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Post by linefacedscrivener on Nov 19, 2019 13:58:25 GMT -5
One thing that has become closely associated with Robert E. Howard is the Post Oak tree. As there was no known title for Howard's semi-autobiography novel, Glenn Lord gave it the title Post Oaks and Sand Roughs. Recently, the Robert E. Howard Foundation released this novel along with other autobiographical material written by Howard. The Post Oak is a tree native to Texas and Howard wrote about it to both August Derleth and H.P. Lovecraft. His writings of the tree are almost lyrical, so I wanted to give each of the REH quotes: “There are two main post oak-belts in Texas, known as the East and West Cross-timbers; the divide is in the West Cross-timbers. This post-oak growth is low, scrubby and thick; in the summer it is not unpleasing to the sight, densely cloaking the hills and valleys as it does, but in the winter it presents the most dreary, drab appearance imaginable. The motif of Nature then is a weary brown – brown earth, brittle brown trees – even the sky seems brownish. At times the effect is distinctly one of gaunt savagery.” —Robert E. Howard to August Derleth, December 29, 1932 “The eastern lowlands are very different from this country. Winter pauses at the fringes of the hills. There are rich rolling prairies and warm misty riverlands, where the grass and leaves are ripe and green long after the post oaks stand gaunt and naked in the hills.” —Robert E. Howard to August Derleth, November 28, 1935 “Post oaks are the blight of this country, them, and lack of water. In the early days, this was all rolling prairies and bare hills, covered with sweet mesquite grass, and with myriad springs and creeks that ran all year. Fencing land ruins springs; the plowed dirt washes into the creeks and chokes them up. Weeds always follow the white man, and they stifled the grass and drove it westward. The Indians kept the land burnt off in each proper season and kept off the post oaks. The land was fat and rich, an ideal cattle country. But the farmers came and fenced and ploughed, and the post oaks grew, and the springs dried up, and the land washed and became poor and sterile.” —Robert E. Howard to H.P. Lovecraft, September and October 1933 The following is a short video that describes the Post Oak and its environment.
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Post by linefacedscrivener on Nov 20, 2019 8:24:18 GMT -5
“Fort Griffin is a sleepy little village, scarcely big enough to even be called a village, slumbering at the foot or the hill where stand the ruins of the old fort. But once Fort Griffin was the toughest, wildest and wooliest town on this continent, back in the sixties and seventies when it was crowded with cavalrymen, buffalo hunters, gunmen, gamblers, reckless cowboys, horse thieves – the salt of the earth and the scum of the earth mingled in a mad chaos.” —Robert E. Howard to August Derleth, September 4, 1933 “I stopped at old Fort Griffin, on the Clear Fork of the Brazos, now almost vanished, and presenting no such elaborate ruins as McKavett. But in its day it was the toughest, wildest, and wooliest town west of the Mississippi. The barracks were on a hill, the town at the foot. Seven men have been hanged in the same oak tree there, at one time.” —Robert E. Howard to H.P. Lovecraft, September and October, 1933 “The salt of the earth and the scum of the earth mingled in a mad chaos” is a line that demonstrates why I am so interested in Howard’s take on Texas history – what a great turn of phrase! Fort Griffin, named after Civil War Union General Charles Griffin, served as part of a defensive line of forts to protect Texans against the Comanches and other Indian Tribes in what eventually became the Red River War (1874) and the Buffalo Wars (1876-1877). The upper portion of land was where the fort was located, but down in the flats below, a settlement developed and it became known as one of the wildest towns in the west, as Howard well describes. The following video comes from the Fort Griffin State Historic site and is shown there on three large screens, hence the letterbox view with three distinct boxes:
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Post by linefacedscrivener on Nov 21, 2019 8:04:17 GMT -5
