THE WILD WEST OF THE SEMINOLE NEGRO INDIAN SCOUTS

(or The Killing of Adam Paine, Medal of Honor Winner)

Black Seminoles played a prominent role in the Seminole battle against the United States Army in Florida during the Seminole Wars, and eventually were forced to emigrate to Indian Territory in Oklahoma in the 1840's along with the rest of the Seminoles. Hounded by slavers and tired of the terrible living conditions on the reservation, a group of Black Seminoles under the leadership of John Horse joined the Seminole sub chief Wild Cat and his followers as they fled to Mexico in the early 1850's to become military colonists under the Mexican government. There they defended the Mexican border against the attacks of Indians and Texans for a country that acknowledged their freedom and gave them land and pay for their service in the military.

By 1870 the political situation in Mexico had deteriorated and life was becoming difficult for the Mascogos. Slavery had ended in the U.S., so when Captain Perry of the U. S. Army came to Mexico to persuade the Mascogos and their allies the Kickapoo to return to the US and settle in Indian Territory, the Mascogos decided it would be a good idea.

On July 4th, 1870, a large group of the Mascogos crossed the Rio Grande back into the United States, to wait at Fort Duncan for transportation to Indian Territory, where they had been promised land to farm. While waiting, they offered to work as scouts for the U.S. Army, in order to earn money and provide for their families. The army jumped at the chance to have such seasoned fighters who were so knowledgeable of the ways of the Indians in the area. 11 Mascogos were mustered in as the Seminole Negro Indian Scouts on August 16th, 1870.

The Mascogos were excellent warriors and farmers, fiercely independent and never subjugated - the only sovereign nation to have voluntarily left the United States and then voluntarily agreed to return. Culturally a blend of Seminole Indian and Afro/Baptist, they now had some Mexican Catholic mixed in. They spoke Spanish, the Seminole languages Hitchiti or Muskogee, some English, and their own language, very similar to African based Gullah, which they called Seminole.

Adam, Isaac, John and Pompey were young men when they crossed over the Rio Grande into the US. Adam was the oldest, around 28. Isaac was 16, Pompey around 17 and John around 23. They had spent most or all of their lives in Mexico, farming, and fighting the Indians who came across the Rio Grande from the United States to raid in Mexico. Now they were expected to help the US army fight Indians coming from the Mexican side of the border. Some of the Indians they would now be fighting were formerly allies - like the Kickapoo - and some were mortal enemies, like the Lipan Apaches and the Comanche.

In Mexico the Mascogo had been known as fearsome warriors, and usually fought under their own commander, John Horse, their Chief. They fought in small groups alongside the Mexican army, or partnered with their allies, the Seminoles and Kickapoo. In the US they were expected to follow army discipline and rules which to them were foreign and foolish. Naturally, there was a lot of conflict with their officers. In addition, the promised supplies and land grants were slow in materializing and it was difficult to support all the members of the various groups on just the scouts' salaries.

In March of 1873 the situation improved when they were assigned a new officer. Lieutenant John Lapham Bullis was a fighting Quaker who had commanded black troops during the civil war and was immediately able to see the value of the scouts fighting and tracking skills despite their disregard for army procedure. He was a fighter of the same sort that they were, able to go for days without rations or sleep, fighting with the same stealth and flexibility as the Indians they were chasing. As one of his scouts put it "His men was on equality too. He didn't stand back and say "Go yonder", He say, "Come on, boys, let's go get em". In Bullis, the scouts found a commander that they could trust and work well with, and together they became an almost unbeatable combination. In eight years of Indian fighting on the frontier they lost not one single man in battle, nor did they have any serious injuries. And they were instrumental in ending the Indian and outlaw raids in that section of Texas.

However, the story in the Black Seminole community was not so pretty. Many of the Mascogo were close to starvation and the Army and the Bureau of Indian Affairs were taking turns denying responsibility for subsisting them or giving them the land and supplies they had been promised. At one point it seemed as if the Bureau of Indian Affairs was about to give them land in Oklahoma, when suddenly some one high up discovered that they were black, and therefore could not be Indians and were not entitled to Indian land! Much later the Bureau again agreed to move them to Oklahoma, but, unwilling to share tribal benefits, the ex-Confederate Chief of the Seminole Nation refused to acknowledge them as Seminoles.

