Military Roads in Texas
Brackettville, Kinney County, Texas
Marker Inscription
The routes that moved troops in early Texas often followed old Indian trails, usually were little more than deep wagon ruts. This one, the Chihuahua Road joining Ft. Clark with other southwest posts -- was widely used, 1850-1880. The Comanche War Trail, part of the Chihuahua Road, carried women, children, and horses stolen by Indians from Mexico to the north. The Spanish era opened El Camino Real (the Old San Antonio Road) in 1691 to join Louisiana to Mexico. After 1836, Republic of Texas settlers demanded forts for safety from Indians; a main 1840 supply road followed present Austin-Dallas highway. Central National Road, 1844, linked Trinity and Red Rivers. (Its rules required all trees to be cut 12 inches or less from ground). From 1848 to 1860, surveys by U.S. led to a network of military roads in west central Texas. In 1849, Capt. Randolph B. Marcy blazed a West Texas trail used by California gold hunters. Famed U.S. 2nd Cavalry made Ft. Belknap - San Antonio Road a military artery in 1850s. During Civil War, supplies moved from Mexico to Texas over the cotton road. The Indian campaigns of Capt. R.S. Mackenzie in 1870s opened trails across the staked plains; but by 1881, the railroad had begun to replace Texas' once-famous military routes. (1968)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
The roads that moved troops across early Texas often began as Indian trails worn into wagon ruts. This marker traces a whole network: the Spanish Camino Real opened in 1691, the Chihuahua Road linking Fort Clark to southwestern posts, the grim Comanche War Trail that carried captives and stolen horses, and the U.S. military roads surveyed after 1848. Marcy's 1849 trail guided California gold-seekers, the 2nd Cavalry made the Fort Belknap–San Antonio road an artery, and Mackenzie's 1870s campaigns opened the staked plains — until the railroad displaced them all by 1881.
Why it matters
These routes carried the soldiers, settlers, traders, and Native peoples whose movements decided the fate of frontier Texas, from Spanish colonization to the end of the Indian wars.
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Related people
- · Capt. Randolph B. Marcy
- · Capt. R. S. Mackenzie
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Fort Clark
Brackettville, TX
Established in 1852 beside the springs of Las Moras Creek, Fort Clark guarded the military road from San Antonio to El Paso and the border with Mexico. Nearly every U.S. cavalry regiment passed through, and its garrison — including the Seminole-Negro Indian Scouts and the Buffalo Soldiers of the 10th Cavalry and 24th and 25th Infantry — played a decisive part in the Indian campaigns of the 1870s. Held briefly by Confederates during the Civil War, the fort remained a horse-cavalry post until 1946.
Fort Clark, U.S.A.
Brackettville, TX
From its founding in 1852 until it closed in 1946, Fort Clark guarded the California road and the Texas frontier against raids and outlaws, named for a major killed in the Mexican War. Union troops abandoned it after Texas seceded in 1861 and reoccupied it in 1866, later relying on the celebrated Seminole-Negro Indian Scouts and a nearby Indian reservation. Nearly every U.S. Cavalry regiment served here, and in World War II the 2nd and 11th Cavalry trained on its grounds before the post was inactivated in 1946.
John Horse
Brackettville, TX
Born in Spanish Florida in 1812 to a Black mother and a Seminole father, John Horse became a leading figure among the Black Seminoles during the Second Seminole War, fighting alongside Chief Coacoochee before serving the U.S. Army as scout, interpreter, and mediator. Repeatedly pursued after his people's freedom was stripped away, he led followers out of Indian Territory in 1849 toward sanctuary in Mexico, resting near Las Moras Spring in 1850 and later settling at Nacimiento in exchange for guarding the border against Apache and Comanche raids. He survived an ambush near this site in 1876 and died in Mexico City in 1882.
Seminole Scout Camp on Fort Clark
Brackettville, TX
For decades the descendants of Africans who had fled slavery for Spanish Florida — where they joined the Seminole people and forged the distinct Black Seminole community — carried their hard-won freedom across the continent. After removal to Indian Territory and a sojourn in Mexico, one group crossed back into Texas in 1870 to serve the U.S. Army as the Seminole-Negro Indian Scouts. They made their home at 'the camp' on Fort Clark, building jacal houses and digging irrigation ditches along Las Moras Creek while scouting the border country until their disbandment in 1914.