Capt. John B. Denton Zombie

05/25/2026

Tha day I got dead… 💀

☞OTD in Texas History -- 185 years ago, May 24, 1841
The death of Capt. John B. Denton at The Battle of Village Creek

The Battle of Village Creek was fought between 1,000 or more Village Creek Indians consisting of warriors of the Caddo, Cherokee, & Tonkawa tribes against a Republic of Texas Militia force consisting of approximately 70 soldiers led by Brigadier General Edward H. Tarrant (1796-1858), resulting in a narrow victory for the Texas Militia.

☞Twelve Indians were killed during the battle, but the only fatality amongst the Texas Militiamen was Captain John B. Denton (1806-1841) namesake of Denton County, Texas & the county seat, the City of Denton, Texas.

☞Much of the Village Creek battle site now lies inundated beneath the waters of Lake Arlington in Tarrant County. However, a historic marker there commemorates the event and death of Capt. John B. Denton.

☞The left-hand photograph depicts an undated portrait of General Edward H. Tarrant. The right-hand photograph depicts General Tarrant’s tombstone at Pioneer’s Rest Cemetery in the City of Fort Worth, the county seat of the General’s namesake county -- Tarrant County, Texas. Note: This is the only known photograph of Edward H. Tarrant.

04/20/2026

Back in my day the Capitol of Texas moved around a mite…

The Arcane Texas Fact of the Day: 189 years ago today, on April 19, 1837. Houston became the capital of Texas. This followed an order from President Sam Houston on December 15, 1836, to move the seat of government there from Columbia (now West Columbia). The Texas Congress began operating in Houston on that date in 1837, even though the capitol building was still under construction at the time. Houston served in this role until 1839, when the capital moved to Austin (then known as Waterloo) under President Mirabeau B. Lamar.

Here's a description of Houston in 1839. It's a bit gruesome. I've preserved the spelling and odd capitalizing:

"The fleas were as thick as the sands of the sea. Our clothes were actually bloody, and our bodies freckled after a night of warfare with the Vermine [sic]. I cannot convey an idea of the multitude of Rats in Houston at that time [1839]. They were almost as large as Prairie Dogs and when night came on, the streets and Houses were literally alive with these animals. Such running and squealing through the night, to say nothing of the fear of losing a toe or a nose, if you chanced to fall asleep, created such an apprehension that together with the attention that had to be given our other Companions made sleep well nigh impossible."

----- C.C. Cox, as quoted in the Southwestern Historical Quarterly

Shown here: This photograph, date unknown, shows the capitol building in Houston, the one that was used as the Texas state capitol before it moved to Austin. It was built on the downtown site now occupied by the Rice Lofts at 909 Texas Avenue in downtown Houston. This building was demolished in 1881.

04/11/2026

It's our 180th Birthday today! On April 11, 1846, Denton County was established by the Texas legislature shortly after the state joined the United States. For more about our history, visit the Denton County Office of History & Culture website at https://www.dentoncounty.gov/352/Denton-County-History.

03/25/2026

Seventeen Texian prisoners from the failed Mier Expedition were executed in Mexico in what became known as the Black Bean Episode on this day in 1843. Writing on the back of this photograph, which was provided by the Fort Bend Museum, suggest it is probably a reunion of the survivors of the Mier Expedition.

https://bit.ly/4bKm6R9

03/25/2026

Kicking Bird, a Kiowa chief, circa 1870. Like the Comanches, the Kiowas were originally from the northern Great Plains, with earlier roots believed to be in the Yellowstone River region of present-day Montana. Also, like the Comanches, by the 17th and early 18th centuries, the Kiowa had migrated southward, eventually settling in the southern Plains—particularly in areas that are now western Oklahoma, Texas, and eastern New Mexico. Their adoption of the horse, introduced by the Spanish, transformed their society into a highly mobile, buffalo-hunting culture.

During the 18th and early 19th centuries, the Kiowa formed a powerful alliance with the Comanche and the Kiowa Apache (Plains Apache). This alliance dominated much of the southern Plains, controlling trade routes and conducting raids into northern Mexico and rival tribal territories. Kiowa society was organized around warrior traditions, seasonal buffalo hunts, and spiritual practices such as the Sun Dance, which played a central role in their cultural life.

The expansion of the United States and its settlers into the Plains in the mid-19th century brought increasing conflict. Following a series of military confrontations, including events associated with the Red River War, the Kiowa were ultimately forced onto a reservation in present-day Oklahoma. The war marked the end of their resistance to U.S. military control and the collapse of the free-ranging buffalo culture that had sustained them for generations.

