Great Raid of 1840

Location of Linville and Victoria

Date	August 7, 1840
Location	Victoria and Linnville, Texas
Result	Comanche Victory

Belligerents

Texians

Comanche

Commanders and leaders

Mathew Caldwell,
Edward Burleson

Buffalo Hump

Strength

Approximately 100

Unknown; estimates, c. 400

Casualties and losses

At least 30 killed at Victoria and Linnville, and 11 at Plum Creek

35 killed, 29 caught and imprisoned

Great Raid of 1840
Location	Linnville Calhoun County, Texas
Coordinates	28°40′06″N 96°38′19″W / 28.66833°N 96.63861°W / 28.66833; -96.63861 (Great Raid of 1840)Coordinates: 28°40′06″N 96°38′19″W / 28.66833°N 96.63861°W / 28.66833; -96.63861 (Great Raid of 1840)
Date	August 7, 1840 (UTC-6)
Attack type	Raid on a frontier settlement
Deaths	23 either killed or carried away
Perpetrators	Comanche

The Great Raid of 1840 was the largest raid ever mounted by Native Americans on white cities in what is now the United States. It followed the Council House Fight, in which Republic of Texas officials attempted to capture and take prisoner 33 Comanche chiefs who had come to negotiate a peace treaty, killing them together with two dozen of their family and followers. The Texas Officials were determined to force the Comanche to release all white captives among them. To avenge what the Comanche viewed as a bitter betrayal by the Texans, the Comanche war chief Buffalo Hump raised a huge war party of many of the bands of the Comanche, and raided deep into white-settled areas of Southeast Texas.

Comanche War Chief Buffalo Hump was determined to do more than merely complain about what the Comanches viewed as a bitter betrayal. Spreading word to the other bands of Comanches that he was raiding the white settlements in revenge, Buffalo Hump led the Great Raid of 1840. Buffalo Hump gathered a huge raiding party, at least 400 warriors, with wives and young boys along to provide comfort and do the work. Altogether as many as a thousand Comanche may have set out from West Texas on the Great Raid. On this raid the Comanches went all the way from the plains of west Texas to the cities of Victoria and Linnville on the Texas coast. In what may have been the largest organized raid by the Comanches to that point, they raided and burned these towns and plundered at will.

The huge war party crossed into central Texas and first attacked the town of Victoria, August 6. Although rangers had found the tracks of a gigantic war party coming out of West Texas, and were shadowing the onrushing Comanches, part of the war party broke off and attacked Victoria before the citizens could be warned. One resident wrote, "We of Victoria were startled by the apparitions presented by the sudden appearance of six hundred mounted Comanches in the immediate outskirts of the village." The citizens of Victoria hid in the buildings, and the Comanches, after killing a dozen or so townspeople and riding up and down, departed Victoria when rifle fire from the buildings began to make the riding dangerous. The war party intended to gather horses and loot the coastal towns, which were not as prepared for the Comanches as the central Texas cities. After the attack on Victoria, the Comanches camped the night of August 6 on nearby Spring Creek.

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