Captain Jeff of the Texas Rangers: Fighting Comanche & Kiowa Indians on the South Western Frontier 1863-1874 [Hardcover]

A famous Ranger and Indian fighter of the 'Frontier Battalion'

The Texas of the post American Civil War period remained a wild and hostile country where the pioneers struggled to make a home and life for themselves by farming or as cattle ranchers. The country could at anytime be raided by 'desperados' or suffer depredations from marauding bands of Indians from the Comanche or Kiowa tribes who could strike swiftly only to disappear to safety over the border into Mexico or into the vast wilderness. While the army did its vital part, much burden was placed on the Texas Rangers who had been serving their state, from the time of the Republic and before, ever ready to protect isolated settlements and to track down and bring wrongdoers to swift justice. This book concentrates on the life and services of one notable Texan and ranger, Captain William J. 'Jeff ' Maltby who served in the Mexican War and Civil War and by turns was a teamster, wagon-master, scout and dispatch rider. Maltby became a legend in his own lifetime specifically for the long battle he waged to the death with an illusive and notorious Kiowa chief known, for obvious reasons, as Big Foot, Jape, his Comanche henchman and their murderous band of Indian renegades. The account of this extended battle of violence and wits, where each party was by turn hunter and hunted, makes the most riveting reading. This book, the story of one of the lesser known heroes of the American south west frontier during the nineteenth century, will fascinate all those interested in the subject.