JOHN "JACK" COFFEE HAYS
©Lee Paul

In the early days of the Texas Republic, there were no well-recognized and permanently established corps of Texas Rangers, and it left the Texan frontier a virtual no man’s land. With no one specifically designated to range and protect the settlements, citizens had to rely on themselves and the sparsely disbursed Texas army and local militia to survive Indian attacks and bandit raids. There were a number of men fitted to be leaders, to be sure, but no one really in command of a Ranger company, other than military members of Sam Houston’s army. All that changed when Jack Hays arrived.

There has never been a more genteel candidate for heroism than Jack Hays. Considered by all to be the finest Ranger Captain who ever lived, he originally came to Texas to make maps for the new Republic. It wasn’t long before he found himself the chief guardian of the Texas frontier. Idolized by his men, he was a Captain at age twenty-three, a Major at twenty-five, and a Colonel at thirty-one. Considered the greatest Indian fighter in Texas history, his exploits on the frontier are legend.

Born John Coffee Hays, 28 January 1817, on the family’s plantation near Little Cedar Lick, Wilson County, Tennessee, he was named in honor of a close family friend, General John Coffee, a hero of the War of 1812. Grandfather Robert Hays immediately dubbed him "Jack," an affectionate nickname which stuck until the end of his life. His parents were Harmon and Elizabeth (Cage) Hays, and he had one older brother named William. Five younger siblings named James, Mary Anne, Harry Thompson, Sarah, and Robert arrived in the next nine years.

The Scot-Irish Hays family arrived in America with great-grandfather John Hays, who, induced by a combination of famine and politics, had sailed with his family and a party of immigrants from Ireland in 1740. Arriving in Virginia, his son Robert was born to his second wife, Martha Thompson. Robert Hays grew up in the Rockbridge area of Virginia which was, ironically, the same area settled by Texas Ranger William Alexander Anderson "Big Foot" Wallace’s grandfather Samuel Wallace.

Too young to participate in the Seven Years War, Robert Hays became a Lieutenant in the North Carolina Infantry during the American Revolution and quickly advanced to the rank of Captain. By 1785, he had settled on Little Cedar Lick in Wilson County, Tennessee, where he met Jane Donelson, the daughter of Colonel John and Rachel (Stockley) Donelson. Colonel John Donelson was the founder of Nashville and one of the wealthiest men in the state at that time. Jane had four brothers and one sister: John, William, Stockley, Samuel, and Rachel. Sister Rachel (Donelson) Robards married Andrew Jackson, hero of the Battle of New Orleans in 1814, and seventh President of the United States.

Robert Hays was considered by all a very wealthy man. He built Fort Haysboro, which later became the small town of Haysboro, and had close family friends, which included the more wealthy and prominent land speculators, William Polk and William Blount. In the first assessment of real estate in the Nashville area, his name is listed as one of the influential principal property-holders. Later, when his brother-in-law Andrew Jackson fell on hard times, he sold Jackson the land on which The Hermitage now sits. By the time his sixth child Harmon was born, he carried the rank of Colonel.

Harmon Hays served with Sam Houston in the Creek War in Alabama and was a member of General John Coffee’s dragoons. In May 1814, he had been promoted to Lieutenant and was selected to face the center of the British advance with General Andrew Jackson at New Orleans. When he married Elizabeth Cage, whose wealthy family had moved from Virginia to settle near Nashville, he resigned his army commission and retired to the family plantation at Little Cedar Lick.

Jack Hays had a fabulous childhood. Andrew and Rachel Jackson had no children of their own, although they did adopt one of Rachel’s nephews, naming the child Andrew Jackson, Jr. They also took in another of her nephews, Andrew Jackson Donelson, sending him to the academy at West Point. They both adored Jack. He was a constant visitor at The Hermitage, listening enthralled as Rachel regaled him with all sorts of incredible stories of his great uncle. Rachel Jackson died of a heart attack 22 December 1828, and it was a grief-stricken Andrew who took the Office of President on 4 March 1829. It was also a severe blow to young Jack, who had idolized his great aunt.

Jack Hays was a handsome man with a warm, friendly smile and easy manner that belied his raw courage. Tall and willowy with broad shoulders and straight back, he had the fair complexion of his Scot-Irish ancestry. Invariably, his black hair fell rakishly over his forehead and shadowed his blue eyes. By the time he was a teenager, he was one of the most popular lads in the whole area. Together with good breeding, he inherited a tradition of leadership and public service. To say he was conscious of his heritage and traditions of honor and civic duty would be an understatement. He never forgot his upbringing, and it served him well all his life.

It was always Jack’s plan to go to West Point, but in 1832, his father died. A few weeks after his father’s death, his mother also died. Her funeral was held in a pouring rain. That night, he and his siblings stayed with Uncle Stockley Hays. The next day, they were torn apart. Older brother William was able to fend for himself, and Jack meant to do the same thing. But Uncle Robert Cage, his mother’s brother from Yazoo County, Mississippi, took the two youngest, Sarah and Robert, and asked that Jack come, too. Jack was fifteen-years-old and rebellious at the thought of separation from the others, but little brother Robert was only five-years-old, and Robert wanted his brother. Jack took his big brother responsibilities very seriously. He stayed with Robert.

At the Cage plantation in Mississippi, well-meaning Uncle Robert tried to interest Jack in business as a career, and he suggested that young Jack begin by working in a local store. Jack objected, still wanting to go to West Point. Eventually, after being unable to sway his uncle, Jack peacefully left home.

He was still fifteen when he decided to learn surveying. Hiring himself out as a chain boy for that summer, he soon decided on saving his money and paying his own way through school. Since people were moving west in droves, he had no problem acquiring a practical knowledge of surveying, as land speculators and ex-soldiers paid him handsomely to locate numerous tracks of land, some located in hostile Indian country.

There’s no way of knowing how much the stories Rachel Jackson told of his famous uncle influenced his life, but once near a Choctaw hunting location in Mississippi, young Jack and his friend George Work found themselves stalked by a hunting party. The boys rode for their lives, but the Indians were able to shoot the horse from under George. Jack raced back to his friend, told him to take his horse and lasso the first Indian who came up. George never once questioned Jack’s authority. While he mounted, Jack ran to nearby rocks, took up a position, and when George roped the leading pursuer, took deliberate aim and fired. He then leap-frogged upon the Indian’s pony, and the two boys raced to safety. His quick thinking in the face of death would serve him well in Texas.

In two years, Jack had saved enough money to enroll in Davidson Academy at Nashville. In the year that he attended, he excelled in academics as well as athletics, and running became one of his favorite sports. That winter was bitterly cold, and he became sick. Unable to get well or attend school, he thought the warmer climate in Yazoo County might be his salvation. He returned to his Uncle Robert’s plantation in Mississippi. Hardly had he arrived, when the Texas issue surfaced.

Jack was nineteen-years-old when the dispatch from Texas brought William Travis’ call to arms. Texas had declared itself an independent republic on 2 March 1836. Before Jack was really well enough to leave, successive dispatches brought the news of the fall of the Alamo, the Goliad Massacre, and the news of citizens fleeing toward Louisiana in advance of Santa Anna’s army. With his patriotism fully aroused, he decided to cast his lot with the Texans.

He arrived in Texas after the Mexican surrender at San Jacinto on 21 April 1836, but he still joined the army of the Republic commanded by General Thomas J. Rusk. One of his first assignments was to assist burying the remains of Colonel James Fannin’s 400 massacred men in Goliad. What he learned during this assignment gave him a realistic concept of what it meant to fight a revolution and become part of the infant Republic. When lack of funds forced a furlough, he chose to remain in service without compensation. He sought out Sam Houston, who advised him to join a company of Rangers being enlisted for service on the southwestern frontier. Captain Erasmus "Deaf" Smith was in command, and he had been Houston’s Chief-of-Scouts during the Revolution. His Rangers were charged with carrying out the Republic’s policy from the settlements all the way to the Rio Grande.

Hays officially became a Texas Ranger in December 1836. He enlisted for twelve months with pay of thirty dollars per month. Also included was food for himself and his horse. However, he had to furnish his horse, rifle, pistols, and other equipment which were subjected to inspection. Although the government was supposed to furnish provisions and ammunition, long scouting expeditions often compelled the Rangers to obtain both from the routed enemy.

At that time, there were only two settlements of any distinction between San Antonio and the towns along the Rio Grande. One was Victoria, and the other was Refugio, and both lay to the southeast about ninety miles. All the rest of the area from San Antonio to the Mexican border was a huge area heavily infested with all manner of hostile beings. The most fierce of all the hostiles were the Comanche, and they claimed the whole territory as their personal hunting ground. Considered the best light cavalry in the world, they had driven off most of the other Indian nations, including the Kickapoo and most of the Apache. Only one small band of Apache remained along the Medina River, and their chief was Lipan. His band became known as the Lipan Apache, and they remained bitter enemies of the Comanche. Mexico had also claimed the area, refusing to acknowledge Texas’ idea of the border. Their preferred boundary line was the Nueces River, which emptied into the Gulf of Mexico 150 miles further north from the Rio Grande. The area was a true no man’s land.

Captain Smith took his Rangers to San Antonio, where the overwhelming majority of citizens were of Mexican descent. He camped just south of town for one month to rest his men and horses and to restock his supplies. Hays spent the rest period learning Spanish. Two months later, Captain Smith had his men help bury the ashes of the Alamo defenders. Jack Hays had just turned twenty years old, and by now, he understood fully what it meant to be a Texan.

Hays’ first scout as a Ranger was in February 1837. The Mexican town of Laredo had grown large enough to overspill the Rio Grande and encroach on the Texas side of the river. It was the only settlement on the north bank, and the Rio Grande was the border Texas had declared at the end of the Revolution. To make sure the citizens of the town understood that Texas jurisdiction prevailed, the Rangers intended to raise a flag of independence on the town’s church spire.

