They have a new television program on concerning Deadwood, South Dakota. It may have been a wild town for a moment. Muskogee, Indian Territory was a wild town for over thirty years. Deadwood couldn't hold a candle to Muskogee. The majority of the one hundered twenty or so deputy U.S. marshals killed in the I.T. were killed in a fifty mile radius of Muskogee. If they want to make a movie about a wild town, make it about Muskogee.

Muskogee doesn't have the romantic names and characters with name recognition that Deadwood has. I agree though that I would put Muskogee's law enforcement history up against any place in the American West.

Maybe the folks in Muskogee didn't know how to cuss, etc. Frankly, it's hard to get attention focused on anything that doesn't involve foul language, free love or nickel beer.
But, seriously, aside from the romantic characters angle, the attention of the nation was focused on Deadwood because of the recent Custer debacle and the discovery of gold. Instead of coal, had gold been discovered near Muskogee, the attention might have shifted. As to wild towns, Oklahoma has more than a few whose history is more violent than Deadwood, Dodge, and Tombstone. Draw a 40 mile circle around Pauls Valley for instance and if you check the records you'll find that from 1871 to 1936 there were more killings within that circle than anywhere else in the state.

How many people are there on record for being killed in the Pauls Valley vicinity between 1871 and 1936?

Beats me, I haven't done a hand count of all killings for that period. I've only had time to document 77 in a 15 mile radius around Pauls Valley between 1871 and 1907, and that ain't near all of 'em.

I think that name recognition and national media attention has alot to do with Muskogee having been overlooked for so long. That and of course our beloved Hollywood.

A little off the subject of law enforcement, I am about 1/2 through with the sequel to "Dances With Wolves" entitled "The Holy Road"...having never read the original and having only seen the movie, I was shocked to learn that the original story is actually about the Comanche Indians and not the more "media-friendly" Sioux. The Comanche were just as fierce as the Sioux and their story, though told in the written form in "Dances With Wolves" and "The Holy Road", were grossly overlooked in the movie "Dances With Wolves". There has been talk that the sequel is to be made in the near future though Kevin Costner has expressed no interest in participating.

I was told they made "Dancing with Wolves" on the northern Plains because they couldn't find a locality on the southern Plains or it was cheaper to film up north. So with that being the case, they made the story revolve around the Lakota Indians. It was interesting in the movie where they showed the Pawnee attacking the Lakota, in real life it was the other way around. Funny what Hollywood will do with history. The Comanche were the greatest horsemen of the Plains Indians. Most Hollywood movies about the southern Plains always is shifted to some locality further north or west in Hollywood films, for example the "Searchers" with John Wayne. The movie scenery was nice but had nothing to do with west Texas or the Indian Territory, the land of the Comanche and Kiowa. A better example would be "True Grit" with its snow capped mountains in the background. Maybe one day Hollywood will get it right.

Do y'all know if there are any original papers,info, etc on Delaware Jack & the Leonard man that the book/movie "The Searchers" was partly based on? The Leonard man (can't think of his name) is my Aunt's ancestor, & they tracked down the official doccument where he wrote the Gov. to get permission to go where they did, to look for the captives. Were the captives the Durgan girls? I can't think of the name of the book/ author the movie "The Searchers" was based on. For me, it would just be neat to have more info, esp. about Delaware Jack, & this story. All I know about Delaware Jack, is his name.

[QUOTE] I can't think of the name of the book/ author the movie "The Searchers" was based on. QUOTE]

The book was called "The Searchers" by Alan Le May and was originally published in 1954. He also wrote an novel called "The Unforgiven" which was later made into a movie starring Burt Lancaster and Audrey Hepburn

--meursault.

