When brothers William and John Wright arrived in the United States from
Ireland in 1850 and could find no other suitable employment, they joined
the U.S. Army's Regiment of Mounted Rifles, which served on the Texas
frontier. Their description of their experiences is unusual on several
counts: it is a view of Texas in the 1850s, when personal accounts were
rare, and it is written from the point of view of visitors to this
nation. And because the Wrights published their book in 1857, only three
years after they left the army, their story has an immediacy lacking in
many memoirs. He was a man in the prime of life, tall and slender, with
black plaited hair descending all the way down his back, and a
countenance, whose handsome, intelligent, and dignified expression, was
scarcely concealed by the red streaks of war-paint that covered it. . .
. Little mercy is shown to an Indian in war, and especially by the Texan
rangers, who are scarcely, if at all, advanced beyond the savage state
themselves. So the prisoner was immediately tied to a tree, and a number
of men were selected to shoot him. On ascertaining his fate, he
instantly commenced singing his death-song . . . which vibrated like the
notes of a clarion on the air of early night . . . until his voice was
lost in the fatal volley, and all was over. This softcover facsimile of
the Book Club of Texas's 1995 fine limited edition of 300 copies makes
this classic firsthand account 04 Activeable to a broad audience for the
first time since 1857. It is illustrated with wood engravings from
William H. Emory's Report of the United States and Mexican Boundary
Survey.
