A vast and desolate region, the Texas-New Mexico borderlands have long been an ideal setting for intrigue and illegal dealings-never more so than in the lawless early days of cattle trafficking and trade among the Plains tribes and Comancheros. This book takes us to the borderlands in the 1860s and 1870s for an in-depth look at Union-Confederate skullduggery amid the infamous Comanche-Comanchero trade in stolen Texas livestock.
In 1862, the Confederates abandoned New Mexico Territory and Texas west of the Pecos River, fully expecting to return someday. Meanwhile, administered by Union troops under martial law, the region became a hotbed of Rebel exiles and spies, who gathered intelligence, disrupted federal supply lines, and plotted to retake the Southwest. Using a treasure trove of previously unexplored documents, authors James Bailey Blackshear and Glen Sample Ely trace the complicated network of relationships that drew both Texas cattlemen and Comancheros into these borderlands, revealing the urban elite who were heavily involved in both the legal and illegal transactions that fueled the region’s economy.
Confederates and Comancheros deftly weaves a complex tale of Texan overreach and New Mexican resistance, explores cattle drives and cattle rustling, and details shady government contracts and bloody frontier justice. Peopled with Rebels and bluecoats, Comanches and Comancheros, Texas cattlemen and New Mexican merchants, opportunistic Indian agents and Anglo arms dealers, this book illustrates how central these contested borderlands were to the history of the American West.
About the Author :
James Bailey Blackshear, Associate Faculty Professor of History at Collin College in Plano, Texas, is the author of Honor and Defiance: A History of the Las Vegas Land Grant in New Mexico.
Glen Sample Ely is the award-winning author of The Texas Frontier and the Butterfield Overland Mail, 1858-1861 and Where the West Begins: Debating Texas Identity.
Review :
"Confederates and Comancheros braids two of our greatest stories--the Civil War and the Wars for the West--into a spirited and engaging tale. Riding between the Blue and the Grey in these years were little-known allies, enemies, and trading partners: Comancheros, Comanches, Ciboleros, and Apaches, who appear in these pages as essential players in a borderlands epic."--James Brooks, author of Captives and Cousins: Slavery, Kinship, and Community in the Southwest Borderlands
"Confederates and Comancheros is a great tale, well told. The narrative is crisp and intelligent, the scholarship meticulous. This detailed account of the Union's Civil War defense of New Mexico is interwoven with a carefully documented view of the Comanchero trade involving all strata of New Mexico citizenry, from the wagon driver to the business and political elite."--Thomas Ty Smith, author of The Old Army in the Big Bend: The Last Cavalry Frontier, 1911-1921
"Comancheros, the New Mexico merchants who traded, often illegally with Comanches and other Southern Plains nations, have been highly fictionalized over the years. But. James Bailey Blackshear and Glen Sample Ely, historians knowns for their works about frontier Texas and New Mexico, correct that oversight and in the process deliver a highly readable and detailed look at the mostly illicit trade. With impeccable scholarship, the authors focus on the Civil War era and provide a lively look at assorted characters, few of them completely reputable, and put the dealings, shootings, legal procedures, raids, spies, killings and cattle drives in perspective. Along the way, Blackshear and Ely also correct some longstanding myths. Fascinating and a whole lot of fun to read. "--Western Writers of America, The Roundup
"James Blackshear and Glen Ely's collaboration on the complicated struggle for control of the Texas-New Mexico borderlands in the Civil War era does much to illuminate the complex webs of conflict and cooperation among the various groups living on and around the Llano Estacado. Part economic history, part military history, and part ethnography, the work seeks to restore the Comancheros, largely Hispanic merchants and herders who traded extensively with the Comanche empire, to their rightful place in history...anyone interested in the far reaches of the Civil War in the Texas-New Mexico borderlands will benefit from a careful reading of Confederates and Comancheros. Both authors are to be commended for using their extensive expertise in the region to draw back the curtain on the economic activity that motivated many of the actions and reactions in the theater. The book further proves that the Civil War and the subsequent conquest of the American West are two acts that cannot be disentangled in the historical record, and will remain forever linked in history just as strongly as the disparate communities the enterprising Comancheros bound together."--H-Net Reviews
"James Blackshear and Glen Sample Ely thoroughly reimagine the Comanchero trade that brought stolen Texas livestock to New Mexico in exchange for guns, ammunition, and trade goods for the Plains Indians. The authors reveal the remarkable extent to which Anglo and Hispano merchant elites, prominent politicians, and government officials from Santa Fe and Las Vegas backed expeditions to the Llano Estacado in pursuit of this ethically suspect enterprise."--Rick Hendricks, coauthor of Pueblo Sovereignty: Indian Land and Water in New Mexico and Texas
"With Confederates and Comancheros, James Blackshear and Glen Ely have done considerable service to the historical profession by demonstrating in great detail that Comanche raids in Texas and the trading economy of New Mexico during the 1860s and 1870s were inextricably linked. Their archival work is impressive and the book is well-documented. They demonstrate that this illicit trade was so lucrative that it influenced New Mexico politics throughout its life as a territory. Afficionados of Wild West history will recognize several prominent names connected to Billy the Kid and the Lincoln County War. They also prove that a prominent myth in Texas History, that of Charles Goodnight and Oliver Loving blazing the cattle trail along the Pecos River that bears their names in 1867, is inaccurate. Overall, this book will be valuable to students of frontier Texas and New Mexico in the late nineteenth century."--Western Historical Quaterly
