Herman Lehmann For Western Wednesday...!

Herman was one of those children that was kidnapped by the Indians, but didn't want to leave and go back home.

He had become so much a part of his adopted tribe, he was made a warrior and minor chief. Wanting to stay with their captors was not all that uncommon. Many refused to leave, or ran away when returned to their true families. Here is Herman's story from Listverse.

Herman Lehmann

Photo credit: Alchetron

Herman Lehmann didn’t see himself as a white boy living among the Apaches. To him, he was an Apache warrior through and through. He was kidnapped at age ten, and it changed him so much that when he was found eight years later, he couldn’t even remember his own name.

By then, Lehman was a respected warrior in his tribe who called himself “En Da.” He’d been made a petty chief for his ability to fight, and he’d joined the Apaches in raids and battles, even leading a charge right into a fort full of Texas Rangers.

All that changed, though, when a medicine man killed his adoptive father, an Apache warrior named Carnoviste. Lehman took his revenge and killed the medicine man. He then had to flee into the wilderness. For a year, he lived alone, hiding from the Apaches and the white men alike, until he finally settled down in a Native American reservation.

When his mother heard there was a white-skinned, blue-eyed boy on the reservation, she came out, praying it was her son. At first, she didn’t recognize him, and Herman was less than friendly. “I was an Indian,” he explained, “and I did not like them because they were palefaces.” But Herman’s sister spotted an old scar only he could have and, overcome with joy, cried out, “It’s Herman!”

The sound of the name puzzled him. Somehow, Herman thought he’d heard it before. It took a long moment, Herman would later recall, before he realized that he was hearing his own name.

No one knows for sure what made the captors stay when given the choice...but it was their choice and should have been allowed.Just my opinion, of course.

Coffee out on the patio this morning, but you better bring a sweater!