Herman Lehmann
Encyclopedia
Herman Lehmann was captured as a child by Native Americans
. He lived first among the Apache
and then the Comanche
but eventually returned to his family later on in his life. The phenomenon of a "white boy" raised by "Indians" made him a notable figure in the United States
. He published his autobiography, Nine Years Among the Indians
in 1927.
, on June 5, 1859, to German immigrants Ernst Moritz Lehmann and his wife Augusta Johanna Adams Lehmann. He was a third child, following a brother Gustave Adolph born in 1855, and a sister Wilhelmina who was born in 1857. Following the birth of Herman, the Lehmans had another son William F. born in 1861. Augusta had three more daughters, Emeliyn, Caroline Wilhelmina and Mathilde, but their birth order is unclear, as it is unclear whether these were children of Lehmann or her second husband Buchmeier.
The Lehmanns were part of the first wave of Adelsverein
settlers who had emigrated from Prussia
on the ship Louise, arriving in Galveston, Texas
on November 2, 1846. After John O. Meusebach
negotiated the Meusebach–Comanche Treaty to open up settlement of the Fisher-Miller Land Grant
, the Lehmanns settled on a farm four miles southwest of Loyal Valley
.
Moritz Lehmann died in 1862, and Augusta married local stonemason Philip Buchmeier in 1863.
, who had been sent from Fort McKavett
to recover the two Lehmann boys. In the short battle that followed, Willie Lehmann was able to escape, but the Apaches fled with young Herman. Sergeant Stance became the first black regular to receive a Medal of Honor
for his bravery on this mission. The kidnapping site was designated a Recorded Texas Historic Landmark
in 1991, Marker number 11283.
. He was adopted by a man named Carnoviste and his wife, Laughing Eyes. A year after his capture, General William T. Sherman passed through Loyal Valley on an inspection tour. Augusta Lehmann Buchmeier was granted a private audience with Sherman to plead for his assistance in finding her son.
The Apaches called Lehmann “En Da” (White Boy). He spent about six years with them and became assimilated into their culture, rising to the position of petty chief. As a young warrior, one of his most memorable battles was a running fight with the Texas Rangers on August 24, 1875, which took place near Fort Concho
, about 65 miles west of the site of San Angelo, Texas
. Ranger James Gillett nearly shot Lehmann before he realized he was a white "captive". When the Rangers tried to find Lehmann later, he escaped by crawling through the grass.
In the spring of 1877, Lehmann and the Comanches attacked buffalo
hunters on the high plains of Texas. Lehmann was wounded by hunters in a surprise attack
on the Indian camp at Yellow House Canyon
(present-day Lubbock, Texas
) on March 18, 1877, the last major fight between Indians and non-Indians in Texas.
In July 1877, Comanche chief Quanah Parker
, who had successfully negotiated the surrender of the last fighting Comanches in 1875, was sent in search of the renegades. Herman Lehmann was among the group that Quanah found camped on the Pecos River
in eastern New Mexico. Quanah persuaded them to quit fighting and come to the Indian reservation
near Fort Sill
, Indian Territory in (present-day Oklahoma
). Lehmann refused to go to the reservation, however, he later followed at Quanah's request.
, the commanding officer of Fort Sill, whether there were any blue eyed boys on the reservation. He said yes; however, the description led them to believe that this was not her boy. Nevertheless, she requested that the boy be brought to her.
In April 1878, Lt. Col. John W. Davidson ordered that Lehmann be sent under guard to his family in Texas. Five soldiers and a driver escorted Lehmann on a four-mule-drawn ambulance to Loyal Valley in Mason County, Texas. Lehmann arrived in Loyal Valley with an escort of soldiers on May 12, 1878, eight years after his capture. The people of Loyal Valley gathered to see the captive boy brought home. Upon his arrival, neither he nor his mother recognized one another. Lehmann had long believed his family dead, for the Apache had shown him proof during his time of transition to their way of life. It was his sister who found a scar on his arm, which had been caused by her when they were playing with a hatchet. His family surrounded him welcoming him home and the distant memories began to come back. Hearing someone repeat "Herman", he thought that sounded familiar and then realized it was his own name.