As of 2012, there were only 20 people left who spoke the Kiowa language natively, as a first-language, with perhaps 80 individuals who spoke it as a second language. Since then, the situation has not been dramatically reversed, but it also has not collapsed completely. According to Omniglot, about 100 people speak Kiowa today, most over the age of 45, and the language is classified as severely endangered. However, efforts are being made to revitalize the language, including classes for children and adults. The University of Tulsa, the University of Oklahoma in Norman, and the University of Science and Arts of Oklahoma in Chickasha offer Kiowa language classes, Kiowa hymns are sung at Mount Scott Kiowa United Methodist Church, and the Kiowa Tribe offers weekly language classes at the Jacobson House, a nonprofit Native American art center in Norman, Oklahoma. Here's hoping they are successful. It would be a shame to see it disappear forever.

03/24/2026

Holy smokes, check out this remarkable historical photo of buffalo hides being hauled to market in Weatherford, Texas. This was taken in 1874, when Weatherford was at the edge of Anglo settlement. What strikes me is that these wagons weren’t just hauling hides, they’re hauling away the last great breath of the southern plains buffalo and a way of life that depended on them. Each wagonload represents an animal that had roamed in numbers so vast they once seemed beyond counting, now reduced to cargo, measured and sold by the pound. To the hunters it represented prosperity, but in hindsight it feels more like a ledger being closed, the end of an era, and although it must have seemed ordinary at the time, both the settlers and the Native Americans were witnessing the near-erasure of a species that had shaped the land for eons. In retrospect it's so easy for us to see. And I'm not trying to moralize or mourn, just observing that we can cause such great changes without fully understanding at the time what those changes represent, how the repercussions ripple out.

Another photo courtesy the truly outstanding archives of UTA Special Collections. Bless the archivists!

03/19/2026

The Arcane Texas Fact of the Day: Today marks the 186th anniversary of the Council House Fight, one of the most explosive and consequential encounters in early Texas history.

On March 19, 1840, in San Antonio, leaders of the Penateka Comanche came into town under a flag of truce, intending to negotiate peace with officials of the Republic of Texas. Texas authorities had made their position clear: all white captives were to be returned. The Comanches arrived with only a handful, among them Matilda Lockhart, whose condition suggested severe abuse during her captivity.

When it became clear that most captives had not been brought in, tensions snapped tight. During the meeting inside the Council House, Texas officials informed the assembled Comanche chiefs that they would be detained as hostages until the remaining prisoners were delivered. The chiefs resisted. Some attempted to flee, calling to warriors outside for help.

What followed was sudden and chaotic. Fighting broke out inside and around the Council House. By the time it ended, roughly thirty Penateka Comanche leaders and warriors had been killed, along with several women and children in the courtyard. On the Texan side, six were killed and about twenty wounded.

In the aftermath, Texas authorities released one Comanche woman, instructing her to carry terms: the return of remaining captives in exchange for twenty-seven Comanches taken prisoner. The Penateka leadership did not comply, and most of the Texan captives later escaped on their own.

For the Comanches, the incident was a profound betrayal. In their diplomatic tradition, envoys were not to be harmed. The killing of leaders under negotiation ignited outrage. That outrage soon took the form of retaliatory raids deep into Texas, including the sweeping Great Raid later in 1840.

03/18/2026

Map of Texas, 1835. State Archives Map Collection, 2750. TSLAC. Map of Texas outlining departments of Bexar, Brazos, and Nacogdoches. Municipalities in red created by the Consultation, those in green created previously.

• The Department of Nacogdoches was a political region including both the settlement and the municipality of Nacogdoches and most of East Texas, which covered the northeastern portion of the state of Coahuila and Texas during Spanish and Mexican rule between 1737 and 1836.

• The Department of Brazos formed in 1834, was a Mexican administrative region in Texas covering the area between the Lavaca River and the Brazos-Trinity watershed, with San Felipe de Austin as its capital. In 1835, this region became a hotbed of rebellion, with the Consultation meeting at San Felipe, eventually leading to the Texas Revolution and independence declared at Washington-on-the-Brazos in 1836.

• The Department of Bexar was a vast administrative district within the Mexican state of Coahuila y Texas, with its capital at San Antonio de Béxar. It became the focal point of the Texas Revolution that year, culminating in the Siege of Bexar (October–December), where Texan forces defeated General Martín Perfecto de Cos.

03/14/2026

Written by an old trail cowboy, the Texas Quote of the Day is 100% awesome: "When I was sixteen years old I had a little experience with horse thieves. My father noticed a suspicious looking man riding around our place one day so he told us boys we had better watch the horses. My brother and I went out to guard the horses that night and just about mid-night the thieves came in two or three different squads. How many there were we never knew. We watched them give signals to each other with the fire of their ci******es. Then we fired at them and scared them away. We hit one of them, but never knew if we killed him or not. After that we were never bothered with horse thieves.

