Lipantitlan State Historic Site

Texans and the Lipan Apaches 

           Under the United States government, Texans were encouraged to be kind towards their neighboring Lipan Apaches, and to remain peaceful. Many Anglos disagreed with measures of peace and chose to disobey the law and violate the treaty. Over the years, other tribes and the war with Mexico built distrust and broken vows between the Republic of Texas and the Lipan Apaches, so much so that the United States government felt the need for a reservation in order to force the remaining tribal members to “remain safe” and contained on the land the government outlined for them. On this reservation they would not be a danger to Texas residents, and they would be left alone to do as they wished, or so they were made to believe. The fact is the Lipans refused the reservation, and they refused a forced removal. Instead, they fled across the border to Mexico and joined up with the Mescalero tribe. 

           The very Lipan definition of territory differs greatly from the Anglo definition. “’A group’s territoriality is perhaps not best represented by a map at all . . . Rather, a verbal description of territorial principles (as evinced in subsistence practice, language and cognition, oral tradition, and historical evidence of actual locations and activities), reconstructed from native and nonnative sources and augmented by statistics and several visual representations, is more likely to capture territoriality.’” (Barr, 10). To the Lipans, the land was not something to be bartered away like currency, it was a thing to be respected, not something you could own, but something that was shared between all living things. But to the Texans and later the Americans, land was something you owned, the more land you owned the more powerful and rich you were. 

           It was an unfair trade for the Lipan Apaches, they believed they were sharing their land while the Anglos and Mexicans just took it greedily and without compassion. There was very little for the Lipan Apaches to gain, as they never stood a chance against the Mexican government, the Texas government or the United States government, all they could do was to watch helplessly as their home was taken from them and endure brutal punishment when they tried to fight back to try and keep it.  

                      There is not much to see at this site, it's a beautiful area. There are a lot of trees, and open area with grass. All in all you will find it is very peaceful now. There are no amenities, no restrooms, no sign in center with brochures and cute little trinkets. 

Mexican Government and the Lipan Apaches 

           For the Lipan Apaches borders meant nothing, since land was not a thing to own to them, it was given to them by their God Ussen who was their creator and by the White Painted Woman who promised long life and longevity. To the Lipan the land was never a thing that one would own and control, it was its own entity, a living breathing life force. The fact that Spain and then Mexico sought to control the land and deprive the Lipan tribes of what they were given, seemed unconscionable, then to add insult to injury the United States came to do the same thing as well. 

           But to the Mexican government the Lipan Apaches were unwanted trespassers who had a blatant disregard for authority and lack of respect for boundaries. Coupled with scuffles and soon to be war with Texas and the United States, Mexico was feeling the strain of controlling their territory and the repeated threats of attack from all sides. But to the Lipan Apaches, they were fervently trying to avoid genocide at all costs, fighting off invaders on all fronts and feeling closed in with nowhere to run and no allies to help them survive. 

           Prior to 1855, the Lipan Apaches were allies of Mexico. They traded with them, fought against other tribes (the Jumano and Tonkawa) and the white settlers nearby with whom they were friendly. But as tensions rose between the United States and Mexico, the situation got worse for the Lipans who navigated both sides of the border in their everyday lives. .“On March 20, 1856, Mexican forces massacred forty-one Lipan Apaches (or Nde) at a place called Gracias a Dios in the northeastern Mexican state of Coahuila. In the days that followed, the killing continued, until more than 130 Lipan Apaches were dead. The massacre was unusual, because, at the time it was carried out, the Lipan Apaches were allies of the Mexican government.” (Baumgartner, 36). The Mexican government sought to drive the Lipan Apaches out of Mexico, they no longer wanted to deal with the border crossers. 

           The Lipans agreed to a treaty with the Mexican government to keep the peace with the United States, and the Mexican government offered them guns in exchange to win war against their enemies the Comanches. Neither side followed thru on their promise. As such, relations became worse for the Mexicans, the Lipans and the Americans. 

           Some historians have suggested that the massacre was the final straw for the Mexican government in unwanted border crossings by the Lipan onto Mexican territory, while others have suggested the Mexico was fed up with removing them.  