At first, he was sullen and wanted nothing to do with his mother and siblings. As he put it, "I was an Indian, and I did not like them because they were palefaces." Lehmann's readjustment to his original culture was slow and painful. He rejected food offered, and was unaccustomed to sleeping in a bed.
Herman Lehmann’s first memoir, written with the assistance of Jonathan H. Jones, was published in 1899 under the titleA Condensed History of the Apache and Comanche Indian Tribes for Amusement and General Knowledge (also known as Indianology). Lehmann hated this book for he felt Jonathan had taken liberty to fluff it up a bit.
Throughout his life, Herman Lehmann drifted between two very different cultures. Lehmann was a very popular figure in southwestern Oklahoma and the Texas Hill Country, appearing at county fairs and rodeos. To thrill audiences, such as he did in 1925 at the Old Settlers Reunion in Mason County, he would chase a calf around an arena, kill it with arrows, jump off his horse, cut out the calf’s liver, and eat it raw.
His second autobiography, Nine Years Among the Indians (1927, edited by J. Marvin Hunter) was at the request of Lehmann. He requested that this time the book be written just as he told it. It is one of the finest captivity narratives in American literature, according to J. Frank Dobie
.
Herman Lehmann’s story also inspired Mason County native Fred Gipson’s novel Savage Sam
, a sequel to Old Yeller
.
They left Texas and moved back to Indian Territory in 1900 to be close to his Apache and Comanche friends.
Lehmann and Fannie had 2 sons, Henry & John, and 3 daughters, Amelia, May, and Caroline.
On August 26, 1901, Quanah Parker
provided a legal affidavit
verifying Lehman's life as his adopted son 1877–1878. On May 29, 1908, the United States Congress
authorized the United States Secretary of the Interior
to allot Lehmann, as an adopted member of the Comanche
nation, one hundred and sixty acres of Oklahoma land. Lehman chose a site near Grandfield
and moved there in 1910. He later deeded some of the property over for a school.
Herman Lehmann was ill for many years. The exact cause of his death is unknown. As per his niece Ester Lehmann (9/4/2007), she believes it could have been cancer. Lehmann died on February 2, 1932, in Loyal Valley, Mason County,Texas, where he is buried next to his mother and stepfather in the cemetery next to the old Loyal Valley one-room school house.
Native Americans in the United States
Native Americans in the United States are the indigenous peoples in North America within the boundaries of the present-day continental United States, parts of Alaska, and the island state of Hawaii. They are composed of numerous, distinct tribes, states, and ethnic groups, many of which survive as...
. He lived first among the Apache
Apache
Apache is the collective term for several culturally related groups of Native Americans in the United States originally from the Southwest United States. These indigenous peoples of North America speak a Southern Athabaskan language, which is related linguistically to the languages of Athabaskan...
and then the Comanche
Comanche
The Comanche are a Native American ethnic group whose historic range consisted of present-day eastern New Mexico, southern Colorado, northeastern Arizona, southern Kansas, all of Oklahoma, and most of northwest Texas. Historically, the Comanches were hunter-gatherers, with a typical Plains Indian...
but eventually returned to his family later on in his life. The phenomenon of a "white boy" raised by "Indians" made him a notable figure in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. He published his autobiography, Nine Years Among the Indians
in 1927.
Early life
Herman Lehmann was born near Mason, TexasMason, Texas
Mason is the seat of Mason County, Texas, United States. The town is an agricultural community on Comanche Creek southwest of Mason Mountain, on the Edwards Plateau and part of the Llano Uplift. The population was 2,114 at the 2010 census.-History:...
