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Just as a general observation, I would guess anything I am posting here is pretty much History 101 to the Texas history fanatic/reenactor crowd.

A puzzle though that Plum Creek ain't in print better than it is, the way that Rev War and War Between the States battles are.

Back to the fight... with respect to the vegetation, Moore writes...

From the Big Hill near [fifteen miles east] of Gonzales to Plum Creek, this area of Texas was heavily wooded. Beyond Plum Creek there was an open prairie which led towards the hill country area of Austin. The trail of the Indians paralleled the Clear Fork of Plum Creek.

This was at least a thirty-mile long north-south belt of what one presumes was largely post oak and associated brush. For those not familiar, post oak is one a number of species of smallish, heat and drought tolerant oaks.

Browsing around the web, the marker for the Plum Creek fight actually lies inside the town of Lockhart, and it says this....

http://www.forttours.com/pages/hmcaldwell.asp#Plum

The Battle of Plum Creek, August 12, 1840, began on Comanche Flats (5.5 mi. SE) and proceeded to Kelley Springs (2.5 mi. SW), with skirmishes as far as present San Marcos and Kyle.

Relating this to the watershed map...



Hwy 183 runs north-south between Lockhart and Gonzales. That is the route probably taken by Ben McCulloch's group as they hurried to Isham Good's cabin (just above the top red dot on Plum Creek.

Caldwell, as we have seen, inbound from Seguin, would have come in from the southwest, crossing the West and Clear Forks of Plum Creek.

Burleson and his group arrived the morning of the battle, coming down from the northeast.

The Comanches would be coming north on a course east of Hwy 183 and would have been looking to angle northwest towards home.

Moore has it that the fight, once commenced, proceeded up the Clear Fork of Plum Creek. "5.5 miles SE" of the historical marker in Lockhart would put the beginning of the fight near the confluence of the Clear Fork and Plum Creek proper. This would also be a logical crossing point for a Comanche force coming from the south and angling to the northwest.

This is what Moore has to say of the evening before the fight.

Arriving at Isham Good's cabin from Austin at about the same time was Major General Felix Huston, leader of the Texas Militia, with his aide, Major John Izod, and Captain George Howard of the First Regiment. Huston arrived on the evening of August 11 "and found Captain Caldell encamped on Plum Creek with about one hundred men".

The three companies moved two or three miles and made camp for the night on Plum Creek, above the return trail of the Indians.

I'm guessing they stopped on the northeast bank of Plum Creek at the bend, about where Tenney Creek is marked on the map;

McCulloch's party must have crossed the Clear Fork on the way to Plum Creek.

I have been assuming that Caldwell took the most direct route coming up from the southwest and crossed the West and Clear Forks. But if they really had camped that night on the Old San Antonio crossing of the San Marcos on the evening of the 10th, that could possibly put them ten miles due east of Lockhart. Seems odd that they would take such a roundabout path given that they were in a mad hurry. The San Marcos is spring-fed, with a relatively finite inflow from the source even in wet years, I'd hazard a guess it was fordable in a number of places.

In either case, Caldwell's route on the 11th would have taken him right across the expected return route of the Comanches. This might partly explain his slow pace that day, as John Henry Brown noted they had been...

Waiting some hours at noon, watching for the approach of the enemy after night

The perspective of Caldwell's party could have been that by the time they finally made Isham Good's cabin that night they had crossed tbe entire expected route of the Comanches and found no sign, nor is it mentioned they encountered any other Texans that day. Neither would they have crossed McCulloch's trail.

In that light, it is not so surprising that Robert Hall writes of Caldwell's party...

We camped at Isham Good's first, and, not hearing any news, we were about to return home, when Ben McCulloch rode into camp. Goat Jones was with him. They reported that the Indians had plundered the lower country, and were returning on the same trail.

Up until that point they would have had no recent confirmation that the Comanches were indeed coming that way. After all, they had been looking all day and must have been expecting the usual rapid withdrawal on the part of the Comanches. It would have been a reasonable asumption on their part that the Comanches must have passed north somewhere else.

Skipping ahead in the narrative, here's Moore's description of the movement of the Texan force on the morning of the 12th, just before they were joined by Burleson's men...

Huston's hundred-man command moved forward... across one or two ravines and glades.... They entered a small, open space well concealed from the larger prairie by a thicket of trees and bushes along a creek branch

Which would fit the topography south of Tenney Creek.

I'm guessing Kelley Springs, where the Comanches would turn to face the oncoming Texans, may be represented by the blue dot on the southernmost fork of the Clear Fork. Just downstream of that small blue dot there appears to be a pond or wet area indicated. We know that during the battle several Comanches fled across a wet area, miring some of their horses and laden mules.

