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Authors: Mike Blakely

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General Carleton stood silent for a moment, actually considering my point. “That is an argument worthy of consideration,” he said. “However, I believe the war against the Confederacy will soon be over. The Rebels cannot hold out much longer. Texas will soon fall under the Stars and Stripes again. When that happens, we will again inherit the war against the Comanches. To treat with them now only to turn on them then would not be honorable. The only course is to mount
a punitive campaign against them. We have proven this course of action against the Mescalero Apaches and against the Navahos. Both tribes have been subdued, and reports of their murders and rapes and thefts have virtually vanished.
That
is the way to achieve peace with the Indians. Whip them soundly and start them on the road to Christianity and civilization. And
that
is what I intend to do.” He pounded his fist on the table with each “that,” leaving no room for negotiation.
“Sir,” I said, “with all due respect for the military leadership you and Colonel Carson have proven to possess, the Comanches will not be defeated as easily as the Navahos and the Mescaleros.”
Carleton smiled. “Now we're getting down to some important business. Explain your statement.”
“The Comanches don't grow crops. They don't have vast orchards or pumpkin fields for Kit's troops to destroy. You might surprise them and run them out of one of their camps and capture and burn their lodges and all their accoutrements only to learn that they have made new lodges and weapons within a matter of days. Their country is vast and uncharted. Their commissary is the buffalo and the deer, and they know where to find the herds and how to subsist on rabbits and rats on the way to the herds. Their tactics of evasion and escape are unparalleled. And all this is to say nothing of their fighting skills, which are unconventional and extraordinary.”
“I admire your respect for the enemy, Mr. Greenwood. But they can be routed. The Texans proved that at the battle of Pease River.”
“The Texans are braggarts. That was not a battle. It was a massacre of women and children and Mexican slaves. There were no warriors present in that camp.”
“You're mistaken. I've read the reports. Chief Peta Nocona was killed.”
“I am
not
mistaken, sir. I was in that camp. I witnessed the slaughter. The man Sul Ross claimed was Peta Nocona was actually Peta's Mexican slave—a captive. Peta Nocona died less than a year ago, of an infected wound received in a fight against Utes.”
The general looked at me as if I had lost my mind. “Even assuming
you are correct, it changes nothing. The Comanches are raiding with the Kiowas and they must be punished. I will not entertain fanciful notions that they are somehow invulnerable to attack. If they prove more difficult to subdue than other tribes, so be it. Colonel Carson knows the Comanches every bit as well as you do, Mr. Greenwood, and he will adjust his tactics and keep after the scoundrels until victory is achieved and the Comanche menace has been removed.
That
is what we are here to discuss.”
Agent Stocker turned to Kit. “Colonel Carson, certainly you must see the benefits of attempting a lasting peace with the Indians.”
Kit drew a deep breath and thought about the question as he absentmindedly curled the corner of one of the maps on the table. “I feel for the poor devils, Martin, I really do. But they savvy just two things. Friend and enemy. A friend is somebody stronger than they are. An enemy is weaker. If we want to be friends with them, we have to show them our strength. That's their way. The elders in the Ute tribe tell me that only a few generations back the Comanches moved down here from up north and just flat kicked hell out of the Apaches to take the plains. That's what they do and that's all they understand. They will hate our guts if we just sit on our asses and let them raid our towns and ranches. They will respect us if we take the fight into their own country.”
“Where is the authority for such action?” Stocker demanded. “There is no proof that the Comanches want war with us. Only a few of them have been accused of raiding. Does this warrant a campaign of attrition against them?”
“Mr. Stocker,” said the general, “I appreciate your commitment to your duty as agent to these savages, but believe me, I
have
the authority to order a campaign. Your suggestion that not all the Indians are guilty is a point worth considering, however. So I will allow someone familiar with the Comanches to go along with the troops to identify the friendlies and try to keep them out of the fighting.” He looked at me when he said this.
“I've offered to guide a peace delegation into Comanche country,” I replied. “For now, that service is all I am willing to commit to.”
“Suit yourself, Mr. Greenwood. You are not the only scout available to this department. At this meeting, however, you may prove of some service by identifying known campgrounds of the enemy and informing Colonel Carson and myself of the strength of the enemy warriors, their weaponry, supplies, et cetera.”