Carlisle School for Native American Children

           When the Anglos came they tried all the ploys already done with other tribes: trading, bribery, deceit, and theft. No action was so low as the kidnapping of the Lipan Apache children, while simultaneously removing the adult Lipan Apaches or worse killing them on sight. "Kesetta, a young Lipan girl about ten years old, and a young boy, Jack, a few years younger, were taken prisoner by a 4th Calvalry soldier during the June 1877 attack o a Lipan camp near Zaragosa in which nineteen Lipans were killed.1 Kesetta and Jack were later considered siblings but this is not truly known; it is also possible they were just two cousins or even unrelated children from the same camp. They were brought back to Fort Clark and adopted by Charlie Smith and his wife, Mollie. Smith was a member of the regimental band and was stationed at Forts Clark and Duncan from 1877 to 1880. In 1880, he and his wife were posted to Fort Hays, Kansas. In March 1880, the children were enrolled at the Carlisle Indian School in Pennsylvania as Kesetta Lipan and Jack Lipan."  (N. M. Minor).  Jack died young of tuberculosis, while Kesetta lived to her 30s before she succumbed to illness as well. The weather of the northeast differed greatly than that of their native Texas, and the fact that the population was far more dense in Pennsylvania contributed to both Jack and Kesetta contracting illnesses and dying. 

Texas-Mexico War 

           “This morning about daylight, the enemy, seven hundred strong, entered our old encampment, and in a few minutes attacked us in our new position, which they kept up for about twenty minutes and then made a hasty retreat. Three Mexicans were left dead on the field, and, from their trails, many were dragged off; their killed and wounded could not have been less than thirty men.” (Inquirer 1842). Despite the war with Mexico, Texans usually retained a positive and brave outlook on the war front when writing home or to a newspaper with news of the conditions at hand. Even when the government was facing financial difficulties and was looking every way conceivable to try and face funds for the war, Texans never lost hope. “A bill, authorizing the President to sell off…400,000 acres of the Cherokee lands will attempt to raise the credit of Texas.” (New York Herald). Texas was going into debt quickly fighting off Mexico, Native American tribes (one of those being the Lipan Apache in south Texas) and trying to set up its own economy. War is expensive, having to endue being at war for years on end drains the treasury relatively quickly.  

           The war with Mexico was over the land of Texas itself, the unwillingness of the Anglo Texans to conform to the rules and laws set forth by the Mexican government, and the last offense was the treasons actions of the Anglos setting up their own government and choosing to steal the land of Texas from the Mexican government. Mexico gave the Anglos authority to settle in Texas with rules to follow in exchange. The continuous struggles with control and autonomy led to the war between Mexico and Texas, as Texas sought Independence and Mexico fought to regain control of the state from the traitorous Anglos. The Lipan Apaches played both sides of the fence in their fight, playing to the highest bidder and ultimately being played for a fool by these two powerful entities. Mexico would lose the war, and Texas would gain its freedom and become its own country The Republic of Texas. A border country between Mexico and the United States. And the Lipan Apaches had no say in the agreements that were made on behalf of their land by the very people who stole it and murdered them in return.  

           This is not a fairy tale ending, or a happy ending. This site is merely a remembrance of a people that are all but wiped out by genocide, and all these people get is a metal sign on land that was once theirs and all it records is one battle. These are a people who are worth remembering, for who they were, and what they believed in, and they shouldn't be part of the genocidal white washing of history and they shouldn't be erased. If you dig down deeply enough, there's more to these markers than what brief message they convey. There is a heritage, and there is memory. 

Barr, Juliana. "Geographies of Power: Mapping Indian Borders in the "Borderlands" of the Early Southwest." . The William and Mary Quarterly,. JSTOR.

Baumgartner, Alice. "The Massacre at Gracias a Dios: Mobility and Violence on the Lower Rio Grande, 1821-1856.". Western Historical Quarterly. doi:10.1093/whq/whaa140.

Commission, Texas Historical. Details for Fort Lipantitlan, Accessed April 18th 2021. https://atlas.thc.state.tx.us/Details/5355006315/print.

Herald, New York. "Important from Texas and Mexico-War Sure", Nineteenth Century U.S. Newspapers. August 10th 1842. Accessed March 28th 2021. link.gale.com/apps/doc/GT3013949314/NCNP?u=txshracd2626&sid=NCNP&xid=21827404.

Inquirer, Pennsylvania. "By Last Night's Mail." , Index and Nat. Intel, and the South and West. July 29th 1842. Accessed March 28th 2021. link.gale.com/apps/doc/GT3011476824/NCNP?u=txshracd2626&sid=NCNP&xid=e9735370.

Edited by H. Walking Woman, N.M. Minor. The Story of Kesetta and Jack, The Official Website of the Lipan Apache Tribe. Accessed May 10th 2021. https://www.lipanapache.org/Museum/Kesetta_and_Jack_Lipan.html.