Empire of the Summer Moon: Quanah Parker and the Rise and Fall of the Comanches, the Most Powerful Indian Tribe in American History (62 page)
Authors: S. C. Gwynne
Tags: #State & Local, #Kings and Rulers, #Native American, #Social Science, #Native American Studies, #Native Americans, #West (AK; CA; CO; HI; ID; MT; NV; UT; WY), #Wars, #Frontier and Pioneer Life, #General, #United States, #Ethnic Studies, #19th Century, #Southwest (AZ; NM; OK; TX), #Biography & Autobiography, #Comanche Indians, #West (U.S.), #Discrimination & Race Relations, #Biography, #History
3
. J. Evetts Haley, ed.,
Charles Goodnight’s Indian Recollections,
pp. 25–26.
4
. Ibid.
5
. Ibid.
6
. Jo Ella Powell Exley,
Frontier Blood,
pp. 183–84; citing untitled manuscript of J. A. Dickson.
7
. Ibid., p. 186.
8
. Ibid., pp. 199ff.
9
. Ernest Wallace and E. Adamson Hoebel,
The Comanches,
p. 81.
10
. Charles Goodnight,
The Making of a Scout,
manuscript in Panhandle Plains Historical Museum Archives.
11
. Wallace and Hoebel, pp. 178ff.
12
. Ibid., p. 183.
13
. “Quanah Parker in Adobe Walls Battle,”
Borger News Herald,
date unknown, Panhandle Plains Historical Museum Archives, based on interview with J. A. Dickson.
14
. Elizabeth Ross Clarke,
YA-A-H-HOO: Warwhoop of the Comanches,
manuscript at Center for American History, University of Texas, Austin, p. 73.
15
. Exley, p. 184, citing untitled Dickson ms.
16
. Chief Baldwin Parker,
Life of Quanah Parker, Comanche Chief,
through J. Evetts Haley, August 29, 1930, manuscript at Center for American History, University of Texas, Austin.
17
. Exley, Dickson ms.
18
. Randolph Marcy,
Adventure on Red River: A Report on the Exploration of the Red River by Captain Randolph Marcy and Captain G. B. McClellan,
p. 159.
19
. Scott Zesch,
The Captured,
pp. 68–76.
20
. Thomas W. Kavanaugh,
The Comanches,
p. 372; Zoe A. Tilghman,
Quanah, Eagle of the Comanches,
pp. 68ff.
21
. Kavanaugh,
The Comanches,
p. 481.
22
. Tilghman, pp. 68ff.
23
. Exley, p. 204, citing untitled Dickson ms.
24
. Kavanaugh,
The Comanches,
p. 473.
25
. Olive King Dixon,
Fearless and Effective Foe: He Spared Women and Children, Always,
manuscript, Center for American History, University of Texas, Austin.
26
. Eugene E. White,
Experiences of a Special Indian Agent,
pp. 276ff. White’s account is taken from his conversations with Quanah in later years.
27
. The ultimate source of this story is Quanah, but his accounts, passed down to us through three different sources—Eugene White, Olive King Dixon (via Goodnight and Baldwin Parker), and Ella Cox Lutz, Quanah’s granddaughter—agree in all important aspects.
28
. Wallace and Hoebel, pp. 136–37.
29
. White, p. 284.
30
. Ibid., p. 286.
31
. Dixon, manuscript.
Fourteen
UNCIVIL WARS
1
. Ernest Wallace,
Texas in Turmoil,
p. 238.
2
. David La Vere,
Contrary Neighbors,
p. 169.
3
. Ibid., p. 178.
4
. Ibid.
5
. Ibid., p. 171.
6
. T. R. Fehrenbach,
The Comanches,
p. 450.
7
. Angie Debo,
The Road to Disappearance: A History of the Creek Indians,
pp. 150ff.
8
. Fehrenbach,
The Comanches,
p, 449.
9
. Debo, p. 152; also La Vere, p 171.
10
. Fehrenbach,
The Comanches,
p. 459.
11
. Wallace, p. 244; R. N. Richardson,
The Comanche Barrier to South Plains Settlement,
p. 142.
12
. W. S. Nye,
Carbine and Lance: The Story of Old Fort Sill,
p. 35.
13
. Hampton Sides,
Blood and Thunder,
p. 308.
14
. Thelma S. Guild and Harvey L. Carter,
Kit Carson: A Pattern for Heroes,
pp. 231ff.
15
. Sides, p. 368.
16
. Thomas Kavanagh,
The Comanches,
p. 398.
17
. Letter to commanding officer, Fort Bascom, September 27, 1864; Official Records of the War of Rebellion, series 1, vol. 41, pt. 3, pp. 429–30.
18
. Captain George Pettis,
Kit Carson’s Fight with the Comanche and Kiowa Indians
(Providence Press Company, Sidney S. Rider [copyright], 1878), p. 3.
19
. Mildred Mayhall,
The Kiowas,
p. 161.
20
. Pettis, p. 5.
21
. David A. Norris, “Confederate Gunners Affectionately Called Their Hard Working Little Mountain Howitzers ‘Bull Pups,’”
America’s Civil War,
September 1995,
pp. 10, 12, 14, 16, 20, and 90.
22
. Pettis, p. 9.
23
. Ibid.
24
. Kavanagh,
The Comanches,
p. 395.
25
. Ibid., p. 16.
26
. Ibid.
27
. 39th U.S. Congress; Second Session, Senate report 156, pp. 53, 74.
28
. Dee Brown,
Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee,
p. 86.
29
. 39th U.S. Congress; Second Session, Senate report 156, pp. 73, 96.
30
. Sides, p. 379.
31
. Ibid.