What does the cow say? "Moo." What does the Texas cow say? "Moo, Ya'll!" Sorry, I had to include that - family joke. I included it because this particular post is about Texas Longhorn Cattle. “The few cattle brought into Texas by the first settlers, work-oxen and milk cows, were scrubby, stunted mostly; it was the longhorn cattle, brought from Africa originally by way of Spain and the West Indies which formed the herds of the first American ranchers.” —Robert E. Howard to H.P. Lovecraft, May 1935 “The first cowmen that came up the Chisolm were not looking for trouble. They had enough trouble on the trail, fighting their way through wildernesses swarming with outlaws and hostile Indians. All they wanted to do was to find a market for their longhorns. They did, and money flowed like water through the Kansas cowtowns, and thence all over the United States.” —Robert E. Howard to H.P. Lovecraft, March 6, 1933 “The Texas puncher of the old days was a dangerous and boisterous varmint, still when the boys had hazed a herd of longhorns up from the Border, through flooded rivers, blizzards, deserts and hostile Indian country, it was natural that they’d want to blow off steam. Abilene owes its very existence to the big Texas herds that flowed through it to the markets of Chicago and the East.” —Robert E. Howard to H.P. Lovecraft, December 1930 “The old time cowboy with the Spanish mustang and the longhorn steer has followed the raiding Comanche, the buffalo hunter, the whole-sale cattle rustler and the old scouts into silence and oblivion.” —Robert E. Howard to H.P. Lovecraft, January 1931 Fort Griffin State Historic Site, the subject of my last post, is also home to part of the official longhorn herd of Texas – one of two official animals of Texas. The Texas longhorn is the official large mammal of Texas, while the armadillo is the official small mammal of Texas. The Texas longhorn were brought to Texas by the Spanish and when Texans went off to fight in the Civil War, they proliferated. Those returning from the war realized the north needed meat and they had cattle, so the cattle drives north to the railheads became, as Howard describes, a hard way to make a lot of money. As the American railroad system expanded, the great American cattle drive, as Howard also notes, went into "silence and oblivion." The following video is about the official Texas Longhorn herd at Fort Griffin:
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Post by linefacedscrivener on Nov 21, 2019 19:08:07 GMT -5
The armadillo is the official small mammal of Texas, but did Howard ever mention this cute little critter? Yep. Once: “Not long ago I surprized an armadillo just a block or so off the main business part of town, one night.” —Robert E. Howard to H.P. Lovecraft, May 1934
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Post by linefacedscrivener on Nov 22, 2019 10:19:06 GMT -5
“Texas has always been in a period of transition, changing from something to something else.” —Robert E. Howard to H.P. Lovecraft, September and October 1933 The six flags of Texas mark the political-governance aspect of Howard's quote above, but, in reality, Texas has been constantly changing in more ways than just the flags she has flown. While it is true, the only three things guaranteed in life are death, taxes, and change, Texas has undergone an incredible amount of transitions throughout its history, including politically, socially, economically, technologically, religiously, etc. Here is the full passage of Howard's description of the continuing transition, both historically and during his time-period: “Texas has always been in a period of transition, changing from something to something else. Even before the Anglo-Celts came in from the east, there had been change - priests building missions in the wilderness, Indians submitting to conversion, then rebelling, and hostile tribes sweeping down to destroy the budding Spanish land-owners’ civilization. Then there was change from Latin to American dominance, during the first of the period in which there was transition from Spanish to Mexican rule, with resultant chaos. The white settlers changed their government by force of arms, and had to adapt themselves economically, too. There was transition from wilderness to farms, and during that time many were changing too, from agriculture to cattle-raising. others from the grain crops of the mid-west to cotton growing. On the heels of these transitions, before they were complete was the Civil War and the necessity of adjusting conditions to the reality of free niggers, free labor, and the abominable carpet bag rule, which latter was soon kicked out bodily. “But another change was necessary, in shifting the cattle market from New Orleans and Shreveport to the towns of Kansas. Steel ribbons of railroads creeping westward brought a wild prosperity, and the cattle-pauper of the day before became the cattle-king of the next day. Herds rolled north and westward, to Kansas, to Montana, to Canada, to New Mexico, filling the great empty lands with cattle and men, peopling the west, stocking the ranges - even before this movement was