Chiricahua Apache Enduring Power: Naiche's Puberty Ceremony Paintings (Contemporary American Indians)

Chiricahua Apache Enduring Power

Contemporary American Indian Studies J. Anthony Paredes, Series Editor

Chiricahua Apache Enduring Power Naiche’s Puberty Ceremony Paintings

Trudy Grif¤n-Pierce With a Foreword by J. Jefferson Reid and Stephanie M. Whittlesey

T H E U N I V E R S I T Y OF A L A B A M A PR E S S

Tuscaloosa

Copyright © 2006 The University of Alabama Press Tuscaloosa, Alabama 35487-0380 All rights reserved Manufactured in the United States of America Typeface: AGaramond ∞ The paper on which this book is printed meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information SciencesPermanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48– 1984. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Grif¤n-Pierce, Trudy, 1949– Chiricahua Apache enduring power : Naiche’s puberty ceremony paintings / Trudy Grif¤n-Pierce ; with a foreword by J. Jefferson Reid and Stephanie M. Whittlesey. p. cm. — (Contemporary American Indian studies) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN-13: 978-0-8173-1544-3 (cloth : alk. paper) ISBN-10: 0-8173-1544-6 (alk. paper) ISBN-13: 978-0-8173-5367-4 (pbk. : alk. paper) ISBN-10: 0-8173-5367-4 (alk. paper) 1. Naiche, c. 1857–1921. 2. Chiricahua Indians—Biography. 3. Chiricahua Indians—Social life and customs. 4. Chiricahua Indians—Government relations. 5. Indian art—Southwest, New. 6. Puberty rites—Southwest, New. I. Title. II. Series. E99.C68N354 2006 979.004′9725600922—dc22 [B] 2006013114 Front cover image: Naiche deer hide painting of puberty ceremony Gáhe dance. Naiche sold this to Dr. Everette Rowell, 1911 or 1912. Believed to be Naiche’s last painting. (Adapted from the Haffenreffer Museum of Anthropology, Brown University, Bristol, R.I., acc. no. HMA 77–189. D. 35″ long by 17.5″ wide). Back cover image: Chiricahua Apache deer hide painting, c. 1875. (Adapted from painting at Peabody Museum, Harvard University. Cat. No 10/22551. Dimensions: 42.5″ long, 37.1″ wide.)

This book is dedicated to Naiche, who led his people through the most dif¤cult part of their history.

Table of Contents

List of Figures ix Timeline of Chiricahua Imprisonment xi Prologue: Life before Naiche and the Chiricahua Apache Prisoners of War xiii Foreword: A Bronze Ga’an Speaks J. Jefferson Reid and Stephanie M. Whittlesey xvii Introduction 1 Chapter 1: Ethnographic and Historic Background of the Chiricahua Apaches 11 Chapter 2: Military Conquest as a Physical, Psychological, and Symbolic Event 46 Chapter 3: Exile and the Construction of Cultural Identity 71 Chapter 4: Pratt and the Carlisle Boarding School 87 Chapter 5: The Art of American Indian Prisoners of War 107 Chapter 6: The Chiricahua Apache Girl’s Puberty Ceremony and Naiche’s Hide Paintings 133 Epilogue: Life after Naiche 169 References 171 Index 183

List of Figures

1. Chiricahua Apache homeland and sites of their imprisonment 2 2. The Cochise Stronghold, southeastern Arizona 12 3. Cochise buried here in an unmarked place among the rocks 12 4. Apache Pass 14 5. A rocky ridge in Apache Pass 14 6. Reconstructed Chiricahua Apache wickiup at Apache Pass 15 7. The ruins of the Butter¤eld Stage Station, Apache Pass 15 8. Geronimo with warriors 18 9. Naiche and Geronimo with warriors 18 10. Chiricahua Apaches at peace talks 19 11. Cañon de los Embudos (Canyon of the Funnels), Mexico 19 12. St. Augustine, Florida 49 13. Matanzas River approaching Fort Marion 50 14. Fort Marion looking toward the Matanzas River 50 15. View of the Matanzas River from Fort Marion 50 16. Stairs to the terreplein, Fort Marion 52 17. The terreplein, Fort Marion 52 18. Road to Fort Pickens 72 19. Fort Pickens 73 20. Entrance to Fort Pickens 73 21. Casemate, Fort Pickens 74 22. Railroad tracks going north from Mount Vernon, Alabama 90 23. Train station (now Senior Citizen Building), Mount Vernon 91 24. Present-day house across from train station 91 25. Dense foliage, typical of Mount Vernon landscape 94 26. Chiricahua Apache children at Fort Marion 106 27. Chiricahua Apache children after being inducted into Carlisle Indian Industrial School, Pennsylvania 106 28. Oklahoma horizon at sunset, near Fort Sill 108 29. Fort Sill National Historic Landmark, Oklahoma 110 30. Lew Kaywaykla’s deer hide painting of Gáhe (Mountain Spirit Dancers) 111 31. Gáhe (Mountain Spirit Dancer), Fort Sill, Oklahoma 111 32. Chiricahua Apache farmers at Fort Sill, c. 1904 112

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Figures

33. Chiricahua Apache children at school, Fort Sill 112 34. Bishop Whipple Talking to Prisoners by Bear’s Heart (Cheyenne) 118 35. On the Parapet at Fort Marion Next Day after Arrival by Zotom (Kiowa) 119 36. Killing of Gray Beard by Zotom (Kiowa) 124 37. Plaza and Cathedral, St. Augustine by Doanmoe (Kiowa) 125 38. Captain Pratt and Kicking Bird Meeting the Hostile Kiowas by Doanmoe (Kiowa) 126 39. Captain Pratt’s House by Doanmoe (Kiowa) 126 40. By Steamboat Up the St. John’s River by Wohaw (Kiowa) 127 41. Kiowa Portraits by Wohaw (Kiowa) 129 42. Naiche, son of Cochise, at Fort Pickens 135 43. Chiricahua Apache deer hide painting 149 Color ¤gures 44 through 51 follow page 156. 44. Painting of Girl’s Puberty Ceremony Gáhe dance, 1898–1916 45. Painting of Girl’s Puberty Ceremony Gáhe dance, 1898–99 46. Painting of Girl’s Puberty Ceremony Gáhe dance, 1898 47. Painting of Girl’s Puberty Ceremony Gáhe dance, given 1908 48. Painting of Girl’s Puberty Ceremony Gáhe dance, given by Naiche to Mark Harrington 1909 49. Painting of Girl’s Puberty Ceremony Gáhe dance, purchased from Naiche 1909 50. Painting of Girl’s Puberty Ceremony Gáhe dance, purchased from Naiche 1909 51. Painting of Girl’s Puberty Ceremony Gáhe dance, owned by Mary Roe, wife of Rev. Walter Roe, Reformed Church missionary to POWs, 1897–1913 52. Inn of the Mountain Gods Resort and Casino, New Mexico 165 53. Lake and grounds at Inn of the Mountain Gods Resort and Casino 54. Golf Course, Inn of the Mountain Gods Resort and Casino 166 55. Road to Whitetail, Chiricahua Apache community at the Mescalero Apache Reservation, New Mexico 166

165

Timeline of Chiricahua Imprisonment 1861:

The “Bascom incident,” occurs, destroying any hope for peaceful relations between Cochise’s people and Anglo-Americans. Lieutenant Bascom, under a ®ag of truce, accuses Cochise of kidnapping a child. When Cochise denies any knowledge of the child’s whereabouts, Bascom tries to capture Cochise and his group. Cochise and his immediate family escape, but Bascom captures and later hangs Cochise’s male relatives. Naiche, Cochise’s son (then a child), is one of those who escapes with his father and mother. A bloody war ensues, lasting over a decade.

1872:

The federal government establishes a reservation for the Central Chiricahuas (Cochise’s group) in their homeland, the southeastern corner of present-day Arizona next to the border with Mexico.

1876:

The federal government abolishes the Chiricahua Reservation and concentrates all Apaches on the San Carlos Apache Reservation in the Gila River bottomlands, in east-central Arizona. Smallpox kills many; malaria is rampant.

April–November, 1886:

Over 500 noncombatant Chiricahuas are deported to Fort Marion, in St. Augustine, Florida, for incarceration.

September 1886:

Naiche, Geronimo, and their group surrender in Mexico, and the warriors are sent to Fort Pickens, in Pensacola Bay, Florida, for incarceration. (Their wives and children are diverted to Fort Marion, St. Augustine, Florida.) All Chiricahuas are designated “prisoners of war” and remain so for 27 years.

1887:

The Chiricahuas at Fort Marion are moved to Mount Vernon Barracks, Alabama. The wives of the warriors at Fort Pickens are given the choice of joining their husbands at Fort Pickens with their children or of going to Mount Vernon Barracks.

May, 1888:

Naiche, Geronimo, and their group join the other Chiricahuas at Mount Vernon Barracks, Alabama.

1894:

All the Chiricahuas are shipped to Fort Sill, Oklahoma.

1913:

Those Chiricahuas who choose to do so move to the Mescalero Apache Reservation, New Mexico, where their political status is subsumed under that of the Mescalero Apache Tribe. Others remain in the Fort Sill, Oklahoma, area where they are all eventually given parcels of land. They own this land individually instead of living on a reservation. The status of “prisoner of war” is eventually lifted from both groups of Chiricahuas.

Prologue: Life before Naiche and the Chiricahua Apache Prisoners of War

I

cannot remember a time before I knew of Cochise, the famous Chiricahua leader. My earliest childhood memories are of the movie Broken Arrow (Daves 1950) and the book Blood Brother (Arnold 1947.) Cochise’s dignity, integrity, and stature as a great leader remained etched in my mind despite the great liberties that I later learned were taken with his story. I am part Catawba Indian from South Carolina and having a positive American Indian role model shaped my childhood, especially when other children asked me why I “looked so different” with my dark, almond-shaped eyes and high cheekbones. Even though the Navajos drew me to Arizona in 1970—I came here to join a traditional Navajo family after my mother died—the Chiricahua Apaches were always in my heart. When I of¤cially moved to Arizona from Florida the following year, my Jeep seemed determined to turn off to the exit to the Cochise Stronghold. Saddened that the Chiricahuas no longer lived in their homeland, at the time I wondered where they had gone, why they had vanished. TUCSON, ARIZONA, APRIL, 1998 I am sitting in my of¤ce in the Anthropology Department at the University of Arizona grading student term papers when a middle-aged woman with a kind face appears in the doorway. In a soft voice but with very clear enunciation, she asks, “Are you Trudy Grif¤n-Pierce?” I say that I am and motion to the chair beside my desk. “How can I help you?” “I am Alicia Delgadillo.” She holds out her hand. The way that she gently clasps my hand instead of shaking it forcefully and the soft tones in which she speaks, tell me that she is either part American Indian or has spent much time in their company. “I was told that besides being an anthropologist, you are also an artist and have taught classes in the Art History Department on American Indian art. You are also part Catawba Indian.” Now she begins to get to the heart of her visit: “I’m organizing a seminar with the Chiricahua

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Prologue

Apache Prisoners of War Descendants with the University of Arizona and the Arizona State Museum, and I was wondering if you would like to be a part of it.” The minute I hear the word “Chiricahua” my excitement begins to rise. “That sounds wonderful. I’d like to hear more about it.” “You know about the Chiricahua Apache Prisoners of War Descendants?” When a puzzled look passes over my face, she expands, her voice gaining strength, “These are the descendants of the people who were with Naiche, the son of Cochise, and Geronimo, who held out until the very last and only surrendered in 1886. The government also uprooted the rest of the Chiricahuas who, by then, were settled on reservations in Arizona and shipped them all back to prisons in Florida. The government gave them all—we’re talking about over 500 people—the designation, ‘prisoners of war’ and moved them to Alabama, and then to Oklahoma. Then, ¤nally after 27 years, when the government decided it wanted Fort Sill back for military purposes, they gave the descendants of the original group the choice of staying in Oklahoma without a reservation on individual allotments of land or of joining the Mescalero Apaches on their reservation in New Mexico. As you know, they were never allowed to return to their homeland in southern Arizona.” My heart contracts at the thought of so much loss. “I’ve lived in Florida,” I can’t resist telling her. “So I know what it feels like, with no mountains and all that heavy, humid air pressing down on you. I never felt like I could breathe until I moved here with the mountains and the wide open expanses and the sky.” I shake my head with a sense of despair. “That’s worse than the ‘Trail of Tears’!,” I add. “The Cherokees weren’t forced into prisons on the other side of the country from their homeland, and they were eventually allowed to make new homes for themselves in Oklahoma. And they were never given Prisoner of War status. Everyone knows about the ‘Trail of Tears’ but no one ever talks about what the Chiricahuas went through. Yet it’s the Chiricahuas that Hollywood nearly always depicts in all those old Western movies. The most common belief—I get this from most of my students—is that the Army killed all the Chiricahuas and none are left. No one ever talks about their survival.” “That’s right,” Alicia nods, pleased that I understand. “That’s why a seminar like this is so important.” Instead of shifting in her chair, she sits in stillness and quietly listens to me, furthering my impression that she has spent much time among the Chiricahuas. “How did you get involved in all this?” “Well, years ago I worked at Fort Sill and got to know some of the Chiricahuas. Over the years we’ve built up a relationship, and several years ago, we organized a trip to Mexico to see the places where Naiche and his people had

Prologue

xv

spent so much time. It was tribal elders and families. We camped out for several days, and a medicine woman brought pollen and did a blessing. Everyone was very deeply moved. It was healing for everyone to go back and be in the places where their ancestors had walked, to experience those places for themselves. They took the children, too, to show them.” I am beginning to understand why Alicia speaks as she does. Even though English is clearly her native language, Alicia’s intonation and clipped syllables indicate that she probably speaks some Apache. Her longtime relationship with Chiricahua individuals is obviously one of great trust and affection. “Tell me more about the seminar.” “Well, we already have a number of people lined up to speak. Ed Sweeney, who’s written so much about Cochise, is going to talk about the history, and we’ve got Frank Sladen Jr., who’s the grandson of Captain Joseph Sladen, who kept a journal in the 1800s. Museum professionals will do presentations— Cecile Ganteaume from the Smithsonian, Alan Ferg and Diane Dittemore from the Arizona State Museum, and Peter Booth from the Arizona Historical Society. Bernadette Adley-Santamaria, who’s a White Mountain Apache Ph.D. student here at the U of A in linguistics will talk about language loss. Two of the Prisoners of War Descendants will talk, Elbys Naiche Hugar, who is Naiche’s granddaughter and Berle Kanseah, whose grandfather was the youngest warrior with Geronimo. Jordan Torres, who’s a direct descendant of Cochise and Naiche, will be showing his work also; he’s a well-known sculptor.” “That’s really impressive. How do I ¤t into all this?” “I’d like for you to speak after Miriam Perrett, a librarian from Wales who has done a lot of research into Naiche’s hide paintings, and to provide an art historian’s perspective on Naiche’s paintings of the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony. All the other Chiricahuas painted war exploits or courting scenes. Some even did pictures of the circus when it came to town. But Naiche was the only one who painted the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony. I’d like you to shed some light on the symbolism in his paintings and the signi¤cance of his work. I know you’re an artist, too, so maybe you could also talk about his work from an artist’s perspective also. Would you like to be a speaker?” I can barely contain my excitement. “Oh boy, would I!” I can feel my face lighting up with an ear-to-ear grin, and my surroundings begin to melt away. I am already swept up in Naiche’s world. “I was hoping you’d say that,” Alicia replies, smiling. “I’ve brought Xeroxes of Naiche’s work, as well as some done by the other Chiricahuas.” After the seminar was over, I was once more caught up in teaching. However, when I taught my Native Peoples of the Southwest class, I always devoted several days’ lectures to the Chiricahua people, their history, their dias-

xvi

Prologue

pora, and their resilience. My account (2000) of Alicia’s 1998 seminar opened the Apache chapter of Native Peoples of the Southwest, the textbook that I wrote for my students. Then, in November, 2003 at the American Anthropological meetings in Chicago, I mentioned Naiche’s hide paintings and the Chiricahua Apache Prisoners of War Descendants to my colleague and old friend of many years, Anthony Paredes. Tony chaired the Anthropology Department at Florida State University and now works for the National Park Service. I found myself telling him the details of the Chiricahua imprisonment, including the years they spent in Florida, Alabama, Oklahoma, and New Mexico. He responded with great enthusiasm, “There’s a book there, Trudy, and I can see it even as we talk! And the University of Alabama Press sounds perfect because of all the years that the Chiricahuas spent there at Mount Vernon Barracks! Go talk to Judith Knight, the senior acquisitions editor, while you’re here at the meetings. I’ll tell her you’re coming.” And so, I once more entered Naiche’s world.

Foreword: A Bronze Ga’an Speaks

O

n our dining table stands “Apache Mountain Spirit Blessing,” a 25-inch bronze by the cowboy sculptor R. Scott Nickell. The bronze ¤gure—a ga’an, or Mountain Spirit, in the dialect of the Western Apache—came to Tucson last August from the foundry in Lander, Wyoming, but we bought it in Jackson Hole in June, a full year of non-buyer’s lament after having discovered it among the menagerie of sculptured bears, bison, horses, moose, and elk that roam western parks and galleries. Like Naiche, son of Cochise, painting on hides and Trudy Grif¤n-Pierce painting word pictures, it takes an artist to craft the lasting images that preserve a time, place, or person. Whether these images represent memory itself, material things, or text—the three means by which David Lowenthal tells us we can access the past—they preserve for us a kaleidoscope of personal images. Our bronze ga’an speaks. So, too, does Trudy Grif¤n-Pierce’s book. This highly personalized account of the Chiricahua Apache struggle to survive and Naiche’s efforts to remember broadens our sense of understanding and preserves a sad and shameful historical moment that lingers at the edge of the American conscience: the diaspora of the Chiricahua Apache following their surrender and subjugation. Naiche’s artistic subject, the Apache cultural event he chose to commemorate again and again, is the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony, known by the Western Apaches as nai’es, a set of community and secret rituals highlighted by the public Sunrise Dance. The ¤rst one we attended was in 1971 in the Western Apache town of Cibecue on the Fort Apache Reservation, Arizona. According to Keith Basso, longtime student of the Cibecue Apache, “At one point in history, probably no more than ¤fty years ago, almost every Western Apache girl had a puberty ceremony, or nai’es (‘preparing her’; ‘getting her ready’). Today [1970] this is no longer true.” Yet the puberty ceremony will probably never disappear among the Western Apache or the Chiricahuas because it remains such a vital marker of Apache identity. Our ga’an sculpture and Naiche’s hide paintings provide a link between the past and the future. We hear the chant of the medicine men, the tinkling of the bell rattles, the eerie whir of the bull-roarer; we smell the ¤re’s smoke and the dust shuf®ed up by line-dancing women. Where Naiche records an arc of wickiups in the foreground, we see pickup trucks and four-door sedans, all American made. If

xviii

Foreword

we focus on the Mountain Spirits, we are transported back to the ¤re circle at Grasshopper. It is pitch-black and chilly in the pine forest, ten miles from the faint lights of Cibecue. Glenn Cromwell is singing in Apache and keeping beat on a homemade drum, when, off in the distant darkness we hear the jingle of bells and the intermittent other-worldly sound of the roarer. The human personi¤cation of supernatural beings and forces suddenly appear; they dance around the ¤re and imprint their shadow on the memory of people, who, like us, are not Apache. Like our ga’an and Naiche’s paintings, Trudy Grif¤n-Pierce’s text artfully captures images of a past that continue to live in the present. Naiche’s paintings are visual prayers for the future of his people. In Apache culture, women are revered because they carry life, and the celebration of their coming into womanhood is a celebration of the continuation of the Apache people. We congratulate Trudy for telling Naiche’s story so that many may share his vision, a vision that continues to sustain the Chiricahua today. J. Jefferson Reid and Stephanie M. Whittlesey Tucson, Arizona October 23, 2005

Chiricahua Apache Enduring Power

Introduction

T

he story of the Chiricahua Apache Prisoners of War is a long and heroic story of survival against amazing odds. Today the Chiricahuas remain the only group in the American Southwest that was never allowed to have a reservation in their homeland. The Chiricahuas are still in their diaspora, and, thus, the survival of their cultural identity—as opposed to their political identity, which has been subsumed under that of the Mescalero Apaches— remains all the more important. This is an essential theme of this book. It would be easy to see the Chiricahuas as victims of subjugation by a government that not only hunted them down and shipped them to prison sites in Florida, Alabama, and Oklahoma, where they remained as prisoners of war for 27 years, but also never let them return to their homeland. Their extremely high death rate during their imprisonment in Florida and Alabama contributes to this perspective. Indeed, much of the literature (e.g., Turcheneske 1997) takes this approach. However, I argue that, all along the way, the Chiricahuas were actively making choices about their future, beginning with the fact that they chose not to ¤ght to the death but to surrender so that the Chiricahua people would survive for future generations. While representatives of the federal government tried to apply agentive force to transform Chiricahua society into an Anglo-American model so that it would then become absorbed into the general population, the Chiricahuas remained an active force in this transformational process through their conscious intention to retain the essence of their cultural identity. Throughout the history of their imprisonment, the Chiricahuas not only deployed forms of resistance in often subtle ways but also used such strategies as selecting speci¤c individuals to play certain roles. After their arrival in Florida, when Richard Pratt was selecting children for his school, Geronimo insisted that his nephew, Daklugie, go to Carlisle so that he could learn “ ‘the ways of the White Eyes’ ” and be ably prepared “ ‘to cope with the enemy’ ” as a leader of his people (Daklugie in Ball 1988:135– 136). Against tremendous odds, including the efforts of the federal government to exterminate and then to assimilate them, the Chiricahuas have survived as a people. Ironically—and I use this word because the policy of the federal government had the opposite result from that intended by the of¤cials who made

Figure 1: Above, Mid-nineteenth-century Chiricahua Territory; below, reservation and imprisonment locations of the Chiricahua Apaches.

Introduction

3

that policy—the intensity of the force exerted by the government has been instrumental in the formation of their contemporary identity. Fredrik Barth has called this social process the recognition of “an otherness of the others that is explicitly linked to the assertion of cultural differences” (1995:1). To paraphrase Barth (9), by creating the Chiricahua Apache Prisoners of War Descendants, an active organization that exists today, the Chiricahuas have created a “contrastive cultural emblem” out of a “confrontational historical account” that embodies the perpetration of injustice by the federal government. Scholars today have rejected the assimilationist model based on the implication that a “traditional” culture existed that was static, in®exible, and untouched by interaction with other cultures. Nothing could be further from the truth, because American Indian groups were constantly adapting to ®uctuating resources and were sharing ideas with other groups. As conditions changed, they constantly adapted to these changes. Removing all sense of agency from American Indians, the assimilationist model focuses on how Anglo-Americans forced them to abandon their traditional beliefs and practices for those of the dominant society, and how this process proceeded over time. Today, scholars have replaced this model with one that recognizes American Indians as active agents who chose their strategies for responding to outside pressures, as they had long before the arrival of Europeans to their shores. The current trend in scholarship is based on the fact that “adaptation and borrowing were far more critical to Indian tradition than any imposed notion of purity” (Limerick 1987:189). Instead of reacting to change by simply capitulating to outside forces, groups responded to change with sophisticated responses (Braatz 2003:21). Loretta Fowler, in Shared Symbols, Contested Meanings, distinguished between continuity and identity among the Gros Ventre of Montana. Although resistance to change brings about continuity, identity comes from “the emergence of new concepts and values” as “native groups adapt to a changing social world” (Fowler 1987:8). Frederick Hoxie (1995:343) showed how the Crow Indians of Montana used “the opportunities that were afforded to them by new ideas, new technologies and new alliances” as a strategy for survival rather than as a form of acquiescence to American demands. Timothy Braatz’s recent history of the Yavapai people exempli¤es this approach by going beyond simply identifying shifts in behavior to analyzing what these shifts, such as the adoption of new economic practices, meant to the Yavapai. Using Yavapai accounts of their own history, Braatz applies Geertzian ideas of culture as “socially established structures of meaning” (Geertz 1973:12) so that the search becomes focused on the sources of meaning or signi¤cant structures that the Yavapai used to guide their actions rather

4

Introduction

than the product of using these structures. Instead of simply identifying how Yavapai behavior changed, Braatz (2003:23) analyzes the strategies that the Yavapai used when faced with change: diplomacy, alliances, raiding, relocation, and, eventually the adoption of a “sedentary agricultural existence on federally protected reserves,” in order to remain as Yavapais in Yavapai territory. The Chiricahuas have much in common with the Yavapais in terms of their relatively nomadic lifestyle and their long struggle to keep their Chiricahua identity. However, there were many more Chiricahuas in each of their bands than there were Yavapai, and different groups made different choices. Some grew tired of constantly ®eeing U.S. and Mexican troops and chose to accept the desolate conditions at San Carlos, where they were forced to settle on a reservation. Others chose to ®ee and to escape the slow death by malaria, a disease that was rampant at San Carlos, even though they knew that freedom might mean death. And some even chose how they were to die. Victorio was among the latter group. When his people, the Eastern Chiricahua, also known as the Tcihene or Warm Springs Apaches, ®ed the reservation, they were massacred by Mexican troops at Tres Castillos. Fighting as hard as he could and realizing that it was hopeless, Victorio made a personal decision and refused to accept “ ‘the ignominy of imprisonment and slavery’ ” (Kaywaykla in Ball 1970:100). According to Kaywaykla, Dah de glash, a woman who survived, told him the details of Victorio’s death, “We found the chief with his own knife in his heart. His ammunition belt was empty. Behind rocks we found three of his men who had died by their own knives, as had Victorio . . . ” (102). Later, at San Carlos, Kaytennae, another Tcihene, was unjustly accused of inciting an outbreak and was sent to Alcatraz. Geronimo and others heard rumors that they were also to be imprisoned or executed and chose to escape. Some of the Chiricahuas, primarily those related by blood or marriage to Geronimo or Naiche, ®ed with them to Mexico. They fought until the men decided to surrender—they were never defeated, despite the claims of some of the military of¤cers who led campaigns against them. They surrendered because they wanted to be reunited with their families, whom the army was sending to Florida, and because they wanted the Chiricahuas to survive as a people, the same choice that Cochise had made when he ¤nally decided to accept a reservation. About to lose his best ¤ghting men who wanted to surrender, Geronimo agreed to join them. However, not all the Chiricahuas did surrender; a small group of Nednhi, or Southern Chiricahua, whose home territory was primarily in Mexico, remained behind in their homeland (see Goodwin and Goodwin 2000). Sources on the Chiricahua Apache vary considerably. Morris Opler is the

Introduction

5

primary ethnographer of the Chiricahua and wrote the only book (1941, repr. 1996) that illuminates a picture of Chiricahua life before it was substantially altered by white contact. He also authored an account of Chiricahua mythology (1942; repr. 1994) and Chiricahua social organization (1937; repr. 1955). Castetter and Opler (1936) described the ethnobotany of the Chiricahua and Mescalero Apache, a book that is signi¤cant because the harvesting of wild food resources played such a major role in their subsistence. Considerable attention has been focused on the events immediately preceding Chiricahua dislocation because the Chiricahuas were among the last American Indians to be subjugated by the United States, and the whites who intruded into their homeland were extremely vocal about the “savagery” of their Indian antagonists (Opler 1983:418). Unfortunately, the abundant accounts of military campaigns led against the Chiricahuas (Bourke 1886, 1892, 1891; repr. 1958, 1970, 1971 respectively; Miles 1896; Thrapp 1972, 1974), tend to support this imperialistic view by portraying military ¤gures, such as General George Crook, as heroic and kind, when, in reality, Crook led numerous massacres of Apaches and other Indian peoples. Even individuals who were sympathetic to the Apaches and the deplorable conditions to which they were subjected at San Carlos, such as Lieutenant Britton Davis (1919; repr. 1963), who wrote an account of his time administering the reservation there, used military discourse that applies terms such as “friendlies” and properly “paci¤ed” Apaches and labeled those who fought to remain in their homeland “hostiles,” “renegades,” and “outlaws.” Other histories that include military events, without such hegemonic language, include works by D. C. Cole (1988), Debo (1976), Haley (1997), Roberts (1993), Sweeney (1991), Utley (1987), and Worcester (1979). Eve Ball tried to portray the Chiricahua experience through interviews with Chiricahua people. Using interviews with the elderly survivors of the Chiricahua Apache wars and their children, Eve Ball wrote two books (1970, 1980 [repr. 1988]). However, she tended to ¤ctionalize and romanticize the accounts they had given her in the 1940s and 1950s, in the same style as her regular contributions to western magazines. In this book, I quote from her works, which remain important sources because they are two of the few books that record accounts of individual Chiricahuas who experienced imprisonment; however, it must be kept in mind that this is dramatized and somewhat romanticized history. Ball’s work remains remarkable because she was one of the few whites to earn the respect of the Chiricahuas enough to tell their side of the story and to get it into print, which, at the time, was not easy to do. Ball arrived in Ruidoso, New Mexico, in 1942 and, six years later, bought a house about a mile from the Mescalero Apache Reservation. By about 1950, she had begun

6

Introduction

to interview some of the nearly 70 individuals from whom she gathered information. James Kaywaykla, Asa Daklugie, Eugene Chihuahua, and Jasper Kanseah (the youngest warrior with Geronimo, born about 1872; Kanseah and his mentor Yanozha both died in the 1950s) all spoke with Eve Ball for her books. Individuals did not usually know their exact birthdates, and Ball did not record death years consistently for individual Apaches, but all of these men had experienced the Chiricahua diaspora; Asa Daklugie, one of the last surviving Chiricahuas of his generation, died in 1955. She also collected information from other Chiricahuas who shared their personal experiences and those of their parents. This includes George Martine, Ramona Daklugie, Edna Comanche, Richard Johlsanni (son of Ulsanna), Amelia and Christian Naiche (daughter and son of Naiche), Isabel Perico Enjady (daughter of Perico), Eveline Gaines (granddaughter of Victorio), Evans Istee and Charles Istee (grandson of Victorio and his father). She also used a transcript of the account of Geronimo’s surrender that was recorded at the Mescalero Reservation, in which the scouts, Martine and Kayitah, told their story. Sherry Robinson (2000) mined Eve Ball’s raw data, much of which had not been previously published. Robinson went through unsorted boxes of Ball’s papers, which are in the archives at Brigham Young University, to produce a book with new anecdotal information that adds to the understanding of events as it was experienced by Chiricahua individuals. Robinson (2000:xiii) observed that in comparing transcripts of Ball’s interviews with the written version in her books, “it’s clear Eve cleaned up the dialogue” instead of presenting “their words exactly as they were spoken.” Jason Betzinez who was with Geronimo, wrote his own account of his experience with Wilbur Sturtevant Nye (1959; repr. 1987). However, he wrote this when he was nearly a hundred years old at the urging of his wife, a white missionary of Dutch descent, whom he married late in life. Betzinez’s account glori¤es Carlisle Institute and does not portray the response of most Chiricahuas when they were forced to abandon their own culture for white culture. He (1987:27) writes disparagingly of Apache culture, saying “In my time the Apaches had not yet reached the same degree of civilization as the white man . . . ”. Betzinez was one of the Chiricahuas who chose to remain in the Fort Sill area to farm individually owned allotments of land. Most of the Chiricahuas who settled at Mescalero did not care for Betzinez and one even went so far as to say Betzinez had been a coward when they were on the warpath together. Henrietta Stockel wrote a book (1993) based on medical records pertaining to the Chiricahuas available at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, and archival material (see Walsh, unpublished documents) at the Frisco Native American Museum in North Carolina. She visited the places where the Chiricahuas were impris-

Introduction

7

oned and spoke with specialists there, often going through documents and ¤les that they had kept pertaining to the Chiricahuas. She also used primary sources, including interviews with Apache women, for her book about Mescalero and Chiricahua women (1991). Although Stockel added some additional material to reconstruct con®icting government policies that affected the treatment of the Chiricahuas, her most recent book (2004) is a 153-page narrative based on many of the same government documents as her previous books. Shame and Endurance: The Untold Story of the Chiricahua Apache Prisoners of War brings a somewhat more scholarly approach to this material, but it is not intended to be theoretically framed. Drawing upon oral histories of Chiricahua individuals (and with the approval of some Chiricahuas) and newspaper accounts, Woodward Skinner (1987) produced a record of their captivity. Skinner lived in Pensacola and, although his book meanders and lacks a scholarly style, it is replete with information about their experiences. To document Chiricahua efforts to gain restitution for the loss of their land under the Indian Claims Commission, lawyer Michael Lieder and writer Jake Page (1997) combed through previously unpublished materials found in the National Archives in Washington, D.C., as well as the ¤les in the of¤ces of I. S. Weissbrodt, the law ¤rm that represented the Chiricahuas. This included testimony by Morris Opler, who gave an account of pre-reservation Chiricahua culture. Considerable interest in anthropology today has been focused on agency and resistance in response to the social and political dimensions of distress, place and emplacement, and other externalistic and emotional causes of illness and misfortune. Unfortunately, it is impossible to go back in time and to conduct interviews with the Chiricahuas who experienced imprisonment ¤rsthand. Keeping in mind that the interviews and oral histories that do exist were recorded by people who were bound by their own cultural and personal biases, it is still possible to get some sense of how the Chiricahuas responded physically and emotionally to the experience of dislocation and imprisonment. Using material recorded by Opler, Ball, Skinner, and others, I apply a framework of anthropological theory related to the study of military conquest, exile, and place as a means of de¤ning ethnic identity. Edward S. Casey, a philosopher deeply involved with the phenomenological account of place (1983 [repr. 2000], 1993, 1996 [repr. 2003]), has said that place fuses self, space, and time because place is the most fundamental form of embodied experience. I strongly agree with both Casey and with anthropologist Michael Jackson (1995:1, 5), who believes that in order to understand other peoples’ experiences, it is necessary “to walk away from the familiar” and to plunge “into the confusing stream of direct experience.” Realizing part way through the writing of this book that the only way I had a chance

8

Introduction

of beginning to understand some of what the Chiricahuas had experienced was to go where they had gone, I got on a plane to Florida. Even though I could in no way replicate what they felt, I could, at least, breathe the same air, feel the same humidity and simmering heat, and immerse myself in the sights, and, often, the sounds, that they saw and heard. This is exactly what I tried to do as I walked the grounds of Fort Pickens, Fort Marion, Mount Vernon Barracks, Fort Sill, and Mescalero. Externalistic and emotional causes of illness are of major interest to the burgeoning anthropological sub¤eld known as medical anthropology. I take a medical anthropological perspective because this perspective relates the person to the body as a mode of being in the world and is a response to mentalist theories that ignore bodily sensation. Much more than the study of medical systems as treatment practices, medical anthropology includes the anthropology of the senses, performance theory, the anthropology of the body and the self, issues of agency and resistance, and the exploration of disease/illness/ sickness/suffering, all of which provide valuable tools with which to better understand the experiences of the Chiricahua Apaches. What medical anthropology brings to this understanding is embodied experience, the physical and emotional feelings of being in one’s body. First and foremost, medical anthropology is engaged with the body in context, a perspective that contrasts with classical social anthropology in which the body is largely absent and from biological anthropology which makes the body into a universal object (Lock and Scheper-Hughes 1996:41). Disease is social as much as it is biological not only because of the political oppression that underlies experiential conditions but also because of how the ill person experiences suffering and how she or he is cared for by others. By focusing on the lived experience of repression and subjugation, anthropologists reveal the extraordinary means by which people contest and subvert violence (Green 1998:3). War, con®ict, and human aggression structure people’s everyday reality and social relations (Kleinman and Kleinman 1996; Scheper-Hughes 1992, 1996). In order to better understand this, medical anthropologists are moving away from the incomplete perspective that has been described as the “disembodied body” (T. Turner 1994) which neglects the concrete suffering of people involved in political upheaval. Instead, scholars are turning toward how violence and suffering are embodied by addressing the phenomenological aspects of human experience. This perspective takes into account the bodily distress that a person is experiencing, what Scheper-Hughes and Lock call the “mindful body” (1987). Suffering is constructed and reconstructed in the interface between the politicaleconomic forces that shape the context of everyday life and the socially

Introduction

9

constituted categories of meaning. Above all, individuals are not passive beings but are active agents who respond to the physical conditions that they face in the light of the possibilities created by social relations. The macro and micro levels are connected: the political economy/world system level (the macro) is deeply connected with the Foucauldian poststructuralist level (the micro). What this means is that while political and social systems at the macro level play a major role in determining events and conditions, it is essential not to forget the existential content of suffering and healing as lived events experienced by individuals. Humanistic Marxism focuses on experience as mediating between social structure and the individual (Morsy 1996:27), thus contributing to our understanding of how political systems profoundly affect the conditions of people’s lives. For the Chiricahuas, political subjugation over the course of their 27-year imprisonment resulted in disease, death, and suffering. Clearly evident in their contested history, the Chiricahuas had become a thorn in Washington’s side during their years of captivity as debates raged over what to do with them. However, while the ideology and rhetoric that supported imperialistic doctrine had a profound impact on the social relations and conditions of their imprisonment, it is essential not to lose sight of the individual lived experiences of the Chiricahua people. My intention in writing this book is to make the experiences of imprisonment and displacement come alive for the reader. What was it like to be promised a two-year imprisonment away from the Southwest with their families and then to discover that the government had no intention of keeping this promise? How did the parents and children experience being separated when the children were forcibly taken to Carlisle Institute? How did Chiricahua men feel having their hair chopped off when they reached Carlisle Institute? What did it feel like to be imprisoned in oppressively hot Florida forts, far away from the wide open horizons of the Southwest? What were the bodily sensations at each of the places where they lived? And, most amazingly, how did they manage to retain a sense of Chiricahua identity in the face of continuous and sometimes violent efforts to eradicate this identity? This book is a tribute to the cultural resilience of the Chiricahua people. They survived military efforts to annihilate them, government efforts to subjugate them, and social efforts to destroy their language and cultural practices. Although federal policy makers brought to bear the power at their command, they failed to eradicate Chiricahua spirit or identity. Naiche, the son of Cochise, along with many other Chiricahuas, believed in another kind of power. Although Naiche was not known to have Power in this sense, his paintings show that he believed in it. Accessible to individuals for many pur-

10

Introduction

poses, this Power helped the Chiricahuas survive throughout their history. At no time did they need it more than after they surrendered and faced 27 years of imprisonment far from their homeland. It was with them throughout that dark period, for today not only are the Chiricahuas surviving but they are also keeping their traditions alive and their culture strong and vital.

1

Ethnographic and Historic Background of the Chiricahua Apaches

I want to live in these mountains . . . I have drunk of these waters and they have cooled me, I do not want to leave here. —Cochise

TUCSON, ARIZONA, AUGUST 2004 The sun is just coming up over the Rincon Mountains when I head east from Tucson for the Cochise Stronghold (Figures 2 and 3). The desert is alive with light: prickly pear pads re®ect the light like oval mirrors while creosote, mesquite, and paloverde begin to glow with the sun’s growing intensity. Long tentacles of ocotillo crown the crest of hills, their bright green leaves illuminated. As the country opens up, I pass more horse trailers, pickup trucks, and trailers stacked high with hay. Yuccas and century plants stand silhouetted against the sky. Apache Peak, in the Whetstone Mountains, rises off to the south as I enter Cochise County. Soon the highway is dipping down into the steep sided San Pedro Valley, cut by the river of the same name. Leaving the town of Benson behind, I reach Texas Canyon with its huge smooth boulders so similar to those in the Cochise Stronghold. The morning light spreads across their surface, creating deep pockets of shadow and brilliant rock faces ®ooded with light. And then I take the exit for the Cochise Stronghold, past the immense dry lake known as Willcox Playa to the scattered houses in the community of Sunsites. Pavement gives way to a dirt road. The Jeep bumps over the washboard road, and dust billows up behind me. Looking up at the high pinnacles and steep-sided peaks of the Dragoon Mountains, I can see what made it an impenetrable fortress that could be defended without much effort. Anyone approaching for some distance on the surrounding plain would be clearly visible. I thread my way through a grove of oak trees as the road winds over dry streambeds. The camping ground is empty, and I am glad to have Cochise’s favorite spot to myself. A little sun ¤lters down through the thick canopy, but high above, the sun is hot and bright on the high pinnacles. Two ravens soar above me, chortling to each other as they sweep by on the wind currents.

Figure 2: The Cochise Stronghold, southeastern Arizona. This place provided a secure home for Cochise and his people. Lookouts could easily spot strangers approaching at a great distance. Photo by author.

Figure 3: The Cochise Stronghold, southeastern Arizona. Cochise is buried here in an unmarked place among the rocks and chasms, along with his favorite horse and dog. Photo by author.