Laredo, however, had been fortified with a large Mexican garrison. On 17 March, with the Rangers camped about five miles east of town, the Mexican dragoons surrounded the Rangers and attacked. In the battle which followed, the Mexicans suffered ten dead and ten wounded before retreating back to town. Two Rangers died. Realizing the futility of fighting such a heavily armed force in Laredo, Deaf Smith pulled his men back to San Antonio.  Laredo became a Republic all its own.

This expedition marked the first appearance of the Texas Rangers west of the Nueces River, and it initiated the renewal of the partisan conflict between Mexico and the Republic of Texas, which was to last for many long years. During this campaign, Hays became adept at discovering the enemy’s position, having learned a great deal about the methods of spying from Captain Smith. His quick reporting of the facts earned him a promotion to Sergeant.

Having served with Captain Smith for four months, Hays transferred to the Ranger company of Captain Henry Karnes. President Sam Houston had furloughed all but 500 of the Texas army due to lack of funds in May 1837, and this left the frontier defense in the hands of local militias and Ranger companies. By 1838, Hays was both a soldier and surveyor in the San Antonio area, since surveyors worked heavily armed or under the protection of a military escort, and it was just easier to work at both professions at the same time. He was appointed deputy surveyor of the Bexar District, and although he had already made his mark in thinning out the Comanche in the San Antonio area with his usual routine of fifty- and sixty-mile patrols, he still ended up surveying seventy-six headright certificates in the thickest of the heavily infested Indian lands. The Comanche highly resented his presence and took every opportunity to bushwhack him.

Hays was with Captain Karnes that August when the Rangers went on a scout to the Arroyo Seco area, located about seventy-five miles west of San Antonio. There were only twenty Rangers when they were surprised by more than 200 angry Comanche on the warpath. The Indians attacked not only once, but three times, managing to kill all the Rangers’ horses. During the attack, Hays studied their tactics. He discovered that the Indians would charge and then retreat before a counter offensive could be launched, and then charge again. It was a tactic he used from then on with his own men. He took careful aim and killed the chief. By the time the Indians retreated to the hills, twenty of their warriors were dead and as many more were wounded.

Hays and his men followed, but the Indians would stand on the tops of the rocks and torment the Rangers, out of range of the rifles. Ben McCulloch was one of the Rangers with Hays, and he possessed a very long-ranged gun, which he brought to bear on the Indians. When he fired his first shot, the warriors scattered and were soon out of sight. He did this several times, and finally Hays ordered the men up into the rocks after the Indians. After a few minutes, one of the Rangers reported that he had been shot by one of the Indians, who had been firing on the Rangers as they climbed, and he begged to be helped down the hill. Since it appeared to be impossible to dislodge the Indians, the Rangers assisted their wounded comrade down the mountain. At the bottom, the wounded man said, "Boys, they have knocked the black out of me this time. I am done for." Removing his coat and examining him, however, his comrades were astonished to see the ball drop out at his feet, not having penetrated his body at all. It had apparently struck a rock and glanced off to strike him, but it left a large black spot in his breast, and no doubt felt as though it had gone through him.

By now, everyone realized that Jack Hays was skilled in the battle tactics of the Indians. Part of his rapid development on the frontier was due to his friendship with friendly Delaware Indians and especially with Chief Flacco of the Lipan Apache. Flacco thought Hays possessed some sort of magic charm that enabled him to accomplish his deeds of bravery. He followed the Ranger everywhere, studying him. Jack, on the other hand, learned many of the finer points of trailing from Flacco. From the Lipan chief, he learned that the Comanche were open-field fighters, whereas the Apache preferred ambush. He also learned that the Comanche raided by the light of the moon, caring not for distance, mesquite thickets, or stony mountains in their paths.

The time that Hays went hunting with seventeen Delaware friends to the Pecos River, he learned what it meant to live like the Comanche. The eighteen friends traveled on foot, leaving their horses at home, hoping this maneuver would eliminate any temptation to the Comanche, who took every opportunity to steal horses. Reaching the river, they split into pairs for their hunt, but one member of the party stumbled into camp and said his partner had been killed by a passing band of more than 100 Comanche. The Delaware and Comanche were bitter enemies, and a vote was quickly taken to overtake the Comanche before they could cross the Rio Grande, since both Jack and the Delaware were obligated to remain on the Texas side of the river. They took to the trail with the Delaware in a never-tiring trot from which Hays wearied at the end of the first few miles.

The Delaware and Hays ran for two days and nights, making only brief stops for food, drink, and rest, while the everlasting pounding of feet set Jack to wondering how much longer he could endure. Finally, he surpassed the point of no return, and his screaming muscles and depleted lung power somehow remembered his days at Davidson Academy in Nashville. He had run further than he had ever run before, but he had kept up. At dawn on the third day, they attacked, surprising the Comanche, who ran frantically to the river to escape. It was a victory for the Delaware and Jack, who fought hand-to-hand with only a knife and tomahawk.

When not in the field, Hays resided in San Antonio, where the cost of living was low, recreation was simple, and surveying or fighting bandits and Indians provided plenty of exciting action. One of 30,000 white inhabitants in the whole of Texas at the time, he had witnessed the increase of settlers to almost 45,000 by the beginning of 1839. With San Antonio the western gate to the frontier that extended all the way to the Rio Grande, his little company of Rangers, militia, or surveyors’ helpers often numbered only ten or twelve men. He was the uncontested leader of a close-knit band in a region where guerrilla warfare raged. As one researcher once said, "thus began the control of Texas among the three races: Anglo, Mexican, and Indian."

Few of Hays’ Rangers were ever older than twenty-three years of age, and none of them were ordinary men. The brutality of a hostile country precluded any attempt at civility, yet Hays was the epitome of gentility. An observer of the time wrote that the "man…who appeared to be regarded with particular deference by all, was a slight, raw-boned figure, with a lean Roman face, and an expression of modest simplicity...and I remember feeling some surprise that so unsophisticated, easy, good-natured looking a personage should be treated with so much respect by men necessarily of hardy cast as those around. Yet this individual was the celebrated Captain…Hays, the leader and foremost spirit of the Rangers, a mere youth, though more distinguished for tempered skill and gallantry…than any man who had yet figured in the history of that frontier."

The summer of 1839 demonstrated the Captain’s hypnotic hold on the Indians. He and a handful of his men, along with some over-eager volunteers, went on a fifteen-day trip into Canyon de Uvalde in pursuit of the enemy. Though the Indians hovered near the party and were seen constantly, they would neither attack nor fight. It appeared that the Comanche were studying Hays, as all that his men found were deserted villages, which they quickly destroyed. Although they were able to recover some stolen horses and kill a handful of Indians, there were no pitched battles of any kind. It astonished everyone. The Captain had come to Texas, and the enemy now knew it.

When the Council House Fight of March 1840 erupted, Hays was on a patrol south of San Antonio. The bitter aftermath of this battle led to constant Comanche raids on San Antonio, and local citizens turned to Hays, who organized the volunteer "Minute Men" to chase the marauders on short notice. On one occasion, while Hays was miles away, a Comanche herald appeared in the part of town which later became Commerce Street. On a prancing steed, he challenged the townsmen to come out and fight his band. Eleven inexperience men followed him. Only three returned, the others dying in the ambush of more than 100 Indians.

It took the Comanche about six months to recover from their defeat in the Council House battle, but when they struck, it was with a fury of hatred which blazed a swath through Texas all the way to the Gulf Coast. Buffalo Hump was chief of the Comanche on the raid, and he took between 500 and 1,000 Comanche and Kiowa warriors sweeping through Victoria and Linnville, killing settlers, taking captives, livestock and food, and burning the towns to the ground. At Linnville on Lavaca Bay, most of the residents scrambled into boats and managed to escape, but the warriors still caught and butchered six others and raided the warehouse of John Linn, before burning the town and retreating northward toward home.

They carried with them about a dozen or so captives, all women and children. One woman prisoner had two small children, and one of them being just a baby, hindered her progress. The Indians snatched the child from her and dashed its brains out against a tree. The mother kept going, but her other child began to tire. The Indians then grabbed the boy and killed him, and once they had deprived him of his life, they cast him aside to be food for the hungry vultures.

As word of the raid spread, Texan Rangers and volunteers gathered. They took a stand at Plum Creek, twenty-seven miles south of Austin near present-day Lockhart. Led by Major General Felix Huston, the Texans surrounded the Indians on 12 August and forced them into a fifteen-mile, running fight, in which more than one hundred Comanche were killed. Since the Comanche could not carry off their prisoners, they shot them, killing most of them. One woman survivor with an arrow lodged deep in her breast had witnessed her husband’s massacre in Linnville. Captain Ben McCulloch, who had a mutual hatred going with another Ranger named Switzer, found himself trading life-saving techniques with Switzer, although neither one spoke to the other before or after the fight. Jack did not distinguish himself in this fracas, but President Mirabeau Lamar rewarded him with orders to enlist his own spy company to be headquartered at San Antonio. He was just twenty-three years old.

He began immediately to recruit his men. The requirements were simple, but very few could meet them. He wanted the best set of Indian fighters that Texas ever produced. He demanded---and got---men of good character, courage, and skillful marksmanship. He recruited expert horsemen and horseflesh, insisting they brought with them the broad Mexican saddles which were so comfortable for sitting during long scouts. One exception to this rule was Big Foot Wallace, who rode up on a mule. Big Foot’s reputation as an Indian fighter was well-known to Hays, and Jack hired him on the spot, mule and all.

