The Apache: War to the Knife

The Apache waged unceasing warfare against white invaders of their homeland longer and with greater success than any other Indian People- for more than three centuries.

That’s a quote from author and historian John Upton Terrell who wrote that in his Apache Chronicle.

One of those Apaches that fought for three hundred years, was named Mangas Coloradas. Mangas Coloradas, or Red Sleeves, in English, was described by historian Dan L Thrapp as a quote, giant stalking the desert mountains, who made his own legends and whose fame and the terror of whose name reverberated from Durango in the south to the Navajo country in the north, from the Davis Mountains of West Texas to the Santa Ritas below Tucson. End quote.

Although he fought for most of his life against Spanish and Mexican invaders, it wasn’t until he was 70 years old that he finally fought back against the encroaching Americans in the year 1861. And then, he only fought them for two years. We haven’t talked about the Americans yet in this series over the Apache but in this episode, they finally enter the arena of Apacheria.

At the end of those two years of fighting though, Mangas Coloradas would be betrayed and murdered by the American Army. And his murder would forever tarnish relations between the Apache and the Americans. His murder and subsequent mutilation would lead to decades of battles, raids, and deaths at the hands of the angry and vengeful Apaches.

Before his warring with the Americans though, Mangas Coloradas was very adept at hating and fighting the Mexicans.

Mangas hated the Mexicans with a true passion. He especially hated the Sonorans. The people of the Mexican state of Sonora. During Mangas’ life, genocide and scalping were the official state policy of Sonora. And the Apaches attempted to return the favor. Except the Apaches never wanted to truly kill all the Mexicans. Because, as Mangas Coloradas put it to one American military official, quote, if we kill all the Mexicans, who will raise cattle and horses for us? End quote.

At the same time though, the neighboring state of Chihuahua offered the Apaches peace and protection. But that did not matter to the men and warriors of Sonora who would occasionally sneak into Chihuahua in the dead of night and slaughter any Apache, man, woman, or child, they came across.

Mangas didn’t trust the people of Chihuahua, and the state had a bounty on his scalp, but he steered clear of the officials. His beef was with the people of Sonora and for the last 30 years of his life, from the 1830s to the 1860s, he dedicated his time to punishing that Mexican state.

Mangas Coloradas was more than a warrior though, he was also a chief and a respected and revered one at that. He had power. He had what it took to lead warrior men.

In Edwin Sweeney’s Mangas Coloradas, Chief of the Chiricahua Apaches, Sweeney writes this of Mangas, quote:

Robert M. Utley, distinguished historian and author of The Lance and the Shield: The Life and Times of Sitting Bull, insists that every Lakota man of stature consistently exhibited four cardinal virtues: bravery, fortitude, generosity, and wisdom. And his exemplar is Sitting Bull himself. It is Utley's opinion that these traits are more conspicuous in Sitting Bull than in any other Lakota leader. He will get little argument here. Certainly, when it came to wisdom, we are all agreed, the famous chief of the Hunkpapas had no peer.

Now Mangas Coloradas, perhaps better than any other nineteenth-century Chiricahua chief, can be compared to the celebrated Sitting Bull. Both could inspire followers outside their immediate bands to fight their despised enemies-in Mangas's case, the Sonorans, and in Sitting Bull's case, the Americans. Both were served by devoted younger warrior chiefs who occasionally overshadowed their elders' exploits: in Sitting Bull's case, Crazy Horse; in Mangas Coloradas's case, Cochise. Both were propelled by a vision for their people. Both much desired to live in peace, yet both were rudely forced into conflict, and both were treacherously murdered by Americans or by agents of the Americans. End quote.

Most of his battles were against the Mexicans who left behind little written record so historians are not quite sure how the brave warrior chief Mangas Coloradas fought against his enemies. During one battle though, in 1849, he did indeed ride in front of his warriors during a skirmish with Americans in Sonora. Mangas also led attacks at the presidios of Janos and Fronteras in 1856 and 1858. And then in 1862, while in his 70s, he was shot by American Private John Teal and the old warrior survived.

He was a giant of a man. After his death, he was measured at six feet four inches but in his prime, it’s estimated that he could have been six feet seven inches tall. A true Indian warrior. A towering Indian warrior. Much taller than the average Apache. Much taller than the average American. The American doctor that noted his size actually wrote up a fantastic description of the warrior:
 He was a man of the finest physical proportions and qualities ... as straight as the reed from which his arrows were made. His head and face were formed after the finest and most marked models of his race. The forehead projected sharply and prominently over the eyes. It was unusually high and wide for an Indian. The head was remarkable for width from ear to ear. The cheek bones were large and prominent, and lower jaw massive... His black eyes were very large, and, under the influence of anger, sparkled and flashed like black diamonds....

His neck was strong and firm, not gross, giving graceful attachment to a magnificent pair of shoulders and a body measuring forty-three inches in circumference, and clothed with muscles that would have crazed a young and enthusiastic student of anatomy. His limbs were faultless, perfect in proportions and symmetry. End quote.

It’s a shame he was betrayed and brutally murdered, dismembered, and mutilated…

This episode will neatly cover the time period of Mangas Coloradas’ life. It’ll begin at the end of the 1700s where we last left off, and the episode will end at the onset of the most violent era in American History, the 1860s, the time of the useless war between the states. The Civil War. A war which devastated the east, while sending destructive ripples throughout the American Southwest.

Mangas Coloradas was a leader of his band of Chiricahua Apaches for over 40 years. This band was the Chihennes, or red paint people, although he was probably born a Bedonkohe Apache. During his lifetime, the Bedonkohe would actually look to Mangas as a leader. The Chihenne Apache were the easternmost Chiricahua band and they were the most numerous. They had the highest population, although that population most likely never toped 3,000 members.

During his reign over his band of Apaches, Mangas liked to have his people camp out near modern day Silver City in a place known as Santa Lucia Springs or today, Mangas Springs. It’s a few miles south of the Gila River at the base of the Burro Mountains which themselves are south of the Mogollon Mountains near a small town called Pinos Altos. It’s a beautiful area I visited not too long ago. Geronimo is said to be born just north of this region. And Paul Andrew Hutton in his Apache Wars, he sums up the area I love very nicely when he wrote, quote:

He grew to manhood amid the grandeur of the Mogollon Mountains, where great stands of Douglas fir, Ponderosa pine, and aspen sheltered wolves, bears, panthers, and great herds of elk and deer that fed the people. These high and rugged mountains, cut by innumerable canyons, afforded relief from the searing summer heat of the piñon and juniper woodlands below. It was a natural Eden, replete with game as well as a wide variety of edible nuts and berries. The mescal, or agave, plant, a staple for all the Chiricahuas, grew abundantly in the foothills above the desert to the east. End quote. I’ll put pictures of the beautiful region up on the page for this episode.

Mangas Coloradas led a group of the Chihennes known as the Mimbres group which probably means he came from the beautiful and full of Ancient Ones ruins Mimbres Valley. That’s where the amazing revolution in Anasazi art on ceramics came from.

Mangas was probably born around 1790, maybe 1791 maybe 1793. He was born towards the end of the previous episode, during a time of relative peace with their enemies, the Spanish. He was born in that same beautiful area north of Silver City, New Mexico known as Santa Lucia Springs, which the Apache, in their language, called Canyon Spreads Out. I will not be saying the Apache name. But by 1814, Mangas was already a group leader. And then by 1820, a Bedonkohe leader. And by 1840, a Chiricahua tribal leader of the Cedonkohes, Chokonens, and Chihennes. He would eventually broker a strong alliance between his band, the Bedonkohes, and the Chokonens. With the Chokonens, he married off one of his daughters to their up and coming chief, a man named Cochise.

But long before that, during the time that Mangas was born, in the late 18th century, the Apaches and the Spanish were celebrating an unprecedented halt in the widespread violence that had been the norm for over 200 years.

Mangas Coloradas’ ancestors, which may have even included his father, had only a few years before Mangas’ birth, participated in an unprecedented raid on Janos.

In 1778, Hugo O’Conor, a man I mentioned a few times in the previous episode, but Hugo O’conor, whom the Apache had nicknamed Captain Red on account of his Irish Red hair, Hugo O’Conor attacked the Chihenne in their own territory at the base of the Mogollon Mountains.

In retaliation, Mangas Coloradas’ immediate ancestors staged a retaliatory raid near Janos and killed fourteen Spaniards.

The 1770s had been a wild time of violence between the Apache and the Spanish, especially in the territory of Nueva Vizcaya, modern day Chihuahua. From 1771 to 1776, the Apache killed 1,674 Spaniards, captured 154 of the people, stolen over 68,000 heads of cattle, and forced the abandonment of over one hundred ranches and mines throughout the region.

That’s when the Spanish began their policy of giving the peaceful Apaches rations and having them settle nearby the presidios while they violently and relentlessly pursued the war Apaches who would not settle. I discussed this at length in the last episode. Well, it was during this time of relative peace that Mangas Coloradas was born.

Peace in the Spanish Northwest between the Spaniards and the Apaches was well and good but this funding of rations was expensive. And it was expensive at a time that the Spanish back at home, on the continent, they really needed these funds. It was around this time that the Little Corporal from across the French border had begun to make trouble in Europe. Or maybe Europe made trouble for him. Regardless, the continent was to be liberated from her monarchs and Spain was next on the chopping block.

So, back in the northern territories of New Spain, the leaders of the presidios and towns that had suggested, rather forcefully, that the Apache settle around the Presidio, they had to suggest now that the Apaches actually, go back please to your mountain strongholds but DO NOT RAID! They said, we’ll still give you rations but you can’t live here. They of course didn’t say it was because they couldn’t afford it… At the time the reversal of policy was established, it’s estimated that 2/3rds of the Chiricahua Apaches lived at the various presidio forts. But by 1810, only a third of those 2/3rds remained.

It seemed, Mangas Coloradas’ family never did head towards the presidios but instead chose to stay in the wilderness of the Mogollon Mountains.

The removal of the Apaches back to their mountain strongholds didn’t spell disaster for the peace though, and actually, this peace lasted for quite some time. Some researchers say it lasted until 1831 when the Mexicans officially ended the rations. Others say the peace lasted until 1821, when Mexico officially won its independence, others say it began to unravel in 1810 when the Mexican Revolution began. Either way, it was an unprecedented cessation of hostilities between these mortal enemies of Spanish and Apache.

Frank C Lockwood in his The Apache Indians writes of the peace, quote:

From 1790 to 1810, there was a nearer approximation to peace than at any previous time. It is true that recalcitrant bands, operating independently, continued to make raids now and then and that the soldiers had to be forever on the alert to meet these attacks and to pursue and chastise the troublemakers; but, as compared with earlier conditions and with those that were, unhappily, to follow, there was a state of peace between the red man and the white. End quote.

In the end, The presidios proved to be very expensive and the Apaches, when they desired a raid, would simply bypass the forts anyways which made them nothing more than according to author Karl Jacoby in his Shadows at Dawn, this bypassing made the presides nothing more than a scattering of disconnected outposts.

On top of the expense of handing out food, clothing, tobacco, and liquor, manning and arming the forts was just as expensive as the rations. Soldiers had to be there constantly to watch over the Indians to make sure they weren’t attacked by non peaceful Indians… the soldiers also had to make sure the Peaceful Apaches didn’t run away.

Not to mention the locals of Tubac and Tucson and Janos, the people of these presidios, they didn’t enjoy having a bunch of drunk Indians hanging around their towns. And they didn’t like that they had to pay taxes to continue to support the lives of the Indians who weren’t working or, as they saw it, weren’t contributing to Christian society. Cause remember, the Apaches never really took to Catholicism. Not even during this establecimientos de paz era. Later they’d adopt many a Christian religion as Daklugie states in Indeh, An Apache Odyssey. But that was later.

Beyond the cost of the presidios and rations though, Spain had other worries. And they came one after another in the early 19th century like the rapid firing of arrows from an Apache bow.

Take for instance, the sudden and complete sale of all of French Louisiana to the United States in 1804… No longer were the French and their sparse numbers wandering the land above New Spain, but instead, the hungry and eager Americans were just itching to consume more territory.

And then even worse, in 1808 Napoleon invaded the Iberian Peninsula. Shortly afterwards, the Spanish King, Charles the IV, was deposed. That meant, back in New Spain, the viceroy, was no longer legitimate… the government of New Spain, was no longer legitimate. the American born Mexicans in Mexico City, they began to salivate at the thought of Independence. After all, only 30 years before, the Americans to the north had won their independence! And then France killed their monarchs. Haiti overthrew their colonial government… the virus of revolution was spreading.

Then, on September 16th of 1810, Don Miguel Gregorio Antonio Ignacio Hidalgo y Costilla Gallaga Mandarte y Villaseñor or just Miguel Hidalgo, set New Spain on fire when he began the war for Mexican Independence.

This budding movement to the south of the presidios in Apacheria, the Mexican Revolution, it forced the Spanish to move men and money away from the Apache policy that had been working and towards a counterrevolutionary policy that would ultimately fail.

This meant, the Apaches were no longer receiving as much rations. It would only be a matter of time before the landscape would again erupt in Apache raids.

It didn’t help that to the north, The Navajos began again to send innumerable raids into New Mexico and her cities. The Utes also began to war again. The Comanche too set fire to the prairies.

Author John Upton Terrell actually has a really great quote about the state of affairs in the American Southwest and soon to be Mexican Northwest at this time. He wrote in Apache Chronicles, quote:

1811

This was the picture:

East of the Rio Grande, in the mountains of southeastern New Mexico, were the Faraon, survivors of Comanche onslaughts on the Great Plains. They raided Spanish settlements to the north and to the south in Nueva Vizcaya, often uniting with their close relatives, the Mescalero.

The Mescalero inhabited the region between the Pecos River in Texas and the Rio Grande in New Mexico. Barred by the Comanche from traveling northward to hunt, they preyed on the herds of livestock in Coahuila and Nueva Vizcaya.

Directly east of the Mescalero were the Llanero, the Lipiyane, and the Natagee, constituting a single tribe. On their north was the Comanche barrier, and they concentrated their attacks on the Spanish towns and ranchos of Coahuila, frequently uniting on raids with the Mescalero and the Faraon.

The Lipan dwelt southeast of the Llanero. They attacked the Spanish in lower Texas, but often joined the Mescalero and Llanero on raids into Coahuila.

In southwestern New Mexico were the Mimbreno. Bands of them joined the Faraon in raiding New Mexican settlements and the Gileno and Chiricahua on forays into Mexico. The Gila Apache lived along the river from which they received their name, in southeastern Arizona. They ranged on their raids as far north as the Zuñi and Hopi Countries and far south into Nueva Vizcaya and Sonora.

South of the Gileno was the homeland of the Chiricahua, in the rugged mountains of southeastern Arizona. They attacked ranchos, mines, and towns in southern Arizona and in the northern Mexican provinces. In raiding they joined the Mimbreno and Gileno, and these united bands were feared more by the Spanish than any other Apache.

They not only struck in well-organized and superbly directed attacks, but wreaked more devastation, killed more people, stole more live-stock, and destroyed more property than any other raiders.

In the Pinal Mountains and the Tonto Basin were the Tonto (Coyotero), and because of their isolation they seldom had been the targets of Spanish campaigns. However, they frequently emerged from their remote range to join the Chiricahua on raids into Mexico. End quote.

Clearly, the revolution’s violence had spread and the violence was consuming the nation’s children. As revolutions so often do.

During this violent and uncertain time, one thing and pretty much one thing only saved the non Indian residences of New Mexico. That was the inability of the Apache, Navajo, Ute, and Comanche to come together. If they had come together to expel the Spanish and Religious, as John Upton Terrell suggests, 1680 would have happened all over again. But the Indians didn’t align together and the few civilian militias and Puebloan mercenaries that ceaselessly fought off the Apache, Comanche, and Navajos, kept New Mexico in the hands of New Mexicans.

And this wasn’t an easy task. Once the revolution began, the men assigned to the presidios were either called south or they abandoned them. The ones that stayed had few firearms. Mostly bows and arrows. But New Mexico held out.

So it was in this atmosphere that Mangas Coloradas grew up. He saw the peace fall apart. He saw the uncertainty and revolutionary civil war. And then by 1814, Mangas was the leader of his Apache group.

In 1821, Mexico won its independence from Spain. The last Spanish governor of the territory of New Mexico exclaimed in a speech, quote, New Mexicans, this is the occasion for showing the heroic patriotism that inflames you… with our last drop of blood we will sustain the sacred independence of the Mexican empire! End quote.

New Mexico though, would not stay part of the Mexican empire for long. The Americans to the east had already begun Manifest Destiny.

In 1823, the new Mexican officials in the capitol of Mexico City, split up Nueva Vizcaya into the states we’re used to seeing today: Chihuahua and Durango. They also repealed Spanish laws that made it impossible for foreigners to settle the territory. Predictably, overnight, Anglos showed up to settle what they knew would be theirs soon anyways. Not just Anglo Americans though, curiously, Sweeney mentions that Shawnees and Delawares also showed up to stake a claim in the wild and woolly west.

I would mention here, for no particular reason, it’s never a good idea to open your borders up to foreigners who have desires to one day claim your land as their own…

In an 1801 Textbook for American youths back east titled A Short but Comprehensive System of the Geography of the World by Nathaniel Dwight, in that textbook, Dwight stated of the vast western world that was alien to the schoolchildren, quote, New Mexico and California were valuable… there is a good pearl fishery on the coast; gold mines are found in the interior country, and large plains of salt lying in a solid mass.

He goes on to write, that the quote, Spanish settlements are weak, and the people are jealous and suspicious. They do not care to publish the natural advantages of their country, lest other nations should be induced to visit it. End quote.

Mere moments later, Americans would in fact be induced to visit the Spanish that resided on the future American’s land.

The Americans that trickled into Apacheria in the early 1800s were described by a British Army Lieutenant, Travel Writer, and Western Explorer named George Ruxton in his posthumous 1848 book Adventures in Mexico and the Rocky Mountains. He was the first person to write extensively about the American Mountain Men he encountered on his extensive travels through the area we all love so very much. I admit I did not know who this man was until researching for this series but now I’m interested in him. He died from… dysentery in Saint Louis after a bad fall in the Rocky Mountains at age 27. But he wrote of those first Americans who were teasing the borders of New Spain and Mexico, quote:

It is a general impression amongst the lower classes in Mexico that the Americans are half savages, and perfectly uncivilized. The specimens they see in Northern Mexico are certainly not remarkably polished in manners or appearances, being generally rough backwoodsmen. End quote.

These Americans first began to appear in Santa Fe in 1804 as traders and fur trappers. These were the mountain men, the beaver trappers, the beard growers, the hunters, and Indian women marriers.

Only a few years later though, in 1807, a man who will get his own series right after this Apache one wraps up, Zebulon Pike, he gets himself and his crew arrested in 1807.

The man with the awesome name, Zebulon Montgomery Pike, he was a spy for the United States of America and he was sent out west by Thomas Jefferson to see what was going on beyond the new Louisiana Territory the nation had just purchased. This was actually his second mission and on this one, he was to check out the Spanish in what would eventually be the American Southwest. Pike’s peak in Colorado is named after Zebulon Montgomery Pike. But he and his small group of American soldier escorts were arrested in New Mexico near Santa Fe and they were all sent to Chihuahua under military guard by New Mexican Governor Joaquin del Real Alencaster.

I will talk all about that and he and his two expeditions at length in his own series but he’s mentioned now because on his way south to Chihuahua, Zebulon Montgomery Pike became the first American to write about the Apaches. He probably was not the first American to see or interact with them, but he was the first to write about the Apaches. And this is what he wrote, quote:

Around this fort were a great number of Apaches, who were on a treaty with the Spaniards. These people appear to be perfectly independent in their manners and were the only savages I saw in the Spanish dominions whose spirit was not humbled, whose necks were not bowed to the yoke of their invaders. End quote.

During this time that Pike saw the Apaches, remember, it was 1807, during the time of peace. But that was about to collapse.

After Pike, more Americans slowly trickled into the area, especially after the Revolution began and the place was thrown into turmoil. The Americans, like the Apaches, certainly took advantage of the opportunity that chaos allowed.

The group of Americans that came to Apacheria and first interacted with the Apache as mentioned were the fur trappers, the Mountain Men. They were technically, illegal immigrants… But there were also merchants, smugglers, traders. They were in modern day Arizona and New Mexico to make a buck and they had no problems trading with the Apaches. Obviously they avoided the Mexican authorities. Much to the Mexican Authorities frustrations.

Karl Jacoby in his excellent Shadows at Dawn wrote of the Americans quote,

As early as the 1820s, American traders had begun to enter illegally into northern Mexico, offering arms, ammunition, and alcohol to the Apache in exchange for livestock and other goods stolen from Mexican Pueblos. Los Americanos precipitated, in the eyes of Sonorans, a rise in the frequency and lethality of Apache attacks. End quote.

By the 1820s, the Apaches had once again resumed their intense raids on a population in northern Mexico that had not yet formed a cohesive identity. Specifically, the fighting resumed in earnest around 1824. After the revolution and independence, with the Spanish gone and the Mexicans in disarray, the Apaches raided far south beyond the Santa Cruz River and deep into Chihuahua and Sonora once again.

The Santa Cruz river, by the way, essentially goes from the Phoenix basin to Tucson. Modern day I-10 mirrors this river if you wanna think of it that way.

With the Spanish gone, and the Mexicans busy with constant power struggles and civil wars, strong or wealthy men rose up in the northern settlements to become caudillos. Essentially, war lords. These men would be the ones in northern Mexico to fight the Apaches now. Fight, or make localized deals with the Apaches.

But these men weren’t always aligned or cooperative with one another and often times they too were rivals. So essentially this boiled down to separate communities and towns having separate peace agreements between themselves and the Apaches. So, technically, not much had changed since the Spanish era.

Jacoby mentions some sources that called these arrangements quote, partial treaties of peace, end quote. These were defined by being between Mexican communities and Apache bands. So highly localized and specific to each community. But most of them involved the Apaches mansos, or tame apaches not attacking the specified Mexican town in exchange for rations and goods. What little they could give. And often times… the Mexican promises were hollow.

Many of the treaties though, were very temporary. Some of them lasting only six months or so. Just long enough for each side to breathe between attacks. Breathe… and trade.

Jacoby has a great paragraph about this dynamic of trading, which often included trading goods from other looted Mexican settlements. Quote:

Such partial peace agreements did not so much reduce violence as displace it. Having made peace with an Apache band, it was not uncommon for a Mexican village to undertake a thriving trade with their new associates in goods seized from other settlements. "[What was stolen from one Mexican found ready sale to another," noted an observer, "the plunder from Sonora finding its way into the hands of the settlers of Chihuahua, or ... selling without trouble to the Mexicans living along the Rio Grande.” End all quotes.

So these agreements didn’t end the violence but rather it just moved it elsewhere temporarily.

And this new violence was a bit more terrifying than previous bouts of warring exchanges. This time, a large problem for the Mexicans in Sonora and Chihuahua, the Norteños, a new problem they were witnessing was that the Apaches were using far better and much newer firearms than they had received from the French. Often, they were much better and newer than the firearms the Mexicans were using. And the Apaches, they were even better shots than the Mexicans.

But the Mexicans, they knew who were supplying the Apaches with these newer and better rifles.

A Mexican priest of the time even commented that Apaches were clearly using American rifles and that they’d quote definitely been seen among the Apaches. End quote. They being Anglo Americans. American men had been seen amongst the raiding parties of the Apaches.

American boot prints were even seen alongside Apache moccasin ones in the dust and desert sand leading back to America after Apache raids on Mexican towns. And again, these raids were increasing in the early 1800s, after the Revolution.

When it came to fighting the Apaches, according to John Upton Terrell, quote, the Mexicans had to begin all over again, almost exactly where the Spanish had begun, but under far more difficult circumstances. End quote.

The Apache would almost never engage in open battles although when they did, they proved themselves as adept at fighting in formation as the Mexicans. Zebulon Pike even mentions that the thinking at that time was that the Spanish, cause the revolution hadn’t happened yet when he recorded his travels, but the Spanish would not conquer the Apache.

