Although far from the minds of American's today, the Battle of Pease River was a defining moment in our history that's about to find fulfillment through the Natural Law of Cause and Effect. It was late-December in 1860 when twenty-three-year-old Sul Ross lead a group of Texas Rangers up the steep canyon walls of the Pease River Valley next to Mule Creek (near present-day Fort Worth) bent on obliterating a Comanche Indian camp. Only what they discovered wasn't one of the small nomadic bands that sprung up all across the Great Plains, but the main artery of the Comanche Nation. Charles Goodnight, a twenty-four-year-old "destined to become one of Texas great cattle ranchers" 1, had launched a full expedition from Fort Belknap to Pease River and recruited Ross as the commander.
Who were the Comanches?
Certainly at its height, the Comanche Nation numbered well over ten thousand, and their territory extended over the breadth of the Great Plains from Mexico to the Northern border. They were known as some of the most talented horsemen who ever lived, implementing the first mounted war parties, thus conquering battles with other Indian Nations and foreign settlers. But, most of all they embodied a true free society (albeit not for the women).
"The Comanche male was gloriously, astoundingly free. He was subject to no church...no priest class, no military societies, no state, no police, no public law, no domineering clans or powerful families, no strict rules of personal behavior...free to come and go as he pleased. This was seen by many people...as an American sort of freedom." 2
Move to winter camp that never was
On that late December day in 1860, the Comanches never anticipated the white man traversing so far into their native lands. They were wrong, and their mistake came at the worst time. The village was gearing up to move to their winter camp with "sixty-nine pack-mule loads of buffalo meat-something more than fifteen thousand pounds of it-and three hundred seventy horses" 3 all captured by Captain Ross's Rangers. It was more of a massacre than a battle; a few braves, but mostly women and children were killed. Although the Comanches regarded the battle as a disgrace, nevertheless Chief Peta Nocana died a gallant death defending his tribe.
Details of squaws or braves killed were never a part of the fiery tale that spread through the taverns of Texas; in the eyes of the Texans it was a turn in the war to decimate the Comanche Nation. They didn't understand how American expansion into the lush grassland of the Great Plains forced the buffalo to move south and away which caused starvation and deprivation to thousands of Indian lives.
A nation's food supply is lost
In response to the Rangers' hostility, Comanches looted and attacked the Texas homesteads with a savage vengeance, raping the women and destroying homes by fire. Even so, that bleak December day, a tear ripped through the heart of their motherland that has yet to be repaid: the Comanche's food supply was compromised that winter of 1860-not the entire nation, but many souls faced starvation.
It's possible that the Dust Bowl years of 1930-40 on the Great Plains accounted for some retribution when severe drought caused an extreme loss-100,000,000 acres of farmland became useless dirt. But, as painful as that was, it may not be considered a completed circle.
The Natural Law of Cause and Effect still turns in the palm of the Infinite's Hand. We will all suffer the loss of our nation's food supply. But, with compassionate understanding, then to the most extent, you'll be freed from the results of our nation's past action.
References
Gwynne, S. C. Empire of the Summer Moon. Ch. 12. Scribner, Copyright 2010
Ibid, Ch. 4
Bedford, Hilory G. Texas Indian Troubles. p. 73. The account also appears in J. W. Wilbarger, Indian Depredations in Texas