Ethnographic and Historic Background

13

When I rejoin the interstate highway after leaving the Cochise Stronghold, I again head east, this time for Fort Bowie, the focal point of military operation by the U.S. Army against the Chiricahuas. Apache Pass, which separates the Dos Cabezas and Chiricahua mountains, was a favorite place for Chiricahua families because of the dependable source of water at Apache Spring and the abundance of plant life (Figures 4 and 5). Near Apache Spring a wickiup has been constructed to provide the feeling of a Chiricahua camp (Figure 6). Desert grasslands cover the lower slopes, and the chaparral has evergreens, manzanita, mountain mahogany, and silk tassel. Along the sandy drainages, willow, walnut, and cottonwood ®ourish, while the higher slopes have oak, juniper, and pinyon pine. I had not realized the proximity of so many key places to each other. Parking my Jeep on the dirt road, I hike down a trail and over a wash. After walking through open country for a couple of miles, I come across the remains of the Butter¤eld Overland Mail Stage Station (Figure 7), the Chiricahua Apache Indian Agency, the site of the Bascom Affair in 1861 (see Timeline), the site of the Battle of Apache Pass in 1862, and Fort Bowie. The stone foundation of the stage station once held a kitchen–dining room, sleeping rooms, and a storage room for feed and weapons. Standing inside its walls, I try to imagine what the drivers and passengers must have felt. The road they took is clearly visible, but it is hard to conceive of a wheeled vehicle traveling over such rough terrain, especially at relatively high speeds. The company had to design something called the Celerity Wagon for the more rugged routes in the Southwest; smaller and lighter in weight than the bulkier coaches used on other parts of the line, these wagons were designed for speed and rocky terrain. Dusty and sweaty, drivers and passengers must have been very relieved to see the Apache Pass Stage Station come into view after being thrown around a jolting wagon for endless hours. Built in 1858 and used until the eve of the Civil War in 1861, this station linked El Paso with Fort Yuma in a cross-country route that began at Memphis, Tennessee, and ended in San Francisco, California. The Overland Mail Company paid Cochise and his people to supply station employees with wood until 1861, when Lieutenant Bascom tried to imprison Cochise over a kidnapping he did not commit. He executed some of Cochise’s male relatives by hanging and then left their bodies for the buzzards to eat. Bascom’s actions led to ten years of open warfare with Cochise and his warriors. Realizing that continued warfare would only lead to the extinction of his people, Cochise decided to make peace on the condition that their reservation would be located in their homeland. As I continue along the trail, past the Fort Bowie cemetery, I come to the remains of the Chiricahua Apache

Figure 4: Apache Pass, a favorite camping site for Cochise’s band before Anglo-American arrival. Apache Springs, here at the pass, ®owed year-round, making it a strategic place. Photo by author.

Figure 5: A rocky ridge in Apache Pass, showing typical vegetation: yucca, agave, and ocotillo. Photo by author.

Figure 6: Reconstructed Chiricahua Apache wickiup at Apache Pass. Photo by author.

Figure 7: The ruins of the Butter¤eld Stage Station, Apache Pass. Photo by author.

16

Chapter 1

Indian Agency, including the stone house where Thomas Jeffords lived as their agent. Cochise had agreed to living within the con¤nes of a reservation as long as their Indian agent was his friend Jeffords, whom he knew would see that they were treated fairly. One of the most remarkable friendships ever recorded in history, the relationship between these two men was based on mutual trust and respect. I was only four years old when I read Elliott Arnold’s 1947 novel, Blood Brother, but it stayed with me for the rest of my life, even after I discovered the great liberties that Arnold had taken with historical facts. For example, he invented a Chiricahua heroine, Sonseeahray, for Jeffords to marry. Jeff Chandler vividly portrayed Cochise as a man of moral strength and dignity in Delmer Daves’s 1950 ¤lm Broken Arrow, based on Arnold’s book. This ¤lm was a major breakthrough in its depiction of American Indian individuals as sympathetic characters. Anglo-American audiences were not entirely prepared for this radical shift in perspective in Westerns, however, so the scriptwriter, Albert Maltz, used Jeffords’s ( James Stewart) voice for narration. Thus, the audience sees and interprets events through his eyes; Jeffords is our guide to the world of the Chiricahua Apaches (Walker 1996:124). As in Arnold’s novel, in the ¤lm Sonseeahray (Debra Paget) is killed to satisfy the Production Code disapproval of miscegenation, a code that regulated ¤lmmaking until 1956 (127). The 3,000-square-mile Chiricahua Reservation existed from 1872 until 1876 (see Timeline) when the federal government abolished it and ordered the Chiricahuas to move north to the San Carlos Reservation in the hot, barren, and disease-ridden Gila River Valley. I imagine Jeffords sitting at a desk in the building, scratching his head as he sorted out the problems of rations that were never delivered and how to pay local ranchers to provide supplies for the Apaches. Before Cochise’s people settled on the reservation, Apaches ambushed Union troops while they were en route to confront Confederate troops in Arizona in what was known as the Battle of Apache Pass; this was the encounter that led to the establishment of Fort Bowie to protect the pass and the spring. Fort Bowie, which is now part of the National Park system, served as the nerve center for military campaigns against the Chiricahuas, who broke out of the San Carlos Reservation when they could no longer stand the slow death caused by its deplorable conditions. Brigadier General George Crook and, later, Brigadier General Nelson Miles left Fort Bowie to follow Naiche’s and Geronimo’s band into Mexico. Photographer C. S. Fly accompanied the troops and took the ¤nal photographs of the Chiricahuas as free people (Figures 8, 9, and 10) as well as a photograph of the meeting between

Ethnographic and Historic Background

17

U.S. troops and Chiricahuas at Cañon de los Embudos (Canyon of the Funnels) (Figure 11). Upon their ¤nal surrender in September 1886, Naiche, Geronimo, and their small group of warriors, women, and children were brought to Fort Bowie, gathered here on the parade grounds, and taken by wagons to the railroad station for their long trip to Florida. Fort Bowie, nearly twice the altitude of Tucson, is relatively cool even in the late August sun. But as soon as I stop walking, ®ies and other insects land on my arms. The resignation and misery of surrender, along with the fear of anticipated execution, must have been crushing as the Chiricahuas climbed into the wagons in the simmering September heat with little idea of what lay ahead. One of the surprising features of Fort Bowie is its size. The remains of the ¤rst Fort Bowie are quite small, but the ruins of the second one stretch out extensively across the valley. Laid out with corrals and stables on the north and the commanding of¤cers’ quarters on the south, Fort Bowie features a large parade ground, where a ®ag snaps and clanks against a tall ®agpole in the desert breeze. The of¤cers’ quarters line the parade ground to the north and west, while the adjutant’s of¤ce, school, telegraph of¤ce, and old hospital are on the east side. The subsistence storehouse, granary, and cavalry barracks lie between the parade ground and the stables. Although ruins are all that are left, an illustration of the fort at the height of its development in the early 1890s shows a well-established community. Even though its usefulness to the military ended with the exile of the Chiricahuas, the fort remained an active post for another eight years. THE CHIRICAHUAS The Chiricahuas are one of seven Apachean tribes that also include the Kiowa-Apache, Jicarilla, Lipan, Mescalero, Western Apache, and Navajo. The Apacheans (or Southern Athapaskans) came from the Mackenzie Basin of Canada, where the nucleus of Athapaskan speakers is located. The Apacheans speak languages related to those spoken by Athapaskans in Canada, Alaska, and northern California. (Athapaskan [Na-Dene] is so different from other American Indian languages that Joseph Greenberg (1987:331) considered it to be one of three American Indian language groupings, the other two being Amerind and Eskimo-Aleut. Linguists have since discredited his overly broad classi¤catory scheme [Goddard 1996:317].) In small bands of undifferentiated peoples, the Apachean peoples migrated southward from Canada. Just as earlier peoples had unknowingly crossed the temporary land bridge across the Bering Strait from Asia into North America,

Figure 8: Geronimo with warriors. Left to right, Yanozha, Chappo (one of Geronimo’s sons), Fun (Yanozha’s half-brother), and Geronimo. Photographed by C. S. Fly, March, 1886. Courtesy Arizona Historical Society, Tucson, No. 174.

Figure 9: Naiche and Geronimo with warriors. Left to right, Perico (with baby), Geronimo, Naiche, and Tsisnah. Photographed by C. S. Fly, March, 1886. Courtesy Arizona Historical Society, Tucson, No. 171.

Figure 10: Chiricahua Apaches at peace talks. Front row, from left, are Biyaneta, two unknown girls, Haozinne (Naiche’s wife), unknown, Laziyah, Catle, unknown, and Garditha. Second row includes Nah-bay (Nahi) and Fun. On horseback, second and fourth from left, are Tsisnah and Yanozha. Photographed by C. S. Fly, March, 1886. Courtesy Arizona Historical Society, Tucson, No. 181.

Figure 11: Cañon de los Embudos (Canyon of the Funnels), Mexico. Geronimo chose this spot for the peace talks because it was close to the border but safer than on the U.S. side. Photographed by C. S. Fly, March, 1886. Courtesy Arizona Historical Society, Tucson, No. 182.

20

Chapter 1

this large contingent of Athapaskans steadily expanded into new territory. In their search to provide more plentiful resources for their growing population, they were continually segmenting into new groups and moving into unexplored areas. As nomadic hunter-gatherers, they left little archaeological evidence, which has not only made it dif¤cult to trace their route but also has kept scholars from assigning a de¤nite date to their arrival in the Southwest; archaeologists estimate their arrival in the Southwest at some time between a.d. 1000 and a.d. 1500. The Apacheans had developed a culture well-adapted to their northern homeland: men hunted game with bows and arrows and ¤shed in lakes and rivers, while women gathered berries, processed hides, and made buckskin clothing decorated with porcupine quillwork and wove baskets. In contrast to the Puebloan cultures of the Southwest, the Apachean sinew-backed bow was more complex than the staff bow of the Pueblos, and they wore hardsoled moccasins rather than sandals. Their forked-pole, bark- or skin-covered dwellings were the precursors of Apache wickiups and Navajo hogans that they would build when they reached the Southwest. Their shamanistic ceremonies emphasized healing, and they respected and feared the dead. They also considered it essential to celebrate a girl’s passage into womanhood. Organized into family groups and loosely knit bands, they had informal leaders who had limited authority. Probably by about a.d. 1400 (Opler 1983:382), the Apacheans had arrived in what is now called the Southwest in small bands of undifferentiated migratory peoples. The Spanish would later call them Apache, from what is probably a Zuni word for any group of non-Pueblo people. Resilient and resourceful, they had had to adapt to many varied ecological niches on their long journey. Once they reached the Southwest, change continued to be a vital process that exposed them to different cultures and ways of life, providing important stimulus for their own way of life. By the late 1500s, the Apacheans had separated into smaller groups and spread over a region from northwestern Texas to central Arizona (Basso 2004:12). Over the course of centuries, they evolved into seven distinct groups—the Kiowa-Apache, the Western Apache, the Lipan Apache, the Jicarilla Apache, the Mescalero Apache, the Chiricahua Apache, and the Navajo—as each group split away from the main group and moved into what became its own territory and adapted to the local conditions of climate, terrain, and available food sources. [Today, most of these groups have chosen other political designations.] Their contact with nearby non-Apacheans— Puebloan and Plains peoples—provided an array of cultural traits from which they selected speci¤c traits that they adapted to their own cultural beliefs and practices. While the Navajo and Western Apaches took on many borrowed

Ethnographic and Historic Background

21

traits from their Pueblo neighbors, most Apaches were more in®uenced by the peoples of the Great Plains. Over time, however, such in®uence was hardly unidirectional. After Apacheans acquired the horse from the Spaniards, they served as a conduit for this valuable resource, introducing horses to the Plains tribes. Mescalero medicine man Bernard Second told historian Eve Ball that the Cheyennes honored the Apaches in song for giving them the horse. “Nobody should say that the Apaches were in®uenced by the Plains Indians—just the contrary was the case,” said Second (Robinson 2000:133), “Our old people say that the Plains Indians were originally just river tribes [before they got horses].” According to linguistic evidence, the Kiowa-Apache were the ¤rst to divide from the main group as they moved eastward onto the southern Plains, into present-day Oklahoma. The Western Apache moved into the central mountains of what is now Arizona, while the Navajo expanded westward and southward from the Four Corners region. The Lipan migrated into presentday central and south Texas, while the Jicarilla established themselves in what is now northern New Mexico and southern Colorado. The Chiricahuas and Mescaleros, probably the last to separate from each other, established themselves in a central position, remaining in contact with most of the other Apacheans except for the Kiowa-Apache. Eventually, the Mescaleros moved east of the Rio Grande, while the Chiricahuas developed a specialized hunting and gathering economy and spread into southwestern New Mexico, southeastern Arizona, and northern Mexico. CHIRICAHUA CULTURE IN 1850

Political Organization Although anthropologists use the term “tribe”—a label based on common territory, language, and culture—to identify and differentiate these groups from each other, none of them formed a single political unit. The tribe was a loose union of bands, which, in turn, were a loose union of local groups. Like the tribe, bands lacked a chief with any kind of organized political authority. The boundaries of each band were recognized by other bands, and its members felt a strong attachment to their territory. Each band occupied a large enough territory (Figure 1) that they seldom needed to go outside their area for hunting and gathering; before their population was decimated by warfare and disease, individuals seldom married outside their band (cf. Basehart 1967, 1970). Most scholars consider the Chiricahua tribe to have been comprised of three bands, although some recognize a fourth band. The Southern Chiricahuas— who called themselves the Ndndai, which also appears as Nednhi and Nednai

22

Chapter 1

(Enemy People), implying that they were ¤erce warriors—ranged through small sections of what is now southwestern New Mexico and southeastern Arizona, with most of their territory in present-day Mexico. Mexicans and Americans knew them as the Janeros, Carrizalenos, and Pinery Apaches, in reference to the places where they lived (Sweeney 1991:4). Their homeland lay in the mountains along what is now the international border with Mexico, but they roamed deep into the Sierra Madre in the Mexican states of Chihuahua and Sonora (Opler 1996:1–2). The section of this band known as Janeros took their name from a town in northwestern Chihuahua where they had friendly relations, and from 1820 through the 1870s their leaders were Juan Diego Compa, Juan Jose Compa, Coleto Amarillo, Arvizu, Laceris, Galindo, Natiza, and Juh (Sweeney 1991:4). Juh was probably their most famous leader. The Carrizalenos, who took their name from another Chihuahuan town, were led by Jasquedega and Cristobal in the 1830s (4). Mexican campaigns hit both groups hard during this time period, virtually wiping out the Carrizalenos. The largest of the four bands, the Eastern Chiricahuas called themselves the Tcihene, which also appears as Chihenne, or Red Paint People. They lived west of the Rio Grande in what is now New Mexico in the Cuchillo, Black, Mimbres, Mogollon, Pino Altos, Victorio, and Florida mountain ranges (Opler 1996:2). Mexicans and Americans referred to various sections of this band as the Mimbres, Mimbrenos, Mogollons, Warm Springs, and Coppermine Apaches, in reference to the speci¤c locations they inhabited. Mangas Coloradas, Delgadito, Victorio, Nana, Loco, Mano Mocha, Fuerte, Itan, and Cuchillo Negro led the Tcihene from the 1820s through the 1870s (Sweeney 1991:4). The Tcokanen or Chokonen (a word translated by some as Tall Men [Lieder and Page 1997:6]), or Central Chiricahuas, occupied territory west and south of the Red Paint People. They lived in the southeast corner of present-day Arizona and a small area in northern Mexico that included the Dragoon, Dos Cabezas, and Chiricahua mountains. They also ranged east into what is now southwestern New Mexico, south into the Sierra Madre, and north to the Gila River. Their leaders from the 1820s through the 1870s included Relles, Matias, Tapila, Yrigollen, Miguel Narbona, Pisago Cabezon, Posito Moraga, Esquinaline, and Cochise, who had become the leading chief of his band by the mid-1850s (Sweeney 1991:5). The smallest band, the Bedonkohe, were absorbed into other bands during the 1860s as more and more of them were killed in warfare, with most of them choosing to follow Cochise after the death of Mangas Coloradas (Sweeney 1991:5). They lived northeast of the Central Chiricahuas in the Mogollon Mountains and the Gila River area. Geronimo was born into this band.

Ethnographic and Historic Background

23

There has always been confusion among outsiders over the divisions of what is now designated as the Chiricahuas because different subgroups, at times, joined together and then separated from each other. With increasing encroachment into their territories, Apache raiding and warfare increased, which discouraged any understanding of tribal divisions by outsiders. Some historians, such as Angie Debo (1976:9–13), consider the above classi¤cation to be a generalization that evades the true complexity of the tribal divisions of the groups known today as the Chiricahuas. She identi¤es the Bedonkohe, the Mimbrenos, the Warm Springs or Chihenne, the Chokonen, and the Nednai as tribes because they were well-de¤ned units. The Warm Springs Apaches also differentiated themselves from Cochise’s people. James Kaywaykla, who was with Geronimo, identi¤es himself as a Warm Springs Apache or Chihenne and says that “only the tribes of Cochise and Chihuahua were true Chiricahua” (Ball 1970:xiv). Each band was divided into several local groups, with each occupying a given area of band territory. Local groups took their names from a prominent natural landmark or from the name of its leader. Each group had a gota (headquarters)—such as the Cochise Stronghold in the Chiricahua Mountains—that could be easily defended and had access to water, ¤rewood, and grazing land for their horses. Although occupied for long periods of time, such a settlement was not necessarily permanent; if an enemy penetrated it, a large number of people died there, or the animal or plant resources in the vicinity were sharply reduced, a local group would establish another headquarters (Opler 1983:411). Only the local group had a nanta (leader), a man who embodied the most centralized authority that existed in band life. After their territory had been invaded by Anglo-Americans, one Chiricahua characterized the demands of leadership among his people: “Ability in war and wisdom make the leader. It’s easier to get to the front if you are a good ¤ghter. . . . The leader is not chosen, he is just recognized” (Opler 1996:466). Although he exercised in®uence, he had no coercive power and no way to enforce an unpopular decision. Those who disagreed with his policies were free to move elsewhere and join another local group, for no one had a lifelong commitment to living with the same local group. However, the local group remained a relatively stable unit because families did not change their af¤liation easily. It was extremely dif¤cult for a man to relocate because he was tied to his wife’s relatives by the strongest of economic and social ties and could not change residence unless his wife’s father also wished to move. Having shared household and economic responsibilities with her mother and sisters since childhood, a woman would not want to leave unless her entire extended family decided to change location. Only something as serious as severe economic reverses, fears of witch-

24

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craft, or interfamily feuds would cause a family to change its membership to another local group. Thus, local groups and bands tended to be endogamous. Responsible for the well-being of the entire local group, the leader tried to prevent internal disharmony by conferring with other family heads before he decided upon any course of action. His position had to be continuously validated through the demonstrated effectiveness of his strategies. The Chiricahua leader Cochise exempli¤ed the qualities of a respected leader through his wisdom, bravery, successful policies, eloquence, and the deep sensitivity he showed to the needs of his people, including the less fortunate members of his group. Although Cochise and other prominent individuals, such as Mangas Coloradas, Victorio, and Juh, are represented in movies and books as band or tribal chiefs, they were actually only local group leaders (Opler 1983:411). As the leader aged and his in®uence waned, another man emerged from the local group to take his place. Although his post was not hereditary, his children, who were considered to have received his guidance and leadership experience, often succeeded him. However, if they were not considered to be of chieftainship caliber, such a succession was not inevitable. Eugene Chihuahua (Ball 1988:45) had this to say: “Sometimes sons succeeded their fathers, but not unless they were elected by the warriors as Taza was after Cochise died.” But being a chief was not dependent on being a good ¤ghter—all warriors could ¤ght. Being leader meant to lead, to draw together the men, to lead the men willingly toward a shared goal. “This thing that makes a man a great chief—Daklugie’s father, Juh, had it. He told his men that he had nothing to offer them but death; but they followed him. They were loyal to him and they would have fought and died, if necessary, for him; but they, as well as Juh, were ¤ghting for their freedom, their families, and their homeland. And their self-respect. Chihuahua and Juh led their men and didn’t hide up on some mountain with ¤eld glasses like your of¤cers did” (45). When historian Eve Ball (1988:283) asked Daklugie, Juh’s son, if Apache chiefs were by nature dictators, he retorted, “Certainly not. They submitted plans to a council for approval or rejection. They listened to their warriors. They were dependent upon the approval of their people to hold them. They were far from being dictators.” Strong leadership, familiarity with the local group territory, and a network of ties through blood and marriage made the local group a stable unit. Ten to thirty extended families comprised a local group that families could count on to provide economic, martial, and ceremonial support beyond the resources of a single family. Men from a single local group usually formed their own war and raiding parties, and when visitors came for ceremonial and social groups, they were usually members of the same local group. If an under-

Ethnographic and Historic Background

25

taking required more people, the leader of each local group directed his members. The documentation of Chiricahua populations at this time is problematic because there was little sustained contact with Anglo-Americans before the establishment of reservations.

Social Organization Most individuals chose their marriage partners from their local group so that their families had a long acquaintance and knew that they could depend upon each other. Upon marriage, a person took on myriad responsibilities and obligations toward a new extended family, and the two families now joined by marriage were expected to support each other and to interact harmoniously. Such good relations were essential in economic activities. Daklugie described how he came to marry Ramona, Chihuahua’s daughter, and what was expected of him in the meantime, as well as after they had been married: It was while we were at San Carlos that a very wonderful thing happened to me. My father and Chihuahua had talked over the matter a long time before telling me. They had decided that when I was old enough I was to marry Ramona, Chihuahua’s daughter. We were both very young, too young to know whether or not we wished to marry. My father told me that but also said that it was his hope that Ramona and I would love each other and welcome this marriage. Then he warned me that “from now on you are not to see each other except when her parents or I am with you. Even then, if you talk, it must be with something between you, a bush perhaps, and you must speak back to back. You must respect Chihuahua’s daughter and defend her with your life if necessary. And when you are a man and have proved yourself to the satisfaction of the warriors, you may be married with a four-day feast and all the tribe must know of your wedding. That way Ramona will be respected as she should be, and you will love each other and be happy. After your marriage, you will owe nothing to me nor to our family; you will support your wife’s family and protect and defend them. [Ball 1988:73–74]

Daklugie took his father’s words to heart, and, after their people were exiled to the east, when he and Ramona were among the students bound for Carlisle, he made sure that she was not threatened or hurt in any way on the train. During their time at Carlisle he continued to look out for her as much as he could. Eventually, after their people moved to Fort Sill and he had earned enough money to get a house and support a family, Daklugie and Ramona married. For their Chiricahua wedding feast, she wore a beautiful beaded buckskin dress, and, because, according to Daklugie, Ramona “wanted

26

Chapter 1

the respect of the White Eyes, too . . . we had both ceremonies. For that one she made a beautiful silk dress” (Ball 1988:164). Eve Ball, who knew them, said, “Never, I think, have I ever known a happier marriage than that of Ramona and Ace Daklugie” (1988:164). When the Chiricahuas were still in the Southwest, economic pressures were constant, and there was little margin of survival, so people usually chose to remain in the area where they had a long acquaintance with the local resources. A hunter wanted to continue his familiarity with the haunts of various animals in territory that he had known since childhood. He hunted best on his home ground “because he garnered power from the very ground itself—a power he lost when he entered other hunting grounds” (Kaut 1957: 63–64). He had also developed long and close relationships with special hunting companions and, by staying in the same local group, he was able to hunt with these same men. A woman had learned the natural timetable of wild food harvests in the area she had grown up in and was able to continue using this valuable knowledge if she stayed in the same area. Over a period of many years, she had acquired very speci¤c knowledge of rough terrain and its resources. The separate dwellings of nuclear families were clustered nearby so that families related by blood and marriage could work together. When a man married, his principal obligations for the rest of his life were to his wife’s extended family. Women were thus anchored to the social unit by remaining in the same familiar setting in which they had grown up. A girl was a member of the same work group throughout her life. She worked with her mother and sisters before and after her marriage. No matter whom she married, she usually stayed in her local group territory, where her knowledge of the food resources of the area continued to be useful. She had learned from childhood how to ef¤ciently exploit its natural resources and then taught this to her daughters. Women thus contributed signi¤cantly both socially and economically, which helped ensure their relatively high status within the Chiricahua culture. The groom had to make the major adjustments when he married by joining his wife’s encampment. He had grown up hunting and working with his father, unmarried brothers, and brothers-in-law, and now he was responsible for his wife’s parents and her other close relatives. Since he was expected to move near his wife’s family (matrilocality), it was much easier for him if he married within his own local group because he would already be familiar with the terrain and the hunting grounds. If he married into another local group, he would have to learn the nature and resources of the area as quickly as possible in order to provide effectively for his new family.

Ethnographic and Historic Background

27

As Juh told his son, in the above quote, after marriage, his son would no longer be responsible for his parents and siblings, but instead, he was to provide for and protect his wife’s parents. He was expected to replace the sons whom his parents-in-law had lost through marriage and to heed the requests of his parents-in-law, regardless of the severity of the burdens that they imposed upon him. He took on lifelong responsibilities to defend the camp, to show the greatest deference to his af¤nal relatives, and to cooperate in economic and military enterprises with the men of his new extended family. In the company of his af¤nes (in-laws), a husband was expected to demonstrate respect in speech and action by using forms of speech and practicing avoidance, especially toward his mother-in-law. If his wife were to die, after an appropriate mourning period had passed, he often married his wife’s sister (sororate). If her husband died, a woman usually married her dead husband’s brother (levirate). Both traditions helped heal the emotional loss of death and provided for surviving mates and children. Because he was expected to give lifelong support to his wife’s parents, this also meant that a man did not have to provide food and support for two sets of af¤nes. Before marriage, the boy’s relatives gave gifts to his future bride’s kin (progeny price). Grandparents, especially maternal grandparents, played a major role in instruction and discipline, and the importance of their role was re®ected in kinship terminology, for maternal and paternal grandparents were called by different terms. Same-sex siblings were very close, while those of the opposite sex restrained their speech and behavior toward each other. Parallel cousins (children of the father’s brother or mother’s sister) were considered to be siblings, while cross-cousins (children of the father’s sister or mother’s brother) were addressed by separate kin terms. All cousins of the opposite sex were treated with restraint and even avoidance. Except for the Navajo and Western Apache, who had matrilineal clans, the Apacheans reckoned kinship bilaterally, which meant that both male and female sides of the family were of equal importance in ¤guring kinship ties. Typical of band organization, bilaterality provided more options in terms of band membership.

Subsistence and Division of Labor The severe weather and short season of the mountains and the unpredictable water supply of lowlands in Chiricahua territory were not conducive to farming. However, sometimes they planted a crop in a wash and left it to survive on its own, returning only for the harvest. They relied on the hunting and gathering of wild plant foods for subsistence, which meant that they had to be ready to follow the food harvests as they matured and to move from hunting area to hunting area as the supply of game dwindled in an area. Procuring

28

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food with these techniques meant that the population had to be thinly dispersed over a large range. Since small groups carried out most economic work, there was little need for highly centralized leadership. Typically women did the gathering and food preparation and constructed dwellings and clothing as well as took care of the children. Men were occupied with hunting, raiding, and warfare, though they also helped to gather the agave (also known as the century plant or mescal) and prepare the oven in which to bake this primary food source. Daklugie, Juh’s son, described the Chiricahua way of life before it was interrupted by white encroachment: Our people roamed, following the ripening of foods, so that they could provide a year’s supply. They killed deer when venison was at its best, late in the fall. They baked mescal in the spring when the blossom stalk was pushing through the leaves. And they gathered acorns and mesquite beans. They cached supplies in places near water all along the route from Cochise’s reservation to Juh’s, and sometimes in many other strategic spots. When we traveled, we followed the ridges, usually the high ones, and fortunately for us mountains run generally north and south instead of east and west. Even so, at times we had to cross a plain from one chain to another; and if on the warpath, as we usually were, we usually did it at night. If forced to leave one camp without supplies, we knew that at the next stop we had them, not only food, but sometimes blankets, cooking pots, weapons, and ammunition. When we found an overhanging cliff under which there was honey, we spread a hide on the ground, shot masses of comb loose with arrows, and, when it fell on the hides, squeezed the honey out into buckskin bags. It was the only sweet we had except dried fruit. We either burned the thorns from the fruit of the cacti or got them off by rolling them in the sand. Dried, the cacti were good and nourishing food. But of all cacti, we liked the fruit of the giant one, the saguaro, best. [Ball 1988:32]

Chiricahua groups had to be mobile so that they could follow their food sources during the growing season, which lasted from early spring until late fall. This enabled them to collect plants that grew at different elevations and matured at different times. As the elevation increased, so did the annual precipitation, resulting in changes in both vegetation and wildlife; their range included desert, pinyon and juniper forests, tall ponderosa pines, aspen, and dense forests of Canadian-type spruce and ¤r. In the early spring, yucca stalks sent out new sprouts; nuts were the last food source to be gathered. Women also collected such foods as mesquite beans, agarita berries, sumac

Ethnographic and Historic Background

29

berries, juniper berries, locust blossoms, the fruit of the screw bean, the rootstocks of the tule, onions, potatoes, varieties of greens, sun®ower seeds, grass seeds, acorns, pine nuts, pinyon nuts, walnuts, prickly pear, other cactus fruits, raspberries, strawberries, chokecherries, mulberries, grapes, and the stalk, blossoms, and fruit of the yucca (Opler 1983:413). The most important plant was the agave, or century plant, whose tender shoot they roasted and whose crown they baked and then dried in the sun for storage. Men helped by carrying the heavy crowns to a single location, digging a pit, gathering rocks to line the oven, and guarding the temporary agave camp. Dried and stored, the baked agave provided a nutritious and delicious food that lasted for much of the year. Women of the same extended family formed a working unit. Not only did they harvest and process wild foods together, but they also cooked at the home of the senior woman, and each married woman took her share home to her husband and children. The same group shared game and helped each other in tanning and sewing hides. House construction—usually a wickiup— was a woman’s task. Working together, they erected this simple dome-shaped structure of poles and thatch. Occasionally, especially among the Eastern Chiricahua, a teepee was used. Kaywaykla, a Warm Springs Apache, or Chihenne (Eastern Chiricahua), explained: Each of these faced the rising sun, as do all Apache dwellings. Our teepees, before they were destroyed by the cavalry, had done so. I could not remember having slept in a teepee covered with skins, though all our people had made them so before the Blue Coats came. Since then we had lacked enough hides even for clothing. [Ball 1970:17]

Hunting, Raiding, and Warfare Each man made his own weapons and equipment for his horse. Hunting, raiding activities, and warfare—and the preparation of equipment for these activities—took most of his time. The decoration of shields and other possessions related to his protection and well-being was a highly personal activity. Young boys went through a rigorous training period and were forced to run great distances with a mouthful of water to learn proper breathing. Their male relatives trained them well in the arts of concealment and endurance; only when they had participated successfully in four raids were they considered to be adults. Although many of the same skills were necessary for success in raiding and hunting, anthropologist Morris Opler calls them “rival industries” (1996:332) because those who were especially successful in raiding, bringing back lots of booty, were believed to become poor hunters because

30

Chapter 1

they no longer saw the deer when they went out to hunt. Those who had a deer ceremony to enable them to hunt well were expected to curtail their raiding activities. Hunting was a male occupation, and men from the same extended family hunted together and shared their game with each other. The presence of a woman—even a basket because it embodied female industry—was considered to be detrimental to the outcome of the hunt (Opler 1983:412). Men hunted primarily deer and antelope; other meat sources included elk, wood rats, squirrels, cottontail rabbits, and opossums. They also ate surplus horses and mules as well as wild and domestic cattle. Raiding for cattle became increasingly important as a subsistence activity as white encroachment cut off their access to traditional food-gathering areas. They would not eat bear because contact with them was considered to cause illness; peccary and turkey ate snakes and were therefore rejected as potential food sources. Fish were also excluded because their “slickness” was similar to that of a snake (Opler 1996:328–332). Later, when the Chiricahuas were imprisoned in Florida and Alabama, the federal government did not take these food restrictions into account. In Florida, they were expected to catch ¤sh and eat them. In Florida and Alabama, they were issued pork as part of their provisions, which they would not eat because of the relationship of peccaries to hogs. Even without these food restrictions, they were issued insuf¤cient rations, which created a continuous state of malnutrition that left them more susceptible to disease. Without agriculture and with their hunting areas taken over by white encroachment, the Chiricahuas developed a heavy reliance on raiding, more than other Apaches, which brought them into con®ict with Spanish, Mexicans, and Anglo-Americans. Raiding was considered to be an integral part of the economy, and an unwillingness to participate in raiding and warfare was attributed not to cowardice but to indolence (Opler 1996:333). The purpose of raiding was not the acquisition of territory or the extermination of other groups. The Chiricahuas needed what the Mexicans and, later, whites, had, so their intention was not to drive ranchers away, but rather to steal their valuable resources. Raiding parties avoided combat unless it was absolutely necessary, while war parties tried to in®ict as much injury and death as possible. Since a successful raid depended upon being able to travel without being detected, a raiding party only numbered from ¤ve to ten men from a single local group. The sole objective was to bring home horses, cattle, and possessions without pursuit. Raids were organized when there was a shortage of food and usually took place in the early hours of the morning. In contrast, warfare was a punitive expedition intended to avenge deaths. The relatives of the dead person’s father or his wife tried to enlist as many

Ethnographic and Historic Background

31

men as possible, which included those from several local groups. If at all possible, they singled out the individual who had done the killing and attacked the town or settlement where their relative had lost his life. When this was not possible, they attacked any encampment in enemy territory. Geronimo’s story provides both an understanding of personal loss that led to a lifetime driven by the need for revenge as well as an understanding of how easily different groups joined forces to create successful war parties. Geronimo, whose grandfather was Chief Mahko of the Bedonkohe, grew up listening to his father’s tales of Mahko’s sagacity and strength in the wars with the Mexicans as well as how he traded horses with the Mexicans in more peaceful times (Debo 1976:9). Geronimo and Alope, a slender Nednhi girl, had long been in love, and when he reached adulthood, he was able to marry her. As was the custom, the couple lived with her parents among the Nednhi in Mexico, who were led by Juh at that time. They were back with the Bedonkohe when the Mexican state of Chihuahua decided to try peace with the Apaches by inviting them to trade and furnishing them with rations. About the summer of 1850, the Bedonkohe went on a trading trip to Mexico with the great Mangas Coloradas and his people. They took their families since it was a peaceful expedition. Stopping at Janos, they made camp outside the town, and every day the men went in to trade and left their families, horses, and weapons in camp. As the men were returning to camp late one afternoon, a few women and children ran to tell them that “Mexican guards from some other town” had massacred many of their people. Disregarding the state boundary, General Carrasco had brought his troops from Sonora, discovered the Apache camp, killed about 25, and captured some 60 women and children who became slaves in Mexico. Geronimo later told the artist Elbridge Ayer Burbank (Burbank and Royce 1944:33) that “on his return he had found his father, his mother, his wife and children all dead, lying in a pool of blood on the ground.” Geronimo said that then: I stood until all had passed, hardly knowing what I would do. . . . I did not pray, nor did I resolve to do anything in particular, for I had no purpose left. I ¤nally followed the tribe silently, keeping just within hearing distance of the soft noise of the feet of the retreating Apaches. For two days and three nights we were on forced marches, stopping only for meals, then we made a camp near the Mexican border, where we rested two days. Here I took some food and talked with the other Indians who had lost in the massacre, but none had lost as I had, for I had lost all. Within a few days we arrived at our own settlement. There were the decorations that Alope had made—and there were the playthings of our little ones.

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I burned them, even our teepee. I also burned my mother’s teepee and destroyed all her property. I was never again contented in our quiet home. I had vowed vengeance upon the Mexican troopers who had wronged me, and whenever I . . . saw anything to remind me of former happy days my heart would ache for revenge upon Mexico. [Barrett 1907:43–45]

In 1850 or 1851, Mangas Coloradas gathered together the Bedonkohe and their Mimbreno relatives to form a war party, and Geronimo sought out Cochise and the Chokonen as well as the Nednhi under Juh and the Warm Springs under Baishan. Mangas Coloradas was in charge of the expedition since it had been his people who had been killed, but Geronimo was in charge of the ¤ghting. They traveled to Mexico to the town of Arispe, where the same Mexican troops that had massacred the Bedonkohe families were stationed. The Apaches triumphed after a two-hour ¤ght that left the battle¤eld strewn with Mexican dead (Barrett 1907:47–54).

Worldview and Spiritual Practices Origins We learn from Kaywaykla that Ussen (Creator of Life) created the universe, and, although prayers were sometimes addressed to him, Ish son nah glash eh (White Painted Woman) and her son, Child of the Waters, played a more dominant role in Chiricahua spiritual practices. Their most important ritual narrative tells how, during a time of drought and famine, when many were perishing, White Painted Woman decided to sacri¤ce her life to save the lives of the people. She left her people and lay upon a rock awaiting death, but instead of death, new life came to her. In the night rain fell on her and a child was conceived who became known as Child of the Waters because Ussen was his father (Ball 1970:68). When the child grew old enough to hunt, White Painted Woman made weapons for him and the boy brought back game. Yahyeh, the terrible monster that had destroyed the human race except for White Painted Woman and her son, smelled the aroma of the meat when it was cooking and demanded that they give it to him. Child of the Waters challenged the Yahyeh, and told him that they would each have four shots with arrows. Protected supernaturally by his Power, Child of the Waters remained untouched while his shots penetrated the four coats of stone on the Yahyeh’s chest and pierced his heart (69–70). Thus Ussen’s son conquered the enemy, making the world safe for human beings. The actions of Child of the Waters and his mother, as well as the substances and practices that they used to vanquish the Yahyeh and the other monsters and to force them to

Ethnographic and Historic Background

33

be of bene¤t to humans from that time on, have been incorporated into Chiricahua ritual practices. The Gáhe, whose home was in the highlands of Chiricahua territory, were believed to ensure the safety of the people from disease, evil, and enemies (Opler 1996:87). The trickster, Coyote, also played a role in the creation of the world by stealing ¤re and sharing it with humanity. He also made death a part of life and introduced incest, gluttony, lying, theft, and adultery (Opler 1996:197). Thunder and lightning were considered to be people who must be respected, lest they induce illness (Opler 1996:196). According to most accounts of the birth of Child of the Waters, Ussen used water to impregnate White Painted Woman, but one version states that lightning was used (196). White Painted Woman was believed to have existed since the beginning of time. There are many variations on the identity of Killer of Enemies, who has been described as White Painted Woman’s brother, older son, husband, or the twin of Child of the Waters (Opler 1996:197). In most versions, Killer of Enemies was considered to be an adult when his younger brother, Child of the Waters, was born. Before these supernaturals left for their homes in the sky, they instructed the Chiricahuas in the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony. The Girl’s Puberty Ceremony or Womanhood Feast The Girl’s Puberty Ceremony—called the “womanhood feast” by the Chiricahuas—which is still practiced today, has long been a focal point for social, economic, and ritual events as well as a powerful marker of cultural identity. This public, and, today, tribal event contrasts with other Chiricahua ceremonies that are individual, personal matters. In the past, if a girl did not celebrate this ceremony, it was believed that she would not live long or have healthy children, so no man would seek her out as a bride. When properly performed, it was believed to grant long life to the singer as well as to the girl and to ensure well-being to the entire community. This ceremony was so important that it was held even in the middle of war when people were on the run from enemies, as Jason Betzinez (1959:87), who was with Geronimo, explained, “One of the girls with us reached womanhood, so right away her parents arranged the traditional ceremony in her honor, even while the shooting was heard on the other side of the hill. Since this is one of the most important events in a woman’s life the ceremony is never neglected, not even at a time such as this.” The following description of the ceremony and its symbolism is from Morris Opler (1994:15; 1996:82–132), unless otherwise noted. Since this event entailed great expense and elaborate planning during more normal times, preparations usually began a year or more before the feast, which was held after the girl’s ¤rst menses. The girl’s special buckskin dress, made according

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Chapter 1

to prescribed rules, was decorated with designs that symbolize forces, such as the morning star, the crescent moon, the sun, a rainbow, that were asked to help the girl throughout her life. Her dress was blessed upon its completion. The girl’s parents decided who should be the older, respected woman who would supervise the making of the girl’s dress, dress her ritually, and instruct her in proper behavior throughout the ceremony. As soon as the woman accepted this position, the girl called her “mother” and the woman called the girl “my daughter,” even though they were not related by blood; this relationship was lifelong. A male ceremonialist, known as a singer, directed the proceedings. His mastery of the lengthy and intricately detailed cycle of songs to which the girl danced was crucial to the success of the ceremony. The one clear example of priestcraft among the Chiricahuas, the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony was handed down through instruction from older singers rather than through a personal dream or trance experience. This contrasted with the acquisition of most Chiricahua rituals that came from personal contact with supernatural forces. The ceremonialists who knew the songs, prayers, and procedures of the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony learned them from the previous generation of singers. Young men were encouraged to learn the songs from the older singers, so that this ceremony, essential to the well-being of the Chiricahuas, would be carried on. The singer was responsible for overseeing the construction of the large sacred structure in which the songs were chanted. The girl’s family was expected to provide the singer’s eagle feathers, a deer- or elk-hoof rattle, a basket tray, skins on which the girl kneeled or lay during speci¤c parts of the ceremony. Pollen, white clay, red ocher, and iron ore were also required. The Chiricahua origin story provides validation for the ceremony; White Painted Woman instructed the people: From here on we will have the girl’s puberty rite. When the girls ¤rst menstruate you shall have a feast. There shall be songs for these girls. During the feast the Gáhe shall dance in front of the ceremonial structure, that is, to the east of it. They dance for the four evenings of the ceremony, just after dusk, and their dance always precedes the social dancing. [Opler 1994:15]

The ceremony continued for four days and nights, ending on the ¤fth morning. Early on the ¤rst morning, the ceremonial teepee was erected facing the east. At the same time but in a different place, the older woman who was guiding the girl dressed her. The singer then guided her to the teepee with an eagle feather and singing. She performed other ritual actions in front of the

Ethnographic and Historic Background

35

teepee, including four ritual runs to the east, which she made around a basket tray ¤lled with objects related to the ritual. That evening, she was again led to the teepee. Ritual songs “sang” her through a long and rewarding life, replete with happiness and health, and dances with an intricate dance step unlike those of any social dances, took place. Dancing and singing lasted late into the ¤rst night inside the teepee, while social dancing continued in front of the ceremonial structure. Gáhe dancers impersonating the Mountain Spirits then performed around the ¤re to bless the camp and the procedures. A ceremonialist was in charge of dressing them and singing the ritual songs to which they danced. The second, third, and fourth days were devoted to visiting, feasting, and other social activities, with no morning ceremonies. The second and third nights had activities similar to those of the ¤rst night. After dancing and singing continued throughout the fourth night, the ceremony was completed at dawn. As the sun rose, the singer painted a sun symbol on the palm of his hand and rubbed this design over the girl’s head as the sun’s rays entered the teepee. She was led to an area east of the teepee where there was a buckskin painted with footsteps that she walked through. The tray basket, ¤lled with all the materials used for the ceremony was also there, and she performed four ritual runs around the basket; each time she completed a run, the basket was moved closer to the teepee, which was being dismantled at the same time. As she returned from her last circuit, the four poles of the teepee were pushed to the east and the ceremony was completed. The Acquisition of Supernatural Power The Chiricahuas believed that supernatural power is the life force or animating principle of the universe. This Power was eager to be of use to humanity and was believed to constantly seek human beings through whom to express itself in the world (Opler 1996:202). Encounters with Power could occur at almost any moment in a person’s life although they usually occurred in adulthood. Power made its presence known by a sign, through the spoken word, or by appearing in the form of an animal or supernatural being; later it assumed a humanlike form to speak with the chosen individual. If the person responded favorably, not only did the Power serve as a guardian spirit, but it also helped the person to diagnose and treat illness by revealing the details of a curative ritual. The Power was not to be mistaken with the channel through which it came; it was the Power that was revered and could be withdrawn if a person offended it with ingratitude. The possession of any ritual acquired from Power made a man or woman into a shaman. Even “the power to make someone run fast, is enough to make

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you a shaman,” a Chiricahua told Morris Opler (1996:200), and “a little rite makes you a shaman just as much as a long elaborate one.” A shaman might use his ritual only for the good of his or her own family or might be willing to use this ritual for others as well. Someone who was able to cure others consistently would become well known and might even be able to make a living to some extent from the rituals that he or she performed. Power also brought success in war and raiding, hunting, love, games, and many other endeavors. A Chiricahua told Opler (1996:214), “ . . . my power gives me the ability to get horses and mules. The power sends me out and tells me, ‘You are going to get this.’ ” He went on to explain that his Power also told him that the enemy was coming. In a technique often used during warfare, a shaman, who got his Power from a star, would locate the enemy by tracing a cross of ashes, pollen, or abalone shell on his left hand, holding his hand toward Venus, and waiting for a ®ash of lightning to reveal the direction of the enemy (215). Power was also used to weaken the enemy, to provide concealment from the enemy, and to make warriors invulnerable to arrows and bullets. A Chiricahua explained how his father had received Power: This happened towards morning, and he was sound asleep. Something touched him and told him to awake for it had good things to tell him. He pushed the cover off his head, and there beside him sat a silver-tip bear. It spoke in a human way to him and told him it was time for him to get up, that it was here he would get something to know and travel by. [Opler 2002:42]

Sam Haozous told historian Angie Debo how Geronimo had his ¤rst contact with Power, which occurred while he was grieving the loss of his family at the hands of Mexican soldiers: He had gone out alone and was sitting with his head bowed weeping when he heard a voice calling his name, “Goyahla!” Four times—the magical Apache number it called. Then it spoke, “No gun can ever kill you. I will take the bullets from the guns of the Mexicans, so they will have nothing but powder. And I will guide your arrows.” The fact that he was often wounded, but never fatally strengthened his belief. [Debo 1976:38]

HISTORY In the following sections, the ¤rst time that I mention Arizona and New Mexico, I refer to them as “what is now Arizona” or “present-day New

Ethnographic and Historic Background

37

Mexico;” after this, for the sake of simplicity, I will only refer to them as “Arizona” or “New Mexico.”

