Texas Ranger Tales II PDF
Preview Texas Ranger Tales II
title: Texas Ranger Tales II author: Cox, Mike. publisher: Republic of Texas Press isbn10 | asin: 1556226403 print isbn13: 9781556226403 ebook isbn13: 9780585227818 language: English Texas Rangers--History--Anecdotes, Texas Rangers--Biography--Anecdotes, Frontier subject and pioneer life--Texas--Anecdotes, Texas-- History--1846-1950--Anecdotes, Texas-- History--1951- --Anecdotes. publication date: 1999 lcc: F391.C783 1999eb ddc: 976.4 Texas Rangers--History--Anecdotes, Texas Rangers--Biography--Anecdotes, Frontier subject: and pioneer life--Texas--Anecdotes, Texas-- History--1846-1950--Anecdotes, Texas-- History--1951- --Anecdotes. Page i Texas Ranger Tales II by Mike Cox Republic of Texas Press Page ii Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Cox, Mike. Texas ranger tales II / by Mike Cox. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 1-55622-640-3 (pbk.) 1. Texas RangersHistory Anecdotes. 2. Texas Rangers Biography Anecdotes. 3. Frontier and pioneer lifeTexas Anecdotes. 4. TexasHistory18461950 Anecdotes. 5. TexasHistory1951- Anecdotes. I. Title. F391.C783 1999 976.4dc21 99-27602 CIP © 1999, Mike Cox All Rights Reserved Republic of Texas Press is an imprint of Wordware Publishing, Inc. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without permission in writing from Wordware Publishing, Inc. Printed in the United States of America ISBN 1-55622-640-3 (pbk) 1-55622-740-X (hbk) 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 9904 All inquiries for volume purchases of this book should be addressed to Wordware Publishing, Inc., at 2320 Los Rios Boulevard, Plano, Texas 75074. Telephone inquiries may be made by calling: (972) 423-0090 Page iii Contents Foreword v Elmer Kelton Introduction vii Isaac Burton and His Horse Marines 1 It Would Never Do to Run 13 His Friends Called Him Foot 24 "Rip" (Rest in Peace) Ford 39 What Goes Around, Comes Around 52 Hard and Bloody Work 58 The Cry of the Death Bird 68 The Mutiny of Company H 74 I Took a Notion I Wanted to Be a Ranger 85 "Cap" Arrington 97 Being Robbed: A Vested Right 110 Thalis Cook and the "Steer" Branded MURDER 121 The Other Half of the "Four Great Captains" 134 Whispering Tom and the Plan of San Diego 148 A Killer Bullets Couldn't Stop 162 Cowboy Tom Hickman 175 The Sherman Riot 193 The "Eyes of Texas" on the Balinese Room 206 Ranger Grub 220 Shootin' from the Lip: Great Ranger Quotes 230 The Texas Ranger Motel 239 Hollywood Rangers 249 Appendices Texas Ranger Filmography 265 Texas Ranger Reunions 280 Index 281 Page v Foreword by Elmer Kelton As a spokesman for the Department of Public Safety, Mike Cox is in a particularly advantageous position to seek out stories of the legendary Texas Rangers. In this second volume he tells more tales about the lawmen who have worked, struggled, and sometimes died to bring order to Texas, from the state's earliest times to the recent past. Where possible he has separated fact from fable, though often that is difficult to do with subjects who so often in their own time appeared much larger than life. In this book we meet men like John Salmon "Rip" Ford, farmer, surveyor, physician, newspaperman, and civil servant as well as Ranger and Civil War commander of Texas Confederate troops. Ford served without complaint wherever duty called him, whether behind a desk in some stuffy government office or in the saddle on long and dangerous treks far out on the Indian frontier. He led troops to victory in the final battle of the Civil War. Unknown to him and those who rode with him on the Gulf Coast, the war had already been declared over. We meet hard-fighting Bigfoot Wallace, about whom it was said that it would be hard to tell a lie because the truth was so amazing. Indeed, many tall tales were told about him, some instigated by him, but his record needed no embellishment. He was a veteran of many a desperate Indian fight and participated in the notorious drawing of black and white beans in a Mexican prison to determine which captives would live and which would die, yet he managed to reach the ripe old age of eighty-one still able to go on an occasional toot and get himself thrown into jail. There is the unlikely yet true story of the ranger "Horse Marines" who disobeyed orders and captured two supply ships off the Gulf Coast, diverting to needy Texas rebel forces a quantity of food, arms, and ammunition intended for Santa Anna's invading Mexican army. Page vi From more recent times, Cox tells about such well-remembered Rangers as Tom Hickman, sometime cowboy and rodeo hand who enjoyed performing in the limelight but could hold down his end of a gunfight, as he once demonstrated in foiling a Clarksville bank robbery When the smoke cleared, two robbers lay dead on the street. Rounding out the book are miscellaneous Ranger anecdotes such as the one about Captain John Hays' Rangers, who climbed high up in a bee tree to take its store of honey and spotted twenty-five Comanches getting ready to charge. And the time Bigfoot Wallace unknowingly ate a skunk. And the time a veteran Ranger showed a rookie a thing or two about modern cooking by baking their dinner on the engine block of his automobile while they traveled down the road. And the story about the Ranger captain who prayed just before his company attacked a bandit band: "Lord, if you'll just stick around for a few minutes, you'll see the golldangdest fight you ever witnessed. And Lord, if you can't see fit to help us, just please don't help them." All in all, this is a grand collection of stories and characters, most of them little known until now. Mike Cox knows how to spin a good yarn.
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