done, there came the squatters, the small farmers, with their wire fences, cutting up the ranges, ruining the great cattle barons; the necessity of fencing, of adjusting to smaller, more cramped conditions; of cowboys to find a new range, to become farmers, to settle down in small humdrum jobs - great God, no wonder so many of them turned outlaw. Then the growth of towns, the intricasies of business, and then the rush of oil booms, and all the time smaller changes, like the irrigating of the Lower Rio Grande, to change brush-wood wastes into blossoming orange groves, and the opening of ports, new markets and new industries. Transition? Why, heavens, there’s never been anything else in Texas! “In the years I’ve been in this section I’ve seen it change from a purely agricultural section to an industrial and oil producing section, and back again to an agricultural country. And less than a generation before I came here, it had changed from a cattle country to a farming country; and a generation after I am gone, it will change again into a land of irrigated gardens and intensified stock farming. Post oaks are the blight of this country, them, and lack of water. In the early days, this was all rolling prairies and bare hills, covered with sweet mesquite grass, and with myriad springs and creeks that ran all year. Fencing land ruins springs; the plowed dirt washes into the creeks and chokes them up. Weeds always follow the white man, and they stifled the grass and drove it westward. The Indians kept the land burnt off in each proper season and kept off the post oaks. The land was fat and rich, an ideal cattle country. But the farmers came and fenced and ploughed, and the post oaks grew, and the springs dried up, and the land washed and became poor and sterile. It’s hard to blame the old settlers because of their carelessness. For generations they’d been pushing leisurely westward, with always plenty of land when they wore out one farm. Suddenly they woke up and realized that there was no more free land; and their descendants are only now beginning to learn how to build up the land and make it rich again. “Oh, I suppose I shouldn’t bore you with all this stuff. It must seem very tiresome to a dweller in an industrial section. But after all, the food of the nation does come from the soil. I’ve gotten clean off what I started to say, which was that Texas is, and always has been, in a state of transition difficult to appreciate.” —Robert E. Howard to H.P. Lovecraft, September and October 1933
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Post by linefacedscrivener on Nov 23, 2019 8:31:37 GMT -5
"You struck a responsive chord in me when you mentioned turkey dinner. Thanksgiving! Baked turkey, with dressing made of biscuit and cornbread crumbs, sage, onions, eggs, celery salt and what not; hot biscuits and fresh butter yellow as gold; rich gravy; fruit cakes containing citron, candied pineapple and cherries, currents, raisins, dates, spices, pecans, almonds, walnuts; pea salad; pumpkin pie, apple pie, mince pie with pecans; rich creamy milk, chocolate, or tea - my Southern ancestors were quite correct in adopting the old New England holiday. "I hope you had as enjoyable Thanksgiving this year as I did." -Robert E. Howard to H.P. Lovecraft, December 1932 Happy Thanksgiving from deep in the heart of Texas to everyone at The Swords of Robert E. Howard! "Some Line-Faced Scrivener"
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Post by Von K on Nov 25, 2019 10:38:13 GMT -5
Happy thanksgiving linefacedscrivener! And thanks for one of the best threads on the forum.
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Post by linefacedscrivener on Dec 2, 2019 8:06:17 GMT -5
Robert E. Howard’s “An Unborn Empire” is back after a week of eating too much. I hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving. “Remember the Alamo! Remember Goliad!” was the war cry of the Texas Revolution. While most remember the Alamo, not as many remember Goliad, or, more specifically, the Goliad Massacre. Robert E. Howard did not forget. On March 27, 1836, Santa Ana, the General and President of Mexico, ordered the mass slaughter of the Texian Army prisoners captured during the Battle of Coleto. An estimated 400 prisoners were murdered at the Presidio La Bahia, renamed by the Texians: Fort Defiance. Some of the soldiers feigned death and escaped, while others, non-soldiers, were released. Because of this, word got out and the Texians became more determined than ever to defeat Santa Ana and gain their independence. Robert E. Howard mentioned Goliad on several occasions in his letters to H.P. Lovecraft. The first was talking simply about the town and what it was like from one of