Frank C Lockwood in his The Apache Indians writes of what Pike saw, quote:

Captain Zebulon Pike reports the conversation of a brave New Mexican officer, Malgares, who escorted him from Santa Fe to Chihuahua. He had had many encounters with the Apaches and was well able to discuss their methods of warfare. On one occasion when he was on a march with a hundred and forty men, he was attacked by a band of Apaches, both horse and foot, and a battle of four hours ensued. Whenever the dragoons would make a general charge, the Apache cavalry would retire behind the infantry, while the infantry would send a shower of arrows against the Spaniards, and then retreat. Malgares declared that quote, it was not to be thought of that the Spanish cavalry could break the Apache infantry. End all quotes.

The Mexicans it seems, also could not break the Apache infantry.

A quick aside but we have the term guerrilla warfare on account of the way the Spaniards fought against the Napoleonic troops in Spain. The Spaniards on the Iberian peninsula had essentially, fought in the same manner that the Indians fought them in the new world… They fought Napoleon the same way the Apache fought the Norteños.

The Apache, they couldn’t tell the difference between a Spaniard and a Mexican, but they could tell that these Mexicans hated them even more than the Spanish had. Without the benevolence of the crown and the church, the state began a policy of eradicating the Apaches. Or if not killing them all, at the very least, taking them captive as slaves.

John Upton Terrell again:

Records are vague, but mission documents indicate that several hundred captive young Apache were baptized in the first few years after New Mexico became a Mexican dominion. Because they had few soldiers at their command, the Mexican provincial governors engaged friendly Ute, Comanche, and unconscionable civilians to conduct slave raids for them, paying for their services with booty, which included both human beings and livestock. End quote.

The Mexicans, as mentioned a minute ago, they also restarted the Spanish policy of giving the Apache gifts and rations to induce them to peace. Except… the Mexicans a lot of the time, just, wouldn’t follow through. They wouldn’t end up giving the rations over. The Mexicans would just promise the Apaches that supplies were coming and then they’d never hand them over. It didn’t take long for the Apaches to realize the treachery so eventually they stopped trusting the people under this new Mexican flag. And then that not trusting turned into even bloodier raids.

Then, in 1826 the Mexican government issued regulations that pretty much kept up the Presidios although, the Presidios were by now just a shell of their former militaristic grandeur.

Much later, in 1834, as part of a sweeping campaign of retaliation against the Apaches, Mexico just straight up reissued the exact same regulations that were issued by Spain in 1772, the New Regulations for Presidios by King Charles the Third. Apparently, the Mexican government issued the exact same decree, right down to the royal signature, of King Charles, on the decree, despite there no longer being any royalty in Mexico or King Charles the Third in Spain. It was that decree I talked about in the last episode that set up the line of forts 100 miles apart to be manned and armed for retaliatory attacks against the Apaches and other Indios.

Before that decree though, in 1829, the Mexicans initiated an ill advised plan to expel all Spaniards from Mexico. This was ill advised because they not only took their expertise with them. But the Spanish took their knowledge and their wisdom and their experience… they also took their money.

Initially the rations continued at near starvation levels but that couldn’t last. And then, the Mexicans thought well, we can give each Apache family a plot of land around the Presidios! That’ll get em to farm and turn them away from raiding, right? Well, nothing came of that. The Apaches weren’t interested, and neither were the Mexicans. They remembered the Apache attacks and weren’t thrilled at the prospect of them getting full autonomy. Nor were they thrilled with having Apache as neighbors.

So… eventually, what remained of the peaceful Apaches, that one third of the 2/3rds, they packed up, and headed north into the various mountains and thorny wildernesses they’d originally came into the Presidios from.

That was the nail in the coffin for the Norteños and by 1831, that second date proposed for the end of the Apaches de Paz, in 1831, with no money left for… anything, the Mexicans officially ceased all rations and informed the Apaches that they were now on their own. They should civilize themselves, learn to plant, learn to assimilate. They must now fend for themselves… poor choice of words, really. Because by the spring of that year, according to Sweeney, quote, almost every Apache band formerly under Mexican influence had gone to war. End quote.

The central Mexican government, being new and shockingly corrupt, was as ineffective as the local Mexican governments were in the northern hinterlands and they could not effectively come together to fight the Apache. No one across the tortilla curtain, it seemed, could fight effectively or even bring an effective policy against the Apaches.

During the 1820s in New Mexico, it was not uncommon for there to be two or even three Governors at the same time. If you thought the 1600s were a political nightmare in New Mexico, the period between Independence and Annexation by America was even worse. These governors were corrupt. They extracted bribes, tariffs, they wrote arbitrary laws, jailed foreigners arbitrarily, they allowed prostitution and gambling to reign supreme. The governors and officials allowed hordes of Anglo Americans into the territory and then they would fail to collect the fees or taxes from them. Or alternatively, they’d collect everything they had from them.

The fedrals down in D. F. were equally as worthless and numerous. They’d send an order only to change or rescind the order a day or two later. Bandits were rampant. Indian attacks were a plague. Counterattacks were usually ineffective and often only succeeded in capturing women and children as slaves who would then be sold wherever they could be bought.

Over in Arizona, by the late 1820s, only two Mexican cities still existed: Tubac and Tucson. Thankfully, they were spared the raids of the Apaches at this time, mostly because as John Upton Terrell puts it, quote, there was little left to be stolen. End quote.

El Paso became almost a ghost town. The rio Grande valley in southern new Mexico was nearly completely abandoned. Everyone needed a strong armed escort to go anywhere safely. And a lot of times, that didn’t even work as quote, the bleached bones of the defenders lay among the burned skeletons of the vehicles. End quote. That quote was taken from Josiah Gregg’s Commerce on the Prairies.

By 1832, over 100 Mexican towns along with countless ranches and mines in northern Mexico were abandoned due to the constant and violent Apache raids. The Mexican state of Chihuahua was almost completely depopulated in the 1830s. In the Chiricahua Mountains region of southeastern Arizona, the Apaches there would force the Mexican ranchers to abandon the entire range, leaving behind, according to Alden Hayes in his A Portal to Paradise, leaving behind an estimated one hundred thousand head of cattle. That number seems rather high, but…

The Mexicans felt as though they had but few choices and for the next four years in the 1830s, they would wage a war of total extermination against the Apaches.

Enter… La Sección Patriótica or, the Patriotic Section.

In 1832, while the Apaches were devastating Mexican villages, representatives and local leaders from many a small town and pueblo in the northern frontier of Mexico, places like Tucson, these leaders all decided to join forces with the Pima or O’odham under a Mexican man named Joaquín Vicente Elías. And once joined together, they formed this militia or military group that became known as the Patriotic Section. And the Patriotic Section meant business. And by business, I mean they were going to attempt to wipe out the Apaches. And they were going to do a much better job attempting to destroy the Apaches than, as they saw them, the pathetic Mexican troops had done.

So, in June of 1832, with 200 Mexican and Pima volunteers, Elías charged into that all important Apache canyon of Aravaipa, the beautiful valley where the Apache Kid will later be born, Elías and his men charged in and surprised the Apache. The ensuing battle would last a grueling four hours.

In the end… Elías and his La Sección Patriótica killed over 70 Apaches and took 13 children captive. They also recovered 216 horses and mules. They themselves… the Patriotic Section, they suffered…1 death.

The backlash that happened next was not expected by Elías, but I’ll let Karl Jacoby tell the story, quote:

Elías's triumph, soon memorialized in a bando (a government broadside designed to be read aloud in the region's scattered villages) entitled "Triunfo sobre los apaches" ("Triumph over the Apaches"), ignited a controversy along the northern frontier. No one questioned the ethics of killing a large number of onetime apaches mansos cornered in Aravaipa Canyon, distributing their children as criados, or executing adult captives. But there were concerns voiced about the wisdom of Elías's actions, which were seen in some border settlements as "exciting their [the Apaches'] revengeful temperament" and inevitably leading to Apache counter-raids. Custagio Martínez, San Ignacio's justice of the peace, pleaded with Sonora's governor for rifles and ammunition for his town's inhabitants, claiming "already we have them [the Apaches] in our homes!” End all quotes.

Remember, the Central Mexican government in D. F. had by the 1830s made it even more difficult to own personal firearms since the federal government feared yet ANOTHER revolution.

Quick aside though, in the 1850s, after the American invasion and after decades of repeated Apache attacks, the government did write into the constitution for the first time, the right for people to keep and bear arms. Of course that would later be rescinded… a move that our Republic should never make.

But back to the Apaches and the 1830s.

In 1835, the Mexican government passed a law that forced Mexican men in the northern frontiers, men known as Norteños, to fight… REGARDLESS of their status or money. A draft had been declared and in 1835, the central Mexican government forced every able bodied Norteño to fight the Apaches.

The Decree essentially said that in the name of justice, humanity, and the inherent interest of self preservation, of the Mexican Republic, said Mexican nation must issue a declaration of war against the quote unquote barbarian apache peoples.

Jacoby wrote of this decree quote, according to the decree, each district in the state was ordered to maintain a supply of weapons to be used against he Apache: those Vecinos who were too poor to make contributions to these depots were also required to serve a fifteen day stint in the military each month. In addition, as the Apaches were now considered quote unquote outside the law, the decree instituted what would become a common reward in Sonora and Chihuahua for much of the rest of the century: a cash bounty on all Apache scalps. End all quotes.

The policy was known as Proyecto de Guerra and it promised twenty-five pesos for the scalp of a child. Fifty pesos for the scalp of a female. And 100 pesos for the scalp of an adult male. Chihuahua would adopt a similar policy two years later.

Because of this scalp policy, as Jacoby puts it, quote, hostilities with the Apache spiraled upwards. By 1841 Juan Nepomuceno Almonte, the Mexican minister of war and navy, could speak of the existence of a continual state of war along Mexico’s northern border in spite of all the quote, measures taken for the persecution and extermination of the barbarians. End all quotes.

We will return to the scalp policy later because it is again repeated in the late 1840s and it is then I will mention one of the greatest American novels ever written.

But this scalp policy against the Apaches was, and still is, quite egregious in the eyes of the Apache who believe that whatever form their body is in when they die, is the form they will take in the afterlife. For eternity.

A rather touching footnote in Eve Ball’s Indeh, an Apache Odyssey has Daklugie the Apache narrator tell a story about how an Apache woman whose husband had been hanged by the army, she could not tolerate life without him so she too hanged herself. Eve Ball writes, quote, Dead shot’s wife, too, was said to have hanged herself. Daklugie said that because she loved her husband very much she wished to go through eternity with him, even though it might have meant a deformed elongated neck. End quote.

So scalping an Apache meant to an Apache that in the afterlife, their quote unquote Happy Place, they will be bald and scarred forever.

The Apache Happy Place is, as Daklugie points out, much like our Christian idea of Heaven. He says in their Happy Place, the Apaches, quote, are to have bodies such as we have on earth, but they will never wear out, tire, or know hunger. End quote. He goes on to say that in the afterlife, the Apache will continue to walk, hunt, make love, gamble. Of that Daklugie says, quote, gambling is one of our favorite pastimes, so why not gamble in cloud land? End quote.

In the Happy Place there are trees, grass, animals, friends, relatives, safety, and a quote unquote happy life. It takes four afterlife days to get to the Happy Place though, but once there, it is a place of paradise. A celestial kingdom.

One of the reasons the Apache don’t mention the name of their dead is because if one does mention the name of an Apache who has passed, that Apache is obliged to cease what he is doing in the Happy Place and visit the Apache on earth. Daklugie says, quote, our people believe in communication with their loved ones who have gone before them. If they speak in Apache the name of one who is dead, they summon the ghost of that person to them. This person might be hunting, or gambling, or sleeping, and he may not want to come, but he must. End quote.

I reckon that may be annoying but it certainly doesn’t last forever, right? I mean, eventually all who knew your Apache name will soon pass on as well and join you in the Happy Place.

Daklugie also mentions that the Apache do not believe in quote, your queer ideas of hell. End quote. After this life there is only the Happy Place or if an Apache is guilty of a great sin or transgression, usually against his own people… he is reincarnated as a bear. At least once, but maybe a few times. Until he learns his lesson. This is why the Apaches do not eat bear meat or use bear hides. And they only kill a bear in self defense. Which is the same policy they have against killing men.

Rather comically, Daklugie mentions that even White Eyes, Americans, at least it was thought at one time, would also go to the Happy Place. But that changed with Geronimo’s passing. He says to Eve Ball, quote:

We thought that even White Eyes might eventually be admitted to the Happy Place. Of course that’ll never be done now, not with Geronimo there. If even one got in, the first thing we’d know, surveyors would be invading and farmers stringing barbed wire over the place. End quote.

He’s not wrong. But hopefully the Happy Place is infinite and there’s enough grass, trees, meadows, and animals to satisfy even an eternal white man’s desires.

Apaches called Americans White Eyes. But Daklugie told Eve Ball that quote, white eyes is not the exact meaning of our word for them; a more exact meaning would be pale eyes. The first white people our people saw looked very queer because Indians have no whites in their eyes; the part around the iris is ore nearly coffee-colored. End quote.

While Mangas Coloradas was growing up in the beautiful area of the Mogollon, Black, and Burro Mountains, his father seemed to be a head man. A chief even. While this didn’t guarantee that Mangas would become a chief one day, it certainly helped his odds.

One does not inherit the chiefdomship though. It had to be earned. And a great way to earn that title is by being a good warrior. So while not a lot is known about Mangas’ childhood, it is assumed, he was taught to be a good warrior.

One Apache told a famous Apache anthropologist named Morris Opler that, quote, Ability in war makes a great leader. End quote. Clearly, Mangas possessed this ability in war. As his later life will prove.

Edwin Sweeney in Mangas Coloradas writes of chiefs, quote, he must be willing, even eager, to speak in public and able to supply wisdom in council, to practice fairness in arbitrating disputes between group members, to make person sacrifices, and to demonstrate a deep sensitivity to the less fortunate members of his group.

He continues, quote:

Many courageous and able fighters lacked the personality, the wisdom, and the capacity for self-sacrifice to become leaders. The son of a chief, however, had an advantage in that his elders had usually provided him with excellent raining as a young man, thus preparing him better than most to follow in the footsteps of his father and assume a leadership role. End quote.

But a great leader also needed power. Supernatural power. Eve Ball writes in Indeh of power, quote: Power is a mysterious, intangible attribute difficult to explain, even by one possessing it. It was, even above his courage, the most valuable attribute of a chief. End quote.

Daklugie goes on to tell Eve Ball about this all important power. He asks her, quote, without it, how could he maintain discipline and hold his warriors? You know that Apaches are not easily controlled. Unless they believe their leader has power, he’s out of luck. End quote.

Powers could come in all shapes and sizes. And not only chiefs had powers, but most adult Apaches had some sort of power. Both men and women.

Someone could have the power to tell the future. Like Geronimo had. Others could have power to tame and speak to horses. Others could speak to bears. Some Apaches were known to have the power to heal the sick and injured. Another power could be the ability to tell exactly where and how far away an enemy was. Yet another power could be the ability to always be successful in finding ammunition. Like the great old chief Nana. Daklugie said Nana, quote, long past eighty and crippled, rode all night, he brought back ammunition. End quote. Nana was also said to have power over trains and rattlesnakes. The latter being a rather dangerous power. Others, like Daklugie’s father, had power over men. That may have been the most important power for a chief of the Apaches. For often times, leading men to battle meant they would not be coming home. But instead, journeying on to the Happy Place.

Historians and biographers aren’t sure what Mangas Coloradas’ power or powers were but no doubt, they had something to do with strength and success in making war.

Before Mangas Coloradas was known as, well, Mangas Coloradas, or Red Sleeves, before he was THE chief of the warriors of all the Chiricahua in 1840, he went by another name. That name, no doubt, was Fuerte. Strength, in Spanish. But more loosely translated as manly, strong, or stout.

The first time Fuerte is mentioned in documents, was in 1813, shortly after the troubles began again with the Spanish, who were now, or soon to be, Mexicans. That year, 1813, is also the same year that Apache oral tradition suggests Mangas Coloradas as a young man became his people’s chief. So, it stands to reason, the tall, brave, Apache chief in the Mogollon Mountains region of southwest New Mexico named Fuerte, would later be known as Mangas Coloradas. They were the same Apache chief.

The Apache often went by several different names throughout their lifetime. They’d be assigned one at birth but often, it would change as the child grew up, gained powers, and then gained a reputation. One unnamed Apache told ethnologist Grenville Goodwin that quote, if a striking new name is acquired, people begin to use it and drop the old name. End quote.

In the Apache Wars by Hutton, he states definitely that Mangas Coloradas began as Fuerte and I just took that at face value but Sweeney makes a more compelling argument for why the two are the same… to be honest I did’t know there was any doubt but the pieces of the Mangas Coloradas Fuerte puzzle fit so very nicely together.

Sweeney writes that both Fuerte and Mangas Coloradas were called quote unquote General in Mexican documents of the 30s and then in the 40s. Their physical appearance was the same, their home territory was the same, they ran in the same circles and BOTH had the same subordinate Apache warrior men. Lastly, Sweeney writes, quote:

References to Fuerte disappear after 1837 without any mention of his death, while references to Mangas Coloradas begin soon after that time…

He goes on to write, quote:

Other Apache scholars, notably William B Griffen and the late Eve Ball, concur with my conclusion that Fuerte and Mangas Coloradas could possibly have been one and the same man. End quote.

So what was Mangas Coloradas up to in these early years after the peace began to crumble? Well, besides marrying into the Chihennee band, he became a chief at an unusually young age. He was probably in his early 20s. And then, by 1820, he was chief not only of his adopted Chihennee band but also of his original Bedonkohee band. He’d remain their leader for the next forty years…

Around 1812 to 1815 though, it seems Mangas Coloradas, Fuerte then, made a name for himself as a warrior when he went deep into Sonora on a raid. And during that raid, it seems he picked himself up another wife. This one was a Mexican woman. Her name was Carmen and although she was not of the people, the Apaches remember her fitting well into Apache life back in the mountains of New Mexico. Mangas would have many wives, as many Apache men did, throughout his lifetime.

The bulk of that story though, is retold by an… unreliable writer named John C Cremony. So it may not be entirely true, especially the extravagant details I skipped over. The part that is true for real though, is that Mangas Coloradas did take a Mexican wife named Carmen at some point.

Another story from his early years is probably also not quite true and it comes from the Boston Evening Transcript in 1873, so a decade after he was murdered.

This story has him, in 1810, fight in a quote, single handed contest with seven Navajo Indian warriors, five of whom he slew and scalped and two saved their lives by a hasty retreat from the scene of bloody contact. End quote.

I highly doubt that he scalped them, as we have talked about how that practice was not an Apache way… at least, not yet. But it is true that he may have fought the Navajos.

Hutton has his early years avoiding the Mexicans and only raiding and fighting the Navajos and Comanches and Puebloans in New Mexico, on account of the peace and all. But it is true that he had a Mexican wife so I wouldn’t doubt that there was the occasional rare and brave raid into Mexico and the occasional foray north into Navajo and Puebloan lands. Remember, the Navajos teamed up with the Puebloans and Spanish under Anza to expel the Apaches from the northern part of New Mexico in the late 1700s. Mangas Coloradas was no doubt reminded of this by his relatives.

While the raids into Mexico and against the Navajos cannot be definitively proven to have happened, there is ample evidence to suggest that Mangas Coloradas absolutely raided a Spanish settlement right on his doorstep known as Santa Rita del Cobre.

Santa Rita del Cobre is a ghost town now. But nearby is the massive, absolutely decimated and scarred blight of a landmark known as Chino Mine. It is a copper mine. It is right off of Highway 152 between the beautiful Mimbres valley and Silver City. It is painfully visible and it is still open. It employs a healthy amount of people in the region but boy is it hideous. Well, this mine is immediately south of Mangas Coloradas’ home. And in the year 1800, when he would have been around 10 years old, an Apache, who no doubt was reincarnated as a bear, but an Apache showed the Spanish, a man named Lieutenant Colonel Jose Manuel Carrasco, where this newly discovered copper was.

The Apache don’t dig in mother earth for ores. They’ll use silver and turquoise and other beautiful precious stones, they won’t use gold, but while they use and wear and employ minerals, the Apache find it highly disrespectful to go digging around mother earth. The White man had no such qualms.

By 1803, the Spanish had set up a mine, a town, and a small presidio to guard the lucrative mining operations. Again, this was right outside Mangas’ home, right off his front porch. For a while the Chiricahua Apaches tolerated the small operation. They got the silly licenses which permitted them to hunt the Spaniards land, they took rations, they had somewhat friendly relations, but eventually, as the territory descended into more chaos, as Mangas got older, the peace there also fell apart and Mangas would lead a large raid into the small town.

On June 25th, 1807, for some reason, 150 Apaches, maybe led by Fuerte, aka Mangas Coloradas, maybe not, but 150 Apaches raided the small town of Santa Rita del Cobre. One man was killed. Another was injured. Hundreds of head of livestock were scattered.

The following year, 1808, another raiding party killed yet another man and drove off even more livestock.

In 1812, the Apaches, again, maybe led by Fuerte, I’m not sure, but the Apaches raided the small mining town twice! By the end of the second raid, the town had no more livestock.

In 1813, the Bedonkohees and Chihennees, Fuerte’s people, they went all the way down and raided Janos! This was, after all, when the violence had slowly begun to return.

In retaliation, the Spanish authorities, they asked for Fuerte specifically in the year 1814 to please keep the peace. Please stop raiding Santa Rita del Cobre.

This request also suggested the Apache stay in their homeland in the Mogollon Mountains as long as they avoided the mining town. Remember, the Spanish and Mexicans no longer wanted the Apaches near their Presidios as had been previously the policy. It was cheaper to keep them away. But much to my surprise when reading, Fuerte and his people instead, did the opposite and they actually moved TO Janos, or right outside of the presidio. And while there, Mangas and 407 of his people received their rations and kept an eye on the Spanish.

Mangas and his people stayed at Janos until March of 1816 when an epidemic of smallpox broke out among the Apaches after having received a large gift of 33 blankets from the Mexicans… I imagine those two occurrences are completely unrelated…

They would return though, but would leave again in 1817 when the Spanish slash Mexican rations began to dry up.

Mangas Coloradas and his people would then head north, back to the Mogollon Mountains area where they would yet again go about raiding their favorite target: Sonora.

Although, curiously, at one point in 1819, Mangas would lead a group of Chiricahua warriors against some Western Apache or Coyoteros who had threatened to burn down Santa Rita del Cobre, the mining town. Apparently, Fuerte, Mangas, would be successful in his raid against his cousins in Arizona.

Adding all that up, by the time he was 30 years old, when he became head chief of the Chiricahua Apaches, he had raided the Spanish, the Mexicans, the Navajos, Western Apaches, probably some Puebloans, and who knows who else. You know who he hadn’t raided? The Americans. And again, he wouldn’t until he had no more choices available to him.

Officials at Janos would continue to record that Fuerte and 200 of his people were around the Presidio in the years 1820 and 1821 still accepting what little rations remained.

By 1826 though, it’s clear, that Fuerte, not yet Mangas Coloradas, was back in his old stomping grounds in the Mogollon Mountains. But he wasn’t just hanging around the beautiful landscape, admiring the vistas. No, he was putting Santa Rita del Cobre, that small mining town, under siege. And we know this on account of one James Ohio Pattie.

Sylvester Pattie, father of James Ohio Pattie, but Sylvester and his son both spent the 1825 beaver trapping season on the Gila River. This meant they were probably the first Americans to penetrate that deep into Apacheria.

This was no small feat either. It was dangerous territory. If the authorities caught you without a license, they’d jail you. If Mexican bandits caught you they’d kill you and rob you. If Apaches caught you…

After this adventurous time in the region, James Ohio Pattie would go on to publish his account and encounters and it would go on to be a bestseller in the US and in Europe. The book was called The Personal Narrative of James O Pattie of Kentucky.