Martin Stocker stood up suddenly, his chair scooting across the floor behind him. “Gentlemen, I must respectfully excuse myself from further involvement in this affair. This meeting has evolved into a council of war. I will not stand by and watch plans being made to attack and kill the very people whose welfare I am charged to protect. You should know, General, that I will protest this campaign in a letter to my superiors at the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and to President Lincoln himself.”
Calmly, Carleton looked up from his maps. “I would expect no less of you, Martin. Thank you for coming.”
When Stocker stormed out, I considered following him. But I was not as reputable as he. I was sneaky. I wanted to investigate General Carleton's plan and determine what he had in mind in the way of a campaign against the Comanches. In making this decision, I indeed became a spy again. I was collecting intelligence that I hoped would benefit an enemy of the United States of America. Oddly enough, I felt no guilt in this act of treason toward the United States. In fact, when I thought about my Comanche brothers, I liked being the scoundrel that I was. My disloyalty to Kit, on the other hand, gave me no small amount of shame. He may have been the only man alive who could have talked General Carleton out of the campaign, but he was convinced that the Indians had to be warred into peace.
Carleton began asking me numerous questions about the Comanches and their haunts. Some of them I answered honestly, knowing that one band's location months ago would prove useless intelligence now anyway. When asked about their favorite campgrounds, I was evasive, except when I knew that Kit knew the answer as well as I. I didn't want Kit to catch me lying for the sake of the Comanches. But in spite of what Carleton believed, Kit Carson did not know the Comanches
the way I did. He knew the Utes, the Navahos, the Mescaleros, the Arapahos, and the Cheyennes
better
than I did. But not the Comanches. So I could get away with spreading a modicum of false information without Kit or Carleton knowing.
When asked about Comanche strength and supplies, I erred on the side of weakness. I didn't want to paint the Indians as too powerful, for fear Carleton would order even more recruits and arms to go out against them. What I did find out in this meeting was pretty much what I had already suspected anyway. Carleton would commit some three hundred cavalry and infantry troops to the campaign, plus another hundred Ute scouts, if they could be recruited. Fort Bascom, the new post on the Comanche Trail, would serve as the jumping-off point for the campaign. Preparations should begin immediately and the campaign launched as soon as possible before winter came on.
When the meeting was over, Kit and I walked down the street to a cafe. Kit knew the owner, and asked for a table in the back, where no one would recognize him. We ordered a couple of steaks and talked about friends and family all through our meal, without mentioning a word about the meeting in the general's war room. Finally, though, as Kit pulled his napkin from the front of his shirt and threw it on the table, his face turned grim and he looked me right in the eye.
“You know what I need,” he said, as a statement more than as a question.
“You need intelligence.”
He nodded. “I need to know where they're at, and what their strength is.”
I sighed and put my silverware down, my appetite suddenly gone. “I'm going out there, Kit, but not necessarily as your spy. I believe this campaign against the Comanches is wrong. I'm going to try to do something about it.”
“What can you do, now, Kid?”
“I've got to try something. Anything. Those are my people. They trust me. Maybe I can try to get the major chiefs together and ride in for peace talks.”
Kit shook his head. “There's no time. You know the bands are scattered from hell to breakfast. Anyway, even if you could
talk the chiefs into begging peace, which I doubt, General Carleton has already sent orders to Fort Bascom to turn all flags of truce away. He will not treat with the Indians, Kid.”
“I can't just let this happen. And you don't have to, either. You could resign your commission. Look at you, Kit, they're using you up like an old horse that ought to be out to stud.”
Kit chuckled. “There's more life left in me than you think, Kid. And I need the salary to support Josefa and the children. Anyway, I've never resigned from anything in my life. It is my duty to follow orders.”
“You weren't always a soldier.”
“No, but it suits me. I believe my men need to be led, and I believe the Indians have got to be whupped into accepting civilization. Otherwise, we'll have to kill 'em all before it's over. With your help, we could whup 'em quick and save more of 'em in the long run.”
I stared at my plate and searched my heart. “You're not going to whip the Comanches, Kit. I don't care if you muster a thousand men. You'll lead them all to slaughter on the plains. I don't want to see your last campaign end in a horrific defeat.”
Kit smiled. “Those Comanches have sure got you hornswoggled. I know it won't be easy. That's why I need your help. But it can be done. The Comanches will not hold the southern plains forever.”