Despite the desperate situation of their families, the Scouts continued to prove themselves heroic in battle and uncanny as trackers and scouts. The records show constant petitioning for their rights by their superior officers, particularly Bullis and Mackenzie. Almost every major officer they worked under spoke of their courage, battle skills, and the outrage of their being denied what they had been promised.

Then a new ruling denied rations to anyone but the men who were actually serving as scouts. Out of a community of over 200 people the scouts never numbered more than 50 men. The situation became impossible. The elderly and families without a scout in them to depend on were literally starving. Without adequate land and supplies to farm, camping temporarily on the army reservation, they had no way to subsist themselves. Some resorted to petty thievery, occasionally stealing a stray cow. It must be understood that in the Texas of this time prominent white men had made their fortunes by rounding up stray cattle and branding them as their own. But if a Mascogo took one it was theft and they were liable for prosecution. In 1877 Bullis paid the county tax inspector, James Ballantyne, the exorbitant sum of $40 for four cattle supposedly stolen by the Mascogos.

Against this backdrop the scouts performed feats of incredible bravery and skill. They worked hard and long hours together, survived great deprivations and were usually victorious. Most of them seem to have genuinely enjoyed their working relationship with Bullis, although there is evidence that there were factions among the community who quarreled with each other, and even some that hated Bullis. In 1876 scout Dan Johnson Jr. was arrested for threatening Bullis' life with a pistol. He also was hauled in several other times that month for assaults on other scouts. As their situation deteriorated, tensions grew worse in the community. Many began to think of returning to Mexico.

This is the situation faced by the four Medal of Honor winners in December of 1876.

Here are their individual stories.

THE MEDAL OF HONOR WINNERS

Isaac was the youngest of the lot, born in Mexico; he was around 17 when he enlisted. Family tradition has it that he was captured by Comanche as a boy and raised by them, only to be returned to his family when soldiers captured the Comanche when he was a teenager.

Pompey Factor was one of the first group of scouts enlisted. Born in Indian Territory he was somewhere between 18 and 21 when he enlisted, depending on which records you go by. He was actively enlisted in December 1876.

Sergeant Ward was born around 1847, probably in Arkansas. His real name was John Warrior, brother of Bill and Scott Warrior, but an enlistment officer changed it to Ward. Enlistment records are very faulty as to names and ages for the scouts. He too was actively enlisted in December 1876.

There appears to have been no attempt to find the culprit: some believed the bandit and prominent citizen John King Fisher was behind it, others that it was irate citizens who didn't want the Mascogos cultivating the land along the lush Los Moras river. King Fisher was notorious for his hatred of the Scouts, and he was such a powerful figure that he essentially controlled law enforcement in Kinney County. When he killed Scout George Washington in a barroom brawl it was impossible to find a grand jury to even convene, much less indict him. Everyone, including Judges and prosecutors, were too scared to show up. So it is not unlikely that he had a hand in the attempt on Horse's life.

With their leader, John Horse, half dead from his wounds, the community was in an uproar. Mascogos were in constant fear for their lives. They were also starving, and they began to quarrel amongst themselves. From September through December there were repeated cases of threats made against each other, brawls and rioting. In the meantime members of the white community began to attempt to use the law to try to oust the scouts. The ironic thing about this period is that while certain of Brackettville's citizens were swearing out complaints that the Mascogos were thieves, other equally upstanding citizens were requesting that the Army enlist the rest of the available Mascogos as scouts in order to form a larger command under Lt. Bullis to keep them safe from bandits and hostile Indians.

In late August Scott Warrior, John Ward's brother, was accused of stealing five horses. Then, early in September, Isaac Payne and Dallas Griner were indicted on charges of theft of a prized gelding belonging to none other than Deputy Sheriff Claron Windus. Isaac and Dallas spent the rest of the year hiding out in the Mascogo community in Nacimiento, Mexico with occasional visits to the community in Brackettville. In December 1876, they came back to celebrate the holy days with their families.

Somehow Sheriff Crowell got word that Adam Paine, Frank Enoch, Isaac Payne and Dallas Griner, all fugitives from the law, were in the scouts encampment for New Years Eve celebrations. He devised a plan for their arrest based on taking them by surprise at midnight, as the year changed, when they would least be expecting it. According to one account the plan was backed up by a company of soldiers brought in to help with the arrest - if so they don't seem to have played an active role.

