Gunfighter

yellowdog762 · Joined: 23 Jul 2007 Posts: 46

The Boy Captives
Clinton L. Smith
ISBN: 0-94369-24-9
First published in 1927.

This is a hard book to locate. I found it in a small store near my deer lease in Leakey, Texas; not far from where the events took place.

This book is the true story of two brothers captured by indians near Dripping Springs, Texas in 1871. These boys were some spunky lads used to hard living. The author recounts that as a child his family only had flour bread around Christmas time and when his family ran out of coffee his mother would roast and grind okra seeds as a substitute.

Several of the family’s neighbors were killed by indians and the brothers even eluded capture several times. Eventually though, as one may guess from the title, the boys were captured by Comanche. One brother was sold to Geronimo and one was sold to another war chief. Both were adopted into the indian’s families. One of the brothers was old enough to be taken along on some raids, usually as a “horse holder” while the older braves did the actual fighting.

I found the methods the Indians used to identify each other at long distances very interesting. After reading that the Comanche would often immediately attack any non Indian they encountered, I better understood why they were so feared.

During the five years that the boys were with the Comanche they roamed from Texas to the Rookies and even to the Pacific Ocean. Eventually they were reunited with their families and were thus able to personally relate their story.