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WILLIAMS, LEONARD G. (1802-1854). Leonard Goyen (Colonel Len) Williams [pseud. Leonard S. Williams, Leonard H. Williams, Leonardo Goyens, Leonard O. Goen], soldier and Indian agent, the son of Maria Priscilla and Thomas Williams,qv was born in 1802 in Tennessee. The family was in Missouri Territory (now Arkansas) by 1818 and in what is now Red River County in 1819. By 1821 Leonard was in the Nacogdoches District. His first grant of land, a Mexican grant dated March 28, 1829, included the town of Mount Enterprise in future Rusk County. This grant was for services in the Fredonian Rebellion,qv during which he served under Col. Peter Ellis Bean.qv Williams married Nancy Isaacs, the niece of Cherokee Indian chief Richard Fields;qv they had nine children. The family professed to be Roman Catholic. Nancy died about 1835. Williams then married Jane Ware; they had three children. Williams served in the revolutionary armyqv at the siege of Bexar,qv where he lost the sight in one eye. He was a sergeant in Benton's Regiment of Regular Rangers and enrolled on March 31, 1836, for three months extra duty at Williams Crossing on the Neches River. He served with Thomas J. Rusk and William Goyensqv during the suppression of the Córdova Rebellion.qv On February 3, 1840, Williams was appointed as a commissioner to inspect the land office in Houston County; he was given the title of colonel by Sam Houston,qv who in 1842 appointed him one of four commissioners to deal or "treat" with the Indians. He participated in the Tehuacana Creek Councilsqv and was an Indian agent at Torrey's Trading Post No. 2. During a trade trip as Indian agent for Houston, Williams came across Cynthia Ann Parker,qv captive of the noted attack on Fort Parker by the Comanche Indians. He was later sent as United States agent to try and ransom her. Although Williams used an X to sign various documents, he was considered an intelligent man with knowledge of seven or eight Indian dialects. He died in April 1854 on his homestead and was buried in what is now Pitts Cemetery in Limestone County. Williams was recognized for his service to Texas in the United States Congressional Record on April 8, 1965, and by the Texas legislature in May 1965.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: Jack Moore, The Killough Massacre (Jacksonville, Texas: Kiely Printing, 1966). Carl Coke Rister, Border Captives: The Traffic in Prisoners by Southern Plains Indians, 1835-1875 (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1940). U.S. Congress, Congressional Record (Washington: GPO, 1873-). Amelia W. Williams and Eugene C. Barker, eds., The Writings of Sam Houston, 1813-1863 (8 vols., Austin: University of Texas Press, 1938-43; rpt., Austin and New York: Pemberton Press, 1970). Jesse Wallace Williams, Old Texas Trails (Burnet, Texas: Eakin Press, 1979). Dorman H. Winfrey and James M. Day, eds., Texas Indian Papers (4 vols., Austin: Texas State Library, 1959-61; rpt., 5 vols., Austin: Pemberton Press, 1966).

Doris Jeane Baldwin Pruett


The following, adapted from the Chicago Manual of Style, 15th edition, is the preferred citation for this article.


Handbook of Texas Online, s.v. "WILLIAMS, LEONARD G," http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/view/WW/fwi30.html (accessed November 27, 2004).

(NOTE: "s.v." stands for sub verbo, "under the word.")





The Handbook of Texas Online is a joint project of The General Libraries at the University of Texas at Austin (http://www.lib.utexas.edu) and the Texas State Historical Association (http://www.tsha.utexas.edu).

Copyright ©, The Texas State Historical Association, 1997-2002
Last Updated: July 23, 2002
Comments to: comments.tsha@lib.utexas.edu

I think this is who I'm thinking of, but will have to check. My Aunt said this ancestor & "Delaware Jack" searched for Indian captives, & took trade goods as an excuse to search. Other than the book "The Searchers"(said to be based on two different true stories), it looks like to me, no one else ever wrote about them. & when I looked for "Delaware Jack" on the Handbook of Texas online-nothing came up.

[QUOTE] Cynthia Ann Parker,qv captive of the noted attack on Fort Parker by the Comanche Indians.

Cynthia Ann Parker was captured by the Comanches when she was nine years old. She later married Comanche chief Peter Nocona and had a son, Quanah Parker, who was a fierce raider in Texas and principally figured in the Battle of the Adobe Walls. Later he surrendered and for a period was imprisoned at Ft. Sill. Bringing this back to Oklahoma, Quanah was a consultant and an actor in the film "Passing of the Oklahoma Outlaws," produced by Bill Tilghman and E.D. Nix. Teddy Roosevelt was a friend of his, and stayed at his house, the roof of which was gaudily emblazoned with large painted white stars, each of the seven stars representing one of his wives.

--meursault

Back to what Art was saying regarding moving the setting of Dances With Wolves to the northern plains...I think there has to be something else at work though (ie name recognition) when it comes to using the Lakota Sioux. The opening scene has Lt. Dunbar going to Fort Hays and then on to the small outpost of Fort Sedgewick...these are all in Kansas and the geography of Kansas is more like that of Oklahoma than it is Nebraska, South Dakota, or North Dakota/Montana. Certainly is irritating to say the least that Oklahoma always seems to get the short end of the stick when it comes to history. Even the TNT movie which Oklahombres Board Member Dee Cordry participated in as a historical consultant, "You Know My Name", based on the latter life of Bill Tilghman, was filmed in Canada of all places! I believe Dee said that it was due to costs.

Any...I shall digress