Comanche

Comanches' in Camp

Photo: Oklahoma Historical Society Museum.

The Comanches were a southern plains tribe, renowned for their raiding throughout West Texas and northern Chihuahua and Coahuila, Mexico. By the mid-nineteenth century, the Comanches had become a large tribe of twelve or more confederated bands, expert horsemen, and prominent adversaries to the United States citizens in Texas. Nomadic buffalo hunters, the Comanches dominated the country well into the 1870s, subordinating numerous adjacent tribes in the process.

In 1848 - 49, the Comanches were decimated by outbreaks of smallpox and cholera, which killed about half of the tribe. In 1854, some Comanches were compelled to reside on a federal reserve established on the Brazos River, where they were later removed to tracts in the Indian Territory (Oklahoma) and in the Texas panhandle. Other Comanches, continued the time-honored tradition of raiding in Texas and deep into the recesses of Mexico. Comanches established the Great Comanche Trail, which plunged southward past Fort Stockton, into present-day Big Bend national park, and across the Rio Grande into Mexico.

In 1874 - 75, military forces under Colonels Nelson A. Miles and Ranald Mackenzie struck the Comanches a severe blow in what has been dubbed the Red River War. Most of this campaign occurred in the Texas Panhandle. The Comanches were defeated and forced to return to their reservations. Prominent of the Comanche leaders of this era was Quanah Parker.