In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

chapter four IMPLEMENTATION OF EMPIRE The task of conquering the Trans-Pecos rested with the U.S. Army, and Fort Davis had become a focus of operations against Indians even before it officially opened. In late September 1854, Bvt. Maj. Gen. Persifor F. Smith had left El Paso en route to selecting the site for the new post on Limpia Creek. Smith’s command included a hundred members of the Regiment of Mounted Riflemen, a mountain howitzer, and a dozen handlers. Upon reaching Eagle Springs, about 120 miles east of El Paso, the party encountered a group of immigrants herding cattle to California, who reported that Mescalero and Lipan Apaches had recently stolen a number of their stock. On October 1, Smith dispatched Capt. John G. Walker and forty-two Mounted Riflemen after the marauders. Four civilians accompanied Walker’s regulars.1 A Missourian, Walker had been appointed an officer in 1846 and brevetted for gallantry during the Mexican War. Second in command was Lt. Eugene A. Carr, who would later be awarded the Medal of Honor for his Civil War heroism at the Battle of Pea Ridge, Arkansas. Fortunately, one of the Mexican civilians, José Policarpo (“Polly”) Rodriguez, was an experienced tracker. After a day and a half’s march of seventy miles, Walker’s troops spotted two Indians. Captain Walker split his remaining forces with Lieutenant Carr. Racing ahead, Carr’s section stumbled into the middle of an Apache encampment of sixty to seventy lodges. Suddenly, an unseen party of Indians swept out of a protected gorge and fell upon Carr’s platoon. Walker’s arrival with the rest of the command drove away the Indians after a sharp, confused fight. “The sides of the mountains were literally covered with mounted and dismounted warriors,” Walker recalled, “and with the women and children escaping from the village near which we were.” But as the soldiers began destroying the camp lodges and food supplies, the Indians re-formed and began raining down arrows from the surrounding heights. Prudence seeming the better part of valor, the captain withdrew. Lieutenant Carr had been severely wounded; the guide, Polly Rodriguez, had taken an arrow wound just above his hip, and a hail of arrows had killed a private. Walker estimated Indian losses at six or seven killed and double that number injured. Seeking professional attention for Carr’s wound, Walker broke off the pursuit and on October 5 rejoined General Smith, seven miles west of Dead Man’s Hole. Walker praised his entire command: Carr’s gallant conduct had been “worthy of his profession”; the soldiers had eaten hardtack for three days “without a murmur of discontent.” Guide Rodriguez earned recognition for his “good service as a trailer and as a good rifle shot in the fight.” Smith agreed with this assessment; noting that several arrows had left the captain’s shirt in tatters, he added that Walker’s “spirited action there is highly to his credit and that of his command.” A flurry of operations in western Texas and eastern New Mexico followed the Walker fight. Majors John S. Simonson and James Longstreet scoured the Trans-Pecos that winter. They found good water sources in the Guadalupe Mountains and at Pine Spring, 125 miles northwest of Fort Davis, but failed to locate any Indians. Perhaps the leadership had been uninspired. Although Longstreet later became one of Robert E. Lee’s ablest corps commanders during the Civil War, the aging Simonson, a veteran of the War of 1812 and once described as “a simple, but kind old fellow . . . deficient in reason , cramped in his understanding, and warped in his judgment,” was long past his prime. The presence of several companies of mounted Texas volunteers had undoubtedly added to the beleaguered old officer’s predicament.2 Meanwhile, columns led by Capt. Richard S. Ewell and Lt. Samuel D. Sturgis combed southeastern New Mexico. In a series of running battles in the Sacramento Mountains that winter, Ewell’s command, including twentynine dragoons and fifty infantry, killed fifteen Mescaleros and destroyed an Indian village. Yet they had not inflicted a crushing blow. Exhausted by the terrain and the winter season, Ewell’s troops limped back to the cover of the federal forts in New Mexico. The lack of forage had hit the dragoon horses particularly hard. “The infantry were of valuable service,” Ewell concluded, “and towards the end of the campaign were able to outmarch the dragoons.” On...

Share