About Stampede Creek Texas

Stampede Creek rises six miles northwest of Moody in southwestern
McLennan County (at 31 21'N, 97 26'W) and runs southwest for eleven
miles to its mouth on Lake Belton (formerly the Leon River) in Bell
County. Before the formation of Lake Belton, it converged with the Leon
River approximately one mile northeast of what is now Highway 36 Bridge.

This creek received its name on June 4th, 1839 when the horses of an
encamped squad of Texas Rangers stampeded during the night. At this time
there were still a number of hostile Indian tribes in the Republic of
Texas. Raids were frequent upon the white immigrants, particularly in
the Central and Southern parts of Texas. Companies of rangers were
placed in charge of various forts to defend these immigrants.

One of these forts was near present day Little River and on May
25th,1839, Captain John Bird and a company of Rangers arrived there. The
next morning he and the thirty-four men under his command encountered a
small group of Indians north of the fort. They pursued them
approximately 10 miles to a creek near the present day town of Temple
where they came in contact with and battled more than 200 Caddo,
Kick-a-poo and Comanche Indians. The Indians were defeated but the
Texans received several casualties including Captain Bird. The Comanche
chief Buffalo Hump was also killed in the battle. The creek became
known as Bird's Creek.

Nathan Brookshire assumed command after Bird's death. He and his men
returned to the Little River fort that night and to Nashville the day
after.

Over a week later a squad of rangers from Nashville returned to the
Bird's Creek site to bury Captain Bird and the other dead. Once that was
done they rode west to the east side of the Leon River in pursuit of the
defeated Indians. According to Lieutenant George B. Erath, a Texas
Ranger, who was there, the Rangers camped on the banks of the creek
where the Indians had buried and hidden some of their dead. The Indians
had also driven and killed a number of buffalo on the way there. It was
a hot summer and the stench from the buffalo carcasses and dead Indians
terrified the horses and caused them to stampede that night. That
incident gave the creek its name.

Some thirty-seven years later on July 4, 1876, another stampede occurred
on the banks of the Stampede Creek. That morning just outside Belton a
large herd of longhorns put together by the Wilson Brothers of Kansas
City had started its slow journey up the new " western" or "Dodge" fork
of the Chisholm Trail. This fork began at Belton and followed along the
Leon River, then passed west of Fort Griffin instead of through Ft.
Worth and then on to Dodge City Kansas. The herd had more than the usual
2500 head. That coupled with the 25 cowboys made it a little unwieldy.
Most cattle drives had only a dozen or so cowboys.

The herd spread over five miles of Texas prairie as the animals grazed
their way slowly north up the trail. The drive was without incident
until about 4 in the afternoon when a thunderstorm unnerved the cattle.
The electrical thunderstorm passed and by 10 p.m. the bedded longhorns
appeared to have settled down under the star filled sky. Then the cattle
remembered the storm earlier in the day rose in unison and began to run.
The older Wilson and another cowboy jumped onto their horses trying to
save the herd.. Unfortunately, one of the other cowboys, a Mexican, was
drunk and rode to the East side of the herd firing his six-shooter into
the air. This drove the cattle straight ahead as the older Wilson
brother and one of the other cowboys rode on the West side. These two
excellent horsemen knew if they could cut off the cattle successfully
the herd would turn. But unfortunately with the drunken cowboy working
against them on the other side, the cattle ran blindly over a bluff
and into the deep gully below.

A count the next morning showed 2700 head of longhorn dead or dying. One
of the cowboys had died in the stampede as well.This was one of the most
destructive stampedes in Western recorded history.