Lynn County, TX News

Lynn County, TX News

DRAW, Lynn County. Texas, April 26.—(AF)—Three persons were killed and at least five were injured , one of them critically, by a twister that hopped-skipped- and-jumped around this south plains community late today. Most seriously injured was Irene McKay, one-year-old daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Louis McKay. She suffered a skull fracture when the McKay home was destroyed. All members of the family were injured, their bodies lacerated by flying debris. The John Walters home was hit and a son, M. B., and a man employed on the place were killed. A little girl was injured seriously. A. R. Hensley said the storm first struck-southwest of O'Donnell, but missed that community, and then wrought havoc In .widely separated farms around this village Of about 40 persons. At cast one farm woman in the mini unity was injured serious. At the Caswell home, a mile and a half west of Draw. Caswell vas injured seriously and his wife killed. A nearby house, unoccupied at the time, was wrecked. Five persons were brought to Lubbock hospitals and nurses, factors and Ambulances went to the scene.

TAHOKA, Tex.. April 26.- ;AP) — Tornadic winds which struck the little community of Draw. 18 miles south of here today, left one person dead, and reportedly destroyed numerous houses. Meager reports coming here on Tippled communications wires said the body of Mrs. V. 0. Caswell whose home was blown away from the residence sight. Fear wan expressed for safety of the family of Mack Walters. Bob Alexander, a survivor told of being caught by powerful winds one mile east of the Caswell home. His Automobile was overturned several times and wrecked. Alexander suffered severe bruises and shock. A message to Funk Hill, newspaper publisher of Tahoka. said it was believed four persons had been killed. He said he received the additional names of Johnnie Walters, son of Mack Walters: George Walters, a nephew of Mack Walters, and a MacKay infant Through Lubbock hospitals, it was learned a MacKay infant had been admitted to a sanitarium there, but its chances for survival were slim.
[Daily Capital News | Jefferson City, Missouri | Wednesday, April 27, 1938]

Floyd F. Reece, Tahoka, Texas saved a girl from drowning at Post, Tex., July 5, 1926.
[Constitution Tribune | Chillicothe, Missouri | Saturday, April 30, 1927]

HEARNE. Tex., Sept. 6 —Five members of a migratory cotton picking family were killed today when their truck and a freight train collided at a crossing four miles southwest of here in central Texas. The accident killed Mr. and Mrs. Frank Sarabio of Tahoka, Tex., and their three children and wiped out the family with the exception of one son who is with the U.S. Army in Korea. The dead were: Frank Sarabio, 36, driver of the truck: Maria Sarabio, 41, his wife, and their children, Albert. 17; Genoviva, 16, and Domingo, 3. A passenger, Matilda Arrendondo, about 16, was injured and was in critical condition in the Hearne Clinic. The other passenger, Henry V. Pena, jumped out of the truck and was unhurt.
[Joplin Globe | Joplin, Missouri | Tuesday, September 07, 1954]

Tahoka, Texas.— "You're the bravest kid I ever saw," an officer in the Union army once told I. P. Metcalf, better Known locally as "Uncle Ike." "I'm not brave; I've got too damned much pride to be a coward," the then youthful fighter quickly retorted. It was probably; that "pride" he spoke about while doing Service in the Civil war that has marked "Uncle Ike" us a successful fighter, and "Uncle Ike" Civil war veteran, ex-Indian fighter and former, member of the Texas Rangers, has led a quiet life as "marrying squire" of Tahoka for the last few years. "Uncle Ike" Metcalf took his first step onto the fertile plains of Texas in 1868, as one of a detachment of Texas Rangers.

