Loyal Valley - Texas Ghost Town

LOYAL VALLEY

NAME: Loyal Valley
COUNTY: Mason
ROADS: 2WD
GRID: 3
CLIMATE: Warm winter, hot summer
BEST TIME TO VISIT:Winter, spring, fall

COMMENTS: Near Mason.
REMAINS: A few buildings.

German immigrant farmers were the first to occupy Loyal Valley in the late 1850s. The town was first called Cold Creek, a name taken from a creek that flowed through the area. Loyal Valley was a stage stop on the road from San Antonio westward to El Paso. A two story stone building that was the stagecoach inn still stands at the center of the former town. Not well known to present day generations is the incident of 1870 when an Apache raiding party captured an eleven year old boy named Herman Lehmann. The boy was born near Loyal Valley in 1859 and lived in the town with his family when the raid occurred. He lived with the Apaches for four years then killed an Apache medicine man. The young German spent a year alone living on the plains. He then joined a Comanche tribe and spent four more years with them becoming a warrior and participating in Indian raids against white settlements. Belonging to one of the last Comanche bands to surrender to the U.S. Army at Fort Sill in 1879, he was identified as a white captive and, against his will, was returned to his family at Loyal Valley. His mother had remarried and was operating the stagecoach inn at the time of his return. He never fully adjusted to life in the German community although he did marry and raised a family in Loyal Valley. He died in the town in 1932 and is buried in the Loyal Valley cemetery which is just off U.S. Highway 87 on Loop 2242 about 18 miles southeast of Mason. SUBMITTED BY: Henry Chenoweth	Store at Loyal Valley in the late 1860's Courtesy Sophienburg Museum, New Braunfels, Texas

German immigrant farmers were the first to occupy Loyal Valley in the late 1850s. The town was first called Cold Creek, a name taken from a creek that flowed through the area. Loyal Valley was a stage stop on the road from San Antonio westward to El Paso. A two story stone building that was the stagecoach inn still stands at the center of the former town. Not well known to present day generations is the incident of 1870 when an Apache raiding party captured an eleven year old boy named Herman Lehmann. The boy was born near Loyal Valley in 1859 and lived in the town with his family when the raid occurred. He lived with the Apaches for four years then killed an Apache medicine man. The young German spent a year alone living on the plains. He then joined a Comanche tribe and spent four more years with them becoming a warrior and participating in Indian raids against white settlements. Belonging to one of the last Comanche bands to surrender to the U.S. Army at Fort Sill in 1879, he was identified as a white captive and, against his will, was returned to his family at Loyal Valley. His mother had remarried and was operating the stagecoach inn at the time of his return. He never fully adjusted to life in the German community although he did marry and raised a family in Loyal Valley. He died in the town in 1932 and is buried in the Loyal Valley cemetery which is just off U.S. Highway 87 on Loop 2242 about 18 miles southeast of Mason. SUBMITTED BY: Henry Chenoweth

Store at Loyal Valley in the late 1860's
Courtesy Sophienburg Museum, New Braunfels, Texas

BACK