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"The actual "San Antonio Road" as you mentioned were a series of routes that were totally dependent on the time of year they could be traveled. Weather conditions played in importantly. Remember the Spanish exploration and on into the 19th century was during a 500 year phenomenon known as as "The Little Ice Age", which many believe ended in the 1850's. Below San Antonio de Bejar, there have been identified three specific routes."

Sure I know that and so do you. Most folks think of a superhighway through the wilderness though.

As you say it was an area to travel through-- got this way when it is wet, that way when it is dry- another way in spring. Where is the most reliable water etc etc.

St Denis is one interesting dude.

St. Denis, and his son-in-law Athanase de Mezieres where both extremely interesting dudes!!!!!! One of the best lessons the Spanish learned after the Treaty of Paris 1763, was to let the French in their newly acquired domain deal with "Les Sauvages" on their behalf.

The Spanish always attempted to strong armed the Indians into submission at a great cost. The French , on the other hand, generally took the method of intergration with Indians to achieve the same goals. The French were infatuated with the Indians. Many went "native" in those days!

M�ZI�RES, ATHANASE DE (1719�1779). Athanase de M�zi�res y Clugny, the son of Louis Christophe de M�zi�res and Marie Antoinette Clugny, was born to nobility in Paris and was baptized on March 26, 1719. His career as an infantryman in Louisiana began in the early 1730s. Over the next thirty years he served as ensign, lieutenant, and captain. In the 1740s he was assigned to the French outpost at Natchitoches, where in 1746 he married Marie Petronille Feliciane de St. Denis, the daughter of Louis Juchereau and Manuela S�nchez Navarro de St. Denis.qqv This brief marriage ended when Marie died in childbirth in 1747, and M�zi�res later married Pelagie Fazende. On September 15, 1763, shortly after Louisiana had passed from French to Spanish control, he was discharged from the infantry. Like many Frenchmen in Louisiana, he offered his services to Spain, and in late 1769 Alejandro O'Reilly appointed him as lieutenant governor of Natchitoches. M�zi�res, skilled in Latin, French, and Spanish as well as in several Indian languages, embarked on an extraordinary career as Spanish agent to the Indians of northern Texas. In 1770 he carried out the first of several expeditions to the Red River, and in the following year he successfully negotiated treaties with the Kichais, Tawakonis, and Taovayas, and by their proxy, with the Tonkawas. In 1778 Bernardo de G�lvez, governor of Louisiana, released M�zi�res for additional services in Texas, where he was to forge an alliance among the Spanish, Comanches, and Norte�os against the Apaches. To this end M�zi�res traveled extensively over the course of a year-to the new town of Bucareli, to the Red River, and even to New Orleans. En route between Los Adaes and Nacogdoches, he suffered a serious head injury when thrown from his horse. After convalescence, he continued on to San Antonio, where he arrived in September 1779. In the capital he learned of his appointment as governor of Texas. But M�zi�res, some sixty years of age, remained gravely ill and did not assume office. He had one child by his first wife and eight by his second. He died at San Antonio on November 2, 1779, having never fully recovered from being unhorsed, and the proposed general alliance with the Comanches and Norte�os was never realized.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: Herbert Eugene Bolton, ed. and trans., Athanase de M�zi�res and the Louisiana-Texas Frontier, 1768�1780 (2 vols., Cleveland: Arthur H. Clark, 1914). Donald E. Chipman, Spanish Texas, 1519�1821 (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1992).

"He died at San Antonio on November 2, 1779, having never fully recovered from being unhorsed, and the proposed general alliance with the Comanches and Norte�os was never realized."

I cannot help but think that this "alliance" was to keep the Brits out of the area. The Spanish had been scared schidtless of the English worming their way into their territory since the 1740's. Hench their support of the American Revolution. Oh yeah, BTW,,,, George Rogers Clark's men were well outfitted by the Spanish from supplies at St. Luis (That's St. Louis Missouri) when they went up against the Brit garrisons at Kaskaskia and Vincennes......

