Name_______________________

Period___________________

Cynthia Ann Parker

Cynthia Ann Parker was born in 1824 to Lucy and Silas M. Parker in Crawford
County, Illinois. When she was nine her family moved to Central Texas and built
Fort Parker on the Navasota River in what is now Limestone County. The family
developed a community around the church of her uncle, Elder John Parker. As
protection against the Natives of the area, they built substantial walls around their
community and created a company of Texas Rangers for the area. The
settlement became known as Fort Parker.
On May 19, 1836, Fort Parker was attacked by several hundred Comanche and
Kiowa. They killed several of its inhabitants. During the raid the Comanche
seized five captives, including Cynthia Ann. Within 6 years, all the captives had
been returned to their white families, except Cynthia Ann who remained with the
Indians for almost twenty-five years.
Although she was beaten and abused at first, she was soon integrated into the
tribe. Cynthia was given to a Tenowish Comanche couple who cared for her, and
who raised her like their own daughter. She became Comanche in every sense;
was trained in their ways and was totally devoted to her adopted parents. The
memories of her white settler life quickly faded.
She never voluntarily returned to white society. U.S. Indian agent Robert S.
Neighbors learned, probably in 1848, that she was among the Comanche. He
was told by other Comanche that only force would induce her captors to release
her. Cynthia Anna married Peta Nocoma, a young Comanche chief who gained
fame for his many violent raids on white settlements in the territory. They had 3
children: Quanah, Pecos and Topsannah (2 boys and 1 girl).
On December 18, 1860, Texas Rangers under Sul Ross attacked a Comanche
hunting camp at Mule Creek. During this raid the Rangers captured three of the
supposed Indians. Peta Nocoma was wounded, but managed to escape with
their two sons, Quanah and Pecos.
The Rangers were surprised to find that one of the Comanche had blue eyes; it
was a non English speaking white woman with her infant daughter. Ranger Isaac
Parker later identified her as his niece, Cynthia Ann. Cynthia accompanied her
uncle to Birdville on the condition that military interpreter Horace P. Jones would
send along her sons if they were found. While traveling through Fort Worth she
was photographed with her daughter at her breast and her hair cut short - a
Comanche sign of mourning. She thought that Peta Nocona was dead and
feared that she would never see her sons again.

On April 8, 1861, a sympathetic Texas legislature voted her a grant of $100

annually for five years and some land and appointed Isaac Parker her guardian.
But she was never reconciled to living in white society and made several
unsuccessful attempts to flee to her Comanche family. Cynthia Ann's every
attempt to return to her people failed, and she was repeatedly caught and
returned.
She never adjusted to white life and was often locked in her room to keep her
from running away. Often refusing to speak or eat, she died in 1870 of influenza
at the age of 43. In the last years of Cynthia Ann's life she never saw her Indian
family, the only family she really knew. But she was a true pioneer of the
American West, whose legacy was carried on by her son Quanah. Serving as a
link between whites and Comanche, Quanah Parker became the most influential
Comanche leader of the reservation era.
Quanah refused to accept the 1867 Treaty of Medicine Lodge, which confined
the southern Plains Indians to a reservation and attempted to turn them into
farmers in imitation of the white settlers. Quanah decided to remain on the
warpath, raiding in Texas
Please answer in complete sentences.
1) Why do you think Cynthia Ann did not want to return to the white culture?

2) What were the key events in Cynthia Ann Parkers life?

3) Who was Cynthias famous son?

4) What do you think were some of the differences in the two cultures of her life?