“I can't help you this time, Kit. My heart's not in it.” I felt crushed to admit this, yet the honesty in my words bathed my soul with relief of the burden.
Kit leaned forward, his elbows on the table. “Listen, Kid, you're going out there anyway. Just keep your eyes and ears open. You'll know when I'm coming, so ride out and meet me for a parley. You can tell me whatever you want to, or tell me nothing at all. Just meet me halfway and talk. Can you just promise me that much?”
I thought for a while as Kit's eyes searched mine. “If I hear you're coming, I'll ride out and talk. But it will only be to try one last time to talk you out of this campaign.”
We left it at that, and said our farewells. I retired to my room and began writing letters to the commissioner of Indian Affairs, to senators, to the secretary of war, the secretary of state,
and to President Lincoln himself, begging them all to call off the campaign. I knew the odds were against me. Most if not all of my letters would probably fall into rubbish bins or fireplaces. Even should one get read, and answered, the reply would probably come too late to make a difference.
After posting my letters, I made immediate preparations to ride into Comancheria. I had heard the government viewpoint. It was time to seek the wisdom of Burnt Belly and test my brotherhood with Kills Something. I felt as if the fate of the entire world rested on my shoulders. In reality, looking back, I was nothing more than a pawn in a trifling struggle that would scarcely warrant a paragraph in the book of world history. But it was my paragraph to write, and I was prepared to fill my inkwell with blood.
B
urnt Belly sat cross-legged before the fire in his lodge. It was a small prayer fire, for the weather was pleasant, and the heat of fires not needed. The bottom of the buffalo-hide lodge cover was rolled up two fists above the ground to draw the temperate air in as the warmth of the fire sought escape through the smoke hole. The old shaman pulled a mouthful of whiskey from the small jug I had brought him. He took a healthy pinch of black powder from the buckskin pouch. All at once, he spat the whiskey and threw the black powder into the fire, causing the little blaze to flare. Now he resumed a chant that meant nothing in the Comanche tongue, but as far as I knew might very well have been the language of the spirits. This had been going on since dawn, and the sun was now plunging toward the western horizon. All day, I had listened to the chants, fed the fire for Burnt Belly, smelled the smudges of cedar and fir whose smoke carried prayers up to the Great Mystery.
Suddenly the chant ended. “They are coming,” Burnt Belly said. “In two moons.”
I had not even told him about the campaign yet—only that I
needed to seek his wisdom and advice. It is possible that Comanche and Kiowa scouts had been keeping an eye on the construction of Fort Bascom, and had simply surmised that the attack was imminent. It was possible that Burnt Belly had reasoned that the soldiers must strike before winter fairly set in. Or it is possible that the spirits told him the future. With Burnt Belly, one never knew.
“Yes,” I said. “Three hundred bluecoats and a hundred Utes.”
“Fools,” he said. “Let them come.”
“Would it not be better to ask for peace?”
“What peace? The same peace that the Mescaleros and Navahos got at that slave camp on the Bitter Water?”
“A different peace. One that allows us to stay in our own country with honor.”
“The blades of our lances will win that peace. I have had visions. Our time to show our strength draws near to an end. The great war between the whites is almost over. The
tejanos
and the bluecoats will soon be one people again. Before that time comes, we must take everything we can and drive every hostile white man from our country. Then, the battle will become one to hold what we have won. The bluecoats and the
tejanos
do not respect an enemy who wants peace. They understand only the arrow and the bullet and the knife. Let them come into our own country, and we will teach them respect.”
This echo of Kit's observation almost amused me. “Little Chief will lead them. He has defeated the Mescaleros and the Navahos.”
Burnt Belly scoffed. “They are weak. Both people are our enemies. We might have defeated them ourselves, generations ago, but we have let them survive so that we may raid their fields and herds. Little Chief will find one of our horseback soldiers worth ten of their warriors.”
“I tried to tell them not to come. I did not say too much, but I tried to tell them they could not defeat the Comanche and Kiowa alliance. They would not listen. They are too full of arrogance and pride.”
“Little Chief is your friend,” he said.
“Yes, but my loyalty lies with my brother, Kills Something, and the Comanche people.”
“You speak the truth. Your heart is Comanche, but it runs with the blood of a white man. You want to fulfill your promise to fight against the whites who will invade us, but now you see that you must do battle with your own warrior-brother, Little Chief.”
