Back to Nelson Lee. Did he even ride with Hayes and the Rangers?
Nobody knows how much of his book was pure invention. Walter Prescott Webb, a renowned Texas historian wrote a foreward of one edition of Lee's book saying how well it described Ranger life.
Which would seem to indicate that Webb knew startlingly little about Indians, indeed his seminal work "
The Texas Rangers: A Century of Frontier Defense" (1936) is light on specifics in that regard. Webb devotes 23 pages to a chapter on Hays, but devotes most it to the time the Rangers spent fighting Anglo and Mexican thieves and brigands.
If you had to reccomend a book or two about Jack Hayes or the Rangers, what might it be?
I dunno that there IS a good book about Hays, the problem being so few records were kept as to the specifics of Ranger activities prior to the Mexican War, such that all we get are collections of anecdotes from the five years or so Hays rangered out of San Antonio.
These are all Texas classics, already mentioned here and worth a look...
The Texas Rangers Walter Prescott Webb 1936
Comanches: The Destruction of a People T.R. Fehrenbach 1973
Empire of the Summer Moon Gwynne 2010 (???)
..there's more mentioned on this thread, I just ain't read 'em. The latest and greatest Ranger book though is prob'ly one Steve NO clued me on to...
The Texas Rangers: Wearing the Cinco Peso Mike Cox 2008.
All contemporary sources, both Indian and White, testify to the remarkable abilities of John Coffee Hays. Cox does devote 20 plus pages to him, but is likwise reduced to anecdotes, best summed up by the following quote, pertaining to 1844, two months before Hays rode out after Yellow Wolf...
Though not yet at full strength, Hay's company rode that March in pursuit of cattle thieves. The rustlers had driven off nearly two thousand head of cattle and were believed to be headed north towards the Colorado River. If Hays caught up with the cattle thieves, the result did not make the public print.(One wonders how one sneaks 2,000 cattle anywhere without leaving a trail plain as day, likewise one wonder how such thieves could hope to outrun any sort of pursuit.)
Given the anecdotal history of Hays from even the best sources, this account on
http://www.theoutlaws.com/heroes2.htm is prob'ly as good as any.
Here's a quote from that last link that interests me, concerning the ubiquitous Delawares again, practically the phantoms of Texas history, they show up all over the place.
The time that Hays went hunting with seventeen Delaware friends to the Pecos River, he learned what it meant to live like the Comanche.
The eighteen friends traveled on foot, leaving their horses at home, hoping this maneuver would eliminate any temptation to the Comanche, who took every opportunity to steal horses. Reaching the river, they split into pairs for their hunt, but one member of the party stumbled into camp and said his partner had been killed by a passing band of more than 100 Comanche.
The Delaware and Comanche were bitter enemies, and a vote was quickly taken to overtake the Comanche before they could cross the Rio Grande, since both Jack and the Delaware were obligated to remain on the Texas side of the river. They took to the trail with the Delaware in a never-tiring trot from which Hays wearied at the end of the first few miles.
The Delaware and Hays ran for two days and nights, making only brief stops for food, drink, and rest, while the everlasting pounding of feet set Jack to wondering how much longer he could endure. Finally, he surpassed the point of no return, and his screaming muscles and depleted lung power somehow remembered his days at Davidson Academy in Nashville. He had run further than he had ever run before, but he had kept up.
At dawn on the third day, they attacked, surprising the Comanche, who ran frantically to the river to escape. It was a victory for the Delaware and Jack, who fought hand-to-hand with only a knife and tomahawk. An extraordinary feat by anyone's standards: Eighteen guys carrying rifles and the equipment for the same run down 100 mounted Comanche raiders ON FOOT and put 'em to rout. Tho' nary a revolver in the bunch. Oughtta be a Texas legend, but it aint.
Birdwatcher
