Who the Lipan were
The Lipan Apache were an Apachean people whose country in the 1700s and 1800s stretched across much of Texas, from the southern Plains to the Gulf coastal region, and into northern Mexico, especially Coahuila. They spoke a Southern Athabaskan language closely related to that of the Jicarilla. The name Lipan is of uncertain origin, and the Lipan have their own names for themselves and their groups. Spanish and later sources distinguished several Lipan bands, but the details of these divisions are not always clear.
Their story differs from that of the Apache in Arizona and New Mexico because it unfolded on a different frontier. For the Lipan, the key powers were the Spanish colonies of Texas and Coahuila, the Comanche on the Plains, and later Mexico, the Republic of Texas and the United States.
Movements and the Comanche
By the early 1700s, the Lipan were hunting bison on the Plains and using horses. As the Comanche became a major power on the Southern Plains, the Lipan were pushed southward into central and south Texas. The wider context is covered in the article on the horse and the Southern Plains. The Lipan came to depend on the hills and river valleys of Texas, and their position was often precarious, caught between Comanche enemies to the north and Spanish colonies to the south.
Relations with Spain
The Spanish Crown saw the Lipan sometimes as potential allies and sometimes as threats. Spanish officials in Texas and Coahuila built presidios (forts) to defend the colonies, and the relationship between those posts and Apache groups was complicated. This Spanish presidio frontier shaped the lives of many people.
In the 1750s, the Spanish founded the San Saba mission and presidio in central Texas, partly with the hope of settling the Lipan and creating an alliance against the Comanche and their allies. The mission was attacked and destroyed in 1758, a major setback for Spanish plans. Historians continue to discuss the Lipan role and the motives of the various parties, and accounts differ.
Later, Spain and then Mexico alternately made peace with and warred against Lipan groups. Some Lipan families lived near Spanish settlements, traded with them, and in some cases served as scouts or auxiliaries.
Mexico and Texas
When Mexico became independent in 1821, Texas became part of the Mexican state of Coahuila y Tejas. Settlers from the United States soon began arriving in large numbers, and after the Texas Revolution of 1835 to 1836, the Republic of Texas took control of much of Lipan country. Relations between Texans and the Lipan included negotiated peace and cooperation in some periods and violence in others. Some Lipan men served alongside Texan forces on occasion, but this did not protect Lipan communities from the pressure of settlement.
Texas annexation by the United States in 1845 did not end the problems. Settlement continued, and the Lipan were pushed to the margins of what had been their country. Many Lipan families moved south of the Rio Grande into Coahuila and nearby regions, where they sometimes found a refuge but also faced Mexican military campaigns and conflicts with other groups.
Dispersal in the 1800s
Over the middle and later 1800s the Lipan were scattered. Some families remained in Texas, some lived in northern Mexico, and some moved to join other Native communities, including the Mescalero in New Mexico. Disease, warfare and displacement all reduced Lipan numbers. Exact population figures for this period are uncertain and are not given here.
Some Lipan men also served as scouts for the U.S. Army in Texas in the 1870s, as did men from other nations. The reasons for such service varied, and it is now a matter of historical discussion in many Apache communities, in the same way as the wider topic of scout loyalty and survival is discussed.
In the early 1900s a group of Lipan from Mexico was moved to the Mescalero reservation in New Mexico, generally dated to about 1903. This is how Lipan people joined the Mescalero community.
What the Lipan name means in history
Because the Lipan lost their homeland and were not placed on a reservation of their own, they have sometimes been called a vanished people. That is incorrect. Lipan descendants are alive today, and the story of their communities and the question of recognition is covered in the article on Lipan Apache descendants.
Sources and care
Much of the written record comes from Spanish and Mexican officials, missionaries, Texan settlers and U.S. officers. These sources often reflect fear, conflict and incomplete understanding, and they used the word Apache loosely. Historians therefore sometimes disagree about whether a given incident involved Lipan or another group. Descendant families and communities keep their own histories, which differ in emphasis from the documentary record. Anyone doing family research should treat claims carefully.