Major Robert S. Neighbors

As a member of the Fourth Texas Legislature, Neighbors sponsored the law that opened the way for Indian reservations in Texas. He later charged that army officers at Fort Belknap and Camp Cooper failed to support his agents, and despite threats against his life he never faltered in protecting the reservation Indians. The Handbook of Texas names his killer as Edward Cornett and says Neighbors probably did not even know him. He was a Methodist, a Mason and a temperance leader. He had married Elizabeth Ann Mays at Seguin in 1851, and their home was in San Antonio.

What the plaque says

As Indian agent, forceful peacemaker and humanist, Maj. Neighbors had more influence over Texas' Indians than any other man of his era; came to Texas in 1836. He served as quartermaster in Texas army, 1839-41. While on Texas Ranger duty in San Antonio, 1842, he was taken as a prisoner of war to Mexico by Gen. Adrian Woll and spent 18 months in Perote Prison. Began his service to the Indians in 1845. As agent for Lipan-Apache and Tonkawa tribes, he used field system of control, visiting Indian homes, learning a red man's way of life, improving living condition, helping them to trade. He ably defended their rights, was counselor and friend, and sought new homes for them, never faltering in commitment to their safety. As a Texas commissioner in 1850 he organized El Paso County; he was also a state representative, 1851-1852, and a presidential elector in 1852. Major Neighbors later became the supervising agent for all of the Indians in Texas. Frontier civilians and soldiers failed to support his Indian policies. Many became hostile. On Sept. 14, 1859, he was murdered near here by a white man as he was returning after safely removing all reservation Indians from Texas. He was buried in Belknap Cemetery (1/2 mile E. of Town). (1967)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Fort Belknap — steps away
  The 1851 northern anchor of the first Texas frontier forts, on the Brazos below Newcastle, a Butterfield stop and the post beside the Brazos Reservation until its people were driven out in 1859.
• Old Post Office Museum and Art Center — 9.2 mi
  Graham's 1936 Art Moderne post office, with a New Deal mural by Alexandre Hogue inside, now the free museum of Young County in the town where the Texas cattle raisers first organized.

More markers nearby

• Camp Belknap, C.S.A. — steps away
• Colonel William C. Young — steps away
• Tonkawa Scouts, C.S.A. — steps away
• Major Robert Simpson Neighbors — 0.4 mi