I taught history a good number of years in local Texas high schools and really concentrated alot on the Alamo and different empressarios.The most enlightening thing in all my years was the talk surrounding the Pena diaries.I was flabergasted to think that a Mexican officer might have been keeping a log of activities in and around the San Antonio area at that time.I never could get my head wrapped around the fact that it had snowed the winter of 1835 in Mexico and I was under the assumption it was not a just a little dusting but major snow storms.The logistics must have been a nightmare and add to that...that many Mexican family members traveled w/the army of Santa Anna.I am anxious now to get some of these books to add to my small lot of knowledge about the early days of the Texas frontier. powdr

Fascinating info

Reinforcing the notion that "unexplored winderness" or whatever was mostly an American conceit (not trying to be negative here, just the way it was).

Anyhow... the Comanches believed whupped at Plum Creek in August of 1840. Flush with notions of victory, an expedition of about 180 men under Major George Howard set out from San Antonio about October 1, eaded West, looking to carry the war to the Comanches.

On irritating commonality among Texas history books is the use of terms like "headwaters of the Nueces" as if the average reader had a clue where that was. Anyhow, a whole ten days later Howard's force was just 100 miles Northwest, having found no Indians, said expedition by that time "on the headwaters of the Nueces"


From the "picture worth a 1,000 words" dept.... here's an actual map of the Nueces...




Uvalde lies 70 miles down modern Hwy 90 from San Antonio.

It may be significant that Moore makes no mention of Howard bringing any Indian Scouts. Howard and his 180 men, including such notables as Matthew Caldwell and, as it turned out, Ben McCulloch, would spend six weeks traversing a route that in places crosses the most scenic of our Texas Hill Country, scoring what amounted at best to an incomplete victory against the Comanche band they encountered.

About the 11th Howard's "spies" (scouts) locating the trail of a large Comanche camp headed southwest in the direction of modern Fort Clark/Brackettville at the headwaters of Las Moras Creek (I believe the westernmost faint blue line on the above map). Las Moras Springs/Brackettville/Fort Clark being about thirty miles west of Uvalde along that same Hwy 90.

Howard wrote...

Upon reaching the headwaters of the Nueces, the spies reported fresh sign and it was evident we were in the vicinity of a considerable encampment of Indians.

Perhaps on the advice of the likes of Caldwell and McCulloch, Howard divested the column of most of its supplies and attempted to steal a march on the Indians, however the trail was lost in the dark and the column halted until morning.

The men were halted, ready to move on at any moment. The guides however could not dicover the trail during the night. At daybreak (of October 13), it was found on our right, and I dispatched Captain Caldwell, Mr. McCulloch and a Mexican to examine it. They soon returned and reported to have seen Indians, and that we were discovered.

A mad ten-mile rush ensued, the Comanches scattering from their camp in advance of the Texans such that only about four were caught and killed, including a young woman apparently killed in cold blood after being captured and bound. The Comanches were however forced to abandon most all of their possessions, including many horses, their tipis and their winter food supplies. Interestingly, Howard mentions capturing "several Indian rifles". Also, no mention of items identifiable as coming from the Great Raid in this particular camp.

For the most part, their horses played out, pursuit ended at the camp, some of the party chasing the Comanches for another five miles but being unable to come up with them.

Would the victory have been more complete if Howard had used Indian scouts? Hard to say, but a person who had grown up on the Plains in tune with the "moccasin telegraph" might have known better where to look, might have better been able to conceal Howard's force on approach, and might possibly have been better able to follow such a large trail in the dark.

Relatively bloodless as it was, the sacking of the camp must have served notice of a sort through Comancheria. Comanche camps had been attacked by parties of that size before, even well inside Comancheria, but this time it was Texans doing it.

Over the next four weeks Howard's force drifted northeast to the "head of the Frio River" (one of the blue lines just east of Barksdale on the map) and from there to the "head of the Guadalupe". At which point a second map becomes appropriate. Here's the Guadalupe...



Note that Jack Hays would fight major engagements with Yellow Wolf's Comanches on the squiggly part of the Guadalupe north of San Antonio in 1841 and again in 1844.