, on June 5, 1859, to German immigrants Ernst Moritz Lehmann and his wife Augusta Johanna Adams Lehmann. He was a third child, following a brother Gustave Adolph born in 1855, and a sister Wilhelmina who was born in 1857. Following the birth of Herman, the Lehmans had another son William F. born in 1861. Augusta had three more daughters, Emeliyn, Caroline Wilhelmina and Mathilde, but their birth order is unclear, as it is unclear whether these were children of Lehmann or her second husband Buchmeier.
The Lehmanns were part of the first wave of Adelsverein
Adelsverein
Society for the Protection of German Immigrants in Texas, better known as Adelsverein , organized on April 20, 1842, was a colonial attempt to establish a new Germany within the borders of Texas.-History:...
settlers who had emigrated from Prussia
Prussia
Prussia was a German kingdom and historic state originating out of the Duchy of Prussia and the Margraviate of Brandenburg. For centuries, the House of Hohenzollern ruled Prussia, successfully expanding its size by way of an unusually well-organized and effective army. Prussia shaped the history...
on the ship Louise, arriving in Galveston, Texas
Galveston, Texas
Galveston is a coastal city located on Galveston Island in the U.S. state of Texas. , the city had a total population of 47,743 within an area of...
on November 2, 1846. After John O. Meusebach
John O. Meusebach
John O. Meusebach , born Baron Otfried Hans von Meusebach, was at first a Prussian bureaucrat, later an American farmer and politician who served in the Texas Senate, District 22.-Early years:John O...
negotiated the Meusebach–Comanche Treaty to open up settlement of the Fisher-Miller Land Grant
Fisher-Miller Land Grant
The Fisher-Miller Land Grant was part of an early colonization effort of the Republic of Texas. Its 3,878,000 acres covered between the Llano River and Colorado River. Originally granted to Henry Francis Fisher and Burchard Miller, the grant was sold to the German colonization company of Adelsverein...
, the Lehmanns settled on a farm four miles southwest of Loyal Valley
Loyal Valley, Texas
Loyal Valley is an unincorporated farming and ranching community, established in 1858, and is north of Cherry Spring in the southeastern corner of Mason County, in the U.S. state of Texas. The community is located near Cold Spring Creek, which runs east for to its mouth on Marschall Creek in...
.
Moritz Lehmann died in 1862, and Augusta married local stonemason Philip Buchmeier in 1863.
Capture
On May 16, 1870, a raiding party of eight to ten Apaches (probably Lipans) captured Herman Lehmann, who was almost eleven, and his eight-year-old brother, Willie, while they were in the fields at their mother's request to scare the birds from the wheat. Their two sisters escaped without injury. Four days later, the Apache raiding party encountered a patrol of ten African-American cavalrymen led by Sgt. Emanuel StanceEmanuel Stance
Emanuel Stance was a Buffalo Soldier in the United States Army and a recipient of America's highest military decoration—the Medal of Honor—for his actions in the Indian Wars of the western United States....
, who had been sent from Fort McKavett
Fort McKavett State Historic Site
Fort McKavett State Historic Site is a state park in Menard County, Texas, United States. Fort McKavett was a frontier fort established as Camp San Saba in 1852 to protect settlers from Indian raids...
to recover the two Lehmann boys. In the short battle that followed, Willie Lehmann was able to escape, but the Apaches fled with young Herman. Sergeant Stance became the first black regular to receive a Medal of Honor
Medal of Honor
The Medal of Honor is the highest military decoration awarded by the United States government. It is bestowed by the President, in the name of Congress, upon members of the United States Armed Forces who distinguish themselves through "conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his or her...
for his bravery on this mission. The kidnapping site was designated a Recorded Texas Historic Landmark
Recorded Texas Historic Landmark
Recorded Texas Historic Landmark is a designation awarded by the Texas Historical Commission for historically and architecturally significant properties in the state of Texas....
in 1991, Marker number 11283.
Life with the Apaches
A few months after Lehman's capture, the Apaches lied and told Lehmann they had killed his entire family, depriving him of any incentive to attempt escape. The Apaches took Herman Lehmann to their village in eastern New MexicoNew Mexico
New Mexico is a state located in the southwest and western regions of the United States. New Mexico is also usually considered one of the Mountain States. With a population density of 16 per square mile, New Mexico is the sixth-most sparsely inhabited U.S...
