Featured Tribe: Karankawa - Texas

The Karankawa Indians lived along the Texas coast of the Gulf of Mexico. Their territory was from the west end of Galveston Island down the coast to where Corpus Christie is today. There were several bands, or maybe even several tribes. We are not sure, because much of the history of the Karankawa is lost. No one bothered to study them in any detail while they were still around to study. Making things worse, the Karankawa were favorite targets of many false myths and made up stories.

They were pretty good fighters and European settlers feared them. The Europeans also wanted the Karankawa's land. This may be why they made up so many bad myths about them. Many of the Karankawa warriors were over 6 feet tall. People were shorter back then and 6 foot tall Indians were really big. They had bows almost as tall as they were and shot long arrows made from slender shoots of cane. It is said they would suddenly show up in their canoes, seemingly out of no where, to attack. They would run away and retreat or escape the same way. They would go into the swamps and swampy woods were Europeans had a hard time following. There was a good reason why they were such good fighters and why they were so unfriendly to American settlers.

By the time American settlers came in contact with the Karankawa the Karankawa had already had some pretty bad experiences with Europeans. Early on, Spanish slave traders cruised along the coast of Texas and they would kidnap Karankawas by force or trickery and make slaves out of them. Later, the French, under the explorer LaSalle, were very unfriendly. The French stole two canoes without asking. They just took them. When the Karankawa asked that the canoes be given back the French refused and a shooting war between the French and Karankawa started. The French lost and LaSalle's small colony was destroyed by the Karankawas. From the Karankawa's point of view, every time the Europeans came around, the Europeans would try to steal from, kidnap, or kill the Karankawa. No wonder they were not very friendly. Seems like this happened to all the Indians in Texas and America. This was not always the case.

There's more here: http://www.texasindians.com/karank.htm