THE CAPTIVE BOY

by

JULIA ROBB

Genre:  Historical Fiction

Date of Publication: December 20, 2015

Number of Pages: 170

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Colonel Mac McKenna’s Fourth Cavalry recaptures white captive August Shiltz from the Comanche, only to find August is determined to return to the Indians. McKenna attempts to civilize August to nineteenth century American standards and becomes the boy’s foster father. But when August kills another boy in a fight, McKenna rejects him, and August escapes from Fort Richards (Texas). When war with the Comanche breaks out, McKenna discovers August is a war leader – and his greatest enemy.

Praise For The Captive Boy

“THE CAPTIVE BOY by Julia Robb is a story told in a unique way – through journal entries by several different characters, and a novel within the novel. Robb is masterful in her depiction of each character, bringing to life an intriguing tale of the Old West.” — Writer’s Digest competition judge

“It will capture you and keep you engaged from the beginning all the way through the end and also give you insights into the difficulties faced by those who fought on both sides of the Indian Wars in Texas after the Civil War. Buy this book. You will not be disappointed​.” — Steve Mathisen

“Ms. Robb’s research is evident on every page. Without becoming bogged down in detail, she employs just enough of it to paint an accurate picture of a dangerous and unforgiving time.” — Samuel L. Robinson

“The Captive Boy and Me”

Guest Post by Julia Robb

Readers usually ask me why I wrote the novel, and that’s an easy question to answer because two things happened at the same time. I became interested in the greatest (unknown) general of the Indian Wars: Ronald Mackenzie; and I was enthralled by The Captured: A True Story of Abduction by Indians on the Texas Frontier, a nonfiction history by Scott Zesch.

Mackenzie (who his men nicknamed “Three Finger Jack” and who the Indians nicknamed “Bad Hand”) was a Union veteran who ended up whipping the Comanche and Kiowa.  Soldiers and Indians tagged Gen. Mackenzie with nicknames because he had only three fingers on his right hand.  During the Civil War, Confederate artillery shot off two fingers — minor wounds compared to his other six.

Then, I read Scott’s book, which was compelling. Although captive children have been romanticized, they were not happy or healthy people.  After they were either traded back to their families, or recaptured, they couldn’t stay married, they couldn’t keep a job, some of them never learned to read and write, they couldn’t stay in one place, and they had a hard time communicating.  (Interestingly enough, bipolar disorder also causes some of these same symptoms).  One returned captive, Adolf Zorn, ending up living in a cave until a short time before his death.

In an interview, published on my website, I asked Scott what caused the children’s unhappiness and disfunction.  Scott said:

In my opinion, immersing yourself in a very different culture is one of the most rewarding experiences you can have, but it comes at a cost, and that cost is usually a sense of rootlessness, of never completely belonging to one place or one people.

Reading Scott’s answer, I was upset on the children’s behalf.  Believe what you want about the Indian Wars, the kids were innocent victims. Their parents (many of them German immigrants) settled where it was not safe to settle, the kids were captured, and their lives were subsequently ruined.

I wanted to explore that tragedy through fictional story, and August Shiltz jumped into my mind.

And he wouldn’t leave.

At the same time, Mackenzie, a real life historical figure, was earning my admiration; and I knew he was a lonely man.  It wasn’t a big jump to wonder what would happen if August was recaptured and a fictional Mackenzie (who I renamed Mac McKenna) became his guardian and foster father.

In context, the Comanches were mostly kind to white captive children, but they were the adults’ mortal enemies.  (There was a big exception to this. In 1840, after a fight between Comanches and Texans, Comanches murdered dozens of white captive children. They burned them to death.)

Here’s a question and answer with Scott Zesch that readers will find enlightening.

ME: It’s difficult … to understand how a people can rape women (and they almost always did before killing them, as well as keeping them as sex slaves in camp), and practice lengthy torture, both on the trail and in camp, but at the same time love their own children, as well as adopted children. Do you have any thoughts on this?

SCOTT: Julia, the closest analogy I can draw is wartime atrocities. And, of course, what was happening in Texas at that time was war. There seems to be something in the human character that provokes people to brutalize and dehumanize ‘the enemy’ in that situation (including civilians), but I’m afraid I can’t explain it.”

Side Note: Cynthia Ann Parker was captured in 1836 in Texas, when she was nine or ten years old, and recaptured by Texas Rangers in 1860. At the time she was recaptured, Cynthia Ann was married to a Comanche warrior and had three children, one of whom was the famous Quanah Parker.

Julia grew up on the lower Great Plains of Texas, eventually became a reporter, and lived in every corner of the Lone Star State, from the Rio Grande to the East Texas swamps. She couldn’t shake images and experiences and began writing them down.

A priest once disappeared on the Mexican border and that inspired parts of Saint of the Burning Heart. She discovered a hypnotic seducer, who she turned into Ray Cortez, the bad guy in Del Norte. Reading about child Comanche captives and their fates made her want to write about a cavalry colonel who attempts to heal a rescued boy, and that turned into The Captive Boy. Finally, what happens to a man who is in love with another man, in a time and place where the only answer is death? That became Scalp Mountain.

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