The Forts Trail: Fort Griffin to Fort Concho
About 160 miles from Fort Griffin through Albany past Fort Phantom Hill to Abilene and Buffalo Gap, then southwest on US-277 by Fort Chadbourne to Fort Concho in San Angelo.
The Route at a Glance
In the 1850s and again after the Civil War the Army strung posts across country the Comanche, Kiowa and other nations held, and the Comanche Nation tells that history in its own words. The Texas Forts Trail, one of the state's heritage trail regions, links the posts in a 650-mile loop through 29 counties. This drive takes a north-to-south piece of it, about 160 miles and four and a half hours without stops. Abilene & the Forts Trail and San Angelo & the Concho Valley cover the country.
Fort Griffin stands above the Clear Fork of the Brazos beside US-283, which roughly traces the Western Trail. Herds bound for Kansas passed the fort after 1875, and on the flat below it a town served buffalo hunters and drovers until the fort closed in 1881 and the railroad went to Albany instead. Albany, fifteen miles south, sold its first lots in 1875 and soon became a supply point on the trail. Its 1878 stone jail is now the Old Jail Art Center, and the town puts on the Fort Griffin Fandangle.
West on US-180 and south on FM 600, the road reaches the chimneys of Fort Phantom Hill. Here it meets the line of the Butterfield Overland Mail, which ran from 1858 to 1861 from Fort Belknap by the Clear Fork and Smith's stations to Phantom Hill, then south past the site of Tye and Mountain Pass and across Valley Creek to Fort Chadbourne, some 58 miles. In Abilene, Frontier Texas! is the trail's visitor center. FM 89 runs south into the Callahan Divide to Buffalo Gap, the first Taylor County seat, where two old roads met, and Abilene State Park is just beyond.
FM 89 and US-277 lead southwest to Fort Chadbourne, founded in 1852, which guarded a Butterfield station from 1858 and now stands on a working ranch eleven miles northeast of Bronte. Bronte, named for Charlotte Brontë, moved a mile to meet the Kansas City, Mexico and Orient line after it was built through in 1907. Short of water, Fort Chadbourne was replaced in 1867 by a post where the North and Middle Concho rivers meet, and the drive ends there at Fort Concho, headquarters of the Tenth Cavalry from 1875 to 1882, on the edge of downtown San Angelo.
The Drive, Stop by Stop
8 stops along the route, in driving order from Fort Griffin, near Albany, Texas to Fort Concho, San Angelo, Texas.
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That's the drive. Take your time, pull over often, and let The Forts Trail: Fort Griffin to Fort Concho do what it does best.
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