The Captured by Scott Zesch - Critical Essay

Introduction

"The Captured" is a biography of about ten children captured by Comanche Indians mostly between the ages of eight to fourteen and held for about six months to eight years. The abductions by the Indians in the 1860s and 1870s were not uncommon but was a way for the Indians in trying to build up their tribes in the wars against the white men. The cases of abductions always started in violent ways, with the Indians brutally killing the families of the children, attacking them, burning down their farms or stealing their horses. In the book, a mother of one abductee was shot with arrows twice, scalped alive, but survived to bear a very healthy child after a month (Zesch n.p). Additionally, the escapes were harrowing as the Comanches trained themselves to ride for three or more days without having a nap or any food. When a horse would give out, they would abandon it and steal more horses. When they got food, they would kill any animal found in their way and eat it raw (Strong n.p). However, during all these incidences, the children were tied to the horses. Also, in the cases, posses of the whites followed the Indians in an attempt of recovering the children but they all failed.

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Order now

Once the abducted children arrived at the camps of the Indians, they were given to women who were childless or other families whom they pleased adopted them, lovingly treating them. Later, they came to see the Indians as people who were loving (Resendez n.p). Nonetheless, all the children held for more than a year preferred the Indian culture, and none of them was always willing to return to their white families. However, they were reunited forcibly with their original families after varying periods as they were located, and as a result of many negotiations with the Indians to release them. Those who returned to their homelands had been Indianized. The same trauma of abduction was the same trauma they had during their return to their white families. All the children had difficult adjustments and retained many characteristics of the Indians for the rest of their lives (Zesch n.p). A large number of them slept outdoors for several years, made their arrows and bows, hunting a great deal after that.

Moreover, most of the children were the German American families of the immigrants, and they only spoke German originally. Afterward, they all became fluent in the Comanche in their captivity, with most losing their ability to speak German or English, making them relearn their native language. However, most of them refused to attend schools as they had absorbed the nature of love from the Indians and could not stand to be indoors for a long period. Some moved as adults constantly, having enjoyed the migratory lifestyle of the Indians (Zesch n.p). Eventually, to some degree, most of them readjusted to the white life, becoming cowboys and buying ranches. The men were spoiled as Indians during their stay in the Indian land. Nevertheless, the most amazing activity was that even the children captured for less than a year were glad to be recaptured by the whites and were affected by the experience that all of them requested to be adopted by the native Americans (Gelo, Daniel and Christopher n.p)

The white children become so attached to the Indians because their lives in being whites were very hard as they were immigrant family's members on the Texas frontier and also had to work hard in farm chores and herding animals while living in the starvation brink (Wampler n.p). Another reason was that the actual fathers of the children seemed to have been very busy starving off starvation to virtually spend any time with their children or teach them. In contrast, the Indian fathers spent time with the boys and engaged them in all their activities from war tactics to riding to the spiritual beliefs of the Indians (Resendez n.p). Also, the Indians had excitement and freedom as school was never there and they were indulgent with their kids and rarely gave them punishments. In their first year as slaves and captives, they performed many menial activities but not in an excessive amount, but as the Indianized, they became warriors that ended those chores (Gelo, Daniel and Christopher n.p).

Conclusion

The book, "The Captured," is very fair in its portrayal of the brutal Indian's side and their positive side. And despite the massive stealing of farm items and horses by the Indians, and the settler attacks, the captives always defended them after their captivity explaining how Indians were driven to conduct the actions, as buffalos were slaughtered and the nomadic lifestyles made impossible by the white families (Strong n.p). Also, amazingly, on the arrival of the "roaring twenties," and the cattle drives of 1870s and were long over, various enemies knew that they had many similarities with their own young. The rangers of Texas, Indians on the reservation and former cowboys, met at the yearly convention of an Old Trail Driver Association. The fondly reminisced about their battles, reenacted the old rangers of Texas versus the wars of Indians for new moving pictures (Wampler n.p).

Works Cited

Gelo, Daniel J., and Christopher J. Wickham. Comanches and Germans on the Texas Frontier: The Ethnology of Heinrich Berghaus. Vol. 42. Texas A&M University Press, 2018.

Resendez, Andres. The other slavery: The uncovered story of Indian enslavement in America. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2016.

Strong, Pauline Turner. Captive selves, captivating others: The politics and poetics of colonial American captivity narratives. Routledge, 2018.

Wampler, Stephanie. Finding the captors through the captives' voices: An analysis of captivity narratives of the Plains Indians. University of Nebraska at Kearney, 2014.

Zesch, Scott. The Captured. A True Story of Abduction by Indians on the Texas Frontier, 2004.