“It troubles me, but I have spoken in council, and I must defend my people if the bluecoats come, no matter who leads them.”
“So be it. Little Chief is a great warrior. He will fight hard and he will expect no less of you—even as his enemy. The Great War between the whites has turned friend against friend and brother against brother. Each man must answer to the call of his own heart. Do not let it trouble you. It is the way of a warrior.”
“You have answered my two questions. The one about peace, and the one about my friend Little Chief, who now is destined to become my enemy. Now I must decide how to prepare my people for the attack.”
Burnt Belly took another pull from the jug and cast the whiskey and powder into the fire once more. He looked at me, smiling. “That time was just for fun.” He reached his hand toward me. “Help me up, nephew. I have been sitting here too long and I am old and stiff.”
I went to help him, but before I could take his hand, he rose magically, with a strength and balance a man of his years should not have possessed.
I smiled. “You are as tricky as our ancestor Brother Coyote.”
“The trickster loves his life, even knowing his enemies lie waiting to take it from him at every turn in the trail. Do not let these times weigh so heavily on your heart, nephew. These troubles are not of your making. You have been guided here by spirit powers beyond your understanding to protect your people. You must do your duty, but do not suffer it too deeply. Good times follow bad. Our warriors live to fight and die for their home. That is the way to the rewards of the Shadow Land. Come.”
He beckoned me to step outside and I beheld a striking sunset blazing almost bloodred through the dust of some distant buffalo herd. A flock of a dozen mourning doves rocketed overhead, streaking at enviable speeds toward a favorite watering place. The voices of children at play bubbled up from the camp situated all along the Concho River. A drumming of hooves drew my attention across the stream, where two young warriors ran neck and neck on the racecourse. The aroma of cooking food made me hungry.
“The spirits have granted us a great day to be together once again,” he said. “Tomorrow we will call for a council of war. Kills Something will have two moons to prepare the warriors. You, nephew, must make many hard rides to gather supplies—powder and lead, knives and iron for arrow points. You must trade for these things a little at a time in many different places, so the whites will not know you are supplying our people. Then we will move our village to a place of strength. Where do you suggest?”
My answer came quickly. “At the Adobe Walls.”
He nodded. “Yes, the Crossing. That is the place I was thinking of, too. But all
that
will begin tomorrow. For now, we will go see what my third wife has cooked for our evening meal in her lodge. People laugh at me because I married her and she is not very pretty. But she makes me very happy when she cooks, and I already have two pretty wives. Come, I am as hungry as a coyote named No-Leg.”
 
 
THE COUNCIL WAS held the next day, and as Burnt Belly and I recommended to the elders, it was decided that the village would move to Adobe Walls after the warriors had been drilled and I had gathered the supplies. I would use pack mules to transport the wartime provender. Six warriors were assigned to me to help me with the pack mules. Two of them were my old friends of the warpath, Loud Shouter and Fears-the-Ground, who were now respected raid leaders and wealthy horse owners with two wives each and several children.
The only other warrior of any standing to accompany me
was young Quanah, son of the great chief Peta Nocona, whose name would never again be spoken among the Comanches, for Comanches did not speak the names of their dead for fear of being haunted by specters from the Shadow Land.
The other three mule tenders were young warriors who did not relish the idea of being assigned to a mere supply run. Their names were Blackbird, Turtle, and Tobacco Boy. The day we left the Concho, these three boys rode with scowls on their faces, tugging angrily at the lead ropes of their mules, for we passed by their young friends outside of camp, going through all the fantastic battle drills the Comanches had developed to prepare for war. As their friends held wild races and rough contests designed to hone hand-to-hand fighting skills and rescue abilities, they could only mope and lead their mules, tied head to tail behind them.
As we left Kills Something's village, however, I explained to them, mostly in sign language, how important and dangerous our mission was. We would have to ride to the fringes of enemy territory near the Texas settlements, and would be in constant danger of being discovered. If found and attacked, we would have to fight our way back toward Comancheria and use our most sophisticated tactics of evasion to get our war supplies back to Kills Something's camp. This element of danger seemed to cheer the boys up and we got along better for the next few days. Each of my six men tended three mules, giving us eighteen beasts to load with ammunition and other necessities.