Finding no Indian sign, Howard headed north, essentially jumping watersheds...

From the Guadalupe I proceeded to the head of the Llano, and despatched a party to the San Saba, under Captain Cunnigham.

This next map is actually of the Colorado, however the San Saba, Llano and Pedernales (Flint) Rivers are all tributaries of that stream, the San Saba flowing past modern Brady, TX.

The Llano is the next river down, the Pedernales the one below that.



Absolutely spectacular as the scenery in that unspoiled era must have been, it was likely a dreary march. Seeking to impose a sort of "radio silence", Howard permitted no hunting, indicating that he did indeed expect to come upon Indians at any minute. Nine men separated from the main column and shot a deer, and the camp of these men was attacked that same night. Whether it was the shot that had precipitated the attack is debatable, surely a force the size of Howard's would have been shadowed by that time, especially after the the events of October 13th at Las Moras Springs.

On November 5th, a detachment of Howard's force surprised and attacked a travelling party of twenty Indians, presumed to be Comanches, but after a prolonged pursuit succeeded only in capturing some jettisoned baggage. The following day Captain Cunningham and his thirty men returned from their unventful scout of the San Saba, the whole party returning to San Antonio via the Pedernales.

One thing of note was their discovery of the fresh trail of a large party riding shod horses, heading northwest, deeper into Comancheria. This they correctly assumed was the trail of a second major expedition led by Col John Henry Moore.

So, a relatively uneventful expedition tying up the services of 180 men for six weeks. The Indians were probably right about one thing though; most often on such expeditions, once desirable country had been explored by White men, members of the party remembered it and later came back to settle. If it hadn't been before, that particular slice of Comancheria was now familiar ground.

Birdwatcher

mike when i was a kid i swam in the pool where the Nueces springs from the ground.

"I taught history a good number of years in local Texas high schools................ ."

Texas History was taught in the seventh grade when I went to school and was most everybody's favorite class.It was taught by J.D. Burke who was also the football coach.

He instilled a hankerin' for local history in a whole generation of Young County's young'uns.He was about the only teacher I had that was worth a damn.

Thanks for all the work you're puting into this Birdy. I am enjoying the heck out of it. You are right that once a scouting party of settlers located a favorable area the "land stealers" would not be far behind. Indians hated that.

Now 'scuse me a minute while I holler at kaywoodie


"The Spanish always attempted to strong armed the Indians into submission at a great cost. The French , on the other hand, generally took the method of intergration with Indians to achieve the same goals. The French were infatuated with the Indians. Many went "native" in those days!"


I have an old manuscript of the story of the first white settlers in this area, Leon Prarie, of Robertson's colony. Manuscript was written by a decendent in the 1900's. Their child was supposedly the first white child born in what was to become Leon County. They came from Nacodoches in 1831.

There is a one line entry that says when they arrived "there was a frenchman and his indian squar [sic] who were living in a dugout and catching mustangs with dogs"

That is all she wrote. I should imagine he wasn't the only "frenchman" out in the blue unknown.

members of the party remembered it and later came back to settle. If it hadn't been before, that particular slice of Comancheria was now familiar ground."

I was surprised to find traces of old water wells dug right smack in the middle of what have been dry draws as long as I can remember.This practice allowed the earliest settlers to avoid settling right on the Rivers,which would have made them a lot more visible to a greater number of Indians.

These shallow,hand dug wells would supply plenty of water for one family year round.

Birdy, thanks for posting those maps.

I have been reading a couple of primary source books lately, the first being James Gillett's "Six Years With the Texas Rangers". Gillett, like many other first-person historians of the period, describes his travels by geographic landmarks, primarily rivers, watersheds, and heights of land. After pulling my hair out trying to find these locations on standard maps (which are great for highway driving, but suck topographically speaking) I ordered this relief map:

http://www.texasmapstore.com/Texas_Raised_Relief_map_p/topo005.htm

It ain't here yet, but when it comes I'm hanging it on the wall above my desk for easy reference.