The Patties trapped the confluence of the Gila and the Salt Rivers in Arizona, all the while coming into contact with the Apaches of that region. This contact was peaceful… at first. Eventually, the trapping season was over though, and the Patties stashed their furs before heading back east towards Santa Rita del Cobre. But during their travels, they were attacked by an unknown band of Indians and they barely escaped with their lives and horses. Shortly after the battle, the Patties found the corpse of a Mexican. James recorded the finding in his book, quote:

We found a man [Mexican miner] the Indians had killed. They had cut him up in quarters, after the fashion of butchers. His head, with the hat on, was stuck on a stake. It was full of arrows, which they had probably discharged into it, as they danced around it. We gathered up the parts of the body, and buried them. End quote.

Did they dismember the Mexican man as Pattie described or did they honor their belief of no mutilation? I honestly couldn’t tell you. Many Apache contradict their stories, making it hard to know what’s true.

After arriving at the mines in 1826 though, the Patties were asked by the mine operator, Juan Unis to be guards.

The Patties accepted and Sylvester went ahead and built strong new defenses for the Mexicans. Meanwhile, two Apaches, who had been spying on the construction were captured, although one was set free. This apache that was set free was told to go get his chief and bring all his warriors so that they could make peace. If he didn’t arrive within the next few days, the captured apache would be killed.
 Sure enough, a few days later, on August 1st of 1826, the chief and 80 mounted warriors showed up. The Mexicans, they were spooked. This was not good. The Americans though, were unfazed.

It helped that the defenses were adequate, but also, as the chief of these Apache noticed, the Americans seemed to be a different breed than the Spanish.

The Pattie men were in a trench some distance off with rifles aimed at the Apaches. The Patties then asked the big chief if he was ready to make peace. The chief answered, yes of course, I will make peace with you Americans. But I will never make peace with the Spanish. Aka Mexicans. Here’s what Pattie wrote of the rest of the conversation:

When we asked their reasons, they answered that they had been long at war with the Spaniards, and that a great many murders had been mutually inflicted on either side. They admitted that they had taken a great many horses from the Spaniards, but indignantly alleged that a large party of their people had [once] come in to make peace with the Spaniards... and the Spaniards had decoyed the party within their walls, and then commenced butchering them like a flock of sheep. End quote.

The Patties insisted that it did not matter, that they had to make peace with these Mexicans who were working with us Americans or the Patties would raise a sufficient force and quote, pursue them in their lurking places… and that we could shoot a great deal better than either they or the spaniards. End quote. They meaning the Apaches. These Americans were boasting of their shooting prowess and the Apache chief believed them.

He agreed to make peace. The prisoner was set free. Then, Pattie killed three beeves and fed the Apaches. After the feast, the leader of these Apaches, no doubt Fuerte, Mangas Coloradas, he offered the Patties a gift. He gave them ten square miles of choice land three miles from the mines. Pattie graciously accepted but he mentioned that he wasn’t going to work it but rather the Mexicans would work it for him and therefore, the Apaches can’t be killing these Mexican workers. Fuerte, the chief agreed not to molest these Mexicans. He then offered a statement that Mangas Coloradas would make later in life, further suggesting that this unnamed Apache chief who met with the Patties is indeed Mangas Coloradas. He said that he truly desired peace with the Americans because unlike the Spanish, they’d never killed the Apaches except in battle.

If only it stayed that way…

After the speech by no doubt, Fuerte, the Apaches headed back into the Mogollon Mountains.

Juan Unis, the operator of the mine, was fed up with both the mines and the Apache attacks so he convinced the Patties to buy the mine at a steal. Sylvester accepted. Meanwhile, James Ohio Pattie would light out for trapping again. It was what he truly desired.

Although for the remainder of the Patties stay at the mines, the Apache under Mangas kept their word and didn’t attack the town, they did, it seems, or at least some Apaches from somewhere, they did attack James Ohio Pattie and his mixed gang of American and French fur trappers. At least according to James Pattie’s book.

Here’s a nice long quote from John Upton Terrell which reads from Pattie’s published best seller:

The Apache kept their pledge not to attack the mines as long as the Americans operated them, but they retaliated in other ways which forcefully demonstrated their anger. They almost continually harassed the American trappers and their French companions, shot at them from ambush, stole their horses, and robbed their caches of furs and supplies. And one day "our sentinels apprized us that savages were at hand. We had just time to take shelter behind the trees, when they began to let their arrows fly at us. We returned them the compliment with balls, and at the first shot a number of them fell. They remained firm and continued to pour in their arrows from every side.... At length one man was pierced, and they rushed forward to scalp him." As he tells the story, James Ohio Pattie darted from behind a tree to help the wounded man, and was "assailed by a perfect shower of arrows, which I dodged for a moment, and was then struck down by an arrow in the hip. Here I should have been instantly killed, had not my companions made a joint fire at the Indians... by which a number of them were laid dead. But the agony of my pain was insupportable.

A momentary cessation of their arrows enabled me to draw out the arrow from my hip, and to commence re-loading my gun. I had partly accomplished this, when I received another arrow under my right breast, between the bone and the flesh. ... I snapped it off, and finished re-loading my gun."

The trappers retreated to a river bank, and after "we had gained this security, the Indians stood but a few shots more, before they fled, leaving their dead and wounded at our mercy.

"Truth is, we were too much exasperated to show mercy, and we cut off the heads of all, indiscriminately. End all quotes.

But another encounter with the Apaches ended a lot more peacefully.

When James Pattie and his men returned to the spot where they’d cashed the furs, they found that the Apaches of the region had found them and had made robes out of them. I don’t know if you’ve ever felt beaver pelts before but.. dang are they soft. And very expensive. So the looting of these pelts was an egregious sin to James Pattie and his fellow trappers. But according to his testimony, when he approached the Apaches, a dialogue ensued instead of a battle.

I will let Frank C Lockwood who quotes from Pattie’s book regale you with the story:

When, months afterwards, young Pattie returned to the scene of the battle to recover the beaver skins that he had cached on the San Pedro, the band of Indians were again encountered. They had unearthed the beaver skins and made robes of them which they were then wearing. One of them was riding on the horse that Pattie's father had ridden. Pattie compelled the Indian to dismount and surrender the animal. The leader of the band then came forward and asked:

"Do you know this horse?'

“I do,” Pattie replied; 'it is mine.'

"Was it your party we took the horse and furs from a year ago?' the chief inquired.

"Yes, I was one of them; and if you do not give me back my horse and furs, we will kill your whole party here and now? "

"He immediately brought me one hundred and fifty skins, and the horses," Pattie writes, "observing that they had been famished and had eaten the rest, and that he hoped this would satisfy me, for that in the battle they had suffered more than we, he having lost ten men, and we having taken from them four horses with their saddles and bridles. I observed to him that he must remember that they were the aggressors and had provoked the quarrel, in having robbed us of our horses and attempting to kill us. He admitted that they were the aggressors in beginning the quarrel, but added, by way of apology, that they had thought us Spaniards, not knowing that we were Americans; but that now, when he knew us, he was willing to make peace and be in perpetual friendship. On this we lit the pipe of peace, and smoked friends. I gave him some red cloth, with which he was delighted.” End all quotes.

Now, I must say, that last part about the pipe of peace… as Daklugie reminds Eve Ball many times, the Apache NEVER used pipes so… take that however you want to. Daklugie says a lot of things which he later contradicts. But he certainly repeats that a lot. Although, the Apache are a diverse group and Daklugie certainly doesn’t speak for them all.

Shortly after this parlay, James Pattie would return to the mines just before he and his father would head to California where, unfortunately for Sylvester the elder Pattie, he would be arrested for entering the territory illegally and he would die in jail.

James Ohio Pattie on the other hand, he probably saw more of the American southwest than any other American of his time, save for a man named Jedidiah Smith.

James Pattie not only was the first Anglo to fight Apaches, but he was the first to stare down into the Grand Canyon and the first to journey up the Colorado River from its mouth in the Gulf of California all the way to the Rocky Mountains of today’s Colorado. A kind of reverse Powell expedition.

Almost immediately, the Apaches that came into contact with these Americans, they noticed a difference between them and the Mexicans. They saw no difference between a Mexican and a Spaniard but these Americans? First of all, they spoke a strange language the Apache could not understand.

Secondly, these White men were somehow in someway more brave than the Spanish. Or at least, it seemed that way.

Lastly, The Americans had no qualms with shooting first, and asking questions later. Or just never asking questions at all.

The seeds of both distrust and respect were planted quite early in these engagements between the Americans and the Apaches.

In 1828 more of these Americans came into contact with the Apaches. And one of these Americans is podcast favorite, Kit Carson.

In that year, a band of fur trappers who were employed by a man named Ewing Young, they left Taos and headed towards Arizona. In much the same direction the Patties had gone earlier. But near the headwaters of the Salt River in the White Mountains of far eastern Arizona, the group was attacked by Apaches. This battle was so fierce that the trappers were beat and had to high tail it back to Taos. Obviously, this pissed off Young something fierce and he vowed back in Taos to not only seek revenge against these Apache but to make it a profitable mission of vengeance, dangit.

Right before setting out though, Young picked up a few more young trappers and adventurous men. With one of them being an eighteen year old Kit Carson. Carson wasn’t hired as a gun thug or a trapper though, no, he was simply hired as a cook. But the expedition would certainly make a lasting impression on the young soon to be famous man. Carson, Young, and the other men totaled 40 and the lot of them left Santa Fe in April of 1828 for the territory of Arizona.

But they didn’t just head straight there. That would have cost them a fee and or a tax and some suspicion from the Mexican government. So instead, Young marched the men north a considerable ways until, satisfied he had tricked the Mexicans, he turned and headed to the southwest. This trek wasn’t for the faint of heart. Young took the men directly through Navajo land to reach… Apacheria. Neither were very hospitable for White Men. Although, the Apaches hadn’t grown to distrust them quite yet.

In Hampton Sides much loved Blood and Thunder, the Epic Story of Kit Carson and the Conquest of the American West, Sides describes the dangers that this voyage entailed:

Carson's first paid voyage into the mountains was an especially ambitious and dangerous one, for in addition to the usual hardships— grizzlies, Indians, hypothermia, the prospect of a killing thirst or starvation-this mission was strictly illegal. Most trapping excursions ventured north into the unclaimed wilderness of the Rocky Mountains, but this time Young planned to trap within the jealously held, if extremely porous, borders of Mexico. The government in Santa Fe rarely issued trapping permits to foreigners, so in order to confuse suspicious officials, Ewing led his party north into the mountains, then doubled back and rode southwest through the country of the Navajo and the Zuni before striking the Gila River. End quote.

Sides goes on to describe all the information and wisdom that Carson was soaking up from these multinational multigenerational mountain men. Information and wisdom like how to read the land, how to trap for beaver, how to know when an Indian Ambush was about to go down… The mountain men also taught Kit Carson the fighting ways of the Indian, like how they were like wolves: run, and they follow; follow, and they run.

Eventually, Young, Carson, and the other 38 made it to ever increasingly remote territory that was quite deep into Apacheria. Until finally, the band of Apaches that Young believed had attacked them found the crew. Unbothered, Young let himself be known to the Indians.

I’ll actually let Lockwood sum up what happens next though:

The savages were no less eager for the fray than were the Americans; but they were not a match for these cool, hardened mountain men, either in strategy or desperate courage. To the jubilant Indians, Young, when he had shown himself in the open with what they judged to be a mere handful of followers, seemed to halt in fear. In reality, this experienced fighter was making use of his time to place the main body of the trappers in ambush. Seeing such a small company of Americans and mistaking the brief pauses of the leader for cowardice, as Young anticipated, the Indians swarmed over the hills and moved en masse against the few white men in sight. They paid dearly for their haste and indiscretion. When they had advanced to a position where the ambushed riflemen could subject them to a cross fire, the command was given to shoot.

Bullets were too scarce to waste; so the result of the accurate cross fire was withering. Fifteen Apaches were killed at the first volley, and many were sorely wounded. The Apache was never ashamed to run when he was getting the worst of it; and so it was in this case. When the trappers advanced into the open, the enemy scattered like autumn leaves in a gale. End quote.

Frank C Lockwood sure knows how to tell a tale.

In one of Carson’s early biographies, the author wrote that Carson killed his first Indian in this battle and that he shot him, quote, straight through the nipple at which he had aimed-straight through the heart within. End quote.

Hampton Sides finishes this story for us when he wrote, quote, He does not mention it in his autobiography, but according to one account, Carson then removed his sheath knife and pulled back the dead Apache’s scalp, as was the common custom among the mountain men.

Carson was nineteen years old. End quote.

At the same time the Patriotic Section was handing out defeats to the Apaches in southern Arizona in 1832, another Mexican Captain by the name of Jose Ignacio Ronquillo, dealt a significant and violent blow to the Apaches under Fuerte in southern New Mexico. Yet again, in that year, the Apaches fought the Mexicans near Santa Rita del Cobre at the base of the beautiful Mogollon Mountains. The place the Apaches called Mezcal Extends Upward. A place many Apaches of these bands believed was the place that life began after the flood.

I don’t believe there was supposed to be a crushing defeat at Santa Rita but four Apache warrior youths jumped the gun during some peace proceedings between Fuerte and some other chiefs, and Captain Ronquillo. After some brief skirmishes in and around the mountains, white flags were raised on both sides. Talks were had. Documents were about to be signed. And then the four Apaches charged the Mexicans horses and lanced one of them.

Ronquillo had no choice but to press his attack. He was ready for such treachery so when it arrived, he acted. The ensuing battle lasted from noon until sunset. It was May so for 7 or 8 hours, the Apaches and the Mexicans fought. 22 Apaches were killed and 50 were wounded. On the other side, three Mexicans had been killed.

It was quite a humiliating and humbling defeat for Fuerte, not yet Mangas Coloradas and the Apaches. One Apache band, the Carrizaleño band would eventually disappear due to the battle.

A formal treaty would be signed in August of 1832 between the state of Chihuahua and the bands of Chiricahua Apache. In the proceedings, Fuerte was named General and he was put in charge of his Apaches who were to stay in the Mogollon Mountains region WITHOUT being given rations. They were to sustain themselves and they were NOT allowed to raid…

As Sweeney puts it, the peace that came from the truce was only temporary and had little chance to succeed.

Another tenant of the truce was that the headquarters of the Chiricahua Apache was moved from far off Janos to right on their doorstep at Santa Rita del Cobre. One reason was so that the Mexican leaders could keep a better eye on Fuerte and the Chiricahua Apaches but another reason was to stop the trading of stolen loot from Mexico to the Americans who would often trade the Apaches new American guns for the cheap stolen Mexican goods.

One of these main American traders was a man we will certainly talk a lot about and a man I have mentioned before. That man being James Kirker.

The Chiricahua, under Fuerte, would keep the peace for less than six months. By early 1833, they were already raiding into Mexico once again. In that year alone, over 200 Norteños would be murdered by the Apaches. Mexicans could not work their fields, mine their ore, travel from one place to the next. A decade long war between Fuerte and the Mexicans had begun. But it was about to get a lot worse… and more tragic.

In 1834, one of Mangas’ rivals, rival in a sense of friendly fellow Apache war chief, but one of his rivals a respected Apache named Tutije was captured near Santa Rita del Cobre and paraded around Arispe in Sonora before being executed. His execution would further inflame the warring Apaches.

In 1835, Elías and his La Sección Patriótica repeated their 1832 success with another raid on the Apaches near the present day Arizona New Mexico border. They would kill 10 to 15 Apaches and would wound quite a few others. Elías was rather surprised at the Apache’s fighting ability though. He could see that something had clearly changed. He blamed the new tactics on the influence of the Anglo Americans. He was probably onto something…

In 1836, In Santa Rita del Cobre, one Apache woman and two men were killed by Mexican civilians in cold blood. Apparently the Apaches were beaten, stabbed, speared, and shot to death.

But 1837, would be the real turning point in the war between the Mexicans and the Apaches.

Despite his name, Juan Jose Compa was an Apache. He was a Mimbres Apache who lived near Janos, and he had been selected in his youth to be a priest in the Catholic Church. Probably the first Apache to do so. He became educated, he learned Spanish, he was a good Indian.

Despite multiple sources saying his father was murdered by Mexicans, Sweeney says Juan Jose’s father actually died of natural causes in 1794. At that point, Juan Jose Compa’s brother became the leader of the family group. Again, regardless of multiple other sources saying that the Compas were chiefs, they never attained that status among the Apache. It was just that Juan Jose Compa’s ability to speak Spanish and Apache elevated his status among the Mexicans. It also helped his status with the Mexicans that Juan Jose Compa was a peaceful leaning Apache. The Apaches didn’t really even trust Juan Jose Compa. He had essentially become an outsider. And the Apaches didn’t trust outsiders.

One Mexican authority named Colonel Justiniani even said of him that the Apaches quote, did not respect him, nor did they pay any attention to him unless it was in the conferences with Mexicans where he had to talk to the chiefs. End quote. It’s only after his massacre did Juan Jose Compa’s legend grow to the inaccurate versions that filled a few of the books I used for this series.

Many of the books said that Juan Jose set fire to the Mexican countryside. That he made war on all the Mexicans he could find. But the reality is, he was brokering peace treaties between the Apaches and the Mexicans. He was trying to persuade Fuerte to stop attacking the Mexicans. He even told the aforementioned Justiniani that he would force his small band to go to war AGAINST Fuerte’s band if he didn’t make peace! Of course, they would never actually fight each other, he was just saying what he needed to to the Mexicans but he was not the war hungry great Chiricahua Apache leader some of the older books claimed he was. Regardless, his death is rather significant.

By 1836, a year after Sonora had began their policy of scalp bounties where the state would pay hunters of men 100 pesos for the scalp of an adult male Apache, 50 for an adult female, and 25 pesos for an Apache child’s scalp… by 1836, the Chiricahua Apaches were devastating Sonora. They were setting fire to every hacienda and town they came across. The warring factions of Apaches were killing militiamen and their captains. They were stealing horses and mules. They were intercepting mail, reading said mail, and using the intelligence in that mail to plan even further raids, traps, ambushes, and military actions. It seemed, the Apaches used Compa’s ability to read Spanish in these pursuits.

It is true though, that eventually, Juan Jose Compa realized he could do nothing to stop the warring Apaches who were led by Fuerte aka Mangas Coloradas, and others. It is said that by 1836, he was indeed amongst them. Probably even fighting with them.

But again, the Apache’s hatred at this time was directed solely at the Mexicans. The Americans, whom they traded with frequently, they were no bother. Apparently, Juan Jose Compa was even very good friends with a one James Johnson. Or John Johnson. I saw both. Either way, it’s the most American name ever.

Johnson was a fur trapper who also owned and operated a trading post in Moctezuma, Sonora with his Mexican wife. Johnson would gladly accept the stolen Mexican loot that Juan Jose Compa and others brought him. Johnson was on seemingly good terms with the Apache chief and apparently even called him a friend… although, not friends enough to deny a bribe from the Sonoran government to betray and kill Juan Jose.

This bribe though, it did not escape the intelligent eyes of the Apache man who eventually would intercept a letter FROM the Sonoran government TO his American friend that outlined the very bribe and scheme.

Juan Jose Compa even confronted Johnson about the troubling artifact but Johnson dismissed the letter and told Juan not to worry, that they were friends, and that he would never betray him.

Quick cut to only a few months later in 1837 when Johnson rode near Juan Jose Compa’s camp in the Animas Mountains of southern New Mexico with a couple of rough and tumble Missourians by the names of Gleason and Eames. He also had 15 other Anglos and 5 Mexicans with him.

A few of the books I read cover this infamous and upsetting betrayal, actually all of them, but Sweeney’s is the version I trust the most. And in his version, he never mentions that Johnson and Compa knew each other prior to what’s about to take place. And he also doesn’t mention that Johnson was asked to specifically kill Juan Jose Compa… it just so happens that John or James Johnson, Sweeney calls him John, it just so happened that John Johnson came upon Juan Jose Compa and his companions during a planned murderous foray into Apache territory.

It seems as though Johnson was going to collect some bounties regardless of whose head the scalps came from.

The two parties, Johnsons and the Chiricahua Apaches, they met on April 20th, 1837 and for two days, the 20th and the 21st, the groups traded in goods and friendship and all seemed to be well. Until the morning of the 22nd.

I will now quote a vivid retelling of the events that’s in Frank C Lockwoods the Apache Indians:

Upon their arrival the trader told Juan José that he had brought along a sack of pinole as a present for the women and children. The sack was taken from the back of the pack animal and a man was designated by the chief to take charge of the distribution. At once all the Indians-men, women, and children-gathered about the sack. That was what Johnson desired and expected.

Concealed under an aparejo on the back of one of the trader's mules was a blunderbuss that had been brought for just this opportunity. It was loaded with balls, slugs, and bits of chain, not quite so serviceable as the machine gun of the modern American racketeer, but well adapted to its fiendish purpose.

Meantime Gleason, under the pretext that he wanted to buy a fine saddle mule of Juan José's, had drawn the chief a little distance aside where the mule was standing. The plan was for Gleason to shoot the unsuspecting chief with his pistol at the same time that Johnson fired the blunderbuss into the crowd assembled about the bag of pinole. The scheme was instantly executed.

The blunderbuss wrought cruel havoc among the crowd and Gleason shot Juan at the same moment. Wounded, but not unto death, the chief cried out:

"Don Santiago, come to my rescue!"

At the same time he clinched with Gleason and threw him to the ground, and now with drawn knife he was poised ready to stab him. Johnson came over, and Juan José said:

"For God's sake, save my life! I can kill your friend, but I don't want to do it."

In reply, Johnson shot him. He sank down dead on top of his prostrate foe.

"Thus perished that fine specimen of a man. I knew the man well, and I can vouch for the fact that he was a perfect gentleman, as well as a kind-hearted one."

This quotation, and the whole account of the tragedy as related above, I have drawn from Benjamin D. Wilson's unpublished diary, Observations on Early Days in California and New Mexico. Wilson was a trapper in New Mexico at the time of the betrayal and murder of Juan José. He was near the scene of the tragedy at the time and met members of the Eames party who escaped.

Wilson later moved to California, became the first American mayor of Los Angeles, was elected to the State Senate, and became so prominent in California that Mount Wilson was named for him, as were, also, civic objects in Pasadena. We must, therefore, accept his account of this terrible early outrage upon Apaches by Americans as authentic and trustworthy. End all quotes.

I have no idea how authentic and trustworthy the account is but the end result remains the same. At least 20 Apaches were murdered. Possibly 25. And all those that were murdered, had been scalped. A bounty was to be collected, after all.

Among the dead were chief Juan Jose Compa, his brother Juan Diego Compa, and two other chiefs. As well as two of Mangas Coloradas’ wives. Because, yes, our man Fuerte, he was there.

Sweeney writes this of his presence at the ill fated massacre:

Although contemporary accounts do not mention the presence of either Fuerte or Mangas Coloradas, Apache oral history places him at the scene of the massacre. The informants of Eve Ball told her that Mangas Coloradas was present and declared that after the first volley he had grabbed a baby and fled the scene. Only later, they said, did he realize that, quoting the informant, the baby he carried with him was his son. End quote. Unfortunately, two of his four wives were not as lucky, for they fell victims of Johnson’s insidious chicanery. End all quotes.

For his part, Johnson’s trading post would be burned to the ground but… he’d die of old age in California. His treachery went unpunished in this life. Maybe he became a bear a few times after his death though…

After the massacre, Fuerte would never be the same and he would go on to earn his nickname among the Mexicans: Red Sleeves.

A round of terrible fury and vengeance was about to rain down upon the Norteños because of this unprecedented attack. As Sweeney puts it, it’s one thing to defeat your enemy on the battlefield. It’s a whole other thing to defeat them by trickery and cowardice. Having a group of women and children huddle under false pretenses around fake gifts before you blast them away. And then you scalp the whole lot of em? With the ears still attached? Evil. The Apaches could sense the tides turning. War was about to give way to annihilation.

Immediately after the mourning period ended, the Apaches under Fuerte struck back. One Chiricahua Apache much later would tell anthropologist Morris Opler that after a massacre like this the Apaches, quote, they go after anything, a troop of cavalry, a town. They are angry. They fight anyone to get even. End quote.