The robbers were certainly skillful. I recall one day when my brother and I were out on a hunt, we laid down to rest. We used our saddles for pillows and put our belts and “six shooters” under them. And while we were resting someone sneaked up and stole my belt and “six shooter” right from under my head. I suppose whoever it was thought I had money in the little money pouch on my belt, but they sure got fooled.

In 1872 we were not allowed so much liberty. A law was passed which prohibited men from carrying concealed arms.

In 1874 horse thieves and highway robbers were so bad something had to be done. The ranchmen formed an organization known as the “Stock Association” to rid the country of these marauders. I was one of the fifty deputies elected. After a year’s time we had Bexar county clear of robbers.

My first trip up the old cow trail to Kansas was in the year 1873 when I was just a boy of eighteen. My father decided to take some of his cattle to the Kansas market as they sold so cheap here. At that time, one-thousand-pound beeves sold in San Antonio for $8.00 per head and in Wichita, Kansas, for $23.00 per head.

Father asked a bunch of young cowboys if we thought we could take his cattle to Kansas. As we were all young fellows, between the ages of eighteen and twenty-two, eager for adventure, we willingly consented. So on the first day of February, we began gathering our cattle and finished rounding up a herd on March 14th. Early next morning we started on our journey. We traveled all day and that night made our first camping place where Converse, Bexar county now stands, but at that time it was only an open country.

That first night was one never to be forgotten. It rained all night long and our cattle stampeded eighteen times. During one stampede they ran into one of our men. His horse was run over by the cattle and crippled, while the man was carried off about a fourth of a mile on top of the cattle. He escaped with only a few bruises. We were lucky not to lose any cattle that night, but fifteen head were crippled.

The next morning, we bought a two-wheeled cart to carry our bedding and provisions in. Then with a yoke of oxen hitched to it we began our journey again and made our next stop on the Santa Clara where now stands the little town, Marion. That night there was an electric storm which was followed by cold weather and frost. After a few days rest we resumed our trail. When we reached the Guadalupe River it was up about six feet. Our cattle had to swim across and our cart was taken over on a ferry boat.

At our next camping place, we had another stampede and lost thirty-five head of cattle which we never found.

When we reached the Colorado River, it also was up about four feet. After swimming that we kept on the trail to Round Rock where our yoke of oxen was stolen, so we had to rope and hitch two wild steers to the cart. When we reached Fort Worth, at that time a small town of one hundred inhabitants, we sold our cart and bought a wagon and team of horses.

It was a very rainy year and every river we came to was up; however, we crossed them all without loss. When we reached Wash*ta River, in Indian Territory, we had to stay there eight days on account of heavy rains. There I had my hardest time of the trip. For six nights I slept only about one and a half hours and never pulled off my slicker and boots.

Upon reaching the Canadian River we found that so high we could not cross for two days.

Our next stop was on Bluff Creek on the line of Kansas. There one of our men, Joe Menges, roped a buffalo calf which we carried with us to Wichita and sold it to “Buffalo Joe,” who was running a beer garden for the amusement of the trail men.

We camped on the river called Ninnesquaw for three months in order to fatten our cattle for the market. Then my father came to Kansas by train and sold them.

On the seventh of September we began our return trip bringing with us forty-five head of saddle ponies. It took us twenty-seven days to make the return trip to San Antonio. Only five of us made the return trip, Hartmann, Eisenhauer, Markwardt, Smith, and myself.

On my journey I saw many buffalo but killed only one great big one. I also killed seven antelopes.

One morning while I was eating breakfast one of the boys came running up and said, “Chris, come on quick, buffalo ran in the herd and they have stampeded.” I jumped on my horse and went with him. The first thing I saw was one of the boys, Phillip Prinz, galloping after some buffaloes trying to rope one. When he spied me he came and asked me for my horse. I would not give it to him and told him to let the buffalo alone if he didn’t want to get killed. He got a little sore at me, but we rode on back to camp together.

I think we were the youngest bunch of trailmen on the “Trail” that year. The oldest man, Ad. Markwardt, our cook, was only twenty-five years old, and the rest were between eighteen and twenty-two years. Those that rode the “Trail” with me were Alf. Hartmann, Steve Wooler, Joe Menges, Phil. Prinz, Louis Eisenhauer, Ad. Markwardt, Henry Smith, a negro, and my brother Fred.

Besides making trips over the “Trail” to Kansas, I often made trips to the coast.

Years ago, there were no trains we could ship our cattle on as nowadays. Whenever we wanted to take cattle to the seaport we had to drive them. We usually drove them in herds of about two hundred head.

