Rev. Hiram Atwill Graves was a minister and editor of the Christian magazine "Watchman and Reflector", who in 1881 authored the biography "Andrew Jackson Potter, the Fighting Parson of the Texan Frontier."
Reverend Andrew Jackson Potter (1830 - 1895) the "Fighting Parson" was orphaned at the age 10 , being left to support himself. He became a jockey, gambler, fighter, and ruffian---later fighting in the Mexican-American War and then becoming a Texas Ranger.
At a camp meeting in 1856, Potter was converted to a life as a Christian and would become a licensed reverend. When the Civil War came along Potter joined the Confederate Army as a chaplain. After the South lost the Civil War, Potter joined the West Texas Conference of the Methodist Church and was assigned as a circuit minister. He organized frontier churches and while at the same time serving as an advisor, negotiator, and even fighter of hostile Indians. It is said that during his 30 years of frontier preaching he found it necessary to preach with a Bible in one hand and a pistol in the other. He held services in saloons or any available meeting hall, often turning fighting scenes into Gospel meetings.
In the copious title-page the reader is told what he is to expect in this unique volume: "Six Years of Indian Warfare in New Mexico and Arizona. Many Wonderful Events in his Ministerial Life on the Frontier Border of Western Texas, during a Long Term of Evangelical Toils and Personal Combats with Savage Indians and Daring Desperadoes, including many Hair-breadth Escapes." He was generally known as the Indian Fighting Parson. The likeness of the hero of the story constitutes the frontispiece—it is expressive of great force of character. The author and his hero tell the story in their own piquant manner. The history of our times required the book to be written, and we venture to say few will yawn over its pages. It reads like a racy adventure story—but there can be no doubt in regard to the truthfulness of the narrative.
In describing one run-in near the border, Potter writes:
"That night I did not stake my mule, but turned it loose with the other stock, with a drag-rope. Next morning my mule was missing. I was satisfied that the Mexicans had stolen him. I borrowed a horse and rode over into the town to inquire about my mule. After getting into the town, I looked back across the river and saw several Mexicans on foot, trying to rope my mule, which was coming out of a mountain-gorge above the town. It was trying to come to camp, but the four Mexicans were striving to head it off. The mule would dodge their ropes and run around them. I spurred my horse, running through gardens and fields which were not fenced, and plunged into the river. I soon dashed in among them with a ‘pepper-box revolver. The Mexicans drew their butcher-knives, or “billdookies, as they called them. . . ."
We shall call it a Special Providence that safely guided the orphan boy through all the perilous vicissitudes narrated in the following pages— A man is to be qualified to plant Christianity all along the frontier-borders of Western Texas, where savage heathenism and quasi civilization meet and interlap. The mild and loving preacher is not needed here, among a non-reading, bookless population, but shrewd and recklessly brave. A man of themselves is wanted, gifted of nature and polished by grace, one skilled in all the tricks and arts of sin in frontier-life, and in all the modes of border warfare---brave, generous, wise, pure, social, hospitable, zealous, and defiant in the face of the almost-impossible. “The All-seeing Eye” saw the rudiments of that essential character in this orphan child. Born on her early frontier, having inherited all the taste and genius for frontier-life, he continued in that school till his lesson was fully learned; and, after his regeneration, religion supplied all needed virtues for a grace-refined minister.
Reverend Andrew Jackson Potter (1830 - 1895) the "Fighting Parson" was orphaned at the age 10 , being left to support himself. He became a jockey, gambler, fighter, and ruffian---later fighting in the Mexican-American War and then becoming a Texas Ranger.
At a camp meeting in 1856, Potter was converted to a life as a Christian and would become a licensed reverend. When the Civil War came along Potter joined the Confederate Army as a chaplain. After the South lost the Civil War, Potter joined the West Texas Conference of the Methodist Church and was assigned as a circuit minister. He organized frontier churches and while at the same time serving as an advisor, negotiator, and even fighter of hostile Indians. It is said that during his 30 years of frontier preaching he found it necessary to preach with a Bible in one hand and a pistol in the other. He held services in saloons or any available meeting hall, often turning fighting scenes into Gospel meetings.
In the copious title-page the reader is told what he is to expect in this unique volume: "Six Years of Indian Warfare in New Mexico and Arizona. Many Wonderful Events in his Ministerial Life on the Frontier Border of Western Texas, during a Long Term of Evangelical Toils and Personal Combats with Savage Indians and Daring Desperadoes, including many Hair-breadth Escapes." He was generally known as the Indian Fighting Parson. The likeness of the hero of the story constitutes the frontispiece—it is expressive of great force of character. The author and his hero tell the story in their own piquant manner. The history of our times required the book to be written, and we venture to say few will yawn over its pages. It reads like a racy adventure story—but there can be no doubt in regard to the truthfulness of the narrative.
In describing one run-in near the border, Potter writes:
"That night I did not stake my mule, but turned it loose with the other stock, with a drag-rope. Next morning my mule was missing. I was satisfied that the Mexicans had stolen him. I borrowed a horse and rode over into the town to inquire about my mule. After getting into the town, I looked back across the river and saw several Mexicans on foot, trying to rope my mule, which was coming out of a mountain-gorge above the town. It was trying to come to camp, but the four Mexicans were striving to head it off. The mule would dodge their ropes and run around them. I spurred my horse, running through gardens and fields which were not fenced, and plunged into the river. I soon dashed in among them with a ‘pepper-box revolver. The Mexicans drew their butcher-knives, or “billdookies, as they called them. . . ."
We shall call it a Special Providence that safely guided the orphan boy through all the perilous vicissitudes narrated in the following pages— A man is to be qualified to plant Christianity all along the frontier-borders of Western Texas, where savage heathenism and quasi civilization meet and interlap. The mild and loving preacher is not needed here, among a non-reading, bookless population, but shrewd and recklessly brave. A man of themselves is wanted, gifted of nature and polished by grace, one skilled in all the tricks and arts of sin in frontier-life, and in all the modes of border warfare---brave, generous, wise, pure, social, hospitable, zealous, and defiant in the face of the almost-impossible. “The All-seeing Eye” saw the rudiments of that essential character in this orphan child. Born on her early frontier, having inherited all the taste and genius for frontier-life, he continued in that school till his lesson was fully learned; and, after his regeneration, religion supplied all needed virtues for a grace-refined minister.
