The battle of the South Canadian or “Antelope Hills,” fought in 1858, was probably one of the most splendid scenic exhibitions of Indian warfare ever enacted upon Texas soil. This was the immemorial home of the Comanches; here they sought refuge from their marauding expeditions into Texas and Mexico; and here, in their veritable “city of refuge,” should the adventurous and daring rangers seek them, it was certain that they would be encountered in full force--Pohebits Quasho--“Iron Jacket,” so called from the fact that he wore a coat of scale mail, a curious piece of ancient armor, which doubtless had been stripped from the body of some unfortunate Spanish Knight slain, perhaps, a century before--some chevalier who followed Coronado, De Leon, La Salle--was the war chief. He was a “Big Medicine” man, or Prophet, and claimed to be invulnerable to balls and arrows aimed at his person, as by a necromantic puff of his breath the missives were diverted from their course, or charmed, and made to fall harmless at his feet. Peta Nocono, the young and daring husband of Cynthia Ann Parker, was second in command. About the 1st of May, in the year above named, Col. John S. Ford, (“Old Rip,”) at the head of 100 Texian Rangers--comprising such leaders as Capts. S. P. Ross, (the father of Gen. L. S. Ross); W. A. Pitts, Preston, Tankersley, and a contingent of 111 Toncahua Indians, the latter commanded by their celebrated chief, Placido--so long the faithful and implicitly trusted friend of the whites--marched on a campaign against the maruding Comanches, determined to follow them up to their stronghold amid the hills of the Canadian river, and if possible surprise them and inflict a severe and lasting chastisement. After a toilsome march of several days the Toncahua scouts reported that they were in the immediate vicinity of the Comanche encampment. The Comanches, though proverbial for their sleepless vigilance, were unsuspicious of danger; and so unsuspected was the approach of the rangers, that on the day preceding the battle, Col. Ford and Capt. Ross stood in the old road from Fort Smith to Santa Fe, just north of the Rio Negro or “False Wichita,” and watched through their glasses the Comanches running buffalo in the valleys still more to the north. That night the Toncahua spies completed the hazardous mission of locating definitely the position of the enemy’s encampment. The next morning (May 12) the rangers and “reserve” or friendly Indians, marched before sunrise to the attack.