Daniel Wurm - Fort Chadbourne, Texas
Thank you to Bob and Sharon Frye for providing the information that follows. These resources collected during a visit to Fort Chadbourne in 2018 provide valuable insight into the experiences of Daniel Wurm and his comrades at Daniel's last post. It was while stationed at Fort Chadbourne, Texas in 1867 that Daniel Wurm met his demise.
TIMELINE:
Aug, 1865 Macon, Georgia 4th Cavalry ordered to San Antonio, Texas; Texas and Louisiana were part of the 5th Military District during Reconstruction of former Confederate States.
Nov, 1865 San Antonio, Texas 4th Cavalry headquartered at Fort Sam Houston; 2 companies of troops sent to patrol along the US-Mexican border (Rio Grande); 4 companies sent to man outposts from San Antonio to San Angelo against Indian incursions.
May, 1867 Fort Chadbourne, Coke County, Texas 4th Cavalry, Comp H (Daniel’s unit) under Captain Beaumont returned.
Note: US 8th Infantry surrendered Fort Chadbourne to Confederate forces 28 Feb 1861 (prior to Ft Sumter); mostly abandoned during Civil War.
Note: Fort Chadbourne is about 45 miles north of San Angelo, Texas and a few miles from the town of Fort Chadbourne. The fort was established 28 Oct 1852 to protect the western edge of settled Texas territory. It also served as a stage stop for the Butterfield Overland Mail route that connected St Louis, and the eastern United States, to the new state of California (and its gold). Mail could be delivered in 25 days across the southern desert, instead of the 4 months via sailing ship. The transcontinental telegraph wouldn’t be completed until 1861 and the transcontinental railroad until 1869.
Note: Then Major Eugene Beaumont won a Medal of Honor for leading the US 4th Cavalry, including Daniel Wurm, in a charge against Confederate defenses at Selma AL on 2 Apr 1865.
9 Jun 1867 Tom Green Co, TX (?) Lt Peter Boehm with 50 troops from Fort Chadbourne conducted “a scout on the main Concho River, to protect rains and droves of cattle crossing El Llano Estacado …”
Source: Fort Concho and the Texas Frontier, J Evetts Haley, 1952.
Comment: It’s likely that Daniel was part of the 50 troopers that performed scout and escort duties.
Note: In June 1866, Charles Goodnight and Oliver Loving drove 2000 head of cattle along the old Butterfield Overland Mail route towards Horsehead Crossing on the Pecos River before turning north to Fort Sumner, New Mexico. In 1867 Goodnight and Loving repeated the cattle drive, but asked for an Army escort to protect from Comanche attacks. The 1985 novel Lonesome Dove was loosely based on the Goodnight-Loving cattle drives. A 1989 TV mini-series of the same name garnered many honors and awards.
22 Aug, 1867 Mountain Pass, Taylor County, Texas Pvt, Comp H 4th US Cavalry, killed-in-action (KIA)
“Private Daniel Wurm was stationed at Fort Chadbourne in Texas. While on a scouting trip with Private John Maroney, both men were attacked and killed by Comanche Indians near Mountain Pass approximately 40 miles northeast of the post. The next day Lt Peter Boehm, also a soldier at Fort Chadbourne, came upon the bodies and buried them on the right side of the road. The bodies of the two men were apparently exhumed at a later date and moved to San Antonio National cemetery.” source: findagrave.com
Note: Mountain Pass road (near Texas Hwy 351) is about 8 miles southwest of Merkel, Texas and was part of the old Butterfield Overland Mail road to Fort Stockton, Texas (Comanche Springs prior to 1859).
“On August 22, 1867, near East Peak on the overland road, fifty Native American warriors (likely Comanche) ambushed nine troopers from the Fourth Cavalry. Sergeant Benjamin Jenkins and his men quickly dismounted, taking up defensive position on a neighboring hill. During the intense firefight that followed, the well-armed raiding party utilized rifles and revolvers, along with bows and arrows, against Jenkins’ party. The soldiers finally repulsed their attackers, but not before the Indians killed Privates John Maroney and Daniel Wurm. A detail sent back to find the two slain men reported that their almost unrecognizable bodies were “pierced with arrow(s) and bullet wounds, scalped and otherwise mutilated.” The soldiers buried the hapless privates alongside the Butterfield Road. The attack took place on the Overland Mail Route, 6 miles east of Mountain Pass, which is where the road passes under the north side of East Peak in the Guadalupe County School Land Survey.”
Source: The Texas Frontier and the Butterfield Overland Mail, 1858 – 1861, author: Glen Sample Ely, University of Oklahoma Press, Mar 4, 2016; page 380, Pate and Fort Chadbourne Foundation, Fort Chadbourne , 141-42, Freeman and Pate “Fort Chadbourne Chronology”, 172-73 (endnote quotation)
“Nevertheless August of 1867 was a busy month. On 22 August a detail of ten men, after escorting the paymaster up the military road to Fort Belknap, was upon return attacked by Indians at Mountain Pass, forty miles north of Chadbourne. Two soldiers were killed and two of their horses captured. …”
Source: Fort Concho and the Texas Frontier, J Evetts Haley, 1952.
Unknown date San Antonio, Baxter Co, TX reburied: Section C, site 321
Comment: Daniel died about 10 weeks before his 3-year enlistment was completed.
Note: On 21 Oct 1867, the US government signed a peace treaty with the Comanche and Kiowa tribes, as part of the larger Medicine Lodge Treaty, reserving lands for signators in the Indian Territories (present day Oklahoma), almost exactly 2 months after Daniel was killed-in-action.
Note: Lt Peter Boehm, Daniel’s commander at Fort Chadbourne, was a Medal of Honor winner for his actions during the US Civil War on 31 War 1865 at the Battle of Dinwiddie Court House in Virginia. Lt Boehm, from the 15th New York Cavalry, was aide-de-camp to General George Armstrong Custer.
Note: By Mar 1868, Fort Chadbourne was closed due to a lack of reliable water and the military units moved to the newly opened Fort Concho in San Angelo, Texas. Privates Wurm and Maroney were the last two troopers assigned to Fort Chadbourne to die in action.