Each man had a Mexican rawhide riata for roping and a hair rope for staking his horse. They furnished their own arms and other equipment. Weapons consisted of a rifle, one or two pistols, and a serviceable knife. Most chose a Bowie knife. Tied behind the saddle was a Mexican blanket and a small wallet which contained the ammunition, a little salt, parched corn, and tobacco.

They wore sombreros which looked cumbersome, but which protected them from the sun. They had chaps of leather and long boots for protection against the mesquite thorns and cactus, and the boot heels were tall enough to catch in the stirrups and not slip out. Campfire conversation would reveal familiarity with the works of poets, philosophers, and historians. The usual practice was to take up the trail of the marauders and follow it to the end, and about half the Rangers ended up killed each year.

Hays’ method of scouting meant pitching camp along the known Indian highways to the settlements, watching for unwelcome activity. That way, when he spotted something unusual, he was in quick pursuit. In the fall of 1840, two hundred Comanche slipped into the settlements west of San Antonio and drove off a large herd of horses and mules. By the time a messenger reached Hays and he had his men in action, the Indians had a twelve-mile head start. Catching up to them on the Guadalupe, where the Indians had stopped to water the horses, the Rangers caught them by surprise. Although outnumbered twenty to one, the Rangers attacked. As the warriors began to tumble from their horses, their chief was everywhere, urging them into battle. To draw the Rangers’ fire, he even exposed his body from behind his shield. When he fell, the Indians fled, with the pursuing Rangers dealing death and devastation on the entire band. After this daring victory, the Comanche wanted to know the name of their formidable foe. They soon began calling him "Captain Yack." The Mexican enemies also adopted it. At times, it was changed to "Devil Yack."

Since the Comanche had established large encampments on the Nueces and on a few other western streams within attacking distance of the settlements, Hays decided to destroy the strongholds. He spent the next few months in constant assault on the Comanche camps. Chief Flacco, commissioned by Sam Houston with the rank and pay of a captain, fought by his side, remarking that he would never be left behind in any charge, but Captain Jack was "bravo too much."

Whenever Hays wished information without attracting too much attention, he traveled alone and on foot. The Indians who saw him were in fear of him, and they would not attack. The Comanches suffered so many defeats and losses in 1840 and 1841 fighting against him that northern bands returned to the headwaters of the Brazos for safety. Sometime later, a few Comanche chiefs were on the Main Plaza in San Antonio when Jack happened to ride by. One recognized the captain and asked Flacco why the Ranger would dare go into their hunting grounds, knowing there would be no help if he were attacked. Flacco responded by pointing to another Lipan Apache friend and saying, "Me and Blue Wing no afraid to go to hell togedder. Captain Yack, great brave, no afraid to go to hell by hisself."

By now, the young Captain’s reputation proceeded him just about anywhere he scouted. In early 1841, he took a small scouting party to check out the rumors that Mexican troops were assembling in the Laredo area for an invasion of San Antonio. Although his Rangers saw a few enemy soldiers and were not challenged when they boldly rode through town, he decided to make his point about Mexican banditry and cattle stealing known to the Mexicans anyway. He ordered his men to drive a large herd of Mexican horses back to their camp. When he returned them the next day, he sent a note along stating that Texans would be willing to fight enemy troops, but would not rob peaceful citizens. He explained that the horses had been swiped "merely to let the Mexicans know that if we chose to retaliate the robbing which had been committed on the Americans, we were fully able to do it."

The warning was ignored. One month later, in mid-March, bandit Agaton Quinones attacked and robbed two traders near Laredo. Hays and his Rangers were promptly in pursuit. He had twenty-five men, which included twelve Rangers and thirteen volunteers. They were intercepted by Captain Ignacio Garcia and his thirty-five seasoned Mexican cavalry. With Captain Garcia’s ultimatum of surrender or die ringing in their ears, the Texans dismounted and charged. Stealing through the thick underbrush before opening fire was a favorite tactic Hays had learned from watching the Comanche, and it worked splendidly against the Mexican cavalry. With nine dead Mexicans, twenty-five taken captive, along with twenty-eight horses, Captain Garcia retreated to Laredo, where the alcalde timidly emerged with a white flag of truce. Hays had only two demands: turn over the marauders, and give assurance that traders would be protected going to and from San Antonio. When these conditions were promised, the Ranger released his prisoners.

Scouting duties permitted him to locate only five land certificates during the remainder of 1841, although his deputies were constantly engaged in surveying, and he longed to have more time for it himself. On one of the rare occasions that he managed to combine surveying and scouting on a tributary of the Pedernales, he had his famous fight at Enchanted Rock.

Enchanted Rock lies about nine miles west of Llano and eighteen miles north of Fredericksburg to the northwest of San Antonio. On cool nights, especially when following hot days, the rock would make strange, creaking sounds, sounds geologists would later attribute to the contraction of the rock’s outer surface as it cooled off. Also, the rock glittered in the moonlight, especially when following a rain. The Comanche thought both phenomena were some form of magic, that the rock held magic powers, and had called the place enchanted

The rock is a pink granite mountain with a three-mile-round base, one sloping side, and a broad, flat top with only a few small depressions. It is the second largest natural outcropping of granite in the United States, surpassed only by the huge boulder of Stone Mountain near Atlanta, Georgia. Captain Henry S. Brown had stumbled across it in 1829, when he led a group of volunteers against a raiding Indian party.

Hays had heard a great deal about Enchanted Rock, and he understood that it was a taxing climb to the top, but he proposed to scale it, since he would have a good view of the surrounding country. He was camped with his men on the bank of nearby Crabapple Creek, and as the men lounged in the camping area, he armed himself with his rifle, two Colt pistols, his knife, and headed out.

A few minutes later, he arrived at the prominent landmark. It’s north side was nearly a cliff, and the other sides were similarly steep, but the rugged rock did have many deeply worn washes extending from the top to the base. Selecting one at random, he proceeded to climb. He reached the summit, looked at the crater, studied distant landmarks, and then was descending, when he saw a score of Indians advancing to intercept him. He quickly shinnied back up the rock. When he reached the crater, he slid down into its shallow pit and hurried to the north side, where he hid between two projecting ledges under an overhanging rock. It was the only possible defensive position, since the north face could not be climbed, and it afforded him a clear field of fire. In assembling his weapons, he discovered he had lost his powder horn. He could only fire eleven shots, five from each pistol and one from his rifle.

Hardly was he settled in his position when he saw numerous Indian heads peering above the rim of the crater. From their whoops and calls to him, it was obvious that they knew who he was. They shouted to him in Spanish, which they knew he understood, taunting him with "Devil Yack" and other names, trying to entice him from cover, to no avail. Finally, a few brave warriors charged, and bodies thudded near him when he emptied one revolver.

Silence reigned for only a moment, while the Comanche regrouped. Jack prepared for a mass attack. One of the bolder warriors risked his head for a try at fame with a quick arrow shot. Hays’ rifle answered, and the warrior lay dead. At this, there came a chorus of war whoops, and Jack knew they were coming into the crater after him. Many of the enemy leaped to the top of the crater and slid down into it after him while their comrades continued to climb the rock to join in. He emptied his weapons, and then began one of the most fierce hand-to-hand knife fights of his life. He managed to kill one and knock over two more, and as they rushed, another one fell at his feet. At that moment, a chorus of Texas yells routed his attackers. A hundred Comanches had surrounded the base of the rock in preparation for a final assault, when his men had heard the ruckus and had come to his aid.

It’s totally amazing, considering the wildness of the times, that in all of Hays’ Rangering days, he led his men into only one ambush. They were camped on the present site of Bandera in October 1841, and the next day they marched ten miles toward Bandera Pass, only a large Comanche war party heading for the Medina Valley arrived there first. The Comanche had discovered he was coming, and they laid their ambush well. Hiding in the brush and behind the boulders of the steep slopes, they opened fire and charged, once Hays’ men were inside the south end of the pass. With his men ready to panic and scatter, Hays quickly called out, "Steady there, boys! Dismount and tie those horses; we can whip them, no doubt about that!" During the ensuing battle, they fought hand-to-hand combat, until the Comanche wearied and retreated to their horses at the north end of the pass.

By now, Santa Anna had amassed his armies for a second attack on Texas, determined to wrench it back from the "perfidious foreigners." In March of 1842, he sent a detachment of 700 soldiers to San Antonio under the command of General Rafael Vasquez. The General camped two miles from town and issued his terms of surrender. The frightened citizens promptly fled. It was Hays’ job to lead the last of the citizens to safety on the west bank of the Guadalupe opposite Seguin. There, he began to amass his men. General Vasquez stayed in town only two days, but in that two days, his men plundered everything, leaving for Laredo with a dozen carts and 132 muleloads of booty. Hays and his small band of Rangers followed at a discreet distance, but the enemy was too many to attempt any sort of retaliation. Returning to San Antonio, he increased his forces to 150 men and began to heavily patrol the area between the San Antonio River and the Rio Grande. As a result of the Vasquez raid, only a dozen American families returned to town.

Six months later, Santa Anna struck again. On 10 September 1842, he sent General Adrian Woll and 1,300 soldiers on an invasion of San Antonio. Hays learned of the approaching mass and immediately sent Nathaniel Mallon and Big Foot Wallace to Austin for a supply of lead and powder. Then, he went in search of the enemy. While he was scouting, General Woll took the town.

With San Antonio once again in the hands of the Mexican army, Hays withdrew to the Guadalupe River and sent out a call for troops. By midnight on 17 September, a 210-man army had assembled on the banks of Salado Creek, six miles northeast of town. The men were under the command of Colonel Matthew "Old Paint" Caldwell. While camped there, Creed Taylor went down to the creek, a short distance from camp, for the purpose of washing his shirt, since he didn’t have a change of clothing. While waiting for it to dry and finding himself in a pecan grove, he shinnied up the tree to fill his pockets with pecans. As soon as he arose above the level of the prairie, he was fired upon from the direction of camp. He quickly hastened down, donned his wet shirt, and proceeded to camp, demanding to know who had tried to kill him. He was told that newly arrived Irish recruits from Goliad had taken him for a Mexican spy.