32
. Fehrenbach,
The Comanches,
p. 461.
Fifteen
PEACE, AND OTHER HORRORS
1
. Rupert N. Richardson,
The Comanche Barrier to South Plains Settlement,
p. 157.
2
. Ibid.
3
. T. R. Fehrenbach,
The Comanches,
p. 484.
4
. Abstracted from the
Army Navy Journal
15, no. 52 (August 31, 1878); cited in Charles M. Robinson,
Bad Hand: A Biography of General Ranald S. Mackenzie,
p. 57.
5
. Thomas Kavanagh,
The Comanches,
p. 411.
6
. Richardson, p. 151.
7
. Kavanagh,
The Comanches,
p. 412.
8
. Alfred A. Taylor, account in Chronicles of Oklahoma, II, pp. 102–103.
9
. Charles J. Kappler, ed.,
Indian Affairs Laws and Treaties
(Washington, D.C., 1903), vol. II, pp. 977ff.
10
. Henry M. Stanley, “A British Journalist Reports the Medicine Lodge Councils of 1867,”
Kansas Historical Quarterly
33 (Spring 1967): 282.
11
. Ibid., 33:283.
12
. Douglas C. Jones,
The Treaty at Medicine Lodge,
pp. 101ff.
13
. Stanley, pp. 249–320.
14
. Kappler, pp. 977ff.
15
. Ibid., p. 982.
16
. Richardson, p. 237, note 25.
17
. Quanah Parker to Captain Hugh Lenox Scott, 1898, H. L. Scott Material, W. S. Nye Collection, Fort Sill Archives.
18
. David La Vere,
Contrary Neighbors,
pp. 183–84.
19
. Leavenworth to Commissioner of Indian Affairs, April 23, 1868, 40th Congress, Second Session, Sen. Ex. Doc. No. 60:2.
20
. Richardson, p. 161.
21
. Lawrence Schmeckebier,
The Office of Indian Affairs, Its History, Activities and Organization,
p. 48; Richardson, p. 164
22
. Fehrenbach,
The Comanches,
p. 485.
Sixteen
THE ANTI-CUSTER
1
. Charles M. Robinson III,
Bad Hand: A Biography of General Ranald S. Mackenzie,
p. 10, citing Morris Schaff,
Old West Point,
pp. 42–43.
2
. Evan S. Connell,
Son of the Morning Star,
p. 108.
3
. Captain Joseph Dorst, “Ranald Slidell Mackenzie,” Twentieth Annual Reunion of the Association Graduates of the United States Military Academy at West Point, June 12, 1889, p. 7.
4
. F. E. Green, ed., “Ranald S. Mackenzie’s Official Correspondence Relating to Texas, 1873–79,”
Museum Journal
10 (1966): 13ff.
5
. U. S. Grant,
Personal Memoirs
(New York: Charles A. Webster and Co., 1885),
p. 541.
6
. Ernest Wallace,
Ranald S. Mackenzie on the Texas Frontier,
p. 9.
7
. Dorst, p. 7.
8
. Connell, pp. 128–29.
9
. W. S. Nye,
Carbine and Lance,
pp. 63ff.
10
. Ibid., p. 67.
11
. Ibid., p 69.
12
. Jo Ella Powell Exley,
Frontier Blood,
p. 196, citing untitled Dickson manuscript,
p. 37.
13
. Tatum’s second annual report, August 12, 1870, 41st Congress, Third Session, House Ex. Doc. no. 1, vol. 1, 724–729, cited in Rupert N. Richardson,
The Comanche Barrier to South Plains Settlement,
p. 171.
14
. Letter: Ranald S. Mackenzie to William T. Sherman, June 15, 1871.
15
. Robert G. Carter,
On the Border with Mackenzie,
p. 167.
16
. Charles H. Sommer,
Quanah Parker, Last Chief of the Comanches,
p. 43.
17
. There is some disagreement about this among historians. Leading Comanche historian Ernest Wallace believes that the command was Quanah’s, as does Quanah’s principal biographer, Bill Neeley. Evidence to the contrary comes mainly from interviews conducted many years later, and cited extensively in Jo Ella Powell Exley’s
Frontier Blood,
with the Comanche warrior Cohayyah, who said that Parra-o-coom (Bull Bear) was the leader at that time. There does not seem to be any disagreement that Quanah led the night raid or that he led the attack on Heyl and Carter.
18
. Carter,
On the Border with Mackenzie,
p. 170.
19
. Ibid., p. 173.
20
. Ibid., p. 175. Carter notes that the Comanches were “poorly armed with muzzle-loading rifles and pistols, lances and bows.”
21
. Ibid.
22
. Colonel Richard Dodge,
Our Wild Indians,
p. 489.
23
. Handbook of Texas Online, Texas State Historical Society.
24
. Carter, op. cit., p. 187.
25
. Ibid., p. 187.
26
. Ibid., p. 188.
27
. Arthur Ferguson Journal, Utah State Historical Society; cited in Stephen E. Ambrose,
Nothing Like It in the World: The Men who Built the Transcontinental Railroad, 1863–1869,
p. 143.
28
. Ibid., p. 189.
29
. Wallace,
Ranald S. Mackenzie,
p. 54.
30
. Carter,
On the Border with Mackenzie,
p. 194.
Seventeen
MACKENZIE UNBOUND
1
. Letter: Charles Howard to President Grant, cited in T. R. Fehrenbach,
The Comanches,
p. 515.
2
. Robert G. Carter,
On the Border with Mackenzie,
p. 219.
3
. Ernest Wallace,
Texas in Turmoil,
pp. 252–53.
4
. Ernest Wallace,
Ranald S. Mackenzie on the Texas Frontier,
p. 74.