Spanish and Mexican Periods (1539–1848/53) The Chiricahuas were probably well established in their homelands by the time that Fray Marcos de Niza—who led the ¤rst party of Spanish explorers— rode through what is now southeastern Arizona in 1539, even though he made no note of them. Secure in their mountain strongholds, the Chiricahuas probably chose to remain undetected (Goodwin 1942:66–67). Both Grenville Goodwin and Jack Forbes (1960:8–9) believe that it was the Apaches who were the nomadic hunting and gathering people encountered by Francisco Vasquez de Coronado’s men during their expedition of 1540–42. The people whom the Pueblos called Querechos kept Antonio de Espejo and his followers from exploring the mountains near Acoma in present-day west-central New Mexico in 1583. Probably part of the Eastern Chiricahua band, the Querechos traded salt, meat, and tanned skins with the people of Acoma for cloth and other Pueblo products (Bolton 1916:182–183). Juan de Onate was the ¤rst to write the word Apache when he established the territorial capital of Nuevo Mexico at San Juan Pueblo (Lieder and Page 1997:5–6). Neither the Spaniards, who sought safe travel through their territory as well as their conversion to Catholicism, nor the Mexicans, who wanted permission to mine in their territory, were able to establish a lasting peace with the Chiricahuas. The Spaniards tried a series of policies from extermination to colonization in dealing with the Chiricahuas. In the early 1790s, the Chiricahuas sued for peace with the Spaniards, who instituted a system that called for them to live in designated areas in exchange for rations of meat, corn or wheat, brown sugar, salt, and tobacco. With the intention of disrupting Chiricahua society and forcing them into a state of dependency, the Spaniards also gave them guns and liquor. Perhaps as many as two-thirds of the Chiricahuas participated in this system (Sweeney 1991:9). Relations between the Chiricahuas and their neighbors changed signi¤cantly with the Mexican Revolution because the new government allowed the previous system to decline in the early 1820s. The Chiricahuas had increased in strength over time, for they had not allowed the Spanish system to undermine their social system or their skills in raiding and warfare. The Apaches raided for goods in Mexico and then traded these goods for food, guns, ammunition, and whiskey in such isolated places as Santa Rita del Cobre, where Anglo-Americans practiced a ®ourishing illegal trade network (Sweeney 1991:21). The Chiricahuas also established somewhat informal agreements with of¤-

38

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cials in Sonora and Chihuahua that allowed them to continue raiding as long as those raids took place in another district (128).

American Period to the Chiricahua Surrender (1848/53–86) Although the United States acquired most of the Southwest through the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848, it was not until the end of 1853 that the Gadsden Purchase extended the boundary of Sonora and Chihuahua southward. Soon after the Senate’s rati¤cation of the treaty the following April, the Chiricahuas realized that they could continue raiding in Mexico and not be pursued by Mexican troops when they sought refuge in the Chiricahua Mountains, which were now part of the United States. However, AngloAmericans soon began to construct forts, ranches, and settlements in Chiricahua territory. The Chiricahuas continued to raid for cattle on both sides of the border, for they did not consider this activity to be an act of war. However, they soon learned that, in contrast to the policies of the Spanish and Mexican governments, United States policy precluded all raiding. The name that the Chiricahuas had for Anglo-Americans was White Eyes. Daklugie explained why the Chiricahuas gave them this name: White Eyes is not the exact meaning of our word for them; a more exact meaning would be Pale Eyes. The ¤rst white people our people saw looked very queer because Indians have no whites in their eyes; the part around the iris is more nearly coffee-colored. [Ball 1988:19]

At the same time, the Chiricahuas found their hunting and gathering territories increasingly invaded by prospectors eager to exploit potential mineral wealth, surveyors trying to establish roads, and settlers seeking land. They had far more disdain for prospectors than settlers or surveyors. The great chief Nana, according to Daklugie, addressed how the Chiricahuas felt about gold and the people who sought this mineral: We are permitted to pick it up from the surface of Mother Earth, but not to grovel in her body for it. To do so is to incur the wrath of Ussen. The Mountain Gods dance and shake their mighty shoulders, destroying everything near. The Mexicans and the greedy White Eyes are superstitious about this stuff. The love of life is strong in all people, but to them it is not so strong as their greed for gold. For it, they risk their lives. [Ball 1988:10]

Thousands poured through Chiricahua territory on their way to California after gold was discovered in the Sacramento Valley of California in 1848. The federal government also sought to provide lands for veterans of the

Ethnographic and Historic Background

39

Mexican War and to encourage new settlements. At the same time, government of¤cials seemed unable to develop a consistent policy for dealing with the Apaches. Congress voted appropriations to set aside land for them, while the military led vigorous campaigns against them to decimate their numbers. The intervention of the Civil War kept the federal government from following through on its policies. After the war, the governmental policy continued to ®uctuate: reservations would be established and then closed, as the Apaches were moved from location to location, often being forced to share land with groups with whom they had longstanding disagreements. After the Civil War, clashes between Chiricahuas and immigrants increased as more Anglo-Americans ®ooded into Chiricahua territory. The army retaliated against the Indians with severe punishment and the construction of additional military posts. They constructed thirteen forts in New Mexico between 1846 and 1860 (Greg 1968), and by 1862 Arizona was also covered with forts (Brandes 1960). With the discovery of gold, prospectors surged into the Pinos Altos area, in Eastern Chiricahua country. Just before this, in 1852, Fort Webster had been built to protect copper miners in the area. As encroachment into their hunting and gathering areas increased with the establishment of mining and agricultural communities, the Chiricahuas resorted to raiding, and cries against Indian “depredations” became stronger. In 1855, Congress passed an appropriation that would provide the Eastern Chiricahuas with land and food until they could begin farming. Michael Steck was to be the Indian agent; one of the few residents of the area who cared about their well-being, Steck had established good relations with many Eastern Chiricahua groups (Opler 1983:404). However, at the same time, Colonel B. L. Bonneville decided to begin a military campaign and slaughtered many Chiricahuas in the area. Any chances for peace were soon shattered when a hot-headed young of¤cer lured Cochise and four other prominent Central Chiricahuas into what was purported to be a peaceful meeting near Apache Pass. Charged with acts in which they had had no part and held against their will, all the men were executed except Cochise, who managed to escape. The further details of this event, including its effect upon Naiche, are discussed in Chapter 6. In 1863, Cochise’s conviction that Anglo-Americans could not be trusted was further con¤rmed. Mangas Coloradas, then in his seventies, had realized the impossibility of defeating their forces and was receptive to overtures of peace made by Colonel James Carleton. He went to Carleton’s camp unarmed and alone under the promise of safety. His warriors’ fears were con¤rmed when Carleton took Mangas Coloradas into custody. Daklugie described what Mangas’s hidden warriors saw as they waited for the return of their chief:

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Chapter 1

Soldiers killed him and threw his body out of the camp, dug a shallow ditch, and buried him. That was not the worst: the next day they dug up his body, cut off his head, and boiled his head in a big black kettle. 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 [done by Apaches] previously, it was nothing compared to what was to follow. [Ball 1988:20]

The same year, Carleton persuaded leaders in Washington that the Navajos and Apaches should be con¤ned to a small, barren reservation at the Bosque Redondo on the Pecos River (Figure 1). Kaywaykla (Ball 1970:48–49) explained that when Carleton’s envoys met with Victorio, Nana, and Loco, none of these chiefs promised anything because they had no intention of taking their people to such an unhealthy place. Troops then took roughly four hundred Mescalero Apaches there and, later, thousands of Navajos. Once the Navajos contracted smallpox from the soldiers, the Mescaleros simply left one night in the fall of 1865 (Debo 1976:75) and returned to their old homeland on the Bonito near Fort Stanton. Carleton’s brutality destroyed any hope for peaceful coexistence and sowed the seeds of lasting distrust. War became a way of life for Cochise and his people for the rest of the 1860s. The federal government eventually discredited Carleton and transferred him to another command as Steck tried again to establish a reservation for the Eastern Chiricahuas in their homeland in the Rio Grande valley west of the river. However, by this time, AngloAmerican settlers had moved into the area and refused to give up what they considered to be their land, even though many were squatters on government land (Opler 1983:405). In 1871, Lieutenant General Philip Sheridan issued an order for all Apaches in New Mexico Territory to report to the Tularosa Reservation, an area close to the Arizona border. When they heard that their claims to their homeland had been denied, less than a third of their original numbers were still willing to settle in this much less desirable location. The Camp Grant Massacre occurred in the same year, when a group of enraged citizens from Tucson and Tohono O’odham (then known as Papagos) slaughtered over seventy-¤ve Western Apache women and children who believed that they were under the protection of the federal government at Camp Grant. Efforts to curtail the activities of corrupt civilian agents and to develop a consistent governmental policy led to initiation of the “Peace Policy,” which called for the concentration of all Apaches on reservations, where they would be encouraged to raise livestock or make a living through

Ethnographic and Historic Background

41

agriculture. Four areas were set aside as Apache reservations: Fort Apache was to be the home for the Cibecue and some bands of the White Mountain Western Apache subtribes; Camp Verde was to be for the Northern and Southern Tonto Western Apache subtribes and the Yavapai; Camp Grant was for the San Carlos and southern bands of the White Mountain Western Apache subtribes; and Ojo Caliente in western New Mexico was for the eastern, or Warm Springs, band of the Chiricahuas (Basso 2004:21). In 1872, the federal government sent General O. O. Howard to make peace with the Central Chiricahuas. One of the few whites the Chiricahuas trusted, Thomas Jeffords, took Howard to meet Cochise and representatives from the Southern Chiricahuas. After a decade of warfare, Cochise realized that continued hostilities would only lead to the extermination of his people. Willing to negotiate, Cochise agreed to a reservation for the Central Chiricahuas in their homeland, the southeastern corner of Arizona Territory next to the border with Mexico (Howard 1907:184–225; Sladen 1880). Despite the sincere commitment of all three men to the reservation, a series of events soon destroyed the chances for a peaceful way of life there. Flooded with Eastern Chiricahuas ®eeing from the unpopular Tularosa Reservation and with White Mountain Apaches who had feuds with the San Carlos Apaches with whom they had been forced to live at San Carlos, the rations were soon depleted. Some of these Apaches raided in Mexico and then sought refuge on the Chiricahua Reservation. Close to the border, the reservation’s location tempted young warriors to whom raiding was a way of life. Even before Cochise’s death in mid-June, 1874, the government had decided to abolish both this reservation and the one in the Tularosa Valley. In 1876, troops forced the Chiricahuas to move from their beloved Chiricahua Mountains to the San Carlos Reservation in the parched bottomlands of the Gila River.

San Carlos Apache Reservation In 1874, the Department of the Interior began to carry out the devastating and inhumane policy of concentrating Indians in small areas, many of which were hardly habitable. The rationale behind this policy was to lessen the threat they posed to the Anglo citizens in Arizona by making the Indians easier to control. However, this strategy “probably did more to prolong the ‘Apache Wars’ than bring them to a close” (Basso 2004:22). The army began to consolidate all disparate groups of Apaches in Arizona on the San Carlos Reservation. There they suffered from insuf¤cient rations and con®ict between often dishonest civilian administrators and military of¤cers. Disputes broke out among the various Apache groups who had never been associated with each other before. The San Carlos Apaches considered the others to be

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intruders, while the uprooted Apaches resented being con¤ned to a land that was not their own with a climate and terrain so different from their homelands. Their leaders, used to relative authority within their local groups, disagreed among themselves, and factional disputes developed among the Chiricahuas because some of them desired peace while others waited for a chance to escape. Rebellion was inevitable. The Warm Springs band, led by Victorio, pined for their mountain homeland as they died from smallpox and fell ill with malaria bred by the mosquito-infested Gila ®ats. Pionsenay, one of the Chiricahuas who had been living in Mexico, brought his adherents north, where they spoke of their successful raiding. With twenty-two of their women and children who had been on the reservation, they started back towards Mexico. Victorio and Loco took 323 of their people to the mountains toward the northeast, while about 140 of their band remained at San Carlos. A few months later, Victorio and Loco told of¤cers at Fort Wingate in New Mexico that they would be willing to surrender if they were not forced to return to San Carlos (Debo 1976:115–116). While the government decided what to do, the army let them drift back to their homeland where they remained peacefully through the winter of 1877–78. During this time, Naiche, Geronimo, and most of the Chiricahuas remained on the San Carlos Reservation. However, when Juh came up from Mexico to encourage another breakout, they joined him in April 1878. In 1878, government of¤cials decided to allow Victorio’s band to join the Mescaleros on their reservation. However, when Victorio learned of unjusti¤ed indictments against him, he and his people ®ed, leading to a bloody war that ended the following year when Mexican soldiers killed most of his group at Tres Castillos. In the winter of 1879–80, Naiche, Geronimo, and their band decided to return to San Carlos. By the spring of 1881, a revitalistic movement with similarities to the Ghost Dance practiced by the Plains Indians developed, led by Noch-ay-del-klinne, an Apache who prophesied the disappearance of the white man and the return of the old order (Debo 1976:127). The ceremony featured a new dance that frightened Anglo-Americans with its religious ecstasy. The Apaches were infuriated when troops arrested and killed the shaman. Anticipating their arrest, Geronimo, Naiche, and other leaders took about three hundred of their people and bolted for Mexico, where they established their camp in the Sierra Madres of Mexico. It is easy to understand why their free life in Mexico provided a constant temptation over con¤nement at San Carlos. Lieutenant Britton Davis wrote some of the most vivid accounts of conditions at San Carlos. He arrived on the San Carlos Reservation in 1882, when there were about ¤ve thousand

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43

Apaches on this reservation, with about four thousand at or near the Agency at San Carlos (Davis 1963:32–34, 42). The of¤cers dubbed San Carlos “Hell’s Forty Acres,” said Davis, who described the setting as being at the con®uence of the Gila and San Carlos rivers on poor soil that supported only the most bedraggled trees and scrub brush. Drying winds swept the earth of any vestiges of fertile soil, and rain was so infrequent as to be a novelty. Summer temperatures over 100 degrees were the norm and even the billions of airborne insects abandoned the area for cooler climes when the temperature soared higher. The Indian adults as well as the children were understandably untrusting and unwelcoming to strangers, suspecting them of the age-old social injustices which had become commonplace. Forced to live in the barren and unproductive place, they were unable to provide for themselves or have any hope for the future. They knew that the government had agreed to support them and was paying the contractor accordingly, but the contractor was selling their higher quality rations locally, providing the Indians only the dregs of provisions. Even the livestock due the Indians fared little better, as they arrived malnourished and sickly. The Indians, of course, were angry— with no acceptable outlet for their anger—and discontent—but without remedy. Finally induced to surrender, Geronimo and Naiche and their people returned to San Carlos in several groups in 1883 and 1884. Geronimo, always thinking of economics, insisted on raiding Mexican ranches for about 350 head of cattle that he planned to use to begin a cattle ranching enterprise at San Carlos. However, the military did not allow him to keep his herd. In response to the outbreak, governmental policy gave the military full control of the Apaches. While many of the Chiricahuas preferred military over civilian control because they considered military of¤cers were more likely to see that they were treated better, they did not appreciate living in a much stricter police state that now intruded into every aspect of Chiricahua life. Nevertheless, conditions were fairly pleasant and peaceful, for they greatly liked Lieutenant Davis for his fairness and honesty and the fact that he treated them as individuals. Some of the Apache scouts fomented friction with rumors of uprisings and by deliberately mistranslating messages. James Kaywaykla told historian Eve Ball (1970:155), referring to Chato and, to a lesser extent, Mickey Free: “It is a terrible thing for an inarticulate people to depend upon the spoken word of a renegade with no whit of integrity.” [This is discussed at greater length in the next chapter.] Hearing the rumor that the government planned to arrest Geronimo and Mangas, the son of Mangas Coloradas, the two men, with about 40 of their relatives, escaped to Mexico in 1885. Two major campaigns against them fol-

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lowed. When the Chiricahuas surrender in 1886, they did so only because they had no way to replenish their supplies and ammunition. Furthermore, the only reason that the military was successful in locating them in their nearly impenetrable sanctuaries was with the help of Apache scouts. General George Crook accepted the terms of surrender that the Chiricahuas proposed, but these terms were later repudiated by President Grover Cleveland. On the way north, the Chiricahua leader, Naiche, and Geronimo, along with their close relatives and followers, escaped once more. Overcome by humiliation and rage, the President and his Cabinet wanted to annihilate rather than capture the handful of men, women, and children. Acting Secretary of War R. C. Drum telegrammed General Nelson A. Miles to ceaselessly carry on “the most vigorous operations looking to the destruction or capture of the hostiles” (Stockel 2004:29 from In Response to the Resolution of February 11, 1887, U.S. Senate Exec. Doc. 117 (49–2), p. 2). Furious, the President demanded that those Chiricahuas, who had surrendered in good faith and had returned to the reservation at San Carlos be sent to prison in Fort Marion, Florida (Opler 1983:408). General Nelson A. Miles led an army of 5,000 soldiers after the small band of 17 men and 19 women and children (Opler 1983:408). Miles placed Lieutenant Gatewood in charge, with the scouts Martine and Kayitah. Martine and Kayitah, who had relatives among the small band, were instrumental in gaining the con¤dence of Geronimo and Naiche. At the council that followed, Gatewood informed Geronimo of Miles’s message, that their reservation no longer existed. If they surrendered, they would be sent to Florida to join the rest of their people. Geronimo asked Gatewood about Miles’s character: did he mean what he said; had he many friends among his own people; did he keep his promises; did his soldiers like him; did his friends trust his word? As historian Angie Debo (1976:285) points out, “Even at this distance of time and culture one can sense the desperate earnestness of the Indians and how much depended upon the quality of the man in whose hands they were asked to place their lives.” Gatewood answered, “ ‘I would trust General Miles and take him at his word’ . . . Only the future would reveal the extent to which Gatewood had unwittingly betrayed them” (Debo 1976:285–286). Three of Geronimo’s top ¤ghters, Perico, Fun, and Ahnandia decided to surrender. Perico summed up the feelings of all the men when he said, “I am going to surrender. My wife and children have been captured. I love them, and want to be with them” (Debo 1976:286). The 18 warriors deliberated, and Geronimo expressed the conclusions that they had reached in council. Late on the afternoon of September 3, General Miles joined them in Skeleton

Ethnographic and Historic Background

45

Canyon, where the surrender had taken place. The following day, Miles conducted a formal ceremony of surrender. He described Geronimo as: One of the brightest, most resolute, determined looking men that I have ever encountered. He had the clearest, sharpest, dark eyes I think I have ever seen. . . . Every movement indicated power, energy and determination. In everything he did, he had a purpose. [1896: 520–521]

Miles described Naiche as “a tall, slender young warrior, whose dignity and grace of movement would become any prince” (1896:228–229). Miles knew that giving up the Chiricahua warriors to civil authorities would only lead to their deaths. Writing to his wife, he said that the Apaches had “surrendered like brave men to brave men,” and “we were honor bound not to give them up to a mob or the mockery of a justice where they could never have received an impartial trial” (Faulk 1969:170). Before an order from Washington could stop him, Miles got them on a train from Bowie Station for El Paso and San Antonio, where the federal government held the warriors as they decided where to send them.

2

Military Conquest as a Physical, Psychological, and Symbolic Event

No Apache was ever cruel enough to imprison anyone. Only a White Eye was capable of that. —Asa Daklugie

ST. AUGUSTINE, FLORIDA, AUGUST 2004 I awake to a thick, watery dawn, with condensation so heavy that the lens of my camera fogs up as soon as I remove the lens cap. The sun, completely obscured by haze, takes hours to burn off the lingering mist. The previous night when I arrived, the darkness reverberated with the loud and constant croaking of frogs. Trees, plants, and vines dripped and oozed with humidity. The streetlight cast a cold white light, giving the parking lot, which was banked by black, looming foliage, a sinister look. When I reached the porch of the motel, a huge cockroach dropped onto the ®oor in front of me. This morning, I see kudzu vines climbing over a canopy of trees. Signs warn unsuspecting visitors to be on guard against alligators that live in the algae-covered canal. When the Apaches saw alligators, with their great reptilian heads and long slithery bodies that moved with the silent speed of light, they considered them to be the embodiment of evil. They were the denizens of dark or opaque water which, in itself, was the very substance of death. I am in Jacksonville, Florida, retracing the sites of imprisonment for the Chiricahua Apaches. Today, I am driving to St. Augustine, to see Fort Marion, (see Timeline) where over ¤ve hundred Chiricahuas arrived between April 3, 1886, and November 7, 1886 (Opler 1983:408). First to come were Chihuahua’s people, who numbered about 70 warriors, women, and children. In September, Chato’s band of about 14 arrived, followed two days later by over 380 noncombatant Chiricahuas who had been living peacefully at San Carlos in Arizona. Then the families of Naiche and Geronimo and the other warriors came in October, and, ¤nally, 10 prisoners arrived in November. Among those imprisoned at Fort Marion were the scouts who had served the United States government. Resentment ran high among the noncombatant Chiricahuas against Geronimo and the others because they knew that Geronimo’s

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47

actions caused harsher treatment on the reservations and, ultimately, resulted in their exile. Jason Betzinez, one of the Chiricahuas, explained that “under the instruction of army of¤cers, we planted crops and tried to raise some livestock,” all without teams of domesticated horses, “plows, wagons, or farming implements other than salvaged shovels and hoes.” He added, “I managed to raise a good crop of potatoes and corn the ¤rst year . . . that summer I made hay and cut ¤rewood, all of which I sold at Fort Apache” (1987:140, 141). But no sooner had he begun this new way of life than it ended: One day in the late summer of 1886 we were called in to Fort Apache. All men, women, and children were lined up and surrounded by soldiers. The commander ordered the men and boys into a building where he informed us that we were now prisoners of war. We were separated from our women and children, who were assembled in other camps, while we were placed under guard in tents. Some time in September they loaded us all into wagons and started us off under armed guard for Holbrook, Arizona. Our group of prisoners now included many Apaches who had served as scouts, some of them never having been on raids of any kind. These men couldn’t understand why they were thus being rewarded for their hard and faithful service by being hauled away in disgrace. [Betzinez 1987:141]

Loaded onto wagons and marched from Fort Apache north to the train station at Holbrook, Arizona, they were then forced to board a train with windows that were closed and nailed shut. Betzinez continued his narrative: As we got deeper and deeper into Kansas we were greatly surprised to see one farm after another, towns at more frequent intervals, and many more people. We had no idea that there were so many whites. Larger and larger crowds gathered at the depots to see our train go through. Their curiosity was equaled by ours for we had never imagined so many strange things and queer-looking people. [1987:142–143]

Today, to travel from southern Arizona to Fort Marion, you catch a three and-a-half-hour ®ight to Atlanta, Georgia, transfer to an hour-long ®ight to Jacksonville, and drive an hour on the interstate to St. Augustine. I cannot imagine the horror of being herded into a train that was boarded up behind you. During the week and a half of their journey, they lived in fear that at any moment, they would be taken out and shot. Most of them had never ridden a train before and, when they hesitated, soldiers pushed them onto the train

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car. Soldiers fed these fears by frequently “making motions as if they were going to cut our throats,” Sam Kenoi told Morris Opler (1938:383–384). When the train entered a railroad tunnel, total darkness enclosed the cars, and people screamed and yelled in terror, thinking that they were being swallowed up by the earth. Within a day, the stench in every car had become unbearable: the buckets that served as latrines were rarely emptied; no sanitary facilities for washing existed; and leftover food in half-empty ration tins soon went bad in the sti®ing heat. The smoke from the engines ¤ltered into the coaches and, combined with motion sickness caused by the train’s swaying motion and the heat of the September sun streaming in the windows, brought on vomiting. Soon the ®oors of the cars were so slick with vomit, urine, and feces that adults could not stand unless they clutched the seats for support (Stockel 1993:79–80). When the soldiers ¤nally opened the sealed train, they recoiled with the grisly odor and some retched in the heat. Their train pulled into the Jacksonville train depot, and they were herded like cattle from the train to a ferryboat waiting to take them across the wide St. John’s River. After midnight, they boarded yet another train to St. Augustine, disembarked, and marched through the dusty streets, crossed the wooden drawbridge over the dry moat, and went into the fort. None of them had ever been within the walls of a fort that could be surrounded by water. Soldiers broke up the families, and the men and older boys were taken to Anastasia Island and given food, ¤shing tackle, and oil to light the lamps in the lighthouse. The army expected the Apaches to catch ¤sh but, as previously noted, eating ¤sh was a strong cultural taboo that went unrecognized by the government. Those who remained at Fort Marion climbed the stairs to the terreplein, where they tumbled into teepee-shaped Sibley tents and went to sleep. When they saw their new surroundings in the light of day the next morning, many experienced the same surprise as Jason Betzinez: Early next morning I awoke, yawned, and looked out to the east. I was amazed to see there what appeared to be a limitless ¤eld of waving grass. As my eyes cleared I was still more surprised to see that it was the ocean with its continually moving waves. Never before had we seen such a great body of water. As it had been dark the night before when we arrived, we didn’t realize that the fort was right beside the sea. [1987:146]

I can see the same great body of water, the Matanzas River, which opens to the bay and the Atlantic Ocean when I park my rental car near the city’s plaza. Clearly in®uenced by Spanish ideas of city planning, the plaza reminds

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Figure 12: St. Augustine, Florida. Looking through live oak trees and Spanish moss at the cathedral on the central plaza. (Compare with Figure 37.) Photo by author.

me of those in the Southwest. The town of St. Augustine, the oldest permanent European settlement in the continental United States, was established in 1565 by Spaniard Don Pedro Menendez de Aviles. Through tendrils of tangled Spanish moss hanging from giant live oak trees, I can see a stately old cathedral that was there when the Chiricahuas arrived (Figure 12). The Bridge of Lions lies in front of me, linking St. Augustine to the peninsula of land where the St. Augustine Lighthouse is located. As soon as I open the car door, a thick blanket of humid heat assails me. Walking along Avenida Menendez toward the fort, I have the Matanzas River to my right (Figure 13). On my left are mansions that are being renovated to resemble the majestic antebellum houses that line the Battery in Charleston. Draft horses, harnessed to carriages, wait patiently in the simmering heat for tourists to begin tours of the historic district. Fort Marion, now known once more by its original name, Castillo de San

Figure 13: Matanzas River approaching Fort Marion, St. Augustine, Florida. Between April 16, 1886 and November 7, 1886, over 500 Chiricahua Apaches were imprisoned in Fort Marion, known today as Castillo de San Marco National Monument. Photo by author.

Figure 14: Fort Marion looking toward the Matanzas River. Photo by author.

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Figure 15: View of the Matanzas River from Fort Marion. Photo by author.

Marcos, looks much like it did when the Apaches were here (Figure 14), with the same view of the river (Figure 15). Constructed of coquina, a unique sedimentary rock that contains seashells, the fort was built by the Spanish to anchor their defenses against pirates and Great Britain. I try to imagine the terreplein (Figures 16 and 17) crowded with 130 coneshaped Sibley tents, the small space so packed that the base of each tent touched that of the nearest tent. Only equipped to house about a 150 people, the fort became home to over three times that many—nearly 500 Chiricahua Apaches. The few who stayed in casemates on the ¤rst ®oor slept on damp mortar ®oors which probably contributed to illness. Even though they were crowded, those who lived in the tents were able to get fresh air and sunshine, which may have kept the death rates from climbing higher. They prepared the rations they were given on stoves inside one of the rooms on the ¤rst ®oor, just east of the chapel where classes were held. Vent pipes exhausted the smoke outside into the courtyard. Eventually, the army allowed the Chiricahuas to walk about the city with the stipulation that they return to the fort at night. Fascinated by the Apaches, the townspeople bought their willow baskets, moccasins, and models of Apache cradleboards. The Apaches were intrigued by photography and many sat for portraits at a studio located on St. George Street. Men played masca in the dry moat that surrounds the fort, while others played card games, hoop roll-

Figure 16: Stairs to the terreplein, Fort Marion. Most of the Chiricahua prisoners lived in 130 cone-shaped Sibley tents on the terreplein. Photo by author.

Figure 17: The terreplein, Fort Marion. Inside the second room on the ground ®oor, Chiricahua women prepared the rations they were given for their families. Photo by author.

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ing, archery, and football. Teachers from the Congregation of the Sisters of St. Joseph and other schools came to instruct the children in mathematics, English, and the social aspects of the Anglo-American lifestyle. By October and November of 1886, children were being sent to Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Pennsylvania. This August day, the fort teems with tourists, most of whom are far more interested in the Spanish presence than the Apache prisoners. A heavyset father puffs up the steps to the terreplein to look out at the ocean. He yells at his ¤ve-year-old son who scampers off into one of the casemates below, and his wife offers soothing words. The couple’s shirts are soaked through with their sweat, for the 90-degree heat and accompanying humidity are inescapable. The still air sits upon me like a thick quilt. When I climb up the stairs behind them, I smell the salt-tinged air. The sun’s heat burns against my back, and my cotton shirt is sticky with perspiration, my long hair plastered to my neck. Despite the early morning hour, the air is still and hot, and the sun has not yet burned off the thick morning haze. Enervating, the humid, oppressive air sucks all volition from me. After the clear, clean air of Arizona, the Apaches must have thought that they had arrived in hell. And the endless water, with its sinister associations in their culture, as well as the increasing sickness and death among them, must have con¤rmed this feeling. How horri¤ed they must have been to see the soldiers take the bodies of their loved ones and bury them somewhere on North Beach and on Anastasia Island; many Apaches believed that the soldiers simply dumped the bodies in the water because their bones later washed up on the shore (Stockel 1993:90). Entering what was once the artillerymen’s quarters, I gasp for air, trying to catch my breath. The air is sti®ing and unmoving. This room connects with the ordnance supply room and the gunpowder magazine. The thick walls and lack of circulating air, coupled with the dampness, make it hard to breathe. Too musty and humid for the storage of gunpowder, the Spaniards eventually had to move the gunpowder magazine. Even though Dr. DeWitt Webb worked to treat their diseases, many of the Chiricahuas died here from dysentery, acute bronchitis, marasmus (wasting disease), old age, epilepsy, tetanus neonatorum, tuberculosis (Stockel 1993:81–85) and malaria that they had contracted on the reservation at San Carlos. Many were already sick after the miserable conditions of their train trip across the country. The few rations they received left them hungry. Mingling with the tourists, they were exposed to diseases to which they had no immunity. The damp, unhealthy conditions and oppressive humidity, as well as the yearning for home, took their toll.

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THE IDEOLOGY AND RHETORIC OF IMPERIALISM IN THE AMERICAN WEST Blinded by their technology and wedded to their notions of architecture, land ownership, and religion, the ¤rst Europeans to set foot on American shores were largely unable to see the validity of American Indian cultures and considered the inhabitants to be barely human. This attitude justi¤ed the seizure of Indian land and the conquest, slavery, and genocide of Native Americans. The impact of Europeans on the social, political, and economic life of American Indians echoes the fate of indigenous peoples the world over. Chiricahua political leadership, loyalty, and ethnic identity existed at the local group level, making them what anthropologist John Bodley called a “domestic-scale tribal culture” characterized by “the absolute small scale of their populations and the relative simplicity of their technology” (2001:13). By 1800, “globally organized commercial cultures” (13) had begun to dominate the world. The Chiricahuas and other American Indian groups could not compete for long with the politically centralized, large-scale culture that became the United States and swept across the continent with its seemingly inexhaustible supply of social and military resources. This greater concentration of social and political power, driven by expansionist ideologies, made their conquest of indigenous peoples inevitable. The use of the word or ideology of imperialism, however, has not been applied to the American experience until recently. Imperialism was used to denote countries that sought to establish grand empires in far parts of the world; the people who came to American shores saw themselves as seeking a new way of life characterized by the freedom to worship and to practice ways of life for which they had been persecuted in Europe. The charged ideals on which this country was founded created in®uential discourse in which America was depicted as a unique land of opportunity, blessed by geographic and climatic well-being. The land abounded with such great natural resources that settlers could not help but see a divine hand blessing their presence in this “new” world and endowing their efforts at settlement with divine intervention and will. However, as historian Richard Van Alstyne points out, from the very beginning, this country was founded upon the idea of “an imperium—a dominion, state or sovereignty that would expand in population and territory, and increase in strength and power” (1974:1). By 1844, what John Quincy Adams had called a “law of nature” had grown into the idea of manifest destiny and had taken hold of the country. John L. O’Sullivan, an Irish-born editor in New York City wrote about the inevitable annexation of land, “destined to swell the still accumulating momentum of our progress” (Van Alstyne

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1974:116). In 1885, John Fiske, a popular public lecturer gave a lecture and wrote an article entitled “Manifest Destiny” which praised expansionism, Social Darwinism, and Anglo-Saxonism. Although Social Darwinism justi¤ed the use of military force in the struggle for survival, Fiske downplayed violence, knowing that except for the pioneer’s ideas of how to deal with Indians, war was considered to be an evil that should be avoided (LaFeber 1998:98–99). After the Civil War, the United States needed a new beginning. Many had lost families and homes in the war, some had even lost an entire way of life, and the promise of the American West beckoned to them. Everyone perceived the West as a great open frontier of opportunity, where farmers could get the land they needed for a new beginning and industrialists could ¤nd both markets and new materials (LaFeber 1998:11). Ranchers, farmers, and speculators pressed westward as four new trunk railways linked the Paci¤c to the rest of the country; Americans settled more land in the last three decades of the 19th century than they had during the previous 300 years (12). Edward Said pointed out, “Imperialism pits one race, society, culture against (or on top of ) another” (2000:xxv); in order to build an empire, a rigid division with a strict social and cultural hierarchy must be constructed and upheld between members of the dominant society and members of the subaltern societies they overcome. To a major degree, this distinction has been based on the fear that to acknowledge the authenticity of previously excluded historical narratives of minority groups is to threaten the social authenticity and coherence of the nation. This fear provided the basis of Arthur Schlesinger’s book The Disuniting of America, according to Said (2000:xxiv). In the 19th century, the United States was constructing not only its national boundaries but also its national identity as a country based on the principles of manifest destiny—a country that stretched “from sea to shining sea.” The country could not afford to acknowledge that the cost of this enterprise was being paid by the indigenous peoples of this continent. To acknowledge the rights of Native American peoples would have brought into question the morality of the entire enterprise of empire building. How Europeans and, later, Anglo-Americans, reacted to tribal peoples in North America depended, in part, upon the degree of difference that they judged them to be from themselves. The Spanish considered the Pueblos to be “civilized” because they lived in agricultural communities that were not totally dissimilar from their own. Anglo-Americans applauded the Pimas (Akimel O’odham) for their industriousness: by the time that their territory came under the control of the United States, the Pimas were raising enough wheat, a crop brought by the Spanish, to sell it to the army and to would-be gold miners and settlers traveling to destinations farther west.