Wish I would have known this yesterday, turns out I might have practically driven across the site of the heaviest fighting while headed out on FM20 West away from Lockhart.

Birdwatcher

"I don't think that map is totally accurate, but as you can see, the Caprock is clearly in the short-grass region".

All the CRP pastures are required to be planted to NATIVE grasses , and up on the Caprock, they are ALL tall grass.Some are over head high.

But....no big deal.

I live in the Tallgrass Prairie and very close to the Cross Timbers and formerly did live in the Cross Timbers. I've got CRP and have all the grasses you mention in the CRP which was planted around 1999 IIRC. My grass will get over head high in a good year.

I don't know whether they have to be native or not but part of my CRP was specified as being some sort of Fescue. I didn't know of Fescue being native around here so it has always puzzled me.

Curdog, I'm no geologist nor am I a Botanist, but I think "Tallgrass" simply refers to the height of the grass, mainly due to there being much less rainfall out west. The main grasses, Big and Little Bluestem, Indian Grass, Buffalo Grass...are probably the same, just taller here east of...Wichita, where there is more rainfall.

"Goat Jones"? heheh I worked with two guys "named" Goat when I was in Texas working for the KATY. Then there's Goatman's Bridge, up by Denton. It must be a Texas thing.

I would take the view that groups fromm different tribal groups ended up just about everywhere during the upheavals of the Texan period.

Ford mentions that his Caddo and Tonkawan Indian allies possessed an encyclopedic knowledge of Western Texas and Oklahoma. Be hard to get that without going. Likewise Delawares were among the most frequently-hired scouts for West Texas expeditions.

Somewhere recently in print I came across reference to the Seminoles being already present and feared south of the Border in Mexico by the time of the Mexican War. That would be a scant five years after their removal to Oklahoma from Florida.

And then there's the example of Sequoyah, the famous Tennesee Cherokee, late of Oklahoma, dying in Mexico in 1843 while seeking to contact Cherokees living down there.

Jumping ahead to 1861 and moving to Arizona, turns out the first "White" teamsters tirtured and killed by the Chiricahuas in the aftermath of the Bascomb debacle were actually a party of unfortunate Cherokees.

Plus the example of Shawnee scalphuntes in Mexico, one could go on and on....

The Kickapoos? orginally Eastern Woodlands in the Ohio Territory, they show up in East and Central Texas prior to 1840, whupped the Confederates out by San Angelo in 1864, and we know they got as far West as at least the Front Range in Colorado.

Anyhoo... with respect to actual Pawnees in Texas, this from Texas History Online....

When the French were removed from Louisiana in the Treaty of Paris (1763), the Pawnees began suffering attacks from British-armed Sioux and Osage Indians. As a result, several groups of Pawnees migrated south to join their Wichita kin on the Red River. In 1771 approximately 300 northern Pawnees visited the Wichitas on the Red River to trade. Rather than returning home, they merged with the Wichitas and became known as the Asidahesh.

In February 1795 a group of Pawnees, along with Wichitas and Taovayas, visited San Antonio to report injuries that they had received at the hands of Americans and expressed interest in securing friendship with the Spanish.

As to Indians here in the Nineteenth Century, Moore writes...

The Second Congress also made a special effort to study the Indians of Texas, Senator Isaac Burton, former Texas Ranger captain, was now chairman of the senate's standing committee on Indian Affairs. In secret sessions held on October 12, 1837, Burton's committee reviewed intelligence that recognised twenty-seven different bands of Indians living in Texas.

These were...

East Texas

Alabamas
Biloxis
Cherokees
Chickasaws
Coushattas
Delawares
Huawanies
Kickapoos,
Meninominees
Muscogees
Potawatomi
Shawnees

Prairies

Abadaches
Anadarkos
Ayish
Caddos
Comanches
Ionis
Kichais
Nacodoches
Skidi Pawnee
Towash
Tawakoni
Wacos

West Texas

Karankawas
Lipans
Tonkawas

Not sure where the capitol of Texas was in 1837, Washington-on-the-Brazos? So I dunno what they considered "west" vs. "prairie" in 1837.

Note the Meninominees in the mix, IIRC the rest of their kin were up in Wisconsin.

Birdwatcher

The fight unfolding; Robert Hall was likely the first one to make contact, somewhere south or southwest of Plum Creek.

http://www.tamu.edu/faculty/ccbn/dewitt/plumcreek.htm#halldescrip

Capt. Caldwell asked me to take a good man and scout to the front and see if I could see anything of the Indians. I took John Baker, and we rode all night. About daylight we came in sight of the Indians, about seven miles from our camp. We rode back and reported.