In the days that followed, Jack Hays was in command of a scouting company of forty-two of the best mounted men. They advanced into San Antonio to draw the Mexican army out and were immediately pursued by 400 of General Woll’s men. Ben McCulloch’s brother Henry covered Jack’s retreat with ten picked men, and they methodically killed Mexicans as fast as they could reload. Among the ten men were the eagle-eyed Taylor clan: Creed, Josiah, Pipkin, Rufus, and James…all members of the Sutton-Taylor feud which Leander McNelly and his Rangers would moderate thirty years later.

The Battle of the Salado was a definite victory for the small band of Texans, but it took General Woll another couple of days before he began his retreat toward Laredo. Two hundred Mexican families also fled town under Woll’s protection, taking 500 head of cattle and whatever plunder their carts would hold. The small band of Rangers and volunteers followed.

While General Woll’s army camped six miles from present-day Castroville, Hays and Ben McCulloch decided to enter the encampment to gather intelligence. They wrapped Mexican blankets around themselves and slipped into camp under cover of darkness. When they were ready to leave, a sentry challenged them. Hays promptly took the sentry prisoner with them back to Colonel Caldwell, who had camped on the Medina River. This audacious venture caused General Woll to place a $500 price on Jack’s head.

This particular battle brought forth Hays’ rage more than usual. He wanted to attack the enemy before they could reach the Hondo, but Colonel Caldwell’s volunteers were afraid of the enemy’s large artillery protecting their retreat. Hays promptly volunteered to get the enemy cannon. By the afternoon of 22 September, his Rangers had caught up with Woll’s artillery near Arroyo Hondo. The main army had already crossed over the river and were waiting on the west bank for the Mexican families and the two army cannon to make the crossing. Eyes blazing---General Ed Burleson used to say, "When Jack Hays’ eyes begin to darken with a flash in them like lightning out of a black southwest cloud, it’s a good time to let him alone."---Jack and his men charged the cannon, making a mad 400-yard dash while the cannon shot harmlessly over their heads. They killed every man around the cannon and rode down some scattered infantry to clear a spot to make a stand for Colonel Caldwell’s men, who were supposed to be bringing up the rear. But when Jack looked back for the expected support, he saw nothing.

General Woll promptly left the families in the space between the cannon and his main army and advanced with the infantry. Hays and his men had no choice but to fall back. All Jack had to show for his efforts were five wounded Rangers and one dead horse. Reports say he choked back tears of rage the next morning when Major James Mayfield, who had joined the group with 100 volunteers from Bastrop and Travis counties, made a speech which effectively discontinued the pursuit. General Woll and his army returned to Mexico without further intervention. Colonel J. M. Carrasco of the Mexican army later declared that if the Texans had supported Hays’ charge at the Hondo, Woll’s army would have been driven from the field.

After first refusing to obey the order to return to San Antonio, Hays and his Rangers were the last to come in. Awaiting him was a letter from President Houston, dated 14 September, promoting him to Major. Further dispatches authorized him to take command and to declare marital law in Bexar County. It was the first time martial law was used in Texas.

Two months later, Hays and his men were once again on the trail to Laredo. He had sixty scouts and a small group of Lipan Apache led by Chief Flacco, who had received the title of Colonel and a full-dress military uniform. The group was joined by 750 volunteers of the Texas army under command of General Alexander Somervell. They had no wagons and were short on powder, lead, meat, and bread. Leading the way to Laredo was Hays’ spy company. The plan was to seal up the Mexican invasion route once and for all.

Reaching the flooded Nueces River, Hays’ men swam across. He then persuaded the army to build a crude bridge across the main channel so everyone could cross on foot. By daybreak on 8 December, they were in a semicircle around the town, but they were a few hours too late. Early that morning, the Mexican garrison had crossed to the west bank of the Rio Grande, and the alcalde had driven off more than 1,000 horses and mules, thus making sure the Texans would not be able to demand any animals. It was an easy matter for Hays to hoist the Texas flag on the church steeple. Laredo was on the Texan side of the border, but it had harbored Mexican guerrillas and soldiers for so long that its citizens generally considered themselves as being part of Mexico.

That afternoon, the Texans relocated to three miles south of town where they made camp for the night. The next morning, some of the undisciplined, hungry army re-entered and plundered the town, taking what they pleased from the Mexican families. Although the goods were returned to the citizens and an apology made for their conduct, the army kept all the pilfered coffee, flour, saddles, soap, and sugar they could find.

By now, the Texans didn’t know if they were invading Mexico or not, and many were unhappy with the way General Somervell handled the troops. When they were ten miles south of Laredo, 200 men chose to return home after being given permission to go. The rest of the army then crossed the Rio Grande and proceeded to journey to the small Mexican village of Guerrero, some sixty miles south on the Rio Grande. General Somervell ordered the alcalde to provide one hundred horses and five days’ provisions for 1,200 men, and then turned his men back across the border to wait near the town of Zapata, leaving Jack Hays and his Rangers in charge. When no horses and only ten pounds each of sugar and coffee arrived the next morning, the furious General ordered Hays to demand five thousand dollars of the alcalde for not meeting the requisition, and if the alcalde declined, Jack was to tell him that Somervell was going to turn five hundred men loose to sack the town.

The alcalde was unable to raise the money, having only been able to collect $400 from the citizens, and Hays had the uncomfortable thoughts that hundreds of Mexican soldiers had been brought into town during the night. Since the town contained several thousand citizens who could fight from ambush, he wisely took his men back across the river with the alcalde his prisoner.

General Somervell listened to the alcalde’s story, summarily dismissed him, and decided that sacking the town would prove fruitless. He ordered the army to return to Gonzales, and Hays suggested that Chief Flacco also leave. To Flacco, Jack’s suggestion was the same as an order. He had permission from General Somervell to confiscate as many horses as he could find from an old ranch near the Rio Grande, since the herds were a source of supply for bandits, and he obtained a drove of forty animals.

Nearly 300 of the army refused to obey General Somervell’s orders to return home. Among those refusing were some of the most courageous men ever to fight for Texas justice, and they desired the Mexican issue settled. They elected Williams S. Fisher to lead them to Mier, Mexico. Among those who went was Big Foot Wallace.  These men would end up as prisoners of Mexico.

Hays, under his orders from the Department of War, was obliged to resume his independent command at San Antonio. He reluctantly turned toward home. A few miles from San Antonio, he was horrified to see the corpse of Chief Flacco. He learned that his old friend had assistance from two Mexicans and an elderly deaf-mute Lipan in driving his confiscated horses, and while camped near the city, the Mexicans had murdered Flacco and the old man, driving the horses away to sell. Jack and his Rangers so cherished Chief Flacco’s memory that they determined to protect his tribe for as long as the Lipan Apaches remained in the area. It wasn’t until after Hays had left Texas that the Lipan began to prey openly on the settlements.

By act of the Texas Congress on 16 January 1843, Hays was authorized to raise a new company of Rangers. That April, President Houston placed all the territory located between the Frio and Nueces Rivers and the Rio Grande under military law, but Mexican spies were everywhere. Mexico openly announced that it was not surrendering its jurisdiction below the Nueces. In fact, President Santa Anna had decreed that foreigners who invaded "Mexico" would be executed. This announcement, which came while the Comanche were negotiating a peace treaty with Mexico, was immediately followed by an increase in Indian depredations on the Anglo settlements.

Hays and his men then spent most of the year repelling Indians and searching for the notorious bandit Agaton Quinones, who was still robbing and pilfering at whim in the area. After learning that some traders had finally managed to kill the notorious bandit shortly before Thanksgiving, Jack reluctantly furloughed his men, for lack of funds, and headed for a well-earned rest in Sequin. While there, he began courting Susan Calvert, the beautiful daughter of Judge Jeremiah H. Calvert, a newcomer to Texas from Florence, Alabama.

That January marked a turning point in the way western warfare was fought. President Houston told Hays that the Texas Navy had received a supply of the new Colt five-shooter. Jack already knew the advantage of the pistol, having been one of the very few to own a pair in 1839, and he immediately procured an order from the Secretary of War and headed to Galveston to take possession. These weapons allowed the men to reload while at full gallop, something no man would attempt with the old weapons which came apart in three pieces; they had always stopped, dismounted, and reloaded, taking no chances on losing a piece in the long grasses on the prairie. He returned to San Antonio, recalled his disbanded men, and issued each of them two of the new revolvers.

Armed with the new shooters, he took fifteen Rangers on a three-week scout to the north of town. Near Sister Creek on the return trip, they decided to rob a bee tree, only when John Coleman climbed the tree, he noticed twenty-five Comanche astride their horses 300 yards away, studying them. Hays immediately ordered an attack, but stopped short when he saw two lines of the enemy on a hill behind the first group of warriors. Jack ordered his men to the timber, chased by the first row of Indians, as the last two rows fanned out along the sides. Although the Indians charged again and again, the Rangers held them at bay with the new weapons. The warriors finally retreated when their war chief was killed.

By now, Hays and his Rangers had been so prominently successful in guarding San Antonio that bandits no longer entered town. He still carried a price on his head from the Mexican government, and occasionally the Indians took pot shots at him, but for the most part, the citizens of San Antonio finally knew what it was like to live in peace. In March 1844, Buffalo Hump and many of his warriors rode into town seeking a treaty.

