Remove him and that band believes his "medicine" has failed and the fight is over.
Well, Feherenbach ("Comanches: The Destruction of a People") sure puts heavy store in the failed medicine argument. We know that Comanches sought power of a supernatural sort to help them out and better assure success. A process still commonly followed among Mexican narcotrafficantes for one up to the present, "Santa (Santo??) Muerte" immediately coming to mind.
And then there's the "bulletproof" thing disproved at Adobe Walls. But them same Indians at Adobe Walls didn't just turn around and go home immediately but rather lingered until it became obvious that getting them handful of buffalo hunters would cost much more than it was worth, these very same Indians then fanning out to wreak other havoc elsewhere.
Perhaps "medicine" was viewed in the same context that we might view a bulletproof vest; reassuring to have and disappointing to tragic when it failed, but not necessarily a game-breaker.
Another factor to consider in those "failed medicine" situations is that very often, the members of a war party had been lifelong friends or at least acquaintances, having been classmates since Comanche elementary school or whatever, heck, many of the older guys had been their teachers.
Lose someone like THAT and it must have been like losing a family member, right in front of you. Might be hard to call the raid in question where such personal losses happened a success no matter how many scalps and horses were collected. I suspect the reality often was grief now, revenge later. Indeed, very real personal sorrow might account for those "mournful howls" commonly reported in Comanche warfare.
A personal sense of profound loss too would account for the great lengths and risks Comanches took to retrieve the bodies of their fallen companions.
All this of course JMHO,
Birdwatcher
