| |
| Hutchinson
County Highway Markers located in a Road Side Park 6 miles north of Borger.
Photo courtesy Barclay
Gibson, December 2008 |
History
in a Pecan Shell
The name Adobe Walls has been applied to several trading posts north of the
Canadian River.
Fort Adobe
The earliest date is given as 1843 and the first structure
appeared around 1845-46 when an 80 foot square adobe structure was built and aptly
called Fort Adobe.
Indian misbehavior forced the post to close by 1848.
Attempts were made to reestablish the post, but it was finally blown up in frustration,
providing the Panhandle with its first landmark ruins.
First Battle
of Adobe Walls (See Markers)
In
1865 the First Battle of Adobe Walls was fought when Colonel “Kit” Carson and
his force of 335 men (with 75 Indian allies) fought hostile Kiowas, with assorted
Apaches, Comanches, and Arapahoes near the ruins. The casualties were three dead
with 15 wounded for the Army and Indian casualties were estimated to be 60 killed
or wounded.
Second Battle of Adobe Walls (See Markers)
Ten
years later, Dodge City, Kansas merchants opened a trading post/ restaurant/ saloon
a mile from the original ruins. Trade with the area’s buffalo hunters flourished
until June 1874 when the Second Battle of Adobe Walls took place. The main building
was constructed of sod - in the fashion of Kansas buildings - and although the
complex was overwhelmed by a force estimated between 300 to over a thousand Indians,
the defenders held their own with only three dead (one an accident after the fight
was over). The post was abandoned.
Later the Turkey Track Ranch
made its headquarters near the original site. Former Army scout and survivor of
the 1874 fight, Billy Dixon built a
house at the ruins of Fort Adobe. In 1887 Dixon’s house became the community
post office and Dixon became postmaster.
Adobe Walls as touted as an
up and coming settlement in an attempt to recruit settlers, but in truth it never
truly developed. The population never exceeded 20 throughout the 20th Century.
|
A Visit to
Adobe Walls
Photographer's
Note:
"All there
is to be seen of Adobe Walls are Markers and Monuments. Some are on the Stinnett-Spearman
highway and the rest are at the site. There are no structures or remains of any
kind to be seen." - Barclay
Gibson, January 28, 2009 |
First
Battle Of Adobe Walls Site / Markers |
Historical
Marker Text
First
Battle of Adobe Walls
Largest
Indian battle in Civil War. 15 miles east, at ruins of Bent's Old Fort, on the
Canadian.
3,000 Comanches and Kiowas, allies of the South, met 372 Federals
under Colonel Kit Carson, famous scout and mountain man. Though Carson made a
brilliant defense - called greatest fight of his career - the Indian won.
Some
of the same Indians lost in 1874 Battle of Adobe Walls, though they outnumbered
700 to 29 the buffalo hunters whose victory helped open the Panhandle to settlement.
(1964) |
| | First
Battle Of Adobe Walls Site
Photo courtesy Erick Whetstone, 4-22-04 |
Second
Battle of Adobe Walls - Battle Ground Marker
June 27, 1874 |
Marker
in Momory of The Indian Warriors
Who Fell in The Second Battle of Adobe Walls
June 27, 1874 |
Subject: Battle
of Adobe Walls
"The Indians did make a comment as they were leaving
the scene of Adobe Walls. I am surprised that it isn't noted (That I could
find.)
Maybe I know because I am part Caddo. but, when I visited the location
in 1966 with my dad, he told me this. Due to the distance from the mounds that
the bullet traveled and found it's high ground mark to the North, that one Chief
stated: "Shoot today, Kill tomorrow."
In 1966 when we visited, the mounds
were only about 2 feet high, I have not been back since. The walls were formed
in a small square as best that I could tell. The location on the North side of
the Canadian River was located
near a bend in the river that turned in a southerly direction. There were a few
Cottonwood trees near the river and a Texas plaque on a metal post stating the
information about the 1874 battle." - Cal Hunt, February 03, 2011 |
Archeological
Site
The Panhandle-Plains Historical Society acquired six-acres
of the 1874 site in 1923 and archeological digs have turned up a trove of
artifacts. The site is on the National Register and is Texas state archeological
landmark.
Where
to Stay -
Adobe Walls Area Hotels:
Borger
Hotels | Amarillo
Hotels |
|
William
Dixon
Indian Scout 6 US Cavalry |
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 |
 |
From "Water
needed for towns" by Delbert Trew
History states on June
27, 1874, at daylight, a large force of Indians under the command of Quanah
Parker attacked the Buffalo Hide hunting camp of Adobe Walls, located northeast
of Borger just north of the Canadian
River.
Reams of information have been written about the famous battle,
recovered artifacts fill numerous displays in museums, and the battle participants
have been awarded honors and made famous for their efforts during this famous
episode in Panhandle history.
History also leaves the impression the site
seemed to die after the Indians returned and burned it to the ground. This is
not true. Adobe walls do not burn, only the wooden portions of the roof and partitions
inside were destroyed. In fact, according to Cleon Roberts, historian and writer
from Hereford, in his article published in a book titled "The Encyclopedia of
Buffalo Hunters and Skinners," Adobe Walls lived and thrived for about seven more
years after the Indians supposedly left it in ashes.
It seems a stockade
(standing adobe walls) was used as a store run by A.G. Springer in 1875, a year
later. James H. Cator, a famous buffalo hunter and resident living at the nearby
Zulu Stockade, visited the site many times for supplies.
With buffalo hunters, ranchers, cowboys, mustang hunters and others visiting for
some seven years after the Indian battle, there is no doubt Adobe Walls had an
interesting and continuing history and afterlife.
© Delbert Trew |
 |
Bents
Creek Historical Marker
Photo courtesy Barclay
Gibson, December 2008 |
Bird's
Creek by Clay Coppedge
"Sometimes
history remembers the marksman and other times it's the victim whose name attaches
itself to historical immortality. The deciding factor is who writes the history,
and the history of the Old West was not written by the Indians.
That's
why frontiersman Billy Dixon's famous rifle shot in 1874 at the Battle of Adobe
Walls has become part of western history and mythology. It's known as the
shot of the century..." more |
1907
Hutchinson County postal map showing Adobe Walls
(Above "ON" in
"HUTCHINSON")
Courtesy Texas General Land Office |
Texas
Escapes, in its purpose to preserve historic, endangered and vanishing
Texas, asks that anyone wishing to share their local history, stories, and vintage/historic
photos of their town, please contact
us.
Where
to Stay - Adobe Walls Area Hotels:
Borger
Hotels | Amarillo
Hotels | |
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