his visits: “I believe Goliad, Victoria and Gonzales are, in many ways, the most picturesque-looking small towns I’ve ever seen in Texas. Many of their buildings are very old, and the towns are laid out on the old Spanish style, with broad plazas. The population is now largely mixed with German, especially in Victoria, and as many of these Teutonic emigrants came in the ‘80’s and ‘90’s, and even earlier, they have added their part to the German influence. After their stirring history most of these southern towns seem sleeping - quiet and drowsy, they live in dreams, while the frontier has moved on, with it the sweep and change of progress and events.” —Robert E. Howard to H.P. Lovecraft, August 10, 1931 Later, in that same letter, he began a discussion about weapons and mentioned Goliad in relation to Mexican and American sabers: “Mexican swords are generally more curved than those used by Americans. I noted this recently during a trip to the battlefield of Goliad where Fannin and his men were trapped by the Mexican army. I saw two sabers - a Mexican arm and an American - both of which were used in that battle.” —Robert E. Howard to H.P. Lovecraft, August 10, 1931 Four years later, in one of their famous exchanges on barbarism versus civilization, Howard raises the issue of the barbaric actions of the civilized Mexicans at Goliad: “At Goliad there was little fighting but much cold-blooded slaughter. The Mexicans, finding that the Texans wished to be shot in the breast, so as not to have their features mutilated, facing the enemy unblindfolded, took pleasure in blindfolding them and shooting them in the back of the head.” —Robert E. Howard to H.P. Lovecraft, May 1935 Then later that same year, Howard really drives home the point specifically citing the massacre at Goliad. “You say massacres are exclusively limited to barbarians; since you classify my pioneer ancestors and their associates with barbarians, then if you are to prove your point, you should show where they wallowed in slaughter and butchery. But you can’t show one incident where they ever made a slaughter of women and children and helpless men. They did not even retaliate with a massacre for Goliad and the other atrocities committed by the Mexicans. They spared Santa Ana’s life, and the lives of all Mexicans who laid down their arms.” —Robert E. Howard to H.P. Lovecraft, December 5, 1935 The following video by the Texas Historical Commission is a unique 360 degree presentation of the Massacre at Goliad. It takes a little getting used to, but you can toggle around the video while you watch it.
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Post by linefacedscrivener on Dec 2, 2019 19:29:42 GMT -5
“In 1836, when the Texans were fighting for their freedom, the Comanches were particularly bold in raiding the scattered settlements.” —Robert E. Howard to August Derleth, January 1933 A little something different this time. Howard mentions how during the battle for Texas Independence, the Comanche were bold in attacking the settlements that many of the men had left behind. While visiting the Longhorn Caverns near Austin, Texas, the guides tell just such a tale of a young lady from San Antonio being captured by the Comanches on a raid and taken to the caverns that were then called Indian Caverns. A young Texas Ranger set out to rescue her from the Comanche Buffalo Hump. After hearing this story, I searched and searched for evidence of this story, but, finding none, decided to write a short story of the tale. It was just published in the online magazine Frontier Tales and can be read here: "Rescue from Indian Caverns"Enjoy!
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Post by charleshelm on Dec 2, 2019 21:03:49 GMT -5
I have spent a lot of time around Goliad and Victoria, been through Gonzales a bunch, and been to both missions in the Goliad area. Worthwhile to see them.
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Post by linefacedscrivener on Dec 3, 2019 7:50:16 GMT -5
I have spent a lot of time around Goliad and Victoria, been through Gonzales a bunch, and been to both missions in the Goliad area. Worthwhile to see them. I definitely agree with you and Howard - that area is some of the most beautiful country in Texas. That area south of 10, east of 37 and west of 77 is an area that doesn't seem to be widely visited in Texas, but really should be. There is so much to see. From some of the painted churches and Gonzales, where the famous "Come and Take It" flag comes from, to Shiner for the Beer and Sausages, down to Goliad and on to the Aransas Bay, there is so much to see and do. The other thing is that the area is probably not too vastly different from when Howard visited the area.