A wagon train was ambushed while en route from El Paso to Santa Fe. All 12 men were killed.

Twenty two fur trappers known simply as the Kemp party were all killed by Fuerte and the Apaches days later. And during the looting of the Kemp party, Fuerte became Red Sleeves. Sweeney writes quote:

It was after the fight with Kemp’s party, according to legend, that Mangas donned a shirt with bright red sleeves and thus took on his new name, probably more of a nickname, and became Kan-da-zis-tlishishen, or Red Sleeves. End quote.

I like to think his name’s red sleeves on account of all the blood he collected on them but… that works too.

Curiously, a few weeks after the massacre, the man quoted above by Lockwood, the man who would become LA’s first American Mayor, Benjamin D Wilson, he was captured by Mangas Coloradas and his Apache warriors. Wilson knew nothing of the Johnson Massacre when he was captured so it stands to reason that he only learned of it after his capture and subsequent release by Mangas. He probably learned of the events from Mangas Coloradas HIMSELF! Lockwood says that Wilson learned of the treachery by something known as the Eames party but I believe he learned of the horrible event by Mangas as Mangas escorted him personally from captivity among his people to safety. Here’s Wilson’s direct quote of the events surrounding his capture and release:

Everything we had was taken from us. We were marched up to the Apache camp-there we were given to ascertain that something terrible had happened between the Apaches and Americans and that the young warriors were determined to sacrifice us. We expressed our astonishment at the changed conduct of the Apaches, from whom we had ever before received many evidences of friendly feelings. ... In camp that night the Indians kept up a war dance to the east of the wigwam where Chief Mangas kept us confined. That old chief was opposed to our being sacrificed as he said that he had received many favors from Americans and believed it was to the interest of his people to keep up the amicable relations existing till this time. Our party at this time was reduced to three men.... Mangas told us that he had been doing his best to dissuade his men from destroying us but unsuccessfully. Finally at a late hour of the night, Mangas came in greatly excited and said that he had to return to his warriors and one of us must leave, as it was the only one he could save. I asked my men what we should do. One named Maxwell had a sprained ankle and could not walk. The other named Tucker was kind of invalid... So it was concluded that I should go. ... I caught up a small buffalo robe and threw it upon my shoulder (the Indians had stripped me of all clothing) and left. End quote.

Mangas would go on to also save and escort to safety Tucker and Maxwell. Mangas Coloradas, at least for now, really did not hate or want to make war against the Americans. His beef was with the Mexicans. And it was upon them that he released his righteous vengeance.

The massacre by Johnson would start the avenging war of the Apaches against the Mexicans. 1837 saw both Chihuahua and Sonora attacked constantly by Mangas Coloradas and the warring Apaches.

Towns across the north were attacked. Towns with names like Cumpas, Huepac, Fronteras, Galeana, Casas Grandes, Ramos, Janos, El Carmen, Bavispe, Santa Cruz, and others. The situation for the beleaguered Mexicans was dire. They lacked firearms but when they had them, they lacked ammunition. Towns were abandoned. Horses stolen. Funds for fighters was nonexistent. Plans of military excursions were abandoned. Retaliation by the Mexicans was rare.

In 1838, Mangas Coloradas would finally force the closure of the mines at Santa Rita del Cobre. He turned the place into a ghost town, although despite Apache oral tradition AND Anglo writings of the closure of the mines, the Apaches did not in fact massacre every man, woman, and child that left the town. That tall tale was started by the unreliable narrator of Cremony, whom I have mentioned before.

Paul Andrew Hutton in Apache Wars writes of this period, quote:

The desert now reclaimed the untilled fields. Cattle, sheep, mules, and goats wandered free only to fall prey to the great packs of wolves and coyotes that trailed the Apache raiding parties just as the raven shadows the predator on his rounds. Skeletons lined the roads, littered the burned haciendas, and were picked clean by scavengers in deserted villages. It was a perfect reign of terror. End quote.

To make matters even worse for the Norteños, also in 1838, a bloody and expensive civil war erupted in Sonora between two rival caudillos for complete control of the state. This civil war would last a very long time too.

The brief winner of that contest, a quote unquote perfidious politician named Gándara, in 1839 would finally stage a retaliatory strike in the heart of Apacheria. He would score a victory too. The swift battle took place in the Mimbres valley and 17 Apaches would be killed.

Meanwhile the governor in Chihuahua, the brother of the head of the Sonoran forces, Jose Maria Elías Gonzales, a man named Simon Elias Gonzales, he would bring in one of the most interesting and unsavory characters of this era to teach the Apache’s a lesson. The man would be none other than Don Santiago Kirker better known as James Kirker.

I actually mentioned Kirker in my rise of the Kachinas episode when I said, quote, Kirker was James Kirker, an Irishman employed by the governor of Chihuahua to do questionable things to the Mexican Indians but that’s not important right now. End quote. Well, he’s important now.

James Kirker was about the same age as Mangas Coloradas, except Kirker was born in Ireland, not New Mexico.

At 16 he left Ireland though because he didn’t want to be drafted into the Royal Navy. But once in America, rather ironically, he would end up becoming a quote unquote legal American pirate and he would subsequently raid British ships during the war of 1812. After the war, the Irishman met a woman, they had a son, and then he subsequently abandoned them both and headed to Missouri. Then, in 1822, Kirker would join the William Henry Ashley fur trapping expedition! I talked about him and his expeditions in the Black Pioneers episode when I mentioned Moses Black Harris and Jim Beckworth. So Kirker was also on that expedition which headed towards the Rocky Mountains. Once in them beautiful mountains, Kirker stayed until 1824 when he huffed it down south to southern New Mexico. For the next ten years, Kirker would spend the winters trapping Beaver. But beginning in 1826, he became employed by… the mines in Santa Rita del Cobre. His main job was escorting wagon trains of copper from the mines to Chihuahua.

By the 1830s though, it was clear to the Mexican officials that Kirker was trading illicit guns and ammo for stolen mules with the Apache at Santa Rita. Which put him in direct contact with Mangas Coloradas who knew him. Although, Mangas, according to Sweeney would, quote, eventually develop a particular disdain for Kirker. End quote.

Despite Mangas Coloradas’ disdain for Kirker, in 1835, it appears that the Irishman would occasionally accompany the Apache on raids! Lieutenant Colonel and head of the Sonoran military Jose Maria Elias Gonzales even suspected Kirker of training the Apaches, which was leading to their superior abilities to make war.

In 1837 and 1838, Kirker probably again accompanied Mangas Coloradas and other Apaches on raids deep into Sonora. But by 1839, Kirker had switched sides and was now hunting Apache scalps for the Chihuahua government.

Kirker was the perfect man to run this sort of operation. Even if he had a bounty on his head set by the Mexican government for selling guns to the Apaches. They apparently let that slide so he could accomplish this new goal.

Kirker had been amongst the Apaches for a decade. He knew the territory, he knew where their camps were. He knew the Apaches! He knew Mangas Coloradas! The General, as the Mexicans called him. Sweeney calls Kirker a quote, opportunistic and pragmatic man usually prepared to take the side most advantageous to him; this time the advantage was in Chihuahuan pesos. End quote.

So Kirker and his right hand man, a mixed blood French and Shawnee Indian from Ohio named Spybuck… which is just a fantastic name, but Kirker and his 6 foot tall Indian friend Spybuck recruited a bunch of unsavory characters and they agreed to be paid around 100,000 pesos, which… pesos, right? How much could that be? Well, at the time, that would have been equivalent to 100,000 American dollars. The two currencies were about equal. It was an offer, as Paul Andrew Hutton suggests, that Kirker couldn’t refuse.

The day after Christmas, in 1839, Kirker and his men left Chihuahua City for Apacheria.

It would be only a few weeks before he found his first success. In January of 1840 Kirker and his group of other Indians, Mexicans, and Anglos headed towards the Janos area. Once there, he surprised the people of one of Mangas Coloradas’ very good friends and fellow chief by the name of Pisago Cabezon. Fifty miles north of Janos, Kirker and his scalpers killed 10 Apache warriors and 5 Apache civilians and captured 20 others. Pisago wasn’t present during the attack because he was in Janos proper and once he received word, he realized he couldn’t retaliate on account of the 20 prisoners. Unsure of how to proceed, Pisago asked Mangas for his advice. Meanwhile, Kirker went back to chihuahua city with the prisoners to collect his reward.

Not long afterwards though, Kirker and his 100 unruly men traveled the countryside again in search of more scalps.

They’d find them on May 8th when they surprised a small group of Apaches, killed six men, captured 13 women and children, took 121 horses, and four barrels of whiskey.

In retaliation, what was most likely Mangas Coloradas and his warring Apaches attacked a community deep within the Mexican Sierra Madres and killed 27 Mexicans.

After that, the new Chihuahuan governor cancelled Kirker’s contract in favor of the state’s own militia. It’s very possible he got the message that the Apaches sent by attacking so deep into Mexico.

OR, this policy didn’t just anger the Apaches but also angered all of the Indians in the northern frontiers of Mexico. After all, a scalp with black hair’s a scalp with black hair wether it came from an Apache, an O’odham, or even… a Mexican! Those with less or no morals found it quite easy to bring in just any ole scalp of dark hair and say, look, this was once on an Apache’s head. Now pay me. So the policy was scrapped… for now.

This is not the last we will hear of Kirker, by the way.

Here’s a quote from Sweeney:

What Mangas possessed more than any other Chiricahua leader, at least from 1842 to 1857, was a self-confidence, bordering on arrogance, that, like a magnet, attracted fighting men from every Chiricahua band for incursions into Sonora. He was a cerebral leader, an organizer, planner, and diplomat, who led by actions, reputation, demonstrated intellect, and impressive stature. End quote.

I had not planned on making Mangas Coloradas the key character of this episode but not only does his life mirror the time frame I had planned on talking about the Apache but he is such a main actor in the vital events of this Mexican period when the Americans are entering the scene. Not to mention, he’s just so dang interesting.

Besides being such a great warrior and leader of Apache men, he lived in the most beautiful of places in the Mogollon Mountains area. He met so many interesting people. He had 4 wives. Although two were murdered by Johnson. And he had up to 15 children. And his children would go on and do incredible things for the Apaches as well.

Mangas loved his family and later American officials would record how other Apaches regarded the Mangas Coloradas clan as aristocracy. And they WERE aristocracy. One of his daughters wed a Navajo chief. Another daughter married Cochise, for goodness sakes! Other children married chiefs and leaders of a whole host of other Apache bands to the east and west of the Mogollons. Many of his sons gained prominent leadership positions after Mangas’ death. Especially his youngest son, Mangas. Without the Coloradas.

In 1842, after years of death and destruction many Apache leaders, some of whom had children in the custody of the Mexicans which suggests they were forced to do this, but many Apache leaders signed a peace deal with Chihuahua. One core component of the treaty was that rations would return to the Apaches who signed it. This treaty was actually quite successful and would result in two years of increased peace. Although not complete peace. Mangas hadn’t signed the deal, after all.

And during this time he’d keep up the heat on Sonora forcing more residents to flee. At the same time he was using his ties with the other tribes like the Navajos and the western Apaches to keep the heat turned up on both New Mexico and other areas of Mexico respectively.

But it had been a decade of brutal war, death, fire. Everyone on both sides were tired.

Not to mention one of the factions in that long lasting civil war in Sonora had temporarily won and he was threatening to take his successful troops north to beat the Apaches. For good.

So on march 31st, 1843, Mangas did the unthinkable. He signed a peace treaty with the Mexicans. Specifically with the state of Chihuahua. Sweeney writes this of the momentous event:

The agreement was typical of past treaties. In essence, both sides would cease hostilities and agree to "a most sincere peace." Each consented to release their captives, and the Apaches agreed to assist Mexican troops against enemy forces. In return, Monterde would issue rations. The Apaches unanimously elected Mangas Coloradas to serve as "general." He would be the leader responsible for maintaining control of his people. It would be a position that he took seriously. End all quotes.

Monterde was Jose Mariano Monterde, the governor of Chihuahua. He was the same age as mangas at 50 and he too was a lifelong military man. He was from Mexico City. He was a man with a quote unquote impeccable reputation and he left Chihuahua city to personally meet with the General of the Apaches, Mangas Coloradas for this event.

Of course, keeping the peace wasn’t easy and only weeks later a raiding party that most likely was led by one of Mangas’ own sons hit El Paso. And then another hit Janos. But the raiding party that struck Janos were told by Mangas Coloradas himself to return the stolen goods. This interaction was even witnessed by Mexican military officials. Mangas Coloradas really was trying to keep the peace.

And then, Mangas began a series of even more unthinkable actions! He was going to make peace with his enemy Sonora as well…

At least, until the Norteños of Sonora royally screwed that up.

After a raid on Fronteras by warring Apache, 7 peaceful Chiricahua Apache that happened to be at the fort, assisted the Mexican military in pursuing the culprits. But for some unknown reason at some point during the pursuit, the Mexicans pointed their guns at their Apache allies and killed six of them. The 7th ran to Apacheria and spread word of the depredation like wildfire.

Over in Chihuahua the peace was already crumbling and it was made worse when the governor realized he couldn’t keep up the rations he had promised to the Apache. Part of the problem with the lack of provisions was that the fields that needed to be tended to in order to get the food that was necessary for the rations… they had been left unattended on account of the dangers that the constant Apache raids presented. So the Apache’s past raids on the Mexicans prevented the Apaches from currently getting the rations they needed from the Mexican government in order to not further raid the Mexicans.

Peace seemed hopeless. But peace with Chihuahua, for now, lasted. Peace with Sonora? That was an impossibility.

Sweeney writes of this, quote:

Beginning in late 1843, the Chiricahuas launched several war parties against Sonora (many led by Mangas Coloradas and the venerable Pisago Cabezón) which increased in severity almost monthly through early 1845. This gruesome cycle of revenge and retaliation characterized the mid-1840s. Many innocent people would fall on both sides, victims of an Apache arrow or lance, a Mexican machete or musket ball. Mangas Coloradas would never again consider making peace with Sonora, and it would be seven long years before he would even contemplate another agreement with Chihuahua. End quote.

Rather than continue with the violent details of this blood feud between Sonora and the Chiricahua Apaches, between Elias Gonzales and Mangas Coloradas in these early years of the 1840s, I’ll sum it up with, Elias Gonzales and his Sonoran troops inflicted many wounds and deaths upon the Apaches but they were mostly of the peaceful Apaches near the presidios. In response, Mangas led the warring Apaches on violent reprisals deep into Sonora. In response to that, Elias would raid the Apaches in Chihuahua! Meanwhile, the Sonoran civil war continued as the Mexicans killed each other. The Mexicans also fought at this time against the Papagos, The Yaquis, and the western Apaches.

The Mexican Secretary of State in 1844 said about this situation and the Apaches, quote, They belong to that Indigenous race that did not receive even one of those weak rays of light that existed in the continent before the conquest introduced European civilization… he goes on to say, quote, These tribes maintained with the Spanish a war of three hundred years duration, forever marked by deeds of horror and cruelty. End quote.

These deeds of horror and cruelty were on both sides. And they would continue. The northern streams of Mexico ran with blood. The vultures never hungered. The god of war never slept.

Unfortunately, I can’t just skip over that illegal raid into Chihuahua by Elias and his 600 Sonoran and federal troops. This action would severely inflame the war that Mangas Coloradas at this time described as being quote, it would be war to the knife. End quote.

80 Apaches would be killed during the raid that saw Elias cross over in Chihuahua from Sonora illegally and surround Janos. Mostly women and children were the victims. While 30 Apaches were captured and taken prisoner. Many of these dead or captured Apaches were friends and relatives of Mangas.

One survivor of Elias Gonzales’ raid claimed the Mexicans killed quite a few children by, quote, beating them against rocks, end quote.

After the raid, every single Chiricahua band was officially once again at war with Sonora. And unofficially, they were at war with Chihuahua yet again as well. In 1844 the number of raids on that Mexican state totaled ten. In 1845, Chihuahua would suffer 218 Apache raids. From 10 scattered raids to 218 in one year. Peace, it seems, had bled out.

Besides the violence that erupted from this raid by Elias, another outcome was the moving of illicit goods from Chihuahua to New Mexico. Elias brought back stolen guns, horses, mules, and goods from Janos that had been taken from Sonora. Everyone knew this was going on but Sonora complained to Mexico City that chihuahua’s policy towards the Apaches, while keeping them safe, made it impossible for peace in Sonora because the Apache’s had a market for their stolen goods in Chihuahua. Elias wasn’t wrong. And DF understood that so measures were taken to eliminate this illicit trade… but in reality, the trade just moved north to the even more ill ran Mexican state of New Mexico. Specifically to the town of Socorro.

It is now time to bring back Kirker, Carson, and to introduce y’all to Goyakla. You may know him better as Geronimo.

In late 1845, Mexican Norteño officials organized 340 men including Kirker and 30 of his mercenaries. They would do what they were hired to do and they would raid Apache settlements and they would kill Indians and they would take scalps.

But they were just getting started.

In July of 1846, Kirker, Spybuck, and 24 other mercenaries would leave Chihuahua City for the town of Galeana where they would put an insidious plan into motion the Chiricahua Apaches would never forget. It made Johnson’s Massacre look like T-ball.

Kirker convinced the Mexicans to reach out to the nearby Chokonen and Nednhi Chiricahuas and offer them a seat at the table for a peace treaty and a feast.

On July 6th, the Chiricahuas arrived, the feast was laid out by the Mexican hosts, the alcohol was poured freely, a party was had. And then the Apaches passed out.

I debated on wether I should read this or not but… it’s horrific stuff that I’m about to share. This is from Sweeney who will quote Mangas Coloradas himself:

In the early morning of July 7, 1846, Kirker's barbaric party massacred the inebriated Chiricahuas in their sleep. The mercenaries ruthlessly slaughtered some 130 Chiricahuas, consisting of Chokonens and Nednhis. Age and sex were irrelevant; Kirker's crew systematically cut down and butchered any Indians in their path. In referring to the incident, Mangas Coloradas said that "my people were invited to a feast; aguardiente or whiskey was there; my people drank and became intoxicated, and were lying asleep, when a party of Mexicans came in and beat out their brains with clubs." Kirker's party slaughtered everyone they laid their hands on, including one pregnant woman whose child was "torn alive from the yet palpitating body of its mother, first plunged into the holy water to be baptized, and immediately its brains were dashed against a wall." After their deed, Kirker's party marched to the city of Chihuahua, "the scalps carried on poles... in procession, headed by the Governor and priests, with bands of music escorting them in triumph to the town. End all quotes.

Paul Andrew Hutton writes of the aftermath, quote:

Spybuck supervised the scalping, for his Shawnees had perfected a rapid technique. A neat circle was cut at the crown of the victim’s head. The scalper then grabbed hold of the Apache’s long hair and pushed off with his feet against the victim’s shoulders. A loud pop followed as the scalp came off. The scalps were taken to Spybuck, who treated them with some salt for preservation and attached them to long scalp poles. End quote.

Obviously, a party followed the massacre and the parade. A fiesta, if you will, during which time, the priests decorated the front of the church… with the Apache scalps.

That previously mentioned English explorer, George Ruxton, he was there and commented on the affair and said, quote, opposite the principal entrance, over the portals which form one side of the square, were dangling the grim scalps of one hundred and seventy apaches, who had been inhumanly butchered by the Indian hunters in pay of the state. End quote.

After the horrific incident, one Mexican soldier was quoted as saying, all hope for peace… is gone.

That soldier was more right than he could have known. For the Norteños and for the Nation of Mexico, an even larger war was marching from the north in an unstoppable column. And it was going to crush every Mexican rock and thorn that stood in its way towards Manifest Destiny.

Obviously… revenge by the Apaches was inevitable. Cuchillo Negro, or black knife, the chief of the Warm Springs Apaches called all of the bands who had lost someone, which was dang near every band, but Black Knife called together all the Apache tribes for a grand council. Mangas Coloradas was definitely in attendance. Mangas’s son-in-law Cochise was also there.

The plan hatched at the meeting was that the town of Galeana must be destroyed.

After the council a massive fire was built and the chief’s and their warriors danced around it. Goyahkla himself, Geronimo, danced around this fire.

Goyahkla had also grown up in the Mogollon Mountains like Mangas Coloradas. He was not a chief, but instead he was a warrior. A warrior and a man with true spiritual power as well. Essentially, a medicine man.

Paul Andrew Hutton writes of Geronimo, quote:

When he was about nine or ten, what the Apaches called "Night the Stars Fell" occurred. This majestic 1832 meteor shower terrified people all across North America. Three years later it was followed by the equally awesome appearance of Halley's Comet. Goyahkla understood that both of these cosmic events portended great changes to come. He sensed a call to glory and greatness while others shrank before a dark omen of calamity. End quote.

When the warriors that were selected to participate on the siege of Galeana were chosen, they lined up by the giant roaring fire and across from the drummers and danced with their weapons in mock combat. The time for revenge was almost upon the warriors.

Meanwhile, Sonora and Chihuahua made the absolutely unprecedented move to join forces. They put their past squabbles behind them and they decided that eradication of the Apaches was now absolutely necessary. Before the Apaches could plan any reprisals. The Norteños of Mexico were declaring war on the Apaches.

After the council and back at their various camps, the Apaches received news of the Mexicans planned war of extermination. So they began to prepare more lances, arrows, and bows. They also readied their muskets. War was inevitable.

And then… Kit Carson, with 16 men, who were heading from California… all the way to Washington DC. Kit Carson and his 16 men wandered into the camp of Mangas Coloradas right outside of modern day Silver City. Carson had news of John C Fremont’s taking of California and he needed to personally deliver that message to the capital. Which is… or would have been an astounding journey. If he had gotten to complete it.

At Mangas Coloradas camp, Kit Carson, who had met the man previously, although he was known as Fuerte back then, but Kit Carson knew the warrior chief and in camp they talked, they were friendly, they traded, and Mangas gave the lot of the Americans fresh mounts since theirs had been dang near depleted.

It was during this meeting though, that Mangas or another Chiricahua chief, but maybe Mangas, he gave Kit Carson some astounding news: An American General was in possession of the Territory of New Mexico.

In May of 1846, two months before Kirker’s massacre, The Untied States of America declared war against Mexico. It only took an amazingly short one month for The republic to muster troops and militiamen and to begin their march southward.

On June 30th, with 1,568 men soon to be Brigadier General Stephen Watts Kearny set out from Kansas on his long march towards New Mexico. Santa Fe to be precise. He, his men, and two other groups of soldiers made up what would be known as The Army of the West. The two other groups consisted of Colonel Sterling Price and his 1,200 men and a unit of 500 Men and many of their wives that would become known as the Mormon Battalion. Of course they will get their own episode or series in the future. I’ll most likely do a whole series on the Mexican American War and have an episode dedicated to the Mormon Battalion and their longest march in American military history.

On August 14th of that year, from a rooftop in the beautiful little town of Las Vegas, New Mexico, Colonel Stephen Watts Kearny made this proclamation to the newest residents of the United States:

Mr. Alcalde and people of New Mexico: I have come amongst you by the orders of my Government to take possession of your country and extend over it the laws of the United States. We come among you for your benefit-not for your injury.

Henceforth I absolve you from all allegiance to the Mexican Government. . . . I am your Governor. I shall not expect you to take up arms and follow me, to fight your own people who may oppose me; but I now tell you that those who remain peaceably at home, attending to their crops and their herds, shall be protected by me in their property, their persons, and their religion; and not a pepper, nor an onion, shall be disturbed or taken by my troops without pay or by the consent of their owner.

From the Mexican Government you have never received protection. The Apaches and Navajos come down from the mountains and carry off your sheep, and even your women, whenever they please. My Government will correct all this.

It will keep off the Indians, protect you in your persons and property; and, I repeat again, will protect you in your religion. End quote.

It would take the Americans, the newest wards of the Apache Indians, but it would take the US another 50 years to subdue the Apaches.

Four days later though, Kearny had taken Santa Fe. Which meant he had New Mexico.

