Thirty Comanches attack an unknown number of Karankawas at Mission Refugio. Two Comanches are killed.
Time Period: Mexican Era 1821-1835
Tribe: Comanches, Karankawas
Gender: unspecified
Longitude: -96.819357000000
F. Todd Smith, From Dominance to Disappearance: The Indians of Texas and the Near Southwest, 1786-1859 (Lincoln: University of Nebraska, 2006), 110.
Time Period: Mexican Era 1821-1835
Karankawas kill five American sailors shipwrecked on the northern end of Padre Island.
Tribe: Karankawas
Gender: unspecified
Longitude: -97.226379000000
F. Todd Smith, From Dominance to Disappearance: The Indians of Texas and the Near Southwest, 1786-1859 (Lincoln: University of Nebraska 2006), 111.
Time Period: Mexican Era 1821-1835
Three colonists left to guard supplies at the mouth of the Colorado River. They were never found; Karankawas suspected.
Tribe: Karankawas
Gender: unspecified
Longitude: -95.976605000000
Kuykendall, "Reminiscences of Early Texans," The Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association, vol. 6, no. 3, January 1903, 236-237, 247.
Time Period: Mexican Era 1821-1835
Coco Indians (Karankawas) kill two members of Austin’s colony, Loy (or Law) and John C. Alley, who had tried to stop them from stealing a corn-filled pirogue on the Colorado River, near the mouth of Skull Creek and ten miles south of present-day Columbus.
Tribe: Coco
Gender: male
Longitude: -96.406754000000
William B. Dewees, Letters from an Early Settler of Texas (Louisville: Morton Griswold, 1852), 38-40. F. Todd Smith, From Dominance to Disappearance: The Indians of Texas and the Near Southwest, 1786-1859 (Lincoln: University of Nebraska, 2006), 128. J. W. Wilbarger, , Indian Depredations in Texas, (Austin: Steck Co., 1935), 200-01.
Time Period: Mexican Era 1821-1835
In response to the deaths of Loy and Alley, the colony responded by raising a company of 25 men. Finding the Karankawa encampment on Skull Creek, the colonists killed 19 or 20 members of the tribe.
Tribe: Karankawas
Gender: male
Longitude: -96.408224000000
William B. Dewees, Letters from an Early Settler of Texas (Louisville: Morton Griswold, 1852), 38-40. F. Todd Smith, From Dominance to Disappearance: The Indians of Texas and the Near Southwest, 1786-1859 (Lincoln: University of Nebraska, 2006), 128. J. W. Wilbarger, Indian Depredations in Texas, (Austin: Steck Co., 1935), 200-01.
Time Period: Mexican Era 1821-1835
Austin colonist John J. Tumlinson Sr. is killed by Karankawas and Wacos (Wichitas) near the present town of Seguin; colonist Joseph Newman escapes.
Tribe: Karankawas, Wacos
Gender: male
Longitude: -97.964727000000
J. W. Wilbarger, Indian Depredations in Texas, (Austin: Steck Co., 1935), 204-05.
Time Period: Mexican Era 1821-1835
Stephen F. Austin provides emigrant tribes—the Coushattas, Alabamas, and Choctaws--with powder and lead to attack the Karankawas, who had been committing depredations in the colony. Locating a party of Cocos (Karankawas), they kill the chief, his son, and three other tribesmen.
Tribe: Alabama/Coushatta, Choctaws/Chickasaws, Coco
Gender: male
Longitude: -94.684611000000
F. Todd Smith, From Dominance to Disappearance: The Indians of Texas and the Near Southwest, 1786-1859 (Lincoln: University of Nebraska, 2006), 130.
Time Period: Mexican Era 1821-1835
One Karankawa killed by two colonists near the mouth of the Colorado.
Tribe: Karankawas
Gender: unspecified
Longitude: -97.625370000000
Time Period: Mexican Era 1821-1835
Austin launches attacks on Karankawas early in the year, assaulted a Coco (Karankawa) village upstream from the mouth of the Brazos River, killing seven.
Tribe: Coco
Gender: unspecified
Longitude: -95.389051000000
F. Todd Smith, From Dominance to Disappearance: The Indians of Texas and the Near Southwest, 1786-1859 (Lincoln: University of Nebraska, 2006), 130.
Charles A. Gulick, ed. The Papers of Mirabeau Buonaparte Lamar (Austin: A.C. Baldwin, 1921), 4:245–48.
Eugene C. Barker, ed. The Austin Papers (Washington D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1924–27) vol. 1, part 1: 768, 803.
Kelly F. Himmel, The Conquest of the Karankawas and the Tonkawas, 1821-1859 (College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 1999) 49-50.
William H. Oberste, History of Refugio Mission (Refugio, TX: [1942]), 309.
Time Period: Mexican Era 1821-1835
Colonists at Bailey’s Prairie (between present day Angleton and West Columbia) kill several Karankawas seeking to buy ammunition and supplies
Tribe: Karankawas
Gender: unspecified
Longitude: -95.493512000000
Henderson K. Yoakum, History of Texas: From its First Settlement in 1685 to its Annexation to the United States in 1846 (Austin: Steck, 1953), 224.
Time Period: Mexican Era 1821-1835
Austin colonist on Colorado River kills one member of a party of Karankawas butchering one of his cows.