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Post by linefacedscrivener on Dec 3, 2019 8:01:09 GMT -5
August Derleth had written to Howard about the Indian Tribes in his state (Wisconsin), so Howard responded with a description of the Indians Tribes in Texas. Other than some variant spellings, it is no wonder some people thought Howard was a professor. “The Indians of Texas were: the Cenis, who lived in the vicinity of the Neches and the Trinity Rivers, and were first encountered by La Salle in 1686 – they soon became extinct; the Adaes, who lived near what is now San Augustine, and who disappeared about 1820; the Carankaways, who lived adjacent to Galveston Bay – a ferocious, cannibalistic race, akin to the Caribs, they were destroyed in a great battle with the Spaniards in 1744; the Jaranamas, Tamiquez, and Anaquas, small clans living on the lower reaches of the San Antonio River; the Coushattis, a branch of the Muskogees, living in the lower valley of the Trinity – they were broken in the battle of Medina; the Alabamas, who lived along the Neches; the Seminoles, who came to Texas with the Cherokees – others later migrated from Florida, and took up their abode near the Border; the Tonkaways, who lived along the Brazos whence they spread to the Guadalupe – they were destroyed on their reservation by the Comanches in 1864; the Lipans, who were a strong and important tribe, in and about Bandera County, until dealt a terrific defeat by Bigfoot Wallace and his rangers, after which the survivors migrated to Mexico; the Apaches, who need no advertisement – I doubt their assumed kinship with the Lipans; the Carrizos, who were of the Pueblo stock, living along the Rio Grande – they were absorbed by the Mexicans; the Tiguas, Pueblos, living near what is now El Paso; the Caddos, who lived mainly in the eastern part of the state – they included the Keechies, Ionies, Wacos, Nacogdoches, Ayish, Tawakana, Towash, Wichitas, Cachatas, Tejas, and Anadarkos; the Kickapoos, who were driven westward by the white drift – many crossed into Mexico; the Cherokees, who emigrated to Texas between 1822 and 1829, were broken in the war of 1839, and moved to reservations in Oklahoma, later; the Delawares, immigrants from the eastern states, and friendly to the white men; the Comanches, the strongest tribe in Texas, and the lords of the western plains – a more ferocious race never trod this continent.” —Robert E. Howard to August Derleth, January 1933 The following is a short video that, while modern, almost imitates what Howard wrote above, as it covers the wide array of Indian Tribes in Texas, providing, at the end, and update on which Tribes still have a presence today.
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Post by linefacedscrivener on Dec 4, 2019 10:11:54 GMT -5
“Have you heard of Bigfoot Wallace?” —Robert E. Howard to H.P. Lovecraft, October 1931 Robert E. Howard mentioned Bigfoot Wallace when he wrote about the Texas Rangers, which I covered in an earlier post, and when he talked about the various Indian Tribes of Texas, my most recent post. Howard talks about Wallace often in his letters to H.P. Lovecraft and many have written of the influence Wallace had on Howard and his writings. So, I thought I would start a series of posts on William Alexander Anderson "Bigfoot" Wallace who was born on April 3, 1817 and died on January 7, 1899. Here is how REH first described Wallace to Lovecraft: “When you come to the Southwest you will hear much of him, and I’ll show you his picture, painted full length, hanging on the south wall of the Alamo - a tall, rangy man in buckskins, with rifle and bowie, and with the features of an early American statesman or general [the picture above]. Direct descendent of William Wallace of Scotland, he was Virginia-born and came to Texas in 1836 to avenge his cousin and his brother, who fell at La Bahia with Fannin. He was at the Salado, he marched on the Mier Expedition and drew a white bean; he was at Monterey. He is perhaps the greatest figure in Southwestern legendry. Hundreds of tales - a regular myth-cycle - have grown up around him. But his life needs no myths to ring with great-taking adventure and heroism. On his first adventure into the wilds he was captured in the Palo Pinto hills by the Keechies and was tied to the stake to be burned, when an old squaw rescued him and adopted him in place of a son, slain recently in a fight with another tribe. As an Indian Wallace lived for three months, hunting with them, riding with them on their forays against other tribes and against the Mexicans. Once with them he drove a raid into Mexico and in desperate hand-to-hand fighting with the Mexicans, won his name as a warrior. But he wearied of the life, and escaped to his own people again. He was scout, ranger, hunter, pioneer and soldier. When he settled on a ranch in the Medina country, he made a treaty with the Lipans that they would not steal his cattle. They kept that treaty until they decided to move westward. When they moved, they took Bigfoot’s stock with them - every head of it. Bigfoot was slow to anger; he was swift in vengeance. He went to San Antonio and was given charge of a ranger company of some thirty men. With them he hunted the thieves to the head-waters of the Guadalupe River. In the ensuing battle two white men bit the dust, but forty-eight red warriors went to the Happy Hunting Grounds, and the Lipans dwindled from that day, and in a comparatively short time, were but a memory of a once-powerful tribe.” —Robert E. Howard to H.P. Lovecraft, October 1931
