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Re: "Brit officer gathering intelligence undercover in 1880's...in that Great Game...
Now could that be say Sir Francis Younghusband? I know he was prowling about up in those mountains India, Russia and Afghanistan etc on recon and intelligence missions for Britain.
I find the Yom Kippur War of 1973 to be interesting because I lived in a very political orientated place back then(Berkeley, CA) and up until the war everything was quiet. But suddenly the whole place sprung to life with speakers and meetings etc. Also, there were some classic tank battles during the war that I find very interesting.
There was a battlefield from King Phillip's war in the woods behind my house when I was kid and it fascinated me. The battle happened in 1676 when the British didn't offer any support for colonists and they were completely on their own. The battle was far from honorable. Just before dawn about 15 colonists from Wrentham MA snuck up on a camp of 75 Narragansett who were camping on a large rock outside town, and were planning on attacking the town the next day (the town had a population of around 50 at the time, including women and children). They shot most of the Narragansett before they woke up, and a battle ensued around Indian Rock. Skirmishes and raids continued in the immediate area for a month or so, and King Phillip's war continued for more than a year after that.
There were much larger battles with hundreds of deaths during King Phillip's war, but that one had happened in my backyard and that fascinated me. The entire concept of a small group of settlers in the mid-1600's with little to no outside support fascinated me as well, and as I got older I also became very interested in how the conflicts with native tribes began. It still fascinates me to this day.
My contribution is the Civil War Battle of Fort Blakeley in south Alabama. It took place on the afternoon of April 9th, 1865. In fact, most of it took place after Lee had signed the surrender documents at the Appomattox Courthouse.
Old Fort Blakeley and the remnants of the town of Blakeley -- twice decimated by Yellow Fever -- are on the eastern shore of Mobile Bay (actually the Mobile River Delta). The city of Mobile is on the western shore, just a bit to the south.
I stood on, and walked, the extensive earthwork fortifications of old Fort Blakeley, and explored the yawning cellars along the "main street" of the Blakely town site, many times in my youth. The whole area is forested now, so its easy to underestimate the size and complexity. Somewhere around Casa Nighteyes is an early-1960's photograph of me and my entire Boy Scout patrol (eight boys) standing together in the crotch of a massive Southern Live Oak on the Blakeley town site. We're about six feet above ground level.
There was the second battle of Adobe Walls, June 27, 1874.
Adobe Walls had been a trading post near the northern border of Texas, built in 1845, blown up and abandoned in 1848 after repeated attacks by Comanches.
Twenty nine years after it was wrecked, a trader/hunter named James Hanrahan built some new installations among the ruins, creating a small settlement to be used by the 200-300 buffalo hunters who worked the area. The Comanche, along with their allies the Cheyenne, Kiowa, and Arapaho, saw it as a threat to their free ranging ways and decided to eliminate it.
On the date mentioned above, Hanrahan and 27 other hunters, including a young Bat Masterson, were at the settlement when 700 warriors, led by the famous Quanah Parker, attacked.
The initial assault came as a surprise and the Indians were among the defenders almost immediately, triggering a brutal house by house fight until the Indians finally fell back to regroup. Then the defenders managed to keep the attackers at a distance by employing their long range Sharps buffalo rifles with great accuracy. Four of the hunters and fifteen of the Indians were killed in the first days fighting.
On the second day of the siege the Indians ceased their attacks and instead surrounded the settlement and contented themselves with long range sniping. On the third day a group of fifteen Indians rode to an elevated bluff overlooking Adobe Walls, about a mile away. They were there to scout for weaknesses and assumed themselves safely out of range. They were disabused of this notion when Billy Dixon, using a .50 caliber Sharps, shot one of the Indians out of the saddle., the last casualty of the fight.
This discouraged the attackers and they fell even further back, hanging out in the vicinity, but no longer attacking. When reinforcements for the hunters began to arrive, they abandoned the siege.
Modern Day Photo Of The Remains of Adobe Walls.
If you were unfamiliar with this action, but the name Adobe Walls rang a bell, you may be recalling it from the tv mini series "Lonesome Dove." After Gus rescues Laurie from Blue Duck's men, he takes her to Adobe Walls for a night of rest.
There was the second battle of Adobe Walls, June 27, 1874.
Yup, a really interesting battle.
Now that you mentioned the area, a bit west of there was the Battle of the Glorieta Pass, in eastern New Mexico, in 1862. It was probably the largest Civil War battle west of the Mississippi. I've also been told that it is the one depicted (though loosely) in the Clint Eastwood movie The Good, The Bad and The Ugly.
Now that you mentioned the area, a bit west of there was the Battle of the Glorieta Pass, in eastern New Mexico, in 1862. It was probably the largest Civil War battle west of the Mississippi. I've also been told that it is the one depicted (though loosely) in the Clint Eastwood movie The Good, The Bad and The Ugly.
The Battle of Glorieta Pass has nothing in common with the fight depicted in The Good, The Bad and The Ugly apart from being in the west during the Civil War. Glorieta Pass was fought in a narrow canyon, there was no body of water nor bridge being contested. The film's battle concerned a struggle for possession of a bridge in otherwise open territory. Glorieta Pass was a victory for the Federals, in the movie the bridge gets blown up and both sides simply leave.
Re: "Brit officer gathering intelligence undercover in 1880's...in that Great Game...
Now could that be say Sir Francis Younghusband? I know he was prowling about up in those mountains India, Russia and Afghanistan etc on recon and intelligence missions for Britain.
^
Righto! that man has the qualities!...sort of like the guys who fought for Wellington,eh ....;-)...
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