Huston reported that his "spies" (ie. scouts) got back "about six o'clock", one presumes they arrived at a gallop. Sunrise on August 12th in this part of the world presently occurs at exactly 7:00am Central Time, I dunno what 1840 time was, but presumably the sun was just getting up when Hall and Baker hurried back, bringing word.

Hall writes...

During my absence Gen. Felix Huston had been elected to the command of the army, and Ed Burleson had joined us with about one hundred men, including some fifteen Tonkaways. Gen. Huston asked me to take five picked men and ride to the front and select a good position to make the attack. I came in sight of them. They were on the prairie, and the column looked to be seven miles long. Here I witnessed a horrible sight. A captain and one man rode in among the Indians. The captain escaped, but I saw the Indians kill the private.


The Comanches were spread out "about seven miles long". As events would demonstrate, when the Texans finally attacked, almost certainly they attacked only a portion of this host, probably the rearguard.

Who the Captain and unfortunate private may have been is explained by Moore....

At about the same time some of General Huston's men noticed another group of Anglo riders being chased by a portion of the Comanche war party.

This would be Captain James Cocke and eighteen men of the Border Guard (one of the short-lived militia units of that year) coming from San Antonio.

Cocke's company had accidentally come across the Indian's advance guard without realizing the strength of the Comanche party.

That being further evidence that the Comanche column was stretched out.

Cocke's company took up position in a small gove of live oaks.. They dismounted and prepared to attack the approaching small group of Comanches. When Cocke's men spotted the main body of Indians appear behind the advance guard, they swiftly mounted their horses and retreated.

In the rush, Gotlip De Wolfe was left behind by both his horse and his company mates. The Comanches quickly overtook De Wolfe and killed him.

And of the remaining Border Guards...

They did not engage the Indians further until they encountered another force which was moving towards the area to intercept the Indians. Colonel Juan Seguin's company of Federalist volunteers.

No word on how many men were in Seguin's company, likely also from San Antonio. Enough at least that both parties together were enough to attack the Comanches.

According to the Austin Sentinel"they joined their force and immediately purused after the Indians."

From what I gather, the men mustering under Huston at that same time did not witness this attack by Seguin and Cooke, neither does Hall mention it. More evidence that the Comanches were spread out.

The Indians soon became aware of the other, larger force of Texans under General Huston. They began to hve minor skirmishes with various members of Huston's collective forces, while the main body of Indians continued to drive their livestock and plunder northwesterly towards their home camps.

One would imagine that the Comanches were moving fairly rapidly at this point, individuals would have been galloping all along the column, spreading the alarm. Others would have been hurrying forward to confront the Texans and clear the way.

Certainly most Comanches would not have actually seen any Texans at that point, or perhaps even been within earshot of gunfire.

Texan accounts do mention that the Comanches were dressed to the nines for this fight, and likely some minor individual delays were occasioned while warriors hurriedly fixed their paint and adornments and perhaps had their best war horses fetched prior to galloping to the fray.

Meanwhile Robert Hall and his five companions were among the "various members of Huston's collective force" who were skirmishing with Comanches. Hall writes...

I ordered my men to keep at a safe distance and pick off an Indian as the opportunity presented. We skirmished with them for about two miles, when our army came up in fine and opened fire.

I haven't come across specific mention, but it would seem that Hall's "two miles" crossed Plum Creek proper and on up the Clear Fork, the main host of Comanches passing across the front of the Texan forces.

Birdwatcher

I wonder what they were armed with. Kentucky/Pennsylvania long rifles and Fowling Pieces? Would they have had Model 1803 US rifles perhaps or 1816's? Would Plains/Hawken rifles have come about yet?

We are in the post oak belt. Sandwiched between the Pine belt, generally east of the Trinity, and the Blackland, generally west of the Brazos. Crosstimbers is futher north west.

So I was told the upland pariries were both little and big bluestem and a lot of "Indian Grass" which I think is switch grass. Same grass the Caddo, and others, used to build their houses.
The Keechi (Kitsi, Quchi, etc) moved into this area after our local bunch, Deadose, all more or less died out from induced desease in the late 1700's.

In the old days I don't think there was a post oak belt. I think the big prairies went much further east than they do today and there was none of this gradual turn from prairies to forest we see today.

You may be right. The prairies though would have been more broken up by the heavy timber, underbush and canebreaks along the increasingly frequent creeks and streams as one would travel eastward. Plus there would be occasionally fairly big brush timber motes established in some of the prairies that had somehow gotten big enough to resist the frequent prairie fires.