In the spring of the year, we would begin rounding up our cattle, as the beef buyers usually came in the early fall. Our captain would give us orders for the trip, then we would start out, each man with his pack-horse and two saddle horses.

There were large stock pens scattered over the country. We would each go in different directions and all meet at one of the pens. At night when we went into camp we would hobble our tamest horses with buckskin hobbles and staked the wilder ones. We hung our “grub” up in a tree so nothing could bother it.

After we had all the cattle together, we would start for home. As we came near to each man’s house he would cut his cattle out of the herd.

Then came the beef buyer. After he bought as many as he wanted, he would get ready for the drive to the seaport. I helped him out many times just to take the trip.

We would often lose cattle on these trips for they would stampede and of course we seldom found those that got lost.

At one of our camping places an Irishman had built a pen on rollers. When the cattle stampeded in that pen there was no danger of losing any. When they would run the pen went right with them. It was often carried as far as fifty yards.

In the year 1874 I had another very thrilling experience. On account of such a dry year my father decided to move to a different location. He did not know where to go so he gave me the job of hunting a suitable place.

In August of that year, I started out with two saddle horses and one pack horse. I went in a northwestern direction then turned toward the Concho country. I went as far as the New Mexico boundary line, then started back home.

The country I traveled through was very wild. There were just a few small settlements scattered here and there and the people even seemed uncivilized.

I saw antelope and buffalo by the thousands. It was that year the government was trying to kill out the buffalo. I passed many mule trains loaded with buffalo hides. Even though the country was wild I found some excellent locations for a ranch, especially in the Concho country.

When I returned home and told father about the wild country and people he decided not to move so far away.

So he bought a ranch close to where now stands Wetmore. Later he gave me this ranch. I moved up there in 1877 and lived a bachelor’s life till I married Emma Bueche in 1882.

We lived on that same ranch until 1905. Then I bought a small farm of 500 acres at Fratt about nine miles from San Antonio and left one of my sons in charge of the ranch.

I am now living a quiet, peaceful life on my farm.

Every time I go up to my ranch memories of those old wild, happy days come back to me.

Now I am 65 years old and have a clear record of never being arrested and never was involved in any kind of lawsuit."

----- C.W. Ackermann, "Trail Drivers of Texas," 1925

Shown here: C.W. Ackermann, as scanned from the book

03/09/2026

The Texas Quote of the Day is in regards to the Comanche arrival into Texas in the early 1700s and the impact it had: "They came to the plains from the west, slipping through the canyon passes of the Sangre de Cristo Range in small, roving bands. Like so many other Native groups of the age, the Numunu moved to the great continental grasslands seeking new opportunities, to build a new way of life around the emerging ecological triad of grasses, bison, and horses. They were few in number, possessed little wealth beyond a handful of mounts, and seemed indistinguishable from their more prominent allies, the Utes. New Mexico’s Spanish officials noted their arrival to the southern grasslands in 1706 and wrote it off as a minor event. Yet by midcentury, the Numunu, then bearing the name Comanches, had unhinged the world they had almost unnoticeably entered.

Despite its modest beginnings, the Comanche exodus to the southern plains is one of the key turning points in early American history. It was a commonplace migration that became a full-blown colonizing project with far-reaching geopolitical, economic, and cultural repercussions. It set off a half-century-long war with the Apaches and resulted in the relocation of Apachería—a massive geopolitical entity in its own right—from the grasslands south of the Río Grande, at the very center of northern New Spain. The Comanche invasion of the southern plains was, quite simply, the longest and bloodiest conquering campaign the American West had witnessed—or would witness until the encroachment of the United States a century and a half later.

But the Comanche invasion was far more than a military conquest. As they made a place for themselves in the southern plains, Comanches forged a series of alliances with the adjacent Indian and European powers, rearranging the political and commercial geography of the entire lower midcontinent. Seen from another angle, the Comanche invasion was a momentous cultural experiment.

It brought destruction and death to many, but it also introduced a new, exhilarating way of life—specialized mounted bison hunting—to the Great Plains, irrevocably altering the parameters of human existence on the vast grasslands that covered the continent’s center. Finally, Comanche arrival to the southern plains was a major international event: it marked the beginning of the long decay of Spain’s imperial power in what today is the American Southwest. The Comanche conquest of the southern Great Plains was a watershed event that demolished existing civilizations, recalibrated economic systems, and triggered shock waves that reverberated across North America."

---- Pekka Hämäläinen, "The Comanche Empire," 2008. These paragraphs are the book's opening paragraphs. I read the first 54 pages of this last night. It's fascinating, being at the same time scholarly AND fun to read simultaneously. It won the 2009 Bancroft Prize in American History.

Shown here: A Comanche camp at an unknown date. Photo courtesy the Oklahoma Historical Society .