As a way to encourage the treaty, it was decided that there would be a rodeo on the prairie with Hays’ Rangers, the Comanche, and Mexican ranchers as the participants. Jack served as the master of ceremonies with Chief Buffalo Hump as his assistant. Prizes were handsomely mounted pistols and Bowie knives. First prize for horsemanship went to John McMullin, a Ranger; the second to Long Quiet, a Comanche; the third to rancher-trader H. L. Kinney; and the fourth to Senor Don Rafael, a rancher from the Rio Grande. The judges also gave presents of various kinds to all the Comanche. Some of the competitors and spectators tried to get Hays and his assistants to perform some riding feats. A contemporary wrote: "As a horseman…he [Hays] was equal to the best trained circusmen, being able to ride at full speed and pick up a half dollar from the ground with his hand. No Comanche could surpass him in throwing his body from one side of his horse to the other, and thus dodging Indian arrows and sometimes bullets." Chief Buffalo Hump respected Hays so much that he even advised the Ranger leader to get married and have many papooses to carry on "Devil Yack’s" name. However, he suggested that when the first-born arrived, it should be called Buffalo Hump, Jr., and insisted he be notified immediately of the happy event. Jack told him he would.

Perhaps the best compliment Hays ever had about his fighting ability came from a Comanche war chief who had miraculously survived an encounter with the young Ranger and his men on the Nueces. It was April 1844, and Jack had taken fifteen of his men to scout the maze of Indian trails in the Nueces Canyon west of town. On the second day out, one of his men discovered a bee tree. As a precaution, this time Hays ordered his men to keep the horses saddled and stake them. Noah Cherry then crawled up the tree, while the rest of the men relaxed in the long grass. While pausing for a moment in his chopping, Cherry looked up the canyon. He suddenly gave a low whistle, and exclaimed, "Je-ru-sa-lem! Captain, here comes a thousand Indians!" Immediately, Hays and his men were ready. There were more than 200 warriors in the party, and they headed straight toward the Rangers.

Hays ordered his men to stand their ground, cautioning them to take careful aim. The warriors were almost upon them when his shot signaled the moment for defense. As the firing commenced, horses and Indians went down in a pile, blocking those in the rear. The others were forced to separate around their wounded and dying companions to continue the charge. As the last of the Indians thundered past, Hays shouted, "After them! Crowd them! Don’t let them turn back!" His men raced after the Indians, which was totally unexpected by the warriors, and the Rangers began shooting terrified Comanche from their mounts. The fighting was at close quarters, so close that the terrified Indians finally dropped everything and high-tailed it up the canyon. When Jack finally called a stop, some of his men were wounded, but all were alive.

Some time later, in San Antonio, the war chief from the Battle of Nueces Canyon was speaking with a friendly Delaware, and the conversation got around to the fight in the canyon. The Comanche wanted to know who led the attack. When he learned it was "Devil Yack," he shook his head slowly, saying, "I never want to fight him again. Every one of his men had as many shots as I have fingers on my two hands. I lost half of my warriors in the battle, and many others died along the route when returning to my country on Devil’s River."

After the Nueces Canyon fight, Hays had a meeting with President Houston. John W. Lockhart, a veteran of the Texas Revolution, who was staying at the same hotel, wrote: "After he had registered…I looked over the book to see who the stranger was. Imagine my astonishment at seeing the name of John C. Hays. I thought my eyes had deceived me. Could that small, boyish-looking youngster, with not a particle of beard on his face, be the veritable Jack Hays, the celebrated Indian fighter, the man whose praise was sung by all Texans? It could not be, I thought, but I soon found out that he was the "Captain Jack." As soon as he registered, he left the hotel to transact his business…and as soon as he had finished his business, he was off. Many men who visited the seat of Government with such a reputation as Hays had, would have stayed a month, if for no other reason than to be lionized…."

Hays’ Rangers were so successful in clearing out the Indian bands around San Antonio that Jack had the last of his major encounters with the Indians in the Battle of Paint Rock. Paint Rock is a well-known landmark near Enchanted Rock and was a favorite encampment for the Comanche, as it was deep within their hunting grounds. It was February 1846, and Texas was now the 45^th State of the Union. Hays had learned that General Zachary Taylor was raising a force to take possession of the Rio Grande, and he had journeyed to Corpus Christi to confer with the General, offering to place his men under the General’s orders to serve as scouts. At first, General Taylor declined, claiming his own men could do the scouting, but it soon became evident that he needed Hays’ Rangers to relieve his cavalry of the difficult task of keeping his lines of communication open, especially when he lost sixty of his men to Mexican marauders when they were on a scout.

While Hays was with the General in Corpus Christi, the Comanche struck. They raided the settlements southwest of San Antonio with 600 warriors and were in the process of returning to Paint Rock with their booty when Jack returned to his men, who were camped on the Medina. Hays and forty of his best-mounted men were quickly in pursuit. He found the Indians’ trail just south of Enchanted Rock. Since it appeared that they were headed to a small lake at the base of Paint Rock, Hays ordered his men to cut across country to intercept them. It took them two days to reach the lake in the wee hours of the morning, and by carefully watching in the moonlight, Hays was certain that they had beat the Indians to the camp

The lake was about 100 yards wide and about 300 yards long in an east/ west direction with the Paint Rock landmark on the west end. Hays stationed his men in a deep thicket on the north side. At dawn, the Indians arrived, weary and ready for camp, but finding the Rangers in the way, they immediately charged. With 600 foe against so few, it appeared to be any easy victory, but Hays’ Rangers were cool under pressure. As the Indians made charge after charge, they kept up the defense. Making intermittent attacks throughout the day, the Comanche finally withdrew to camp on the prairie that night. Desperate for water, they were forced to send a party twenty miles to get it.

The next morning, the Indians attacked in four successive waves, with some from the final group finally managing to land in the thicket. Unable to rout the Rangers, they tried firing their arrows from the top of Paint Rock. Although they never reached the Rangers, many of the Ranger shot them from that range. At dusk, the Indians withdrew again and sent for water.

On the third morning, all attacks came from the north from different directions, forcing Hays to divide his men to combat the assault. Realizing that the Rangers’ ammunition supplies had to be running low, the Comanche war chief decided on a final, suicidal assault. Just as the charge began, he made a fatal mistake. Turning to shout instructions to his men, his war shield turned with him, and Hays killed him with a single rifle shot. The Indians retreated. Hays immediately ordered one of his men to rope the dead chief and drag the body into the thicket, since he knew they would re-form, charge, and pick up the body at almost any cost. This infuriated the Indians, and they attacked one final time before fleeing to the northwest, leaving more than 100 of their dead on the battlefield. They left so hurriedly that they neglected to inform the six scouts guarding the booty, and the Rangers took them by surprise. Incredibly, only one Ranger was hurt in the arm, Emory Gibbons, and one horse was killed.

Once Hays returned to San Antonio with his men, he learned that America was gearing up for war with Mexico. General Taylor had advanced to Matamoros and was requesting four volunteer regiments. Since the General’s supply base was twenty-five miles away at Point Isabel, he also mustered two of Hays’ Ranger companies, led by Samuel Walker and Ben McCulloch, into national service to keep his communications open. Men began flocking to Texas for the proposed fight. Hays took a few weeks to rest up, and during the interim, he asked Susan Calvert to marry him. She accepted.

When Jack Hays joined General Taylor at the Rio Grande, he was the Colonel of a unit officially called the First Regiment Texas Mounted Rifles, but popularly known as Hays’ Texas Rangers. Samuel Walker was his Lieutenant Colonel, and Jack’s old and trusted friend from his early days in the Rangers, Michael Chevaille, was his Major. He assembled with Taylor’s army at Point Isabel on 22 June 1846.

Except for the clean-shaven Colonel Hays, the Rangers wore long beards and mustaches and made it a point to look and act as ferocious as possible. Each was armed with a short rifle, holster pistols, Colt five-shooters, and a great Bowie knife. Samuel Chamberlain, an artist-soldier in the Mexican War described them thus: "…with their uncouth costumes, bearded faces, lean and brawny forms, fierce wild eyes and swaggering manners, they were fit representatives of the outlaws which make up the population of the Lone Star State."

General Taylor trusted the Ranger scouts, and he assigned Ben McCulloch’s company to find the best invasion route to Monterrey. It didn’t take McCulloch long to determine that the planned route through Linares was bereft of watering places for such a huge army. He suggested that the General take the Rio Grande and the San Juan River, moving toward Monterrey by way of Mier, Camargo and Cerralvo at the edge of the Sierra Madre. Hays and half of the General’s regiment were to parallel the column, scouting the Linares route for 130 miles, and then rejoin the main army.

Hays’ exploits during the Mexican War are almost as unbelievable as his Indian fighting tactics. The first thing he did on his march through Mexico was demand twenty mules for General Taylor’s army from each alcalde in each town he passed…and got them! While camped at the small town of China, he shot a horse thief. After rejoining with the main army and being ordered out to the west, he ran into a lancer regiment led by Lt. Colonel Juan Najera of the Mexican army. Brandishing his saber, Hays challenged Najera to a duel, which totally shocked his men, since he was a deadly shot with a pistol, but totally unskilled with a saber. The Mexican leader eagerly accepted the challenge, drew his long saber, and charged. As they raced toward each other, Hays abruptly swayed in his saddle, drew his Colt revolver, fired under his horse’s neck, and killed Najera with a single shot. Racing back to his men, he issued the warning, "Dismount! Get behind your horses! Give ‘em hell!" As Sgt. Buck Barry remembered it, the Mexicans charged "like made hornets," passing through the Ranger lines three times. Protected by their horses, the Rangers shot down eighty of the enemy at close range and lost only one man.

Learning that the Mexican army was advancing to protect Saltillo along the road he traveled, Hays devised an ambush. Ordering Ben McCulloch’s men to feign a retreat, he dismounted five of his companies along the road, and neatly ambushed 1,500 of the Mexican army from a distance of ten yards, when they raced after McCulloch’s men. When McCulloch’s men turned back around to attack, the Mexican soldiers scattered to the hills. It caused General William Worth, in charge of two brigades of the 2^nd Division following behind Hays and his men, to comment, "Beautiful maneuver." Although they had secured the Saltillo road, a huge Mexican force lay in wait in front of them.

