Born a slave in Mississippi, Bose Ikard became one of the most famous black frontiersmen and traildrivers in Texas. The Civil War left Ikard a free man in Parker County, Texas, and in 1866 he went to work for Oliver Loving as a drover. After Loving was killed by Comanches in New Mexico Territory, Ikard continued in the service of Loving’s partner, Charles Goodnight, for four years. The two men became lifelong friends. Goodnight later commented that he trusted Bose Ikard “farther than any living man. He was my detective, banker, and everything else in Colorado, New Mexico, and the other wild country I was in.” In 1869 Goodnight dissuaded Ikard from settling in Colorado as there were so few blacks there. He settled in Weatherford, Texas, and in 1869 participated in a running battle with Quanah Parker’s Comanche band. In his later years he attended several cowboy reunions. Goodnight visited him in Weatherford whenever the opportunity arose and helped him financially. After Ikard died in Austin Goodnight bought a granite marker and wrote an epitaph for his old friend:
“Bose Ikard served with me four years on the Goodnight-Loving Trail, never shirked a duty or disobeyed an order, rode with me in many stampedes, participated in three engagements with Comanches, splendid behavior.”
Author Larry McMurtry used Bose Ikard as the inspiration for the character Josh Deets in his Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, Lonesome Dove, even paraphrasing Goodnight’s epitaph for Ikard in the novel.