Even today every and I do mean every little stream or watercourse has its belt of timber. Some not very wide but a belt anyway. There just are not any naturally open banked streams unless they have been dozed off.

Oh well Back to the fight at Plumb Creek.

Oh well Back to the fight at Plumb Creek."

Can't wait to see how it turns out.

The Cherokee's that you speak of, was it those who were removed from the SE via the "Trail Of Tears" or did they migrate West on their own accord?

Many refused to go on the "Trail Of Tears" and fled to what is now the GSMNP in E. TN. & W. NC.

Those who fled to the mountains, their descendants make up the Eastern Band of the Cherokee's, with a Reservation at Cherokee, NC. on the edge of the GSMNP. If you've never been there, it's worth the trip to see and explore the area.

Best I remember w/o looking it up the Cherokee removal began @1837-38. If that is right then the Texas Cherokee were voluntary at the invitation of Sam Houston because they were well established in east Texas in 1837.
When Lamar got to be president of Texas he instigated a war against them and drove them out into Indian Territory.

I will get it.

It may help me out of my bubble.

Our Cherokees drifted down from Arkansas for the most part.

Texas History online has them reported here by 1807. 6,000 Cherokees living upriver from Little Rock by the 1820's, about three hundred living in East Texas by that time.

See...

http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/bmc51

and especially...

www.arkansaspreservation.com/pdf/.../cherokee_removal.pdfSimilar

That latter one covering the history of the Cherokees in Arkansas.

And finally, for a detailed and fascinating account of Sequoyah's passage through Texas in 1842...

http://www.cherokeediscovery.com/his_sequoyah.html

I would like to think that if ailing at seventy, I too could be left on my own somewhere in the Hill Country for maybe six weeks.

�The company then, consisting of nine persons, immediately set off with the borrowed horse, crossed the river (Rio Bravo) against the ferry,and after constant traveling, on the seventeenth night, camped within a few miles of Sequoyah�s cave. Much solicitude was felt by us, for the safety of the old man,as we saw much �signs� of the wild Indians on our way. three men were accordingly sent on in advance to the Cave, with provisions to relieve his wants, if still alive, and in need.�

But the Cave where they had left the aged Sequoyah was empty and only a note left by him told of his misfortune of being driven from the Cave by rising waters. Happily, they followed his trail to find the old man �seated by a lonely fire.� Having been driven from his shelter by the waters, he determined to continue on towards Mexico on his own, but met with a band of Delaware Indians who urged him to return with them. �Come, let us now return to our own villages. We will take you to your door,� they urged. �No,� he replied, �I have sent forward two young men to the Mexican country, whom I shortly expect back. I am anxious to visit that country. Go with me there. We will shortly return to our own country.� But no deal was struck, and the Delawares left Sequoyah with a horse and returned to their own country.


And I will say that the whole tenor of this account differs from that of many, whoever these guys were, it seems like they were able to do that whole trip without shooting at anybody. One imagines that them and Smithwick might have got along just fine.

Birdwatcher

Rio Bravo generally means the Rio Grande.Are they referring to the Red by that name?

Historical Texas river names is a very confusing mess!!!!! Especially when you try to differentiate between the Spanish, French ,and later Anglo names.

Good example is the Present names for the Rio Brazos de Dios and Rio Colorado. These two rivers the Brazos and the Colorado names were switched on a later map, by mistake, and the names stuck ever since!!!!

Spanish coundn't decide on what they wanted to call a river either. Original name for the Rio San Gabriel was the San Xavier!

French called the present Colorado the Rivere Maligne.

Additional trivial stuff of interest.

I also suggest the official Mexican report on the influx of eastern Natives composed by Jean Louis Berlandier in 1835.

Another interesting note is a Mexican Colonel Mier e Teran, who recorded the Bedia as being the first tribe to be inoculated for smallpox in the 1830's!

Recommend the book by Bob Weddle on the San Saba Mission and Presidio. Speaks of the punitive expedition against the "Nortenos" in 1758 on the Red River. Nortenos = Witchitas, Taovayas, Caddoan groups, and the relative new kids on the block, the Comanches. Spanish got thier butts kicked.

While you are at it, look up the Villasur massacre of 1721 in Nebraska. Spanish from Santa Fe wiped out by Otoes and Pawnees!

"Arms of God" describes the Brazos better than it does the Colorado , don't you think?

Absolutely. And the present Colorado was always clear water! The Brazos has always been,,,, well,,,, "colorado!"......