With Monterrey now in view, General Worth and Jack Hays’ men marched onward. Before them lay two heavily fortified hills on either side of the city, Federation Hill and Independence Hill. The Americans stormed Federation Hill, after Hays convinced General Worth that his men could scale it. By mid-afternoon, after six companies of Rangers and an equal number from the Fifth and Seventh Infantry drove forward in three waves, the enemy vanished. The Rangers promptly secured Fort Soldado, a large gun emplacement at the western end of the Hill. The next day, 22 September 1846, they achieved one of the greatest victories of the War by taking the opposite parallel peak, Independence Hill, and the Bishop’s Palace, bristling with cannon, and the key to Monterrey’s western defense. It was accomplished with Hays and Ranger Captain Samuel Walker leading two columns up the northwest and southwest slopes, an almost 800-foot, vertical peak, which Mexican General Pedro de Ampudia had presumed unassailable and had thus posted no guards. It was to be a colossal mistake on the part of the Mexican army for the two Ranger leaders easily routed the Mexican army from the fortifications.

By noon, General Worth’s troops had dragged their cannon up Independence Hill and were shelling the Bishop’s Palace. Fearing reinforcements from Monterrey, Jack suggested an old Comanche tactic. He instructed his Rangers to hide on one side of the ridge and Captain Samuel Walker’s Rangers across the way. When the Mexicans soldiers answered the Americans’ challenge by sending out a sortie of infantry and cavalry, the two flanking Ranger columns obliterated them.

Although General Taylor had his men on the northeastern end of the city, it was the loss of the Bishop’s Palace which caused General Ampudia to begin his withdrawal into the center of Monterrey. The afternoon of 23 September found 400 dismounted Rangers and General Worth’s 7^th and 8^th Infantry in street and house-to-house combat. Hays’ men advanced down Calle de Monterrey while Samuel Walker’s men went down the parallel street of Iturbide. At the Cemetery Plaza, they met sharpshooters from the rooftops, prompting Hays to split his men into groups to pick them off.

With Mexican fire sweeping the through streets, the two Worth columns had the brilliant idea to advance through the buildings. A Ranger would pick a hole in the side of the house, insert a shell with a three-second fuse, and blow out a wide opening. Troops would then rush in, clear out the snipers, and the process would be repeated at the next house. By ten o’clock the next morning, the Rangers had trapped the enemy with the grand plaza, the streets leading to it, the cathedral, and the main highway under their rifles. They were within hours of forcing an unconditional surrender when General Ampudia wisely hoisted the white flag of surrender.

General Taylor then halted his advance and ordered a cease-fire. He then gave the Mexican army permission to withdraw the entire, intact Mexican garrison to the mountains to enjoy an eight-week truce. This angered and disappointed all the Rangers, and it brought a storm of criticism from an angry President James Polk.

General Worth did not take full credit for the capture of Monterrey’s crucial western defenses. He expressed his admiration for "the distinguished gallantry of Colonel Hays and his noble band of volunteers…it was the untiring, vigorous bravery, and unerring shots of your regiment that saved my division from defeat." He called Hays’ Rangers "the best light troops in the world," and "Jack Hays is the tallest man in the saddle in front of the enemy I ever saw." By 2 October 1846, all companies of Hays’ First Mounted Rifles had been mustered out and on their way home to Texas. According to one of General Taylor’s men, "Hays and his men were not only the eyes and ears of General Taylor’s army, but its right and left arms as well."

Years after the temper of war had cooled, one veteran wrote: "I was with the regulars but…Had it not been for their [Hays, McCulloch’s] unerring rifles, there is no doubt we would have been whipped at Monterrey." The men who rode with Hays knew him best. "There never lived a commander," stated the New Orleans newspaper Delta, "more idolized by his men."

Jack Hays returned to a hero’s welcome not only in Texas, but throughout the United States. He journeyed with Samuel Walker by boat from Galveston to New Orleans, where Samuel Walker took leave of him to continue on to New York to confer with Samuel Colt about Colt’s repeating revolvers for the Rangers. Hays journeyed to Yazoo County, Mississippi, to bring his little brother Robert Hays back to Texas to work in his surveying business with him. Unfortunately, Jack didn’t get to practice his profession for very long. By allowing the Mexican army to retreat en masse to the mountains, General Taylor allowed Mexico to reorganize for another assault against Texas. Jack Hays was once again commissioned to raise a regiment of mounted troops, only the men he sought were becoming increasingly difficult to find. He wanted experienced border-warfare men who had been at San Jacinto, Mier, or Monterrey. These men were slower to enlist because they had been in the service so long that they had neglected their own personal businesses. Already, since annexation a year earlier, one man in every six of legal age had served Texas in a campaign against Mexico. This is absolutely astounding when one considers that if the other states had been represented in one-half that proportion, the war would have been terminated and no new troops would have been needed in 1847.

Hays was back in Texas by December and in conference with Governor F. W. Harrison about finding enough recruits. The problem was getting men to enlist for the duration of the war, especially since Indian depredations had increased when the majority of the men were away fighting the Mexican army. The Governor agreed to draft a letter to President Polk, suggesting a specific term of service and expressing his concern about protecting the Texas frontier. He sent Hays to Washington as his personal representative to discuss both matters with the President and the Secretary of War. As a result, an order of 20 March authorized enlistment for one year of duration, including those companies deemed necessary to protect the frontier.

Jack Hays married his beloved Susan Calvert on 29 April 1847. He was now thirty years old. Months earlier, he had a carpenter build a home in the 200 block of South Presa Street in San Antonio, the first two-story home there. He also had his surveying business, and he arranged everything so that in the event of his death all technicalities would be cleared in handling his lands. Three hundred and twenty acres of this land was located on the Frio River. The papers bearing on several other pieces of land were placed in the care of new father-in-law Judge Jeremiah Calvert and with his new bride Susan for the duration of the war. Hays then took his men and headed south to rejoin with General Taylor’s army in Mexico.

When Hays had been in Washington, he had heard from Samuel Colt who wanted him to be the first to see the new, improved six-shot revolver proposed by Ranger Captain Samuel Walker. Hays was assured that he would get the lion’s share of the new revolvers once Captain Walker’s company got theirs. On 21 August, Hays’ Rangers, now camped twenty miles south of Matamoros, Mexico, each received two of the new Walker Colt long-barreled six-shooters. After two weeks of training and target practice, they were deadly proficient with the new weapons.

By this time, Jack Hays was one of the most renowned military leader in all Mexico, although he wasn’t always known by sight. When his tent orderly received half a barrel of fine whiskey from Colonel J. M. Withers of the 9^th Regiment of Infantry, the orderly decided to share it with the neighboring tents, the troops of General Caleb Cushing’s Massachusetts Volunteers. As the Volunteers drifted over for the complimentary drink and then drifted away, there appeared a "Massachusetts semi-official" who saw an article he fancied, picked it up, and started to leave. In the meantime, a pleasant, non-talkative, young man, dressed in plain civilian clothes, had appeared and sat down at the far end of the tent. When the New Englander attempted to leave, this unassuming man declared, "Put that down, sir." After cursing and threatening to arrest the young man, the Massachusetts man stepped out of the tent and called for a guard detail. At this point Ranger John "Rip" Ford, who was the camp doctor and who had been watching the whole scene, bellowed, "What! Put our colonel in the guardhouse. Don’t you try it!" When the surprised Massachusetts man learned he had been berating Jack Hays, he thought he would be court-martialed. Instead, he was detained for two days and then released with no charges brought against him.

The second war with Mexico lasted until March 1848. During this war, Hays again demonstrated acts of heroism and courage beyond belief. On 2 November 1847, Hays’ Rangers were ordered to report to General Winfield Scott. Traveling as escorts for Major General Robert Patterson’s division, they reached Jalapa, Mexico, with a total force of more than 3,000 men. A New Orleans Picayune correspondent noted, "The presence of Colonel Hays and his…Texas Rangers acts like a charm upon the rascals."

By now the war was guerrilla in nature, and Mexican authorities were urging their population to attack the Americans whenever possible. Rangers were now used not only to keep the line of communication open, but also to pursue the guerrillas into their mountain retreats.

Upon reaching Jalapa, Hays took the companies of Captains G. M. Armstrong and Jacob Roberts and marched on to Puebla. Hundreds of General "Jo" Lane’s brigade watched in awe as they passed along the main street. Albert Brackett, a Lieutenant in the Fourth Regiment of Indiana Volunteers, wrote: "They certainly were an odd-looking set of fellows, and it seems to be their aim to dress as outlandishly as possible. Bobtailed coats and "long-tailed blues," low and high-crowned hats, some slouched and others Panama, with a sprinkling of black leather caps, constituted their uniforms; and a thorough coating of dust over all, and covering their huge beards gave them a savage appearance. Their horses ranged from little mustangs to large American full-bloods, and were every shade and color. Each man carried a rifle, a pair of pistols, and…two of Colt’s revolvers; a hundred of them could discharge a thousand shots in two minutes, and with what precision the Mexican alone can tell. I watched them closely as they went silently by me, and could distinguish no difference between the officers and men. They carried no sabers." Lieutenant Colonel Ebenezer Dumont, in the same company as Albert Brackett, wrote, "Hays’ men entered the city of the Aztecs and approached the Halls of Montezuma. The sides of the streets were lined with spectators of every hue and grade, from a major general of the North American Army to a Mexican beggar…Quietly the moved along. Not a word was spoken. They seemed unconscious that they were the observed of all observers…Young and vigorous, kind, generous, and brave, they have purposely dressed themselves in such a garb, as to prove to the world at a glance that they are neither regulars nor volunteers common, but Texas Rangers - as free and unrestrained as the air they breathe…."