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However, Anglo-Americans had a far different response to nomadic groups that came to epitomize the Other because their way of life and their appearance were so utterly alien to Anglo-European sensibilities. Furthermore, these groups showed no intention of acknowledging the bene¤ts of “civilization” by relinquishing their traditional ways of life. All nomadic hunting and gathering peoples ¤t into this category. Those whose populations had been decimated by European-introduced diseases posed little threat, and it was not until after the Civil War that the Apaches experienced the full brunt of U.S. military force. However, military confrontation was inevitable, as was the destruction of traditional subsistence patterns and ways of life. The Apaches, and the Chiricahuas in particular, came to embody resistance to civilization; ironically, by the time they were transported to Florida, the Seminole wars were so long in the past that Floridians considered the Apaches to be a tourist attraction. Geronimo and the unfettered and dangerous life that he embodied became exotic commodities that would bring income to Florida cities, and Pensacola and St. Augustine vied for the prestige that his celebrity would bring to their respective cities. Imperialism is a battle ¤rst over land, which includes who owns the land, who has the right to settle and work the land, and who has the right to plan the future of the land. Inherent in the making of claims for North American territory and ¤ghting over these claims is an ideology that supports the domination, extermination, and displacement of Native peoples. Because these issues are contested in narrative, and narrative provides the validation for ideology, the power to narrate and to block other narratives from being heard is essential in imperialism. The ideology that supported the seizure of Native territories through force, if necessary, includes rhetoric such as “certain territories and people require and beseech domination,” which is based on notions of bringing of civilization to inferior peoples (Said 1994:9). The outlying regions of the United States, such as the American Southwest in the last half of the 19th century, were considered to have no existing history or culture when white immigrant settler society brought civilization to this part of the world. Considerable work has been devoted to the kind of dehumanization and moral disengagement that occurs during warfare. The soldier who executes violence has to believe that he is a justi¤ed moral agent, not an aggressor. Euphemistic labeling of the enemy, moral justi¤cation of one’s own actions, and palliative comparison are only a few of the ways in which morally repugnant behavior is transformed into sanctioned behavior (Bandura et al. 1996:364–374). The literature is rife with derisive terms for Apaches that were used by civilians and army personnel during the last half of the 19th century. All of these terms functioned to dehumanize indigenous people and to dis-

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guise the fact that the Apaches were simply ¤ghting for their homeland. Nor did white intruders consider that the Apaches might also be human beings with desires and dreams for the well-being of their families whom they loved and for whom they fought. The story of Geronimo’s losses and subsequent revenge were not uncommon. However, the individuals and families upon whom the Apaches sought revenge never considered that the Apaches might simply be “¤ghting back” for wrongs that had been done to them. Instead, miners and ranchers considered themselves to be innocent victims upon whom Apache depredations were perpetrated. Why did the Chiricahuas surrender? They made a choice not only so that families could be reunited but also so that their people would not die off completely. Eugene Chihuahua explained that his father, Chihuahua, was the ¤rst of the chiefs to surrender so that his men could be reunited with their families, who were already in custody and so that his people could live on: With my father was Nana and some women and children from other bands. Among them was one of Naiche’s wives and one of Geronimo’s. My father, like Cochise, did not want to see his band exterminated; and he well understood what was in store for them if they continued to ¤ght the losing ¤ght. [Ball 1988:100]

However, few were prepared for the grim reality of surrender. Many of the Chiricahuas shared Jasper Kanseah’s belief, “When they put us on the train at Bowie, nobody thought that we’d get far before they’d stop and kill us” (Stockel 1993:150). They had surrendered with the understanding that they would be con¤ned in the East “for not exceeding two years, taking with them such of the families as so desired,” terms that General Crook had accepted (Faulk 1969:85–91) and that, when they surrendered for the last time to General Miles, they still believed were in effect. However, what President Cleveland envisioned was much closer to the fears of the Chiricahua captives, for he wanted them turned over to Arizona civil authorities for summary trials and execution. During the last months that Naiche and Geronimo and their band had been free, ranchers and settlers in Arizona were so outraged that they exerted considerable political pressure that was felt all the way to Washington. General Miles quickly got the Chiricahuas on the train east before civilians could demand authority over the prisoners. Fortunately, Arizona citizens were too wrapped up in celebration of their surrender to notice their departure: “Bon¤res burned in the streets of Tombstone and Tucson, and messages of congratulations poured in on General Miles” (Skinner 1987:110). Debate raged about where they were to be imprisoned once they were

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captured. Miles feared that the damp, lowland climate of Florida would kill them and suggested Indian Territory. Bowing to political pressure, President Cleveland and General Sheridan decided that the Apaches could not be imprisoned anywhere west of the Mississippi. Ignoring Mile’s concern about the physical well-being of the Chiricahuas, they selected Fort Marion in St. Augustine, on the Atlantic coast of Florida, for all the “nonhostile Chiricahuas, including the scouts, until a ‘suitable place could be provided for them’ ” (Lieder and Page 1997:27). When asked if sending the scouts to Florida “might be considered an act of bad faith,” Sheridan ¤red back that “it was absurd to talk of keeping faith with those Indians” (27). The scouts were men who had worked for the United States and had been essential in locating Naiche’s band in Mexico and in getting them to negotiate with the army. President Cleveland took an even harder line for Geronimo when he stated, “I hope nothing will be done with Geronimo which will prevent our treating him as a prisoner of war, if we cannot hang him which I would much prefer,” (Stockel 2004:30; In Response to the Resolution of February 11, 1887, U.S. Senate Exec. Doc. 117 (49–2), p. 4). Once the president learned that Geronimo and the other warriors were already on trains headed east, he was furious. The men were detained for about six weeks in San Antonio while the president and his cabinet debated their destination. THE SCOUTS The scouts had been essential not only in locating the Naiche and Geronimo’s band, but also in helping arrange the ¤nal surrender. On August 24, 1886, Martine and Kayitah, two of Lieutenant Charles B. Gatewood’s scouts, along with a few soldiers, got close to the location of the hostiles. Gatewood charged the scouts with arranging a conference with Naiche and Geronimo, which Martine and Kayitah were able to do because they had relatives among the band. The warriors with Geronimo did not shoot Martine and Kayitah because of strong ties of blood. Martine was a Nednhi and had once been Juh’s orderly, and Kayitah had a cousin in Geronimo’s camp. When he was a child, Martine had been captured by the Mexicans and sold to a kind family that eventually sent him back to Juh. Even though he was devoted to Juh, after Martine married and had children he wanted a peaceful life rather than Juh’s turbulent, nomadic life of constant warfare. In®uenced by his closest friend, Kayitah, who was a scout, Martine also decided to become a scout. According to Martine, General Miles promised them both that if they could get Geronimo to surrender, “I will have the government give you a good home at Turkey Creek and there you will have plenty of good water,

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grass, and game. Everything you need will be furnished you. And the government will give you seventy thousand dollars if you are successful” (Ball 1988:109). The money meant nothing to them but being allowed to settle in Turkey Creek where they could live peacefully meant a great deal. Kanseah, Geronimo’s nephew and youngest warrior (Ball 1988:109–110), was on guard at the top of the trail when Kayitah and Martine approached Geronimo’s camp. Kanseah spotted them as they approached and noti¤ed Geronimo right away. Geronimo soon arrived with Yanozha, Fun, and Eyelash and when told the intruders were Martine and Kayitah, he directed that no matter who was approaching, if they continued toward the encampment they were to be shot. Yanozha and Fun disagreed, telling Geronimo that they approached with a white ®ag, and were known to be brave men and should be heard. Geronimo reluctantly agreed. The scouts reminded Geronimo of the situation and that it was useless to continue to ¤ght the soldiers, and surprised Geronimo with the news that some Chiricahua, including one of his wives and a wife of Naiche, had given up and been shipped to Florida. Because of the desperate situation, and the presence on the mountain of women and children, Geronimo agreed to return with Martine and Kayitah. But because of his peaceful agreement, neither he nor anyone with him ever considered that he and his 17 men had been “captured.” Martine and Kayitah were con¤ned with Naiche’s band and sent to Florida; they remained prisoners until 1913, with the rest of the Chiricahuas. Although he was not able to secure their freedom, Charles Gatewood did see that they received recognition for their service as scouts and received small pensions. After Naiche and Geronimo ¤nally surrendered, all Chiricahua scouts in the ¤eld were ordered back to Fort Apache. Ostensibly to prevent the possibility of future outbreaks by any Chiricahuas, even the scouts who had proven their loyalty to the U.S. Army, the scouts and all noncombatant Chiricahuas were also sent to Florida as prisoners of war. The scouts said that they were “gathered together at Fort Apache at the time of their weekly rationing and were suddenly surrounded by armed soldiers and the able-bodied men were taken aside and placed under armed guard in a stable; the women, children and old men were sent back to their camp” (Faulk 1969:161–162). When General Crook visited the scouts, he asked George Wratten, the interpreter who had stayed with the Chiricahuas throughout their imprisonment, if the surrender could have been made without the scouts. Wratten replied, “I do not think so” (Debo 1976:345). Some of the scouts then related their experiences, including the pledge that they had kept to keep the peace and that they had experienced incredible losses, including livestock, land, horses, and wagons, when they were forced to leave Arizona (345). One of the most famous scouts, Chato, had traveled to Washington to

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receive a medal for his service before he was sent to Florida. When he later met with Crook at Mount Vernon Barracks in Alabama, he held out the medal that he was wearing and asked why he was given the medal only to wear it in the guardhouse. He had thought having the medal was to be a sign of a secure future, but he was wrong. He was frustrated that he had been working on a farm, with a good plow and a good sized plot of land, with ¤elds of wheat and barley growing successfully toward harvest. He had about 30 head of sheep that he planned to shear and sell the wool, and then he was taken away to receive the medal, and since then had been incarcerated. Reminding Crook of how he had used his in®uence to induce the hostiles to surrender at Cañon de los Embudos, Kaytennae said that he had tried in all ways to seek peace, to do as General Crook had directed, and to reason with the chiefs for the good of the Chiricahua people. Since the surrender, Chato had served the General well in daily work details and in continuing to work for the good of everyone, but he was desperate to return home so his energies could be put toward supporting his family. The Chiricahua’s appeal ended on a plea. He agreed that he would also like to have a farm “and go right to work so that my children can have plenty to eat . . . I have a daughter away at school and two other near relatives. I want to see them soon. Won’t you make it so I can see them very soon? . . . There are trees all about. I would like to go where I can see” (Debo 1976:347). CONTESTED HISTORY While Martine, Kayitah, and Kaytennae were not rejected by their people for being scouts, others, such as Chato most de¤nitely were. Three individuals, Chato, Mickey Free, and Kaytennae provide excellent examples of contested history. Lieutenant Britton Davis, who was in charge of the Chiricahuas at San Carlos, speaks of Chato and Mickey Free, who were scouts, in glowing terms, as do other military of¤cers. However, Chato was disliked by nearly all the Chiricahuas because of his duplicity and the perception that he was a braggart. He was jealous of Kaytennae because he would probably succeed Nana as chief; Chato wanted this position for himself. The Chiricahuas never liked Mickey Free, the half-Mexican, half-Irish child that Lieutenant Bascom had been trying to recover when he lured Cochise to the meeting at Apache Pass. Now that he was an adult and in a position of power over them, they like him even less. Using Mickey Free and Tzoe, another scout, to verify his account, Chato convinced Davis that Kaytennae was planning to lead the young men in an escape from the reservation. Rather than listening to Chihuahua, a trustworthy scout who protested Kaytennae’s innocence, Davis had troops arrest

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Kaytennae. He was then sentenced to three years of imprisonment at Alcatraz in San Francisco harbor but was allowed to return to his people after eighteen months (Ball 1970:50). The Chiricahuas did not blame Davis, whom Kaywaykla said they regarded “as one of the best men ever put in charge of us. To this day, older Apaches believe that Davis resigned his commission because he became aware of the deceit practiced upon him by Mickey Free and Chato” (Ball 1970:161). In the book he later wrote, Davis stated his reasons for resigning from the army, which had nothing to do with Kaytennae; furthermore, he described Kaytennae as “surly and unresponsive when spoken to” (1963:73) and stated that he never trusted him from the beginning. Furthermore, it is clear that Davis, years after the event, still thought highly of Chato and Mickey Free. James Kaywaykla (Ball 1970) presents a completely different and much more fully dimensional characterization of Kaytennae as a responsible and loving stepfather who married his ( James’s) mother after his father was killed in battle. The Chiricahuas never forgot Chato’s actions, and they shunned him for the rest of his life. At Fort Sill, he settled in a community far away from Naiche, Kaytennae, and Daklugie, who had nothing but scorn for him. Later, when the Mescaleros learned of his behavior as a scout, they shared this opinion. Ostracized by both the Chiricahuas and the Mescaleros, Chato established his home at Apache Summit, where he had to haul his water over ten miles. He lived there, apart from the others (Ball 1988:282). Interestingly, Kaytennae used his time at Alcatraz to learn English. Upon his return, he became a scout again, so that he could ensure that translations were done correctly. Never again would he allow Chato to have power over him or his people. IMPRISONMENT AND THE EXPERIENCE OF THE TOTAL INSTITUTION President Cleveland and his Cabinet deliberated for about six weeks on the fate of Naiche, Geronimo, and the other warriors while they remained at San Antonio barracks. Their train arrived early Sunday, October 24, 1886, in Pensacola, Florida, where the railroad cars separated so that the one containing the women and children could continue on to St. Augustine (Stockel 2004:37). The men then boarded a ferry to begin their imprisonment at Fort Pickens, located on a barrier island off Pensacola Bay on the western end of the Florida panhandle (see Timeline). In some ways, they had an easier time than their families because, as warriors, they had already been socialized by their own society to expect and endure physical hardship. Disciplined by their extensive

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training, they were used to having their daily activities regulated when they were engaged in raiding or warfare. At Fort Pickens, the men were expected to gather ¤rewood along the beach to supplement the wood provided by the army for their cooking that they did outdoors. They were expected to remove debris from the ditches and grounds around the fort and to dig wells among the dunes near the fort to obtain water for cooking and washing (Stockel 1993:105–106). In a letter to the assistant adjutant general, Colonel Loomis Langdon, who was in charge of the prisoners, described their activities: They scrape, paint and pile shot and shell; they clean the grounds of weeds and dirt that has accumulated in a quarter of a century; they root out from the chinks of the walls the plants and young trees that are constantly getting a foothold there, and they are also engaged in setting out Bermuda grass in the parade ground. [Stockel 1993:105]

Colonel Langdon went on to remark on their conduct: There has been no occasion to reprimand, much less to punish a single one of these Indians since their arrival here . . . they deserve commendation for their cheerfulness of demeanor, for their prompt alacrity in obeying orders and for the zeal and interest they show in the duties assigned to them. [106]

None of the warriors at Fort Pickens became ill with a life-threatening disease, despite their exposure to many tourists—one Sunday they received 459 visitors (Stockel 2004:41)—and the severe disruption of their lives, with unfamiliar food, humid climate, and separation from their families. However, the families at Fort Marion in St. Augustine suffered greatly from disease and a lack of adequate and familiar food. The Army failed to take into consideration the Chiricahua taboo against eating ¤sh and pork, and the lack of nutrients took its toll on the prisoners’ health. Samuel Bowman, the former chief of scouts at the San Carlos Agency claimed that even the rations at San Carlos, which were quite meager, were considerably larger than those issued at Fort Marion (Stockel 1993). Finally, the warriors at Fort Pickens were reunited with their wives and children, and, together, the families remained at the fort until May 13, 1888, when they were moved to Mount Vernon Barracks in Alabama (see Timeline). In contrast to their experience at Fort Pickens—which lasted a little over a year and a half—the impact of sustained imprisonment over eight years at Mount Vernon Barracks in Alabama was probably felt most severely by the men. Since childhood they had been raised to be warriors; this was the core of their identity as Apache men. They did well at Fort Pickens be-

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cause they had been trained to be disciplined and to contend with physical and psychological hardship. However, these skills were not as useful when their imprisonment went on for eight years, and hope gradually faded during their time in Alabama that they could eventually return to their homeland. Nor were they able to sustain their identity as warriors during their stay in what could be called a total institution. Characterized by barriers to social intercourse with the outside world and to departure, total institutions can be grouped into several types. Prisonerof-war camps are subsumed under a type of total institution that “is organized to protect the community against what are felt to be intentional dangers to it, with the welfare of the persons thus sequestered not the immediate issue” (Goffman 1961:4–5). The fate of the Chiricahuas was in the hands of the United States War Department, not the Department of the Interior, from 1886–1913. The War Department directed General Miles “to place them ‘beyond the reach of escape’ ” (Debo 1976:301). In his address to Congress, President Grover Cleveland told how the Apaches had, during an 18-month period of warfare, “committed many murders and had been the constant cause of terror to the settlers of Arizona;” he assured Congress that “these murderous savages” were now imprisoned at “a safe place of con¤nement” (1886, vol. xi:5099–5100). Inmates come to the institution from a “ ‘home world’—a way of life and a round of activities taken for granted until the point of admission to the institution” (Goffman 1961:12). It is from this round of experience that a person con¤rms his or her conception of self. Removed from the home world and its culture, the inmate experiences role dispossession and the corresponding loss of his or her sense of identity (12). This description certainly characterizes the Chiricahua experience as they were forced to become dependent prisoners of the federal government and to relinquish their identity as warriors who provided for and protected their families. To understand how deeply embedded the identity as a warrior was in Apache men, it is necessary to trace how early training and expectations began in Apache boys. When the boy was about six years old, the boy’s father or other close male relative gave the child a bow and arrows so that he could join other boys in hunting small birds and animals. At the same time, boys also began to play games that emphasized speed and agility, such as foot racing, tug-of-war, hide-and-seek, wrestling, and riding horses. Elders encouraged boys to be independent, self-disciplined, and physically ¤t. As boys got older, they honed their hunting skills, learning how to use stealth and perseverance to bring down their prey. They learned how to care for their horses and how to ride with skill and daring. As a boy reached his teens, he took on duties as a scout and guard. He also worked to improve his stamina,

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strength, and physical endurance. When he was about 14 years old, the local group replaced his extended family as his teachers, and the boy began to train as a novice warrior through more intense and formal instruction. Discipline, self-control, and physical hardships dominated his training, and he sharpened his competitive instincts in contests, such as races, wrestling, slingshot ¤ghts, and bow-and-arrow competitions. Boys learned endurance by running up and down hills as well as great distances. The ¤nal stage of the boy’s training consisted of joining four raids as a novice (Sweeney 1991:12–14). The male equivalent of the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony, these four raids were marked by ritual behavior as well as physical hardships. The boy’s behavior was closely watched during the raid because how he comported himself would indicate how reliable and responsible he would be for the rest of his life. He wore a ceremonial hat for protection and was called Child of the Waters, after the culture hero. Other requirements included drinking through a tube, eating all his food cold, and learning the words reserved for war and raiding (Opler and Hoijer 1940:617–634). The boy was also expected to closely watch the behavior of the warriors during the raids so that he could participate in the future; in camp, he had to perform menial chores such as cooking. The four raids comprised what Turner (1969) calls an initiation rite: pubescent boys were separated from the women and children of their community and entered a “liminal” period that consisted of the raiding trips. Reduced to egalitarian servitude in which submission and obedience were emphasized, the boy was expected to perform with courage and reliability as his strength of character was tested. If he passed these tests successfully, he was then a man and a warrior who could accompany others as a full participant on future raids. In some ways, women at Mount Vernon Barracks in Alabama had an easier time than the men because they were still involved in childcare and in cooking and caring for their families. They were able to reconstruct a domestic space in which they carried out many of their traditional duties. The core of their responsibilities had not shifted in the way that it had for the men. While the boy’s initiation ceremony transformed the boy into a warrior as represented by the culture hero, Child of the Waters, the girl’s initiation ceremony transformed her into readiness to be a wife and mother as represented by White Painted Woman. Thus, even in an alien setting, the women and girls, when they reached womanhood, were still able to ful¤ll their identity as mothers and wives (cf. Spindler and Spindler 1958). One of the characteristics of total institutions is forced social relationships in which inmates are “contaminated by forced interpersonal contact” (Goffman 1961:28). Forced interpersonal contact was exactly what the Chiricahuas experienced at Fort Marion and Mount Vernon Barracks when scouts, espe-

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cially the ostracized Chato, and the warriors that they had pursued were forced to lodge in close quarters. This is why one of the ¤rst things they did upon reaching Fort Sill, Oklahoma, in 1894 (see Timeline), was to build separate communities that reestablished their old social/political organization. Shunned by other Chiricahuas, scouts such as Chato and their families constructed communities separate from those of head men and their followers, as previously noted. Another dehumanizing experience in®icted upon inmates is the “violation of one’s informational preserve regarding self ” (Goffman 1961:23–24), which includes the collection and recording of each inmate’s social statuses and past behavior in a dossier available to staff. New audiences can therefore “learn discreditable facts about oneself that are ordinarily concealed” (24). This type of depersonalizing categorizing is exempli¤ed in the list that was prepared when the prisoners were about to leave Mount Vernon Barracks in Alabama for Fort Sill, Oklahoma. Under the heading, “Apache Indians surviving who were captured by General Miles in 1886, and their families” (Naiche’s band surrendered and were not “captured.”) were such entries as: Geronimo. Has been a good man while a prisoner. Age: 60 years. One wife and ¤ve children. 1 boy over 12; 1 boy grown and one daughter married. Total number of children 5. His daughter is married to Dah-ke-ya, soldier, and has 2 children. Geronimo also has 2 sisters, 1 is married, the other is not. He is Justice of the Peace and does well. Has in®uence as such. Nai-che. Soldier. A good man since a prisoner. Has two wives, six children under 12; one boy and girl over 12, both at school, the boy at Hampton, the girl at Carlisle. Total children 8. Has two sisters, both are married. His mother is alive and with him. [Stockel 1993:179]

Another category on the list grouped those who were identi¤ed as “unreliable” with “bad characters” and included such entries as, “Mithlo. Lazy and good for nothing. Is tricky and gets drunk” (180). Holding onto religious practices was one way in which prisoners were able to maintain some continuity with their former selves and their sense of community. Through the performance of ceremonials, they could maintain an identity distinct from the abject one imposed upon them by their captors. When the Chiricahuas at Fort Pickens held a Gáhe (Mountain Spirit Dance), Colonel Langdon, the commanding of¤cer at the fort, decided to open it to the public. The June 9, 1887 edition of the Pensacola Daily Commercial, advertised it as “the grand biennial war dance of the Apaches, now con¤ned within Fort Pickens,” and said that it would “begin at sunset this evening,

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and last until sunrise to-morrow” (Skinner 1987:185). Obviously, the dance was misrepresented for the sake of publicity and to attract potential tourists, many of whom would have considered any dance performed by Indians, especially the Apaches, to be a prelude to war. Nevertheless, it does show that the Chiricahuas were continuing to conduct their religious practices and were probably conducting additional rituals away from the curious eyes of tourists. THE COMMODIFICATION OF THE CHIRICAHUAS The period after the Civil War was marked not only by the construction of transcontinental railroads but also by the building of shorter lines to create accessibility to tourist destinations. This was a time of excursionists, groups of travelers on tours that visited places of interest; such groups were courted by the railroad companies with reduced rates. Railroad companies and boat owners were delighted when Pensacola became home to Geronimo and the Chiricahuas, for a trip to Santa Rosa Island meant travel by rail and by sea. A key aspect of political and ideological domination is exploitation, which, in this case, meant making the Chiricahuas into a commodity, a tourist industry. This began when the civic leaders of Pensacola and St. Augustine vied with each other for the presence of the Apaches. Both towns knew that having them there would encourage tourism and, to be sure, it did: thousands of tourists ®ocked to see the last “wild” Indians to be subdued. The long campaign against the Chiricahuas added to their fame, and, of course, Geronimo was one of the most famous Indians ever known. St. Augustine was already a popular tourist destination by the time that the Chiricahuas arrived. A popular winter vacation spot, St. Augustine was easily reached by the new steam-powered ships. In the 20 years after the Civil War, this small Atlantic coast town was especially popular among former Union soldiers who had fought against the South during the war. Its unusual and historic scenery and tropical climate brought many Northerners to St. Augustine. The tourist industry advertised Florida as “The land of ®owers and tropical scenery,” using photographs, especially widely circulated stereoscopic views (Waldroup 1998:46). The eastern newspapers had, of course, kept the public apprised of the military campaign against the Chiricahuas with such accounts as that in the September 25, 1886, article from Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper (Skinner 1987:85). In blatantly racist language, the article reported that General Miles, of Captain Lawton’s command, captured Naiche and “thirty-two bucks and squaws” with Miles sharing the honor of the victory with General Crook who helped to plan the attack. After hearing this news, and that the Apaches’ destination was to be Fort

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Marion in St. Augustine, the people of Pensacola began a movement by writing their congressman in Washington to have Geronimo sent to one of the local forts on Pensacola Bay. As one letter said, if Congressman Bob Davidson succeeded, he “could point with pride” at having “been instrumental in giving Pensacola an attraction which will bring her many visitors. We hope to see the Indians soon” (Skinner 1987:85). More support came from the citizens of New Orleans who started a petition addressed to the Secretary of War that the Apaches be sent to Pensacola; the relative proximity of New Orleans to Pensacola meant that the Chiricahuas would be within visiting distance. Meanwhile, the federal government carefully orchestrated the train trip east, as well as each of the Chiricahuas’ subsequent moves to other locations, to capitalize on their fame so that the public could see the Apaches. When President Cleveland ordered that Naiche’s band be detained in San Antonio, they were housed at Fort Sam Houston, while the president and his cabinet decided where to send them. During their weeks at the fort, the Apaches drew many tourists as well as a reporter who interviewed them and wrote this account, which appeared on September 25, 1886 in Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper: The captives are held at Government headquarters in San Antonio to await the decision of their fate. They are a hard-looking company, and have attracted crowds of curious visitors since their arrival. . . . Geronimo and Natchez [Naiche] passed their ¤rst Sunday in captivity playing cards in their tent. Captain Lawton, of the Fourth Cavalry, left San Antonio, last week, for their [sic] posts at Albuquerque, having been formally relieved of their [sic] prisoners, and having made their [sic] report to the War Department. Geronimo was very sullen after hearing that Captain Lawton, in whom he had great faith, was going away. Natchez [Naiche] was very much affected by the departure of Lawton. [Skinner 1987:87]

The newspaper article went on to say that over 450 Chiricahuas were now in Florida. This meant that most of the “hostiles and renegades” had been removed from Arizona. An accompanying picture illustrated the smoking remains of a settler’s home after he returned from searching for hostile Indians. All that remained of his family were a little shoe and a bit of torn clothing. Meanwhile, the debate about the fate of Naiche’s band continued to rage. Newspapers gave their opinions, but the President stated that he preferred to see Geronimo tried and hanged. Although newspapers called for trials, they also admitted that a fair trial was not really possible. Especially angry when his Apache scouts were designated as prisoners of war and deported to Florida, General Crook was one of the few to champion the Apaches by saying that

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any man would be savage if his food supply were endangered so that he could not provide for his family (Skinner 1987:97). The president ¤nally directed Secretary of War Endicott to send the captives to Florida, dividing the men, who would be imprisoned at Fort Pickens in Pensacola, from their families and the two scouts, Martine and Kayitah, who would join the other Chiricahuas at Fort Marion in St. Augustine. When they were informed of the decision a few hours before their departure from San Antonio, Naiche and Geronimo requested an interview with General Stanley to tell him that they considered the separation of themselves from their families to be a violation of the terms of their treaty of surrender. Convinced that they were telling the truth, General Stanley informed military of¤cials in Washington, but this had no effect on their separation. On October 22, 1886, the warriors were loaded onto one of four railroad coaches; the women and children along with Martine and Kayitah boarded another coach. Forty soldiers from the 16th Infantry took up the other two coaches. With a ®exible schedule, the train stopped in towns whenever a crowd gathered so that people could see the prisoners. A considerable number of people were at the railroad station in New Orleans, excited to see Geronimo. The following excerpt from an October 23, 1886, edition of the Pensacolian conveys the craze for Geronimo and the racist, patronizing tone of the publicity that surrounded the Chiricahuas at this time: The powers that be in Washington have at last come to their senses and selected Fort Pickens as the most suitable place to incarcerate the greatest living American general and his principal of¤cers. Fort Pickens is well suited as an abiding place for one of Geronimo’s genius, for there he can, like his great prototype Napoleon at Saint Helena, live over again his conquests without being disturbed by the outside world. Fort Pickens is large and solid and can hold Geronimo and his band very well, and a few hundred more if the government sees ¤t to send them. We welcome the nation’s distinguished guests and promise to keep them so safely under lock and key that they will forget their hair raising proclivities and become good Indians. [Skinner 1987:103–104]

When a train accident delayed the Apaches’ train as well as one going in the other direction, the theatrical troupe on board the other train asked for permission to speak to Geronimo and to buy some souvenirs from him. After Geronimo had sold all of his belongings, he became the agent for other Chiricahuas, selling brass rings, cartridge belts, and other items. In addition, a soldier hawked the wares, explaining that Geronimo had worn the article in warfare (Skinner 1987:105). A crowd of a thousand people met the train at the Mobile depot, and,

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when they reached the Pensacola Junction, a reporter was given permission to board the train and meet Geronimo. In Pensacola, the train coaches were separated: the train with 10 soldiers and most of the Chiricahuas went on to St. Augustine, while the coach with the warriors and 30 soldiers was switched onto a sidetrack where they disembarked and boarded a steamer that took them to Fort Pickens. The Pensacolian and the Pensacola Commercial reported the details of their arrival in Pensacola. Geronimo’s fame made him one of the most famous American Indians in history. His reputation drew a constant ®ow of visitors to Fort Pickens that began almost immediately after the arrival of the Chiricahuas. People of all ages and ethnic groups ®ocked to the fort to present cigars, candy, money, and bouquets of ®owers to the Apaches. The Pensacola area was home to several hunting clubs made up of local businessmen and other local citizens. With one club already named the Osceola Hunting Club after the wellknown Seminole leader, a rival hunting club named itself the Geronimo Club. The Chiricahuas were expected to get the fort in shape, after its abandonment nearly 20 years before, in time for the Shipping League Convention. This three-day convention brought several hundred delegates to the island to get a closer look at Geronimo and the other warriors, who were then the nation’s most famous prisoners (Skinner 1987:112). After the in®uential members of the Shipping League interacted with the Apaches, many expressed concern about their physical well-being and the health of their families incarcerated in much more crowded quarters at Fort Marion in St. Augustine. These ¤rsthand accounts caught the attention of the Indian Rights associations in the East, who then brought pressure to bear on the War Department who were in charge of the Chiricahuas. In March, the Vanderbilt’s yacht arrived at Fort Pickens so that its passengers could visit the Apaches. A few days later, the Duke of Sutherland, a wealthy Scottish noble, and his guests took his large luxury yacht to Santa Rosa Island where Colonel Langdon, commander of the fort, gave them a guided tour. On June 9, 1887, the Pensacola Daily Commercial ran an ad placed by the management of the Willie C, an excursion boat, advertising, “GRAND INDIAN WAR DANCE! The Willie C will leave Palafox Wharf this evening (Thursday) to take to Fort Pickens all parties having passes to attend THE WAR DANCE” (Skinner 1987:184). When the Apaches were relocated to Mount Vernon Barracks north of Mobile, Alabama, the of¤cials of the Mobile and Birmingham Railroad offered a promotional excursion. They invited key of¤cials, including Mayor R. B. Owen, city heads of departments and reporters from local newspapers, to have a relaxed trip “up to the railroad trestle on the Tombigbee River where

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a feast would be served in the diner” (Skinner 1987:170). On the trip back down the river, the army would guide the excursionists on a tour of the Apache settlement. However, Mount Vernon was a relatively isolated town without other tourist attractions, so interaction between the Apaches and excursionists lessened considerably. But there was a train station at Mount Vernon, and Geronimo, as well as some of the others, made the most of this, greeting the trains and selling articles that they had made. Geronimo, in fact, was an astute business man whose economic drive was so constant in his life that historian Angie Debo says, “In a different culture he would have been a captain of industry” (1976:233). Before he surrendered, Geronimo expressed this drive in raiding, ranching, and farming. In the spring of 1885, when he lived at Turkey Creek, he planted barley and corn. The herd of cattle that he insisted on bringing back to San Carlos after one of his surrenders, as previously mentioned, he intended to use to sustain a ranching enterprise. Promoters may have thought that they were in charge of Geronimo as a tourist attraction, but, in reality, Geronimo was an active agent who kept close control over the objects he sold and over the appearances he made. He soon learned, over the course of his captivity, that he had a legendary name and that people would come from all over the country to see him. A wily businessman, Geronimo had $10,000 in the bank when he died. In many ways, the Chiricahuas of 1886 have continued to fascinate the American public. Novelists glamorize them and commercial ¤lm-makers continue to make movies about Geronimo, sometimes mistakenly placing him in Monument Valley, at the opposite end of Arizona from where he actually lived. One ¤lm starred Jason Patric as Lieutenant Gatewood, who climbed cliffs with the Chiricahua scouts in pursuit of Geronimo. The Chiricahuas, probably more than any other Native American group, have captured the American yearning for wild open spaces and a free, unfettered lifestyle. Keith Basso expressed this well when he said, “ ‘The Apache’ . . . has been transformed from a native American into an American myth, the haunting symbol of a vanished era in the history of the Southwest” (2004:9).

3

Exile and the Construction of Cultural Identity

Other Indians have homes where they can live and be happy. I and my people have no homes. The place where we are kept is bad for us. . . . We are sick there and we die. —Geronimo

PENSACOLA, FLORIDA, AUGUST, 2004 The contrast between Fort Marion and Fort Pickens could not be more profound. Even though each is located in a militarily strategic position on the coast with a lighthouse in the distance, they are on opposite sides of the state. Fort Marion is on the east coast of Florida and faces the Atlantic Ocean, while Fort Pickens is at the western edge of the state and faces the Gulf of Mexico. Fort Marion, built between 1672 and 1695, is an integral part of St. Augustine, a city that still re®ects its Spanish heritage. In contrast, Fort Pickens, constructed between 1829 and 1834 by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, is isolated at the far end of Santa Rosa Island. Named after Revolutionary War hero General Andrew Pickens of South Carolina, Fort Pickens is the largest of four forts built to defend Pensacola Bay and its navy yard. An hour’s drive from Mobile, Alabama, Fort Pickens is now part of the Gulf Islands National Seashore. I see osprey soaring above, and, rolling down the car windows, I hear the rhythmic rise and fall of buzzing cicadas. Santa Rosa Island is a long, narrow island, and the two-lane road is edged with gleaming white sand that stretches off into huge dunes topped with sea oats that bend in the breeze (Figure 18). In between the dunes, I can see waves breaking on the shore. On my return drive, the air will be fragrant with suntan lotion as families swim and picnic on the beach. A few shrubs and scrubby pines cluster at the western end of the island where the low, rambling structure of the fort is located. Spotting the tall ®ower stalk of a century plant rising from radiating, curving leaves, I immediately feel at home and begin to wonder if there were agave plants here when the Apaches arrived. If so, they must have been happy to see something as familiar as this major food staple. It was from the mescal, a species of the agave, that the Mescalero Apaches got their name.

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Figure 18: Road to Fort Pickens, Gulf Islands National Seashore, Santa Rosa Island, near Pensacola, Florida. Photo by author.

Even though Fort Pickens is surrounded by dark or opaque water, laden for the Apaches with a strong connection to death, the Chiricahua warriors may have felt more at home here than those at Fort Marion, hemmed in by the city on three sides. After their arrival in Pensacola, they took a steamer to Santa Rosa Island. During the passage one of the Chiricahuas, Beshe, was “delighted” when he saw porpoises cavorting in the water (1976:310). The Apaches were surprised that such graceful, playful creatures could live in what seemed to be the same substance as sinister alligators. Here they had room to roam and an abundance of nature as well as relative solitude (Figure 19). Most importantly, when they climbed the ramparts of the fort, they could see the horizon. One of the librarians at the fort told me that she likes to think that they came to feel the similarities between the great expanse of water and distance all around them and the space and light in the desert Southwest. I arrive early, before the visitor’s center has opened and wander around the fort. Even though the sun has not yet burned through the morning mist, there is still a sea breeze that provides far better circulation than the still, suffocating air of Fort Marion in St. Augustine. Entering through the sally port, I imagine the Chiricahuas posing for individual photographs framed by the tall archway (Figure 20). (Photographers from Pensacola came over to take pictures of each warrior.)

Figure 19: Fort Pickens, Santa Rosa Island, Florida. Naiche, Geronimo, and the warriors with them were imprisoned here between 1886 and 1888. Photo by author.

Figure 20: Entrance to Fort Pickens, Santa Rosa Island, Florida. Photo by author.

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Figure 21: Casemate, Fort Pickens, Santa Rosa Island, Florida. Photo by author.

The large parade ground is framed by the archway; just to my left are plaster-lined rooms that once served as a hospital and later as quarters. Most of the fort consists of interior gunrooms called casemates; these dark thickwalled rooms are made of brick covered with plaster; the construction is strong enough to support heavy cannon on top (Figure 21). Wandering to Bastion A, through a grassy area, I look down at the white sandy soil and wonder what the Apaches thought of the earth here, so different from that in Arizona, where it was the same color as their skin. Here it was the color of salt, the color of the White Eyes’ skin. I enter one of the far bastions and explore it to the far corner, seeking solitude from a family of ¤ve young children who are yelling and scrambling over the ramparts to the lookout towards the mainland. Hearing the steady dripping of water, I ¤nd a puddle on the ®oor and see where seepage is staining the wall. A mossy green area is spreading over the plaster that covers the brick. In the corner, a spider spins its web. Voices echo down the arched corridor, and I can hear the family coming closer. When they reach the casemate where I am standing, I lean into the wall, and one of the younger boys throws a rock straight up into the vent designed to allow the smoke from the ammunition to disperse. He turns without seeing me and runs to join his family. Looking out the window, I see the United States ®ag whipping in the

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breeze. What was it like for the Apaches to see that ®ag every day and to know what it symbolized? The sun is still trying to break through the thick cloud cover. An insect drones by and once more I hear voices approaching. As they get closer, I hear a man explaining, in a businesslike tone, that a casemate is an enclosed gun emplacement. He comments on trash left behind by tourists. When the man and woman come into view, I see that he wears a ranger’s hat and uniform, so I begin to pepper him with questions about what it was like for the Chiricahuas when they were here, and he responds with answers. “Before they came, the military left the fort deserted during the summer because Yellow Fever was so bad in Mobile; everyone who could headed for higher, cooler country. But when the Chiricahuas were here, some of the soldiers had to stay here with them. I guess you’ve heard about our yellow fever epidemics this time of year. In fact, that’s why they eventually moved the Chiricahuas in May of 1888, before they had to endure another summer when yellow fever would hit again.” I remembered hearing an announcement on the car radio that morning, “On this day in 1853 yellow fever was so rampant that doctors told people to nurse their sick family members at home because the hospitals were already ¤lled to overcrowding.” “Then in the winter,” he continued, “this bitter wind blew across the mile and a half of Pensacola Bay. It swept across the seven-acre parade ground here at the fort and must have made things pretty miserable. In January and February the temperatures are between forty and ¤fty degrees in the daytime and get down to below freezing at night. There’s not much protection from the wind, which just howled through the casemates where the Apaches were living.” Thinking of the bay that separates Santa Rosa Island from the mainland, I ask about the constant stream of visitors who came to see the Chiricahuas. “Oh yes!” he replies, “Prominent Pensacola citizens petitioned the government to have Geronimo’s group sent here, and the editor of the Pensacolian called Geronimo ‘an attraction which will bring here a great many visitors.’ To get to the fort then, tourists had to get a pass from Colonel Langdon and pay for the boat trip to the island. They were so popular that when the government made the decision to take them to Alabama, the soldiers had to slip them out under cover of darkness so that there wouldn’t be a public outcry against their leaving.” The woman with him adds, “What the Chiricahuas wanted most when they came here was to be reunited with their families who had been taken to Fort Marion.” “Yes,” says the ranger, who introduces himself as David Ogden, “I’ll show you where the families were housed once they arrived. The government de-

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cided to send the rest of the prisoners at Fort Marion to Alabama when they allowed the families to join the warriors here.” As we walk to another part of the fort, I tell him that I am retracing the sites where the Chiricahuas were imprisoned so that I can get a sense of what these places were like. The only way that I could write a book about their imprisonment was to leave familiar surroundings and to immerse myself in the experience of actually being in the same places where they were. When we arrive at the south side of the fort, David points to an area and says, “Over here were the of¤cers’ quarters, which is where the families were housed. The single men were moved to similar rooms on the north side of the fort.” The woman with him adds, “It must have made so much difference once they were together. You could hear the women singing and children playing in the fort. They’d been apart for six long months, and they were so worried about their loved ones. Now, they didn’t have to worry anymore about how their families were doing.” With a warm smile, she adds, “I’m Meghan Jones, by the way.” “We even had a baby born here at the fort,” David tells me. “Perico’s wife gave birth to a son and named him Frederick after the king of Germany. Of course, that was probably to show the powers that be how civilized he’d become. There’s a photo of him with his family over here.” A plaque shows Perico, who was Geronimo’s chief lieutenant, with his long ®owing hair wearing a shirt, vest, and trousers. His pants cover his boots, instead of being tucked inside his boots in the usual Chiricahua style. He holds a small son who wears a Victorian sailor suit with matching straw boater on his head. His traditionally dressed wife and older daughter stand behind a cradleboard in which the newborn is bound. This is when individual Chiricahuas begin to come alive for me, and I began to see the small group of warriors that had held out to the last and their approximate ages: Naiche (age 35), Geronimo (57), Perico (37), Fun (20), Ahnandia (26), Napi (45), Yahnozha (32), Tissnolthos (22), Beshe (40), Chappo (22), Laziyah (46), Motsos (35), Kilthdigai (35), Zhonne (20), and Hunlona (19) (Skinner 1987:100; Stockel 1993:100). Geronimo called Perico “my brother” as cousins are called in the Apache culture; Perico was actually his second cousin and appears to have been Geronimo’s chief lieutenant (Debo 1976:135). Perico appears, with a baby in his arms, in the famous C. S. Fly photograph of four Chiricahua warriors (Figure 9). He stands on Geronimo’s right, while Geronimo and Naiche are on horseback and another warrior stands beside Naiche, his hand resting on Naiche’s saddle. In another photograph (Figure 8), Geronimo stands on the right, with Yanozha, Chappo (one of Geronimo’s sons), and Fun. Perico and Fun had

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the same father, and Fun was considered to be “the bravest of all the band” (Debo 1976:135–136) by many of the men and was one of Geronimo’s most trusted warriors (Ball 1988:155). Later, at Mount Vernon Barracks, according to Martine and Chihuahua, Fun killed himself after he thought he had killed his wife (Ball 1988:155). It was obligatory for Apache men to kill or cut off the nose of an unfaithful wife, and because of this, Fun shot his wife. He also knew that if he killed her, the Apaches would approve but the White Eyes would execute him by hanging. He shot himself because he wanted to escape the terrible death and mutilation of hanging since the body is believed to go through eternity in the state it was in when buried, as previously mentioned. Kanseah was a small thin boy who was training under Yanozha to be a warrior. Daklugie was also a boy then. Nana was a revered elder statesman who would choose Kaytennae to succeed him as leader of their band. Later, Mangas (about 45), who was the son of the great Mangas Coloradas, and two young warriors, Fitahat and Gosa (both 16) arrived after they surrendered on October 20, 1886, when they had heard of Geronimo’s surrender (Stockel 1993:100). When the Chiricahuas at Fort Marion were moved to Mount Vernon Barracks, the women whose husbands were con¤ned at Fort Pickens had the choice of joining their husbands or accompanying everyone else to Alabama. The wives of Motsos, Tissnolthos, and Chappo Geronimo and one of the wives of Ahnandia stayed on the train to Alabama. Motsos was especially upset when his wife took their three children to Mount Vernon instead of joining him. Colonel Loomis Langdon, who was in charge of the Apaches at Fort Pickens, wrote to Herbert Walsh of the Indian Rights Association in June 1887 about Motsos’s situation, saying, “His case is particularly hard because he is remarkably attached to his family. There may have been some intriguing to effect this separation on the part of the chiefs, who only had to keep silence to prevent her coming here.” Langdon also mentioned that Tissnolthos’s wife believed this, saying, “The other squaws believe that at the time of the transfer to this place [Fort Pickens], this woman, being rather young, was sent away to the Indian School at Carlisle, Pennsylvania.” Regarding Chappo, Langdon wrote, “He is the most intelligent Indian in the lot. His wife did not come. She too is supposed to have gone to Carlisle” (Stockel 1993:108). Naiche and Geronimo each had three wives join them, and Mangas and Perico had two wives come to Fort Pickens. Geronimo’s wife Ga-aa, known also as She-gha, suffered from Bright’s disease and died on September 28, 1887, becoming the only Apache to die at Fort Pickens. Quite a few visitors come to Fort Pickens to learn more about the Chiricahuas, including people from Mescalero. David tells me, “A number of Apaches have come to see the fort since I’ve been here. Sometimes they come

