Everyone knows of the legendary Texas Rangers and that it only takes one Texas Ranger for one riot. Little is known of its infancy in Texas and where it all began.
Alcalde John Tomlinson of the Colorado District (Colorado County) and Captain Robert Kuykendall requested permis sion from Trespalacios to raise a company of men to protect the colonists brought by Stephen F. Austin from Indian attacks. Moses Morrison recruited 10 men to serve as protectors.
However, when Austin returned from Mexico City in 1823, he found the colony still
smooth efficiency. She used an axe, a cotton hoe, her bare hands, or whatever club was nearby to settle matters. Hysteria was an unknown emotion. She abhorred people that yelled, screamed, or yakked profusely and only raised her voice to whoop and play with her grandchildren. Next door, Mama Brune relied on a .410 shotgun, a .22 Remington pump rifle, a similar cotton hoe, and was also known to stomp a critter to death. Her voice sang loudest when shaking a sack and calling cows.
Yes – maybe we lost something when people are no longer reliant on outhouses, cisterns, or splitting wood for cooking and heat. Natural instincts have diminished, the Society of Screaming Yinnies (SSY) is prevalent, and the Blue Sky (BS) salesman reaps wealth from continued foolish and misguided controversies. (continued) plagued by Indians and announced he would employ an additional 10 men at his own expense. These men would serve as “Rangers” for the common defense.
On Oct. 17, 1835, Daniel Parker, a member, sought to create a corps of Texas Rangers under the command of Silas M. Parker to range and guard the frontier between the Brazos and the Trinity Rivers.
There were 25 men under the command of D. B. Frazier to patrol between the Brazos and the Colorado rivers. The name was derived because their duties had their range over the entire country of Texas.
By Nov. 24, 1835, there were three companies of Rangers to protect settlements against the Indians. Privates received $1.25 per day for pay, rations, clothing and horse service for an enlistment period of one year.
By December 1836, President Sam Houston raised a battalion of 280 mounted riflemen, and soon Bastrop, Robertson, Milam, San Patricio, Goliad and Refugio counties came under the protection of the Texas Rangers.
In 1901, Ranger activities involved citizen criminals. During the later years of the Nineteenth Century, the Rangers were involved in detective work brought on by fence cutters and horse and cattle theft.
By 1927, the force, led by Captain Frank Hamer, captured the infamous Bonnie and Clyde, whose trek also sometimes came through Columbus and surrounding areas.
However, the pair would meet their fate in Louisiana’s Bienville Parish.
The Texas Rangers were absorbed into the Texas Department of Public Safety when DPS was created in 1935.
During their first year under DPS, the Rangers were active in about 255 cases and by 1955, the Rangers were active in 16,701 cases.
One local ranger of notoriety is Zeno Smith. He is the only ranger who wears a black hat.
There is a plaque in Eagle Lake noting Smith.
Apart from the Bonnie and Clyde saga, the Rangers’ legend grew during each event a Rang- er was involved. Their quiet but firm presence has helped in nu merous violent situations.
During a riot in the Rusk State Hospital for the Criminally Insane in the 1950s, Ranger Captain R.A. Crowder, armed with only a .45 pistol, and the leader of the riot conversed and the inmates surrendered.
The iconic badges were made using a Mexican silver coin. The Rangers would cut a five-point ed star into the center.
According to records, the earliest surviving Texas Ranger badge was worn by Ranger Ira Aten in the 1880s and, with varying details, has been worn by Rangers ever since.
The Texas Rangers are North America’s oldest statewide jurisdictional law enforcement agency.
firearms.
