When Little Bull Came to Austin

Little Bull was a Comanche captured and brought to Austin where he was jailed briefly in 1874. My interest in Little Bull started while working on a project documenting Comanche activity in Central Texas ca.1869 through the early to mid-1870s; part of a larger project on the history of Comanche Peak by Lake Travis.

I stumbled on the story of his capture as reported in issues of the Austin news in 1874. I was drawn into his story and wondered, what became of Little Bull after being jailed in Austin? It was not until I stumbled on a photo of a Comanche named "Bull" sitting beside Kiowa Chief Satanta in the State Penitentiary in Huntsville that the full arc of his story came together.

The story of Little Bull has, as it turns out, been well documented. But the various sources tell bits and pieces of the story, some conflicting. So in this post I'll compile the highlights from a number of sources, and provide references for anyone wanting to read further.

My thanks to fellow historian Lanny Ottosen for help on research.

Little Bull in prison uniform (left) sitting with Kiowa Chief Satanta in the State Penitentiary in Huntsville. Photo is from DeGolyer Library, Southern Methodist University's digital collection. http://digitalcollections.smu.edu/cdm/ref/collection/jtx/id/257

In 1874 members of "Frontier Battalion" Company D led by the newly commissioned Lt. Daniel Webster Roberts engaged a party of Comanche variously reported in number as 6, 9 or 11 in Menard County. The Special Report of the Adjutant-general reads:

"Company D.—November 21, 1874, Lieutenant D. W. Roberts with a detachment of his company, engaged, in Menard county, a party of 11 Comanche Indians, kill­ing 5 on the field, capturing 1 Indian (Little Bull,) 3 horses. 1 Spencer rifle, and 2 Remington pistols. Lieutenant Roberts gave up pursuit on account of the horses of his command being broken down, but Lieutenant L. P. Beavert, Company B, with Major Jones’ escort of 2 men, overtook the remaining 5 Indians, when they took refuge in a cave, where he fought them until night, killing 1 and wounding 1. Under cover of the intense darkness, the other Indians escaped."

By one newspaper account there may have been several women in the party, with indications they were associated with the 5 that were reported to have escaped to the cave. The women were reported in the news as unaccounted for; they may well have been the ones listed in the Adjutant-general report as escaped, in which case there were perhaps 3.

From newspaper accounts it is doubtful the one listed as "wounded" survived unless they were among those that escaped. Based on newspaper accounts which were quite graphic, it's safe to assume the only Comanches to have survived this encounter were those that escaped, and Little Bull. No quarter was granted anyone else, even one that tried to surrender.

A half dozen rangers escorted the captive to Austin where a large crowd watched as he was paraded up Congress Avenue to the Capitol grounds dressed in his "wild Indian costume, strapped to a mule", then placed in the Travis County jail in Austin.

A Mexican who had been a captive of the Comanches acted as an interpreter and the captive was interviewed by Adjutant General William Steele. The captive said his name was So-no-ya-na, or Little Bull. He and his companions had come down into Texas on "mules" from the reservation in Fort Sill, Oklahoma and were five days into their trip when the battle with the Texas Rangers ensued.

It's hard to know what to make of the reference to "mules"; was this in fact true, or something lost in translation. Roberts' first hand descriptions of events, published in 1914 in his book Rangers and Sovereignty, place the Comanches on horses. But the Adjutant-general report lists only 3 horses recovered and Roberts' book relates that Little Bull was riding double horseback when captured. In short, not a large caballada for 11 persons. Nor was the party well armed if only 1 rifle and 2 pistols were recovered.

Ranger Scott Cooley who had been in the skirmish made arrangements to put Little Bull on "exhibition" to the public at a local opera house in Austin for 25 cent admission; the opera house appears to have been that of Duncan J. Murchison on what was then Pecan Street. As Cox writes, "The show went on, but only until the ranger commander [Adjutant General W. Steele] found out about it and ordered the overly entrepreneurial ranger to cancel the event".

Cooley resigned from the service December 9, 1874, shortly after the skirmish. Cooley was responsible for the execution and mutilation of at least one captured Comanche, and as Parsons and Brice write in their book "mutilation was no stranger to Scott Cooley". Cooley would later become an outlaw, and is said to have killed and scalped fellow Texan John Worley as part of Cooley's part in the "Mason County War". While no explanation for Cooley's resignation from the Texas Rangers was given, his conduct during the skirmish in which Little Bull was a part may have played a role. More in Parsons and Brice's book.

Little Bull was eventually transferred to the State Penitentiary in Huntsville. Of Little Bull's stay at Huntsville, Roberts wrote in his book:

[Once in Austin] "Governor Coke said he was a state's prisoner, but the expense of keeping him did not belong to any one county [he was in Travis County jail] and he sent him to the state prison at Huntsville. He was not required to work and only held there for safe keeping. He found company there in the person of old Santana (sic) .. the old chief recognized him readily and said he [Little Bull] was 23 years old .. Little Bull got fat and saucy, but two years of confinement was too much for him and he died of consumption [TB]".