Crowell, Windus and Jonathan May, a local teamster, positioned themselves outside the scout's camp, waiting for midnight. A dance was going on, some say in Scout Friday Bowleg's yard, others say at the church. Dances for the Mascogos were usually a combination of religious ritual and social activity. This one was probably a "Watch Night" as the community held a shout in the church to bring in the New Year. At midnight the Mascogos would come out and circle the exterior of the church with the shuffling dance steps of a shout, singing of the dead they had lost that year. This was the moment Sheriff Crowell was waiting for. According to one account, Adam Paine was dancing when he heard the Sheriff call his name. As he turned, Claron Windus fired at him with a double-barreled shot gun, "shot him so close it set him on fire". Other accounts say that there was a struggle while the Sheriff was trying to handcuff the men and that Adam and Frank were shot while trying to run. What is certain is that when the smoke cleared Adam Paine was dead and Frank Enoch mortally wounded. Scout Bobby Kibbett jumped Windus, and while Windus and Crowell were wrestling with him, Isaac Payne and Dallas Griner got away. Isaac's wife Julia recounts, "Along about midnight I heard the shooting, and then I heard a horse galloping, and my husband fell off -- he was drunk -- and said, "Julia, they've killed Adam".

Crowell called Judge W.W. Arnett to the scene to perform an inquest. Adam's body was given to his family for burial. Enoch died under the care of a surgeon in town. Bobby Kibbett was later tried and acquitted of attempting to murder Claron Windus. And that was that.

Isaac Payne escaped to Mexico, but came back within the month to re-enlist. Either Windus must have dropped the charges that Isaac and Dallas stole his horse, or Bullis somehow managed to get them cleared. It does raise the question of how substantial those charges actually were if they could have been cleared so rapidly as to allow Isaac to re-enlist that month. He remained a scout until 1901 and died in 1904. Oral histories conflict as to whether he is buried in Nacimiento, Mexico or with his official headstone in the Seminole Scouts Cemetery in Brackettville.

Pompey Factor had had enough. Along with Chief John Horse and a number of other Mascogos he left for Mexico, where it was safer. He was listed as a deserter, but several years later returned and was removed from deserter status and re enlisted for another year. In 1880 he left the army for good, and spent the rest of his life as a farmer in Mexico, only returning to Brackettville in 1926, destitute, in hopes of a pension. He was finally granted the pension, but it came too late. He died a pauper in 1928 and is buried in the Scout's cemetery.

John Ward remained in the scouts for a total of 24 years as a Private, a Corporal and a Sergeant. He was forced by rheumatism to leave the army in 1895. He received a monthly pension until his death in 1911. He is buried in the Scout's cemetery.

Adam Paine is buried in the Scout's cemetery alongside the other three.

Less than a month after Adam Paine's death Claron Windus resigned as Deputy Sheriff in order to become Kinney County Assessor of Taxes. The next month he married Agnes Ballantyne and within a few years had become one of the largest landowners in the country by purchasing land sold at delinquent tax sales. By 1897 he was so wealthy that his house was the first in Brackettville to have indoor plumbing. In 1898 he volunteered for the war in Cuba and spent a year there. He died in 1927, a wealthy and successful man with a long and varied career. He is buried in the Masonic Cemetery in Brackettville.

John Lapham Bullis commanded the scouts until 1881. When he left the citizens of West Texas joined together to thank him for his role in protecting them against Indian attacks. They awarded him two ceremonial swords, along with the title "Friend of the Frontier". The Texas legislature passed a resolution thanking him for his "gallant and efficient services" He died in 1911, a wealthy and respected man, promoted by Teddy Roosevelt to Brigadier General on merit alone.

The Seminole Negro Indian Scouts were disbanded in 1914, and all but a few of the scouts families were thrown off the military reservation to fend for themselves. Neither the scouts nor their descendants ever received the land or supplies that were promised them. Nor was their essential role in ending the Indian raids ever acknowledged.

The descendants of the scouts are now scattered throughout the U.S., but every September they come together at the Seminole Negro Indian Scout Cemetery in Brackettville, Texas to celebrate Seminole Days and to remember with pride the achievements of their ancestors, the Seminole Negro Indian Scouts.