Reading thru Hermann Lehmanns book (titled above) seeking out the usual historical tidbits. Ruffcutt and I were had just glanced upon the tortures and treatment of captives/prisoner.
Ran across a comment by Lehmann. He at the time was with a band of Apaches as they are the ones who first captured him. Their band was visited by a band of Comanches that had a white captive with them. About his age. Another child of German settlers to Texas name of Adolph Korn. He said they conversed in German so neither of their captors could understand them.
(While with the Apaches he mentions the on again and off again stints on one of the New Mexico reservations. And how he had to be hidden in the woods when the soldier came thru on an inspection.)
This encounter with Korn would have been circa 1870-71ish. So I took this to mean that by this time these two bands had learned enough English to be dangerous to them. I found that interesting.
Lehmann does describe that he witnessed the execution of white children captives who would not settle down and be quiet on the trail. Not pretty.
While on the subject of captives. Have also read the story of the Smith boys captured in Comal county. A good read but I certainly feel a bit more artistic license was used in this narrative. I also highly recommend Wilbargers monumental work “Indian Depredations in Texas”. While a bit dated now, it contains a weath of primary document gathered thru the interviews of surviving participants. As does Deshield’s The Border Wars of Texas"
The cave where he lived in Mason County I got to see a while back. Pretty cool stuff...
Mason is an awesome county!!! I love the place as well as Menard county.
Our old TxDOT maintenance supvr. in Mason, Wibby Shearer had all kinds of stuff he had dug up being raised there. He had oodles of neat stuff he dug up at old Fort Mason. He’s long passed now and best I know the historical society there now has his collection. They have a nice museum on the square.
