First Battle of Adobe Walls
Stinnett, Hutchinson County, Texas
Marker Inscription
(November 25, 1865) Largest Indian battle in Civil War. 15 miles east, at ruins of Bent's Old Fort, on the Canadian. 3,000 Comanches and Kiowas, allies of the South, met 372 Federals under Col. Kit Carson, famous scout and mountain man. Though Carson made a brilliant defense - called greatest fight of his career - the Indians won. Some of the same Indians lost in 1874 Battle of Adobe Walls, though they outnumbered 700 to 29 the buffalo hunters whose victory helped open the Panhandle to settlement. (1965)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
In the closing months of the Civil War, thousands of Comanche and Kiowa warriors — allied with the Confederacy — clashed with a Federal column of some 372 men led by the famed scout Col. Kit Carson near the ruins of an old trading post on the Canadian River. Though Carson mounted what he called the greatest fight of his career, the vastly outnumbered soldiers were forced to withdraw, making this one of the largest Indian engagements of the war. A decade later, some of the same warriors would face buffalo hunters at the 1874 Battle of Adobe Walls, a fight that helped open the Panhandle to settlement.
Why it matters
Adobe Walls marks the collision of the Civil War with the Southern Plains Indian wars, a turning point in the long struggle for control of the Texas Panhandle.
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Related people
- · Kit Carson
Related events
- · First Battle of Adobe Walls
- · Battle of Adobe Walls (1874)
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Bents Creek
Borger, TX
Named for brothers Charles and William Bent, whose Colorado-based trading empire reached deep into the Texas Panhandle. From the mid-1830s they and their men rode out from their post near present-day La Junta to trade with the Kiowa and Comanche along the Canadian River, eventually raising several posts here—most notably the adobe-walled Fort Adobe of 1843–44. Those crumbling walls later framed two famous frontier fights: Kit Carson's hard-pressed 1864 clash and the 1874 Battle of Adobe Walls between buffalo hunters and Plains warriors.
Fifteen miles to the Site of the Battle of Adobe Walls
Borger, TX
Fifteen miles from this marker lies the site of the first Battle of Adobe Walls, fought on November 25, 1864, when Kiowa and Comanche warriors met U.S. troops led by Colonel Christopher 'Kit' Carson. Carson attacked the villages but, badly outnumbered, was forced to withdraw in what proved to be the famous scout and frontiersman's last fight. The clash was one of the largest engagements between the Army and the Southern Plains nations.
Battle of Adobe Walls
Stinnett, TX
On November 25, 1864, Colonel Christopher "Kit" Carson led a column of U.S. troops against a large force of Kiowa and Comanche near the ruins of an old trading post known as Adobe Walls. Sheltering behind the crumbling walls, Carson's men fought a hard engagement before withdrawing from the far more numerous warriors. It proved to be the famed frontiersman's last battle.
Exploration Route of Lt. James W. Abert
Masterson, TX
In 1845, just as Texas was joining the Union, the U.S. government sent West Point topographical engineer Lt. James W. Abert and a 33-man party to map the Canadian River. Camping near this spot, Abert was visited by Kiowa who said they were at war with Texans but welcomed him once he proved to be an American, and his maps and notes on the river's geography and its native peoples became valuable to the young state and nation.