. He was adopted by a man named Carnoviste and his wife, Laughing Eyes. A year after his capture, General William T. Sherman passed through Loyal Valley on an inspection tour. Augusta Lehmann Buchmeier was granted a private audience with Sherman to plead for his assistance in finding her son.
The Apaches called Lehmann “En Da” (White Boy). He spent about six years with them and became assimilated into their culture, rising to the position of petty chief. As a young warrior, one of his most memorable battles was a running fight with the Texas Rangers on August 24, 1875, which took place near Fort Concho
Fort Concho
Fort Concho is a National Historic Landmark owned and operated since 1935 by the city of San Angelo, the seat of Tom Green County in West Texas...
, about 65 miles west of the site of San Angelo, Texas
San Angelo, Texas
San Angelo is a city in the state of Texas. Located in West Central Texas it is the county seat of Tom Green County. As of 2010 according to the United States Census Bureau, the city had a total population of 93,200...
. Ranger James Gillett nearly shot Lehmann before he realized he was a white "captive". When the Rangers tried to find Lehmann later, he escaped by crawling through the grass.
Asylum with the Comanches
Around the spring of 1876, Herman Lehmann killed an Apache medicine man avenging his killing of Carnoviste, his chief and master. Fearing revenge, he fled from the Apaches and spent a year alone in hiding. He became lonely and decided to search for a Comanche tribe that he might join. He observed a tribe all day long then entered the camp just after dark. At first they were going to kill him, however, a young warrior approached him that spoke the Apache tongue. Lehmann then explained his situation--that he was born white adopted by the Indians and that he left the Apaches after killing the medicine man. Another brave came forward verifying his story and he was welcomed to stay. He joined the Comanches who gave him a new name, Montechema (meaning unknown).In the spring of 1877, Lehmann and the Comanches attacked buffalo
American Bison
The American bison , also commonly known as the American buffalo, is a North American species of bison that once roamed the grasslands of North America in massive herds...
hunters on the high plains of Texas. Lehmann was wounded by hunters in a surprise attack
Battle of Yellow House Canyon
The Battle of Yellow House Canyon was a battle between a force of Comanches and Apaches against a group of bison hunters that occurred on March 18, 1877, near the site of the present-day city of Lubbock, Texas...
on the Indian camp at Yellow House Canyon
Yellow House Canyon
Yellow House Canyon is a canyon that is about long, heading in Lubbock, Texas, at the junction of Blackwater Draw and Yellow House Draw, and trending generally southeastward to the edge of the Llano Estacado about east of Slaton, Texas; it forms one of three major canyons along the east side of...
(present-day Lubbock, Texas
Lubbock, Texas
Lubbock is a city in and the county seat of Lubbock County, Texas, United States. The city is located in the northwestern part of the state, a region known historically as the Llano Estacado, and the home of Texas Tech University and Lubbock Christian University...
) on March 18, 1877, the last major fight between Indians and non-Indians in Texas.
In July 1877, Comanche chief Quanah Parker
Quanah Parker
Quanah Parker was a Comanche chief, a leader in the Native American Church, and the last leader of the powerful Quahadi band before they surrendered their battle of the Great Plains and went to a reservation in Indian Territory...
, who had successfully negotiated the surrender of the last fighting Comanches in 1875, was sent in search of the renegades. Herman Lehmann was among the group that Quanah found camped on the Pecos River
Pecos River
The headwaters of the Pecos River are located north of Pecos, New Mexico, United States, at an elevation of over 12,000 feet on the western slope of the Sangre de Cristo mountain range in Mora County. The river flows for through the eastern portion of that state and neighboring Texas before it...
in eastern New Mexico. Quanah persuaded them to quit fighting and come to the Indian reservation
Indian reservation
An American Indian reservation is an area of land managed by a Native American tribe under the United States Department of the Interior's Bureau of Indian Affairs...
near Fort Sill
Fort Sill
Fort Sill is a United States Army post near Lawton, Oklahoma, about 85 miles southwest of Oklahoma City.Today, Fort Sill remains the only active Army installation of all the forts on the South Plains built during the Indian Wars...
