 1871, Captain Julian Fields, of Mans- field, Tarrant County, started a wagon-train, drawn by thirty- six fine mules, from Jacksboro to Ft. Griffin, in Shackleford County, to convey a consignment of flour, which he agreed to deliver to the United. States forces per terms of contract. Nine miles from the present town of Graham in Young County, on Salt Creek prairie, the train was assaulted by about 150 Kiowa Indians, led by their chiefs, Satanta, Satank and Big Tree, and all the teamsters but two were murdered, the fine wagons burned and the valuable Missouri mules taken into captivity to the reserva- tion at Ft. Sill.
EPOCH-MARKING EVENT IN SAVAGE DEPREDATION HISTORY. 211
Not many hours before this sanguinary occurrence, General W. T. Sherman had passed over the spot, going from fort to fort on a tour of inspection. He was at or near Ft. Richardson, Jacksboro, when the Salt Creek massacre occurred. General Sherman and the general government's attention had been often attracted to the terrible Indian atrocities here on the frontier, but guided by prejudicial reports from Northern newspapers demanding mercy for the Indian and actuated by that state of indifference that occurs beyond the radius and realization of danger, the government had taken only perfunctory steps to render assistance.
Because of this state of affairs, General Sherman's proximity to the latest terrible affair was a portentuous circumstance for the frontier. He immediately set about to make an investiga- tion and dispatched General MeKinzie to the vicinity of the murder for the verification of the details, and ordained a court of influential pioneer citizens at Jacksboro, who thoroughly laid before him the afflictions of the frontier.
General Sherman passed on to Ft. Sill, and while there obtained through the Indian agent, Tatum, the names of the tribes and individuals who had committed the atrocious Salt Creek deed. These latter had returned from the scene of their crime and boasted as to how the crime was committed. The chiefs above referred to were now ordered under arrest by General Sherman and returned to Jacksboro for civil trial. Judge Chas. Soward, of Decatur, presided at the trial and assessed the punishment made necessary by the verdict of guilty returned by the jury, at death by hanging. The writer has not space to mention the spectacular events of this noted trial, and only the part it bears in the ending of the Indian troubles is to be dwelt upon. Fur- ther details will be found in Josiah Wilbarger's History, as well as in Mr. Bedford's volume entitled, "Texas Indian Troubles." The sentences of death passed against the chiefs were afterward commuted to life imprisonment and they were confined in the penitentiary. This proceeding was concurred in by Judge Soward and Indian Agent Tatum, who both recommended commutation to Governor E. J. Davis, being convinced that
212
PIONEER HISTORY OF WISE COUNTY.
confinement would have more salutary effects on the wild tribes than capital punishment.
Judge Soward has prepared a statement for the present writer which has not been reproduced in either of the books referred to. The statement deals with the sequel to the above trials and convictions and sets forth the agreement reached by the Governor of Texas, the agent representing the United States, and the Indians, as well as being substantiative of the profoundly beneficial results of the trial which led to the conviction of the chiefs.
SEQUEL OF THE TRIAL AND CONVICTION OF SATANTA AND BIG TREE, AT JACKSBORO, JULY 8, 1871, BY JUDGE CHARLES SOWARD, OF DECATUR.
"The punishment of these Indians having been commuted by the Governor of Texas from death to imprisonment for life, they were conveyed by the sheriff of Jack County to the peni- tentiary at Huntsville, Texas, in a covered wagon accompanied by a guard of United States cavalry, furnished by Colonel Mc- ยท Kinzie of the Sixth U. S. Cavalry. After remaining in the penitentiary for some time, a treaty was made between the United States authorities and the Indian tribes located on the Ft. Sill reservation, which was joined in by the Governor of Texas, whereby all of the Indians were to be considered on parole and were to answer to roll call every morning. Under this agreement the Governor of Texas agreed to return Satanta and Big Tree to the reservation and they were to remain on parole. It was further provided that if any such Indians should fail to answer to roll call or thereby violate their parole, such, except- ing Satanta and Big Tree, should be arrested by the United States authorities and conveyed to San Augustine, Florida, and that in case Satanta or Big Tree, or either of them, violated their parole they should be by such authority arrested and returned to the penitentiary of Texas.
After this treaty was made and Satanta and Big Tree were released upon the Sill reservation, there was one big raid made by a number of these Indians into Texas; this was some time
SEQUEL OF THE TRIAL AND CONVICTION OF SATANTA, ETC. 213
in 1874, and it was in this raid that the Huff family, of Wise County, were murdered. Upon the return of these renegade Indians to the reservation they were all arrested per terms of the treaty before mentioned, and in all 135 were sent to San Augustine, Florida. Satanta, who violated his parole, was re- turned to the penitentiary of Texas and soon thereafter com- mitted suicide by throwing himself from the balcony in the peni- tentiary.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.