The Spanish captain responsible for protecting the San Saba mission sensed grave danger on March 10, 1758.

The Apaches viewed the seventeenth-century arrival of the Spaniards with alarm and apprehension. The Europeans’ preoccupation with their eternal enemies – the Comanches, Tejas, Tonkawas and other East Texas tribes – was interpreted as an act of aggression.

Sixty years of constant conflict eventually convinced the Spaniards to turn their attention to the troublesome thorn in ...