Shortly after liberating Santa Fe from the Mexicans, Kearny would leave the oldest capitol in the US and he would meet with various peoples and tribes around Santa Fe to assuage their fears. It sounds very old school Spanish style governorship.

At one such meeting though, on September 23rd, General Kearny met with a Jicarilla Apache chief by the name of Chacon. Present at this meeting, was future Confederate Colonel John T Hughes who would write the interaction down. He’d publish a popular memoir after the war. Hughes wrote this of the interaction between General Kearny and the chief, quote:

The chief of one branch of the Apaches, with about thirty of his tribe, came to hold a grand council with the Governor-General. The general made a long speech to him through an interpreter encouraging them to industry and peaceful pursuits, and particularly to the cultivation of the soil, as the surest and best mode of procuring an honorable subsistence; that they must desist from all robberies and the committing of all crimes against the laws of the territory; that if they did not, he would send his soldiers amongst them and destroy them from the earth; but if they would be peaceable towards their white brethren, he would protect and defend them as he would the New Mexicans and make them all brothers to the white people and citizens of the same republic and children of the same father, the President, at Washington City.

To all these things the venerable Sachem replied in a spirit worthy of his tribe. He said, 'Father, you give good advice for me and my people; but I am now old and unable to work, and my tribe are unaccustomed to cultivating the soil for subsistence. The Apaches are poor; they have no clothes to protect them from the cold, and the game is fast disappearing from their hunting grounds. You must, therefore, if you wish us to be peaceable, speak a good word to the Comanches, the Yutes, the Navajos, and the Arapahoes, our enemies, that they will allow us to kill buffalo on the great plains. You are rich— you have a great nation to feed and clothe you—I am poor, and have to crawl on my belly, like a cat, to shoot deer and buffalo for my people. I am not a bad man; I do not rob and steal; I speak truth. The Great Spirit gave me an honest heart and a straight tongue. I have not two tongues that I should speak forked.

He continues:

My skin is red, my head sun-burnt, my eyes are dim with age, and I am a poor Indian, a dog; yet I am not guilty. There is no guilt there (putting his hand on his breast), no! I can look you in the face like a man. In the morning of my days, my muscles were strong; my arm was stout; my eyes were bright; my mind was clear; but now I am weak, shriveled up with age; yet my heart is big, my tongue is straight. I will take your counsel because I am weak and you are strong. End all quotes.

Obviously, there was just no way the United States could nor was it willing to, allow the Apaches to hunt buffalo on the Great Plains. For soon, the Buffalo would be all but extinct in the Buffalo Kingdom anyways. Not to mention, the place the Apaches used to call Apacheria was then Comancheria. It was also the Land of the northern plains tribes. No, the Apache would soon find out that they were destined for the reservation system. But that’s for the next episode.

Two days after his meeting with the Jicarilla Apache chief, Kearny would head for California with 300 men. They were all guided by an old Mountain Man named Thomas Broken Hand Fitzpatrick and they were following the Rio Grande south… right into Apacheria.

Quick note about Broken Hand, he was one of the west’s most famous and greatest mountain men. He was a trapper, trader, guide, Indian fighter, and later, an Indian agent up north. He was from Ireland but he took to the west nicely. His nickname broken hand, was on account of a firearms accident he suffered that left his left hand useless. Always unload your guns before cleaning.

But, on October 6th, Kearny and his men came upon Kit Carson and his 16 men near Socorro, New Mexico. The two groups exchanged their various pieces of game changing information and then Carson told Kearny that look, don’t worry about them Apaches, they are stoked that we are at war with the Mexicans. They hate those guys and it seems like the Mexicans are about to exterminate the Apaches so they’ll definitely fight with us. No worries. Or something to that effect.

With that news, and the news that California had already been taken by the Americans, Kearny decided to cut his 300 men by 2/3rds. He kept only 100. He also turned Broken Hand Fitzpatrick around and told him to instead take the news to Washington about California. He then turned Carson back around and said, congratulations you’re now in the Army and I need you to take me to California.

Also on that same day, October 6th, 1846, another famous American military leader and map maker, Lieutenant William H Emory, he passed through Apacheria as well and he too ran into some Apaches, possibly the first real meeting of American Army personnel and the Apaches.

Emory was on the Rio Grande near a place called Valverde which… I could not locate, honestly, but he was at this place when his Indian guides spotted the Apaches. Well, later that evening, the Apaches came down into the American’s camp. Frank C Lockwood sums up what happens next and he quotes Emory while doing so. Emory wrote Notes of a Military Reconnaissance after these incidences of the Mexican American War. Quote:

They came down to the American camp in a very friendly spirit, and after a council with the officers, quoting Emory, quote, swore eternal friendship, as usual, no doubt, with the mental reservation to rob the first American of Mexican they should meet unprotected. End quote. The story continues:

They supplied the expedition with four young warriors as guides. Emory describes them as quote, smirking and deceitful looking. End quote. Even at this early period, some of them had firearms. End all quotes.

Clearly, Emory did not have a high opinion of the Apaches.

On October 18th, two miles from the ghost town of Santa Rita del Cobre, Kearny and his 100 men sat down in camp with the giant warrior legend himself; Mangas Coloradas. Mangas would give Kearny the nickname Horse Chief of the Long Knives. Which I think is awesome.

Paul Andrew Hutton writes that this is the first time a representative of the United States Government, Kearny, and a leader of the Chiricahua Indians, Mangas, met. Although, it would not be the last. Except this one was on much better terms than later meetings will be. And Carson had an inkling of that. Hutton says this of the meeting, quote:

Mangas pledged "good faith and friendship to all Americans," pleased to have an ally in his tribe's war against the common enemy, Mexico. As Kearny presented Mangas with several presents, Carson turned to Kearny's companion, Lieutenant Emory, and winked.

Now quoting Carson, quote, I would not trust one of them, end quote, he said of Mangas's pledges with a wry smile. End all quotes.

The following day, as they were trading again, Lt. Emory would comment that these Apache men reminded him of, quote, pictures of antique Grecian warriors. End quote. He was quite impressed with their physique. He was also impressed with their ability to trade. He would make one more comment though and this one speaks to their humanity. It seems his opinion of them changed rapidly.

He wrote in his journal, quote, there was amongst them a poor deformed woman, with legs and arms no longer than an infants. She was well touted, and the gallant manner in which some of the plumed Apaches waited on her, for she was perfectly helpless when dismounted, made it hard for me to believe the tales of blood and vice told of these people. End quote.

As Kearny and his Americans left for California, Hutton tells a story of an Apache warrior who approached the group and told them some… rather fiery advice in regards to their attitudes towards the Mexicans. This Apache said, quote, you have taken New Mexico, and will soon take California; go then and take Chihuahua, Durango, and Sonora. We will help you. The Mexicans are rascals, we hate and will kill them all. End quote.

Right behind Kearny was Lt. Colonel Phillip Cooke and his Mormon Battalion and it’s very probable that Mangas Coloradas met with them as he had met with Kearny. He would at least later tell an American boundary commissioner that he had indeed met Cooke and his Mormons.

During this time, while Cooke and the Mormon Battalion traipsed through Tucson, the Mexicans put up not a single ounce of fight. Why should these Norteños care? Their real enemy was the Apache and they needed to conserve every bullet for that real and true enemy.

Jacoby describes the situation like this, quote,

The position of Sonora in the unfolding conflict was marked by deep ambivalence. Outraged that the central government had allowed the presidio system to collapse, the Sonoran government initially declined to contribute to the war effort. In December of 1846, for example, troops at Tucson offered no opposition to the American forces that passed through the presidio on their way to California. Sonorans justified such behavior by explaining that they needed to conserve their limited resources to fight the province's more pressing war with "the Apache barbarians." End quote.

So the reason the Mormon Battalion, the only religious unit to ever exist in the United States Military, the reason the Mormons never fought in a single battle during the Mexican American war, despite traveling from far eastern Iowa to Nebraska, to Kansas and Oklahoma, Colorado, southern New Mexico, southern Arizona, San Diego, Los Angeles, Monterrey, the Sierra Nevadas where they buried the Donner Party, and then through Nevada, and then Salt Lake… despite that enormous march, the Mormons never had a single battle with the Mexicans. Well now it makes sense. The Mexicans didn’t fire cause they feared the Apaches even more.

Shortly after that incursion into Mexico by the Mormon Battalion, the vice governor of Sonora, Luis Redondo, issued this decree:

The Enemy Apache, joined together with a considerable number of North Americans, have already penetrated to the outskirts of the presidio of Fronteras. End quote. He then admonishes his people to expel the invaders so that they will quote, be recorded in the annals of history. End quote.

The Mexicans were right to fear the Apaches. By the fall of 1846, it was time for the Apaches under Cuchillo Negro to exact revenge on Galeana.

In between visits from American Military Leaders, the Chiricahua Apaches numbering anywhere from 175 to 200 warriors, headed down into Mexico and towards Galeana. Among the fighters were Cuchillo Negro, Mangas Coloradas, Cochise, and Goyahkla, aka Geronimo.

There are no Mexican sources on this revenge raid so the only account is an oral account much later by an Apache named Betzinez. He wrote that oral account down though and published his very reliable narrative which I will use in the next episode about the latter Apache wars. Betzinez says that despite some Apaches falling in the beginning of the battle, the attack was a glorious victory. He would hear stories of it retold throughout his entire life. He said of the incident, quote, the men who took part in this battle, especially those who were my kinsmen, later told me that everyone agreed that this was the greatest of Apache victories. ... The whole tribe were tremendously proud of their fighting men and for years thereafter loved to hear the stories of the battle retold. End quote.

In 1849, a New Orleans journalist named Thomas Durivage visited Galeana and wrote that it was, quote, once a flourishing spot but the Indians have been its ruin and impoverished its wealthiest citizens. End quote.

In 47 and 48, during the Mexican American war, the back and forth tit for tat continued between the Norteños and the Apaches. Some Apaches sued for peace. Others continued war. There were atrocities. Killings. Lots of captives taken by the Apaches so they could trade for their imprisoned people. Mangas is barely mentioned. Horses and mules were stolen. Mexican towns abandoned. Disease brought accidentally by the Americans tore through all the Indians of the region but especially the Apache. And especially the measles. The Americans would continue their march south. They’d blockade Sonora and Chihuahua and Durango though which further exasperated the Mexican’s plight. The Mexican states couldn’t even pay their soldiers who were constantly threatening to mutiny. They were no longer fighting the Americans but the Apache threat obviously never dissipated. Elias Gonzales was yet again put in charge of the defense of Sonora. There were no funds though.

But even as the war with the United States was ending, things only got worse in Sonora and Chihuahua. The Apaches were growing even more bold.

Mostly because, the land most of the Chiricahua called home was now in the United States and they could raid Mexico, flee back to the us, and never worry about any Mexican parties pursuing them across the border.

But then in late June of 1848, Mangas’ very important and brave warrior son in law, Cochise was captured by the Mexicans outside of Fronteras. He was then shackled with irons and thrown in the calaboose! A word I love but a word that just means awful crude jail. Sweeney writes that this calaboose was quote, in actuality a man made cave about twenty feel long that Mexicans had excavated from the side of the hill underneath the presidio. End quote.

He remained a prisoner for 6 weeks.

This turn of events forced Mangas to leave the safety of New Mexico and enter Sonora where the Apaches had been laying siege to the town. He probably never made it in time to witness the freeing of his son in law but he would stay in Sonora for a year until 1849.

The siege on Fronteras though, was so bad the citizens began to starve so the Mexicans sent out a group to find supplies. The Apaches were waiting for this and half of this Mexican group was killed. The other half was taken prisoner.

The Mexicans tried again with the same results. Eventually a peace deal was struck. Prisoners were exchanged. Cochise was freed. Fronteras as a result, was practically abandoned. 250 years of military might and fortitude… forced to be derelict by the Apaches. Not long afterwards, Tubac, Tumacacori, Cocospera, and Oputo were all also completely abandoned.

By February of 1848, the war with the United States was over. The Mexicans lost… badly. The Americans now controlled huge swaths of territory that were once Mexico. Polk’s presidency was a success for Manifest Destiny. The number frequently cited is HALF of Mexican TERRITORY was taken but, most of that quote unquote territory was completely uninhabited by Spaniards or even Mexicans. The populations were nearly entirely genizaros or Indians. Besides New Mexico, a few towns in far southern Arizona, and Southern California, there were no Mexicans living in the territory of the American west that we took as spoils of war. And California and those that remained in southern Arizona, they had no qualms with the Americans taking over anyways. Now of course, that’s my bias showing but the population of these centers were so low that it’s quite the misleading statistic when the reference material state that the US took half of Mexico’s land. While it’s true, the Americans did pay Mexico 15 million dollars for the territory it took. And later the Mexicans would try to sell even more land so…

When the Americans took the territory though, obviously it wasn’t empty and the peoples living on the land became wards of the United States. Including the Apache. And that came with some problems.

One of the reasons the Apaches and the Americans had gotten along alright so far was because the Americans were never there to stay. They hunted or trapped or panned for gold and then they were gone. But now… this land was theirs and they were going to settle it. Immediately that became clear to some of the Apache.

The other problem for the Apaches was Article XI of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, it states that the US now has to keep the Apache from invading Mexico AND neither Americans nor Apache could buy stolen goods from Mexico. While this may have worried the Apache though, as Sweeney puts it quote, Most well-meaning American officials would ignore this requirement, realizing that it was a condition impossible to enforce. End quote.

As we know and as the Mexicans knew at that time, the Apache went wherever they wanted. Three hundred years of war had not stopped them from raiding or roving. And when they came back with Mexican stuff, well, the Americans enjoyed purchasing cheaper things that were stolen from Mexico. Especially cattle. And mules.

Instead of the new border helping the Mexicans in the northern section of their nation that bordered the United States, this new border actually HURT the Mexicans way more. Now, the Chiricahua and Western Apaches felt bold and even safe raiding Sonoran towns because they could just run back into the US without fear of the Mexicans chasing them.

In 1849, one such raid into Sonora was so bad that 86 Mexicans lost their lives at the hands of the marauding Apaches. And for that, the Americans would have to pay. Because the treaty also stated that the Americans would pay for Apache depredations that originated on the US side of the border. That was something even early officials knew would end up costing millions.

Another provision was that the US would force the Apaches to return any Mexican captives they may take during their raids. This one hurt the Apaches when it was occasionally enforced and it would cause some souring relations. If they couldn’t take captives, how would they get their own captured people back?

A year after the war ended, gold was found in California which was thankfully now in the hands of the Americans. When gold was found, the world rushed in. Many Mexicans at this time fled from Northern Mexico for California in search of their golden future. And to escape Apache raids. Upwards of five or six thousand Mexicans abandoned the war ravaged territory for the golden hills of California, leaving the land seemingly defenseless. The Apache took notice and by the end of 1849, large Apache war parties were roaming the state of Sonora with impunity.

One of these roving war parties was 200 strong and they attacked 150 miles deep into Sonora, almost to the capitol! They would kill every single Mexican and Mexican allied Indian they came across. Men, women, and children. The number reported to the governor was 98 people killed, 22 wounded, and seven captured in January of 49. There is little doubt that this party was led by Miguel Narbona, a prominent Chiricahua war chief, and Mangas Coloradas. There’s good evidence Cochise was there as well.

As for the men captured by the Chiricahua Apache… what little life they had left was not going to be pleasant. Towards the end of the 19th century, a Chiricahua Apache summed up what happens to the captured when he described it to anthropologist Morris Opler. Quote:

The Chiricahuas treated Mexicans in a rough way when they were captured... These Chiricahuas were more the enemies of the Mexicans than of any other people on earth, because the Mexicans treated these Chiricahuas in a nasty way.

They say they used to tie Mexicans with their hands behind their backs. They then turned the women loose with axes and knives to kill the Mexican prisoner. The man could hardly run, and the women would chase him around until they killed him. . . . Usually the people whose relatives had been killed wanted it to be done. They wanted to have their way about it. End quote.

Throughout this time of the late 1840s early 1850s I read about more attacks and raids and villages burning on both sides than I can fathom. Every time, it was 20 dead 5 captured, 8 dead 4 captured, towns burnt down with the bodies strewn across the fields, just over and over and over again. This was truly a war between the Mexicans and the Chiricahua Apaches. To recall all of these battles to y'all would be tiring, unnecessary, and disheartening. The Mexicans were paying for their treachery with ample amounts of blood. Sure, they’d score a few wins under Elias Gonzales and his men but they were rarer than the bloody Apache wins.

Some Apaches were suing for peace. One Apache quote unquote chief would even promise to kill Mangas Coloradas for the authorities in Chihuahua. He would die under mysterious circumstances shortly after that declaration.

Needless to say, there was a lot of death in northern Mexico by the Apaches at this time. All the while, the Americans and the Apaches were both growing leery of each other.

By 1849 battles between the Americans and the Apaches were growing in number and intensity.

For starters, the Americans had moved into Santa Rita del Cobre, which had been abandoned for over a decade. They were moving into the Mimbres mountains in search of gold. The Americans were actually moving into every part of Apacheria. Moving into and moving through on their way to California. American Cattle were being stolen by the Apaches and their Texan cowboys were being killed. American military leaders were being killed in skirmishes.

But the Americans were better armed and better trained and the Apaches could tell the difference. And the Americans had no qualms of crossing the border and pursuing the Apaches into Mexico.

But… just as it appeared that the peace factions of Apaches and the government of Chihuahua were going to sign peace deals in 1849, the state governments of Chihuahua AND Durango reinstitute the scalp policy which they called the Fifths Law. Obviously this made things worse yet again. This time it was $200 for a scalp and $250 for a live warrior. Kirker and his mercenaries were back on the trail.

In 1985 one of the greatest American novels ever written was published. That novel is Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian OR The Evening Redness in the West. It is possibly my favorite work of fiction or at least it’s up there. I essentially coerced my wife into reading it shortly after we got married. I think it’s an exceptionally important novel and it focuses on this exact time period of the scalp hunters in Chihuahua. The main character, the Kid, joins up with Anglo scalp hunters and some truly horrendous and unbelievable things occur while the Glanton Gang is led by a mysterious hairless man known as Judge Holden who may actually be the devil himself. If you have not read it, I implore you to press pause on this, pick it up, and read it cover to cover. It’s tough at times but its very good. But John Joel Glanton, he was a real person. He hunted for scalps in Chihuahua in 1849. Especially after the Apaches massacred a group of American, German, and French gold seekers who were headed to California.

Clearly, some of the problems with bringing back scalps are addressed in the book like oh, long black hair’s black hair no matter if it came from a Yaqui or an Apache or for the Anglos… a Mexican. It’s an ill advised practice and it enflamed relations to an even worse level than they already were at that time. The Contracts of Blood as the Apaches called them, the scalp laws were rescinded before the year was even over.

One of the very first Anglo cattle ranchers in the American Southwest was… none other, than Mr Kit Carson and in 1849 he and a friend had started over after the Mexican American war and had started a ranch he called Rayado that was situated in the Rayado valley of northern New Mexico in the town of Rayado. The town was the first town founded after the Mexican American War on the great plains side of New Mexico. The town and Carson’s Ranch were just off the Santa Fe Trail and just south of the town of Cimarron. It sits right at the base of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. The most southern Rocky Mountains. The mountains I live just south of. Today you can visit Kit Carson Mesa in Rayado and the Kit Carson Museum. The whole area is quite some distance from the Southern New Mexican Chiricahua Apache that I’ve been discussing at length. This is just a little reprieve from the southern deserts of the Chiricahua and Norteños.

So in 1849, Kit Carson is on the far southern end of the Rocky Mountains on the Eastern Great Plains side of them. This was very much Comancheria. But it was also Apacheria. This land before the Comanche, this area was claimed by the buffalo hunting, migratory, dog sled using Apaches that would eventually be known as the Jicarilla Apaches. But by 1849, they were a shadow of their former self.

Hapton Sides in Blood and Thunder writes this of the Jicarilla:

The Jicarillas had few allies. They were overpowered by larger, better-armed, and more cohesive warrior tribes of the plains, especially the Comanches, who made frequent incursions into their territory.

The Jicarillas were a cornered people, living in the interstices, in the shadow of stronger nations. Years later a spokesman of the Jicarillas would remember this dark time when everyone in the tribe seemed plunged in fear. "At the first sound, even a shout, they all made for the brush," he recalled. "And whenever they went out on the plains, they were afraid to stay there.”

Sides continues:

Since the American occupation of New Mexico, the Jicarilla hunting grounds had consistently thinned as new settlers moved into their already attenuated territory. Squeezed in this way, the Jicarillas turned to raiding. End all quotes.

I’ll actually just continue to quote Sides because he sums up this Jicarilla history at this time quite well and uses great quotes in doing so. Quote:

For several years the outrages committed by the Jicarillas had been hotly discussed throughout this part of the territory. An army lieutenant stationed in Taos reported in the summer of 1849 that the Jicarillas were quote, robbing everywhere throughout the mountains. End quote.

Col. George A.McGill at the time described the Jicarillas as quote unquote troublesome and quote unquote in-corrigible, and darkly predicted that they would quote, continue to rob and murder our citizens until they are exterminated.

When he was governor, Charles Bent characterized the Jicarilla Apaches as quote unquote, a great annoyance to life in New Mexico. They were "an indolent and cowardly people," he wrote, "living principally by thefts committed on the Mexicans, there being but little game in the country through which they range, and the fear of other Indians not permitting them to venture on the plains for buffalo.” End all quotes.

With anywhere from 500 to 1,000 people within the Jicarilla band at this time, that extermination would not have been difficult. Thankfully it didn’t happen though. But the Jicarilla Apache people were desperate. And hungry. Their game in the mountains and on the plains was thinning out. And they often weren’t welcome in the mountains or on the plains they needed to hunt on anyways. They were not adept at farming. They, like their southern cousins, depended on raiding to stay alive. Sides remarks, quote: In the three years since the American occupation, the Jicarillas had swiped many thousands of sheep from ranchers in northeastern New Mexico. End quote.

Kit Carson and his friend Maxwell whom he had the ranch with, they knew this and they expected it. They had many and often run-ins with the Apache in what Kid Carson and other residents of the area called dinner stops. These stops were requests backed by a plethora of warriors for food tobacco and other various gifts that the Anglo land owner could not refuse to give.

But not everyone knew this lesson of giving gifts when the Apaches demanded them. Some travelers even considered the Apache bribes as highway robbery. Some travelers would refuse to hand over what was asked. Some travelers would learn a hard lesson.

One such traveling party in October of 1849, became known as the White Party which was headed by James White. Along with him was his wife Ann, their daughter, their servant, a German named Lawberger, another unnamed American, and his Mexican servant. When the Apaches appeared the first time in few numbers, White shooed them away while refusing to pay. Shortly afterwards though, the same Apaches reappeared but with many more of them. Again, with rifles and knives, James White refused to pay. I will once again quote Hampton Sides book about Kit Carson to sum up the tragedy that ensued:

They, meaning the Apache, they descended in a storm of arrows, promptly killing White's Mexican escort, who fell into the burning campfire. The travelers attempted to flee but did not get far. Soon the bodies of White and his two other guides bristled with shafts. The Indians scooped up Ann White, her daughter, and the servant, and stole across the prairie. End quote.

But not all the Apaches fled. Some of them hid nearby the ransacked carriages and dead bodies and waited for more travelers to come so that they could also raid them. And that’s just what happened. Except, this Mexican caravan somehow escaped… well, all but one escaped. A young boy had been shot with an arrow and had played dead and his Mexican escorts had left him there. After everyone was gone, he got back up and walked until he was rescued. In Santa Fe, he told the authorities what had happened. Before long, a one thousand dollar reward for retrieving Ann White was declared.

A week later, some Puebloans told the authorities that they had been in the camp of some Jicarillas when they noticed a white woman and her baby. They were both in distress. Immediately after the news spread, a company of 1st Dragoons under Major William Grier was dispatched to track down the woman. But their first stop was on the other side of the mountains, at the home of Kit Carson.

Carson wasn’t too hard persuaded and immediately off he went with Maj Grier and the Dragoons towards the site of the massacre which was only about 40 miles east of Rayado.