Tribe: Karankawas
Gender: unspecified
Longitude: -97.625370000000
F. Todd Smith, From Dominance to Disappearance: The Indians of Texas and the Near Southwest, 1786-1859 (Lincoln: University of Nebraska, 2006), 131
Time Period: Mexican Era 1821-1835
Captain Jesse Burnam and 30 Austin colonists, shot at a canoe filled with Karankawas two miles above the mouth of the Colorado River. Eight Karankawas are killed.
Tribe: Karankawas
Gender: male
Longitude: -97.625370000000
Henderson K. Yoakum, History of Texas: From its First Settlement in 1685 to its Annexation to the United States in 1846 (Austin: Steck Co., 1953), 1:225-26; William B. Dewees, Letters from an Early Settler of Texas (Louisville: Morton Griswold, 1852), 50-53.
Time Period: Mexican Era 1821-1835
Commissioned by Stephen F. Austin to conduct a punitive expedition against the Karankawas for the killing of Austin colonists, Captain Randal Jones and a company of 23 settlers skirmish with Karankawas on Jones Creek, near the mouth of the Brazos River. Three whites and 15 Indians killed.
Tribe: Karankawas
Gender: male
Longitude: -95.420809000000
J. W. Wilbarger, Indian Depredations in Texas, (Austin: Steck Co., 1935), 201-02.
Henderson K. Yoakum, History of Texas: From its First Settlement in 1685 to its Annexation to the United States in 1846 (Austin: Steck Co., 1953), 1: 224-25.
Time Period: Mexican Era 1821-1835
Immigrants to Austin colony killed, travelling from the mouth of the Brazos River en route to the Austin colony. Karankawas are blamed for the attack.
Tribe: Karankawas
Gender: unspecified
Longitude: -95.380812000000
J. W. Wilbarger, Indian Depredations in Texas (Austin: Steck Co., 1935), 201.
Time Period: Mexican Era 1821-1835
The families of Elisha Flowers and Charles Cavanaugh were attacked by 70 Karankawas, near Live Oak Bayou on Old Caney Creek. Five women were killed: Cavanaugh’s wife and three daughters and Flowers’ wife Polly.
Tribe: Karankawas
Gender: female
Longitude: -95.767182800000
J. W. Wilbarger, Indian Depredations in Texas (Austin: Steck Co., 1935), 209; Rachel Jenkins, "Flowers, Elisha," Handbook of Texas Online (http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/ffl21), accessed June 15, 2015. Uploaded on June 12, 2010. Published by the Texas State Historical Association
Time Period: Mexican Era 1821-1835
A party of colonists led by Aylett C. Buckner kill 40-50 Karankawas near the mouth of the Colorado River, three miles east of present day Matagorda, in retaliation for attack on Cavanaugh and Flowers’ families. Sometimes referred to as the “Dressing Point” Massacre.
Tribe: Karankawas
Gender: male
Longitude: -95.968271000000
F. Todd Smith, From Dominance to Disappearance: The Indians of Texas and the Near Southwest, 1786-1859 (Lincoln: University of Nebraska, 2006), 131.
J. W. Wilbarger, Indian Depredations in Texas (Austin: Steck Co., 1935), 210.
Kelly F. Himmel, The Conquest of the Karankawas and the Tonkawas, 1821-1859 (College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 1999), 51.
Malcolm D. McLean, ed. Papers Concerning Robertson’s Colony in Texas (Arlington, Texas: University of Texas at Arlington Press, 1975), 2:525.
Time Period: Mexican Era 1821-1835
A party of Karankawas demand corn from Daniel Gilleland, an Austin colonist then living near present-day Wharton. Refusing to give them any, he raises a party of settlers and attacks the Karankawa camp, killing several Indians.
Tribe: Karankawas
Gender: male
Longitude: -96.098549000000
John Wesley Wilbarger, Indian Depredations in Texas (Austin: Steck Co., 1935), 214.
Time Period: Mexican Era 1821-1835
A band of five Karankawas raids the La Parra Ranch (near present-day Sarita), killing ten - one man and nine women and children. The Indians plunder the ranch, taking one woman and three girls captive.
Tribe: Karankawas
Gender: male, female
Longitude: -97.785987000000
Enrique Villarreal to Alcalde of Guadalupe and Mariano Cosio Ramon, September 4, 1833, Bexar Archives, Dolph Briscoe Center, University of Texas at Austin.
Time Period: Mexican Era 1821-1835
Karankawas raid a ranch near Guadalupe Victoria (present-day Victoria). A presidial company of 14 men engage the Karankawas, killing three warriors and a young girl.
Tribe: Karankawas
Gender: male, female
Longitude: -97.034897000000
Placido Benavides to Alcalde of Goliad, August 26, 1833, Bexar Archives, Dolph Briscoe Center, University of Texas at Austin.
Time Period: Mexican Era 1821-1835
A presidial company from Victoria (then known as Guadalupe Victoria) attacks a Karankawa village near Arroyo Tres Palacios on Matagorda Bay (present-day Palacios). During a battle that lasts an hour and a half, six Indian men and four women are killed.
Tribe: Karankawas
Gender: male, female
Longitude: -96.237703000000
Placido Benavides to Ramon Musquiz, May 28, 1834, Bexar Archives, Dolph Briscoe Center, University of Texas at Austin