One passage in Gillett has me particularly intrigued. He describes a "scout" involving about 30 Rangers out of San Antonio along the El Paso road (El Camino Real), out to Fort Lancaster, then north into the table-land between the headwaters of the South Concho and the Pecos watershed; during said scout their mounts nearly expired from lack of water. They went nearly 48 hours without water, which is a LONG time for horses to go without H2O.

As it happens, my wife and I went for a drive last Monday, headed west across the trans-Pecos just to see what's what, and drove through that very area. (We live very close to the headwaters of what he calls the "South Concho" River.) The drive down the Pecos valley is hauntingly beautiful. By chance we took the side road south of I-10 and stumbled upon the stretch where it overruns the El Paso-San Antonio road across the Pecos to Fort Lancaster. The view from the top of the road east of the Fort at sunset was breathtaking beyond belief. We're planning to return there in a few weeks, I'll make sure I get some photos to post here.

Anyways, look up that map. It might be useful to you.

Doc, I have good friends that own the property where Ft. Lancaster is located, there on Live Oak creek. Mendoza stayed in the same oak mott on the west side of the creek, in the 1660's on his way to the Concho!

BN

kaywoodie, that place is THICK with history. You can practically smell it! I was sitting up in the car seat like a damn bird-dog when we descended the hill to the river crossing, even before I knew where we were. That ground has been important since long before the Spaniards established the King's Road.

Yeah, like the paleo projectile point I found on the place turkey hunting one year. Right behind the fort on the pvt. land. We've found lots of spent and loaded Spencer ctgs in one location from the 1870's. As well as minie's, buttons, buckles, etc.... from when the place was active.

April before last we filmed an edition of "Veteran Outdoors" there.

I want to thank you guys--please keep it up. I have never been within 500 miles of Texas but I find this stuff and the links facinating.

On my little Rez I'm considered the resident historion simply because I like reading the old HBC archives. You guys make me feel like the rank amature I really am.

I promised something on the Talon siblings. A very interesting story of adventure, hardship, and almost unbelieveable coincidences!

TALON CHILDREN. Lucien and Isabelle (Planteau) Talon, who joined the La Salle expedition in 1684, brought six small children to the Texas shore, where they experienced the wilderness and its natives as few Europeans ever did. Among the Talon children were the only survivors of the Fort St. Louis massacre, save one, and another who was in Ren� Robert Cavelier, sieur de La Salle's company in eastern Texas when he was slain. Not only were they to shed light on the riddle of La Salle's colony but also to provide lucid accounts of life among the Texas Indians. Some of the Talons were to involve themselves in historical events of Texas and the South at least until 1715. Lucien Talon was a native of the bishopric of Beauvais, in Normandy. He and Isabelle Planteau, of St. M�ry Parish in Paris, are believed to have married in Quebec, where two sons and two daughters were born: Marie-Elizabeth on September 10, 1672; Marie-Madeleine on November 3, 1673; Pierre on March 20, 1676; and Jean-Baptiste on May 26, 1679. The third son, Lucien, may have been born before the family left Canada for France, where they arrived about the time La Salle began organizing his expedition to the Gulf of Mexico. When the family joined the expedition, Madame Talon was again pregnant; a fourth son, Robert, was born during the voyage. Lucien Talon, p�re, was a carpenter by trade but seems to have joined the expedition as a soldier. He is said to have been "lost in the woods" before October 1685. The elder daughter, Marie-Elizabeth, contracted a fatal illness, probably in the winter of 1686. When La Salle left the settlement the last time, in January 1687, to seek his post on the Illinois River, he took the oldest son, Pierre, not quite eleven. He intended leaving the lad, and possibly a few others, among the Hasinai (Tejas) Indians of eastern Texas to learn the language. Thus, he might form a link between these friendly natives and the twenty-odd men and women left in the colony on Lavaca Bay. Whatever the plan, it was diverted by tragedy in both the group with La Salle and the one remaining in the settlement. Alonso De Le�n, after returning to Coahuila with Jacques Grollet and Jean L'Archev�queqqv in 1689, gathered up four of the Talon children on his 1690 entrada. He first found Pierre, who with Pierre Meunier had been living among the Hasinais, then took Marie-Madeleine, Lucien, and Robert from the Karankawas on the Gulf Coast. All bore Indian tattoos on their faces and parts of their bodies; the two younger boys had forgotten their native language. Jean-Baptiste Talon and another youth, Eustache Br�man, were rescued from among the Karankawas by the expedition of Domingo Ter�n de los R�os in 1691.

