Three Years Among the Comanches: The Narrative of Nelson Lee, the Texas Ranger (Western Frontier Library)

In this reprint of a classic Indian Captivity Narrative from the 19th century, Nelson Lee recounts his adventures and his narrow escape from the Comanches in tales nearly too tall to be true. From South America to Texas, he finds adventure everywhere. Lee emerges from one hairy situation only to ride into another daring adventure with the coolness of a Hollywood hero. For three years he is held captive among the Comanches. Tortured by his captors, this Texas Ranger survives to tell others about what he observes and learns about the Comanche tribe, and publishes one of the best descriptions of the life of the Texas Rangers. Three Years Among the Comanches is Nelson Lee's detailed account of his life as a Texas Ranger, his capture by the Comanches, and his grueling escape through the mountains back to a white settlement. Although his perspective is obviously biased by the fact that he was the tribe's prisoner, the book provides an interesting view of the Comanche way of life before it was forever changed by contact with white people. Lee saw his companions and many other white captives tortured and slaughtered by the Comanches, and he himself was punished brutally for straying beyond the limits of the camp while a prisoner.He believed that the only reason he was not killed by his captors was because he possessed a silver watch with an alarm, through which the Indians believed the Great Spirit spoke: "While they were stripping and dressing me...one of them picked up my coat and discovered the watch...While thus regarding it...the alarm went off. The utter astonishment of the Indian was beyond description...the chief wrapped it carefully and tenderly in his deerskin pouch and placed it in his bosom, not, however, until I had comprehended...that they regarded it as something supernatural which connected me with the Great Spirit."Eventually Lee became somewhat reconciled to the tribe's way of life, and came to admire certain individuals; he even married a Comanche woman, which the Chief considered further assurance that his captive would not escape. However, Lee continued to try to impress the tribe with the superiority of the white man, detailing the technological wonders of civilization. The Comanches were having none of it, and always responded: "Wonderful, wonderful are the works of the white man, but the Great Spirit will destroy them all."Three Years Among the Comanches is full of extreme situations and near-deadly encounters. Aside from his trouble with his human captors, the author has frightening brushes with alligators, snakes, panthers and millipedes:"Several times both of us crossed the stream. On my last passage, when perhaps two-thirds over, I discovered at no great distance, a huge alligator making directly towards me. He was at least fourteen feet in length, and had been undoubtedly attracted by the blood which tainted the water. My first impulse was to draw my knife and turn upon him, but a second thought determined me to exercise that discretion which is the better part of valor, and accordingly, I venture the assertion that in all aquatic feats of which we have any account, there never has been known a specimen of "taller swimming" than I then and there performed. Fortunately, I reached the shore and succeeded in scrambling to the top of the bank just as the monster came like a great battering ram against it."Lee's narrative of his life as a Ranger and a captive of the Comanches is lively, detailed, and always fascinating. A Reprint Of The 1859 Narrative In Which Nelson Lee Presents A Picture Of Life In The Texas Rangers During The Mexican War, And Relates His Experiences As A Captive Of The Comanche Indians For Three Years. With An Introduction By Walter Prescott Webb ; Foreword By Gary Clayton Anderson. Reprint. Originally Published: Albany : B. Taylor, 1859. Includes Bibliographical References. 'Containing a detailed account of his captivity among the Indians, his singular escape through the instrumentality of his watch, and fully illustrating Indian life as it is on the war path and in the camp.'