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Post by linefacedscrivener on Dec 5, 2019 11:01:52 GMT -5
“A year so ago a man of fair education, raised in this state since infancy, asked me if I knew anything about a fellow named Bigfoot Wallace! Ye gods! Even I can remember when Bigfoot’s exploits were subjects for innumerable tales of the old-timers.” —Robert E. Howard to H.P. Lovecraft, November 2, 1932 One can only wonder if Howard had remained alive and continued writing about Texas, would he have written about William "Bigfoot" Wallace? I imagine he would have as many other Texas authors have written about his colorful life. One famous Texas author, J. Frank Dobrie, wrote of Wallace for the Handbook of Texas. If you link to the modern Handbook of Texas Online today, they still have what Dobrie wrote about Wallace on their website. If you are not familiar with Dobrie, he was a Texas folklorist who wrote from the 1920s into the early 1960s, mostly about Texas. Here is how he summed up Wallace's life: WALLACE, WILLIAM ALEXANDER ANDERSON [BIGFOOT] (1817–1899). William Alexander Anderson (Bigfoot) Wallace, soldier and Texas Ranger, the son of Andrew and Jane Ann (Blair) Wallace, was born in Lexington, Virginia, on April 3, 1817. He was descended from Highlanders William Wallace and Robert Bruce, and the clan instinct was strong in him. In 1836, when he learned that a brother and a cousin had been shot down in the Goliad Massacre, he set out for Texas to "take pay out of the Mexicans." A good many years later he told John C. Duval that he believed the account had been squared. Wallace was a magnificent physical specimen. In his prime he stood six feet two inches "in his moccasins," and weighed 240 pounds without surplus fat. For a while he tried farming in the vicinity of La Grange, but the occupation was not to his taste. In the spring of 1840 he moved to Austin, saw the last buffalo of the region run down Congress Avenue, decided that people were getting too thick, and moved to San Antonio. He was with the Texans who fought Gen. Adrián Woll's invading Mexican army near San Antonio in 1842 and then volunteered for the Somervell and Mier expeditions. Some of his most graphic memories were of his experiences in Perote Prison. As soon as he was released, he joined the Texas Rangers under John Coffee (Jack) Hays and was with the rangers in the Mexican War. In the 1850s Wallace commanded, as captain, a ranger company of his own, fighting border bandits as well as Indians. He was so expert at trailing that he was frequently called upon to track down runaway slaves trying to get to Mexico. He drove a mail hack from San Antonio to El Paso and on one occasion, after losing his mules to Indians, walked to El Paso and ate twenty-seven eggs at the first Mexican house he came to-before going on to town for a full meal. During the Civil War he helped guard the frontier against the Comanche Indians. At one time Wallace had a little ranch on the Medina River on land granted him by the state of Texas. The later years of his life were spent in Frio County in the vicinity of a small village named Bigfoot. He never married. He was a mellow and convivial soul who liked to sit in a roomy rawhide-bottomed chair in the shade of his shanty and tell over the stories of his career. Occasionally he rode to San Antonio; less occasionally he would go to Austin and consort with "Texas John" Duval. Wallace was as honest as daylight but liked to stretch the blanket and embroider his stories. He read and was no illiterate frontiersman, but he summed up in himself all the frontiers of the Southwest. His picturesqueness, humor, vitality, and representativeness of old-timy free days, free ways, and free land have broken down the literalness of every writer who has treated of him. Without directing events, he was there when they happened-and he was a tale-teller. As a folk hero he belongs more to social than to military history. Wallace died on January 7, 1899, and shortly thereafter the Texas legislature appropriated money for moving his body to the State Cemetery. Source: Handbook of Texas Online, J. Frank Dobie, "WALLACE, WILLIAM ALEXANDER ANDERSON [BIGFOOT]," accessed December 03, 2019, www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fwa36.