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to do ceremonies, and, when they come for that purpose, I block off the area to give them some privacy from the public. In the mid-1990s, a Chiricahua medicine man came to do a blessing and he tied medicine bundles around the site. Hurricane Opal blew through just after that, and I was worried that they’d blown away because so much got destroyed in the high winds. But amazingly, all the medicine bundles were all still in place, just about all that was.” He looks at me and nods slowly, “I guess they had Power.” EXILE Edward Said described exile as an experience whose “essential sadness can never be surmounted.” He went on to call it “the unhealable rift forced between a human being and a place” (2000:173). Even “the achievements of exile,” wrote Said, “are permanently undermined by the loss of something left behind forever . . . what is truly horrendous . . . [is] that it is produced by human beings for other human beings” (173–174). Although Daklugie was referring to imprisonment in the epigraph to Chapter 2, his words are equally true for exile: that only a White Eye could be so inhumane that he would forever exile a people from their homeland; an Apache would never do that to another human being. Said spoke to this when he compared exile to death, saying “that, like death but without death’s ultimate mercy, it has torn millions of people from the nourishment of tradition, family, and geography” (2000:174) Exile is a condition designed to deny dignity and an identity to a people, to strip from them their collective ethos or habitus (Bourdieu 1977), the coherence of their way of life within a place, within a speci¤c habitation. Most signi¤cantly, exile is not a matter of choice. In contrast to someone who has been banished from his or her homeland, an émigré is anyone who immigrates to a new country; they may have immigrated voluntarily. Expatriates choose to live in a foreign country. Refugees are usually a large mass of people forced out of their home country for political reasons; because they must leave quickly, they leave behind most of their goods and belongings and therefore need international assistance. But exiles are forever outsiders; they have been banished from their homeland forever. Place and emplacement within one’s homeland are vital components to a sense of personal and social identity. Emplacement refers to being concretely placed in a particular place and time (Casey 1993:23). Places anchor and orient people, becoming part of their identity. To be homeless not only means to be without a home but to also be “without any effective means of orientation in a complex and confusing world” (xv). The interplay between body

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and landscape is experienced as “place . . . a locale bounded on both sides” (29). While the surrounding landscape is just beyond the place where I am standing, the inner boundary of a place is where I am currently located in my embodied self (29). A person relies on his or her body as the primary agent in the landscape, ¤nding one’s way through landmarks or one’s own path marks. Thus, it is through our bodily experience of the unmarked landscape that we remember a place, endowing it with memory and meaning. Place bestows upon people not only a local habitation but also an identity and a name; it is both individual and collective in character. The history of a people is embedded in their surroundings; speci¤c spatial features endow the land with “multiple forms of signi¤cance that reach into their lives and shape the ways they think” (Basso 1996:34). This means that “knowledge of places is therefore closely linked to knowledge of self ” and makes it possible to grasp “one’s position in the larger scheme of things” (34). This means that a sense of place fuses elements of personal and ethnic identity with social and moral force. N. Scott Momaday takes this even further by saying, “The sense of place is paramount. Only in reference to the earth” can a person “persist in his identity” (1994:1). The importance of place as integral to personal identity in Chiricahua culture is evident from a statement by Morris Opler in his court testimony when the Chiricahuas were seeking restitution for the loss of their land. Opler said that if a Chiricahua had been born and had grown up in a place, but had gone away, when he returned, he would “roll at this place as a symbol of having come home, of identi¤cation with the place. He would get down on the ground and roll” (Lieder and Page 1997:16). Clearly, for the Chiricahuas, place had much to do with a sense of personal and ethnic identity, endowing an individual with what Basso calls “a con¤dent sense of who one is as a person” (1996:34). Thus, to strip away place—the sense of emplacement within one’s homeland—for a people as spiritually and emotionally tied to the very ground from which each person received his or her sense of identity—could not have been anything but devastating. Desolation, whose Latin root, desolare, means to abandon, “has everything to do with displacement from one’s usual habitat” (Casey 1993:192). To be desolate is to be without hope and “without the resources normally offered by friends and family in a familiar dwelling place” (192). These young and vigorous warriors—Naiche was only in his early thirties and many were in their twenties—imprisoned at Fort Pickens experienced just this kind of desolation, for they had been stripped of the emotional resources offered by their families and their dwelling place. Having traveled across the country in a train for so many days, they had become well

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aware of the distance that separated them from their homeland—and the impossibility of returning on their own even if they were able at some point to escape. THE IDEOLOGY OF PLACE Casey points out that our memories are nearly always situated in a particular place or linked to a physical setting. Those memories that are not anchored to a setting are impoverished or incomplete and that is disorienting. Keith Basso’s work with the Western Apache (e.g., 1996) contributes some of the most insightful analysis on the ideology of place through an exploration of place as it constitutes a sense of individual and community identity for this group. He incorporates Heidegger’s (1977) concept of dwelling to designate the awareness inherent in the “multiple ‘lived relationships’ ” between people and places. Space acquires meaning through these relationships as people step back from the rush of everyday experiences to stop and consciously attend to places as they also dwell on aspects of their own selves. In this way, places trigger self-re®ection, and place-centered narratives serve as models for action. The Western Apache differ signi¤cantly from the Chiricahuas because they continue to live in their homeland; never having experienced exile, the Western Apache have a continuous history in the places that give their lives meaning. Situated in speci¤c locations, wisdom from the past takes the form of cautionary narratives that they are able to consult as guides for action in situations that arise today. An event that is judged to be similar is brought to mind by hearing the name of a speci¤c location; the person pictures the surroundings where the narrated events occurred, and imagines himself or herself as the person who acts with wisdom in the narrative. If the person experiences a powerful sense of identi¤cation with the character in the story, then the experience is considered to con¤rm that this narrative will serve as an appropriate guide to action in the person’s present situation (Basso 1996:80–81). Basso concludes “it is hard to conceive of a cultural construct whose bearing on place is more intimately related to ideas of self hood” than this kind of “extended re®ection on the symbolic dimensions of the physical environment” (95). Places in the Chiricahua homeland were equally laden with symbolic meaning that triggered self-re®ection and place-centered narratives that served as models for action. After all, many groups derived their very names from their territories: Warm Springs, Mimbrenos, Janeros, Carrizalenos. Unfortunately, the historians of the time were recording their military history rather than place-centered narratives in Chiricahua culture. Furthermore, the domi-

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nant political ideology of the time meant that little value was placed on recording Chiricahua knowledge. Had the historians tried to record the placecentered narratives, the Chiricahuas would probably not have been forthcoming, for the withholding of cultural knowledge was one of the few things within their control. It is probable, judging from Western Apache and Navajo oral literature, that the Chiricahuas had an equally profound relationship with their surroundings. To take away not only a person but an entire tribe of people from the places that gave their lives meaning is like burning a library, generations of literature and knowledge. How could a new place, especially a succession of places from which they were repeatedly uprooted, ever provide such wisdom and meaning and identi¤cation? Anthropologist Michael Jackson lived and traveled for three years with the Walpiri people of the Tanami Desert in Central Australia in an effort to get a sense of what constituted the concept of home for them. He became convinced that “a sense of home is grounded less in a place per se than in the activity that goes on in a place.” By this he means that concentrated activity— dancing, ceremonial participation, food gathering, hunting—is “experienced as a quickened relationship between oneself and whatever one works upon” (2000:148). A fusion of the product of that activity and the place in which it is accomplished is felt in bodily praxis. Furthermore, a person carries out these activities in concert with others just as one’s parents and grandparents did. Thus, the place embodies not only the endeavors that are undertaken there but also unites an individual with others who have died and with those who are still alive. A place is then “charged with the energy and vitality of those who live and labor there” (148). People thus experience home with their entire bodies because it resonates with lived experience. This is exactly what Geronimo was referring to when he pleaded with General Miles to let him go home to Arizona in 1898: “The acorns and the pinyon nuts, the quail and the wild turkey, the giant cactus and the palo verdes—they all miss me . . . I miss them, too. I want to go back to them” (Debo 1976:405). Geronimo remembered eating these familiar foods, existing side by side with the vegetation and the animals. He had grown up with this landscape, just as his parents and his grandparents had, and he was never to set foot in this place again. When the Chiricahuas left each of the military installations where they had been imprisoned, the women wailed and sang songs of loss and lamentation. Bystanders wondered why they were crying if they were going to a new place where conditions would be better. However, not only did the Apaches not know that the new place would be preferable to the old, but they were also mourning for their loved ones whom they had to leave behind.

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They were leaving family members buried in that location, and being moved meant leaving them behind. Their sense of loss was rekindled because it was permanent; they were forever losing a place where they had shared lived experience with a child or a husband or a parent whom they would never see again. These places were also embedded with the shared experiences of the Chiricahuas. Yes, they were places where they did not want to remain, but they had passed a signi¤cant portion of their lives there: they lived at Mount Vernon Barracks for seven years and at Fort Sill for nearly twenty years. Together in those places, they had shared hardships, mourned for their loved ones, prepared and eaten food, built houses, and laughed at the antics of small children learning to walk. When they left a place, they grieved for those they had left behind, but they also knew that they would never see that place again, and, thus, they grieved for the place, for the shared activities that had created their collective and individual memories. They were grieving for the home that they had actively created in that place, even though the underlying tone of the memories was a deep sadness because of their exile. Each new goodbye evoked their parting from Arizona, and they were, in a sense, leaving home, the home that they had established in that place, once more. Anglo-Americans had trouble understanding why the Apaches yearned so passionately for Arizona. America was a country of immigrants, and, in the 19th century, the country was more in touch than today with its immigrant roots. First- and second-generation Americans remembered their relatives who had packed up their belongings and moved across an ocean to pursue a better, more prosperous way of life. They may have felt nostalgia for their homeland, but those who had really wanted to remain in “the old country” had done so, while those who chose to make the United States their home had set different priorities. Once people were in this country, they often decided to go west to begin a new life with better prospects. Even though it might have been a dif¤cult and heartbreaking choice, they had still chosen to move on. But the Chiricahuas had not been given a choice. Theirs was a forced move, a permanent exile that was forced upon them. How could the Apaches, who had no permanent houses, be so attached to what was considered by Anglo-Americans to be a wilderness? From the nonIndian perspective, home was a house, a building ¤lled with shared memories, a habitus of walls and boundaries, a habitation constructed by human hands. To see the world in this way is to see life without walls as inconceivable. Possessions and family members must be housed, and a homeless person is looked at with pity. This is why people who live in houses regard those who live without permanent dwellings as the embodiment of primitiveness. The owning or renting of a house constitutes that which is civilized; a nomad who

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considers home to be the open territory, a land without walls, must therefore be an alien being, the complete negation of ourselves and thus, the epitome of the Other. Never mind that this territory is charged with the shared activities and events that have occurred there over the course of generations and that this is what constitutes their sense of home. It becomes inconceivable to most of those who live in houses that another way of looking at the world can exist. This sense of a physical structure constituting home (rather than an open place) is what enables people in the industrialized world to relocate because of economic concerns. After all, one place is as good as another. But this notion of home is relatively recent and is tied to the rise of the bourgeoisie in the 17th century ( Jackson 2000:86). Marx and Freud both used the house as a root metaphor: for Marx (Godelier 1986), the edi¤ce (uberbau) of a social structure depends upon the foundations (grundlage) of economic infrastructures, while Freud (1922) used architectonic metaphors of construction, such as comparing the unconscious to an anteroom that borders a reception room where consciousness resides. This understanding makes the loss of home even more poignant for the Chiricahuas, who were buffeted about by the changing policies of the federal government and con®icting factions that controlled their fate at different times. However, this makes the resilience of the Chiricahua people even more remarkable. Other peoples throughout history have been expelled from their homelands; this has been the fate of groups that were overcome by enemies with superior numbers and technology throughout history. Many individuals, among them Richard Henry Pratt (Lieder and Page 1997:33), were convinced that the Chiricahuas would cease to exist as a people and become completely assimilated into white culture. Others predicted their extermination through disease, but what made the difference between extinction and survival was the determination of the Chiricahua people and the support of non-Indian individuals who were able to affect government policy in their favor. The vast majority of Native Americans have been subject to displacement in the form of involuntary relocation. The conviction that “the land on which they have lived for many generations was given to them as a permanent residence” at the time of Creation leads to a sense of place-deprivation (Casey 1993:308). Casey described the natural response: “anger (at the displacers) combines with incredulity (at being displaced) as well as with intense longing for the place vacated” that leads to a combination of “outrage, unbelief, and nostalgia” (308). Not only were the Chiricahuas being held against their will in a mountainless land far from home, but they were also removed from the boundaries of the land intended for them by Ussen. Being separated from

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their sacred mountains and the places of their homeland meant being cut off from a vital source of spiritual strength. Thus, the imprisonment of the Chiricahuas, a people whose beliefs were based on maintaining orderly and balanced relations with all aspects of the universe, was particularly horrifying because their continued presence in a land where they did not belong violated the natural and moral order of their world. The sense of spiritual dislocation must have been profound and unrelenting, and, no doubt contributed to their six percent per year mortality rates (War Department 1894 in Lieder and Page 1997). The Navajo leader Barboncito made a statement to this effect when his people were dying during their exile at Fort Sumner, New Mexico. “When the Navajos were ¤rst created, four mountains and four rivers were appointed for us, inside of which we should live,” Barboncito told General Sherman. “We were never to move east of the Rio Grande . . . and I think that our coming here has been the cause of so much death among us” (Correll 1979:130–132). Geronimo was haunted by similar thoughts as his people continued to sicken and die. His dearest wish was to be taken back to Arizona where he could live out his last days in his own country. He beseeched President Roosevelt to let his people return to their homeland because there was “no climate or soil . . . equal to that of Arizona” (Barrett 1907:213–216). He and his people longed to return to That land which the Almighty created for the Apaches. It is my land, my home, my father’s land, to which I now ask to be allowed to return. I want to spend my last days there and be buried among those mountains. If this could be I might die in peace, feeling that my people, placed in their native homes would increase in numbers rather than diminish as at present, and that our name would not become extinct. [213–216]

THE LONGING FOR HOME The Chiricahuas never stopped longing for a return to their homeland, but the undiminished hatred of the Chiricahuas by Anglo-Americans who lived in Arizona and New Mexico destroyed any possibility of establishing a reservation for them in southern Arizona. Decades after their removal from the Southwest, delegations from these states ¤rmly opposed their return to an area even as distant as Oklahoma (then known as Indian Territory) from Arizona/New Mexico under the grounds that they would somehow make their way across miles of unknown terrain and return to murder white settlers in southern Arizona and New Mexico. Over time, as various Indian reservations were established in the Southwest, the Chiricahuas became unique, for

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nearly all other Southwestern Indians were granted reservations that encompassed a portion of their homeland. The longing for home never left them. Although exposure to various diseases may have been the direct cause of so many deaths, the despair that comes from acute and unrelenting homesickness was, no doubt, a contributing factor. When General Crook visited the Chiricahuas in Alabama, he said that their mortality was “due to home-sickness, change of climate, and the dreary monotony of their lives” (Debo 1976:347). They had spent the days of train travel fearing for their lives; when Daklugie said that they did not know what was to be done with the band upon their arrival in Pensacola, but all the people of our tribe “anticipated . . . that we would be murdered” (Ball 1988:135), he referred to the group of warriors, but this sense of terror could easily be extended to the separate groups of Chiricahuas who were transported by train to Fort Marion and Fort Pickens as well. The Chiricahua Apaches not only experienced the trauma of political domination but also the effect of displacement from their homeland. These factors affected their physical and psychological well-being and contributed to their high death rate through their sense of acute despair. By the time that the main body of Chiricahuas arrived at Fort Marion on September 20, 1886, 60 cases of malaria and 16 more cases of sickness had occurred (Stockel 1993). Dr. DeWitt Webb, the acting assistant surgeon and medical of¤cer for the Apaches at Fort Marion said 24 Apaches died within the ¤rst three months of their incarceration (80). Of this total, 152 of the 473 Apaches in con¤nement at the end of September 1886 were treated for malarial fever; 59 Apaches suffered from acute diarrhea, and four individuals died from dysentery. This was probably caused from a contaminated water supply because, although a well had been bored in the courtyard of the fort, the casemate used as a toilet was nearby (82). According to military correspondence, Fort Marion was supposed to house only 150 persons, but over 500 Chiricahuas were crowded into this small area. There they lived in packed tents and cooked over open ¤res despite inclement weather. They slept on constantly damp brick and mortar ®oors in the casemates. When a number of Sibley tents arrived from army stores, the Chiricahuas moved from the wet casemates to the exposed area called the terreplein atop the fort (see Figure 17), where sheets of rain and cold winter winds blew unobstructed off the sea. Once the cold weather set in, children began dying from bronchitis; six had died by the end of November, 1886 (Stockel 1993:83). When more and more newspaper articles reported the ongoing decimation of the prisoners through disease, Herbert Walsh, executive director of the

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Indian Rights Association, decided to investigate the conditions ¤rsthand. So incensed by what he saw during his visit in March 1887, he led a public outcry that forced the government to consider making changes. When government of¤cials ¤nally decided to reunite all the Chiricahuas in Alabama, ¤ve of their children remained at Fort Pickens, waiting to be taken to Carlisle School in Pennsylvania. It must have been wrenching for the parents to leave their children, knowing that they might never see them again. Although they did get a ¤nal reunion, when their train came through Mount Vernon on the way to Pennsylvania, only one child would return from this group. Of the ¤ve children, Ira Gosa, Calvin Zhonne, Chappo Geronimo, Eli Hunlona, and Bruce Patterson, only Calvin Zhonne survived the tuberculosis that killed a hundred or more Chiricahua Apache children (Stockel 1993:111–112).

4

Pratt and the Carlisle Boarding School

An intense love of their children is their most striking characteristic. —Angie Debo

MOUNT VERNON BARRACKS, ALABAMA: AUGUST 2004 Driving out of Mobile, Alabama, to Pensacola, I am amazed at how different the interstate highways are in the West from those in the East. All traf¤c coming towards me is obscured by a dense canopy of tall pine trees that shut out all the light and reach the shoulder of the pavement. The two lanes traveling east seem to exist in isolation, a wide winding road that threads its way through impenetrable forests. It would take a machete and considerable effort to enter the dense undergrowth and branches. Even though the opposing lanes of traf¤c are visible when I head to Mount Vernon Barracks later that day on a multilane divided highway instead of the interstate, there is still the sense of the forest waiting to encroach if the vegetation is not kept under control. The woods have begun to reclaim an abandoned motor court: kudzu vines climb over the one-story structure, and one of the wooden walls has caved in on itself. Bushes and shrubs have crept closer to the long building, covering the gravel parking lot. As I drive on, the vegetation opens occasionally to reveal a swamp threaded by a narrow pool of water, its surface dark and opaque. I can only imagine what lives there. One of the Chiricahua prisoners, Eugene Chihuahua, described Mount Vernon Barracks as being on the west of the Mobile River about 25 miles from the Gulf. Mount Vernon initially looked ideal when compared to the mosquito-infested rainy environs of Fort Marion. But they soon learned they were in a worse swamp, with bushes and trees so thick you could barely see the sky without climbing a tree (Ball 1988:138–139). When the federal government released Mount Vernon for public use in 1895, the state of Alabama took over the old military site. The Apaches had just been moved to Fort Sill, Oklahoma, and the government had decided to release the property as a cost-cutting move. After making it habitable for patients, in May, 1902, over 300 African-American patients were moved to the psychiatric treatment facility that now occupies the site where the Chiri-

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cahuas lived for seven years. First called the Mount Vernon Hospital, the facility underwent a name change in 1919 to honor the ¤rst physician there, Dr. George H. Searcy. Set on a rise, Searcy Hospital is framed by tall pines and splashes of brilliant crepe myrtle. A historic plaque stands at the base of the driveway and provides a statement about the hospital’s history. In 1811, the site was used as a rendezvous point for army troops during the Creek Indian Wars; General Andrew Jackson used the cantonment during the War of 1812. In 1824, Congress authorized the construction of arsenal buildings, and the 12 original buildings were erected during the 1830s. Federal troops were stationed there until Confederate forces captured the Arsenal during the Civil War, and, in 1873, the Arsenal’s status was changed to that of Mount Vernon Barracks. The Chiricahua Apaches were imprisoned here from 1887 to 1894. Beyond heavy iron gates are large white frame houses for medical personnel and a parking lot, with a sign that warns, “Lock your car and do not leave your keys in your car!” I climb the wide steps to the administration building, which is bordered on either side by the massive brick wall described by Eugene Chihuahua and seen in photographs as a backdrop for groups of Chiricahua warriors. Approaching the receptionist, I wait for her to ¤nish her phone call. I glance out the rear door of the administration building to see carefully manicured lawns and crepe myrtles with blooms the color of raspberry ice cream. When the Chiricahuas were here, the administration building was two separate buildings that have since been joined into a single structure. Today, only patients and visiting family members are allowed to wander the areas that were once the drill and parade grounds and buildings that lie beyond the horseshoe shaped wall. Eugene Chihuahua described conditions here for historian Eve Ball (1988: 152–153), saying the buildings were on a ridge, but the ridge was in a swamp, with more rain and mosquitoes than they had seen at Fort Marion. In fact, the only thing better about Mount Vernon Barracks was that it was bigger. Married couples could live together, but their houses were dilapidated shacks with dirt ®oors. The unmarried men all lived together in a similar shack. The insects were so bad that babies died from the bites. But the worst part was probably the unremitting rain and humidity—totally unlike their Arizona homes. The men cut trees and built homes that were more sturdy and with good roofs, but the mosquitoes were unrelenting even with thin cloths tacked over the windows and doors. Eventually malaria took its toll on the camp. After the receptionist directs me to the police of¤ce, the digni¤ed African American of¤cer in charge offers me a seat, and we begin to talk. In the South, just as among the Chiricahuas, it is proper to visit and spend time in

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conversation before getting down to business. When I leave two hours later, I still feel that I am leaving too abruptly. I tell him who I am, mentioning that I am part Catawba Indian from South Carolina. He is part Choctaw as well as West Indian, a heritage that is evident in his chiseled nose and high cheekbones. A young white policeman joins us, and we begin to discuss the kinds of industry that exist in the area. “We got sheet metal and an abundant supply of water around here so we have a steam plant,” the second of¤cer says. “And barges can get up and down the Mobile River, which is close by. There’s a DuPont Paint plant and several chemical plants.” “Are the chemical plants because of the swamps?” I ask, adding that I saw a swamp gas sign outside one facility that I passed. This turns the conversation toward the mysterious lights that people say they see hovering above swamps and marshy areas. We begin to talk about alligators and other creatures that dwell in swamps, a topic that leads to graveyards and the spirits of the dead. The second of¤cer says, “There’s so much history here, all you have to do is scratch the surface of the ground and you ¤nd arrowheads. Some areas, you come across bones, Indian burials.” The other of¤cer adds, “They say the Apaches were secretive. They buried their dead in concealed graves. People say those graves are out there along the creek banks, but I’m sure not going to mess with them.” I can imagine how the Chiricahuas felt after having little control over the burial of their dead in Florida; no wonder they were secretive about burying their loved ones during their time in Alabama. And there were so many to bury, for a huge number of them died here from tuberculosis. Thinking about the drive back to Mobile, I start to take my leave and thank them both for their time. The ¤rst of¤cer reminds me of something he had told me earlier, “You want to be sure to see the old train station— they moved it down the road some from the tracks and now it’s the senior center—that’s where Geronimo used to meet the trains and talk to the people who came through. He sure loved that. Naturally, everyone who met him got a real thrill. Yes, old Geronimo and the other Apaches, they’d sell bows and arrows, beaded buggy whips, moccasins, and other trinkets to the passengers.” Later, I drive across the highway, over the railroad tracks (Figure 22) to the old wooden frame railroad station (Figure 23). Construction techniques have not changed dramatically in the last century: only the boat in the front yard ties the house across the road to this century (Figure 24). It is easy to imagine Geronimo at the train station greeting passengers. A gregarious and enterprising character, Geronimo enjoyed his celebrity but,

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Figure 22: Railroad tracks going north from Mount Vernon, Alabama. This is the route taken by trains carrying Chiricahua Apache children to Carlisle Indian Industrial School, Pennsylvania. Photo by author.

worried about his reputation, repeatedly asked army of¤cers not to let anyone think badly of him. One of the passengers who arrived on the train at Mount Vernon Barracks wrote this about him: Geronimo has an eye to thrift and can drive a sharp bargain with his bows and arrows, and quivers and canes, and other work, in which he is skillful. He prides himself upon his autograph, written thus, G E R O N I M O, which he af¤xes to what he sells, usually asking an extra price for it. [Debo 1976:353]

Clearly the most notorious of all the Chiricahuas, Geronimo probably has the most recognizable name of all American Indians. Toward the end of his life, he made many public appearances, from the Trans-Mississippi and International Exposition, held at Omaha in September and October of 1898, to Theodore Roosevelt’s inaugural parade in Washington in 1905. He had to get approval from the War Department, which made a distinction between

Figure 23: Train station (now Senior Citizen Building), Mount Vernon, Alabama. Photo by author.

Figure 24: Present-day house across from train station, Mount Vernon, Alabama. In many ways little has changed in this small town since the Chiricahuas were imprisoned here. Photo by author.

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purely commercial exhibitions and of¤cial celebrations, to participate in these events because so many promoters wanted Geronimo, whose very name attracted crowds. In 1904, he participated in the Louisiana Purchase Exposition at Saint Louis, where he renewed contacts with old reservation friends in the “Apache village,” one of the many clusters of typical native dwellings near the Indian building (Debo 1976:410–412). At every one of the places I visit where the Chiricahuas were interned, there are more books and pictures of Geronimo than anyone else or about any other subject related to the Chiricahuas. There were even portraits and stacks of books about Geronimo at the gift shop at Fort Marion in St. Augustine, a town in which Geronimo never even set foot. Adding insult to injury, the noncombatant Chiricahuas who were incarcerated at Fort Marion were stigmatized by being known as the “Geronimo Apaches” (Turcheneske 1997:3). Even the Indian rights activists, the very people who were struggling to see that the conditions of their imprisonment were improved, referred to them by this term. This undeserved appellation only furthered the myth that Arizonans wanted the nation to believe: that the noncombatant Chiricahuas aided Geronimo. This group was especially offended when Geronimo and the other warriors left Fort Pickens to join them at Mount Vernon Barracks. “What do we want to bring him among us for? He’s a warrior man,” they argued. “We never did kill nobody, never caused trouble to anyone. He’s going to give us a bad name” (3). Sam Kenoi told historian Eve Ball (Debo 1976:335) that during a council meeting some members of the group objected to the return of the warriors to their group, which was then at Mount Vernon Barracks, because they held Geronimo responsible for their plight. This was probably why none of the Chiricahuas at Mount Vernon came to the train station to meet Geronimo, Naiche, and the other warriors and their families when they arrived. Instead, military personnel led them up the hill to Mount Vernon Barracks. Outside the gate, they sat on their baggage awaiting orders and looked down on the village where the Chiricahuas lived. Geronimo then walked over to look at the encampment only to see no one. Finally, his daughter Dohn-say came out of a distant building and walked toward him with slow steps and bowed head. Following Apache tradition, Geronimo appeared not to notice her approaching. But once she got closer, her feelings overcame her and she ran to him, throwing her arms around his neck, and burst into wild weeping (Debo 1976:334–335). Interestingly, this ¤erce image persisted even after they left Alabama for Oklahoma. Years of peaceful behavior, cattle ranching, and farming could not erase the stigma of Geronimo’s reputation, and it was only after his death that the Chiricahuas were allowed to return to the Southwest. To suggest that they join other Apaches in New Mexico while Geronimo was still alive would

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have been “politically ruinous to those politicians who had the audacity to even suggest such a project” (Turcheneske 1997:100). DEATH AND DISEASE AT MOUNT VERNON Hopes that conditions at Mount Vernon Barracks in Alabama would be an improvement over those at Fort Marion were soon destroyed. Dr. Walter Reed, destined for future fame, arrived at Mount Vernon Barracks August 15, 1887, to be the post surgeon. Despite his initially optimist reports, the prisoners continued to die and the improvement that he had predicted never came. By the end of 1889, he admitted that his hopes that the Chiricahuas “were at last shaking off the disease which has been such a scourge to them had been premature and not well founded” (Debo 1976:342–343). During the four months preceding the middle of November, Reed reported that three “strong young women when my former report was made, and a girl of 13 had died of pulmonary consumption” and that six men and women were ill with the same disease “and within 90 days not one of these will be alive” (343). Having worked at Fort Apache in Arizona, he had considerable experience with the Apaches so he was able to say with conviction in his of¤cial report that the mortality rate was “simply appalling; this too amongst a people who, in Arizona, were remarkably exempt from lung troubles” (343). By the end of 1887, only 396 Chiricahuas were still alive, and of the some hundred students at Carlisle, six had already died and many of the others were sick with tuberculosis (Stockel 1993:149). Of the 70 men at Mount Vernon, less than half were considered to be well enough to work; once the warriors and their families at Fort Pickens arrived, the number of healthy men increased to 47 (149). By the time that they left Mount Vernon for Fort Sill, nearly half of the original group had died (199). Dr. Reed said that the Apaches were feeling considerable “anxiety and alarm” because of the number of fatalities as well as “mental depression” because they were convinced “that the Government does not propose, in the near future, to improve their condition” (Debo 1976:343). Their hopes rose every time a military of¤cer whom they trusted, such as General Howard or Captain Bourke, came to see them, and they told him of their desires for removal to a healthier place. Resigned by now to never returning to their homeland, they asked for good land where a river ®owed, where it snowed, where there was pasturage and timber. Along with enough cattle to begin a ranching enterprise, they could become self-supporting. But the same pattern always followed: a conference during which they expressed their hopes, followed by months without any results as their hopes gradually subsided, and

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Figure 25: Dense foliage, typical of Mount Vernon, Alabama, landscape. Photo by author.

then a sense of even greater depression as they accepted that their conditions would not change. Even though Mount Vernon, some 30 miles north of Mobile, was hardly all swampland, the climate was considerably more humid and oppressive than the Florida seacoast. The hollow where they lived during the beginning of their seven-year stay had little air circulation. Although the 2,162 acres at Mount Vernon was an improvement over their cramped quarters at Fort Marion, the swampland and dense lowland forests and sandy soil were not suited to agriculture (Figure 25). In 1889, General Oliver O. Howard, who was now commander of the Headquarters Division of the Atlantic, ordered a detailed report on their conditions. His concern for the Chiricahuas had not diminished since he had helped establish the Chiricahua Reservation with Cochise and Thomas Jeffords. First Lieutenant Guy Howard, General Howard’s son and aide-decamp, stated in his report submitted December 23, 1889 (Ball 1988:157–158), that about one quarter of all the Indians brought east were dead within threeand-a-half years, most from consumption [tuberculosis], which was rapid and always fatal. Lieutenant Howard attributed the Chiricahuas’ high death rate to a number of factors. He blamed the degrading nature of their continued prisonerof-war status and said that sickness and depression were inevitable when one

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considered the unnatural moist climate, the forced removal of their children to boarding school, and the many promises that had been made and not kept to ¤nd them a permanent home. When Major General Crook came to Mount Vernon, he found the prisoners depressed and demoralized. In his report, Crook stated that “home-sickness, change of climate, and the dreary monotony of empty lives,” as well as the unhealthy climate, were responsible for the alarming death rate (Stockel 1993:159). He recommended that land be found for them where they could have their own farms and work for themselves. Based on these reports, Secretary of War Red¤eld Proctor recommended to President Harrison that the Chiricahuas be transferred to Fort Sill in Indian Territory. Unfortunately, when the president presented these recommendations to Congress in January 1890, the move to open up Indian Country to white settlement had already begun in Congress. Strong opposition remained against removal of the Chiricahuas to any location contiguous to New Mexico Territory as well. The Chiricahuas had to wait another three years before they would be allowed to leave Alabama. TAKING CHIRICAHUA CHILDREN One of the most tragic aspects of life at Mount Vernon Barracks was the separation of children from their families and the subsequent death of so many of them. The same train station where Geronimo entertained tourists was also the site of many tearful farewells between Chiricahua parents and their children. Fears that they might never again see each other proved to be justi¤ed as children died from contagious diseases to which they had never developed immunity. Some children were so ill when they were put on the train to return to Alabama, they died before they reached their parents. Earlier, once they had settled into life at Fort Marion in St. Augustine, their biggest fear was the separation of their families. The arrival of Captain Richard Henry Pratt at Fort Marion soon proved that these fears were indeed justi¤ed. In December 1886 Pratt selected 44 students from 12-to-22 years of age, and the following April, he took another 62 children. Chiricahua parents protested to the post commander that government of¤cials had promised that their children would not be taken from them (Lieder and Page 1997:34), but their claims were disregarded in what was considered to be the best interest of the children. In response to the pleas of one family to keep their children, soldiers forced the parents to choose which child they would keep and which they would send away (34). Some mothers tried to hide their smaller children under their skirts, while some older men claimed some of the girls as their wives because married women were not forced to go.

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The families were correct in assuming that their children’s fate at Carlisle was yet another terrifying situation. The children’s separation from their parents had been preceded by the terror of the long train trip from Arizona to Florida. They had seen the adults and leaders of their bands overcome by fear and the uncertainty of possible death when all of them were forcibly taken from their homeland and herded into train cars for the lengthy journey across the continent. Everything in their lives had been turned upside down. Then, in this ¤nal step, the children were taken from their parents and forced to travel to a distant boarding school where they had no idea of what was expected of them. Furthermore, if they wanted to communicate with their parents, they had to do so in an unfamiliar language that had to be translated by their teachers into written words and then retranslated back into spoken Apache once their letter arrived in Florida. With the dif¤culty of translation of many Apache concepts and words, communication of any depth between parents and children was virtually impossible. Chiricahua children had been relatively healthy until this point. Compared to other American Indian groups, the Chiricahua Apaches were able to avoid much of the contagion experienced by other groups because of their limited contact with Europeans. Although diseases such as measles and smallpox affected them when contact occurred, their dispersed population had helped them manage to escape the devastating death rates experienced by sedentary groups such as the Pueblos. The Apaches, in effect, ran away from the diseases by changing location. Spanish of¤cials expected an epidemic every 18 to 20 years, and Apaches ®ed in terror when, in 1780, 1797, 1799, and 1800, smallpox swept through the Mexican states of Chihuahua and Sonora (Hrdlicka 1908:231). But once they became a captured people, contagious diseases, to which they had never acquired total or even partial immunity through prior exposure, swept through their population and threatened to annihilate them as a people. Before Europeans arrived, rickets, tuberculosis, typhus, cholera, smallpox, plague, and leprosy were unknown among American Indians in the Southwest (Hrdlicka 1908). European contact, however, changed this as pandemic after pandemic swept through Indian populations. Boarding schools were ideal places for the spread of disease, and students were particularly susceptible to tuberculosis. THE CARLISLE INDIAN INDUSTRIAL SCHOOL Antonio Gramsci (1971) argued that educational and religious institutions are essential to the control exercised by governmental structures. Cultural hegemony—the domination of subordinates through the internalization of a

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strati¤ed social order—augments the force that is used to control the state’s governmental structures. State institutions produce and reproduce ideological consensus within the citizenry through the use of the ideological process that Gramsci conceptualized as hegemony. Nation-making, as discussed in Chapter 2, depends, in large part, on state-produced ideology. Gramsci identi¤ed the state not only as the governing institutions of a nation, but also as the ways in which these institutions articulate with “civil” society, which include educational and religious institutions. In his application of Gramsci’s key concepts to the analysis of racism and postcolonial societies, Stuart Hall identi¤ed the vital role that “schooling, cultural organizations . . . communal or organizational forms, ethnically speci¤c institutions” play in “giving, sustaining and reproducing different societies in racially structured form” (Hall 1986:26). Hall emphasized the vital importance that Gramsci placed on these institutions and that they must “cease to be relegated to a super¤cial place in the analysis” (26). Richard Henry Pratt’s Carlisle Indian Industrial School provided just such a crucial context for the accomplishment of powerful ideological work, work that was designed to result in cultural hegemony. The assumption underlying Carlisle was essentially that of indoctrination: by taking children, who were considered to be less entrenched in their cultural beliefs and practices than adults, Pratt sought to have them internalize white domination as the natural order of society. Through the activities and regimented behavior forced upon them, the children would come to see how barbaric their previous lives had been once they abandoned them in favor of more civilized practices. In keeping with the ideology that American Indians were inferior people living in an unenlightened state of ignorance and barbarism, the only hope lay in separating the children from their families and customs and in educating them to act like other Americans. Reformers presented persuasive public relations campaigns for the removal of Native American children from their parents, who were considered to be so embedded in their traditional ways of life that they were already beyond any possibility of embracing new ways of life. The children were to be taken to distant boarding schools where they would be physically and socially transformed through rigid adherence to forced schooling and a regimented lifestyle. Through such a regime, AngloAmerican values could be instilled into the children as they learned the manual skills necessary to become self-suf¤cient in the white world. The idea of educating indigenous children was not new: recognizing education as a key agent of acculturation, the Spanish monarchy had created colleges in central Mexico for indigenous peoples in the sixteenth century (Szasz and Ryan 1988:284). Sir Edwin Sandys, president of the Virginia Company, made the ¤rst attempt in the English colonies to provide formal school-

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ing for American Indians when he ordered that proceeds from the sale of land be used to erect an Indian college near present-day Richmond (285). Missionaries played a major role in training Native Americans in the values and material culture of whites during the colonial period. During the decades immediately following the establishment of the United States, of¤cials directed little attention to Native American education, but they did see that federal funds for their practical training became available through treaty provisions, executive orders, and trade and intercourse laws. The schools that resulted from this funding included on- and off-reservation boarding schools, academies, manual labor schools, and day schools, often run by missionaries. Some southeastern tribes established their own schools before their forced removal to the west. The Civil War temporarily ended attempts at Indian education, but after the war, Bureau of Indian Affairs of¤cials, philanthropists, missionaries, army of¤cers, and Indian tribes began to restore and expand a system of education for indigenous children. Established in 1879 in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, by Richard Henry Pratt, Carlisle Indian Industrial School was probably the most famous off-reservation boarding school. Pratt argued that removal from the child’s tribal environment increased the ef¤cacy of education into Anglo-American values, appropriate behavior, and useful skills for a self-suf¤cient future. In addition to instruction in academic subjects as well as various trades and vocations, students were expected to work part time to help defray the administrative costs of their education. Such experience also was meant to aid their assimilation by immersing them in white culture outside the schoolroom. Pratt, a veteran of the Civil War and an of¤cer who had seen duty on the Southern Plains since 1867, began his foray into Indian education by instructing 72 Cheyenne, Kiowa, Comanche, and Arapaho men when they were imprisoned at Fort Marion in St. Augustine, Florida. Accused of committing crimes against soldiers and white settlers, these men arrived in the spring of 1875 and were interred in the 17th-century Spanish stone fort for the next three years. Seventeen of the men were considered ready for transfer to the Normal and Agricultural Institute in Hampton, Virginia, a school for African American students. Their success at Hampton led Pratt to persuade the federal government to let him transform the army cavalry barracks at Carlisle into an Indian school (Brunhouse 1939). The ¤rst students included several of the Plains Indians from Fort Marion and about 150 others, who were predominantly Lakota. Pratt, a believer in penal reform, was convinced that the best means of assimilation was education; he oversaw classes in reading, writing, religious instruction, and manual labor (Berlo 1996:14). He also encouraged Indian