Taken to Mexico City, the five Talon children were placed as servants in the household of the viceroy, Gaspar de la Cerda Sandoval Silva y Mendoza, Conde de Galve. Shortly before the ailing count ended his term and returned to Spain (early in 1696), the three older boys were sent to Veracruz to be enrolled as soldiers in the Armada de Barlovento, then commanded by Andr�s de Pez y Malz�rraga. Pierre was about nineteen at the time, Jean-Baptiste sixteen, and Lucien probably fourteen. They were assigned to Santo Cristo de Maracaibo, the flagship of Admiral Guillermo Morfi. Marie-Madeleine and Robert went to Spain with the retiring viceroy and the countess. About a year later Santo Cristo was captured by a French vessel in the Caribbean Sea. The Talon brothers, less than cooperative in their initial interrogation by French officers, asked to be sent to Spain. They were taken instead to France, where Pierre and Jean were enrolled in naval service. Lucien, being considered too young for French military service, was employed as a servant at Ol�ron. The marine minister, Louis Pontchartrain, heard of the repatriates about a year later. He ordered their immediate interrogation in the hope that they would provide information useful to Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville, who was outfitting a new voyage to the Gulf of Mexico. With French officials still confused as to the location of La Salle's colony, the Talons held the distinction of having traveled from the settlement to Mexico City.

The interrogation indeed proved useful, for it revealed that they remembered much of the Indian languages: Jean-Baptiste of the Karankawas, Pierre of the Hasinais. Jean-Baptiste gave the only eye-witness account of the Fort St. Louis massacre, where he and his sister and two small brothers had seen their mother slain. Having lived as an Indian, he gave an account of the Karankawa existence that has long been of interest to anthropologists. Pierre did the same for the Hasinais, and recounted events surrounding La Salle's death�a version somewhat different, if doubtful, from that of Henri Joutel. Although Pontchartrain failed in his effort to get the two lads on the first Iberville voyage to Louisiana, they did join the second�as soldiers in the company of Louis Juchereau de St. Denis. They remained in the colony two years, serving at "Fort Biloxi" (Fort Maurepas). But the record is silent on any part they had in explorations by St. Denis and Jean-Baptiste de Bienville up the Red River. The Talon brothers, undoubtedly, were the two soldiers sent home with Iberville in April 1702 on Pontchartrain's special order, that they might "look for their woman"�their sister, who had gone from Mexico to Spain with the Condessa de Galve in 1696. Marie-Madeleine, apparently, had not remained long in Spain but had failed to make contact with her brothers upon her return to France. She married Pierre Simon of Paris in 1699.

Two years later, Pierre and Jean-Baptiste were in a Portuguese prison. Neither the reason for their incarceration nor its duration are known. No more is heard, directly, of Jean-Baptiste. Pierre reappears a decade later on the banks of the Rio Grande with his brother Robert and his old captain, St. Denis. He at last had been called upon to retrace the road linking French territory with New Spain. It was Pierre, still wearing his Indian tattoos, who guided St. Denis through Hasinai country and interpreted for him among both Indians and, after his arrival at San Juan Bautista, Spaniards. The two brothers slipped back across the Rio Grande, while St. Denis was borne off to Mexico City, and returned to Mobile. They carried their captain's brief written message to the French governor Cadillac, which they would supplement orally. Having fulfilled this historic role, the Talons fade into obscurity. One source records that Jean-Baptiste remained in Louisiana and that Pierre died in France. Robert settled in Mobile, where he married Jeanne Prot (or Praux) and fathered children born in 1719 and 1721. Nothing is heard of Lucien, fils, after he went to Ol�ron in 1698. Marie-Madeleine is said to have returned to her native Canada, where her son, named Pierre like his father, married at Charlesbourg in 1719.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: Pierre Margry, ed., D�couvertes et �tablissements des Fran�ais dans l'ouest et dans le sud de l'Am�rique septentrionale, 1614�1754 (6 vols., Paris: Jouast, 1876�86). Cyprien Tanguay, Dictionnaire g�n�alogique des familles canadiennes depuis la fondation de la colonie jusqu'a nos jours (Montreal: E. Senecal, 1871). Robert S. Weddle et al., eds., La Salle, the Mississippi, and the Gulf: Three Primary Documents (College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 1987).

