extended family, though other
families lived there as well (all
totaled some 28 souls). The fort
consisted of two-story blockhouses
at the corners and log cabins in
which the farmers’ families lived.
A corral provided a safe holding
area for livestock. All of this stood
behind walls of sharpened 12foot split-cedar logs which were
notched periodically with rifle and
lookout holes.
The Parkers lived in the compound because they were in a
wild place frequented by “wild”
people, native people who lived
by their own set of values, values
and sensibilities quite often at
odds with those of the whites. The
fort folk made treaties with local
Indians who were of a less warlike
temperament than the nomadic
Plains bands to the west. Apparently they’d had little trouble with
the local Caddos, no incidents
or confrontations, because the
settlers, who by day worked the
fertile fields surrounding the fort,
regularly left the gates wide open
for easier comings and goings.
This laxity in security certainly
figured into the harrowing events
that unfolded at Fort Parker on
May 19, 1836.
JULY 2015
PA R K E R C O U N T Y T O D AY
The sun rose in a muted orange and yellow sky that morning, spreading its horizontal rays
across the glistening fields and
blocky stockade where the agricultural families were preparing for
another day’s toil. It was a good
morning for a while … until about
9 o’clock.
“One minute the fields (in front
of the fort) were clear, and the
next moment, more Indians than
I dreamed possible were in front
of the fort,” wrote Rachel Parker
Plummer in her memoir Narrative
of Twenty One Months’ Servitude
as a Prisoner Among the Commanchee Indians, published in
Houston in 1838. Cynthia Ann’s
17-year-old cousin, Rachel, too
was taken that day.
20
The sight of several hundred
Indians on the surrounding prairie
and in the front fields filled the settlers
present with a deep sense of foreboding. Others of their number worked in
fields one to two miles from the fort,
unaware of the “powder keg” set to
blow back at the fort. When one of
the Indians about 300 yards out hoisted a white flag, no one at Fort Parker
believed the flapping flag of peace
genuine. There were no sighs of relief,
rather hurried discussion about what
to do in the little time they imagined
they had left to act. Benjamin and Silas Parker, sons of patriarch Elder John
Parker, voiced tactical disagreement.
Wh ile Silas, Cynthia Ann’s father,
wanted the five men present to man
the walls and fight, Benjamin, figuring the outcome of that plan would
be slaughter, preferred to talk to the
Indians. If nothing else, it would allow
time for the women and children to
escape out the back and find refuge in
nearby woods.
Elder John Parker, 77, agreed with
his eldest son, Benjamin, who collected his courage and went out to
speak with the Indians — largely
Comanches with a smattering of
Kiowas, Wichitas and local Caddos.
The Indians said they’d come seeking
beef, water and a place to camp, but
their words rang untrue in the frontiersman’s ears, who upon returning
to the fort said it was his opinion that
they would all be killed.
Again the brothers argued, Silas that
they should close the big gate and
take to the walls, Benjamin that it was