, Indian Territory in (present-day Oklahoma
Oklahoma
Oklahoma is a state located in the South Central region of the United States of America. With an estimated 3,751,351 residents as of the 2010 census and a land area of 68,667 square miles , Oklahoma is the 28th most populous and 20th-largest state...
). Lehmann refused to go to the reservation, however, he later followed at Quanah's request.
Return and adjustment
Herman Lehmann lived with Quanah Parker’s family on the Kiowa-Comanche reservation in 1877-78. Several people took notice of the white boy living among the Indians. However, Lehmann's mother never gave up believing that she would one day see her son again. She questioned Colonel MackenzieRanald S. Mackenzie
Ranald Slidell Mackenzie was a career United States Army officer and general in the Union Army during the American Civil War, described by General Ulysses S. Grant as its most promising young officer...
, the commanding officer of Fort Sill, whether there were any blue eyed boys on the reservation. He said yes; however, the description led them to believe that this was not her boy. Nevertheless, she requested that the boy be brought to her.
In April 1878, Lt. Col. John W. Davidson ordered that Lehmann be sent under guard to his family in Texas. Five soldiers and a driver escorted Lehmann on a four-mule-drawn ambulance to Loyal Valley in Mason County, Texas. Lehmann arrived in Loyal Valley with an escort of soldiers on May 12, 1878, eight years after his capture. The people of Loyal Valley gathered to see the captive boy brought home. Upon his arrival, neither he nor his mother recognized one another. Lehmann had long believed his family dead, for the Apache had shown him proof during his time of transition to their way of life. It was his sister who found a scar on his arm, which had been caused by her when they were playing with a hatchet. His family surrounded him welcoming him home and the distant memories began to come back. Hearing someone repeat "Herman", he thought that sounded familiar and then realized it was his own name.
At first, he was sullen and wanted nothing to do with his mother and siblings. As he put it, "I was an Indian, and I did not like them because they were palefaces." Lehmann's readjustment to his original culture was slow and painful. He rejected food offered, and was unaccustomed to sleeping in a bed.
Herman Lehmann’s first memoir, written with the assistance of Jonathan H. Jones, was published in 1899 under the titleA Condensed History of the Apache and Comanche Indian Tribes for Amusement and General Knowledge (also known as Indianology). Lehmann hated this book for he felt Jonathan had taken liberty to fluff it up a bit.
Throughout his life, Herman Lehmann drifted between two very different cultures. Lehmann was a very popular figure in southwestern Oklahoma and the Texas Hill Country, appearing at county fairs and rodeos. To thrill audiences, such as he did in 1925 at the Old Settlers Reunion in Mason County, he would chase a calf around an arena, kill it with arrows, jump off his horse, cut out the calf’s liver, and eat it raw.
His second autobiography, Nine Years Among the Indians (1927, edited by J. Marvin Hunter) was at the request of Lehmann. He requested that this time the book be written just as he told it. It is one of the finest captivity narratives in American literature, according to J. Frank Dobie
J. Frank Dobie
James Frank Dobie was an American folklorist, writer, and newspaper columnist best known for many books depicting the richness and traditions of life in rural Texas during the days of the open range...
.
Herman Lehmann’s story also inspired Mason County native Fred Gipson’s novel Savage Sam
Savage Sam
Savage Sam is the 1963 film sequel to Old Yeller written by Fred Gipson. It was inspired by the story of former Apache captive Herman Lehmann, whom Gipson had seen give an exhibition when he was a child....
, a sequel to Old Yeller
Old Yeller
Old Yeller is a 1956 children's novel by Fred Gipson, which received a Newbery Honor in 1957. It was illustrated by Carl Burger. The title is taken from the name of the big yellow dog who is the center of the book's story...