Entering Lynn county, or what is now called Lynn county, from the southeast, the rangers marched northward to the Tahoka springs, on the west side of Tahoka lake, about nine miles northeast of the present town of Tahoka, where they pitched camp and spent ten days. Metcalf had been stationed at Camp Cooper, six miles above Fort Griffin on the Clear Fork branch as a member of the .Second Texas Rangers the occasion of his first trip to the plains he says was this : Along in the summer of about '68, 60 negro soldiers, either of the sixth or the tenth Calvary, I don't remember which, from Fort Concho, where San Angelo now stands had been sent to the plains under the command of Lieutenant Gilbert on the trail of a bunch of Indians who had been stealing horses from outlying ranches. As the days went by fear for the safety of the negros grew. No word was heard from them. Then, one day in August, orders were received at Camp Cooper for the 36 Texas Rangers stationed there to start a search for the negro troopers. "The only settlements in western -Texas in those days were centered around Fort Griffin, Fort Concho, Del Norte, where El Paso now stands and a few other such Forts. Indians in Oklahoma were allowed to leave reservations and journey into the western part of Texas to hunt, the buffalo that grazed the plains in herds of from a hundred to several thousand head. Frequently these Indians, not content with killing buffalo alone, raided scattering and isolated ranches, waylaid travelers,, and even at times ventured down into Comanche, Brown, Erath and other Central West Texas Counties. It took a brave group of men to start a trip across the plains facing the probability of meeting up with hostile Indians the scarcity of watering places and the danger of getting lost and running out of food to say nothing of the lonesomeness of such a trip.

But when the orders came the whole bunch was rearing to go Captain Brown of Erath County was to be in Command. While we were getting ready to break camp and to start the trip that was in cover and hundreds of miles that would take weeks of a mail carrier of the Dallas-Weather ford - Fort Griffin - Fort Davis - Fort '"Adobe" Del Norte line rode in and told us of a terrible massacre of a bunch of California immigrants committed by a band Of Comanche Indians, that had taken place near the head of Devil's river, between the present town of Odessa and Concho. "As this would not be much out of our way we decided to go by way of the scene. "We arrived sit the head of the "river. some time later, which was known as Devil's Creek springs, and found that the immigrants had apparently camped there several days Six miles northwest of There we found the most hideous sight I ever saw Thirty-six :people "had been slaughtered, stripped of their clothing, and cut to pieces. Not one white mail lived to tell the story of how it all occurred, but the story was silently told in the scene we saw.

Mark of Comanches Work.

"We knew the Comanches had done the, work, as the Comanches and Tomkawas were the only Indians that roamed in west Texas at that time. I never knew of a Tonkawa tribe harming white people, but the Comanches were always into mischief. "The Indians probably found the immigrants camped at the springs and waited for a good chance to attack them. When the "latter got out from under cover and on the plains the Indians sped down on them unawares and wiped out the entire group. "Nothing was left undone. They murdered and undressed their victims, took their valuables, cut their throats and stomachs open, scalped them, and left their bodies on the open prairies. The wagons were burned where they stood, and their positions showed that little fight had been made, for if they had the wagons would have been corralled. Ashes, the dead bodies of 36 men, women and children, three dead mules, and one dead horse, and a few scattering feathers from mattresses, were all we found. The number of hoof prints showed .that the-tribe of Indians had been a large one. The story of the burial of the dead is almost too awful to tell. We arrived probably ten days after the massacre had taken place. Graves were dug by the sides of the dead about two and one-half feet deep. One man would do the digging while another would hold up a shovel of burning tar near him to kill the odor. When one man got tired digging he exchanged places with the tar burner. It took us two days to bury them. With this gruesome task accomplished, the rangers doubled back to Big Spring, near which were the Kilpatrick and Coffee ranches, the nearest outpost to the plains country. From there they journeyed to Wet Tobacco creek which runs through Borden county, then to Moore's Draw, 20 miles southeast of the present town of Tahoka; and then to Tahoka lake.

Never Heard of Lost Negroes,

"We stayed at Tahoka lake for about ten days," Uncle Ike says, "waiting and watching for the lost negroes but never saw or heard of them. We got tired staying there and moved to the Yellow Horse canyon and then to the Blanco canyon. While going down the Blanco we met up with a bunch of Comanches and had a little skirmish. One or two of our men were wounded and we killed 12 or 18 Indians, I don't remember which. From there we returned to our old. camp "Were we glad to get back? Man, civilization looked good to us." But, "Uncle Ike" Metcalf had received the thrill that accompanies one in coming of the great stretching plains of western Texas and as civilization moved westward he settled in Lynn County and took up the more peaceful position of marrying squire. Since then he has married more couples than any other man living in the plains or Panhandle Country.
[Tyrone Daily Herald | Tyrone, Pennsylvania | Monday, April 18, 1927]