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Post by linefacedscrivener on Dec 6, 2019 11:15:42 GMT -5
“Yes, Bigfoot Wallace was really a gigantic figure in the old days of the Southwest, when individual prowess and courage meant so much in the development of the frontier.” —Robert E. Howard to H.P. Lovecraft, December 9, 1931 In the December letter quoted above, Howard was replying to Lovecraft who had replied to Howard's October letter in which he told a tale of William "Bigfoot" Wallace. Reading Howard's story, one does have to wonder if Wallace was not one more motivating factor for the development of his most famous character: Conan of Cimmeria. Howard's story to Lovecraft follows: “Tales, and many tales, are told of his adventures as a scout, a ranger, a soldier and a stage-driver from San Antonio to El Paso, but the tale I like best is the tale of his battle with 'the big Indian', the epic combat of all the Southwest. “The rangers had trailed the Indians to the head-waters of the Llano. They went into camp, seeing at sundown the signal-smokes going up. Bigfoot was restless; that turbulent, individualist spirit of his would not let him lie down and sleep quietly with the enemy near, while other men stood guard. A few hours before dawn he slipped out of the camp and glided through the mesquite and chaparral like a ghost. Daybreak found him traversing a steep narrow canyon, which bent suddenly to the left. As he made the bend, he found himself face to face with a giant painted brave. In fact, they caromed together with such force that both were thrown to the earth by the compact. Simultaneously they bounded to their feet and for a flashing instant stood frozen, the grey eyes of the white man glaring into the flaming black eyes of the Indian. Then as if by mutual consent, each dropped his gun and they locked in mortal combat. “No white man in the Southwest could match Wallace in hand-to-hand fighting, but this red-man was quick as a cougar and strong as a bull. Not as heavy as Wallace, he was nearly as tall, and, clad only in a loin-cloth, and covered with bear’s oil, he was illusive and hard to grapple as a great serpent. It was man to man, blade to blade, the terrible strength and ferocity of the giant white man matched against the cruel craft and wiry agility of the savage, with all his primitive knowledge of foul crippling holds and twists. Back and forth they reeled, close-clinched; now rolling and tumbling on the ground, tearing and gouging; now staggering upright, locked like bears. Each was trying to draw his knife, but in the frenzy of battle, no opportunity presented itself. Bigfoot felt his wind failing him. The iron arms of the grave bent his ribs inward and threatened to shut off his breath. The grimy thumbs with their long black nails gouged cruelly at his eyes, ripping the skin and bringing trickles of blood; the steely fingers sank deep in his corded throat; the bony knees drove savagely for his groin. Shaking the blood and sweat from his eyes Wallace reeled upright, dragging his foe by sheer strength. Breast jammed hard against breast, they leaned against each other, gasping wordless curses. The great veins swelled in Wallace’s temples and his mighty chest heaved; but he saw in the red mist the sweat beading thick the redskin’s face, and the savage mouth gaping for breath. With one volcanic burst of superhuman effort, Wallace tripped his foe and hurled him backward, falling on him with all his great weight. The Indian’s head struck crashingly against a sharp-pointed rock and for an instant his dazed body went limp. And in that instant Wallace, with a desperate lunge, snatched out his knife and sank it to the hilt in the coppery body. As a dying tiger bursts into one last explosion of terrible power, the Indian started up convulsively, with a terrible yell, throwing off the giant white man as if he had been a child. Before Wallace could recover himself the Indian’s hand locked on his throat, the brave’s knee crashed down on his breast, and the knife in the red hand hissed down. In that flashing instant Wallace looked death stark in the face - he thought agonizedly of his childhood home and a girl who waited him at the settlements - he saw the black eyes of the Indian 'gleaming like a panther’s in the dark' - the knife struck hard - but only into the earth beside Wallace and as the knife came down, the Indian fell forward with it, and lay dead on the breast of his foe. And Wallace said that a grim smile curved the warrior’s lips, as if, dying, he believed he was sending the white man to blaze the ghost trail ahead of him. “Shaken with the titanic upheaval of that terrible battle, Wallace rose, gazing dazedly down at the silent form of the conquered. His knife was still sheathed in the Indian’s body. The point of that knife was in the red-man’s heart and the wonder of it is that the brave, after recieving that terrible wound, lived long enough to all but slay his foe as he died. Such vitality, surely, is possible only to beasts and men bred close to the red throbbing heart of the primordial. “Wallace looked down at his foe and in his heart rose the respect of one warrior for another. He did not scalp the big brave; he arranged the stiffening limbs and piled rocks above the corpse to make a cairn and protect the body from the ravages of buzzards and coyotes, and beside the brave he laid the knife, and the Indian’s rifle, broken to pieces - weapons for a warrior to bear to the Happy Hunting Ground. And I think of Wallace standing alone and sombrely beside that rough cairn as the sun came up over the wild tree-clad hills.” —Robert E. Howard to H.P. Lovecraft, October 1931
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