Dragoons just means cavalry. Before the Civil War that’s what the US Army called them. That was the popular term for cavalry in Europe.

At the site of the massacre, everything but the bodies, which had been buried earlier, was as it had been. Everything was broken into and everything the Apaches couldn’t carry was destroyed. It was now early November and there was a little bit of light snow on the ground and even Carson, possibly the greatest Anglo tracker to have ever lived, even Carson found it impossible to read the signs presented. He said of this quote, it was the most difficult trail that I ever followed. End quote.

But he teased out what information he could and eventually after almost giving up many times, they found a Jicarilla camp and in it… was a woman’s garment. Then, days later he found another camp and in it, another piece of woman’s clothing. Was Ann White leaving a trail? Carson certainly thought so. He would say of finding these garments, quote, it was the cause of renewed energy. End quote.

12 days after they’d started the chase though, Carson and Grier came upon a camp of Jicarilla Apache. The camp was several hundred strong and it was led by a chief known as White Wolf. The camp was on the banks of the Canadian River near Tucumcari, just at the edge of the Llano Estacado. If the Apache fled on the staked plains, finding them would become extremely more difficult.

In Carson’s mind, the only option was to attack. So that’s what he did! He led the entire dragoons and Grier straight for the Jicarilla camp with his galloping horse. Except… Grier had countermanded the order and told everyone to halt and talk things over. He wanted to meet with White Wolf, not charge in to possible defeat. Obviously, Carson wasn’t going in alone so he wheeled his horse around and unhappily met with Grier. Sides writes of what happened next:

He, meaning Carson, he strongly disagreed with Grier's decision to delay. If Ann White was alive and hidden somewhere in the encampment, the Jicarillas would not turn her over without a fight. Grier's best chance of success, Carson felt, was to surprise the Jicarillas in a lightning assault that gave them no time to react. But now precious minutes were dripping away. End quote.

Carson, of course, was right and as soon as the Jicarilla’s spotted the White Eyes, they began packing up in haste. The element of surprise had been lost. But still, Grier waited. On what, I’m not sure, but in the ticking minutes, a ticked off dead shot aim Apache picked up a rifle and shot at Grier. The bullet tore through Grier’s clothing, slammed into his chest without entering his flesh, and knocked him off his horse. Once he’d caught his breath, he ordered the charge.

But it was too late, by the time they reached the camp, the Jicarillas had spread out in all directions. All of them except one who was swimming. He was shot and killed. Another fleeing Apache was shot as well. The news would get worse. Sides writes of the aftermath, quote:

But then Carson spotted something. About two hundred yards from the campsite, a figure was sprawled on the hard-baked plain.

The men rode over to inspect and found to their dismay that it was the corpse of an American woman. Ann White had been shot through the heart with a single arrow. "She was perfectly warm," Carson said, "and had not been killed more than five minutes." By the looks of things, she must have known that her rescuers were at hand. She had been running away from the Jicarillas. Carson wrote, "It was apparent that she was endeavoring to make her escape when she received the fatal shot.” End all quotes.

Ann White’s body told a sad story of captivity, beatings, and… worse. She was covered in bruises and scratches. Carson wrote that she, quote, was a frail, delicate, and very beautiful woman, but having undergone such usage as she suffered nothing but a wreck remained; it was literally covered with blows and scratches. Her countenance even after death indicated a hopeless creature. End quote.

Carson goes on to say of her, quote, she is surely far more happy in heaven, with her god, than among friends of this earth. End quote.

In a sad twist of irony though, found near her body among the abandoned Jicarilla camp was a pulp fiction novel that had recently been published by Charles Averill tilted Kit Carson: The Prince of the Gold Hunters. In it, Carson is ever the Western hero that easterners read by candlelight. Even in 1849, moments after obtaining 66% of its territory, the myth of the west was strong in the minds of Americans. This was the first time the real Carson ran right smack into the myth Carson. He’d later write, quote, The book was the first of its kind I had ever seen, in which I was made a great hero, slaying Indians by the hundred. End quote.

In that novel though, Kit Carson heroically rides into the Indian camp and actually saves the kidnapped girl from Boston. The fictional damsel in distress lived. The real life damsel in distress… was abused and slaughtered. Carson would later say, quote, knowing that I lived near, I have often thought that as Mrs White read the book, she prayed for my appearance and that she would be saved. End quote.

It is a heartbreaking story. One I struggled to read and one I struggle to relay now. But of course, as we have gone through, this was life for the last 300 years for the Apache. Constant death. Constant revenge and sadness.

Carson blamed Grier for her death and not being able to save her. Her death would haunt him for the rest of his life. A decade later, despite Carson never learning how to read, when a friend offered him his own copy of the novel, Carson threatened to quote, burn the damn thing. End quote.

Neither Ann White’s young daughter nor their servant were ever found.

Lobo Blanco, or White Wolf, the Jicarilla Apache chief, he would be killed by a regiment of Dragoons in 1854 by being crushed to death by a boulder.

Back in Sonora and Northern Mexico, 1850 saw much the same as the previous years. Raids, counter raids, murders, fires, death, captures. Etc etc. Elias Gonzales was fired after nearly 20 years of service in Sonora and a haughty man named Colonel Jose Maria Carrasco took over. But there was a brief time where he hadn’t arrived yet and Elias had left which meant Sonora was even more defenseless.

Jacoby writes in Shadows at Dawn of this violent year of 1850, quote:

The following year, reported the Sonoran writer José Velasco, "more than ever the ferocity of these savages spread over the unfortunate Sonora." The Apaches burned haciendas, ran off livestock, attacked caravans bound for California, and carried women and children into captivity. When Mexican troops under Colonel Carasco undertook a retaliatory raid, the Apaches simply "withdrew to the other side of the dividing line.” End all quotes.

Valesco would later write about how the entire northern section of Sonora was eventually abandoned due to the Apache raids as people fled the countryside for larger towns. He wrote, quote, What better testament to apache raids than these deserted fields, sprinkled with blood? What better witnesses than these abandoned haciendas, ranches, and towns? End quote.

Even sheepherding by the Mexicans would eventually cease due to the ferocious and random nature of the Apache raids.

Jacoby writes how the people of these cities that attracted the countryside folks, these people would build huge walls, or dig deep ditches to try to keep away the Apaches. He even states some of these desperate people would keep their animals in their own home at night! But in the end, all these fortifications only served to make it more enticing and exciting for the Apache who still succeeded in stealing from places like Tucson.

It didn’t help that some of these Apache warriors were kidnapped and Apachified Mexicans. This fact horrified the people of Sonora who felt like they were sometimes being attacked by their own kin and neighbors.

In one pitched battle in early 1851 at Pozo Hediondo, Mangas Coloradas, Geronimo, Cochise, Joh, and many other warriors killed every single Mexican officer on the field. Much of that battle was hand to hand combat. War to the knife as Mangas had predicted.

The Mexicans sent reinforcements but once they’d reached the battlefield and saw the many many mangled dead Mexicans, they refused to pursue the Apaches which… well, the Apaches went on to the Presidio of Bacoachi, killed its mayor, a few other residents, and then traded captives before heading back to their various mountain strongholds.

I mentioned a name there, Joh, well that’s Daklugie’s father. Daklugie of Eve Ball’s Indeh. I’ve quoted from him a few times and will quote from him again. Joh was a warrior chief himself and an important one.

Carrasco’s stated Apache policy was quote, war to the death, except females of all ages and males under the age of fifteen. End quote. He himself would not abide by the males only policy. The Mexican forces were also now forbidden to negotiate with the Apaches any longer. No more battles for a while, captures, and then white flags raised, and prisoners exchanged, and each party went their separate ways. It was now extermination of the Apache warrior class.

In March of 1851, in response to the Pozo Hediondo defeat, Carrasco would begin his policy of extermination at Janos.

During one of the many trading parties where the Chiricahuas would trade their stolen Sonoran loot with the Chihuahuans, Carrasco secretly surrounded the town as the Apaches got hammered on mezcal and whiskey.

Predictably, at night, when everyone was asleep, Carrasco attacked and killed as many Apache men, women, and children as he could.

Paul Andrew Hutton writes this of the incident:

A young warrior named Goyahkla (One Who Yawns) found his aged mother alongside his wife and three children, all scalped in pools of blood. "Whenever I saw anything to remind me of former happy days," he declared years later, "my heart would ache for revenge on Mexico." He had a vision while weeping over his loss, and from it came his mystical warrior power. "Goyahkla," said a voice four times—the Apache magical number, "no gun can ever kill you.

I will take the bullets from the guns of Mexicans. And I will guide your arrows." He might be wounded but he could never be killed.

From that day onward, vengeance became his driving passion. In time he exacted ghastly blood atonement from the Mexicans. His terrified enemies called out to Saint Jerome for deliverance and thus gave to him a new name-Geronimo. End quote.

In Eve Ball’s Indeh, Daklugie talks quite a bit about Geronimo. In one quote on his power of never dying, Daklugie says, quote, I think that Ussen's promise is what gave Geronimo his wonderful courage.

He was by nature already a brave person; but if one knows that he will never be killed, why be afraid? I don't know that Geronimo ever told his warriors that he had supernatural protection, but they were with him in many dangerous times and saw his miraculous escapes, his cures for wounds, and the results of his medicine; so his warriors knew that Geronimo was alive only because of Ussen's protection. End quote.

That protection from the creator, Ussen, gave Geronimo a greater ability to exact revenge on his hated enemies.

Daklugie later tells Eve Ball that Geronimo’s enemies, as with all Chiricahua at the time, were the Mexicans. And because of this incident at Janos by Carrasco, Geronimo would forever exact his revenge. He says, quote, in years to come Geronimo took ample revenge upon the Mexicans, and as long as he lived he hated them. I sat beside his bed in the hospital at Fort Sill the night Geronimo died and I know. End quote.

By early 1852, many Chiricahua bands were themselves at war with the Americans. Although not all, and not all the time. Like they were in Mexico. But the trouble had started.

Some of the trouble was on account of the Americans efficiency… and weaponry. Around this time the Americans began using howitzers, cannons, to devastating and frightening effect, on the Apaches.

In January of 52, the Apaches attacked an American outpost after the Army had murdered some Apaches. Two Sargents died in the fighting and a few other soldiers as well. One soldier, a red headed soldier was scalped. Another was badly mutilated. Sweeney mentions very briefly, and I hadn’t seen it anywhere else so it may be one of those sweeping under the rug situations but Sweeney mentions that the red headed soldier was scalped because the Apache believed the red hair had power. Although according to dang near everyone, the Apaches didn’t scalp, right? Daklugie even told Eve Ball that Geronimo didn’t scalp until after his family had been murdered and scalped but that the greater Chiricahua Apache didn’t scalp until after Mangas Coloradas’ death. So… I’m not sure what to believe about the scalping and mutilation that the Apaches apparently did according to American, Mexican, and Spanish sources but which according to the Apache sources, they never did… except for the times they did…

One soldier at the funeral of those slain in that battle wrote this, quote, The triple funeral was a sad ceremony. No funeral is a pleasant one. But a funeral at a lonely frontier military fort after a skirmish in which the comrades who are buried have been killed and one tortured by savages is a sorrowful affair. End quote.

On July 11th, 1852, a momentous event occurred when Mangas Coloradas signed a treaty with the Americans at the ancient Pueblo of Acoma. It would be the only treaty Mangas would ever sign with the Americans in his lifetime. But because he and his people were so remote down in the Mogollon and Burro mountains, according to Sweeney, his life changed little after the agreement. An agreement which he kept! Except for the part about not raiding Sonora. Obviously.

The reason why he even made the treaty in the first place is because Mangas simply could not keep up a two front war. As the skirmishes with the Americans were increasing in frequency and violence, the war with Mexico was becoming more and more difficult. He couldn’t have two sets of invaders declaring extermination on his people.

The meeting at Acoma was a strange turn of events but Mangas was at this time on good terms with the Puebloans and the Navajo and he still respected the Americans and he believed that they would keep their end of the bargain. So Mangas ascended the ancient steps to Acoma, met with the Americans at his own possible demise, and hatched out a peace plan. Trusting the Americans though… would ultimately be Mangas Coloradas demise… but for now, it was all well and good.

He was there to meet the commander of the Ninth Military Department, aka, New Mexico. That man was Lieutenant Colonel Edwin Vose Sumner. He was a Bostonian and he was a stickler for the rules. He’d travelled with Kearny to New Mexico back during the war with Mexico but now he was the military officer in charge of the territory. He was a tough man to get along with but he was a good soldier. During the war with Mexico a musket ball had struck and glanced off his thick skull. It earned him the nickname bull. The only Apache that could match Sumner in arrogance and boldness was Mangas Coloradas.

Wearing the uniform of a Mexican artillery officer whom he had recently slain, Mangas strolled into Sumner’s camp on the ancient Puebloan Mesa and decided to make a deal.

Sweeney sums up the whole affair nicely, quote:

Mangas Coloradas often showed his willingness to parley with Americans, for he usually trusted them (being one of the few Chiricahua leaders who did), even if it meant endangering his own safety. It must have been quite a meeting between the venerable and powerful Chiricahua Apache chief and the martinet from New England. Accompanied by a few of his people, the chief audaciously entered Colonel Sumner's tent, "made himself very much at home," and in a matter-of-fact manner acceded to Sumner: "You are chief of the white men. I am chief of the red men. Now let us have a talk and treat.” Although he was now in his early sixties, Mangas very much impressed John Greiner, who described Mangas as "a magnificent looking Indian. ... He is undoubtedly the master spirit of his tribe." Mangas, who boasted that his "will and word are law to my people," admitted that his people had grown weary of war and now desired peace with Americans. The Mexicans, however, were another story. End quote.

The treaty basically said that the Chiricahua Apache would honor the United States and their new jurisdiction, they’d allow military outposts to be built, and that they’d have friendly relations with the Americans. For a time, that friendly relations with the Americans would hold. It was a good plan.

The only hiccups in the region at this time were the illicit trading the Army did with the Apaches and the fact that the Apache couldn’t help themselves when it came to taking Mexican prisoners.

It also didn’t help that the appointed Indian Agents were also in on the illicit trading. Often the Army and the Indian agents had no problem trading whiskey for stolen Mexican livestock, mules, and horses. The problems with this arrangement are self evident.

Mangas Coloradas though, he still didn’t mind the Americans and he got along fine with them. Especially as they abandoned many of the forts they set up before finding out they weren’t necessary. Like at Santa Rita del Cobre. This was only temporary though.

The new Indian agent in late 1852 was from Georgia and he was somewhat competent. He realized the Apache must quote unquote steal or starve. He also wanted to teach the Apache to raise livestock and to farm. But for now, the US needed to pass out rations to keep the peace. The new governor of New Mexico liked this plan. And so did the Chiricahuas who in that winter of 52-53 were near starvation levels.

The governor also in April of 53, after nearly causing a second war with Mexico by threatening to inhabit the lands not yet bought by the US but in 53, he signed a sweeping peace treaty with the Apache of southern New Mexico that asked them to choose a head chief, to settle down, to become ranchers, to start farming, to stop raiding, it prohibited the quote unquote ancient custom of retaliation, and in return the government would give em food for three years. Apache historian Dan L Thrapp wrote of the treaty, quote, One might as well covenant with the wind to still or the tide to cease.... These provisions went against the whole fabric of Apache custom and social organization. End quote.

It didn’t matter, the bureaucracy of the federal government nixed the peace plan almost immediately when the new Commissioner of Indian affairs, the hilariously named George Manypenny, took office. Although he’d later admit that oops, he had made that decision in haste before realizing the governor’s rather good plan. In reality, over the years, Manypenny really did have the Indians best interests at heart and he would attempt to work and make their lives better. Mostly by convincing the Apache to settle down and farm.

It’s instances like this, and the fact that many bureaucrats had no idea of Apache culture, its things like this that ultimately derail the peace between the Apache and the United States.

Meanwhile, the Apache, led by Mangas and other warring chiefs continued to raid and kill in Mexico. Specifically Sonora. And in April of 53, the Apaches under Mangas would kidnap the courageous and youthful nephew of Mangas’ old rival, Elias Gonzales. The young man’s name was Abundio Elias. This would cause quite the stir in Sonora since the young man was practically of Sonoran aristocracy. The state would dispatch over 130 troops to chase down the three hundred strong group of Apache. But they were too late. On their way back to the US the Apache would raid their seemingly favorite target of Fronteras where a heavy battle would ensue with the people there. It had recently been reoccupied by Mexicans. The Sonoran and federal troops sent to intercept the Apache would never make it to Mangas though. It’s most likely that after it was discovered who he was, the Apache tortured and killed Abundio Elias for vengeance. It was his uncle after all, who had slaughtered over 100 Apaches recently.

With regards to this eternal blood feud between these two groups… a future capable Indian Agent of the Apaches named Michael Steck would realize that there was little he could do about it. Edwin Sweeney read one of Steck’s letters to the Governor in 1853 and summed up his insight, quote:

In coming years the honest and objective Steck would come to realize that this brutal and stark picture of relations between the Mexicans and Chiricahua Apaches went both ways. Neither group had a monopoly on savage and barbaric behavior toward the other. Neither party could recall who began the bloody warfare. Violence begot more violence, and the never ending cycle seemed destined to continue with no end in sight. End quote.

Back in New Mexico, the governor learned that much to everyone’s surprise, the Apache were planting and tilling the land! They were growing corn! But… oh… they weren’t eating it, oh no, they were, quoting the Indian agent from Georgia, quote, yesterday I found many of the Indians drunk from a miserable beer they make from corn. End quote. The governor wouldn’t learn that though and the Indian agent Wingfield from Georgia would report that quote, our farming experiment succeeds admirably. End quote. That miserable beer was no doubt tizwin. The Apaches loved tizwin, although, it could often get them into trouble… see my series for subscribers over The Apache Kid.

The Apaches really were planting though. They had fifty acres of melons, pumpkins, and corn. No doubt beans and squash in there as well. And truthfully, to get any Apache to plant was a small miracle, really. Maybe this plan, that was already nixed by the Feds without anyone in New Mexico knowing it, maybe the plan could have worked?

In May, Mangas would meet this Indian agent, agent Wingfield and the native Georgian would be floored by the towering Apache man. He would write to the governor admiringly and he’d say quote:

Mangas Coloradas came in today. I assure you that he is a noble specimen of the genus homo. He comes up nearer to the poetic ideal of a chieftain, such as Homer in his Iliad would describe than any person that I have ever seen. No feudal Lord in the paltry days of Chivalry ever had his vassals under better subjection. His manners are stern, dignified and reserved, seldom speaks but when he does it is to the point and with great good sense. You may be assured that he is the master spirit among the Apaches. The Indians are to hold a junta or council tonight and let us know the result on tomorrow. End quote.

After a follow up meeting the next day Mangas agreed to point out a great spot for the army to make a camp and Mangas talked with both the Indian agent Wingfield and the army representative Captain Steen. Who had this to say of the Apache chief, quote, Mangas has more sense than all the rest of them put together. End quote. Steen wasn’t a big lover of the Indians and after meeting Mangas a few years prior back at Santa Rita del Cobre, he was remarked at having said he hoped the Sonorans quote, would catch Mangas and give him a good drubbing. End quote. Maybe he’d changed his mind about the giant Apache warrior since then.

By the end of 53, Wingfield had been replaced by the even more capable agent Michael Steck. He was apparently sincere, honest, and competent. And in his notes at the end of his over 500 page biography of Mangas Coloradas that I read from cover to cover for this episode, Sweeney writes this of Steck:

He was arguably the best agent ever assigned to the Chiricahuas. He combined honesty with diplomacy to gain the trust and respect of the Chihennes and Bedonkohes. He also provided some of the early ethnological data that we have on the Apaches. Besides that with Mangas Coloradas, he developed a good relationship with Cochise before leaving the post in early 1861. End quote. Steck would be reassigned as Indian agent to various peoples by three different president. His honesty knew no bounds. The Apaches trusted him.

In October of 1854, Mangas Coloradas would finally meet Steck.

Switching tracks here a little bit… After gold was discovered in California in 49 and then the territory became a state in 1850, one man formed grand designs to link that far off land with Dixie. Then Secretary of War and future president of the Confederate States of America, and Southern Hero, Jefferson Davis, wanted a railroad through the territories of New Mexico and Arizona. While many Americans at the time didn’t think the dreary, bare, sandy, parched, and sterile Arizona was worth purchasing, Jeff Davis knew the impact this would have on the nation and he knew a railroad linking a Pacific Port and the south could lead to a lifeline of riches.

Unfortunately the land south of the Gila River in Arizona wasn’t part of the United States yet despite us besting Mexico and securing most of the Southwest in the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. But Mexico’s government, ran by Santa Anna, the same man who attacked the Alamo, well his government was corrupt and they were broke. And defending the three hundred Mexicans in Tucson from the constant Apache attacks was proving difficult, to say the least.

So, president Antonio Lopez de Santa Ana sold it to the Americans for 10 million dollars. Although, the original idea was to have a port on the gulf of California! I imagine that would have been Puerto Peñasco.

Congress… I will never understand why, my goodness, but Congress didn’t want that much land so it cut the deal by 9,000 square miles and raised the boundary to its present day line. With the strike of a pen in June of 1854, the president of the United States, Franklin Pierce added 30,000 square miles of new territory. Territory we know and love. But territory the criminal General Sherman despised. He infamously said, quote, We had one war with Mexico to take Arizona, and we should have another to make her take it back. End quote.

Shortly after the purchase secretary Jefferson Davis promised troops to be stationed in Tucson to defend the new Americans from their enemy, the Apaches. And two years later, he’d follow through by sending four companies of dragoons to the region. Each company, had around 65 military personnel from officers to privates to support staff.

Karl Jacoby, in Shadows at Dawn presents the image of Americans arriving to Tucson two years after the region was purchased. He writes, quote:

Having brought an American flag with them, the dragoons’ first act was to hoist it over Tucson’s adobe walls on a crude flagstaff of spliced together mesquite poles. Such rituals, the new arrivals hoped, sent a tangible message that Tucson and its environs were now forever part of the United States. End quote.

But this new part of the United States proved to be somewhat difficult to keep tame. The whole region, at first, was placed under the command of Santa Fe. It was put into the New Mexican territory but that, just didn’t work. Santa Fe was too far away. One visitor to Tucson at the time called the whole area a , paradise of devils.

That whole question of creating a separate territory won’t be resolved until the next episode though. For now, future Arizona was part of New Mexico and the line between the US and Mexico was redrawn again. The Apaches… weren’t really sure of what to make of it all…

In the end, Sherman was proven wrong when silver, gold, and tons of other precious metals were found in the various hills and streams that the United States had purchased. If only we had purchased all that Santa Ana had been willing to deliver.

Much like the land that America gained after the Mexican American war, this land was mostly inhabited by Indians, Apaches mainly. So at first, the Norteños did not care about the boundary moving. But eventually, they came to despise the new line in the desert sand when it became clear that yet again, the Americans were not willing to enforce the part of their various treaties that stated the Americans would stop the Apache from raiding Sonora. Oh, and the Americans would stop BUYING things that had been taken from the Norteños. Those complaints won’t end until the raiding of Mexico finally, after… over three hundred years, those complains to Washington won’t end until the Apache slow their raids in the 1860s when they focus their wars on America.

As we know, the Apache were not the only native residents of the American Southwest and the Mexican Northwest. I mentioned in the last episode that the O’odham were also present in sufficient enough numbers to be of use to the various European conquerers. And the O’odham, because of their close ties to the Spaniards, Mexicans, and then the Americans, they were enemies of the Apache.

During this time period of the mid 19th century, the O’odham records tell of devastating ambushes and raids by the Apache throughout. But they also tell of a few successes against them. The Apache they would have been in contact with would not have been the Chiricahua bands of Mangas Coloradas, Cuchillo Negro, Cochise, Geronimo, and Joh, and the like, no. The Apaches they came into contact with were most likely the Western Apaches.

