T L' l Y _ "'. ' --. H r 1 - I ~ f' n y IL I S . n_: s A "z Y, . K. ' . fT Qz v '1' t I . _ ' 1 i ' 1 I is . , i e, aae ==== aA/''' "'em /*'"%ew " =="w 'Je 4as- yaM - a g aug am2..==awe6 = 46m/ -4".."40"% =41's"5- - - 4*.#- -- eL*.aw-" em. =ss=s,see a,/--- -', s The Fred H. and Ella Mae Moore Texas History Reprint Series Number Fifteen The Indian Papers of Texas and the Southwest 71, .r: Y. t:ir 9ty t t t ' 'r "' gyp., , . iL Sf t B y a . M( } t fii 4I *< 1 /g ', 7733zii" t ;i t :, "t, z: ~ r P 'Pr-fi+L .st , f ti s f ,?a}'.Srr ,' a ;,, Sy ^ , {r t "(' '" Y.,, 6 0. ,," , 1g A f ' ' i 1Ct#^,, t d ,, 4 " ,i.'" y T'_" J i V.s fj,. n Alstx' ,,( f s f. ^ F { { 14.7''1"" ,%,'() j) 'Ayii;, {. <' y, 'y"7' r X, trJ 4't I Yf' ',y t R '' k1C.^k 'ry a ' ; r' Rl ' " . } t} t k i a r ysr. ht :Y .r F ,. , , t } ,,x ta' TX '' t'" '" ,- : ,, r e.i , ' ; .' '+.", "t s, .j 's " .r. N "f Q " a . -. 'tZY{15 -I L I... AWL Ink The Indian Papers of Texas and the Southwest 1825-1916 EDITED BY Dorman H. Winfrey AND James M. Day WITH A NEW INTRODUCTION BY Michael L. Tate VOLUME I Texas State Historical Association Austin Copyright 1995 Texas State Historical Association, Austin, Texas. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-PublicationData Texas State Library and Archives Commission. The Indian Papers of Texas and the Southwest, 1825-1916 / edited by Dorman H. Winfrey and James M. Day ; with a new introduction by Michael L. Tate. p. cm. - (Fred H. and Ella Mae Moore Texas history reprint series) Originally published: Austin : Pemberton Press, 1966. Includes index. ISBN 0-87611-144-4 (cloth) 1. Indians of North America-Southwest, Old-History-Sources. 2. Indians of North America-Texas-History-Sources. I. Winfrey, Dorman H. II. Day, James M. III. Texas State Historical Association. IV. Title. V. Series E78.S8T49 1995 323.1'1970764'09034-dc20 95-18003 CIP 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Published by the Texas State Historical Association in cooperation with the Texas State Library and Archives. This book is number fifteen in the Texas State Historical Association's Fred H. and Ella Mae Moore Texas History Reprint Series. The Texas State Library provided the copy of The Indian Papers of Texas and the Southwest used to reprint this edition. The paper used in this book meets the minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, Z39.48-1984. Contents New Introduction: Indian-White Relations in Texas, 1821-1875 by Michael L. Tate ix Introduction by Dorman H. Winfrey xxiii Preface by Dorman H. Winfrey xxv Texas Indian Papers, 1825-1843 1 Illustrations Chief Bowles of the Cherokee Tribe, drawn by William H. Berry frontispiece Between pages 134 and 135: Treaty between Texas and the Cherokee Indians, February 23, 1836 Map of Cherokee Land Grant Map of Principal Communities and Roads in Settled Area of Republic of Texas Portion of Letter to Sam Houston from General Superintendent of Indian Affairs Joseph C. Eldredge Indian-White Relations in Texas, 1821-1875 Even before the province of Texas broke away from Mexico and established itself as a republic in 1836, the vast region between the Red River and the Rio Grande was host to three centuries of contact between European American and Native American peo- ples. Sometimes trade, alliances, and even kinship relations cre- ated a level of harmony between the diverse groups. At other times, epidemics, warfare, cultural clashes, and conflicts over resources produced a bloody record of raid and reprisal which upset the delicate balance. Throughout the eras of Spanish, French, Mexican and Anglo claims to Texas, diverse Indian nations of Caddoans, Wichitas, Lipan Apaches, Tonkawas, Wacos, Coahuiltecans, Karankawas, Atakapas, and Jumanos interacted among themselves and among the late-arriving European com- munities. By the 1830s, eastern removed tribes such as the Cherokees, Alabama-Coushattas, Seminoles, Shawnees, and Kickapoos had joined the indigenous groups to lay claims to their own small portions of Texas. But the most significant group to emerge as the nineteenth century wore on were the populous Comanches who ranged across much of the territory. These "Lords of the South Plains," superbly mounted on fleet ponies, participated in commerce and diplomatic relations with Anglos and Hispanics, but they also utilized their martial power to hold back the advancing thrust of settlement. Amid these changing patterns of conquest, resistance, and accommodation, all of these people played significant roles in the evolution of Texas. When Sam Houston became the first president of the Republic of Texas in October 1836, he pledged himself to a policy of fair- ness and moderation. In his inaugural address he expressed his personal faith in the Indians and his belief that peace would come if officials "abstain from aggression, establish commerce with the different tribes, supply their useful and necessary wants, [and] maintain even-handed justice with them." Shortly thereafter he invited Comanches, Tonkawas, Wacos, Lipan Apaches, and other small groups to a series of conferences where- by past grievances could be addressed and new trust established. On December 5, the Texas Legislature granted Houston the right to appoint agents and to build government trading houses among the tribes. To further assure enforcement of trade laws, removal of illegal white trespassers from Indian lands, and apprehension of Indian raiders, the legislators specified that a regiment of 280 mounted riflemen be organized immediately for frontier duty. Even though Houston's tenure in office set a good example for future relations, his ranger forces were not able to enforce peace on the frontier. Many settlers refused to wait for the long-range results of a conciliatory program and demanded a militant policy of driving the Indians beyond populated areas. Finding a champi- on in Mirabeau B. Lamar, they supported his presidential candi- dacy in late 1838. The newly elected Lamar immediately pushed through an expensive military preparedness program involving a regiment of 840 "regular army" soldiers who would build a system of forts and work with existing ranger units. The number of military con- flicts with Indians increased significantly during the Lamar administration, but most were of a cat-and-mouse nature involv- ing only occasional skirmishes. That situation changed dramati- cally when Lamar ordered the forced removal of peaceful Cherokees from the Neches River area. Even though these people had long occupied East Texas and previously had signed an agreement with President Houston, they were marked for mili- tary action. Contending that some of the Cherokees had con- spired with Mexican insurrectionists, Lamar ordered Gen. Thomas J. Rusk to attack the camp of chiefs Duwali and Gatun- wali, and to show no mercy to the inhabitants. The brutal attack on July 16, 1839, not only inflicted heavy casualties on the Cherokees, it also alienated other peaceful Indians throughout the region. Turning his attention to the more troublesome Comanches, Lamar invited many of the southern bands to San Antonio during March 1840 for routine negotiations. When the authorities learned that the Indians had brought only two white captives for exchange, they tried to seize the entire group as hostages. In the melee that followed, the Texans killed thirty-five men, women, and children, and took twenty-seven others prisoner. Some military authorities proclaimed this Council House fight a major victory and predicted that it would assure greater Comanche cooperation in the future. They could not have been more wrong. During August, a Comanche raiding party number- ing between 800 and 1,000, bent on revenge for the duplicity at x San Antonio, drove as far south as the Gulf Coast community of Victoria. They stripped the area of its horses, sacked the town of Linnville, and killed two dozen settlers before withdrawing northward. Lamar's administration had practically bankrupted the government and, despite its vaunted claims, had left the Republic facing an even more explosive Indian situation. In December 1841, Texans reelected Sam Houston. He quickly reversed much of Lamar's expensive preparedness program by disbanding most of the regular army, but enlarged the less costly ranger forces by mustering four new companies. Hoping to win peace with a minimum of bloodshed and a maximum of under- standing, Houston encouraged restraint among the rangers, and he specifically ordered them to protect Indian lands from white interlopers and illegal traders. The cabinet heartily endorsed Houston's brand of personal diplomacy with the tribes and his philosophy that "it is much cheaper and more humane to pur- chase their friendship than to fight them." Throughout 1843, Houston sent emissaries to the Comanches requesting a parley and, after numerous misunderstandings on both sides, some of the southern bands agreed to a meeting. At a council held in October 1844, chiefs Pahhahyuco and Mopechu- cope promised to surrender their captives and to cease their raid- ing. In exchange, Houston agreed to terminate all military expeditions and to establish additional trading posts for their benefit. More important, he stipulated that the Republic would again acknowledge Comanche rights to camp and hunt buffalo south of the old San Saba mission. Obviously, Indian raiding on the settlements and white incursions into protected tribal lands did not altogether cease, but the administrations of Houston and Anson Jones, the last president of the Republic, did improve the situation, at least on an official level.