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men to make small drawing books that they sold to tourists for two dollars each, in part as a means of validating his ambitious project in penal reform to the American public. When the Chiricahuas arrived at Fort Marion and Fort Pickens, their numbers included nearly 170 children. The secretary of the Board of Indian Commissioners, E. Whittlesey, suggested to Secretary of the Interior L. Q. C. Lamar that some of the children could be sent to the Institute in Hampton, Virginia (Stockel 1993:113). Having heard about the Chiricahua children, Captain Pratt contacted Adjutant General R. C. Drum on May 29, 1886 (114). B. Upshaw, acting commissioner of the Of¤ce of Indian Affairs, wrote to military authorities in St. Augustine on July 22, 1886, asking about the ages of the children, the condition of the fort, the cost of engaging a teacher in St. Augustine, and the opinion of the of¤cials of the best means of providing for the children’s education (Stockel 1993:114). Religious sisters from the Congregation of the Sisters of St. Joseph were already spending an hour and a half each morning with the children. They took the children away from the crowded, noisy terreplein where their tents were pitched, down the stairs into the courtyard and casemates, where they taught lessons. Nevertheless, Lamar wrote letters to a number of institutions, inquiring how many children they could accommodate and properly train; this included Carlisle, Hampton, the Juanita Collegiate Institute and Indian Training School in Martinsburg, Pennsylvania, and the Lincoln Institute’s Indian Department in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (114–115). During October 1886 individuals at various educational institutions sent telegrams and letters in an effort to make educational arrangements for the Chiricahua children. Finally, on October 23, 1886, the older children were taken to Carlisle while some of the youngest continued to be schooled by the sisters of the Convent of St. Joseph. At ¤rst Mother Alypius and Sister Jane Francis taught the children in one of the dark, dank casemates there at Fort Marion. Observing their children learning reading, writing, drawing, and singing, the Apache men became so interested that they also began drawing and singing religious and patriotic songs. The Apache men and women became quite fond of Mother Alypius, a young French nun and participated in the lessons (Stockel 1993:117–118). When the Chiricahua children were allowed to walk to the convent under the supervision of the younger nuns, they skipped and delighted in their sense of freedom after having been cooped up at the fort. The nuns watched over them as they played in the ocean before their lessons. “I will never forget the kindness of those good women, nor the respect in which we held them,”

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remembered James Kaywaykla (Stockel 1993:117–118) and “that not all White Eyes were cruel and ruthless, but that there were some among them who were gentle and kind.” Unfortunately this was not always the experience of the children who were separated from their families to attend Carlisle, which was located about 20 miles southwest of Harrisburg, capital of Pennsylvania. Once a military frontier post, Carlisle played a role in the Revolutionary War and was later shelled in the Battle of Gettysburg and its buildings burned. In 1865, the buildings were rebuilt but the post was abandoned in the early 1870s. After being donated to the Interior Department as an educational institution for American Indians, Carlisle received its ¤rst students in October and November of 1879. Pratt boasted that his school had almost 50 separate buildings on 26 acres with 311 acres of farmland. In addition to academic classrooms and a library, the school had an auditorium, a gymnasium, an athletic ¤eld, an art studio, boys’ and girls’ trade shops, dormitories for students, housing for faculty, a printing plant, a hospital, and various support buildings (Stockel 1993:118). Teachers conducted classes in language, arithmetic, geography, morals and manners, reading, writing, and spelling. Boys learned how to raise cows, hogs, chickens and to farm; they could also study such technical skills as bricklaying, blacksmithing, bakery, carpentry, carriage upholstering and harnessmaking, mechanical drawing, photography, painting, plumbing, printing, tailoring, tinsmithing, wheelwrighting, and shoemaking. Girls specialized in household arts, which featured cooking, housekeeping, sewing, laundering, and nursing. Students also learned music, and American Indian arts such as weaving, beadwork, and silversmithing. The most innovative aspect of a Carlisle education came from the “outing system,” which placed boys and girls for a year in a nearby household, often a Pennsylvania Dutch family. The outing concept dates back to the colonial period, when ministers in New England and Virginia took Indian children into their homes to educate them. However, Pratt was the ¤rst to institutionalize such a program as part of an educational program and to see that an outing agent from Carlisle visited frequently and wrote reports on the progress of the student. Female children worked as domestics while boys labored in the ¤elds as farmhands (cf. Standing Bear 1928:123–190.) The children were paid between one and ¤fteen dollars a month, depending upon the kind of work and the level of skill that they applied to their work; this money was deposited in an individual bank account for the student. Many families did become very fond of the students and stayed in touch with them long after they had left; some Apache children even took the ¤rst or last names of the families as their own to show gratitude. Pratt’s intention was “to promote the assimilationist goals of the federal

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government by placing Indian children in intimate contact with “ ‘civilized’ American society” (Trennert 1983:267). He summed up his philosophy in a letter to Senator Henry Dawes: “The end to be gained is the complete civilization of the Indian . . . the sooner all tribal relations are broken up . . . even his language . . . the better it will be” (Pratt 1964:266). Pratt made no efforts to disguise his desire to eradicate American Indian cultures when he told entering students to forget their tribal connections and earlier experiences and to transform themselves into individualized Americans. The Carlisle experience thus created a complete break from their former lives: once they entered this institution, their Indian identities were stripped away and their cultural attitudes and values were expected to become those of a white person. Forced to relinquish their languages and their clothing when they arrived, of¤cials cut the boys’ hair and pinned the girls’ hair neatly onto their heads in a re®ection of white styles. Boys were forced to put on trousers and military uniforms. Girls had to wear long modest dresses with petticoats and undergarments that cinched in their waists. Highly skilled at public relations, Pratt promoted his program through pamphlets that featured the students’ “before” and “after” photographs; the children’s dramatic change in appearance, supported by written descriptions and his ambitious lecture series, convinced the public that the children could be civilized. It was not surprising that many, if not all, of the Chiricahua children were terri¤ed at being taken from their parents and sent to Carlisle. Daklugie had this to say about his arrival at Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and Carlisle: “There, desperate to the extent that we did not care whether we lived or died, we were thrust into a vicious and hostile world that we both hated and feared” (Ball 1988:141). The world that they entered was even more of a total institution than the prison camps where their parents and extended families were living. At Mount Vernon Barracks and, even at Fort Marion, where they had lived in tents, the Chiricahuas were allowed to keep their own clothing and their hair. Surrounded by their families, they practiced their ceremonies in some form and spoke the Apache language. While it was not the American Southwest, they had each other for comfort and there was some semblance of normality in being in multigenerational family groupings. But Carlisle was a total institution of the type that Erving Goffman characterized as “institutions purportedly established the better to pursue some worklike task and justifying themselves only on these instrumental grounds” (1961:5). This category of total institution includes not only boarding schools but also army barracks, ships, work camps, colonial compounds, and “large mansions from the point of view of those who live in the servants’ quarters” (5). The central feature of total institutions is a breakdown of the barriers that

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usually separate the activities of sleep, play, and work, so that all these aspects of life happen under the same single authority and in the same place (5). Privacy is minimal and, in some cases, nonexistent, for these activities occur in the company of a large group of others, all of whom are treated alike. The day’s activities are closely regimented and scheduled with the sequence of activities determined by the authorities that oversee the institution. Finally, there is a single rational plan designed to ful¤ll the goals of the institution, and the enforced activities are intended to further this plan. The Chiricahuas who remained behind at Fort Marion and at the Mount Vernon Barracks were allowed to retain much more of their home world than the children who were sent to Carlisle. Goffman (1961:12–13) uses the term “presenting culture” to describe the culture that, in this case, the Chiricahua children brought with them. This culture had given them their conception of self and their means of coping with con®icts as well as their responses to all other experiences; these beliefs and practices taught them all that they knew about how to respond to other people in the world. Carlisle students were expected to relinquish essentially all that they knew about dealing with the world and to replace it with a new culture and a new language that were intended to facilitate their acceptance into the white world. As he or she said good-bye to parents, extended families, and friends, the child lost all previous forms of social support; the child was now at the mercy of the Carlisle staff. This separation from what was the child’s wider world included not only great physical distance which the child had probably etched in his or her mind with each mile of the train or boat journey, but also the distance that comes of knowing that he or she could not be rescued by a parent or other family member because of their powerlessness. The decision was not in the hands of their families, who were now a subaltern people interned by the same organization that had taken the child. From the very beginning, the children could not escape the sense of constraint and judgment placed upon them. Their dress, deportment, and manners were subject to constant scrutiny in the effort to civilize them. Recent concepts in medical anthropology related to the body in context add another dimension to understanding the experience the Chiricahua children were forced to undergo. Margaret Lock and Nancy Scheper-Hughes draw attention to the mechanisms through which “a dominant cultural ideology” in®icts “a negative self-image, distress, and often ill health on the disenfranchised” (1996:44), a description that calls attention to the experience of the Carlisle students. What did they experience with regard to what Lock and Scheper-Hughes call the “three bodies” (45)? These three bodies refer to: ¤rst, the individual body, or the sense of the embodied self as it exists apart from

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other individual bodies; second, the social body which refers to the body as a symbol of societal values and imperatives; and, ¤nally, the body politic, or the ways in which the polity controls and regulates bodies in its society. Students were probably ¤rst aware of the life-changing experiences they were about to undergo at the level of the individual body, which refers to the phenomenological sense of the lived experience of the body-self. Upon arrival at Carlisle, the child’s physical self was systematically, if perhaps unintentionally, morti¤ed as all previous bases of self-identi¤cation were ignored and, indeed, destroyed. Admission procedures included undressing, bathing, disinfecting, haircutting, and issuing institutional clothing. Unfortunately, no narratives exist from female Chiricahuas about their experiences at Carlisle, so we do not know, in their own words, how they felt about the changes they were forced to undergo in terms of clothing. Daklugie did speak for the men in their reaction to being forced to wear trousers: “Nobody knows how all Indian men hated those pants. The track team [of which Daklugie was a member] wore trunks and we felt like Indians” (Ball 1988:146). How Chiricahuas felt about wearing trousers is evident also from the following anecdote told by Eugene Chihuahua about an experience his father had had. When the Chiricahuas went to Florida, an of¤cer approached Eugene’s father, Chihuahua. After questioning him, the of¤cer told him that because of his courage, he wished he could let him return to his own country; since he could not do that, he could ensure that he no longer be forced to work. So that others would know that he would not have to take on women’s tasks, like bringing wood or carrying water, the of¤cer gave him the uniform of a captain in the cavalry since Chihuahua had once been in the cavalry. When the of¤cer insisted that Chihuahua wear the entire uniform, including the trousers, Chihuahua decided to make the pants more acceptable. Eugene Chihuahua explained: “It was degrading for a Chiricahua to wear the pants, and my father hated them; but he cut out the seat and wore his breechclout over them, so that down the side the stripe showed” (Ball 1988:129). Students at Carlisle, however, had much stricter rules about clothing and were not allowed to personally alter any article of dress. Perhaps most dehumanizing was the previously mentioned assignment of arbitrarily selected names that were alphabetically determined. As Goffman (1961:18) remarked, one of the greatest curtailments of the self is the loss of one’s name, and this was just what the Chiricahua children were forced to endure. After their hair was cut and the boys were forced to wear uniforms with trousers and jackets and the girls to wear identical long, form-¤tting dresses, the children were lined up in rows of 26, according to height (Stockel

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1993:122). A name that started with A was given to the tallest, which was how Asa Daklugie received his ¤rst name which he hated for the rest of his life. The shortest child was given a name beginning with Z. To put on a uniform is to relinquish one’s right to act as an individual and to have the self be subsumed under the institution that he or she is representing. Some sense of service is embodied by the wearing of a uniform, with an embedded notion of hierarchy. Although the children were not in the military, the sense of regimentation, including the wearing of a formal uniform, became part of their everyday lives. Goffman calls this kind of stripping of one’s usual appearance “a personal defacement” (1961:20), for the person loses “face,” which entails the factors that make up all sense of personal dignity and place in society. Furthermore, the child was forced to take on a “disidentifying role” which Goffman de¤nes as “a daily round of life that he considers alien to him” (23). Forced to ¤ll their days with structured activities so different from those in their previous lives, Chiricahua children were indeed forced to assume disidentifying roles. The gap between Chiricahua culture and white culture was especially evident in beliefs about the hair. In drawing attention to the social body, how the body is used to think about nature, society, and culture, hair has been a natural symbol. Although beliefs vary widely among cultures about the hair, all cultures consider hair to be an expression of and an extension of the physical body (Douglas 1970). For this reason, hair has become the object of much anthropological interest. In response to an argument that the cutting of hair symbolizes castration (Berg 1951), Edmund Leach responded with his celebrated essay, “Magical Hair” (1958). Leach asserts that the cutting of hair represents a kind of symbolic separation that publicly moves individuals from one social status to another. Broadening the meaning of hair symbolism, C. R. Hallpike (1979) argues that the cutting of hair symbolizes social control: long, loose hair represents being outside society while the cutting of hair is associated with living under a particular disciplinary regime within society. Indeed, for the Chiricahua children, the cutting of the boys’ hair and the restraining of the girls’ hair was an essential disciplinary step for Pratt and the institution he represented in the “taming” of American Indian children. For the Apaches, the chopping off of their hair was devastating. The contrast between the feeling of the long, loose, unrestrained hair that they had had throughout their lives and their suddenly shorn or bound locks was even more extreme than for other Indian groups that traditionally bound their hair. While Plains Indian men wrapped their hair into braids, Apache men wore their hair long and free; at the most, they used a cloth headband to keep it out of their eyes. Navajo women wore their hair in a bun wrapped with yarn, while Hopi women wore their hair in squash blossom whorls at the sides

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of their heads until they married and braids after they married. Apache women, however, tended to wear their hair loose. Thus, long, unrestrained hair was very much an identifying feature of Apache dress and personhood. Hair was so important to the Chiricahuas that they gave ceremonies for children to ensure a good and permanent growth of it. Short hair in Chiricahua culture indicated that a person was in mourning for a loved one. Hair was cut to about ear length with the death of a parent, a brother or a sister, or a husband or wife (Opler 1996:475). Daklugie was proud of his “long and heavy” hair: “Hanging loose it fell to my knees. I kept it braided and thrust under my belt” (Ball 1988:118). When he got to Carlisle, however, they chopped it off. However, in 19th-century Anglo-European culture, only savages wore their hair loose and long. Cutting the boys’ hair and binding the girls’ hair in a severe style was an essential part of the civilizing process. But even more importantly, cutting the hair symbolically demonstrated subjugation. Haircutting at Carlisle also provides an example of what Lock and ScheperHughes (1996) call the body politic because, along with the constriction of their bodies into tight clothing, haircutting was a means of disciplining individual bodies. Michel Foucault (1973, 1975, 1979, 1980) explores how complex, industrialized societies regulate and control individual and social bodies. Carlisle protocol called for haircutting as a sanitary practice and a civilizing practice, but implicitly, it was designed to strip away from the individual all physical remnants of his or her autonomous past. The new student also was photographed, weighed, questioned for a life history, and assigned to quarters. Being asked intrusive questions that no one would ever demand of another Apache must have seemed like one more invasion of the self. No doubt they worried over what would happen to their discarded clothing and the hair that was chopped off, for such things could be collected and used by those practicing witchcraft; more than one child must have wondered when his or her companions began to die if witches had played a role in these deaths. The classic photograph of Chiricahua children (Figure 26) shows them upon their arrival at Carlisle Indian school from Fort Marion, November 4, 1886. Dressed in their own clothing before their hair was cut or fastened back, they appear as individuals with their own expressions and identities. However, in the companion photograph (Figure 27) that depicts them after four months at Carlisle they appear subdued and passive; one girl even leans upon the shoulder of another as though for support. Some of the boys have their hands inside their military coats in a formal pose. Control over the students’ docile bodies seems complete. The federal government, through the arm of Carlisle Indian school, disci-

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Figure 26: Chiricahua Apache children at Fort Marion, Florida before being sent to Carlisle Indian Industrial School, Pennsylvania, 1886. Courtesy, National Park Service.

Figure 27: Chiricahua Apache children after being inducted into Carlisle Indian Industrial School, Pennsylvania, 1886–87. Courtesy, National Park Service.

plined the individual bodies of the Chiricahua children. The transformation of their appearances as well as their demeanors showed the power that the government held over these children, and, by extension, over the Chiricahuas and other Native Americans. Put another way, the extended struggle for domination over American Indians was played out through the bodies of the students at Carlisle and at other Indian boarding schools.

5

The Art of American Indian Prisoners of War

In mimicking the format of photography, Wohaw . . . entered a realm of authority that he and his cohorts usually played the object to. . . . The tree and the warrior are rendered as a trace of what could not be contained or circumscribed by the dominant and expanding culture of the white West. —Anna Blume

FORT SILL, OKLAHOMA, AUGUST 2004 Still an active military base, Fort Sill is an amazing combination of historic buildings and modern technology. As the only still active army installation of all the forts on the South Plains built during the Indian wars, Fort Sill is a National Historic Landmark. At the same time, all ¤eld artillery soldiers and Marines receive their training here, as well as many international students from allied nations. Set among the wide expanses of Oklahoma plains, Fort Sill has several gates through which military personnel and the public may enter. Security has increased since the attacks on the Twin Towers of September 2001 because Fort Sill, as the center for the development and implementation of ¤eld artillery training for the army, would be a prime target for terrorists. After arriving late the previous night, I awaken to the wider skies and gently rolling hills of Wichita Falls, Texas. From there it is just an hour drive north on Interstate 44 to Fort Sill. A soldier I met on the plane apologized for the monotony of the drive, “It’s not very interesting country,” he said, “but you can do 70 miles an hour and then 75 once you get on the turnpike.” Despite the relative ®atness of the land, the openness of the country is a relief to the eyes and soul after the dense thickets and oppressive vegetation of Alabama (Figure 28). And it is closer to the wide open spaces of the West. I can even see distant mountains! Later, I see deer grazing in meadows—does as well as huge bucks with racks of antlers. Eugene Chihuahua spoke for many of his people when he described his ¤rst impression of Fort Sill: Captain Scott had not lied to us. We could see the mountains. They weren’t tall like ours but they were mountains. There were trees, and we didn’t have to climb one to see the sun. There was water in the creek—clear sparkling moun-

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Figure 28: Oklahoma horizon at sunset, near Fort Sill. Photo by author. tain water. There were mesquite beans, and we began gathering and shelling them. We hadn’t seen one since we were taken to Florida. We gathered several hundred bags of them. And there were deer—not so many as at Turkey Creek, but a good many. You’ll laugh at this, but I don’t mind. The best of all was to hear the coyotes sing, and the cry of the quail, too. We hadn’t heard them since we left Fort Bowie. And the smell of sage was good to us. [Ball 1988:169]

When I reach Fort Sill, a part of me feels at home to be on a military installation once more. Having grown up in the Air Force, I am used to regimentation, uniforms, and strict orders. Yet, as with nearly all “military brats,” as we call ourselves, I have always had a love-hate relationship with the total institution that determined every detail of my family’s life. I loved traveling, and I still feel hemmed in when too much time goes by without a trip. I both envy and disdain people who have a home town and family history stretching back generations in a single place. When my father died and I went through his papers, I could not believe how he had to account for every day of his life when we were moving between military installations. The orders are absolute, unbending, and brook no extenuating circumstances. This personal experience has given me some insight into the con®ict between the civilian world and the military world. Throughout the history of the United States the federal government and the military have had con®ict-

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ing viewpoints and have worked at cross purposes, vacillating from one of¤cial policy to another. Nowhere was this more evident than in the treatment of American Indians, most speci¤cally the Chiricahua prisoners of war. Representatives in Congress tried to satisfy the demands of their constituents; of¤cers favored military action; and Indian rights organizations sought to protect the well-being of Native peoples. Torn between benevolence and severity, the federal government struggled to satisfy the demands of the War Department and the Department of the Interior and to respond to President Grant’s Peace Policy that created a Board of Indian Commissioners to evaluate and direct the administration of Indian Affairs. Often, those in Washington had little understanding of actual conditions in the local area characterized by complex relationships among several groups. This lack of understanding led to the Chiricahua saga of imprisonment with its 27-year period of captivity and repeated displacement. As noted previously, most of the Chiricahua prisoners had not borne arms against Arizona citizens but had instead lived peacefully at San Carlos. Included among the prisoners were the Apache scouts who had helped the military locate the Chiricahuas in the mountains of Mexico. As Lieutenant Lyman Walter Vere Kennon summed up the situation: “thus, for the sake of less than twenty” male combatants, “a whole tribe of nearly four hundred innocent people have been condemned to exile and imprisonment, which to many of them has meant death” (1890:253). The Department of the Interior, which was repeatedly entreated by the War Department to take custody of the Chiricahuas, failed to foster the means to economic self-reliance for the Chiricahuas (Turcheneske 1997:3–4). Furthermore, having been promised that Fort Sill would be their permanent home, the Chiricahuas developed a cattle industry and a semblance of stability at Fort Sill. After they had settled in, the government changed its mind, keeping the Chiricahuas in a state of uncertainty for years as it debated the bene¤ts and drawbacks of taking over Fort Sill for artillery training and displacing the Indians who lived there. Today, the museum faces the old Post Quadrangle. The quadrangle is surrounded by a street with the of¤cers’ quarters and single-storied stone buildings with roofed walkways that have the feeling of the Old West (Figure 29). Built before or during the time that the Chiricahuas were here, these buildings include the old Post Headquarters, the Post Chapel, the ¤rst headquarters of the U.S. Army Field Artillery School, and three cavalry barracks with squad rooms, kitchens, and mess rooms. The visitors’ center was originally designed to function as a warehouse but was used as an infantry barracks, a children’s school, and an artillery classroom. The ¤rst thing that one sees, upon entering the visitors’ center, is Lew

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Figure 29: Fort Sill National Historic Landmark, Oklahoma. Photo by author.

Kaywaykla’s hide painting of Apache Gáhe, or Mountain Spirit dancers, that was presented by the Fort Sill Apache Tribe of Oklahoma October 4th, 1969, to Fort Sill in honor of the fort’s centennial (Figure 30). I walk around the room on creaking wooden ®oors, seeing articles of Indian clothing in oldstyle museum cases. Photographs of the wickiups in which the Chiricahuas lived upon their arrival, of Gáhe dancers (Figure 31), and of Chiricahua farmers harvesting hay (Figure 32) are displayed. In another museum case, a photograph of young Chiricahua children stand in a ring with joined hands facing their school teacher in front of a white frame building (Figure 33). The Chiricahuas were here for a longer period of time during their captivity than at any location—19 years, from 1894 to 1913–14. For many, especially those who were born during captivity and remembered no other place, this was home and they elected to remain here instead of joining the Mescaleros on their reservation in New Mexico. When the federal government removed the prisoner-of-war status, only 87 of about 260 Chiricahuas chose to remain in Oklahoma where they were allotted 80-acre tracts of land (D. C.

Figure 30: Lew Kaywaykla’s deer hide painting of Gáhe (Mountain Spirit Dancers) presented to Fort Sill by the Fort Sill Apache Tribe of Oklahoma, October 4, 1969. Courtesy, Fort Sill National Historic Landmark.

Figure 31: Gáhe (Mountain Spirit Dancer), 1912–13, Fort Sill, Oklahoma. Courtesy, Fort Sill National Historic Landmark.

Figure 32: Chiricahua Apache farmers at Fort Sill, c. 1904. Courtesy, Fort Sill National Historic Landmark.

Figure 33: Chiricahua Apache children at school, Fort Sill, Oklahoma, 1894–1913. Courtesy, Fort Sill National Historic Landmark.

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Cole 1994:44). Today, they are the federally recognized Fort Sill Apache Tribe, governed by a chairperson and a business committee; in 1994, they had 3,568 acres of allotted land and a population of 103 (44). The Chiricahuas’ years at Fort Sill were a time of healing and rebuilding. Families were reunited in Alabama, but the conditions were miserable there because of the climate and the fact that they were so far from home. Oklahoma was much more like the land that they were used to. But even with the resiliency of the Apaches, without non-Indians who sincerely cared about their well-being and were able to support their efforts, the conditions here could have turned out badly. The military played a major role in helping them survive and accomplish goals. Hugh L. Scott, who later became a general and the Chief of Staff of the Army, fought for the needs of the Chiricahuas. He took up their cause aggressively to see that they got the provisions and the cattle that they needed to create a viable economy. When Washington of¤cials felt that he was asking too much, Scott argued that if the government failed to allocate the funding they needed, the Apaches might “all be on the warpath in Arizona or New Mexico inside of twelve months” (Turcheneske 1997:44). He pointed out that what he was asking was relatively little in comparison to the hundreds of thousands of dollars that had been spent to “subjugate them and put them where they are now” (44). The War Department had tried to stamp out the traditional family band system at Mount Vernon Barracks by forcing the Chiricahuas to live in a single village. At Fort Sill, they were allowed to live in a number of villages, each with its own leader and extended families, as they had in the Southwest. This enabled the elders to regain their sense of pride and a sense of community that had been lost in Florida and Alabama. Village leaders included Naiche (known as Christian Naiche by then, because those who had joined the military received ¤rst names), Geronimo, Loco, Chihuahua, Chiricahua Tom, Alfred Chato, Roger Toclanny, Carl Mangus, Jacob Kaytennae, Leon Perico, George Noche, while Charles Martine and Martin Kayitah, the two scouts who had helped secure Geronimo’s ¤nal surrender, shared joint leadership of their village; the old leader, Nana, at age 95, was feeble, and died in 1896 (Skinner 1987:397). Government policy shifted over the course of their imprisonment. In the beginning, the government only wanted to remove them from the Southwest for political reasons and did not particularly care what happened to them. If government of¤cials had continued to feel that way, they’d have left them in Florida to die. Instead, responding to public opinion and pressure from military leaders who cared about their welfare, they sent them to what they thought was a better place, Alabama, and, when the conditions there turned out to be even worse, they were sent to Fort Sill.

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Of course, government policy was constantly in a state of ®ux, depending upon which faction controlled the policy. Sometimes advocacy organizations such as the Indian Rights Association were able to lobby effectively and affect policy so that it was more humane. At other times, people who did not care about the well-being of the Indians were in control. Con®ict among different factions in the government was always present. NATIVE AMERICAN SOLDIERS A major factor in the recovery of the Chiricahuas was their enlistment in the military, Towana Spivey, Director of the Fort Sill National Historic Landmark, tells me. I am fortunate to catch him in his of¤ce on a weekend and to have him make time to answer my many questions. Little has been written about the Chiricahuas during their time at Fort Sill, especially with regard to their military service. In an effort to provide some kind of individual incentive and to end their dependent status as prisoners and their identity as Indian people, Secretary of War Proctor decided to enlist them in the army when they were in Alabama in 1891 (Debo 1976:349–350). Nearly all the able-bodied men joined the army, some 46 of the Chiricahua prisoners. Naiche, Mangus, Ahnandia, Tsisnah, and Fun, some of the best known warriors, joined Company I of the U.S. Twelfth Infantry Regiment when they were at Mount Vernon Barracks (Skinner 1987:320). They constructed some 75 houses, a hospital, a combined mess hall and kitchen, and a barracks for Company I (Turcheneske 1997:29) as well as building bridges, scouting, trailing, and skirmishing (Debo 1976:350). In addition to their regular drills each day, they received an hour of instruction in English (350). They wore army uniforms, had their hair cut, and received given names that stayed with them for life. Mr. Spivey hands me a brochure that he has written called “Warriors in Blue” as he explains that the U.S. Army decided to develop an experimental military force consisting of all-Indian units in 1890. Patterned after the British effort in India that created an army composed of local natives, the all-Indian units in the United States were led by non-Indian of¤cers. The Indian unit at Fort Sill was Troop L of the Seventh Cavalry. Ironically, this was part of the same Seventh Cavalry that was defeated at the Little Bighorn. When the Mount Vernon Barracks Chiricahuas arrived there, those who were in the military transferred to this troop. The Chiricahuas joined the Kiowas, Comanches, and Apaches who were already in the existing unit at Fort Sill, as were a few Cheyennes and Arapahos. Cheyenne and Arapaho warriors comprised Troop L of the Fifth Cavalry Regiment at nearby Fort Reno. The ability to speak and write the English language was not required for enlist-

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ment; instead, interpreters were available as well as Captain Hugh Lenox Scott, who was the army’s foremost expert on Indian sign language, which was used extensively among Plains tribes. Hugh Scott (1853–1934), one of the Chiricahuas’ major advocates, was a remarkable man. Upon his graduation from West Point, he began his career by serving in the Seventh Cavalry just after its disastrous defeat under Custer at the Little Bighorn. From the very beginning and throughout his career, he was associated with Indians in war and peace and was trusted by them as a man of his word. Ideally suited for his position, he had contained excitement over the Ghost Dance on the Southern Plains (Debo 1976:359). At the same time, military of¤cials who lacked his tact and understanding ineptly handled the Ghost Dance movement on the Northern Plains, resulting in the massacre at Wounded Knee. Indian soldiers received the standard monthly salary of $13, which included the use of government horses; scouts received an additional $12 a month for the upkeep of their own horses. Their duties included riding escort for payroll wagons and supply trains and guarding against lawless elements that roamed throughout the Oklahoma and Indian Territories. In addition to military duties, some of them developed special skills such as blacksmithing and wagon repair as well as farming and ranching. Why did military service play an important role in the Chiricahuas’ recovery? The entire life experience of an Apache male was directed toward becoming and being a successful warrior. A man’s duty was to bring in meat and to protect his family; he derived his sense of self-esteem and worth as a human being from ful¤lling these duties. As previously discussed, as soon as he reached the right age, a young boy began his training as a warrior and hunter. If he failed to achieve the status of a warrior, he felt considerable shame, as did his family. When the Chiricahuas were taken to Florida, the warriors at Fort Pickens stayed active by clearing away the debris that had accumulated around the fort since its last occupation during the Civil War; they worked six hours a day, ¤ve days a week and were expected to wash and mend their clothing on Saturday (Debo 1976:321). However, those at Fort Marion in St. Augustine were simply marking time; while the women prepared their meals and made clothing, the men had nothing to do except to police the fort (314). Psychologically and physically, the lack of purpose and inde¤nite idleness over which they had little control created a sense of despondency when they moved to Mount Vernon Barracks in Alabama. The inactive warriors, who were in the prime of their lives, could no longer ful¤ll the cultural role for which they had prepared all their lives. Their military service provided a measure of personal ful¤llment. No, it was not the same as living as a free people able to raid and carry out cam-

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paigns of vengeance against the Mexicans and the Americans, but it was inevitable that that way of life would end as settlers pushed into the open spaces of both countries. But as Indian soldiers at Fort Sill, the Chiricahuas hunted in the nearby Wichita Mountains, providing wild game to supplement the diet of the post. The physical and mental discipline required by the military was similar to their own cultural training as warriors. They had an outlet for their mental agility in military strategy as well as an outlet for their physical agility and strength. Most importantly, military service provided an important sense of self-esteem. If this program was so successful, why did the government inactivate the all-Indian units after only seven years, I ask Mr. Spivey, who is of Choctaw blood. “You know that Indian people follow a leader because they trust him. Their loyalty was to the leader not to the organization. They didn’t understand why the white of¤cer who led them was being transferred to another military post; they thought that he must have done something dishonest and was being dismissed. They could not suddenly transfer their loyalty to a stranger, a new person they knew nothing about.” I nod in understanding as he continues, “But they obviously found great ful¤llment in military service because after their units were inactivated, they continued to enlist in the military. And today, American Indians have the greatest percentage of all minority groups in the United States in all branches of the military.” With obvious pride in his voice, Mr. Spivey goes on, “In 2001, we organized the Descendants of Troop L, Seventh Cavalry, so the sense of identity that comes from military service continues here at Fort Sill. This organization is dedicated to keeping the history alive for this all-Indian military unit that served with such distinction.” CONTINUING STATUS AS PRISONERS OF WAR The position of Chiricahua soldiers was unique: even though they were in the military, they remained prisoners of war. Furthermore, they were prisoners of war without a war. Although every effort was made on the part of military of¤cers and others to see that they were treated as humanely as possible, they remained prisoners of the federal government. Surrounding Fort Sill was a reservation known as the Kiowa Agency, home to the Kiowas, Comanches, Kiowa-Apaches, Wichitas, and Caddos. These tribes were under the legal authority of the Of¤ce of Indian Affairs in the Department of the Interior and received medical treatment from civilian physicians under federal contract. In sharp contrast, the Chiricahuas remained under the jurisdiction of the Department of War and their medical

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treatment came from army physicians. This was just one of the distinctions between the Chiricahua Apaches and the tribes that surrounded them in Oklahoma. Their prisoner-of-war status meant that they could not leave Fort Sill for more than a few hours without the commanding of¤cer’s permission. If he gave them a job to do, they were forced to comply without renumeration. They could not own land, so they could not construct permanent homes. Furthermore, these restrictions made it dif¤cult for unmarried Chiricahuas to meet or marry anyone outside of Fort Sill. No one wanted to marry into captivity, which was what occurred, because, if a Chiricahua married, he or she had to continue living at Fort Sill. By 1912, the irony of their continuing status as prisoners of war was evident: only six of the male participants who had been with Geronimo were still alive, and over half the Chiricahuas had been born into captivity. HIDDEN TRANSCRIPTS Systems of domination, which in the case of the Chiricahuas had political, economic, cultural, and religious aspects, have private as well as public dimensions. Anthropologist James Scott (1990), in his work on institutionalized forms of domination, such as prisons, coined the phrase “public transcript” to describe interactions that take place in public between the dominators and the oppressed. He uses the term, “hidden transcript” in reference to the critique of power by oppressed peoples that occurs where the power holders cannot see it. In order to better understand Naiche’s hide paintings of the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony, it is helpful to see the kind of art that other Indian people produced during captivity. Not only does this provide an analytical model, but there is also a direct historical link because a group of Plains Indian men had been imprisoned at Fort Marion in St. Augustine 1875 and 1878; many of these same men later lived near the Chiricahuas when the latter group was moved to Fort Sill. Many of the images that the Plains warriors produced during their time at Fort Marion could be characterized as a hidden transcript, a critique of power relations, because of their multivalent nature. While Pratt encouraged Indian men to produce drawing books intended to illustrate the success of his penal/education program, these vivid autobiographical pictures were also an act of resistance, for chronicling the old ways was a way of keeping them alive. Other drawings (Figure 34) appear to be a critique of the power holders with their ramrod straight posture and the white world that highly valued the conformity and regimentation it forced upon the Indian prisoners. While Anglo-Americans chose to interpret Zotom’s rendering of Indians on the parapet of Fort Marion (Figure 35) as his

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Figure 34: Bishop Whipple Talking to Prisoners by Bear’s Heart (Cheyenne), 1876. (Adapted from drawing at National Museum of the American Indian, Smithsonian Institution, 20/6231.)

acceptance of their subaltern status, it is probable that he was instead af¤rming the courage and resistance of the warriors in the face of challenging circumstances. Plains Indian art took many forms over time, from rock art to hide paintings to muslin drawings and ledger-book art. In these preliterate cultures, visual imagery, along with oral literature, carried the same communicative load that written texts did for other cultures. Entire histories were recorded through the depiction of key events in the lives of the artists. As a re®ection of the system of domination that was imposed upon them, these visual histories have been discounted by the dominant culture not only because they were created by subaltern peoples but also because they are a visual rather than a written record. The written word has been privileged over visual histories. In reality, these images present a competing version of the narrative of Western history as the voices of Native Americans tell what occurred from their perspective. Only now, almost two centuries later, are we willing to hear another version of the events that shaped this country. While the dominant society’s master narrative is one of Manifest Destiny, the true story is far more complex and heartbreaking.

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Figure 35: On the Parapet at Fort Marion Next Day after Arrival by Zotom (Kiowa), 1876–77. (Adapted from drawing at National Museum Cowboy Hall of Fame and Western Heritage Center, Oklahoma City, Arthur and Shifra Collection, 95.2.633.)

After examining the tradition of Plains Indian art, I will explore the artwork of non-Apache Indians imprisoned at Fort Marion as narratives that document tribal societies in transition. While Plains Indian pictographic hide paintings, the precursor of ledger drawings, con¤rmed the social status of individual warriors, the art of the Fort Marion Chiricahua prisoners used imagery to explore tribal histories, everyday life that was now gone forever, and the assertion of tribal dignity in the face of assimilation (Edwin L. Wade and Jacki Thompson Rand in Berlo 1996:45). PLAINS INDIAN ARTISTS Long before the arrival of Europeans to this continent, Native American historians/artists were recording key events on rock faces. Individuals validated their deeds by recording the details of their war and hunting exploits, thus making personal history public. The earliest images took the form of pictographs, which they painted onto the rock surface, and petroglyphs, which involved engraving or pecking images into the surface of the rock. An area especially rich in such images, the northwest Plains has many sites such as the narrow canyons among the southern Black Hills of South Dakota. People returned again and again to inscribe hunting and battle records on the smooth rock surfaces in places laden with Power. Pictographs in the narrow canyons among the southern Black Hills of South Dakota show hunters aided by dogs driving elk and other large game animals into traps (Penney 2004:109). In southern Alberta, men from the Blackfoot and other tribes

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traveled to the Writing-On-Stone site to leave pictographic records of their battles showing warriors bearing large shields engaged in combat; speci¤c individuals were portrayed through individualistic shield designs. A radiocarbondated site from about a.d. 1100 in southeastern Montana’s Valley of the Shields shows three standing warriors holding circular shields; each shield has its own design painted with white, purple, red, green, and orange designs (109–110). Men used bison hide robes and shirts for the depiction of battle exploits, sometimes even combining several events on one garment to provide a fuller biographical account of the wearer’s experiences. One robe that dates to perhaps the 18th century tells the story of warriors ¤ghting on horseback with painted shields overcoming enemies on foot who have guns and red shot pouches (Penney 2004:113). Individual encounters with enemies are depicted, as is the counting of coup. The most valued of war honors, counting coup was often memorialized in Plains painting. Counting coup took tremendous courage because this act involved touching a living enemy, thus incurring far greater personal risk than simply killing him. By the late 19th century, white hunters had killed off most of the great bison herds that roamed the Plains, and most tribes were on reservations. Among the supplies issued by the federal government were sheets of muslin that they used to continue chronicling war exploits. Somewhat earlier, Plains men had begun drawing their experiences on paper with pens or colored pencils. Through trade or armed con®ict, they procured notebooks, ledgers, and other kinds of books ¤lled with blank paper. During the 1860s, Arapaho chief Little Shield ¤lled the ruled pages of a ledger book with images of his war exploits. In one drawing, Little Shield depicts his victory over a Pawnee on foot by drawing his own ri®e touching his enemy’s head (Penney 2004:114). While previous forms of artwork were made by Indians for Indian use, after reservations were established, pictographic painting took on a commercial dimension. After Native Americans were no longer a threat to their safety, white tourists and curio-seekers became interested in collecting handmade objects produced by Indians throughout the country. In response to the growing market, Plains Indians began to paint small deer hides or elk hide and miniature teepee covers for sale in much the same way that Chiricahuas later sold objects that they had made. Not only did this provide a limited income but it also helped, as previously noted, in a minor way, to reduce some of the feelings of dependency on the federal government that the Indians were experiencing. The Plains graphic arts tradition of drawing became an important means of intercultural communication in the late 19th century (Berlo 1996:12–18).

