Summary of S.C. Gwynne's Empire of the Summer Moon (Unabridged‪)‬

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A few key insights from Chapter 1:

1. October 3, 1871 marked the beginning of the end of the bloody Indian wars in America, which had been going on for 250 years since the first landing of the European settlers.

2. On that day, the US Army was ordered to kill the Comanche Indians in Texas, the last of the hostile tribes. The government sent in General Ranald Mackenzie, a Civil War veteran, to teach the other soldiers how to fight the Indians.

3. The Comanches were a powerful group that enjoyed great success amid the Industrial Revolution. No other tribe had ever managed to withstand for very long the emergence of American civilization with its deadly weapons, its land-greedy settlers, its moral double standards, and its utter disregard for native interests.

4. Mackenzie’s troops targeted the Quahadis, an incredibly hostile band of Comanches. Their main focus was Quanah Parker, a young war chief known for being brutal, intelligent, fearless, and a “half-breed”. He was the son of a Comanche chief and a white woman.