We went to Fredericksburg first, for it was the supply point nearest to the Concho River. I have told you about Fredericksburg before. Unlike the residents of any other town anywhere in Texas, the German immigrants of Fredericksburg were on good terms with the Comanches. So Loud Shouter rode to town with me. We claimed to be going into business together hunting buffalo for hides and meat. This was old news in Fredericksburg, for the town had forged a treaty with the Comanches saying the Indians would supply the settlers with wild game if the whites would refrain from hunting. In return, the German immigrants supplied the Comanches with domestic
crops and manufactured supplies. We had no trouble purchasing a muleload of black powder, lead, bullet molds, and a pair of rifles.
Next, I left my Comanche helpers in a supply camp just upstream of the so-called Marble Falls on the Colorado River. The falls were of limestone, not marble, but misnomers were common on the frontier. From the supply camp, I rode alone to Austin, the capital of the Confederate State of Texas. Suspicions here were much more intense than in the remote village of Fredericksburg. Still, claiming to be a buffalo hunter and a trapper, I managed to purchase a muleload of supplies. When asked why I wasn't attached to some Confederate unit, I claimed that I had already served with the volunteers at the battle of Valverde, and had been mustered out. This was true, even though the volunteers I served with were Union.
From Austin, it was on to Salado. I moved very quickly from town to town, keeping my Comanche helpers out of sight in camps to the west. This business of supplying guns and ammunition to Comanches and Kiowas was highly illegal and could have gotten me hanged—probably by a lynch mob—had I been discovered. Therefore, I made my supply sweep across the settlements hastily, lest news of my last purchase should reach the next town before my arrival. As long as I got back into Comancheria before anyone realized I had made multiple purchases of ammunition and guns, I figured I could get away with my crimes against Texas.
I was the first of a new breed of Comanchero. Allow me to explain what I mean by that. The original Comancheros came out of New Mexico in the 1700s, rode eastward into Comancheria and traded Spanish goods to the Comanches in exchange for hides, meat, and slaves captured from other tribes. In those days, the Spaniards considered the Comanches an unconquerable enemy nation of savage heathens. The Comancheros held the respect of the Spanish people for their bravery and ability to function beyond the Comanche frontier. They were flamboyant plains traders who captured the imagination of every adventurous boy and every dark-eyed señorita.
By the time of the War Between the States, however, the word
“Comanchero”
had taken on a sinister ring to Americans.
The Anglos of that time did not consider Comancheria unconquerable. By unspoken policy of the American mind, the Comanches were an enemy who would eventually be removed from the land. The Comanchero, therefore, was a traitor and a criminal. This new breed of Comanchero was what I had become. Hell, I think I invented it, to tell you the truth. But I did not consider my actions wrong. The land simply belonged to the Comanches, paid for in blood. They should have been left alone to live in it as they saw fit.
But history teaches that all the should-have-beens in the world cannot prevent a civilization from being overrun by an aggressive, numerically superior, more technologically advanced nation. The Comanches had overrun the Apaches and Tonkawas a hundred fifty years before, and now they were being overrun themselves. It's easier to see all that now, many years later. At the time, however, all I felt in my heart was the “now” of the situation. The Comanches were good people—no less perfect than any other civilization. They had won this land, and served it well as stewards. They deserved to hold it, and I was on their side, no matter how hopeless their cause.
You ask:
Good people? What about the atrocities?
Yes, some warriors participated in horrors of mutilation and torture. Rape was ceremonial, and believed to make the enemy woman
good
with Comanche seed. But these acts of terror occurred less commonly than you might think, for the history of the Comanche wars was written by whites—wartime propaganda. And the atrocities were most often in response to some white outrage. Women and children massacred, whole villages intentionally infected with smallpox and other virulent diseases, warriors ambushed and slaughtered under white flags of truce.
I feel no shame in admitting my loyalty to the Comanches. Their way was as good as any other civilization's. Better in many respects.
Anyway, after making a small purchase of supplies at Salado, I moved on to Gatesville, Waco, Meridian, and Fort Worth. Some of these towns boasted a precarious telegraph service by this time, fed by gossamer wires tacked to trees more often than actual poles. So, to distract attention from my stockpiling of powder and lead, and to keep the news of my
shopping spree from spreading, I had the Comanche boys who rode with me cut the telegraph lines outside of each town the night before I was scheduled to make my next purchase.

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