[Texas]: [Military]:

[Fort Richardson Courts Martial Document].

San Antonio, Tx. January 27, 1872. [1]p. of manuscript on a folio sheet. Old folds, short tear to one fold line, some creasing to top edge, light spotting. Very good. Item #5395

A true copy of Special Orders No. 18, comprising a list of Army officers assembled to preside over an upcoming general court martial proceeding at short-lived Fort Richardson in north-central Texas in 1872. Fort Richardson was a U.S. Army installation in frontier Texas and part of a system of forts established to provide protection for immigrants in north-central and western Texas against attacks by hostile Native Americans. The fort was situated just seventy miles from Indian Territory. The present document lists ten Army officers of the 4th and 11th Cavalry serving at Fort Richardson who are appointed to oversee the upcoming general court martial. The order was issued at the behest of noted Texas Army commander Colonel Joseph Jones Reynolds, and is signed as a true copy by the adjutant of the 4th Cavalry.

For an idea of the activities taking place around Fort Richardson at the time of the present document: "In May of 1871 Gen. William T. Sherman visited Fort Richardson as part of a fact-finding tour of the Texas frontier. While there, he received word that a freight-hauling wagon train had been attacked by a large party of Indians on the Salt Creek Prairie twenty miles from the fort.... In response to these events, General Sherman authorized Fort Richardson's commanding officer, Col. Ranald S. Mackenzie, Fourth Cavalry, to begin offensive operations against any Indians not on the reservation. Over a fifteen-month period Mackenzie led four major expeditions from Richardson into the Panhandle of Texas. In late 1871 he fought a running battle with the Quahadi Comanches, led by their famous war chief, Quanah Parker. In the summer of 1872 Mackenzie explored the unmapped Llano Estacado, and late that year, on the North Fork of the Red River, he located and attacked the encampment of the Comanche chief Mow-way, killing fifty warriors and capturing 130 women and children" - Handbook of Texas online.

Price: $350