One such violent encounter in 1839 had two O’odham killed before they enacted revenge. For revenge, the O’odham shot and wounded an Apache man named Slender Leg whom they captured and brought back to their village. Slender Leg probably had some sort of deformity which left him with, well, a skinny leg. A stanky leg, if you will. So the O’odham shot him, captured him, brought him to their camp, and then they danced around him for quite a few hours while two widowed by Apache women paced the outer circle. After the dances the dancers opened a corridor for the two women who came with mesquite clubs and beat Slender Leg the Apache to death.

This actually mirrors that report from the Chiricahua Apache I mentioned earlier about torturing the captured Mexicans.

Another recorded story by the Pima or O’odham of southern Arizona tells about an incident in 1846 or 47 when Apaches came by moonlight to steal horses but they were chased down to the river where all the Apaches were killed.

A ton more instances of interactions between the O’odham and the Apaches were recorded during the 1800s on what the O’odham called calendar sticks. This is a bit of a departure in our story from the Apache but these sticks recorded awesome stories so they’re worth a mention.

These calendar sticks were skeletons of saguaros with a form of writing on them that told tales of the individuals in each O’odham village. It was extremely interesting to read about them as I had never heard of them before. Their existence immediately made me wonder if their ancestors also had something similar! Jacoby and other anthropologists must have also speculated on that because Jacoby wrote quote:

Whether the keeping of such sticks first arose as a response to European forms of writing or represents a long-standing O’odham custom is uncertain. The oldest sticks now known only document events going back to the early 1800s. What this absence tells us about the origins of the calendar stick custom, however, is unclear: in the twentieth century the People typically destroyed the sticks upon their caretaker's death. Presumably, this practice held in earlier times as well. End quote.

So, that’s extremely intriguing.

I’ll just read quickly two more stories on these O’odham calendar sticks that relate to the Apaches and this time period. Quote:

1853-54: The Apaches came to steal horses and brought a live vulture with them. They were discovered and several killed.

1855-56: The village off Skaakolk was approached one evening by seven Apaches, who were discovered and surrounded. Six escaped in the darkness, but one was tracked into the arrow bushes, where he dropped his bow. He was soon found to have secreted himself in a hole washed deep in the sand. The Pimas could not see or reach him, so they shook live coals down upon the fugitive, which caused him to yell and suddenly leap out among them. The apparition so startled everyone that no move was made to detain him. As he was passing through their line some asked those around them, "Can we catch him?" but he was such a giant and the peculiar manner of his appearance among them so unnerved for a moment the courage of the men whose deepest instinct was to crush out the life of the Apache, that he made his escape."

End all quotes.

I love the imagery of the Apaches coming to steal the horses, probably at night, and they came with a live vulture. Was it a pet? Very cool. Except that a bunch of Apaches died, of course.

And the imagery of a giant Apache, maybe of Mangas’ size running through a crowd of huddled O’odham with sparks and embers dancing off of him as he screeched through the night between them. That’s just great. Good for him.

By the mid 1850s Mangas Coloradas was in his mid 60s. Things were beginning to change for the Chiricahua Apaches. Their numbers were actually decreasing in 1855. They were beginning to settle down and farm more. A lot of Apache bands were beginning to farm more, really. Or attempting to. While the Apache still raided into Mexico, those raids decreased and lessened in severity. The Chiricahuas also signed many treaties with both the Mexicans and the Americans. None of them would stick but their willingness was surprising. The tide of Americans just seemed endless and ever encroaching. And it was causing problems for Apaches to the east and to the west of the Chiricahua.

In June of 1854, the Mescalero Apaches would attack wagon trains from their stronghold in the Big Bend country of Texas. That group was led by a man named Chief Gomez. After a year of attempting to plant crops and live peacefully, the Mescalero were getting overrun with White Eyes who were invading their land with humans and whiskey. John Upton Terrell writes of this, quote: The flood of whiskey destroyed the Mescalero's initiative. They bartered their horses, saddles, harness, implements, and even their personal belongings for drink. Feuds developed. Fights in which Indians were killed frequently occurred. They were sliding down the path to hell. End quote.

The Governor at that time, Governor Merriwether was incorrectly under the assumption that the peaceful Sierra Blanca Mescalero had attacked the wagons that Chief Gomez had, so he sent the commander of New Mexico, General John Garland after them. The Sierra blanca Mescalero are today near Ruidoso in the Sacramento Mountains. A place I fell in love with over a decade ago and a place that my wife loved so much it convinced her to find us a mountain stronghold of our own in New Mexico.

General Garland, after being commanded to, sent two strong campaigns out into the field. One of them attacked the Jicarilla in the north and the other attacked the Mescalero in the Sacramento Mountains. These cavalry troopers were scouring through the heart of Mescalero Apache land looking for Apache murderers, cattle thieves, and raiders. They marched from the Rio Grande through the mountains eastward towards the Pecos River. Essentially from Las Cruces to Alamogordo to Ruidoso to Roswell.

The soldiers then headed south down the Pecos River, the western boundary of the Llano Estacdo, before heading east again towards Cloudcroft from Artesia along the Peñasco River. They were on the hunt.

During the march, as the men ascended the mountains to almost 9,000 feet, and a heavy snow covered the ground, the American troops were losing horses by the dozen a day. And then a skirmish erupted that saw Captain Stanton and two of his troopers killed. 15 Apaches lost their lives. The troopers chased the Mescalero but eventually they had to turn back in the intense cold and wind.

On their way back down though, a Trooper Bennet would write what they saw in his journal, quote:

Came to where we buried Captain Stanton and the two men. Found the bodies torn from the grave; their blankets stolen; bodies half-eaten by wolves; their eyes picked out by ravens... Revolting sight. We built a large pile of pine wood; put on the bodies, burned the flesh; took the bones away. End quote.

After the chase, the Mescalero were frightened, badly beaten, and hungry. They had no other option than to sue for peace with the governor using Steck as their mouthpiece.

In June of 1855 Governor Meriwether met with the Mescalero, their warriors, wives, and hungry families. He wrote of them, quote, I found these Indians in the most destitute condition imaginable. I relieved their immediate wants, and directed Agent Steck to issue them a limited amount of provisions, from time to time, as they might apply for relief and their necessities seemed to require it. End quote.

The Apache only raided because they had no other way to feed themselves. When the government gave them rations, they calmed down. When the rations were rescinded, just as had happened in New Spain and Mexico, the Apache became violent and raided yet again.

1856 saw rebel Mescalero bands attack out of the beautiful Davis Mountains of far west Texas. Mountains I drove through on my way to Big Bend in May of 2024. They’re a truly beautiful mountain sky island in harsh west Texas named after Jefferson Davis. These Mescalero were led by the rebel chief Gomez who had caused the earlier strife with the Army and the Mescaleros.

1856 also saw Western Apache attack Anglo settlements in the newly acquired Arizona land. They hailed from the Mogollon rim. They also attacked Zuni puebloans and Navajo sheep herders. They were on the war path it seemed. And no one in their way was spared. Not even the son of US senator.

John Upton Terrell sums up that unfortunate incident, quote:

Major H. L. Kendrick was sent with a cavalry contingent to track them down. With the troops was Henry Linn Dodge, Navajo agent, who had been extremely successful in holding the Navajos in line. Dodge, a former army captain, was the son of Senator Henry Dodge of Wisconsin and a brother of Senator Augustus Caesar Dodge of Iowa. He was a staunch friend of the Navajo, had married a Navajo squaw, and was thoroughly trusted and highly respected by all the tribe, except a few outlaws.

While hunting deer near Zuñi, Dodge was ambushed and killed by a group of Apache stock thieves. End quote.

Representatives of the US Marshals estimated that in a period of five years around this time, the Apache stole from the properties in the territory of New Mexico approximately four hundred and fifty thousand sheep, thirteen thousand mules, seven thousand horses, and thirty-two thousand horned cattle. The White Eyes were destined to punish the Apache.

In that year of 1856, only two years after acquiring the land, the town of Tubac, which is south of Tucson, and which was the headquarters for the promising new venture known as the Sonora exploring and mining company, well that town of Tubac by 1856 had a thousand residents. A thousand people meant a lot of loot for raiding Apache. Although, they wouldn’t molest the Americans yet. After all, these lumbermen, miners, ranchers and tough men were well armed Americans in a dangerous land. One American, Charles Poston would comment rather illuminatingly on this subject. This is from Paul Andrew Hutton’s the Apache Wars, quote:

Every man went about heavily armed. "Generally worthless, dissipated, dangerous low white trash" was how Poston characterized the few Americans in the area. Still, Poston felt as if he had founded a frontier Eden: "We had no law but love, and no occupation but labor. No government, no taxes, no public debt, no politics. It was a community in a perfect state of nature. End all quotes. Sign me up!

Charles Poston is described in Edwin Sweeney’s Mangas Coloradas as being simply a capitalist, but Paul Andrew Hutton calls him the self styled father of Arizona. It was his company, the Sonora Exploring and Mining Company that had been the economic boon of Tubac. It was also at his insistence that Jeff Davis sent dragoons to Tucson.

But as he was heading to Arizona, he met up with the agent Steck who was transporting corn to Mangas Coloradas and his Apaches. At Santa Rita del Cobre, Poston actually met the aging giant warring Apache and said he was, a fine looking chief. Poston and Steck would stay at the camp for weeks. I imagine the stories around the campfires were enthralling.

Poston wrote later that they had a good time at the camp and that at some point he and the other Americans quote, exhibited our new firearms which were then Sharp’s rifles and Colt’s revolvers, shot at marks, and drank tizwin, roasted venison, and made the Indians some presents. What they appreciated most was some matches which they wrapped carefully in buckskin. End quote. It sounds like one heck of a good time, really.

Poston also wrote about how the Apaches, after firing their rounds into trees during target practice, they would carve the bullets out of the trees because quote, they were economists in ammunition if nothing else. End quote.

At this old time mountain men style rendezvous, Poston asked Mangas Coloradas if he could please keep he and his large crew of Americans and Germans safe on their way to Arizona. Mangas agreed but asked Poston and Steck to please not interfere with their war to the knife with Mexico. Everyone was in agreement. Poston later said of the Apaches:

I have generally found the Indians willing to keep faith with the whites, if the whites will keep faith with them. End quote.

That was certainly Steck’s point of view as well.

A funny ending to this little anecdote with Poston is that on this trip he brought quite a few tintype photographs of himself he’d had taken of him in New York. During his time at the camp he passed out some of these to the leaders of the various Apache groups that he met. And then, later in life, Paul Andrew Hutton writes, quote, he would learn from an Apache woman that a band of warriors lying in ambush had spared him because their leader carried his tintype. End quote. Remind me to start passing out my business card more often.

The first American fort built in the new territory was built in 1857 25 miles north of Tubac by a Captain Richard Ewell. No doubt at Poston’s insistence.

Ewell also went on to build camp Moore 60 miles to the south. Which is practically on the border. It was near an old Tohono O’odham village which had been built by priests in 1699. But had been abandoned due to Apache raids. Also nearby, silver had been found on a Basque rancher’s land some time before.

Interestingly, this Basque called his ranch Arizona, which apparently in Basque means Good Oak Tree. And that’s where the name Arizona came from.

Ewell would actually write extensively about the land and the ruins he saw around him. As listeners know, the Apache weren’t the first to the area of Southern Arizona, that would have been the Clovis but after them, the Hohokam. Captain Ewell ran into quite a bit of their ruins and even wrote about them. He would write, quote:

A great part of my scout has been in a country without inhabitants, but with the ruins of what must have been large towns abandoned centuries ago. End quote. He continues: It would seem to be a semi-civilized people, migratory and followed by another race at war—as the schools of herring are followed by the dolphin and shark. End quote. How correct he was.

By 1857, the commander of the Department of New Mexico was a man named Colonel Benjamin Louis Eulalia de Bonneville and in that year he would plan and orchestrate the fateful campaign against the Western and Chiricahua Apaches.

Bonneville, as his name suggests was born in Paris in 1796, not a safe time to be from that city. But he’d be in the US with his mother by 1803. He was an interesting character who graduated from West Point before taking leave to… trap fur in the west. He overstayed his leave by two years though and he was dismissed from the army but later he’d be reinstated by Andrew Jackson. Bonneville would go on to fight in the second Seminole War in Florida before participating in the siege of Vera cruz during the Mexican American War. Afterwards… he’d be found guilty of three charges for misbehavior before the enemy and he’d be court martialed. But he also earned a brevet for gallantry and meritorious conduct so… in 1855 he was sent to New Mexico and by 1857 he was the military commander of the territory.

He wanted to use military force to overawe and once and for all placate the Apache. So he gathered a force of 600 men from all over New Mexico and Arizona to avenge the murder of that Navajo Agent Dodge.

Karl Jacoby writes that Bonneville, quote, directed three U.S. Army columns, along with a "spy company" of Mexicans and Pueblo Indian scouts, to converge near the Gila River and to remain in the field until the Apaches in the region were never "heard of again as a distinct people."

For the next month and a half, Bonneville, Lieutenant Colonel Dixon S. Miles, and Colonel William W. Loring with 900 cavalrymen, soldiers, and puebloan warriors, which was the largest concentration of troops ever fielded in Mangas’ territory, this huge force traipsed through the Mogollon Mountains around the Gila River. Bonneville called the land quote perfectly worthless, end quote and a quote, most elevated and tumbled up region. End quote. Perfectly worthless?! It’s perfectly beautiful! What do the French know anyways?

Obviously, the Apache under Mangas simply refused to fight and instead burned the land to deprive the army and their horses of sustenance. But after seven weeks of wandering the beautiful southwestern land, the army came across a large band of Apaches and killed 42 of them while taking 45 women and children prisoner. Karl Jacoby sums up what happened next:

According to John DuBois, a lieutenant on the campaign, the lone male captive, "by Col. Bonneville's desire, or express command, was taken out with his hands tied & shot like a dog by a Pueblo Indian—not thirty yards from camp." DuBois expressed disgust at this "brutish & cowardly" execution, as well as a subsequent order from Bonneville that the lieutenant and several of his men conceal weapons under their uniforms and seize the Apache leaders if they came to parley under a flag of truce. "I could not avoid asking myself," DuBois wondered, "why we had killed these poor harmless savages. It is not pretended that they ever did any harm to us... robbing only from the Mexicans of Sonora.” End all quotes.

Meanwhile, Loring came upon the Apache Chief and friend of Mangas, Cuchillo Negro and his camp. When the Army attacked, they killed Cuchillo Negro, five other men, one woman, and then captured nine women and children with Cuchillo Negro’s wife being among the captured.

Weeks later, short on supplies, horses, and good spirits, the expedition abandoned the campaign. But it had its effects on the Apaches and due to the horrifying size and immense firepower of the American Force, the Chiricahua Apaches would be keeping the peace for the rest of the decade. At least in New Mexico. Because make no mistake, I stopped mentioning it and talking about it but the Apache never stopped raiding and killing and depopulating the fractious, corrupt, and ill ran northern Mexico. Especially Sonora. And especially after the military and civilian leaders POISONED the Apache rations that they gave them! The Mexican officials under a man named Zuloaga straight up laced their whiskey and food with poison and many Apaches fell ill or even died. Possibly over 100 were killed by being poisoned. Mangas got suspicious, he was there after the Bonneville excursion and forced his people back north where he made peace with Steck.

Cochise and Mangas would avoid rations for the rest of their lives. Both Mexican, and American.

By the 1850s the O’odham and the Americans were teaming up, like The O’odham had with the Spanish before, to fight against the Apache. One calendar stick even notes that in 1858 they were starting to tame the enemy. That enemy being the Apache.

But it wasn’t just the O’odham that the US Army used against the Apaches. The Mexican Vecinos now living in the United States, people who knew the land and hated the Apache, they were more than willing to lend a hand to their new government.

On Bonneville’s expedition, the US Army used Mexicans as guides and spies.

And in a town called Mesilla, many of these Mexican Americans would fight back. Although, with dubious methods.

East of the Chiricahuas, the Mescalero were continuing to have a rough go of things with the New Mexicans.

In 1853, so a few years prior, a peaceful band of them came to a town called Doña Ana to meet with the Indian agent. At the agency, the Mescaleros assembled their tepees and stayed for a while. Well, men in the nearby town of Mesilla heard about the group of Apaches and decided to take matters into their own hands. These men formed a militia and named it the Mesilla Guards, they then rode out to where the Mescaleros were camped and slaughtered 14 or 15 of them.

Three years later, a small band of Mescalero decided to do a little bit of raiding near Mesilla but the Mesilla Guards were there to greet them. Three warriors were killed and scalped.

And then, in a repeat of 1853, on the morning of April 17th, 1858, thirty six Mesilla Guard militia members surprised a small group of Mescaleros who had again camped out to meet Steck. Seven Apaches, men, women, and children were killed and three others were wounded.

The Army raced out and captured the leader Juan Ortega and his 35 men, who had Mescalero children in their possession. They were arrested but… here’s what John Upton Terrell writes of the outcome of their arrest.

Town officials immediately got off posthaste letters to the Secretary of War, and town and civil officials in Santa Fe protested that the imprisonment of Ortega and the other "American citizens" was "a gross outrage" committed by the commander at Fort Thorn.

He continues:

Civil officials demanded the release of the "Mesilla Guards," and, having no orders to the contrary, the commander was obliged to free them. They were never punished; indeed, they were never charged with having committed some thirty murders. End quote.

A few days later, that war Chief of the Mescalero, Gomez rode into Doña Ana at the head of a hundred heavily armed Davis Mountain warriors. As soon as he had arrived, he announced that he had come to kill every "Mesilla Guard" that his warriors could get their hands on.

Thankfully though, Steck was there to convince him that… that was a terrible idea. Honestly, he was very good at his job. Gomez took the hint of how bad reprisals would be and left back for Texas.

Much peace reigned in 1860. At least in the US. Mexico was another story. As John Upton Terrell puts it, quote, They would not, of course, cease their raiding into Mexico-there could be no peace under any conditions with Mexicans as long as an Apache of any band was alive—but they could, at least for the time being, hold their high mountain sanctuaries with greater ease if they allowed the overland coaches and wagon trains to go on their way unharmed. End quote.

But in late 1860 an event occurred that would start one of the longest wars in United States History. The quote unquote Apache Wars. Because believe it or not, the United States was not yet at war with the Apache despite its many incursions into Apacheria. But that was about to change with the kidnapping of a small half Mexican boy.

In southern Arizona, an Irishman named Johnny Ward who had come to the Senoita Valley around the time of Poston, whom he was friends with, but Ward came to southern Arizona to settle and to ranch. In the meantime, he met a beautiful Mexican woman named Jesus Maria Martinez who went by Modesto. Not long after they met, she, her daughter, and her curiously red headed, one eyed son Felix moved into Ward’s considerable frontier stone and adobe home. Felix, the adopted red haired boy with a Mexican mother and one eye was about to change history through no fault of his own.

The Ward family was in the heart of Western Apacheria and while this was a relatively peaceful time throughout the land between the US and the Apache, there were still small outbreaks of violence by Apaches who needed to make war for whatever reason. One of those Apaches leading a small raid in January of 1861 was named Beto.

Beto was an Aravaipa Western Apache from that same place that the Apache Kid was from. Well, actually, that’s not quite correct. Beto was really named Victor and while he lived in Aravaipa Canyon he was from Mexico. He was a captive Mexican that had adopted the Apache ways and had risen in the ranks to become a war leader. Like the out of place little Felix, Beto only had one eye and on his scarred face he wore an eye patch. Beto and his small band of warriors wanted two things: Cattle and horses. Their people were hungry. He wanted no deaths. He hoped for only spoils to feed and help his people.

Eventually after leaving the village on horseback, he and his warriors came to Johnny Ward’s sprawling ranch filled with exactly what Beto was looking for.

I’ll let Paul Andrew Hutton’s fantastic words fill you in on what happened next:

Nine warriors slowly approached the quiet ranch house while another group rounded up the cattle across the creek. Beto rode over to the little peach orchard near where the cattle grazed. A boy had climbed up into one of the small, bare trees in his fright. Usually the Apaches would kill a boy this age, either during a raid or later in the village. But Beto, for some reason, did not kill the boy. Instead he motioned for him to come down from the tree and climb up behind him on his horse. The one-eyed warrior could see that the boy also had but one eye. The boy's blind eye, recently hooked by a wounded deer, was not covered with a patch.

A sudden cry went up. Two riders were coming. The warriors charging the ranch house hurried back to their ponies while the others gathered in the cattle. Beto led the way north with the captive boy clinging to his back. End quote.

The White Eyes would pursue the Apaches but they would not overtake them. Beto, Felix, and his warriors with 20 head of cattle would escape.

Once Johnny Ward, who had been out of town returned, he found his woman in shambles and his adopted son gone. Modesto, after all was a Norteño. She knew the depredations of the Apaches well. Her hometown was now a ghost town. But now her home felt like one.

Once word got to the American Military 12 miles away, the commander sent an inexperienced Kentuckian named Second Lieutenant George Nicholas Bascom and his seventh Infantry as well as some dragoons, he sent them on the trail of the raiders. Eventually Bascom and his men came to an area known as Apache Pass and he believed it was the Apaches that lived nearby who had stolen the boy and the cattle. He was wrong, but he sure thought he was onto something. Unfortunately for our story, the Apaches that lived near the so called Apache Pass were that of Cochise.

Apache Pass was Cochise’s stronghold and it was a beautiful area that had water by means of a spring. It was an area with steep cliffs on either side of the little valley. There were trees and game. It was an oasis at the top of the sky island mountain chain known as the Chiricahua Mountains. Nearby the spring and the pass is something known as Dos Cabezas which I drove under in July of 2023. The two noteworthy peaks, in my opinion formed the ears, with the peaks to the south of them forming the muzzle of my dog who had passed a few months before. I’ll post a picture on the site for this episode.

Apache Pass was also extremely close to the nearby important to the White Eyes Butterfield Overland Mail stagecoach station. I knew nothing about this very important route until researching and Paul Andrew Hutton had the best description so I’ll let him tell it.

The Butterfield Overland Mail Company station was an integral part of the new mail system being built to provide a vital official link between the East and California. The first overland mail had been inaugurated on September 16, 1858, when an all-weather southern route had been selected by the US postmaster general. The federal mail contract, worth $600,000 a year plus some choice parcels of public land, had been awarded to John Butterfield, former stage driver, freight line operator, and cofounder of the American Express Company. Butterfield was required to carry passengers and deliver the mail semiweekly within a twenty-five-day one-way trip. Postage was ten cents per letter. Passenger fare from St. Louis to San Francisco was two hundred dollars one way. The total length of the contracted route was a bone-jarring 2,795 miles.

Butterfield's achievement was truly monumental. He carefully supervised the building of bridges, the grading of existing roads, and the digging of wells at the 141 stations that had to be established. Corrals, barns, and outbuildings were constructed, and then stocked with a thousand horses and five hundred mules. Не employed eight hundred men in various capacities, from drivers to stock tenders to station managers. It was hard, dangerous work, but it provided the main artery of connection to "the states" of the far western settlements. End quote.

Clearly, this station, in the heart of Apacheria was vastly important to the Americans. Its safety had been in the articles of many a treaty between the states and the Chiricahuas. Cochise understood that. Cochise respected and guaranteed its safety. He brought the station hay and wood. He returned stolen livestock and horses. Cochise was on quite good terms with the stationmaster, a man named James Tevis. And Cochise and his band often camped about a mile from the station.

But then, in May of 1860, when the Chiricahuas were trying desperately to keep the peace with the Americans, gold was discovered near Santa Rita del Cobre, that bleak thorn in the side of the Chiricahuas for over 50 years. Overnight, quite literally Americans and Mexicans flooded into the area that would be called Pinos Altos or Tall Pines.

In May of 2024 my wife and I stopped into the old town to check it out. We stopped in the Buckhorn Saloon and Opera House, we walked the old streets, and we sat at the finish line of the international bike race known as Tour of the Gila. We didn’t know it was that very weekend we were there so the place was absolutely packed, much to our dismay. Pinos Altos is on one end of the Trail of the Mountain Spirits Scenic Byway at the southern end of the Mogollon Mountains not too far north of Silver City. It’s a very small town in an absolutely gorgeous part of the American Southwest. As I’ve said before, the entire Mogollon Mountains region is impossibly beautiful. Mangas knew what was up when he settled and kept his people there. Unfortunately, the fact that he called the area home is why he would eventually be forced to take up arms against the United States of America… after so many years of seeking peace.

