Fort Worth: A Frontier Triumph

4. The Sword

CHAPTER 4 The Sword '"'"LET the sword do its work," a favorite slogan of David G. Burnet, the provisional president of the Texas republic during its revolution for independence, became the policy of President Lamar in his administration of Indian affairs. Lamar was not his red brother's keeper. He reversed President Houston 's Indian policy. In his inaugural address in December 1838, as the second president of Texas, Lamar called for the following: the total expulsion of United States Indians domiciled in North Texas, the establishment of a line of military posts along the frontier, and the organization of a strong military force. Congress promptly complied. Laws were passed which provided for the construction of a military road from the Red River to the Nueces River; the creation of more than ten companies of Rangers of fifty-nine men each; and the organization of a mounted regiment of 840 men. Soldiers were to enlist for three years at sixteen dollars a month, and to receive a bounty of thirty dollars and a land certificate. Provision for the establishment of troop headquarters for this mounted regiment reveals that the center of danger was in North Central Texas and included the present counties of Dallas, Tarrant, Johnson, Hood, Hill, and Bosque. The law provided that the largest number of men, 168, 18 BOOK! were to be stationed at or near the three forks of the Trinity, and 112 at or near the Brazos. Under the Indian threat, settlers from the Red River to the older settled areas about Bastrop on the Colorado lived in a world of uneasiness. Many people had accepted as facts the surmises which were abroad in Texas. It was estimated that there were some 45,000 warriors concentrated in Indian Territory whom the settlers feared would cross the Red River to make murderous and thieving incursions into Texas. To the fear of these savages was added the dread of the wild tribes of the prairies who, unopposed, were well entrenched in woodlands of the Trinity. The secretary of war of the Texas republic, Albert Sidney Johnston, had proof that the Cherokees and other agricultural Indians of East Texas were cooperating with the prairie Indians to drive the white men from North Texas. So Lamar, in line with his extermination policy, declared that the Cherokees were not entitled to land in East Texas. He offered to compensate them for the land on which they were living, and ordered them to withdraw from Texas. This, they refused to accept, and ignored the order to leave their homes. Land titles for the Cherokees became a sharp political issue. In the meantime, the white settlers of East Texas, uncomfortable under the July sun of 1839, were further disturbed by warfare. The Cherokees fought the troops sent by Lamar to expel them. Most of the warriors were slain along with their famous Chief Bowles, the beloved friend of Sam Houston. Survivors of this Cherokee conflict were driven into Arkansas. Like a volcanic eruption, the so-called "Cherokee War" shook the other Indian camps from the Red River to the Rio Grande. The tribes of North Central Texas feared that, like the Cherokees, they too would be expelled from their homes. They took up their tomahawks. A list of disasterous raids was recorded by the War Department of the Republic during 1839 and 1840. But the settlers from the Red River to the newly founded settlement of Austin were more fortunate than the North Central Anglos, for they lived within easy reach of barricades. A second incident, the Council House Fight, incited the Indians' anger and increased their fear, for in March 1840, Lamar had invited the Comanches to San Antonio for a peace council to which they were to bring their white prisoners. This terminated in a massacre at the council house. The deaths of twelve chiefs, sixty-five warriors, and several squaws unleashed a torrent of vengeance. In the summer of 1840, Comanches and Kiowas, 1000 strong, rode in fury from their northern homes to answer Lamar's policy of the sword. CHAPTER 4 19 Their anger carried their raids as far as Victoria and Linnville on the Gulf Coast. Settlers were slain, towns were captured, thousands of horses were stolen, and children were carried away. As the Indians retired from their destructive raids, they were pursued by volunteers under General Felix Huston and Edward Burleson. At Plum Creek...