page_title: Texas–Indian wars
section_title: Indians in Texas
hierarchical_section_title: Texas–Indian wars / Background / Indians in Texas
context_page_description: The Texas–Indian wars were a series of 19th-century conflicts between settlers in Texas and the Southern Plains Indians. These conflicts began when the first wave of European-American settlers moved into Spanish Texas. They continued through Texas's time as part of Mexico, when more Europeans and Anglo-Americans arrived, to the subsequent declaration of independence by the Republic of Texas. The conflicts did not end until thirty years after Texas joined the United States.
  Although several Indian tribes occupied territory in the area, the preeminent nation was the Comanche, known as the "Lords of the Plains". Their territory, the Comancheria, was the most powerful entity and persistently hostile to the Spanish, the Mexicans, and finally, the Texans. These conflicts lasted from 1820, just before Mexico gained independence from Spain, until 1875, when the last free band of Plains Indians, the Comanches led by Quahadi warrior Quanah Parker, surrendered and moved to the Fort Sill reservation in Oklahoma.
  The half-century struggle between the Plains tribes and the Texans became particularly intense after the Spanish, and then Mexicans, left power in Texas.
context_section_description: The people indigenous to northern Texas including the Panhandle are called the Southern Plains Villagers, including Panhandle culture, who include ancestors of the Wichita peoples. The Tonkawa are a confederacy of tribes indigenous to central Texas. Tribes indigenous to east Texas include the Caddo, including the Adai, Eyeish, Hainai, Kadohadacho, and Nacono, and Kitsai. The Akokisa, Atakapa, Karankawa, and Tamique lived along the Gulf coast.
  The Plains Apache and Kiowa migrated from the west into present-day Texas prior to European contact.
  Until around 1650, the Comanche were part of the Shoshone people living along the upper Platte River in present-day Wyoming. The Comanche emerged as a distinct group around 1650. About this time, they acquired the horse, which allowed them greater mobility in their quest for better hunting grounds. Their original migration took them to the southern Great Plains, into a span of territory extending from the Arkansas River to Central Texas. During that time, their population increased dramatically because of the abundance of buffalo, the use of the horse for hunting and fighting, the adoption of other migrating Shoshone, and women and children taken captive during raids and warfare. Ultimately, their warriors made such effective use of the horse that the Comanche became the most powerful Indian nation of the plains.
  First as Shoshone, their conquest took them to the Southern Plains. There they separated from the Shoshone and emerged as a distinct nation. They based their warfare on speed and calculated violence, developing superb light cavalry skill. In raids, they captured so many children and women of their opponent Indian tribes, keeping and adopting them, that they dramatically increased their population. Those tribes who submitted to Comanche power were given latitude but had to provide food, lodging, and women as tributaries.
  When the Comanche encountered and entered conflict against Spanish colonists, they blocked Spanish expansion to the east from New Mexico and prevented direct communication with the new Spanish settlements north of the Rio Grande. In turn, the Comanche and eventually Apache allies launched deep raids, sending thousands and, at times, tens of thousands of warriors into Mexico; they successfully captured and enslaved thousands of Mexicans. Eventually, the numbers were so large that Hispanics made up nearly thirty percent of the Comanche nation. The Comanches were decentralized; historically, they did not form a single cohesive tribal unit but were divided into almost a dozen autonomous groups. The 12 bands had as many as 45 distinct divisions.  These groups shared the same language and culture but at times fought internally in ritualized combat, even as they cooperated at other times.
  In the 1740s, Tonkawa, Yojuanes, and others settled along the San Gabriel River. The Tonkawa allied with the Bidais, Caddos, Wichitas, Comanche and Yojuanes in 1758 and attacked and decimated the Lipan Apache and the Mission Santa Cruz de San Sabá.
  The Tonkawa continued their southern migration into Texas and northern Mexico where they then allied with the Lipan Apache.
  Also during the 1740s in the Southwest, Spanish settlers sometimes captured American Indian children. Often it was common practice to have the child baptized and then adopt them into their homes, where they were raised to be servants. At first the practice involved primarily Apaches and eventually Comanche children were likewise adopted as servants.
  Prior 1750, the Apaches were highly influential in west Texas, But this changed with the Comanche incursions. Beginning in the 1740s, the Comanche began crossing the Arkansas River and established themselves on margins of the Llano Estacado.  This area extended from southwestern Oklahoma across the Texas Panhandle into New Mexico. The Apaches were driven out in a series of wars, and the Comanche came to control the area. This domain extended south from the Arkansas River across central Texas to the vicinity of San Antonio, including the entire Edwards Plateau west to the
caption: Tonkawa lands
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