Roberts (or his publisher?) reference to Satanta as "Santana" is a misnomer I have seen repeated elsewhere. There was an Apache name Santana, and Santa Anna, a Penateka Comanche Chief. The town of Santa Anna, Texas and neighboring mountains are named for him. More at Santa Anna, Handbook of Texas Online.

Contrary to the DeGolyer Library photo description of Little Bull as a "convicted Comanche horse thief", as Roberts alludes to in his book, Little Bull may have not been charged with a crime, but rather held at Huntsville for "safe keeping" for possible future prisoner exchange.

Little Bull's death was reported in the The Austin Weekly Statesman, Jan 7th, 1878. His obituary read simply: "Little Bull, the Indian that was captured by the rangers, and who was kept in Austin for a short time, has died of consumption in the penitentiary." Little Bull was likely buried at Huntsville Prison Cemetery.

Notes & References

News Articles (available on Newspapers.com)

Austin American-Statesman (Austin, Texas) · 28 Nov 1874, Sat · Page 3. Report of skirmish in which Little Bull was captured. This article reports a party of nine Indians; five killed; one captured. That leaves three unaccounted. Other articles indicate women may have been present and whose fate was unknown; perhaps these are the three unaccounted for in this article.

Austin American-Statesman (Austin, Texas) · 28 Nov 1874, Sat · Page 3. Reports Little Bull in jail in Austin; interviewed.

Austin American-Statesman (Austin, Texas) · 29 Nov 1874, Sun · Page 3. Article titled "Little Bull on Exhibition". Reports Little Bull being put on "exhibition" at Murchison's opera house.

Austin American-Statesman (Austin, Texas) · 29 Nov 1874, Sun · Page 3. Article titled "Later Indian News". More reporting on skirmish in which Little Bull was captured. This article seems to indicate there were women (unspecified number) present but does not specify their fate.

The Austin Weekly Statesman (Austin, Travis, Texas, United States of America) · 3 Dec 1874, Thu · Page 3. Another report in December of the skirmish in which Little Bull was captured.

The Austin Weekly Statesman (Austin, Texas) · 17 Jan 1878, Thu · Page 2. Reports death of Little Bull.

Austin American-Statesman (Austin, Texas) · 7 Apr 1875, Wed · Page 3. Advertisement identifying location of the D.J. Murchison opera house as being on Pecan Street. The opera house was apparently on the second floor over a livery stable run by Murchison.

Bios and Books

19th Century Shining Star: Captain Daniel Webster Roberts by Chuck Parsons. Texas Ranger Dispatch magazine. Originally published by the Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum from 2000 to 2011. Says rangers were camped on the banks of the San Saba River, twenty miles south of Fort McKavett, but the San Saba runs north of Fort McKavett (?)
https://www.texasranger.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/BIO-Daniel-Webster-Roberts.pdf

Texas Ranger N. O. Reynolds, the Intrepid. Chuck Parsons & Donaly E. Brice, 2014
https://books.google.com/books/about/Texas_Ranger_N_O_Reynolds_the_Intrepidhtml?id=UrBKBAAAQBAJ 

Gunfights & Sites in Texas Ranger History. Mike Cox, p. 198. Short discussion of Little Bull having been put on "exhibition" in Austin.

Rangers and Sovereignty by Dan W. Roberts. In May 1874, Dan W. Roberts (Daniel Webster Roberts) was given his commission as second lieutenant of Company "D" of the Ranger Battalion; he would remain with them for the next eight years, later becoming Captain. His account of his time with the Texas Rangers, Rangers and Sovereignty, was published in 1914. He passed away in 1935. Roberts' book is a first hand account of the skirmish and capture of Little Bull. Worth a read, but I found it hard to reconcile with facts related in the Special Report of the Adjutant-general, and with news accounts published immediately after the incident, e.g. the execution of a Comanche that tried to surrender. I suspect that by 1914 when the book was published, there was a desire to "tone things down".
https://books.google.com/books?id=KldAAAAAYAAJ&lpg=PA55&ots=y7dqgFTQdZ&dq=Rangers%20and%20Sovereignty.%20Dan%20W.%20Roberts%20little-bull&pg=PA55#v=onepage&q=Rangers%20and%20Sovereignty.%20Dan%20W.%20Roberts%20little-bull&f=false

Special Report of the Adjutant-general of the State of Texas: September, 1884 - Texas. Adjutant General's Office, pages 25, 41, 46. Link below; search for "Little Bull"
https://archive.org/details/specialreportofa00texa/page/n2

Other

Satanta, Find A Grave. Rather than endure life in prison, Satanta killed himself on October 11, 1878, by diving headlong from a high window of the prison hospital. The death of Larry McMurtry's character Blue Duck in his novel Lonesome Dove is generally taken to be based on Satanta's suicide. He was buried in the prison cemetery until 1963, when he was re-interred in the cemetery at Fort Sill.
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/3143/satanta

Satanta, Handbook of Texas
https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fsa33

Mason County War, Handbook of Texas
https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/jcm01