Comanche Village Massacre

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll pass it along straight. October 21, 1840. Mark that date.

On a bank of the Colorado River, somewhere in what is now Mitchell County, Texas, something happened that the marker calls a massacre — and that word was chosen with purpose, so I'm not going to soften it. A Comanche village. Completely destroyed.

That's not my word, that's the marker's word. Completely. The expedition was commanded by Colonel John Henry Moore, and he brought with him ninety citizen volunteers — mostly residents of Fayette County, men who had answered some call or another and found themselves here, on this riverbank, on this October morning.

Riding alongside them were seventeen Lipan Indians, friendly to the Texan cause, serving as guides. Their chiefs were named Castro and Flacu, and without them, ninety volunteers in unfamiliar country might never have found what they were looking for. They found it.

When it was over, one hundred and twenty-eight Comanche were killed. Thirty-four were captured. Five hundred horses were recovered, along with what the marker describes as much stolen property.

No Texans were killed. Two were wounded. The marker was placed in 1936, nearly a century after the event, and it records these numbers plainly, without decoration.

One hundred and twenty-eight. Thirty-four. Five hundred horses.

Ninety men. Seventeen guides. Two wounded.

Zero Texan dead. Numbers have a way of carrying the weight that words sometimes can't. Out here on the Colorado, those numbers are all that's left.

What the marker says

In this vicinity on a bank of the Colorado October 21, 1840; A Comanche Indian village was completely destroyed and much stolen property recovered including 500 horses; 128 Indians were killed; 34 were captured; The expedition commanded by Colonel John Henry Moore; Consisted of 90 citizen volunteers; Mostly residents of Fayette County; Seventeen friendly Lipan Indians under Chiefs Castro and Flacu served as guides; No Texans were killed and but two wounded. (1936)