Jean L'Archev�que

Remember that name!!!!!!! He was one of the individuals who allegedly assassinated La Salle! His fate is most interesting as well....

L'ARCHEV�QUE, JEAN (1672�1720). Jean L'Archev�que, explorer, soldier, and trader, was born on September 30, 1672, at Bayonne, France, the son of Claude and Marie (d'Armagnac) L'Archev�que. In 1684, at the age of twelve, he joined the expedition of Ren� Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle, and accompanied him on his expedition to reach the Mississippi. They landed instead at Matagorda Bay on the Texas coast on February 20, 1685. A member of the group that assassinated La Salle, L'Archev�que was one of six members of the expedition that stayed with the Hasinai Indians. In 1689 he and Jacques Grollet were the only two who agreed to meet and be rescued by Alonso De Le�n. Taken first to Mexico City and then to Spain, they were imprisoned for thirty months and then allowed to return to America upon swearing to serve the Spanish King. On June 22, 1694, L'Archev�que arrived in Santa Fe, New Mexico, with a group of colonists from Mexico City. In 1697 he married a widow, Antonia Guti�rrez, and they had one son and a daughter, Mar�a. Antonia died, probably in 1701. In 1701 L'Archev�que purchased a landed estate in Santa Fe, but continued as a soldier. He was a scout with Juan de Ulibarri in 1704 and in 1714 a member of a junta. On August 16, 1719, the governor attended the wedding of "Captain Juan de Archibeque" to Do�a Manuela Roybal, the daughter of alcalde Ignacio de Roybal. L'Archev�que had retired from the military and become a successful trader, with operations as far south as Sonora; his business required occasional trips to Mexico City. He was assisted by Miguel (his son with Antonia), and Agust�n (an illegitimate son). A third son was born in 1719 to a servant girl before his marriage. On June 17, 1720, L'Archev�que joined the military force of Don Pedro de Villasur on an expedition against the Pawnees led by Don Antonio Valverde de Cosio. The Pawnees reportedly were led by a Frenchman, and L'Archev�que was to act as an envoy with the Pawnees by interpreting letters from the Frenchman. On August 20, 1720, the Pawnees suddenly attacked, catching the Spanish unprepared; most were killed, including L'Archev�que. He was left unburied on the banks of an unknown river. His estate was valued at 6,118 pesos.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: Adolph F. Bandelier, The Gilded Man (El Dorado) and Other Pictures of the Spanish Occupancy of America (New York: Appleton, 1893; reprod., Chicago: Rio Grande Press, 1962). R. C. Clark, "The Beginnings of Texas," Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association 5 (January 1902). William Edward Dunn, "The Spanish Search for La Salle's Colony on the Bay of Esp�ritu Santo, 1685�1689," Southwestern Historical Quarterly 19 (April 1916). Jos� M. Espinosa, Crusaders of the Rio Grande: The Story of Don Diego de Vargas and the Reconquest and Refounding of New Mexico (Chicago: Institute of Jesuit History, 1942). Vertical Files, Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, University of Texas at Austin. Robert S. Weddle, "La Salle's Survivors," Southwestern Historical Quarterly 75 (April 1972). Clarence R. Wharton, L'Archeveque (Houston: Anson Jones Press, 1941).

