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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