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Both whites and Indians used pictorial means to educate each other about their traditions. Although whites did so with the deliberate intent of educating and converting Indians to their religion and way of life, Indians found whites eager to collect images of indigenous life. Indians discovered that their art had become a marketable commodity. In contrast to written texts, visual imagery could be understood without sharing the same language. Pictorial images were a kind of universal language, and the physical act of painting provided a shared experience. In the 1830s, George Catlin was amazed by the hush that came over Crow, Blackfoot, and Assiniboine men when he brought out his brushes and canvas: “ . . . all other amusements are left, and all other topics of conversation and gossip are postponed for future consideration” (1973:42). Swiss artist Karl Bodmer had a similar reception during Prince Maximilian of Wied’s 1832–34 expedition when he painted portraits and shared his own paper, pencils, and watercolors with the Mandans, who then created drawings of their own. In the 1840s, Father Point, a Jesuit architect and draftsman, and Father DeSmet, also a Jesuit and the ¤rst Catholic missionary to the Indians of the Platte and upper Missouri region, used pictures to educate and covert the Indians (Peterson 1993:108). Visual images have always held great power for Native Americans because to depict something is to think of it and to summon its Power. Such Power is often overlooked by those whose cultures rely much more on the written word to convey information. In 1846, when Father DeSmet visited the Lakota on the upper Missouri River, a chief showed him one of his most prized possessions. The chief opened a small box and drew forth a package that he had carefully wrapped in buckskin. Father DeSmet wrote, “to my great amazement, I saw a colored picture of General Diebitsch [a Russian of¤cer who served in the Napoleonic wars], in full uniform and mounted on a beautiful war horse” (Chittenden and Richardson 1969:634). Before each encounter with the enemy, the Lakota chief invoked General Diebitsch, offering him his calumet. The chief attributed his successes in battle to the general’s powerful presence, which came alive through his image. Art historian Janet Berlo (1996:13) considers the images created by Plains warriors to be equally powerful. During the 1870s, 1880s, and 1890s, they produced ledger books that recorded past victories and wore these on their persons when they met the enemy on the battle¤eld. Just as the men of previous generations had worn painted hides when they went into battle, garbed in past victories, Indian men at the latter half of the 19th century also wore their battle stories on their person but in the form of ledger books. Such books were not necessarily the military record of only one person, either: “ . . . it is extremely common for intimate friends to insert in each other’s books evi-

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dence of mutual esteem by drawing scenes from their past lives” one of Bourke’s Indian scouts told him (Bourke 1872–96, vol. 20:1972–1973). A form of communitas (V. Turner 1969), this act of drawing in each other’s books was an extension of the camaraderie among Plains Indian men, who were known for their age sets and soldier societies. Gerald McMaster notes (Berlo 1996:19) that each group had its own distinctive dance, songs, possessions, and privileges. As they went through the course of their lives, the boys and men in these groups tended to stay close together and come to each other’s aid. McMaster goes on to say that U.S. soldiers then took the record books from the bodies of slain warriors after the end of the battle. Ironically these soldiers coveted the drawing books because they documented the same battles in which they had participated (Berlo 1996:19). Captain John Bourke, who fought against the Apaches as well as other Indians during the 1870s, collected drawing books from the Indian camps that his troops ransacked; he also bought books from Indians, military men, and traders (Porter 1986:63–64). In 1881 in Omaha, he successfully mounted his own exhibition of these works to an enthusiastic reception by the public. THE ART OF PRISONERS AT FORT MARION With this strong tradition of narrative art, it is not surprising that this was the one traditional activity that continued in captivity. In April 1875, military authorities sent 72 Kiowa, Cheyenne, Comanche, and Caddo men from Oklahoma to be imprisoned at Fort Marion in St. Augustine, Florida. Selected for incarceration because they were well-known warriors, these men chose warfare and hunting for the major subjects in their artwork. Many documented what they saw on the long train journey to Florida and their new surroundings at the prison, just as they had previously drawn encounters during battle and the obstacles they had to overcome. This body of art is of special interest because it documents the same Florida fort where most of the Chiricahua prisoners were interned a little over ten years later as well as a train journey similar to the one that took them there. The late-19th-century public interpreted the drawings they made in two basic ways. According to Wade and Rand, many saw them as “naïve renderings by paci¤ed ‘savages’ of the material and social wonders of America” while others interpreted them as “homesick nostalgic doodles of a bygone idealized life on the Plains” (Berlo 1996:45). In depicting bridges, boats, buildings, and trains, Wohaw, Zotom, Howling Wolf, Squint Eyes, Making Medicine, Cohoe, Bear’s Heart, and Etahdleuh were considered to be awestruck “savages” testifying to the greatness of Anglo industrial society. Drawings of Indians in classrooms and military of¤cers inspecting Indian prisoners

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further strengthened this paternalistic viewpoint as it convinced some people that the prisoners were embracing social reform. Authorities encouraged them to draw scenes of their new surroundings instead of objectionable war exploits, so most of the subject matter related to their lives on the Plains was reduced to hunting, courting, and dancing scenes. It is easy to disregard the visual record created by Native American artists in favor of written documentation, but this is simply a continuation of latent paternalism that continues to inform non-Indian perceptions. Much has been written about the oral tradition, validating its position as a worthy object of scholarship; however, visual imagery is often still dismissed as a lesser communicative form. It is vital to remember that in preliterate societies, visual forms carried the full weight of recordkeeping. Through hide paintings and later forms of visual documentation, the past was recorded for future generations. Every people have a need to record their history. The communicative load was just as great for nonliterate people, and the importance of pictorial narratives must not be underestimated. What were the social functions of painting and drawing for Native Americans and how did these functions change over time? Pictographic hide and muslin painting and ledger drawing con¤rmed the status of individuals, thus serving an important social function. Although the practice of drawing in ledger books only spanned a few decades, long before this Plains Indians here kept historical documents in the form of Winter Counts. They represented each year with one or two pictographs on bison hides, a tradition that they later continued in drawing books. Lakota Battiste Good created a Winter Count that represented each year between 1871 and 1880. In 1872, Roan Bear died, while the following year, there was an issue of commodities from the government which he indicated with a striped blanket next to a teepee. 1874 was the year of a measles outbreak, and 1878 was the year that Crazy Horse was killed. The grandniece of Red Horse Owner was still keeping a Lakota record in Red Horse Owner’s Winter Count in the 1960s (Karol 1969). This book spans the period from 1789 (the “¤rst time they rode horses against the enemy”) through 1936 (the New Deal) to the 1960s. The Fort Marion prisoners documented new and old experiences, creating an important record of everyday events as well as tribal histories. Through their artwork, they af¤rmed the social solidarity of their people and asserted what Wade and Rand refer to as “Native American dignity in the face of cultural puri¤cation experiments” (Berlo 1996:45). The contribution of these Plains Indian men, during the three years of their incarceration, was “nothing less than an incipient national literature” (45). Drawing their experiences was also a way to make sense of the tumultuous

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Figure 36: Killing of Gray Beard by Zotom (Kiowa), 1876–77. (Adapted from drawing at National Museum Cowboy Hall of Fame and Western Heritage Center, Oklahoma City, Arthur and Shifra Collection, 95.2.680.)

events, in much the same way that a person might keep a journal. Illustrating their experiences was a way to own them, to validate them, and to integrate them into their own consciousness. Through these drawings, they spoke in their own voices, not through the voices of their captors. Although at the time that they were made, these drawings were devalued by white society, today we consider them to be what Berlo and McMaster have called “an encyclopedia of experience” because “they depict the comprehensiveness of the Plains Indian worldview in the second half of the nineteenth century” (Berlo 1996:19). They narrate a historical era through the voices of individuals who lived the events. Within the body of work created by American Indians imprisoned at Fort Marion, Wade and Rand (Berlo 1996:45–49) have identi¤ed several subthemes that occur, including the Journey (Figure 36), a chronicle of the deportation of the Indian prisoners, and Self-portraiture, which depicts the artist in his native attire juxtaposed with the artist in his newly acquired U.S. military garb. Wade and Rand referred to correspondence and interviews to show that multiple readings of these images occurred: while many Anglo tourists saw them as attempts to emulate whites, Anglo social reformists interpreted them as a capitulation to the Indians’ transformation into “white citizens.” The artists themselves used the imagery to retain a sense of self and to assure themselves that their tribal identity was fully equal to that of white society. Among the drawings of the Journey is one by Kiowa warrior Zotom, whose work shows considerable attention to detail. In “The Killing of Gray Beard” (Figure 36), he draws the shooting of Gray Beard in the scrubby palmetto forest on the Georgia-Florida border. The force of the train’s movement pushes the steam from the smoke stack back toward the train cars. He takes care to show the force of movement pushing the steam from the smokestacks

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Figure 37: Plaza and Cathedral, St. Augustine by Doanmoe (Kiowa) 1876–1877. (Adapted from drawing at Yale Collection of Western Americana, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, New Haven, Connecticut, 1174.)

toward the train cars. A second drawing by Etahdleuh Doanmoe, “Plaza and Cathedral, St. Augustine” (Figure 37), shows the closed-in spaces and built environment of St. Augustine, Florida, where Fort Marion was located. The U.S. ®ag waves prominently in front of a two-story building off to the left, while the church and its bell towers stand in the center of the drawing. Along the plaza pathways, identical ¤gures walk or stand in conversation. Architectural details, such as the number of stories in each structure and building on the right, make the viewer feel that any spectator could recognize the scene. Doanmoe depicts the landscape of home in a far different way than he does the St. Augustine landscape, where the built environment dominates the natural world. To depict altered political realities, Doanmoe departs from conventional depictions in Kiowa ledger art that downplayed topographic detail by richly portraying the distinct qualities of the dry, brown Wichita mountains that turned this color each summer (Figure 38). He refers to a speci¤c place through his topographic details. In his drawing of the plaza and cathedral in St. Augustine, the built environment takes precedence over the obviously planted bushes in the foreground. A straight line of identically shaped bushes provide the only natural feature. Instead, the church with its bell towers and rows of barrack-like buildings take preeminence over the land. His drawing of Captain Pratt’s house (Figure 39) says even more about the subjugation of the natural environment, for Pratt’s quarters are carefully fenced off from the natural domain. Two uniformed guards further provide security. Although Pratt’s house has trees clustered around it, they are within the white picket fence. Doanmoe depicts the major shift in political power and the ideology that underlies it. He may or may not have done so deliber-

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Figure 38: Captain Pratt and Kicking Bird Meeting the Hostile Kiowas by Doanmoe (Kiowa), 1876–77. (Adapted from drawing at Yale Collection of Western Americana, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, New Haven, Connecticut, 4.)

Figure 39: Captain Pratt’s House by Doanmoe (Kiowa), 1876–77. (Adapted from drawing at Yale Collection of Western Americana, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, New Haven, Connecticut, 30.)

ately, but nevertheless, the expansive space in his drawings of his Kiowa homeland stand in marked contrast to the sparsely rendered Eastern landscapes in which all features of the natural environment are dominated by humans and their architecture. A Journey drawing that emphasizes both technological and societal domination is Wohaw’s rendering of a steamboat on the St. John’s River (Figure 40). In May 1875, Kiowa warrior Wohaw and his fellow prisoners were sent from Jacksonville to Fort Marion in a side-wheeler steamboat. Con¤ned to the lower deck in chains along with the cargo, the warriors are not visible in the drawing. Instead, the captain and smiling tourists enjoy a pleasure trip as they occupy the upper decks during their voyage. The most dangerous place on the ship, the lower decks carried the low-ranking crew members and lower-class passengers as well as cargo. Not only were the crowded conditions

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Figure 40: By Steamboat Up the St. John’s River by Wohaw (Kiowa), 1877. (Adapted from drawing at Missouri Historical Society, St. Louis, 1882.18.11.)

a breeding ground for disease but they also surrounded the steamboat boilers which had a tendency to explode (Berlo 1996:172–173). Part of the communicative intent in rendering battle and hunting exploits was to validate the bravery of the artist. It is likely that some of the Plains Indian men were continuing this tradition as they visually recorded speci¤c scenes of their journey to Florida and also scenes of Fort Marion itself. One of the most proli¤c artists was a Kiowa Indian named Zotom. Born in 1853, Zotom participated in raids throughout Mexico and Texas and, in 1874, he was recognized by buffalo hunters in a raid at Adobe Walls in the Texas panhandle, which led to his imprisonment at Fort Marion. Zotom chronicled the Journey from the surrender of Indian warriors in the Red River War (1873– 75) to their arrival at Fort Marion. This included scenes of the long train journey as well as the hunting and killing of Gray Beard, a Cheyenne chief who attempted to escape by throwing himself off the moving train (Penney 2004:117). Zotom is best known for his evocative drawing of the prisoners standing on the parapet of Fort Marion the day after their arrival (Figure 35), the same area where Chiricahua families would later be living in tents. A row of seated and standing Indian men, each wrapped in individually decorated blankets, stand on top of the parapet of the stone fort as they look out at the bay with its lighthouses, steamship, sailboat, and headlands. The fort is rendered in considerable architectural detail, with the guard tower and cannon on top of

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the terreplein and, below, the empty, dark casemates that open off the sunny courtyard in the foreground of the drawing. Zotom also takes care to show stone masonry and wooden timbers used in the construction of the fort. “On the Parapet of Fort Marion Next Day after Arrival,” a title that was applied by one of his captors rather than Zotom himself, can be interpreted in many ways, depending upon what one wishes to see. No doubt Anglo audiences read the image in terms of increased safety for their fellow citizens on the Southern Plains and the successful western expansion of civilization. However, judging from Zotom’s personality and the fact that he completely reverted to traditional ways upon his release from Fort Marion, he probably had a far different intent. One of the few Indians that Pratt disliked because of his determined resistance, Zotom renounced white practices and beliefs upon his return home (Petersen 1971:171–192). I agree with Wade and Rand’s interpretation (Berlo 1996:48) that Zotom saw the similarity between the fortress that looked out at the sea and the mountains of his homeland that overlooked the surrounding plains. Kiowa men sought such high places because they considered them to be places of Power and challenge with sacred knowledge to impart. Rather than passively accept the subaltern status that whites tried to impose on him, Zotom considered his journey and incarceration to be a hardship of war that he overcame and used as a measure of his personal strength and courage. Another work by Zotom is of interest because its subject matter evokes that in Naiche’s paintings. The Sun Dance was the major ceremony for Plains Indians just as the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony was the most important ceremony for the Chiricahuas. In his 1876 “Building a Kiowa Medicine House,” Zotom drew the construction of the Medicine Lodge in which the rituals would take place. (This picture can be found in the Yale Collection of Western Americana, at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, in New Haven, Connecticut.) Interestingly, Zotom chose to depict the gathering of the materials and the construction of the lodge, which “was generally regarded as the most enjoyable part of the whole Sun Dance gathering” because it was such “an informal social event, characterized by much jolly conversation, singing, dancing, laughter, and horseplay” (Nye 1962:67). Naiche also chose to depict a scene that evoked this same sense of communitas among his own people. Although the setting of the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony was somewhat more formal, the same kind of singing, dancing, and sense of joyful participation was experienced by all who were present. The second subtheme, Self-portraiture, was clearly inspired by the art of photography that was spreading across the Great Plains by the 1870s, some 20 years after its invention. When they ¤rst encountered photographic images, American Indians were astonished by the authority of photography in

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Figure 41: Kiowa Portraits by Wohaw (Kiowa), 1877. (Adapted from drawing at Missouri Historical Society, St. Louis, 1882.18.4.)

terms of representing the visual world (Blume 1995). Kiowa warrior Wohaw would have seen many photographs both before he was imprisoned and during his stay at Fort Marion. Photographers documented treaty signings, such as those that Wohaw had attended, and surrenders, such as the surrender of Naiche and Geronimo’s band in 1886. The Fort Marion prisoners were the subject of many photographs, and, more than any of the other artists, Wohaw incorporated the photographic format into his own artwork. In “Kiowa Portraits” (Figure 41), he drew three framed portraits: on the right, four Kiowa men and women in traditional dress stand together; in the center frame, a Kiowa man wears traditional dress and faces the camera in a standard frontal portrait pose; on the left, two high-ranking Kiowa men wear U.S. military uniforms. Signi¤cantly, Wohaw inserted a tree between the right and center portraits as well as a warrior on horseback in the foreground, suspended in his own space. Known for his juxtapositions of divergent visual modes, Wohaw seems to be saying that not everything can be contained within the camera’s eye and that a photograph

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cannot catch all aspects of reality. By placing the lone tree and the warrior outside the framed photographic images, Wohaw shows that not everything can be dominated by Anglo-American expansion. Publicized as the last group of “wild Indians” in the United States to surrender, the Chiricahua Apaches were of particular interest to photographers. Not only was their surrender documented but many photographs were taken during their imprisonment. The famous series taken by photographer Camillus Sidney Fly of Tombstone, Arizona, include the only known photographs of American Indians as the enemy in the ¤eld during their negotiations with General George Crook (Van Orden 1994:1) (Figures 8–11). Naiche must have been impressed by the detail captured by the photographic image as well as the immediacy of the photographic act. His later hide paintings have a threedimensional treatment of space, such as would be seen in the tradition of Anglo-European painting and in photographic landscapes. Little Chief, a Cheyenne warrior, was only 21 when he was sent to Fort Marion. He produced what is probably the most ambitious drawing in a ledger book when he telescoped Cheyenne history and cosmology into an epic rendering of the Sun Dance encampment. Over 550 people, nearly 100 horses, over 100 teepees and tents, and 28 dogs ¤ll this complex drawing (Berlo 1996:132). Considered to be the spiritual heart of the Cheyenne world, the medicine lodge stands at the center with the opening to the encampment at the east, where horses and people enter in a great stream. Teepees are oriented in this direction also, so that they greet the morning sun. Each teepee stands for one family just as the Sun Dance encampment embraces the whole tribe as a family “and serves as a cosmic diagram of how the world should be” (132). This epic illustration evokes Naiche’s depictions of the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony: even though the Chiricahua gatherings were on a much smaller scale, they nevertheless brought many people together as a single family and presented an ideal rendering of the way the world should be, with the Gáhe and the Power of White Painted Woman living among the people. As previously mentioned, Chiricahua wickiups were always oriented with their openings to the east, also. The Kiowa warrior Wohaw created one of the most powerful depictions of the actual Sun Dance. In Plains Indian societies, artists were believed to have shamanistic powers because they communicated with the supernatural world through dreams and trance. George Horse Capture et al. explains that during a trance, a “visionary would establish contact with nonhumans and pledge a secret allegiance to one of them who would grant him protection at any time” (1993:34). The Sun Dance initiated young warriors into the sacred. The visions and spirit helpers that bless the Sun Dancer after he experiences excruciating pain, explained Cree-Chippewyan Jane Ash Poitras (Berlo

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1996:69), bring power into the community. This power from the sacred world is used to help heal and to communicate good to the community. In Wohaw’s drawing, his vision appears in the form of a thunderbird who grants the Sun Dancer the sacred power to help his community. Thus the dancer serves as an intermediary between the sacred and the secular. Rather than being a mere illustration of a life experience, this drawing “is a timeless vision” meant to empower “all who look at it” (69). This concept of the drawing as vision with a power of its own adds another dimension to Naiche’s paintings of the Chiricahua Apache Girl’s Puberty Ceremony, for it means that he summoned the Power of White Painted Woman as well as the Power of the Gáhe. If the prisoners wanted to survive, they had to submerge their feelings and identities by accommodating to the wishes of their captors. Many of them had realized by then that the federal government intended to exterminate their old way of life and those Indians who resisted. Just as the boarding schools brought Indians in contact with other Indians from distant places and made them realize the military and political power of the dominant society (and, ironically, resulted in a sense of pan-Indianness), their train trip across a major part of the continent and their ensuing captivity showed them the geographic extent of the power of the United States. IMPLICATIONS FOR THE CHIRICAHUA APACHE PRISONERS OF WAR Unfortunately, a corresponding body of commentary material does not exist to document Chiricahua artwork, nor is the corpus that they created nearly as large or as varied as that created by the Plains prisoners. Furthermore, Plains Indian art and cultures differ considerably from Apache imagery and values. Nevertheless, the visual narratives created by Plains Indian men provide a link by showing the same physical setting (for those imprisoned at Fort Marion rather than Fort Pickens), including the fort and classrooms of Indian students that were not recorded by Apache prisoners. It is not unreasonable to believe that some of the same emotions were shared by both groups of Indians as they were imprisoned by whites far from their homelands and forced to follow a daily regime to which they were previously unaccustomed. Their feelings of forced accommodation and resistance were probably quite similar. Both groups believed in the acquisition of personal Power through the endurance of physical hardship and spiritual intention. And both were accustomed to roaming freely within the expanses of their homeland; to people who did not live within four walls, imprisonment was an atrocity. Anthropologist Andrea Smith refers to the past as “a site of struggle” because “a plurality of social memories exists in each social setting” (2004:252)

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and the group that holds power controls “public representations of history” (Popular Memory Group 1982:207). The victors not only succeed in battle but also perpetuate their control of power by writing the of¤cial version of historical events, the one that is used in textbooks and taught in schools. Only in relatively recent times has a more humane approach been taken in the treatment of American Indians in textbooks. The survival of subgroups within society depends upon their ability to marshal compelling collective memories and to keep these alive. Distinctness as a group separate from other groups comes from having a unique history. Much of the anthropological literature today is devoted to exploring the mechanisms of how groups maintain their identity and the con®ict between hegemonic, of¤cial accounts of history and subordinate, subaltern versions of the same events (Alonso 1988, 1994; Boyarin 1994; Fabri 1995; Popular Memory Group 1982; Smith 2004; Swedenburg 1995). Obviously, completely objective accounts do not exist: any recorder of history must choose what to include and what to exclude. Plains Indian men recorded their version of events at Fort Marion by selectively drawing their surroundings. Implicit in this is the Anglo-American value system as seen through the eyes of the Plains Indian men. In contrast to their own value system, these Indian artists could see that Anglo-Americans valued regimentation and conformity (Figures 34 and 40) and considered nature to be something that must be kept at bay and controlled (Figures 37 and 39). In addition to these visual narratives, oral histories are also being accepted today as legitimate historical records. Such validation is especially crucial for the Chiricahua Apaches and other groups in the Southwest who surrendered late in the 19th century. As Timothy Braatz points out in his book on the Yavapai, historians of 19th-century Arizona have tended “to rely uncritically on U.S. Army and Indian Of¤ce records while generally dismissing Apache and Yavapai oral histories and ethnographic evidence” (2003:12). For the Chiricahuas, these historical accounts only perpetuated racist accounts of actual events, fueling the argument that they were too “blood-thirsty” to be allowed to return to a portion of their homeland. Braatz’s ethnography is one of the few that contests the master narrative of the region by giving voice to Yavapai historians. My intent in writing this book is to make history come alive from the Chiricahua Apache perspective. By bringing together Chiricahua voices, Plains Indian drawings of Fort Marion, and the physical experience of being in the same places, I want to create a fuller picture of history. Essential to this understanding are Naiche’s hide paintings because they embody the spirituality that is the foundation of Chiricahua life.

6

The Chiricahua Apache Girl’s Puberty Ceremony and Naiche’s Hide Paintings

You have started out on the good earth; You have started out with good moccasins; With moccasin strings of the rainbow, You have started out; With moccasin strings of the sun’s rays, You have started out; In the midst of plenty you have started out song from the Chiricahua Apache Girl’s Puberty Ceremony

MESCALERO, NEW MEXICO, AUGUST 2004 The minute I step outside the El Paso airport, I take in a deep breath of the clear air. The space and light dazzle me with their clarity and distance. Rugged, unadorned mountains rise toward the sky on the horizon, their shadows ¤nely delineated against the intensely blue backdrop of sky. The murky, ambiguous horizon of the East has ¤nally given way to the crisp clarity of western mountains and sky. Working my way westward, every day has brought me closer to the Chiricahua homeland. It has been a personal journey as well, for I am also retracing my own past when I moved from Florida to the open spaces of Arizona in 1971. I had written to Raymond Nakai, the Chairman of the Navajo Tribe, as it was then known. In my letter I told him that my mother had died and asked if he could ¤nd a traditional Navajo family with whom I could live in their hogan. He did. After graduating from Florida State University in Tallahassee, I packed all my belongings into my Jeep and headed west. The present trip, following the path of the Chiricahua imprisonment, has been one of my few trips since then back to Florida. The powerful sense of homecoming that washes over me I feel in every part of my body. Much more than simply a thought, it is a physical experience that penetrates my whole being. Having been a military nomad, I often wonder what constitutes home? What creates identi¤cation with a place? What is the meaning of home?

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For the Chiricahuas, home was Arizona and New Mexico, places where each boulder and wash and mountain had a name and a story. Their history was inscribed on the land, and the land was alive with meaning. When representatives of the Massachusetts Indian Association visited the Chiricahuas at Mount Vernon Barracks in December 1887, it became apparent to all of them that “Arizona is a country which the Apaches almost worship” (Debo 1976:340). As late as 1955, members of the Fort Sill Apache Tribe continued to refer to the injustice of their uprooting from the Southwest. When historian Angie Debo interviewed Old Sam Haozous, great-great-grandson of Mahko and grandson of the respected Mangas Coloradas, he said, with an intensity of feeling impossible to convey in print: “We were innocent and should not have been driven from our homes. . . . The United States didn’t give this land to us. It was ours” (1976:110). And Jason Betzinez said with tragedy in his voice and tears in his eyes: “That was our country. It had always been our home” (110). Faced with displacement from their homeland, the Chiricahuas placed even more weight on the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony as a marker of cultural identity. This ceremony came to embody their unbroken continuity with their ancestors and with their homeland as well as their identity as a people. This chapter traces Naiche’s history as a man and as an artist and explores the reasons why he chose this ceremony as the subject for his art. NAICHE At six feet two inches, with a slender build and digni¤ed bearing, Naiche (Figure 42) bore a strong resemblance to his father, Cochise. Everyone who met him commented on his physical similarity to Cochise, who was described by Captain Sladen as “a remarkably ¤ne looking man fully six feet tall, as straight as an arrow, and well-proportioned, the typical Indian face, rather long, high cheek bones, clear keen eyes and a Roman nose” (Sweeney 1991:357). In contrast, Naiche’s older brother, Taza, looked more like his grandfather, Mangas Coloradas. Taza carried 200 pounds on a 5′10″ frame and had a pleasant, smiling face (Lockwood 1938:125). Born in the early 1840s, Taza had been carefully groomed for the position of leadership. Asa Daklugie, the nephew of Geronimo, explained that Cochise taught Taza “every trail, every source of water, and every secret cache known to his father” (Ball 1988:23). Cochise poured his knowledge into Taza and denied it to Naiche because he did not want dissension between his sons. Most important, Cochise passed along his medicine Power to Taza. This valuable resource included the ability to cure sickness, de®ect bullets, and to divine the strategy and location of the enemy. It was widely known that Naiche lacked this kind of Power (25). Daklugie

Figure 42: Naiche, son of Cochise, September 4, 1886. Taken after his surrender to General Miles. Courtesy of Arizona Historical Society, No. 22355

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explained how signi¤cant this was: “Faith in his Power does much for any man, and especially for a chief, for who can deny the in®uence of the supernatural?” (25). Such Power gave a man the con¤dence to lead his people and, even more important, made the people have con¤dence in his leadership. Naiche had good reason to mistrust whites from an early age. At the occurrence of events in 1861 that would become known to Anglo-Americans as the Bascom incident, Naiche was only about ¤ve years old. Known by the Chiricahuas as “cut the tent,” a reference to Cochise’s means of escape, the story was retold many times around the camp¤re, and, no doubt, became embedded in Naiche’s memory. One of the most notorious incidents in Anglo-Apache relations, it was signi¤cant because it destroyed any potential for peace and goodwill and introduced a long period of armed hostilities. Cochise, who had come to the station at Apache Pass with his wife, their son Naiche, and three of his close male relatives, was accused by Lieutenant Bascom of kidnapping a child. Since the child, Mickey Free, had been captured by the Western Apaches, Cochise knew nothing of the kidnapping or the child’s whereabouts. Cochise denied that any of his band had done this, for they had not, but Bascom said that he did not believe Cochise. This was a very serious accusation in Apache culture, because to call a man a liar was to impugn his word and his character. Cochise overlooked the offensiveness of Bascom’s remark and offered to investigate and to help ¤nd the child. As they talked, Bascom had had the tent surrounded by soldiers, and, when Cochise attempted to leave, Bascom ordered his soldiers to hold the Apaches as prisoners. Cochise reacted instinctively, throwing down the tin cup from which he had been drinking coffee and drawing his knife to slit the tent and escape through the cordon of astonished soldiers. Accounts of what happened after this vary, but most hold that afterwards Cochise and his warriors captured several whites to exchange for his wife and son and relatives. However, Bascom had Cochise’s male relatives hanged and their bodies left until they became skeletons. Daklugie reports that Cochise then dragged one captive to death and hung the others in retaliation (Ball 1988:25). The execution of his relatives in®amed Cochise’s passionate hatred of Americans, and throughout the 1860s, he was driven by his conviction that the whites had begun the war with their treachery. This bloody cycle of revenge marked Naiche’s childhood and adolescence. A decade later, realizing that warfare would lead to the eventual extinction of his people, Cochise decided to make peace and negotiated the 1872 peace treaty that established a Chiricahua Reservation in southeastern Arizona Territory. To contact Cochise, General Howard approached Thomas Jeffords, Cochise’s friend. The portrayal of these events in the movie Broken Arrow

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demonstrates the continuing relevance of the Chiricahua story in the late 20th-century popular culture of the United States. Furthermore, a key scene in the ¤lm depicts the Chiricahua Apache Girl’s Puberty Ceremony. When Jeffords told Howard that “the man that wants to talk to Cochise must go where he is” and asked if he would go there with him, without soldiers, Howard agreed (Sweeney 1991:352). When General Howard ¤nally made contact with Cochise, it was only because he was accompanied by Jeffords and his two relatives that Cochise allowed Howard to enter his camp. The warmth with which Cochise’s brother, Juan, and Cochise himself greeted Jeffords was evident of deep and abiding friendship. First Juan dismounted and warmly embraced Jeffords. When Cochise arrived moments later with his sister, wife, and his son Naiche, Cochise “dashed to where we were gathered from his horse, and gave Jeffords the same warm greeting that Juan had accorded him” (Sweeney 1991:357). Naiche was roughly 16 years old at this time. The depth of understanding and affection that existed between his father and Jeffords was built over time; no doubt Naiche had realized that there were some individuals among the whites like Jeffords and Howard who could keep their word. Deeply concerned about the Chiricahuas’ well-being, General Howard was different from other military of¤cers in his overriding desire to see that they received humane treatment. The fact that Howard was able to convince his superiors that the Chiricahuas be given their own reservation in the Chiricahua Mountains, with Jeffords as their agent, probably also had an effect on Naiche, showing him that it was possible to negotiate with military of¤cers. Even Geronimo remembered Howard with affection: He always kept his word with us and treated us as brothers. . . . We could have lived forever at peace with him. If there is any pure, honest white man in the United States army, that man is General Howard. All the Indians respect him, and even to this day frequently talk of the happy times when General Howard was in command of our Post. [Barrett 1907:128–129]

During the few years that the Chiricahua Reservation existed, Cochise often brought his sons, Taza and Naiche, to the trading post at Fort Bowie. One of the clerks, Al Williamson, commented on Cochise’s friendly relationships with the white Americans there. Cochise, Williamson said, drank with the of¤cers but seldom smiled and had a grave demeanor. He remembered Taza’s pleasant, smiling face and his great size, much like that of his grandfather, Mangas Coloradas. Naiche, however, he described as resembling “his father in his slender build and reserved manner” (Lockwood 1938:124–126). Just before he died, in June 1874, Cochise summoned his headmen to get

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their approval to designate Taza as his successor. Cochise exacted a promise from Taza and Naiche that they would preserve the fragile peace with the white man. However, soon after Cochise’s death, the Indian Of¤ce began to carry out its misguided concentration policy that uprooted recently settled Indian people from their homelands that had been guaranteed to them “forever” (Debo 1976:94). This resulted in the 11 years of heated warfare that came to be known as the Apache wars. Furthermore, in 1876, the existence of deposits of gold, silver, and coal had been con¤rmed on land within the Chiricahua Reservation, providing a major incentive for forcing the Chiricahuas off their land (Skinner 1987:12). With little prior notice, the federal government ordered the Chiricahuas to move to the barren San Carlos Reservation. Jeffords resigned in protest; embarrassed, General Howard was powerless to challenge Washington’s authority. During the period of warfare in the 1860s and early 1870s that preceded the tentative peace, Taza had developed into a strong warrior. He would have been in his early to mid-thirties in 1874 when his father died. Following his father’s wishes, Taza succeeded Cochise; only two years later, however, Taza died of pneumonia, leaving the Chiricahuas without a strong leader. Naiche, as Cochise’s remaining son, was the only choice. The story of Taza’s death disturbed Naiche greatly, for he was not with his brother when he died and did not know the details of his death ¤rsthand. Their new Indian agent John Clum, needed to ¤nance his trip to Ohio to marry his ¤ancé who lived there, so he had concocted a scheme to take 20 Chiricahuas on tour in the East. The party visited the Centennial Exposition at Philadelphia and concluded in Washington, D.C., where Taza died of pneumonia. The Chiricahuas were convinced that Taza had been poisoned (Ball 1970:51–52). “When Taza was poisoned Naiche was too young to become the leader,” Kaywaykla, Juh’s son, later explained (Ball 1970:127). “He had not been trained for the place as had his brother because Cochise wanted his younger son to be loyal to Taza.” At ¤rst, Naiche refused to take over, and Juh, Daklugie’s father, had to step in as interim chief. Daklugie explained, “Naiche was afraid to take his father’s place. I don’t like to talk, [but] after he refused my father had to act” (Robinson 2000:57). Eventually, Naiche did take over. As he matured, Naiche proved to be a brave and able warrior, but he never wielded the authority and leadership expected of a chief. Sam Kenoi told Morris Opler that Naiche “liked his Indian dancing, and he liked ¤ghting, and he liked his drinking. You could make a good soldier out of him, and that was all” (1938:369). Naiche, said Kenoi (369), always sought advice from Geronimo, who

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dominated him. Nevertheless, Geronimo was always careful to defer to Naiche as the recognized chief, and, in photographs, Naiche appears on the right of Geronimo, the place of honor (Debo 1976:102). Britton Davis, the young lieutenant who was trusted by the Chiricahuas for his understanding, knew Naiche on the reservation. In addition to being a good warrior, said Davis, Naiche “was fond of the ladies, liked dancing and a good time generally, and was not serious enough for the responsibilities of leadership” (1963:71–72). Without the statesmanship or military genius of his father or the burning desire of Geronimo, Naiche was not an ideal leader. His lack of Power was his most serious drawback in the eyes of the Chiricahuas because Power entailed the ability to call on unseen forces to bene¤t his people. Naiche lacked this important resource. Power, as discussed in Chapter 1, could take many forms and serve many purposes, but in whatever form, it indicated that one had a connection to the supernatural and the sacred. According to Kaywakla, for example, Lozen, the famed female Chiricahua warrior, had the Power to divine the presence of the enemy. She would step back and extend her arms, with her palms up and hands cupped. Standing with uplifted face, she slowly revolved as she sang: Over all in this world Ussen has Power. Sometimes He shares it With those of this earth. This Power He has given me For the bene¤t of my people. This Power is good. It is good, as He is good. This Power I may use For the good of my people. (Ball 1970:128)

Despite lacking the kind of Power that could bene¤t the Chiricahuas, in many ways, Naiche was suited to the kind of leadership his people needed after their surrender. Of¤cers commented on “the quiet in®uence he had on his people,” his affable and courteous manner, and his cooperative dependability (H. Scott 1928:198; Burbank and Royce 1944:34). Visitors to Fort Pickens in Pensacola, Florida, often commented on his digni¤ed manner. Naiche, as one visitor described him, “responds to summons, smiles gravely, shakes hands cordially, ignoring the stares and comments of the curious with studied

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indifference” (Debo 1976:327). This contrasted with Mangas, who was “more genial” and smiled broadly and with Geronimo, who “steals up unannounced— sly and silent as a mountain lion” (327). Naiche and the other Chiricahuas were essentially powerless in determining where the government would send them or when their prisoner-of-war status would be removed. Despite repeated pleas to the federal government that they be freed from their prisoner status, it was not until the War Department recognized Fort Sill as an ideal site for the training of artillery that the government decided to take action. When the cultivated ¤elds and villages of the Chiricahuas stood in the way of military training, it was obvious that something needed to be done. In 1911, Colonel Hugh Scott, who had previously worked with the Chiricahuas, came to Fort Sill to meet with them and to reach a solution. Naiche’s eloquence and concern for the well-being of his people is evident from his response to Scott: “All we want is to be freed and be released as prisoners and given land and homes that we can call our own. This is all we think about. We are thinking the same today as the last time, and that is why we are here now, to say these things.” Then he went on to describe the educated status of his people, “Half or more than half of these people talk English. Half or more than half can read and write; they all know how to work.” He concluded, “You have held us long enough. We want something else now” (Debo 1976:447). Congress passed a law releasing the Chiricahuas from their prisoner-of-war status on August 24, 1912, appropriating $200,000 for their settlement on lands chosen by the secretaries of war and the interior; in 1913, $100,000 was added to this amount (Debo 1976:447). Since Arizona citizens still refused to consider the return of the Chiricahuas to their homeland, the Mescalero Apache Reservation in New Mexico was considered to be the most appropriate location (see Timeline). A delegation of Chiricahuas was taken to visit the Mescaleros, and each Chiricahua was allowed to choose between the Mescalero Reservation and remaining in Oklahoma on individual farms that had been purchased from the heirs of deceased Comanche, Kiowa, and KiowaApache allottees. Roughly 185 Chiricahuas decided to move to Mescalero, while nearly 80 chose to remain in Oklahoma (448). Naiche and his family—his wife, ¤ve of his children, his mother who was also the widow of Cochise, his two half sisters, his wife’s parents, and his wife’s half brother—led the group to Mescalero, where they arrived April 4, 1913. Historian Eve Ball described Naiche as “a handsome man in his youth and a tragic ¤gure in his age.” Convinced that “he had failed his people . . . he grieved over it til he died” (Robinson 2000:59). His life came to an end in 1921.

