[1]Comancheros: Renegade Mexicans, half breeds and outlaw Americans who lived in Mexican settlements in New Mexico, from whence they traveled in small bands, usually by wagon or oxcart, to the Llano Estacado where they met the Comanches, Kiowas or other Indians and traded guns, ammunition, whiskey and other desirable items for the products of the raids. (Robert T. Neill, San Angelo, Texas.)
[2]Perhaps this was Limpia Creek.—Dr. R. T. Hill.
[3]On June 19, 1865, Major General Gordon Granger, U.S.A., landed at Galveston and issued a general order declaring that “in accordance with a proclamation from the Executive of the United States, all slaves are free.”
[4]The Negro regiments on the Texas frontier during these Indian times were the 9th and 10th Cavalry and the 24th and 25th Infantry.
[5]During the Civil War the cattle on the open Texas ranges increased many fold with the loss by the Confederacy of control of the Mississippi River. After that war they so far exceeded local demand that cattle drives on a much larger scale than ever before attempted, got under way. The Chisholm and Western Trails, “from anywhere in Texas,” on north through the western part of the Indian Territory entrained cattle in Kansas for the Eastern feedlots. The Goodnight-Loving Trail running west along the Middle Concho River, thence north along the Pecos and on parallel to the Front Ranges, supplied cattle for the new ranches being opened from New Mexico to the Canadian Border.
Obviously the Comanche and Kiowa did not overlook this opportunity for cattle rustling.
[6]Captain Lewis Johnson, 24th Infantry, related, “That was the year in which I changed stations twice, marching from Fort Stockton all the way to Fort Brown. On my way,—in March, 1872, I think, occurred an attack on a freight-train at Howard’s Well. (Grierson Springs, Reagan County). It was a train from San Antonio, intended for Fort Stockton.” Testimony before House Committee on Military Affairs, 45th Congress, 2nd Session, Washington, D.C., Dec. 4, 1877.
[7]The Salt Creek Massacre took place near the town of Graham.
[8]When, at the Battle of the Little Big Horn in present Montana, June 25, 1876, General George A. Custer and his entire command were massacred by the Sioux Indians, that command was composed of elements of the 7th United States Cavalry. The massacre took place about three years after the 7th marched into Fort Richardson. There is no evidence of Custer having been at Richardson. At this time, he was probably somewhere on the Missouri River.
[9]This action was not a pursuit following a “fresh trail” into Mexico. It was a carefully planned attack on Indian villages in that country, the locations of which had been accurately ascertained beforehand.
Later on, during 1876 and 1877, Lt. John L. Bullis acting under the command of Colonel Shafter, conducted six such raids into Mexico, all on the upper Rio Grande from Laredo to points southwest of the mouth of the Pecos River. Bullis was a very brave and competent soldier and was awarded a sword by the Texas Legislature. Camp Bullis, near San Antonio, was named for him in 1917.
[10]A regiment of cavalry on the Texas frontier after the Civil War could, at maximum strength, muster about 929 men. A company of maximum strength could muster about 90 men.
A regiment of infantry varied in number more than a similar cavalry unit, and was smaller, mustering generally about 460 men, while a company varied from 25 or 30 men, on up to 60 or 65 men.
[11]“A large trade has sprung up in Western Texas in cattle, which are driven up into Kansas to the railroad at or near Fort Dodge. They go up by what is termed the Pan Handle of Texas—. Fort Elliott is established there for the purpose of aiding cattle merchants who buy cattle in Texas and drive them up to the railroad; and thence the cattle are taken to Ohio or Illinois and fed until spring, when they are sent East. The trade amounts to two or three hundred thousand annually.” Statement of General W. T. Sherman, November 21, 1877, before the Committee on Military Affairs, in relation to the Texas Border Troubles, House of Representatives, 45th Congress, 2d Session.