.
Personal life and death
- July 16, 1885 - Herman Lehmann married N.E. Burke. The marriage ended in divorce, with conflicting accounts of the cause.
- March 4, 1896 - Lehman married Fannie Light. The couple had two sons and three daughters. Although Lehman deserted his second wife in OklahomaOklahomaOklahoma is a state located in the South Central region of the United States of America. With an estimated 3,751,351 residents as of the 2010 census and a land area of 68,667 square miles , Oklahoma is the 28th most populous and 20th-largest state...
in 1926, a divorce was never filed. Upon Lehmann's death, Fannie Light was his legal widow.
They left Texas and moved back to Indian Territory in 1900 to be close to his Apache and Comanche friends.
Lehmann and Fannie had 2 sons, Henry & John, and 3 daughters, Amelia, May, and Caroline.
On August 26, 1901, Quanah Parker
Quanah Parker
Quanah Parker was a Comanche chief, a leader in the Native American Church, and the last leader of the powerful Quahadi band before they surrendered their battle of the Great Plains and went to a reservation in Indian Territory...
provided a legal affidavit
Affidavit
An affidavit is a written sworn statement of fact voluntarily made by an affiant or deponent under an oath or affirmation administered by a person authorized to do so by law. Such statement is witnessed as to the authenticity of the affiant's signature by a taker of oaths, such as a notary public...
verifying Lehman's life as his adopted son 1877–1878. On May 29, 1908, the United States Congress
United States Congress
The United States Congress is the bicameral legislature of the federal government of the United States, consisting of the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Congress meets in the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C....
authorized the United States Secretary of the Interior
United States Secretary of the Interior
The United States Secretary of the Interior is the head of the United States Department of the Interior.The US Department of the Interior should not be confused with the concept of Ministries of the Interior as used in other countries...
to allot Lehmann, as an adopted member of the Comanche
Comanche
The Comanche are a Native American ethnic group whose historic range consisted of present-day eastern New Mexico, southern Colorado, northeastern Arizona, southern Kansas, all of Oklahoma, and most of northwest Texas. Historically, the Comanches were hunter-gatherers, with a typical Plains Indian...
nation, one hundred and sixty acres of Oklahoma land. Lehman chose a site near Grandfield
Grandfield, Oklahoma
Grandfield is a city in Tillman County, Oklahoma, United States. The population was 1,038 at the 2010 census.-Geography:Grandfield is located at ....
and moved there in 1910. He later deeded some of the property over for a school.
Herman Lehmann was ill for many years. The exact cause of his death is unknown. As per his niece Ester Lehmann (9/4/2007), she believes it could have been cancer. Lehmann died on February 2, 1932, in Loyal Valley, Mason County,Texas, where he is buried next to his mother and stepfather in the cemetery next to the old Loyal Valley one-room school house.
Source material
- Greene, A. C. (1972) The Last Captive. Austin: The Encinco Press.
- Lehmann, Herman. (1927) Nine Years Among the Indians, 1870-1879. J. Marvin Hunter; reprint, Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1993, ISBN 0-8263-1417-1
- Albertarelli, Rino (& Sergio Toppi). (1975) Herman Lehmann - L'indiano blanco. (Coll. I Protagonisti, 10.) Milano: Daim Press; reprints: Cinisello Balsamo: Hobby & Work, 1994 (880715093X); Milano: Sergio Bonelli, 1994. - Comic version.
- Zesch, Scott. (2004) The Captured: A True Story of Abduction by Indians on the Texas Frontier. New York: St. Martin's Press.
- Chebahtah, William, & Nancy McGown Minor. (2007) Chevato: The Story of the Apache Warrior Who Captured Herman Lehmann. Lincoln (NE): Univ. of Nebraska Press, ISBN 978-0-8032-1097-4
- Personal visit with Esther Lehmann, niece of Herman and daughter of Willie Lehmann. September 4, 2007