I didn’t know when I visited, despite having just released the second episode in this series, how important Pinos Altos would be in this episode and to the end of Mangas Coloradas’ life.

So Tevis the stationmaster quit his job and headed east to get gold. He was replaced by a man named Charles Culver. With Culver were two other workers: Robert Welch and James Wallace, the stagecoach drive. Wallace, who’d been there a while, was friendly with Cochise.

Quick and very important aside about Tevis though, after he made it east, he’d lead a charge of some thirty miners into an Apache camp near Pinos Altos in October of 1860. These miners would slay 4 Apaches and kidnap many others before being surrounded by angry Chiricahuas seeking revenge. Mangas, was most likely among those seeking revenge. Tevis and the miners would be saved by the Army and never punished for the murders.

According to Historians, this was the second of three reasons that the Chiricahua went to war with the Americans. The first was the simple fact that their territory was getting over run. The third was the forthcoming Bascom Affair I’m about to dive deep into.

But before I do, I must mention despite so many of the sources, all but Sweeney, actually, but despite so many of the sources recounting the story, there is no evidence that the legend of Mangas Coloradas being tied to a tree and whipped by miners at Pinos Altos is true. The only source of that apocryphal tale is Cremony and he is not reliable. While the story makes sense from a revenge standpoint, Mangas never mentions it himself… Sweeney writes of the story, quote, While there is nothing inherently improbable about the story, it is certainly open to question. End quote. He goes on to prove through exhaustive research that Cremeny is the sole source for this tall tale therefore, it is unlikely that it is true.

Now for the Bascom Affair.

On January 29th, 1861, Bascom with an interpreter named Antonio Bonillas, Johnny Ward the stepfather of Felix, and fifty four infantrymen mounted on mules all left the fort and headed for Apache Pass, the station, Cochise, and infamy. Along the way though, Bascom ran into a Sergeant Daniel Robinson and his 12 men. They were recruited for the coming mission on the spot.

Once they’d made it to the station, Bascom told Wallace, the stage coach driver who was on good terms with Cochise to send him a message. Bascom wanted a meeting. Cochise promptly returned the reply of, I’ll be there tomorrow.

At noon the next day, as the Army men were sitting down to lunch, Cochise arrived with his wife, his six year old child, future chief Naiche, his brother, and 3 other Apache adults and one other Apache child. Clearly, Cochise had no idea of the coming battle or he wouldn’t have brought his extremely vulnerable family members. After arriving, Cochise and his brother Coyuntura, were invited into the tent of Bascom for the meeting. But immediately after entering the tent, the apache chief must have sensed something was wrong. Because Bascom called over the Sergeant Robinson that he’d met on the road and ordered him to tie the mules to the wagons, bring in the herds, and place centuries around the camp cause… no Apache was leaving without Bascom’s explicit instructions. He then offered the two Apache warriors some coffee.

Also in the tent, acting as interpreter, was Johnny Ward, the stepfather of Felix. Bascom waisted no time.

In English Bascom asked Cochise to return the boy and the cattle. Johnny Ward translated this into Spanish. Cochise replied in broken Spanish that, well, we don’t have whatever boy you’re talking about and we know nothing about no stinkin stolen cattle. BUT if Cochise was given a little bit of time, he’d no doubt find this boy that was apparently taken by some Apaches from somewhere. He even speculated that the culprits were probably Western Coyotero Apaches. Ward told Bascom in English. Bascom replied with, that’s not gonna work. You and your people will stay here until the boy is returned. Ward began translating the horrible news into Spanish but even before he could finish, Cochise and his brother, simultaneously whipped out their knives and sprang for the back of the tent where the cut a hole in the canvas and slipped out.

Bascom apparently shouted, SHOOT THEM DOWN! Which gave Johnny Ward the confidence to pull his pistol and fire. The bullet hit Cochise in the leg but he continued to run. He hadn’t felt it. His brother though, lagged behind. But Cochise ran on and eventually made it to the boulder strewn canyon wall which he ascended as quickly as he could. Leaving a blood trail on every rock.

Meanwhile, the soldiers not stuffing their faces had began to fire after Cochise. Bullets ricocheted off the boulders.

The Sergeant Robinson that was tasked with gathering animals heard the shots, turned around, and saw an Apache man being chased by a soldier. The Apache apparently hurled rocks at the soldier who shielded his head as the Apache fled behind more Chiricahua rocks. But as the soldier began again his chase, the Apache brave lunged at the soldier from the boulder. But the soldier was quicker than expected and he put a hole in the Apache warrior.

One other Apache attempted to escape but he was pinned to the ground by a soldier with a bayonet.

After the brief fracas, Coyuntura and the remaining Apache were herded at bayonet point into a tent as prisoners.

Paul Andrew Hutton writes of the end of the scene and says, quote, From the ridge top Cochise looked down on the soldier camp. Only then did he realize that he had been wounded in the leg and that, inexplicably, he still carried a tin coffee cup in his hand. End quote.

Now a lot of those fantastic deals may be gleaned from the previously mentioned as unreliable Cremony. But the story of Cochise escaping and what happens next is true.

After no doubt surveying his own damage and letting the adrenaline die down, an hour after the escape Cochise again appeared at the Ridgeline, much to Bascom’s surprise. Cochise shouted down essentially, show me my brother so that I may know he’s alive! If he is, I’ll spare you.

Bascom’s reply was a volley of bullets.

Cochise’s shouting reply was, quote, Indian blood was as good as white man’s blood! End quote. And then, he was gone.

Paul Andrew Hutton writes of what happened next:

The young lieutenant suddenly seemed to realize just what he had done. Wallace, the stage driver, was enraged by Bascom's actions and berated the lieutenant in front of the men. Bascom, totally unnerved, ordered his men to break camp and move down to the stout stone walls of the stage station. Sergeant Robinson pointed out that they would need water from the spring farther up the canyon, but Bascom feared an ambush there.

"Lieutenant, one may better be shot than die of thirst," Robinson replied. "I will go to the spring."

Robinson brought back several canteens filled with water, then later returned to the spring with a burro to secure two kegs of water. At dusk, as the men settled in at the stage station, they saw the orange glow of Apache signal fires on every surrounding mountain peak. It would be a very long night. End quote.

Those signal fires sent their message as well as the lighting of the Beacons did in Return of the King. The next morning, after the soldiers had awakened, they noticed the hills and cliff walls surrounding the station were filled with hundreds of Apache warriors. Warriors under Mangas Coloradas arrived. Geronimo brought dozens of warriors. A White Mountain Apache leader named Francisco had brought many of his warriors. They would all remember this momentous event that would forever sour the relationship between the Americans and the Apache and they would call it that time Cochise cut the tent.

Cochise sent an Indian with a white flag down to Bascom to ask for a meeting. A parlay. Bascom agreed. A Sergeant William Smith, Johnny Ward the stepfather, and Sergeant Robinson who’d gathered the water all accompanied Bascom. The four Americans then met with Cochise and three of his unarmed warriors.

Cochise demanded that Bascom release his people. Ward translated to Bascom who replied that he would only do that if Cochise released the captured boy whom Cochise had not captured. Ward translated to Bascom, who had noticed the Apaches slowly and stealthily approaching all around them, that Cochise said he had no idea about this boy but he’d find him when Bascom released his people.

And then, Wallace, the stage driver who knew Cochise and who’d wandered into the Apache camp with the other two workers, Wallace was captured by the Apaches. The two other workers of the Station fled for the Americans line. At that moment the Americans opened fire and Cochise and his warriors retreated to their side of this ravine they’d been meeting in. The Apache then returned fire. Many Apache were killed but Sergeant Smith and the worker Culver were also hit and killed.

That night the fires were lit again.

The siege on the station would continue.

Two days later, the brother of the slain Culver arrived to the station. He had no idea what had taken place.

Simultaneously though, Geronimo and his warriors had seen and ambushed a train of wagons heading to the station. They killed six Mexican men before the Apaches captured the five remaining men. One was a German, one was a mixed blood Cherokee, there was an Anglo American, and two more Mexicans.

What happened next is… gnarly. And I will let Paul Andrew Hutton tell the story:

Cochise had the three white men bound so they could watch as their Hispanic companions were lashed to the wheels of the wagons. The chief had obviously decided that only the white en had bargaining value. Geronimo’s men then set fire to the wagons. The reflective glow from the fire could be seen in the clouds above the stage station, but the distance was too great to be able to hear the screams of the roasting men. End quote.

On February 7th another wagon filled with Americans arrived through a hail of Apache gunfire and arrows to the station. Word of the siege on the station had not made it out of Apache Pass. Bascom needed to send for help. So the night of February 8th, he sent out one wagon to the east and one to the west. They both made it to their intended targets. Soon, troopers and adventurers from various western forts and towns were on their way to the Station at Apache Pass.

On February 9th though, the Apaches attacked. Bascom needed to water the animals and gather some for his men so he sent a small group of them to the spring. But as they approached, the Apache attacked. Sergeant Robinson was hit.

Back at the station, hearing the melee outside, a fight which was out of view, Bascom turned to future brigadier General of the Confederate States of America, Lieutenant John Rogers Cooke and asked him to go relieve the men at the spring. He would do so bravely.

Back at the station, Cochise led his warriors on an assault. He had thought that Bascom would have sent more men to help those at the spring but instead, Bascom had kept the bulk of his forces behind cover.

Cochise was forced to abandon the dangerous and costly frontal assault. After regrouping, he decided that the Chiricahua would scatter to the mountains. He was forced to leave his family there. But the Bascom Affair wasn’t over yet. Although, war to the knife had now been declared on the Americans by the Chiricahua Indians. No longer was peace an option in the minds of Cochise, Geronimo, and Mangas Coloradas.

On February 10th one of the relief parties of men and a surgeon arrived to the station. On the way there, they’d captured three western Coyotero Apache who were bound as prisoners.

Four days later, the second relief party arrived led by the higher ranking Lieutenant Moore. On February 16th, he sent men out into the Chiricahua mountains to search for the Apache warriors.

Their first discovery on the 19th, were the bodies of four dead, mangled, picked at by vultures men. Paul Andrew Hutton writes, quote, the corpses were so riddled with lance wounds Utah they had probably been unrecognizable even before the vultures had feasted on them. But Oury, who knew Wallace well, was able to identify the stage driver’s body by the gold fillings in his teeth. End quote.

So Wallace the station worker and the other captured prisoners had all been killed by Cochise and his warring Apaches. Murder must meet with revenge according to the Apache.

Back at the station, legend says a card game determined the fate of the Apache prisoners. Moore had wanted to hang them, Bascom had not. Moore had won the card game so the Apaches were to hang. Coyuntura, Cochise’s brother, two more of his warriors, and the three captured western Apache were sent to the Happy Place with elongated necks. Sergeant Robinson wrote later that, quote, the Indians were hoisted so high by the infantry, that even the wolves could not touch them. End quote.

Robinson wasn’t sure how to take the whole affair and he’d also write later, quote, it was a sad spectacle to look upon. An illustration of the Indian’s sense of justice: that the innocent must suffer for the guilty. And that man’s notion that the only good Indians are dead ones. End quote.

Dos-teh-seh and Naiche, Cochise’s wife and child, along with the other small Apache boy were spared. They’d be released in March of 1861 and they’d head back to their Chiricahua relatives who were planning on waging war against the Americans.

Mangas Coloradas’ and Cochise’s war against the White Eyes will begin at the same time the White Eyes themselves were warring with each other. This turn of events will see the Chiricahua and greater Apache pretty much take back most of their lands in a considerably quick time frame. But that is all for the next episode. For the remainder of this one, I must finish the long and violent life of Mangas Coloradas.

Cochise would attack southern Arizona after the Bascom Affair and kill nine Americans. He’d capture two of them and then he according to Sweeney quote roasted them upside down with their heads suspended eighteen inches above the fire. End quote.

Meanwhile, Mangas wanted to attack Pinos Altos which by now, on account of events the Apaches wouldn’t understand yet, the town had gone from 500 to 100 men.

The buttefield overland stage also abandoned the territory. And then the forts were abandoned and the soldiers left. And with them, the territory slowly lost its safety conscious residents. The Tucson Arizonian newspaper described the desperate times like this:

Our prosperity has departed. The mail is withdrawn; the soldiers are gone and their garrisons burned to the ground; the miners murdered and the mines abandoned; the stockraisers and farmers have abandoned their crops and herds to the Indians, and the population generally have fled, panic struck and naked in search of refuge. From end to end of the territory, except in Tucson and its immediate vicinity, there is not a human habitation.

The Apaches thought this was their doing. It was not.

At around 70 years old, Mangas was still a war chief but his younger and bolder and incredibly skilled son in law, Cochise, the main focus of our next episode, he took the reins, attracted more warriors, and led the charge for most of this time period.

The two men brought their combined groups to a place known as Cooke’s Canyon and that became their base of operations for their war against the Americans. Cooke’s Canyon is southeast of the Mogollon and Black Mountains where Pinos Altos is. It’s just north of Highway 10 between Demming and Las Cruces, aka Mesilla. Between 1861 and 1863, the Apaches would ambush and kill over one hundred whites in Cooke’s Canyon. It would later be described as being quote, sadly defaced with human bones and graves. End quote. One soldier would write in his journal, that he, quote, found many bones, skulls, and graves. End quote.

From Cooke’s Canyon the two killed and mutilated the corpses of what was known as the Free Thomas Party. All seven Americans perished. Nine Mexican vaqueros were killed and horribly mutilated a short time later in the canyon as they herded cattle from Mesilla to Pinos Altos. Shortly after that, what’s known as the Ake party, which included many famous westerners, mountain men, and even Kit Carson’s half brother, they were ambushed in a thrilling shootout between themselves and the Apache led by Cochise and Mangas. The Apache took four hundred cattle and nine hundred sheep. They also inflicted four deaths and quite a few injuries upon the Americans. But all of the women and children left safely. Mangas apparently did not let his people later mutilate the corpses of these brave Americans.

Arizona Confederates would actually pursue Cochise’s band south immediately after the Ake Massacre while they were trying to enter Mexico to sell their loot, as was customary now that the war had begun against the Americans. These Confederates would kill 8 Apaches after both camps had travelled all night. And they’d re-secure all the stolen livestock.

This group of New Mexican and Arizona Confederates called themselves the Arizona Guard and they had their headquarters in Pinos Altos. The only other Anglo town west of the Rio Grande in the area was Tucson. And that was so very far away.

After the attack against Cochise, Mangas and his group met with his Son-in-law and the two with their enormous band of warriors decided to strike back at the Anglos at Pinos Altos.

They did so at the first sign of day break on September 27th, 1861, when the Apaches simultaneously began the battle at every spaced out camp in the small town. The fighting was incredible and eventually by noon, it was hand to hand, war to the knife, on the main street outside a hardware store known as Roman’s supply store. Inside many miner and what few women that lived in the town loaded the town’s cannon with nails and buckshot and fired it at the Apaches that were regrouping on the main thoroughfare. After the cannon shot, the Anglos mounted a furious counter attack and the Apaches were forced to flee.

Five Americans died and many many more Apaches perished. But the true toll on the Anglos was the immediate desertions of miners and men from Pinos Altos. Only 70 would remain after the fight.

In retaliation of their many dead, the Apaches would go on to attack, kill, and torture what various wagon trains dared to pass through the territory. Each time, the Arizona Guard would chase them away… at least until they too were chased away by California Yankees.

These Yankees would enter Apache Pass on July 14th 1862 where they were predictably ambushed by Cochise, Mangas Coloradas, Victorio, Nana, Joh, and many other leaders and their many warriors. But… the Yanks would prevail on account of shelling the Apaches hiding places with Howitzers over 40 times.

The battle began with the over 70 year old Mangas and over 50 year old Cochise leading their men in hand to hand combat after an initial volley of bullets. But they were repelled to the rocks that surrounded that all important spring. The Army ran for the stage station. It was a repeat of the Bascom Affair.

Eventually the Yanks would take the high ground, shell the Apaches, and chase them away from the spring. At some point though, Mangas had snuck away and was blocking the western side of the pass. And there, another battle broke out. And this fight was led by Mangas Coloradas himself.

Private John Teal would describe what happened next:

The Indians then turned toward me. I had mounted & fired my carbine at them, they closed in around me, both mounted & on foot. The chief or commander of the Indians was armed with a citizen rifle but was unwilling to fire at me without a rest so, after rallying his warriors, he ran for a rest & I after him but, on looking over my shoulder, I saw the mounted Indians tolo close on my rear for safety, so I turned on them & they scattered like birds. I turned again to tend to the old chief but I was tolo] late, he had got to a bunch of Gaita [Galleta] & was lying on his belly on the opposite side of the bunch pointed straight at me, which caused me to drop from the horse on the ground & the Indian shot the horse instead of me. The horse left & I laid low sending a bullet at them whenever I had a chance. We kept firing until it was dark when a lucky shot from me sent the chief off in the arms of his Indians. End quote.

Private John Teal had shot Mangas Coloradas. The old chief was then taken to Chihuahua where he was patched up by a Mexican doctor before he returned north to once and for all settle down. He had no more war left in him.

But the leader of the Californians, General James Carleton, would make sure that Mangas paid for his recent depredations. Mangas, and all the Apaches. As Sweeney puts it, quote, we can explain Carleton’s Apache philosophy in one word: extermination. End quote.

At Pinos Altos, Mangas attempted to find a White Eyes that would send a message to Santa Fe that he wanted peace. He apparently even went up to Acoma to ask for peace, but back at Pinos Altos again, Mangas had a conversation with a drunk ex Arizona Guard member named Jack Swilling. During the conversation, Mangas admitted to taking part in one of the many raids on the wagon trains in Cooke Canyon. To this, Jack Swilling apparently told Mangas to his face that he was going to kill him for that. Mangas ignored the threat.

Jack Swilling was not bluffing though and after he had teamed up with some gold prospectors led by a famous mountain man named Captain Joseph Reddeford Walker, they hatched a plan to capture an Apache leader, preferably Mangas. As this group was on their way out of town they ran into an army Captain Edmund Shirland who had with him 20 men. Swilling and Walker told Shirland of their plan and Shirland, under orders to kill Mangas by Carleton, liked this plan and decided to join in. They then headed back to Pinos Altos where they raised a white flag and waited a day and a half for Mangas to come in and make quote unquote peace.

Despite everyone begging him to not trust these Americans, Mangas went to Pinos Altos to sue for peace anyways. He just wanted to grow old, or older, and plant. And for some reason, as he always had, he still trusted the Americans.

With around a dozen men, including old Victorio, someone we’ll talk about next time, but Mangas with his dozen men came into camp on January 17th around noon. The soldiers were hiding amongst the various brush and rocks. Mangas didn’t notice them at first. Jack Swilling approached Mangas and informed him of the situation in broken Spanish.
 One man that was there and who was a member of Jack Swelling’s party, a man named Daniel Ellis Connor, he would later write to historian James McClintock who would publish what happened next.

When our squad suddenly leveled our guns upon the party, for the first time Mangas showed appreciation of his serious position. Swilling went up to him and laid his hand on the chief’s shoulder and finally convinced him that resistance meant destruction of the whole party. End quote.

Essentially, Swilling would tell Mangas that you are now being detained so that we can go through Apacheria and pan for gold unharmed. You’re our leverage for staying alive. Your men can go.

As Victorio, one of his sons, and the other Apaches left Mangas apparently told them they, quote, were not fooling with Mexicans now. End quote.

On January 18th, as the military was escorting Mangas to Fort McLane, which is not far from today’s Silver City, Mangas’ son would beg the army to see his father. After the meeting, he was seen leaving the escort with tears in his eyes.

At Fort McLane, Jack Swilling turned Mangas over to Brigadier General Joseph Rodman West. According to an eyewitness, Mangas towered over West who quote, looked like a pygmy beside the old Chief. End quote.

Sweeney sums up what happened next, quote:

West informed Mangas, "[You have] murdered your last white victim, you old scoundrel." He gestured to the east, where Cooke's Canyon lay, and remarked that it was covered with the "bleached bones" of Mangas's victims. Mangas, though disinclined to speak at all, responded that he had fought only in self-defense, only after "we were attacked by the white man who came digging up my hills for the yellow iron," a claim that was undeniably true from the chief's perception. The general then told Mangas that he would not seek to avenge all the atrocities that Mangas had carried out against Americans. Instead, West magnanimously advised the chief that "the remainder of his days would be spent as a prisoner in the hands of United States authorities; that his family would be permitted to join him and they would be well treated."

Mangas refused the offer. The last thing West told Mangas was that if he tried to escape, the guards would shoot him down. But later, he’d return to the guards and tell them, according to Clark Stocking, quote, men, that old murderer has got away from every soldier command and has left a trail of blood for 500 miles on the old stage line. I want him dead or alive tomorrow morning, do you understand? I want him dead. End quote.

As the 18th turned into the 19th, two of the guards on that freezing night began to heat their bayonets and poke the old chief on his exposed feet and legs. Either that or they launched hot coals at him. Or even pieces of the adobe wall. Regardless of the method, they were trying to get the old Chief to rise from his sleeping position. Eventually, after an enough torture, that’s just what he did. Mangas Coloradas raised himself from the ground and yelled in Spanish at the two soldiers that he was no child to be playing with.

The soldiers in unison raised their rifles and shot the old warrior in the chest as soon as he’d finished his chastisement. Immediately afterwards they bayoneted him before another soldier with his pistol came over to the Apache who lay face down on the ground and shot him through the back of the head. The bullet took some of his forehead and nasal cavity with it as it struck into the ground.

The camp, startled by the noise, eventually returned to bed satisfied. When West was informed of his death, the Brigadier General told the guards they could now quote, go to sleep. End quote.

The report was that he was shot while trying to escape. West would claim he tried three times and on the third time, Mangas Coloradas was put down. Therefore, quote, the good faith of the US military authorities was in no way compromised. End quote. This was a lie and over the years, the true story would slowly come out from those that were there.

The next morning one of the soldiers took his Bowie knife and scalped the chief. Later that day they’d drag him to a gully and throw some dirt on him.

But a few days later, a group of soldiers with a surgeon examined his disinterred body. The Surgeon named Sturgeon severed Mangas’ head from his body. Even later, another surgeon came through the area, this one named Surgeon John Quincy Adams, nephew of the ex President took a thigh bone.

In Eve Ball’s Indeh, Daklugie would comment on this murderous execution and he’d say, quote:

To an Apache the mutilation of the body is much worse than death, because the body must go through eternity in the mutilated condition. Little did the White Eyes know what they were starting when they mutilated Mangas Coloradas. While there was little mutilation previously, it was nothing compared to what was to follow. End quote.

In the next episode, we will find out what was to follow.

Thank y'all for listening and I’ll see you again soon in the American Southwest.

Selected Sources:

The Apache Indians by Frank C Lockwood

Mangas Coloradas: Chief of the Chiricahua Apaches by Edwin R Sweeney

Apache Chronicle: The Story of the People by John Upton Terrell

Once They Moved Like The Wind by David Roberts

The Bears Ears by David Roberts

The Navajo by Clyde Kluckhorhn & Dorothea Leighton

Fossil Legends of the First Americans by Adrienne Mayor

Frontiers: A Short History of the American West by Robert V Hine & John Mack Faragher

From Cochise to Geronimo: The Chiricahua Apaches 1874-1886 by Edwin R Sweeney

Shadows at Dawn: An Apache Massacre and the Violence of History by Karl Jacoby

Western Apache Language and Culture by Keith H Basso

The Indian Frontier of the American West 1846-1890 by Robert M Utley

A Portal to Paradise by Alden Hayes

The Apache Wars: The Hunt for Geronimo, the Apache Kid, and the Captive Boy Who Started the Longest War in American History by Paul Andrew Hutton

https://www.archaeology.org/issues/250-1703/trenches/5293-trenches-arizona-hopi-montezuma-castle

https://frontierpartisans.com/25352/return-to-apacheria/