Frontier blood : the saga of the Parker family / Jo Ella Powell Exley. [electronic resource]

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Exley, Jo Ella Powell, 1940-

Series:

Centennial series of the Association of Former Students, Texas A&M University ; no. 90

The centennial series of the Association of Former Students, Texas A&M University Frontier blood

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Pioneers--Texas--Biography.

Pioneers.

Parker family.

Frontier and pioneer life--Texas.

Frontier and pioneer life.

Parker, Cynthia Ann, 1827?-1864.

Parker, Cynthia Ann.

Parker, Quanah, 1845?-1911.

Parker, Quanah.

Comanche Indians--Texas--History--19th century.

Comanche Indians.

Indian captivities--Texas.

Indian captivities.

Texas--History--19th century--Biography.

Texas.

Pioneers--Southern States--Biography.

Frontier and pioneer life--Southern States.

Indian captivities--19th century--Personal narratives.

Texas--History--19th century.

Pioneers--History--19th century--Texas--Biography.

Frontier and pioneer life--Texas--Biography.

Comanche Indians--Texas.

Pioneers--Southern States.

Genre:

Biographies.

History.

Personal narratives.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xiii, 331 p. ) ill. ;

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

College Station : Texas A & M University Press, c2001.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

A must read for anyone with an interest in the far Southwest or Native American history.

The descendants of Elder John Parker were a strange and often brilliant family who may have changed the course of Texas and Western history. Their obsession with religion and their desire for land took them from Virginia to Georgia, Tennessee, Illinois, and finally Texas. From their midst came Cynthia Ann, taken captive by Comanches as a young girl and recaptured as an adult to live in grief among her birth family until she died. From their line too came her son, Quanah Parker, last of the great Comanche war chiefs--and first of their great peace leaders. Although the broad outlines of the stories of Cynthia Ann and Quanah are familiar, Jo Ella Powell Exley adds a new dimension by placing them in the context of the stubborn, strong, contentious Parker clan, who lived near and dealt with restive Indians across successive frontiers until history finally brought them to Texas, where their fate changed.

Drawing on a wealth of contemporary accounts, including several first-person stories, the author follows Cynthia Ann through her life in the Indian camp & eventually her recapture by her birth family. She also tells the dramatic story of Quanah Parker through childhood, battle, surrender, & reservation life. This narrative is filled with authentic flavor and sets straight a story that has sometimes been distorted. It offers new insight if not a definitive interpretation of Cynthia Ann Parker's last years, providing a more complex picture of the 'white' years of a woman who had matured among the Comanches since the age of nine. Among the documents from which Exley draws are a short autobiography of Daniel Parker, Rachel Parker Plummer's two narratives of her Indian captivity, James Parker's account of his search for Rachel & the other captives, & several autobiographical accounts Quanah dictated to his friends.

Exley tells a compelling story and gives rich character insights into the extended Parker family. But she also does more: she gives a feeling of what it was really like to live on the frontier in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. -- Publisher description.

Contents:

Part I. Daniel

1. A Poor Sinner 3

2. The Wrong Road 11

3. Plain and Unpolished

The Diamond in the Rough State 24

Part II. Rachel

4. Father, Forgive Them 41

5. Vengeance Is Mine 61

6. How Checkered Are the Ways of Providence 82

Part III. James W.

7. The Tongue of Slander 97

8. The House of God 106

9. Sundry Charges 113

10. Called Home 122

Part IV. Cynthia Ann

11. Miss Parker 133

12. The Hand of Savage Invasion 144

13. The Long-Lost Relative 165

14. Thirsting for Glory 183

15. It Was Quanah 202

16. So Many Soldiers 219

17. Blood upon the Land 231

18. I Lived Free 252.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (p. [303]-321) and index.

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

ISBN:

1-58544-948-2