When Jack Hays and General Lane learned that American prisoners were with a body of Mexican troops at Izucar de Matamoros, they set out to rescue the Americans. Jack took only 135 Rangers on the expedition; Lieutenant H. B. Field of the Third Artillery had one gun and twenty-five men; and Captain Lorenzo Lewis had the Louisiana Dragoons. Pelted with hard, cold rain all the way, the combined forces killed sixty Mexicans and rescued twenty-one American prisoners, who were then mounted on Mexican horses and returned to service. The next day, they began the march back to Puebla with a train of captured ordnance.

The journey was slow, for the ordnance, coupled with the heavily loaded captured wagons, could not keep up. At a particularly difficult pass, they fell far behind. Since they were strung out on the march, two hundred Mexican lancers thought it a good opportunity to attack. Immediately, Hays and his Rangers charged to meet the enemy, who broke and retreated. With thirty-five men, Hays pursued them across a wide plain. Across the prairie and up the long foot of the mountains, the enemy fled, but with exhausted mounts, they stopped midway up the hill to make a stand. This was not unexpected by the Rangers.

Racing alongside Hays was Henderson Ridgely, who was shot from his saddle. Captain Roberts’ horse was killed under him, and he was thrown. The lancers fled over the summit with the Rangers right behind them. As the Rangers advanced, 500 lancers spilled from a ravine and moved to meet the Rangers. Almost out of ammunition, Hays gestured for a retreat, and as they went, they recovered the bodies of Ridgely and William Walpos, who had also fallen in the ascent of the hill. Captain Roberts hopped up behind George White. Jack Hays now brought up the rear. When his men reached the plain, he deliberately whirled his horse and shot two lancers. At intervals, he slowed down, faced about in the saddle, and the lancers reined and zigzagged in a desperate attempt to save themselves, which slowed their advance. Hays continued in this fashion until all his men were safely through the pass. General Lane reported, "Never did any officer act with more gallantry than did Colonel Hays in this affair."

When Hays rejoined his men, he found them all reloaded and primed for battle, but the lancers didn’t chance it. General Joaquin Rea of the Mexican army chose to recall his 500 lancers and his total force of 1,200 scattered army. The official estimate was fifty enemy killed, and two Rangers killed and two wounded.

A few days later, Lieutenant Albert Brackett was in downtown Puebla when he finally got to meet the celebrated Jack Hays in person. He had this to say about Hays’ appearance, "I could scarcely realize that this wiry-looking fellow was the world-renowned Texas Ranger. Jack was very modest…very plainly dressed, and wore a blue roundabout, black leather cap, and black pants, and had nothing about him to denote that he belonged to the army or held any rank in it. His face was sun-browned; his cheeks gaunt; and his dark hair and dark eyes gave a shade of melancholy to his features; he wore no beard or mustache; and his small size - he being only about five feet eight - made him appear more like a boy than a man…."

Upon their return to Puebla, Hays and his Rangers were ordered on to Mexico City. They left for the capital on 6 December 1847. They impressed General Ethan Allen Hitchcock, who wrote, "Hays’ Rangers have come, their appearance never to be forgotten.…All sorts of coats, blankets, and head-gear, but they are strong athletic fellows. The Mexicans are terribly afraid of them." Ranger Captain John Ford later recalled, "Our entrance into the City of Mexico produced a sensation among the inhabitants. The greatest curiosity prevailed to get a sight at "Los Diablos Tejanos" - the Texas Devils."

The Rangers stayed a month in Mexico City where hardly a night escaped that there wasn’t some sort of confrontation between the local guerrillas and the Rangers. After listening to gunfire night after night, General Scott finally decided it best to send the Rangers out on a scout. On 10 January 1848, Hays took sixty-five men and went looking for the guerrilla-assassin leader, Padre Celedonia de Jarauta. After being informed that the priest was at San Juan Teotihuacan, Hays’ Rangers occupied a large stone building on one side of the plaza. While the weary Rangers slept, Padre Jarauta and 400 guerrillas opened fire from rooftops around the square. Seventy-five of them charged the doorway where the Rangers slept, but not all the Rangers were sleeping. Captain Ephraim Daggett and five others stood in the door and heroically turned back the rushing mob. Hays then ordered his men to the roof and out into the street. Padre Jarauta was wounded in the next charge, and the battle ended with the padre being carried off by his own men. Fifteen of his men were killed and five wounded, but the Rangers were unscathed. In less than thirty hours, Hays’ Rangers had marched 107 miles and beaten an enemy force five times their size.

On 18 January, Hays and four Ranger companies were assigned to General Lane for the task of clearing all roads and seeking out guerrillas at Puebla and Oaxaco. After learning that Mexican President and General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna might be in Tehuacan, the Rangers stopped an ornate coach accompanied by a dozen armed guards in route to the city. The sole passenger had an American safe-conduct pass, so General Lane decided to let the man pass, but Hays was suspicious. Fearing that he would warn Santa Anna of their approach, he had his fears realized when they marched into town the next morning and found a white flag in the plaza. The courier had warned Santa Anna at 2 o’clock in the morning, and the Mexican General had wisely fled town.

Santa Anna had fled so hurriedly that he left behind seventeen packed trunks. There were hundreds of dresses, which General Lane later sent to Santa Anna’s young seventeen-year-old second wife, Dolores de Tosta. One of his coats was so heavy with gold braid that the Texas felt impelled to weight it. It tipped the scales at fifteen pounds. Another jacket lavishly laden with silver later provided enough metal for a set of spoons. When an ornate cane with a pedestal of gold and an eagle-shaped head of diamonds, rubies, sapphires, and emeralds was discovered, the Texans presented it to Jack, but when Major William H. Polk requested that it be sent to his brother, President James Polk, Hays readily agreed, saying, "I have no use for such an ornament. Take it, Major, and give it to the President, and say it is a present from the Texans."

On 17 February 1848, Hays Rangers and 130 of Major Polk’s Third Dragoons were once again after the elusive Padre Jarauta. Intelligence had reported the padre in the mountains northeast of Mexico City, and General Lane meant to stop his raiding activities. Hoping to surprise the priest in the town of Tulancingo, ninety miles distant, the army made a dash, only to find that Jarauta had been gone for two days. Next came the report that Jarauta was at Sequalteplan with 450 guerrillas. Leaving at midnight, Hays’ Rangers set out on a forced march. Arriving at sunrise, they caught the Mexicans by total surprise, charging into the walled barracks area after Jack’s horse had knocked open the gate. He then took four companies and raced to the main plaza, where they charged a large barracks full of lancers and infantry. The Rangers won the running fight by chasing the enemy over half a mile, even though they were outnumbered two to one.

When it was all over, 120 enemy lay dead, and only five Rangers were wounded. Hays was thoroughly disappointed to learn that the wily Padre Jarauta had escaped from a large church on the main plaza only moments before the Americans arrived. The priest never recovered from the defeat, and was no longer a threat. In all, General Lane’s expedition lasted fourteen days and covered more than 500 miles. Including the 400 of the previous excursion, the men had traversed more than 900 miles in thirty-five days. It should further be noted that during a six-week period in which the Rangers were supposed to be "resting up" in or near Mexico City, they were out marching and fighting for five of them.

Jack Hays finally got to meet Mexican General Santa Anna after the armistice. Both Mexico and the United States gave permission for the General to leave the country, but fearing that he might still be taken prisoner, Colonel George W. Hughes, the governor of occupied Jalapa, provided the escort. On 28 March, Hughes left Jalapa with an escort of three companies of Maryland mounted volunteers to meet the defeated General Santa Anna of the Mexican army at San Miguel, where the General owned an estate. An elaborate dinner party was in the making. Knowing the Hays’ Rangers were only four miles away, Colonel Hughes invited Jack to the festivities.

Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna was both a hero and a villain in his own country. Paradoxically, his name Santa Anna means Saint Anne, the mother of the Virgin Mary. He was of Spanish descent, not Mexican, had almost no formal education, and was a quarrelsome schoolboy. When he was an adult, he bragged that he had only read one book!

His father was a mortgage broker and had wanted him to become a businessman, but Antonio would have none of it. He lied about his age when he was sixteen and joined the Spanish army as a cadet. One of his heroes was a despicable person named General Arrendondo, whose influence on Santa Anna gave the future leader of Mexico his worst character traits.

By age nineteen, Santa Anna was a first lieutenant. It was 1813, and General Arrendondo received orders to cross the Rio Grande and put down the first rebellion for freedom by the inhabitants of Texas. The rebels were a badly trained mob of Mexicans, Americans, and Indians, and no match for the crack troops of the Mexican army. Arrendondo butchered all of them. It was Santa Anna’s first taste of battle, and he got a citation for bravery. General Arrendondo’s savage methods deeply impressed him, and right then and there he learned two fatal illusions: Texans must be handled harshly, and Texans can’t fight.

In the Pastry War when the French blockaded the important Mexican port of Vera Cruz in 1838, he volunteered to lead troops against the French. He handled things so badly that he narrowly escaped from the enemy, running from the French troops in nothing but his underwear. He reappeared splendidly dressed astride a white charger, rode down to the harbor, and promptly took a grievous wound below the left knee which required amputation of his leg. He became his country’s hero, and once again was back in the President’s chair. Altogether, he served five times as President, and five times he was kicked out of Mexico into exile.

He was in his fourth term as President when the Mexican War broke out. Having been defeated by General Taylor and then by General Scott, he had resigned the presidency in a desperate attempt to get out of Mexico City before being caught by Jack Hays and his Rangers. The Mexicans had begun calling him "The Immortal Three-Fourths" in reference to his peg leg, and he was once again being exiled from Mexico.

