The Legacy of Chief Canoso: Lipan Apache Peacemaker (unknown–unknown)

Canoso was a Lipan Apache chief in the Texas territory who was heavily involved in the continuous and mostly failing efforts to make peace with the Spanish during the late eighteenth century. The Spanish referred to him as one of the lower Lipan chiefs. Although few details about his private life are available, he did have a brother who the Spaniards considered a “lesser chief.” Canoso was known as an Apache leader, a warrior, and a peacemaker.

Canoso had made overtures for peace on June 16, 1789, when he, along with chief José Chiquitto, and accompanied by Manuel de Urrutia, came in “the practice of peace” to San Antonio, as recorded by Interim Governor Rafael Martínez Pacheco in his log for the presidio of San Antonio de Béxar. On December 29, 1789, however, six Lipan Indians entered Martínez’s bedroom in San Antonio. Alarmed, Martínez calmly stalled until guards could arrive at which time the Lipans drew their weapons and a fight broke out. The Spanish killed all six of the Apaches, and the Apaches wounded one Spanish soldier. Martínez was convinced they had come to assassinate him and to discover information about Juan de Ugalde’s Spanish-Norteño force which was on a campaign against the Apaches. On January 9, 1790, the Spanish-Norteño force surprised a Mescalero-Lipan ranchería (or settlement) on Soledad Creek. Canoso was among the chiefs who suffered losses: sixty Apaches were killed, including two other chiefs, and many women and children were captured by the Spanish-Norteño force. However, Canoso and a number of his people escaped. Canoso's band of Apaches then separated from the Mescalero, and the Lipan Apaches retreated southeast of San Antonio and established themselves between the Nueces and Colorado rivers. From March until July 1790 the Lipans in this area attacked and stole from Spanish settlements, primarily along the Rio Grande, while also pursuing peace with the Spanish. Canoso, as a Lipan chief, became an integral player in these peace efforts.

     On April 20, 1790, two Lipans carrying a cross, seeking peace, and explaining that they had been sent on behalf of Canoso and Chiquito arrived at San Antonio. The two representatives sought to recover a pair of Lipan women previously captured by the Comanches during the attack at Soledad Creek on January 9, then rescued by the Spanish, and who now lived in San Antonio. Because Canoso and Chiquito had learned from their experience at Soledad Creek, their representatives promised, on behalf of their nation, that their people would be loyal in the future. Canoso and Chiquito understood their people could not live in safety without having peace with the Spanish. On May 23, 1790, Canoso entered San Antonio with his party. They turned over their weapons and promised to end hostilities from that day forward and to show loyalty to the Spanish. Canoso likely wanted to make peace because the Apaches were under constant pressure and harassment at the hands of the Wichitas and Comanches of North Texas, among other American Indian groups.

Yet, throughout 1790 Lipan chiefs and their warriors still behaved violently toward the Spaniards. They took the lives of twenty-five Spaniards in the three Spanish towns: Laredo, Revilla, and Mier. They succeeded in stealing remarkable numbers of livestock which they used to trade for weapons with the Atakapas and Karankawas in the southeast. In late 1790 chiefs Canoso and Zapata Sas bartered with the Akokisa for 300 rifles.

In April and May of 1790 Chief Canoso, Chief Agá, and a lesser captain known as Cabezón traveled separately to San Antonio to meet and apologize for previous hostilities and to ask for peace. Before a peace agreement could be finalized, Martínez was relieved of his position as interim governor of Texas and Manuel Muñoz began serving as the governor. On August 30, 1790, Agá met with Governor Muñoz, on behalf of the Apache leaders Canoso, Zapato Sas, Roque, José Chiquito, Asmey, and Casaca Chiquita, to inquire of Viceroy Conde de Revilla Gigedo, if they could come to talk peace. The new governor, however, refused to make peace and cited Lipan raids along the Rio Grande as the reason; he both incentivized with gifts and incited the Norteños to continue their attacks against the Lipans because Muñoz valued the friendship of the Norteños and Comanches over the Apaches who he viewed as untrustworthy. In December 1790 this resulted in the Norteño (Nations of the North) tribes of the Comanche, Wichita, and Tonkawa to attack Canoso on the Colorado River. This attack resulted in the death of an Indian named Casimiro, along with ten Lipans, and the theft of Canoso’s horse herd.

On February 2, 1791, Viceroy Revilla Gigedo sent word to the governor of his approval to negotiate peace with the Lipans at San Fernando de Austria (presently Zaragoza Coahuila just south of the Rio Grande). Lipan captain José Antonio and Pedro Nava, the commandant of the Eastern Interior Provinces, met there on February 8, 1791, and came to a peace agreement that permitted the Lipans to enter and trade in Spanish towns.

The peace agreement did not last long. On March 3, 1791, Manuel Espada expressed a distrust towards the Lipans because, when questioned about peace, the Lipans said Canoso would be coming soon for his peace treaty, which Espada saw as a stalling technique. He did not believe Canoso would ever come. Canoso did not leave his ranchería on the Colorado River like the treaty requested, and in April 1791 he traded livestock for weapons with the Akokisa. On May 1, 1791, Chief José Lombreña and six of his party met with Commandant Nava to extol the peace when a fight broke out, killing all the Apaches, including Lombreña, and two Spanish soldiers. In early 1792 Norteños, who were well-armed by the Spanish, killed Chief Zapata Sas while he fled. Their deaths lead to Canoso gaining greater importance, as did chiefs Chiquito and Moreno. After suffering these great losses, Canoso, Chiquito, and Moreno showed increasing interest in peace.

On July 7, 1792, Canoso came to Juan Cortés at La Bahía del Espiritu Santo and offered to keep peace faithfully in this province and elsewhere where the Lipans had been hostile. With no protocol guiding his action, Juan Cortés could only express to Canoso an anticipation that El Conde de la Sierra Gorda would be pleased. Canoso left happy, and then Cortés relayed the events to the Conde de Sierra and awaited word back from him. Cortés also expressed concerns about the policy of prohibiting the Lipans from entering Spanish presidios, which Cortés believed would foster mistrust and hinder peace efforts. Having heard no official response through Cortés, Canoso returned in September.

Manuel Muñoz, knowing Canoso’s desire for peace, eventually notified Canoso that he must return livestock stolen from the Spanish and cease future hostility. Before agreeing to these terms, Canoso met with the Bidais who informed him of an illegal American trading post where Canoso would go to trade for arms before setting out on a buffalo hunt. In the spring of 1793 Canoso and his people settled along the Atascosa River. By April 1793 Canoso, Chiquito, and Moreno finalized the peace agreement with Manuel Muñoz. The Lipans agreed to cease hostility and stop trading with the southeastern tribes in return for the ability to trade with the Spanish and that the Spanish would keep the Norteños from attacking the Lipans.

In the coming years both parties would break this agreement and fail to live up to their promises. However, the April 1793 treaty was successful in stopping the war between the Lipan Apaches and the Spanish for the rest of the eighteenth century.