Red River War may also refer to the conflict between Oklahoma and Texas known as the Red River Bridge War.
A Kiowa ledger drawing possibly depicting the Buffalo Wallow battle in 1874, one of several clashes between Southern Plains Indians and the U.S. Army during the Red River War.

The Red River War was a military campaign launched by the U.S. Army in 1874 to remove the Comanche, Kiowa, Southern Cheyenne, and Arapaho Indian tribes from the Southern Plains where they had been raiding settlers and travelers and enforce their relocation to reservations in Indian Territory. It brought an end to the Texas–Indian Wars. The war strategy was formulated by senior Army officers led by Sheridan and Sherman, and achieved its objective with relatively few casualties on either side. The war's end saw the final military defeat of the once powerful Comanche, Kiowa, and southern Cheyenne Indians, and, with the virtual extinction of the southern herd of buffalo, the opening of the Texas Panhandle to settlement by cattle ranchers.[1][2]

Background

During the 1850s, west-bound settlers came into conflict with the local Indian tribes. To protect the settlers from Indian attacks, the Army established a series of frontier forts. The start of the American Civil War in 1861 resulted in a withdrawal of the troops from the western frontier.

The Medicine Lodge Treaty of 1867 called for two reservations to be set aside in Indian Territory—one for the Comanche and Kiowa and one for the Southern Cheyenne and Arapaho. According to the treaty, the government would provide the tribes with many basic services and training, housing, food and supplies, including guns and ammunition for hunting. In exchange, the Indians agreed to stop their attacks and raids. Ten chiefs endorsed the treaty and some tribal members moved voluntarily to the reservations.

Commercial buffalo hunters ignored the terms of the treaty as they moved into the area promised to the Southern Plains Indians. A few branches of the tribes, including Quanah Parker's Quahadi Comanches refused to even sign the treaty. The great southern herd of American bison was all but exterminated in just four years—from 1874 to 1878. The disappearance of the buffalo reduced the Indians to dependence on reservation rations.

As conditions continued to worsen many of the Indians who were still there now left to join with the bands who had returned to the Texas plains. Among the Indians there was talk of war and of driving the white man from the land.

War

In 1874 a leader emerged in the person of Isa-tai (White Eagle) of the Quahadi Band of Comanches. Isa-tai was doing his best to incite a war against the whites. A plan was formed that the Indians would attack and destroy the new settlement of buffalo hunters at Adobe Walls.

On June 27, 1874 some 300 Indians, led by Isa-tai and Comanche Chief Quanah Parker, attacked Adobe Walls. Though the 28 hunters who occupied the post were outnumbered, they were well armed with long-range rifles and were able to hold off the Indians. With their failure at Adobe Walls, many of the Indians began to spread over the plains of Texas. For the Indians, this brought retaliation by the U.S. Army, defeat, and confinement to the reservations.

The attack on Adobe Walls served as a catalyst for the U.S. Army to make plans to subdue the Southern Plains tribes permanently. By late August, 1874, the Army faced some 1,800 Cheyennes, 2,000 Comanches, and 1,000 Kiowas, mounting in all about 1,200 combat fighters.[3]

The offensive utilized five columns converging on the general area of the Texas Panhandle and specifically upon the upper tributaries of the Red River where the Indians were believed to be. The strategy aimed at full encirclement of the region, thereby eliminating virtually all gaps through which the Indians might escape. Colonel Nelson A. Miles moved southward from Fort Dodge; Lieutenant Colonel John W. Davidson marched westward from Fort Sill; Lieutenant Colonel George P. Buell moved northwest from Fort Griffin; Colonel Ranald S. Mackenzie came northward from Fort Concho; and Major William R. Price marched eastward across the Panhandle from Fort Union. The plan called for the converging columns to maintain a continuous offensive until a decisive defeat had been inflicted on the Indians.

During the Red River War of 1874, as many as 20 engagements between the U.S. Army and the Southern Plains Indians may have taken place across the Texas Panhandle region. The well-equipped Army kept the Indians on the run until eventually they could not run or fight any longer.

The decisive Army victory came when Mackenzie trapped the main enemy force with their families and winter food supply in their main hideout in upper Palo Duro Canyon. In a dawn attack down the steep canyon wall, Mackenzie's troops killed only two or three Indians, but destroyed their supplies and slaughtered over a thousand Indian horses. The warriors, dismounted and out of food, fought no more and went back to their reservations.

The Red River War officially ended in June 1875 when Quanah Parker and his band of Quahadi Comanche entered Fort Sill and surrendered; they were the last large roaming band of southwestern Indians. The Comanche and the Kiowa were granted reservation land in southwestern Indian Territory.

See also

References

  1. ^ Utley (1974)
  2. ^ Haley (2009)
  3. ^ Utley (1973) p 211
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