Santa Anna enjoyed a great deal of food and wine and thoroughly began to enjoy what he thought was the favorable impression he was making on the Americans. Noticing a man standing quietly in the crowd without insignia, dressed partly in the Mexican fashion, but quite plainly, Major John R. Kenly went up to Jack Hays, saying, "Suppose you let me present you to General Santa Anna." Major Kenly led the young Ranger through the crowd. "There was," Kenly narrated, "General suspension of conversation, a movement of alarm perceptible among the Mexican officers of the escort, and a silence very painful to me. Santa Anna was as yet eating fruit. I said, ‘General, permit me to present to you’ - when I had got thus far, he turned his face toward us and was in the act of rising - ‘Colonel Jack Hays.’ When I pronounced this name, his whole appearance and demeanor changed, and if a loaded bombshell with fuse burning and sputtering had fallen on that dinner table, a greater sensation would not have been caused….Senora Santa Anna grew very pale…Colonel Hays, gentleman that he was, bowed politely and withdrew from the room." Immediately thereafter, Santa Anna announced that he was ready to leave. On 4 April, Santa Anna left Mexico. Hays was one of his escort to La Antiqua, where the General embarked on a Spanish ship bound for Venezuela.

The Mexican War was now over, but the Rangers were among the last to leave for home. On 10 April, Hays went to Vera Cruz to apply for transportation to Texas. While waiting to be mustered out, the men conducted trials and found that the latest Colt six-shooter threw a ball farther than a Mississippi rife could. They also found time to remember their chaplain, Presbyterian minister Samuel H. Corley, who had acted as nurse, confidante, and preacher for the duration. The men took up a collection of $500 in gold and gave it to Corley. In a letter to Captain Ford, Corley later wrote, "God bless Hays’ regiment; but for them, I could never have paid my debts."

On 29 April 1848, all of Jack Hays’ men were mustered out of the service at Vergara. All, that is, except Hays and Captain John Ford, who were to rejoin the Ranger frontier guard in Texas. Captain Ford later wrote that another brigadier general would have been appointed if the war had lasted any longer, and it was understood in Mexico City that Hays would have been the choice. Sailing on the steamboat Maria Burt, the men landed at Powder Horn on Lavaca Bay, where a cannon salute, dinner, and fancy ball awaited them. When they reached Salado Creek, they were greeted by a delegation of San Antonio residents. On 20 May 1848, a victory ball was held in their honor, and a correspondent for the New Orleans Picayune noted that ‘the particular star of the evening was the beautiful lady of Colonel Hays…and the constant recipient of the most marked attention.’ One month later, Jack Hays retired from the Ranger service.

Although Jack Hays cited "personal reasons" for his resignation from the Texas Rangers and the army, it wasn’t so he would be around home more often. Shortly after he returned to surveying, a group of San Antonio investors asked him to help find a shorter route to El Paso. With permission from authorities, his proposed exploration of the area was approved with his use of Texas Rangers from an outpost. Leaving San Antonio on 27 August 1848, he headed for a Ranger camp on the Llano near Castell.

Jack Hays lead a combined force of men up the Llano River to Comanche Creek and then followed the James River and the north fork of the Nueces River over to Las Moras, a tributary of the Rio Grande. Always heading west, they finally reached what the Indians had called the Puerce, a wide river bordered by cliffs and gorges, which Hays named "Devil’s River." They reached the Pecos River on 26 September. They had only gone 418 miles in one month.

As they wandered through the country west of the Pecos, their food ran out. Water became scarce, and by 9 October, Samuel Maverick noted that they were "eating mustang meat" which was "in great request." When they finally straggled into San Carlos, a small Mexican village on the Rio Grande, nine days later, they had been out of rations for twelve days and reduced to eating "grass, rattlesnakes, skunks, panthers, and pack mules." They purchased enough food to make it to Fort Leaton, and although El Paso was then only 150 miles further, over known wagon roads, winter was approaching. Jack Hays decided to return home.

The expedition left Fort Leaton on 31 October 1848, headed northeast, finding the 150 miles to the Pecos to be level country and good for year-round travel. Reaching the head of the Devil’s River, they split into three groups: twenty-eight men went east and directly to San Antonio; Captain Samuel Highsmith headed northeast to the Concho and his own Ranger camp; Hays took thirteen men to explore the Las Moras River region to the southeast. Determining the area to be to inhospitable, Hays turned his party toward home. By 10 December, his expedition had traveled 1,303 miles in 106 days. He concluded that the best wagon road route from San Antonio ran north to the San Saba, then through Concho country to the Pecos, and west to El Paso, a route which roughly parallels Interstate 10 in use today.

In January 1849, Hays was being pressured into running for Governor of Texas, a job he refused to consider. When the U.S. Congress created the Department of the Interior with Indian Affairs under its jurisdiction, he was interested in become the Indian sub-agent for the newly acquired Gila River country. Fame, however, had a different role for him. He left Texas in June 1849.

Jack Hays traveled west with his good friend, Major John Caperton and forty men, accompanying a detachment of army engineers and infantry escort building the road to El Paso. While camped opposite old El Paso for about five weeks, he concluded that he would never be able to make a treaty with the treacherous, warlike Gila Apaches. He gave it a try, but he soon came to the conclusion that the tribe would never accept reservation life without a great deal of trouble, and suspecting that it would be years in the making before the Federal Government would have a working policy with the Apaches, he resigned his post in Tucson.

A small party of emigrants were in Tucson at the time, and he agreed to lead them through Apache country to California. Taking a new route through the desert, he led the party thirty miles a day down the Gila River to the Colorado, reaching the California side on 5 December 1848. He was in San Diego by the end of the month.

He arrived in San Francisco in early January 1850, where he ran for Sheriff of San Francisco County. He took office on 9 April with his friend John Caperton as the deputy. Since the California gold rush brought more than 40,000 individuals flocking to San Francisco, it was a wild and woolly town when Hays took office, He soon had a 200-man volunteer night force to help him maintain the law. This night patrol called themselves the "Committee of Vigilance of San Francisco." Their first prisoner was hanged on the plaza for stealing a safe.

While Sheriff, Hays was instrumental is securing prisoners for the labor force, utilizing about seventy in a rock quarry for the purpose of building the streets of San Francisco. He also helped organize the city’s first fire department. By September 1850, his wife Susan and brother Robert Hays were in San Francisco with him. He then bought the Mountain Home Ranch, a spread of 2,000 acres thirty miles away. When he was re-elected Sheriff, he and Susan moved to a house on Powell Street. On 25 August 1852, their first child was born. The proud parents named him John Caperton Hays, but remembering a promise he had made seven years earlier, Jack nick-named his son "Buffalo Hump, Jr." When the Comanche war chief heard the news, he sent the baby a fine gold goblet and two gold spoons. The couple would have five more children, but only daughter Elizabeth and their first son John would survive to adulthood, the others dying in infancy.

Also in 1852, Hays and his friend John Caperton bought into a Spanish land grant of ten square leagues which embraced two oak-covered peninsulas. This purchase made both very wealthy men. Hays became Surveyor General of California, and laid out the plans for a new townsite on the property…Oakland…becoming its first resident. Some of the acreage which he and John Caperton owned on the waterfront sold for an average of $3,000 per acre.

He had only one final campaign against the Indians while living in California, which was triggered by the discovery of the Comstock Lode and the rush to Virginia City, Nevada. The Paiute Indians attacked in 1860. Legend has it that Hays came to help an old comrade in arms, Texas Ranger Captain Edward Storey, who had raised the Virginia City Rifles to fight the Paiutes. He took control of the 530-man Washoe Regiment, many of whom had been Indian fighters in Texas. They were joined by 212 federal troops from Carson City, and Hays was put in charge of all.

The men encountered the Paiutes at Pinnacle Mount on 2 June 1860. During three hours of fierce hand-to-hand combat, 200 volunteers and 100 regular army drove between 800 and 1,000 Indians from their hiding places. They then chased the Indians four miles before the Indians scattered to their mountain retreat. Although Chief Winnemucca escaped, his power was broken, and the Army was able to put an end to the hostilities. After only ten days, Hays was able to disband his men and return home.

Hays’ ability and reputation for honesty helped him become one of the most important ranchers and real estate developers in all of California. He was a liberal philanthropist, a civil leader active in the promotion of utilities, banks, wharves, and railroads. He became a major stockholder in Oakland Gas Light Company, and was the founder and director of the Union National Bank. In 1877, he was assessed at $162,700 for local property taxes, and by that September he had purchased almost 10,000 acres of state land and had an estate of more than a half million dollars. He became the mainstay of the California Democratic party and a generous supporter of academic institutions and education in the state. He succeeded in combining the active and the contemplative life to a degree rarely equaled since.

By 1879, Jack Hays was feeling his age. He began to spend his winters in Arizona or Southern California, seeking relief from attacks of rheumatism and arthritis. When he became seriously ill, he began disposing of his property into Susan and son John’s names, leaving only $10,000 of property in his own name. Shortly after 3:30 on the afternoon of 21 April 1883, San Jacinto Day, Jack Hays died at his ranch at Piedmont, California. He was sixty-six years old. The Oakland Light Cavalry served as escort and honor guard in carrying his body to Mountain View Cemetery.

Jack Hays spent thirteen years in service to Texas, all of it as a Texas Ranger and defender of the people. And the people did not forget. In 1848, the grateful citizens of Texas showed their gratitude by naming Hays County in his honor. Jack Hays was a gentle man, a caring and compassionate man, but he never lost a fight. His raw courage and fearlessness against overwhelming odds made him a legend. Although he made several trips back to Texas to visit friends, he lived the remainder of his life in California. He became, undoubtedly, the most famous Texas Ranger who ever lived.

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