My own words,

A series of Indian rawhide painting have surfaced in of all places Switzerland. They arrived there thru a Swiss Jesuit Priest who's congregation was in Arizona back in the middle of te 18th century. They depict the massacre of the Villasur party. When the Spanish kicked the Jesuits out of New Spain he returned to Switzerland. It is not known how he ended up with the paintings.

This massacre is now thought to have occured in present day Nebraska.

BN

Verrry Interesting especially to me. I am in the middle of all this stomping around. Navasota is the legendary site of LaSalle's death and is about 40 miles sw of me. Bucarelli and Trinidad sites are @15 miles se of me and as I have said I am almost on the "official" San Antonio road.

Back in the late '50 a small cannon barrel was discovered on a place not to far north east of me near the Trinity river. Oklahoma Univ where it was sent said it was cast in Sevile Spain in 1620. How in the hell did it get to Leon County? Did some expedition lose a cannon?

The barrel turned up when a ranch road was being buldozed and it was burried about three feet under the surface. I have no idea where it is now.

Check with 'oops.

Prolly just fell out of the pocket of one of them cast iron suits the conquistadores wore.

Pardon my cynicism, but you just got here, try that drive again in August

Heck, folks deserved medals back then for just getting to places like that on foot, horseback and in wagons. In summer the heat must have been excrutiating by our modern standards, and the water both warm and foul.

And reeked? I suspect the term "reeked" just scratched the surface. Way-old sweat, long-term unwashed bodies and clothing (wool) mixed with the odor of old horse sweat.

I mean, it might even have been as smelly as riding public transportation was in England back the the sixties....

Thanks for the map suggestion.

Just a brief return to the narrative to keep it rolling along, and I'll say again, if not for the writings of Moore ("Savage Frontier") we'd have lost the trail entire by this point.

Turns out there was another Moore, apparently unrelated to the writer (tho said writer is of Old Texas stock and does number a Ranger Captain among his antecedents).

John Henry Moore. Ran to Texas as far back as 1818 to avoid studying Latin (hey, I can relate )

http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fmo30

If nothing else, the guy deserves fame for designing the "Come and Take It" flag.

Moore was the leader of the 1839 San Saba expedition against the Comanches, said expedition villified as a colossal failure in the "revolvers-changed-everything" sort of popular histories.

Actually Moore did everything right, advancing in the middle of winter behind a screen of Lipan Apaches. Surprise was complete. Smithwick was along on that expedition and wrote several memorable passages about it.

http://www.lsjunction.com/olbooks/smithwic/otd16.htm

Moore lost his horses, and everyone had to walk back, but most everyone DID make it back, if skinnier and a tad worse for wear.

The next year Moore narrowly missed Plum Creek, arriving from LaGrange at that place the same day as the fight, after it was over. In fact Moore almost didn't go out again after Comanches that fall, but decided to go at the last minute.

An extraordinary expedition, flawlessly executed, far up the Colorado on past the San Saba, maybe against the very same Comanches as 1839, this time securely encamped in the very heart of Comancheria.

Much has been made of the bad blood between Moore and the Lipan Chief Castro following the 1839 San Saba fight. If bad blood there was, it was forgotten entire by 1840.

The memory of popular history is selective: Everyone remembers Wounded Knee, nobody recalls eight times that number of settlers dead at the hands of the Santee Sioux two decades earlier. The Washita and Custer are notorious, yet probably ten times that many Blackfeet dead in the Marias River massacre in Montana just two years later.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marias_Massacre

Nearly two hundred Comanche dead after Moore succeeded in surprising them in 1840, a figure even exceeding Sand Creek. Possibly the heaviest loss of Comanche lives ever in any single recorded action, and just to erase his earlier embarassment Moore came back to Austin driving FIVE HUNDRED Comanche horses. As complete a victory as one could possibly ask for.

Hardly anyone remembers today.

Maybe one or two revolvers among Moore and his men, the rest single-shot muzzleloaders, presumably a LOT of flintlocks in the mix, rifles again doing most of the execution.

Gotta run, more later.

Birdwatcher