Seven months ago on this thread I wrote....
"Anyways....
Now we come to the legend.... John Coffee Hayes hisself...", and then got sidetracked into Indians and such.
Well part of the reason is prob'ly on account of so few actual specifics of the earlier life and exploits of the man himself are known, even Wiki, which is often a trove of historical information at least, being notably vague on the topic.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Coffee_HaysWhat we do know for sure is that he was born in Tennessee in the year of 1817, to a very-well connected family, Andy Jackson being his uncle.
Sources differ, but he apparently came to Texas in 1836, at the age of 19, with at least some surveying skills. Much is unsaid as to precisely WHY he came to Texas. The ordinary reasons one supposes, adventure and opportunity, but carried to a degree extraordinary in Hays' case.
We may suppose he looked up that other Jackson protege, Sam Houston, upon arrival. Whatever the specifics of the correspondence had been, young Jack's preledictions were apparently already evident as Houston promptly appointed him to be a Ranger in Erasmus "Deaf" Smith's outfit.
From there, near as I can gather, he drops off the radar screen for awhile. Sources have it that he was a member of Moore's failed 1839 expedition against the Comanches, tho' Smithwick, who was there, makes no mention of him. Sources also have it that he was present at Plum Creek in 1840.
At least part of those three or four years he was quietly making a reputation as a surveyor, one who was excpetionally fearless and able when Indians were encountered.
One other factor accounting for his anonymity in the first years however may have been a inclination on his part to keep company with Indians.
One of the best sourcves on Hays might be that written by a fellow Ranger and longtime associate, who travelled with Hays to California after the Ranger years and served as his Deputy when Hays was Sheriff of San Francisco.
Unfortunately the name of this guy escapes me at present, and I'm hanging on a thin google edge just now with amny windows open, but before I lose it suffice to state that the account was written in 1878 in Tennessee, unfortunately in a dime novel Western format( Hays hisself was still alive and wealthy in California at that time, but wrote very little of his life).
But from this book we get this... from a link I posted back in March (
www.theoutlaws.com), now inactive wherein Jack went....
hunting with seventeen Delaware friends to the Pecos River... The party travelling on foot.
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. The Delaware again, who show up everywhere in Texas in this period, and who were apparently both highly thought of in some circles and who were also apparently NOT to be messed with.
Worth noting too that Sam Chaimberlaine, in his very good memoirs, specifically includes some Delawares in the mix along with Jack Hays' rangers amid the exceedingly rough company in the bars of San Antonio..
http://www.tshaonline.org/supsites/chamber/story/life.htmSeems a safe bet that if you were going to tag along with a company of Delawares on foot into the wilds of Comancheria, as Hays may have done, you were probably held to a pretty high standard while on that trip.
That Hays worked well with Indian warriors is well supported, his close partnership with the Lipan Apaches and his adoption of Indian methods while on campaign being a widely celebrated part of his legend.
And it aint just hype and hearsay-type sources, even the sober and very well researched National Park Service Amistad piece has this to say...
http://www.nps.gov/history/history/online_books/amis/aspr-34/chap3.htm Shawnee are shown on the Sulpher River of Texas on the 1828 Teran map. Known as the 'Absentee' Shawnee, they had settled south of the Red River in 1822. Over the next decade, the Shawnee traded in Nacogdoches and San Antonio, often in the company of the Delaware, Cherokee, and Kickapoo.
In 1832, they attacked a large Comanche band at Bandera Pass.
Recognizing that this tribe had knowledge of the geography of Texas and knowledge of other Native Americans, the Shawnee (along with the Delaware) were frequently chosen as scouts for the Texan and United States armies, and from 1840 to 1860 the two groups were "virtually omnipresent on the Texas frontier".
While only a small number of the Shawnee or the Delaware resided for a long period in Texas... in the early 1830s members of the ill-fated Villa Dolores colony stated that the Shawnee hunted game and beaver for pelts on the Rio Escondido and at Las Moras Creek....
Because of their skill and because of the colony's fears of Native American attack, they were hired as hunters for the colony... in 1838, Jack Hays, a Texas Ranger, encountered them on the Pecos and traveled with them to the Rio Grande in a joint pursuit of Comanche Allowing that the recollections of Hays' former Deputy may have grown fuzzy recounting what was doubtless told to him by Hays himself perhaps thirty years previous, Hays' ultimately successful two-day on foot running chase of raiding Comanches may have been accomplished in company with Shawnees rather than Delwares, or a mixed party of the two.
Regardless, Hays was an extraordinary man seeking out extraordinary company, and matching the best those literally rough and tough men had to offer, to the limitsof human endurance.
Always hard to say how a given historical figure would have fared today. In Hays' case however, we have a skill at violence, extreme athleticism, tendency to test himself and seek out rough company, combined with an abiltiy to lead those same people.
All of these qualities were present in a number of idividuals of all races on the Frontier, but what sets Hays apart was an ability to move away from violence and to adapt and succeed very well in settled times, as he did in ranching and real estate in California in his later years.
My guess is that Jack Hays today would have been career Spec Ops, a Navy SEAL or the like.
Birdwatcher