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NAICHE AS AN ARTIST The ¤rst account of Naiche as an artist comes from Moses Folsom, a reporter for the Pensacola Daily Commercial. Folsom, a correspondent for several newspapers, had traveled extensively in the West writing about conditions on various reservations. Early in 1887, Folsom visited the Chiricahua prisoners of war at Fort Pickens in western Florida. At this time, the men in Naiche’s band were still separated from their families, who were imprisoned in Fort Marion at St. Augustine, on the eastern side of the state. Despite the fact that his writing re®ected the dominant ideology of the time—he referred to the “diabolical wickedness and bloodcurdling cruelties” of the Chiricahuas—he also described Naiche’s ¤rst recorded creative efforts. On his tour of the prison, Folsom “looked around some more and found Chief Naiche seated at a table engaged in some activity” (Skinner 1987:156). Folsom was surprised to discover that Naiche was drawing a picture of a horse, using crayons of various colors. As scholar Miriam Perrett (1998:1) points out, Naiche had probably been creative since his childhood. While Chiricahua women in the second half of the 19th century made baskets, cradleboards, wickiups, and clothing for their families, men were responsible for weapons and horse gear. Ceremonial occasions required buckskin with elaborate beaded and painted designs: the dress for the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony, the painted hats and hide ponchos for medicine men, and the fringed kilts for the Mountain Spirit dancers. Although there were no full-time artists in Chiricahua society, anyone with special abilities had many opportunities to express their creativity. Used to being able to provide for his family and people, Naiche, along with all the other Chiricahua warriors, hated the feeling of dependency that was forced upon them. Their entire lives had been centered on their prowess in hunting and raiding as a means to acquire the necessary food and clothing that they needed. Some of those who had already been sent to Fort Marion had had to leave behind farming enterprises, as discussed earlier. The only means open to the Chiricahuas to earn income was to sell what they had and to make objects that might appeal to the public. On the train trip to Florida, the Chiricahuas discovered that the public was hungry for any object associated with Geronimo and the other Apaches, so a market already existed for Indian artifacts. As previously noted, the city of Pensacola had actively lobbied for Geronimo, whose ®amboyant character and showmanship had caught the imagination of the public. Geronimo was delighted by his fame, and Naiche was pleased to remain out of the limelight. Often over a hundred tourists a day came to see the Chiricahuas. Pensacola citizens, their hopes bolstered by the lengthy and well-publicized mili-

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tary campaign to capture Geronimo, compared his imprisonment at Fort Pickens on the island of Santa Rosa to Napoleon’s incarceration on the island of Saint Helena. Both the hyperbole and the patronizing tone are characteristic of newspaper reports about the Chiricahuas. Naiche was seldom, if ever, mentioned in these reports, and Geronimo was nearly always referred to as the leader of the band. In reality, the Chiricahuas continued to defer to Naiche as the actual leader as they had since the death of his brother Taza: The powers that be in Washington have at last come to their senses and selected Fort Pickens as the most suitable place to incarcerate the greatest living American general and his principle of¤cers. Fort Pickens is well suited as an abiding place for one of Geronimo’s genius, for there he can, like his great prototype Napoleon at Saint Helena, live over again his conquests without being disturbed by the outside world. Fort Pickens is large and solid and can hold Geronimo and his band very well, and a few hundred more if the government sees ¤t to send them. We welcome the nation’s distinguished guests and promise to keep them so safely under lock and key that they will forget their hair raising proclivities and become good Indians. [Skinner 1987:103–104]

In fact, Geronimo’s presence drew so many tourists that he learned to exploit this by selling not only his own productions but also those of the other prisoners. When it became evident that Geronimo was the one who got the attention, Naiche and others gave him items to sell for them. Even before their arrival in Pensacola, this preference became evident. On their way to Fort Pickens, when an open draw between Mobile and New Orleans delayed their train, a train headed in the other direction was also delayed for several hours. The theatrical troupe on board the other train asked for permission to speak to Geronimo and to buy souvenirs from him. After Geronimo had sold everything he had, he stepped behind a train car and put on items that other Chiricahuas gave him to sell. Then he returned to the memento seekers, took off the article, and handed the brass ring or cartridge belt to the purchaser (Skinner 1987:105). The public continued their fascination with Geronimo. However, some reporters tried to delve more deeply into the character of the other Chiricahua warriors. On March 3, 1887, one reporter interviewed Naiche and found him to be articulate and digni¤ed, a major departure from the stereotype that he had previously held. William Hosea Ballou, a New Yorker who wrote for the Chicago Tribune and other newspapers, was writing a story called “Apaches at Fort Pickens” (Skinner 1987:199). His description of Naiche said that “he spoke as a lawyer and with great acumen. . . . He sat in a chair. He talked calmly, almost dispassionately. There were no gestures” (203). When Ballou

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asked him how he liked his quarters, Naiche replied, “We have to like it. There is nothing else to do” (203). Artistic pursuits also helped to combat the ennui and sense of imprisonment that the Chiricahua experienced. Conditions at Fort Pickens were relatively bleak and desolate as described by Ballou, who called Fort Pickens “the purgatory of the continent” for eight months of the year. “The sands blaze in ¤erce heat. Swarms of poisonous insects envelop it. . . . Tides, in high weather, reach to its walls” (Skinner 1987:199). The reporter asked Naiche what had led to the last campaign. Naiche replied, through interpreter George Wratten (Skinner 1987: 204–205), that the abominable treatment by the Indian agents, who stole from them and failed to protect them from the lower classes of Mexicans, and subsequently failed to speak up for them when the Indians were blamed for the crimes committed by the Mexicans. The Indians determined that there was no peaceful future in the current situation, and that in all likelihood they would be persecuted and probably killed for the crimes of others, so they decided to escape. When further pressed, Naiche responded that even when they do have food and other provisions, they are charity and unworthy of the Chiricahua, who traditionally are self-suf¤cient and independent hunters. He tried unsuccessfully to explain the Chiricahua reaction to eating another man’s food, and wearing another man’s clothes and shoes, and made a good case for being provided decent land upon which to build their homes, raise their crops, and prepare for the future. Naiche’s ¤erce independence and pride was evident, but no changes were forthcoming. Naiche was Cochise’s son and a chief in his own right; not only was he humiliated by no longer being able to provide for his own family, but his impact on the well-being of his people had also been wrested from his control. The only way in which he could provide for his family was through his artwork. Even though no record exists of any artwork that Naiche produced during the miserable conditions at Mount Vernon Barracks, he probably continued to engage in creative activity. When General Oliver Howard sent his adjutant and son to inspect conditions at Mount Vernon, teacher Sophie Shepard witnessed Lieutenant Guy Howard’s meeting with the Chiricahua men in the schoolhouse. She described Naiche as “a magni¤cent-looking man, whose face was so sorrow stricken that it pained her to look at him” (Skinner 1987:268). Once more, Naiche railed against the state of dependency into which he and his people had been forced by the federal government, lamenting that they had been promised tools and the land on which to work, and these promises had been broken (268). Naiche went on to describe his despair at the effect that Mount Vernon was having on his people: “This is a bad place for my people; they are dying

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around me. The sun rises on my friends; they are here. The sun sets, and they are gone!” (Skinner 1987:268). Dr. Walter Reed concurred, saying that if the ravages of pulmonary diseases were to be stopped, they must be removed to a dry climate (268). During the three and a half years of imprisonment, the original 515 Chiricahuas who had been taken from Arizona had experienced an extremely high death rate. Of those sent to Carlisle, 30 had died, 12 had returned due to poor health, and 70 remained at Carlisle. Howard (269) reported that the Chiricahuas had experienced a 6.8 percent annual death rate, over three times the annual death rate in the United States, which is less than two percent. Against this miserable everyday reality, Naiche probably turned to his art as a way to pass time and as a means of generating income. Although the date for Naiche’s ¤rst recorded hide painting was not until 1898 or 1899, when he was at Fort Sill, he was probably producing art in some form during the eight years at Mount Vernon. It is also possible that Naiche produced more hide paintings than those extant in collections; he may have made some for his relatives and friends or for sale to tourists. At Fort Sill, Oklahoma, when the Chiricahuas were ¤nally allowed to settle down to a more normal way of life, Naiche’s creativity blossomed, and this is when he produced the exceptional hide paintings and wood carvings for which he was known. Naiche had honed his skills so well by the time that painter Elbridge Ayer Burbank encountered him at Fort Sill, Burbank (Burbank and Royce 1946: 33–34, 207, 223) called Naiche “by far the best” of all the Indian artists that he had ever known. Burbank, nephew of Edward E. Ayer, president of the Field Museum in Chicago, had been sent by his uncle to Fort Sill to paint a portrait of Geronimo in 1897. Burbank returned to visit the prisoners in 1898 and again in 1899; it was during this third visit that he met Naiche (Debo 1976:379). Curious about his technique, Naiche approached Burbank one day when he was sketching. From then on, Naiche observed Burbank at his work every day to glean as much knowledge as he could from Burbank’s explanations of his technique; Burbank later sent Naiche a full set of colors from Chicago. He described the cane that Naiche had carved and given him as “beautifully executed, then as ¤nely painted” (Burbank and Royce 1946:33–34, 207, 223). Burbank purchased one of Naiche’s hide paintings for the Field Museum but later gave it to French artist Jean Baptiste Millet who took it back to France, greatly impressed by its beauty. Naiche was familiar enough with the extensive songs of the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony to lead the singing for the ceremony when it was conducted in September 1905 for Geronimo’s 16-year-old daughter, Eva (Debo 1976:392). Having seen the ceremony throughout the course of his life, Naiche was able

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to incorporate details such as symbols from the girl’s dress and the formation of the dancers into his paintings. Because of his creative bent, Naiche was especially observant and attuned to the details of the visual world around him. NAICHE’S CREATIVITY Naturalist Diane Ackerman raises the question, “Are artists born into a different sensory universe?” (2004:159). Phenomenologist Merleau-Ponty described the intensity with which painters experience and express the world around them. He cited the example of Cézanne, who claimed not only to see the depth and smoothness of an object but also to see its odor. According to Merleau-Ponty, Cézanne considered his task as an artist to be that of making visible how objects in the physical world feel in tangible form, including the presence of these objects. One of the ¤rst traits that facilitates creativity is a genetic predisposition for a given domain (Csikszentmihalyi 1997:52). A person whose nervous system is more sensitive to color and light has an advantage over others in becoming an artist. Born with exceptional sensitivity to visual stimuli, he or she can discriminate among shapes, shadows, colors, and details, and remember visual images better than the general population. Such a person pays greater attention to the details of visual information. Being better at the visual domain, an artist becomes more interested in colors and shapes, learns more about them, combines them, and plays with colors, shapes, and visual details. Artists view and experience the world around them with a much greater intensity of feeling than do most people, who do not take in the sights and sounds and smells of the sensory universe around them to the same degree. In order to have created the paintings that he created, I believe that while he was painting, Naiche smelled the smoke of the camp¤re and heard the beating of the drum and saw the light of the ¤re illuminating the faces and clothing of the dancers near it. Perhaps he even sang the songs to himself as he worked; Navajo medicine men often sing songs that relate to speci¤c sandpainting imagery as they reproduce these images (Grif¤n-Pierce 1992). Acting as a mnemonic of sorts, the words of the songs could have guided him to a remembered image of the positioning of the dancers at that time. At the very least, the music would have recreated the emotional terrain in which the ceremony—and, therefore, his painting—existed. Such music would have guided him into the same state of joy from experiencing the sense of communitas that was the essence of the ceremony for his people. During the ceremony, everyone focused on their commonalities, their sense of being Chiricahua, and on the joy of welcoming the girl into womanhood in a time-

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less ceremony given to them by White Painted Woman. All personal concerns were set aside as well as any differences in rank or other inequalities, replaced by a sense of oneness in purpose and intention. One of the key things that Naiche had been trained to do as a young man when he was tracking deer or watching for enemies was to be able to direct his attention so that he was intensely aware of his surroundings. This intense attentiveness and his visual acuity helped him to record images in his memory. Neuroscientists have identi¤ed several kinds of memory, including semantic and episodic memory (Ackerman 2004:81). Semantic memory helps people remember a long string of facts about a domain of knowledge; Naiche would have used his semantic memory to recall all that he knew about the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony and the Gáhe dancers. Episodic memory, as the term suggests, refers to the details of a speci¤c moment when something occurred; Naiche would have had in his mind many snapshots of moments in speci¤c ceremonies, and it was from this bank of episodic memory that he composed his scenes and painted them. Writer Pearl Buck holds that truly creative minds combine intense sensitivity with the overpowering necessity to create, a feeling of such urgency that unless they are creating they are not really alive (81). If this is so, then the wide range of traumatic experiences that marked Naiche’s life must have hit him especially hard and painting must have provided a necessary haven into which he could temporarily escape the bleakness of his surroundings. On a personal level, there is no doubt that Naiche could remove himself from the emotional and spiritual desolation of his present surroundings while he was engaged in the creative process. It is common for artists to experience a suspension of time, in which the conditions of the present cease to exist as the artist becomes immersed in the world that he or she is depicting. The periods of time that Naiche could devote to his art may have been the few moments of remembered joy in what was otherwise a bleak period of enforced dependency. Whether he was conscious of it or not, while he was painting, Naiche was able to immerse himself in the happiness of the past that temporarily blocked out the reality of the present. In examining the details of his paintings, it is possible to imagine Naiche’s sense of joy in recreating past scenes. Perhaps he even depicted speci¤c individuals: in his paintings, the designs of blankets worn by people vary, as do the colors of headbands and clothing. He may have thought, the night of that particular ceremony, Kaywaykla was standing over there with his wife, and Perico and his wife were over there, beside their wickiup. In drawing couples, he may have re®ected on the webs of kinship as people came together to

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celebrate the Chiricahuas’ most cherished ceremony. A powerful sense of community pervades his paintings. In one of his paintings (Figure 44, see color section), he shows couples peeking out of their wickiups to watch the ceremony as wisps of smoke wind upward from the smokeholes in their homes. A row of spectators stands in front of them, their attention focused on the dancers that circle the ¤re. Each detail is lovingly rendered, from moccasins to blanket designs. Caught in a moment of movement, the masked dancers raise their dance wands as they bring to life the Mountain Spirits that they embody. Each of the four Mountain Spirit dancers and the clown that accompanies them is rendered with individual distinctness, their bent posture in contrast with the upright dignity of the pairs of female dancers that also encircle the ¤re. Naiche’s paintings bring to life James Kaywaykla’s description of the ceremony, as it was given to the Chiricahuas by their medicine woman, Esonknhsendehe: Listen, remember, and obey: When your young girls have attained womanhood you are to make a feast for the worthy—the chaste. You will observe the rite of which I tell you. It is for the maidens, their sponsors, and the medicine men. It is to commemorate the sanctity of the gift of producing new life. The medicine men are to sing many prayers, a hundred seventy-four, or more, during the four days of the ceremonial. You are to teach them these songs. While they sing the maidens are to dance, and the fourth night the singing is to continue until dawn. During this rite the men will retire to a secret place and dress for their dance. There are to be four groups of four men each, for four is your sacred number. They will wear buckskin skirts, moccasins, and a mask surmounted by a high crown of sticks, painted with sacred symbols. No red is to be used. Their bodies are to be blackened and symbols painted upon chest and back. The men are to be accompanied by one or more clowns, with bodies painted white, and heads covered with masks. These will be boys learning the rites so that they may in time be admitted to the company of the dancers. They are to serve the men, to return to them any wand that may be dropped by the dancers, and to relieve the solemnity of the occasion. This dance is to be performed only after night has fallen. The participants are to be treated with the respect that would be shown if they were the Mountain Spirits they impersonate. No sign of recognition may be given them, not even by their mothers. Through the minds of the dancers, messages will be transmitted to the minds of the maidens who for the four days partake of the qualities of White

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Painted Woman. The maidens will tell the medicine men the messages they receive, and these must be obeyed, for they are for the bene¤t of the entire tribe. All who attend the dances will receive good. [Ball 1970:38–40]

This powerful story clearly states the sacredness and Power that are present in this ceremony and how these forces may be of bene¤t to the people. In its depiction of such a life-af¤rming ceremony, one that brings out the humanity of the Chiricahua people rather than the stereotypical “blood-thirsty” portrayal of Apaches popular in other Westerns of this time (1950), Broken Arrow remains a breakthrough ¤lm. This ceremony lies at the very heart of Chiricahua life and belief. Naiche was drawing this Power to him to bene¤t his people and to ensure their continuation as a people through the only means that was available to him, painting. Cecile Ganteaume (2002:46), an associate curator at the National Museum of the American Indian, believes that Naiche made his series of hide paintings of the Chiricahua Girl’s Puberty Ceremony for a white audience in an attempt to correct their misinterpretation of the ceremony as a “Devil Dance.” Acutely aware of the extent to which whites denigrated his people and their way of life, says Ganteaume, Naiche sought to af¤rm not only Chiricahua values but also to interpret them in a more favorable light to non-Indians. As noted previously, one excursion company even advertised it as a “War Dance” (Skinner 1987:185). In the late 1800s, newspaper reporters often used “bitter satirical and cutting remarks” to describe ethnic groups and this “taunting, scof¤ng gibe . . . could hardly have better re®ected the mood of the American people” at this time (55). The story that appeared in the Pensacola Daily Commercial stated: All day yesterday and today preparations have been going forward for the grand biennial war dance of the Apaches, con¤ned within Fort Pickens, which will begin at sunset this evening, and last until sunrise to-morrow. Wratten, the interpreter, has been to Warrington, purchasing gewgaws and ribbons for the purpose of decoration, and a ‘high old time’ is anticipated by both the Indians and those who intend witnessing the festivities. [Skinner 1987:185]

Ganteaume bases her argument that Naiche made his paintings for a white audience on the fact that he diverged from the Chiricahua style of painting to adopt a three-dimensional mode of constructing space so that whites could comprehend the ¤gures and perspective (Ganteaume 2002). Apache pictorial representation arranged ¤gures and other elements radiating from a center point, providing an aerial perspective of the scene (Figure 43); the

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Figure 43: Chiricahua Apache deer hide painting, c. 1875. (Adapted from painting at Peabody Museum, Harvard University. Cat. No 10/22551. Dimensions: 42.5″ long, 37.1″ wide.)

painted hide was intended to be laid on the ground and viewed from multiple angles. In contrast, a three-dimensional composition had a foreground, midground, and background so that the painting could be hung vertically and viewed from a single angle. As Ganteaume traces the chronology of Naiche’s paintings, she shows how he modi¤ed his pictorial schema, incorporating additional elements of threedimensional composition in successive paintings. The following discussion is drawn from her description of his paintings (2002:49–52). In his ¤rst known painting, dated 1898 (Figure 45, see color section), Naiche used a more traditional Apache treatment of space with ¤gures radiating from the center (Figure 43). In his next known painting (Figure 46, see color section), he depicts the scene from a new viewpoint, with the audience aligned along the bottom of the painting with their backs to us. By 1908, he is depicting two rows of male and female onlookers, some sitting and some standing, to create a more

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realistic sense of space (Figure 47, see color section). The next spatial device that Naiche adds is overlap to suggest movement through space (Figure 48, see color section). He has the paired female dancers slightly overlap one another as they move around the bon¤re and uses overlapping wickiups at the bottom edge to create a sense of foreground. In Naiche’s later paintings, from around 1909 (Figures 49, 50, and 51, see color section), he also uses foreshortening to convey three-dimensional space with a foreground, mid-ground, and background. In the foreground, spectators peek out of overlapping wickiups. The mid-ground is ¤lled with an audience of male and female paired onlookers that form a semicircle; ¤gures at the end are foreshortened to create a sense of a semicircle. I believe that while creating art that would appeal to a white audience was one of Naiche’s goals in producing his hide paintings, it was not his primary goal. The Chiricahuas have always been a spiritual people; the basis for their belief system is Ussen and his goodness. Through the hide paintings, Naiche was able to appeal to Ussen for help for his people. Having been denied Power through more conventional Chiricahua channels, Naiche turned to the only strength that set him apart from others: his artistic ability. The Chiricahua believed in the power of visual imagery as well as in the power of thought to create and in®uence events. Embued with the sense of responsibility to lead his people at an early age, Naiche was helping them in the only way that he could. His eloquent pleas to of¤cers who came to ask his opinion had not helped to change the Chiricahua’s situation, so he turned to supernatural assistance. Furthermore, there was the sense of pleasure and ful¤llment that he got when he created his paintings. Not only was he immersed in his own world of painting but, because of the subject matter, he was also able to make the feelings of participation in the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony come alive. They were able to celebrate this ceremony during their captivity, but I believe that Naiche was not painting recent celebrations of this event. Instead, he was reaching back to long ago ceremonies held at a time when the Chiricahuas were a free people. By painting them, he was able to prolong the duration of the time that he remembered them, the time that he actually dwelled in these vivid memories. He remembered where the participants were dancing, the postures that they assumed, the movement of their bodies, and where the audience was standing. These vivid recollections made the harsh reality of the present melt away. In its place were some of the most joyful experiences from the ¤rst 35 years of his life. A combination of scienti¤c and anthropological insights is helpful in answering such questions as why Naiche chose the puberty ceremony as his subject matter instead of branching out into other subjects. Why did he

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change his style over time? And what led him to create art in the ¤rst place? Even though creativity and innovation are ¤elds whose very nature make them dif¤cult to study, there are certain shared characteristics that are helpful in understanding Naiche’s possible motivations for creating and changing his style over time. The disappointment of being transferred to Mount Vernon instead of returning to their homeland as free people must have been heartbreaking. Furthermore, after hoping for an improvement over the conditions that they had experienced in Florida, their oppressive new surroundings must have seemed even more desolate. The conditions of everyday life were chaotic and beyond the control of the Chiricahuas, in comparison to the autonomy of their previous life. With few opportunities and few possibilities and the government providing their food and supplies, the Chiricahuas must have felt purposeless and alienated. Naiche and the other Chiricahuas could not have helped but experience a chronic state of psychological dislocation. It must have been especially dif¤cult for the men, who, as young and vital warriors, had lived a self-suf¤cient life in which they provided for themselves and their families; now they experienced the humiliation of forced dependency on the United States government, a government that provided insuf¤cient and undependable supplies of food and shelter. In the Southwest, they lived in their own territory and were respected by others. Masters of their domain, they had a clear sense of their own identity. For the rest of their lives, they would be reduced to a subaltern status, living on the outside of the dominant society and forced to accept the vagaries of the federal government as its Congress debated their future. They had to learn a new language and new skills because their own Apache language was considered by the dominant society to be inferior. Their children were forcibly taken away to learn the ways of a new language and a new culture. They constantly worried about the health and well-being of their children at Carlisle, who, far too often, were sent home to die. And those who survived must have seemed lost to the white culture, with all its alien ways. No doubt they worried about the future of these children who, it seemed, were hybrids caught in between cultures and not belonging to either. They were too Indian in appearance to succeed in the white world but, with their newly acquired veneer of white “civilization,” how would they get along in the Indian world to which they were returning? Finally, there was the disease and death all around them in Alabama and throughout their incarceration. From a healthy people at home in their environment, they had become a sickly people who were disappearing from this world. All too easily, those around them were succumbing to disease and dying. No doubt some of them wondered about their survival into the next century. They must have

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asked themselves, Will there even be a Chiricahua people or will we disappear forever? Humans may be hard-wired for the excitement of discovery. Psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (1991, 1997) believes that humans have a dual motivational system, programmed for survival on one hand and for evolution on the other. He proposes that “some individuals have developed a nervous system in which the discovery of novelty stimulates the pleasure centers in the brain” (1997:109). A certain number in any given population are more motivated than others in the same population by the enjoyment that comes from confronting challenges and by discovering new ways of doing things. If this is true, it could explain some of the differences in the ways that various Chiricahuas responded to incarceration. Some, like Daklugie, resisted but then learned valuable information during their Carlisle experiences; others, like Betzinez, accommodated much more comfortably to the white world, choosing to remain at Fort Sill and raise cattle. This would also explain part of the reason why Naiche, above all the others who experienced incarceration, is remembered as a gifted artist. Sociologist Talcott Parsons (1942) introduced the distinction between instrumental and expressive functions. When the Chiricahuas lived in the Southwest, much of their time was spent developing and using their instrumental skills that enabled them to cope effectively with their environment. The men had found ful¤llment in hunting and raiding, activities that demanded their complete attention. From childhood Apaches learned how to structure their attention on nuances of sight and sound in their environment that non-Apaches overlooked. Based upon subtle cues in their environment, they made life-and-death decisions. They invested enormous amounts of energy into learning the discipline and skills essential to warfare and hunting. Apache warriors probably experienced the same kind of clarity of purpose, because all distractions had been eliminated so that they experienced a sense of exhilaration from the same intense focus and purpose that led Vietnam veterans to speak with nostalgia about front-line action (Csikszentmihalyi 1991:69). Yet, from the time that they surrendered, the warriors had no outlet for these skills. Their entire lives, until this point in time, had been directed toward developing the skills necessary for hunting and raiding, and now they were no longer able to derive the sense of intense satisfaction that they had felt from performing these activities successfully (cf. Macgregor 1946). Naiche was fortunate because he still had expressive skills to rely upon and to develop further. Through his painting, Naiche was able to externalize his subjective experiences of the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony. When he was totally immersed in his painting, he could escape his public persona and set aside the expectations of being a leader. Through his art, he could enter a world where

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his people were joyful and bound together by a celebration that brought greater good into everyone’s lives. His painting was motivated not so much by a desire to achieve some external goal but rather by the feeling of freedom from the threats and stresses of his everyday life. Even though he eventually had to step back into the conditions of his everyday life and confront the purposelessness and poverty of his people, while Naiche was involved in his world of symbols, he was removed from an unbearable reality where experience was raw and unmediated. Naiche found refuge in his art. Creating art is also a way of bringing order to chaos. With so many shapes and colors competing for attention in our sphere of vision at any moment in time, the artist must select those that are most salient of the scene that he hopes to present and concentrate on the essence of those particular shapes and colors to make them recognizable, if that is what he is trying to accomplish. There is a deep sense of satisfaction in bringing order to something as tangible as shapes and colors on a piece of paper or hide. This is especially true when the world around the person is ¤lled with disorder and chaos that is beyond the control of the individual. CULTURAL CAPITAL One important factor is the ownership of “cultural capital” (Bourdieu 1977), which refers to access to a domain. As the son of the most prominent couple in his band, Cochise and the daughter of Mangas Coloradas, Naiche certainly owned cultural capital. Even though he was not trained to be a leader, Naiche lived in a household that teemed with a sense of authority. People looked to his father for leadership and for problem-solving. Cochise drew upon the wisdom of Apache history, Apache stories told by the elders, in order to lead his people, which he is said to have done with great compassion. Cochise was also respected for his speaking ability, as were all Apache headmen. Naiche would have seen his father in a public arena, speaking to his people and explaining why he believed a speci¤c course of action was the wisest of several choices. Cochise was also probably more re®ective than most Chiricahuas because he had to consider all possibilities and then make a strong case for what he considered to be best for everyone, even the poorest members of his group. Growing up with one of the most renowned Apache leaders gave Naiche access to thoughtful discussions and a sense of life beyond sel¤sh concerns. The Mountain Spirit dancers and the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony were very much a part of Naiche’s life, as they were for all Chiricahuas, but Naiche probably also heard discussions about the meaning of the dancers and the ceremonies and their place in Chiricahua life. He lived in a household that

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encouraged him to become more self-re®ective and to consider wider meanings than most Chiricahua children. When Naiche began to paint hides that illustrated the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony, he was drawing on substantial cultural capital because he grew up with parents who were not only knowledgeable about Apache tradition but were also probably able to articulate its meanings to him. One of the few bene¤ts that Naiche experienced from imprisonment was contact with white artists. While we do not know as much about the details of his imprisonment at Fort Pickens in Pensacola, we do know that Apache men at Fort Marion in St. Augustine were encouraged to draw, so it is entirely possible that this was also true at Fort Pickens. The constant stream of tourists to both forts would also have exposed Naiche to visitors who may have brought him images that he studied. Furthermore, this was a time of photography. Beginning with the photographs taken by Camillus Sidney Fly of Tombstone, Arizona, on March 25 and 26, 1886, Naiche experienced ¤rsthand what it was like to be photographed. Remarkable because they are “the only known photographs of Indians as enemy in the ¤eld” (Van Orden 1994:1), these images were taken at Cañon de los Embudos, Mexico, and show Naiche, Geronimo, and their warriors as free people and as they negotiated with General George Crook. After his surrender, Naiche was photographed many times, and, no doubt became familiar with the photographic image, which evoked a new way of seeing. For someone as sensitive to visual stimuli as Naiche was, he must have been impressed by both the immediacy of this new technology and its ability to record details and to order perspective with a foreground, mid-ground, and background. No doubt such exposure to different ways of seeing and recording provided exciting new visual stimuli that affected him as an artist. Various artists came to see him during his incarceration and they shared not only their media with him but also their work. Originally interested in Naiche because of his position as hereditary chief and his digni¤ed bearing, they became fascinated by his artistic abilities and saw considerable talent in his efforts. This led them to encourage him as an artist and to discuss ideas about perspective and styles of visual representation with him. Inspired by this encouragement and interest in his work, Naiche experimented and set new challenges for himself in his work. Ironically, had Naiche not been imprisoned, he would probably not have had the time to devote to his artistic development or the same degree of exposure to other ways of representing the world around him. Such intellectual and artistic stimulation must have been rewarding, just as the experience of having people purchase his work must have also brought him some level of personal satisfaction.

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NAICHE AS AN ACTIVE AGENT Psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (1991) has spent decades researching a phenomena known as “®ow.” An experience that can occur even in concentration camps (Frankl 1963), ®ow is characterized by a sense of being an active agent in one’s own life instead of being buffeted by outside forces. This state of inner experience comes about when we concentrate so completely on the task at hand that everything else, including outer conditions, is temporarily forgotten. The model that he bases his work on is called “a phenomenological model of consciousness based on information theory” (Csikszentmihalyi 1991:25); this means that his work deals with events (phenomena) as they are experienced and interpreted instead of focusing on the structures (such as neurochemical processes) that make the experience possible. Information theory refers to the dynamics of attention and memory which include knowledge about how we process, store, and use sensory data. With so much going on around us, everything we see, hear, smell, or remember can potentially enter our consciousness. However, we only have a limited amount of attention because the central nervous system has de¤nite limits on how much information—differentiated sounds, visual stimuli, nuances of thought or emotion—it can process at any given time. Information enters consciousness as we intentionally focus our attention on the information or automatically focus attention through habits based on biological or social instructions. We actively shape events that go on around us, imposing on them a reality of their own through our consciousness. Through intention, we attend to some stimuli in preference to others. Memories, thoughts, and feelings become shaped by the things that we consider to be important. Artists see the world in a different way from other people by attending more to visual stimuli and building up a storehouse of visual memories deepened by emotional attachment that make these memories come alive. One of the strongest motivating factors that people in the sciences, the arts, and in avocations, such as chess and rock climbing, mention is the quality of experience they feel when they are involved with the activity. Interestingly, this optimal experience—“an almost automatic, effortless, yet highly focused state of consciousness”—that Csikszentmihalyi (1997:112) calls ®ow is described in “almost identical terms” whether the person is an artist, athlete, scientist, or writer. He also found, in his research, that the descriptions do not vary signi¤cantly by culture, gender, or age. When people describe being in a sense of ®ow, they mention between one and eight of the following characteristics (Csikszentmihalyi 1991:49–70). First, the task at hand is one that can be completed because there are clear

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goals every step of the way. This contrasts with everyday life with its contradictory demands. When he was creating his hide paintings, Naiche knew what element he wanted to paint next, what ¤gures went in what area of the hide. Circumstances must also lend themselves to a period of intense concentration. Concentration is possible if the task both has clear goals and also provides immediate feedback. Naiche knew immediately after painting a horse or a dancer if it was a skillful rendering. He knew if he should place the next ¤gure farther toward the margin and if there was room for one more wickiup in the foreground of the painting. The balance between challenges and skills is equal. The person feels well matched to the opportunities for action, in contrast to the challenges of everyday life, which often feel overwhelming. Clearly, the daily life that the Chiricahuas were leading at Mount Vernon, with its constant death and depression, was beyond their control; even during their more settled life at Fort Sill, they still had to face the stigma of their prisoner-of-war status. Against this background of uncertainty, it must have been a great relief for Naiche to spend time immersed in an activity in which his artistic skills were fully equal to the challenge of painting a hide that depicted a ceremony he knew so well. One of the most salient characteristics of a ®ow experience is such deep but effortless involvement that the worries and frustrations of everyday life fall away, replaced by a sense of bliss. The experience is so enjoyable that a sense of control is experienced over one’s actions. And, ¤nally, the activity dictates the rhythm so that all sense of time as measured by outside events seems to vanish. Hours may pass by in minutes, and day may become night. The overwhelming characteristic of this kind of experience is that of intense concentration, so intense that a person brings all of his or her relevant skills to the challenge in front of him or her, leaving no room for attention to process any other information. This kind of intense involvement with the task at hand means that the person stops being aware of himself or herself as separate from the actions being performed. While the experience lasts, the person forgets all the unpleasant aspects of life. The activity has clearly structured demands that impose order, and the disorder of everyday life is shut out. Concentration is focused on a narrow window of time, shutting out all troubling thoughts and problems. The person is very much in charge of the situation and, while engaged in the activity, it becomes a total world. In everyday life, people often feel threatened, but in a ®ow situation, the clear goals, stable rules, and challenges that are well matched to the person lead to a heightened sense of control. This kind of intense engagement in an activity brings about a loss of self-consciousness and self-transcendence. The

Figure 44: Naiche deer hide painting of Girl’s Puberty Ceremony Gáhe dance, 1898–1916. (Adapted from painting at Fort Sill National Historic Landmark, Fort Sill, Oklahoma. Cat. No. 91.157.48. Dimensions: 33″ long, 27″ wide.)

Figure 45: Naiche deer hide painting of Girl’s Puberty Ceremony Gáhe dance, 1898–99. Believed to be Naiche’s earliest existing painting of this ceremony. (Adapted from painting formerly in collection of Newberry Library, Chicago. Acc. No. NL 206. Auctioned at Sotheby’s New York, 1990. Dimensions: 69″ long × 54″ wide.)

Figure 46: Naiche deer hide painting of Girl’s Puberty Ceremony Gáhe dance, 1898. (Adapted from painting at the Fort Sill National Historic Landmark, Fort Sill, Oklahoma. Cat. No. 90.211.2. Dimensions: 74″ long × 60″ wide.)

Figure 47: Naiche deer hide painting of Girl’s Puberty Ceremony Gáhe dance, given 1908 (may have been painted earlier). (Adapted from painting owned by Legters Family; Naiche gave this to Rev. Leonard L. Legters, pastor, Reformed Church Apache Mission, Ft. Sill 1906–1910, to commemorate the birth of David Legters in 1908; dimensions unknown.)

Figure 48: Naiche deer hide painting of Girl’s Puberty Ceremony Gáhe dance. Naiche gave this to Mark Harrington in 1909. (Adapted from painting in Southwest Museum, Los Angeles. Acc. No. 900.G.128. Dimensions: 33″ long × 20″ wide.)

Figure 49: Naiche deer hide painting of Girl’s Puberty Ceremony Gáhe dance, purchased from Naiche 1909. (Adapted from painting at Cultural Resources Center, National Museum of the American Indian, Smithsonian Institution, Suitland, Maryland. Acc. No. 021417.000. Dimensions: 32.5″ long × 28″ wide.)

Figure 50: Naiche deer hide painting of Girl’s Puberty Ceremony Gáhe dance, purchased from Naiche 1909. (Adapted from painting at Cultural Resources Center, National Museum of the American Indian, Smithsonian Institution, Suitland, Maryland. Acc. No. 021417.000. Dimensions: 31″ long × 26.75″ wide.)

Figure 51: Naiche deer hide painting of Girl’s Puberty Ceremony Gáhe dance, c. 1911. Owned by Mary Roe, wife of Rev. Walter Roe, Reformed Church missionary to POWs, 1897–1913. (Adapted from painting sold by Reese Kincaid, Rev. Roe’s brother-in-law, to the Oklahoma Historical Society, Norman, Oklahoma. Cat. No. 3893. Dimensions: 47.25″ long × 48.25″ wide.)

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experience is an end in itself so that the activity is self-contained; it is not done with the expectation of a future reward. The experience is so intrinsically rewarding that it lifts the experience of life to another level, turning helplessness into a feeling of control. Life becomes meaningful and ordered and deeply satisfying. When Naiche was engaged in painting, he was an active agent with a sense of mastery over himself and his activity. All other parts of his life fell away and ceased to exist in his mind for as long as he was involved in the activity of painting. One of the remarkable ¤ndings from Csikszentmihalyi’s work is that some individuals even experienced a sense of ®ow in concentration camps or as prisoners of war. Richard Logan (1985, 1988) worked with people who were imprisoned by the Nazis during World War II, in jungle camps in North Vietnam, and in solitary con¤nement by the Hungarian communist regime. Andrew Solzhenitsyn (1976) described a fellow prisoner who sustained himself by mapping the world on the ®oor of the cell and pretending that he was covering a few kilometers each day as he traveled across Asia and Europe to America. These individuals were able to create ®ow experiences by ¤nding an opportunity for action in their greatly restrained environments, setting goals within the situation, and monitoring their progress through the feedback they received. Once they achieved the goals they had set, they set more dif¤cult challenges for themselves. In this way, they were able to keep the integrity of their selves by being intrinsically motivated by their actions. They managed to ¤nd something that lay outside the reach of the external forces that imprisoned them and to wrest control back to their own consciousness. A major characteristic of ®ow activities is that they provide a sense of discovery that transports the person into a new reality. A person’s sense of mastery leads to the growth of the self. All cultures have developed activities that improve the quality of experience, including art, dance, music, ritual, and games. When individuals in preliterate societies were not engaged in everyday subsistence activities, they spent time making clothing or hunting equipment which required a necessary measure of skill not only in creating the object but also in decorating it. Thus everyone had some means of creative expression that gave them access to ®ow experiences. Creativity—the physical activity of creating art in some form—is far from the only means of achieving ®ow. Sera¤na Vinon, a 77-year-old woman from a tiny town in the Italian Alps (Csikszentmihalyi 1991:145–146) continues to rise at 5:00 a.m. to milk her cows. When she returns, she cooks a huge breakfast before taking the herd to the meadows just below the glaciers or, if the weather is bad, tends the orchard or cards some wool. During the summer months, she spends weeks on the high pastures harvesting hay, and then car-

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ries it on her head to the barn, a distance of several miles. Evenings ¤nd her reading or telling stories to great-grandchildren or playing the accordion for friends and relatives. When asked what she enjoys doing most, Sera¤na laughed and went through her litany of daily activities: milking the cows, taking them to pasturage, and doing all of the things that make up her life each day. Sera¤na explained (146) “It gives me a great satisfaction. To be outdoors, to talk with people, to be with my animals. . . . I talk to everybody— plants, birds, ®owers, and animals. Everything in nature keeps you company; you see nature progress every day. You feel clean and happy: too bad that you get tired and have to go home” (146). When the Chiricahuas went about their daily tasks in their homeland as free people, they experienced this sense of being immersed in their daily activities, in which they found a deep level of satisfaction and enjoyment. There was no sharp distinction between work and free time. Although life was not easy—nor was it in the Alpine village described above—the people in the local group found a way to make these tasks enjoyable by mastering a broad range of dif¤cult challenges and deriving a sense of satisfaction from them. The key to such satisfaction is being an active agent in one’s own life. Another woman from the same village, Giuliana, explained, “I am free, free in my work, because I do whatever I want. If I don’t do something today I will do it tomorrow. I don’t have a boss, I am the boss of my own life” (Csikszentmihalyi 1991:147). SUMMONING POWER BY DEPICTING RITUAL The connection between ®ow and religion has long been recognized in the work of Victor Turner (1969). Such activities connect people with supernatural power, creating order out of chaos. Many anthropologists have described the transformative power of ritual time, which shuts out the everyday and allows participants to enter into a circumscribed space and time that brings everyone together in a sense of communitas that transcends the individual sense of self. Emile Durkheim contends that, by de¤nition, religion “expresses things as being other than they are” (1975:94). While individual reason ¤nds the existence of these things to be disconcerting, l’esprit collectif, the collective mind, sees reality in a different way. Society—“a plurality of brains and minds acting and reacting on each other”—fashions the shared traditions as well as the collective states of mind and emotion, which are the very foundation of religious belief (95). Live performance, with music, song, and shared participation, helps everyone focus attention and reinforces a shared meaning system through deeply meaningful communication with the supernatural. By choosing the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony with the Gáhe dance, Naiche

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was drawing on the most spiritual part of his culture, and thus, he was focusing on and summoning the power it represented to help his people. He could have selected many other subjects, such as scenes of courtship or hunting or even warfare, favorite subjects of other Apache men, but instead, he chose to focus on the very core of Apache belief and identity, the most sustaining subject that he knew. The Chiricahuas were known to have created drypaintings, also known as sandpaintings, in a ritual context to prevent or stop epidemics and to foil the enemy. A Chiricahua told Morris Opler about seeing “a ground drawing” used during a war campaign: A regiment of cavalry and a regiment of infantry were after us. A shaman drew the picture in pollen on the ground and left it there. Then we retreated to a hill. Both regiments turned off the trail and went back by a roundabout way, though the trail was plain, and they could have kept going. That is the way the ground drawing works. When it is used like this, the enemy is unable to follow. Something happens to the enemy always. They give up before they get to the place of the ground drawing, or they cannot pass it. [Opler 1996:265]

Implied in the above description is the power of visual imagery. No doubt, Naiche, as the son of Cochise, had either heard his father speak of the power of ground drawings or had actually seen them used during his own war campaigns. Visual imagery was important in other ritual aspects of Chiricahua life. Painting was important for ritual reasons, and shamans often colored a patient’s face with sacred substances, such as pollen, white clay, or specular iron ore. As children grew up, they became used to seeing individuals whose faces had symbols of the sun, moon, stars, or various constellations on their cheeks (Opler 1996:21). As previously described, the ornamented dress worn by the girl undergoing the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony was decorated with designs that symbolized the powers that would be summoned on her behalf. This included the morning star, the crescent moon, and a stepped design that symbolized the home. Circles represented the sun, and the fringes that streamed from the circles were the sunbeams. The rainbow was also symbolized. The Chiricahua hide painting (Figure 43) depicts a cross in the center, which represents the center of the cosmos with its widening quarters symbolizing the four directions. The ¤gures radiating out from around the cross are the powers to whom a medicine man appealed for help, including those of the four directions. Hide paintings such as this were made not for decoration but to summon powers, usually for help in healing, and only men who had gained Power through personal contact with supernatural power (as discussed

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earlier) had the authority and the knowledge to create such hide paintings. Unlike some men who used supernatural power for their own bene¤t, those who made deer hide paintings used the paintings in a ritual context to draw upon their power for the bene¤t of the community. A medicine person’s Power instructed him or her to create such a painting, and the imagery, which could take the form of people, animals, or more abstract imagery, personi¤ed manifestations of holy powers that were associated with the celestial realm. This included lightning, clouds, rain, and rainbows. Birds often appeared, especially hummingbirds, because they were believed to carry Apaches’ prayers up to the heavens. A Chiricahua talked about the acquisition of a bear ceremony and how a person’s Power instructed him what he should draw on the hide: That bear had given him a ceremony with songs and prayers when he was in that cave. Then, when he got back to his people, he helped them when they got sick. When he healed sick people, he took a circular piece of rawhide, covered it with buckskin, and painted Bear, Lightning, and Buffalo on it. That was because Bear had told him that Lightning and Buffalo were his friends and their powers all worked together. [Opler 1996:291–293]

Holy powers were often represented in the four corners of the hide in the colors that symbolized the four directions which included black, green or blue, yellow, and white. Red was sometimes used as well. As part of this spiritually ordered cosmos, the powers represented in visual form were addressed in clockwise order, believed to be the direction of the sun’s path across the sky, from east to south to west to north. The creation of the universe was intimately related to the giving and sustaining of life, which is the meaning of the name Ussen. Medicine people helped to recreate the universe anew and to remind all those who were present of the sacredness of life and all living things through the creation and use of hide paintings. There is little doubt that when Naiche was painting his scenes of the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony, he focused on the order of the cosmos that was depicted on so many levels in this ceremony: in the symbolism of the girl’s dress, in the markings on the masks of the Gáhe dancers, and, on a wider level, in the continuity of his people and the repetition of this ceremony through time. Knowing that White Painted Woman had given and directed the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony, that the Mountain Spirits were watching over his people, that his parents and theirs before them had seen and participated in this ceremony, Naiche brought all of these thoughts to his paintings. Perhaps speci¤c celebrations of this ceremony passed through his mind, especially those of his female relatives. He might remember the ¤rst time that he truly under-

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stood the symbolism of the ceremony or perhaps the last one that his group celebrated when they still lived in Arizona as a free people. When bell hooks, a leading cultural critic, was lecturing on art and aesthetics at the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, she was asked if she thought that art mattered and if art truly made a difference in our lives. She replied: I could testify to the transformative power of art. I asked my audience to consider why in so many instances of global imperialist conquest by the West, art has been either appropriated or destroyed. I shared my amazement at all the African art I ¤rst saw years ago in the museums and galleries of Paris. It occurred to me then that if one could make a people lose touch with their capacity to create, lose sight of their will and their power to make art, then the work of subjugation, of colonization, is complete. [1995:xv]

This is why Naiche’s act of creating his hide paintings of the Chiricahua Apache Girl’s Puberty Ceremony was actually an act of resistance. He probably did not intend it as such, for as a warrior and an Apache, resistance meant physical freedom. But denied physical and political freedom, Naiche, for the brief time that he was lost in his painting, found freedom by entering a world that had existed long before the intrusion of Europeans into his homeland. PARADIGMS OF POWER This book traces the experiences of the Chiricahua prisoners of war through military conquest, exile and displacement from their homeland, forced assimilation, and the isolation of children from their families. I have used the images created by other Native American prisoners of war at Fort Marion as a window into the experiences and responses that were probably shared by the Apache prisoners at that fort. The impact of these experiences cannot be underestimated. But these experiences did not bring about the result intended by the federal government: the destruction of the Chiricahuas as a people and their complete assimilation into the dominant society. Naiche played a major role in the survival of the Chiricahua Apache people not only through the hide paintings that he produced but also through the quiet strength and stabilizing in®uence of his personality. In many ways, he was the ideal person to see his people through this time of diaspora and imprisonment. Furthermore, his artistic abilities might not have blossomed under other conditions, leaving behind a remarkable record of his people’s history and beliefs.

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Described earlier, the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony—called “the womanhood feast” by the Chiricahuas—has always been a powerful marker of cultural identity for the Chiricahuas as well as for other Apaches. The Mescalero Apaches (Farrer 1980, 1991), the Western Apaches (Basso 1966, 1970, 1983), and the Jicarilla Apaches (Tiller 1992) continue to celebrate this ceremony today. Although the Fort Sill Apaches decided to discontinue this rite, they give more emphasis to the Dance of the Mountain Spirits (Stockel 2004). As a rite of transformation, this ceremony marks the transformation of the girl into a woman. As a rite of intensi¤cation, the ceremony reaf¤rms traditional Chiricahua values for everyone present. In so doing, this ceremony also ensures that their traditions and their identity as a people will continue. The spirit of White Painted Woman, with all her powers of renewal and rebirth, infuses the pubescent girl during the ceremony. The presence of the Gáhe dancers summons great power that ensures the continuation of the Chiricahua as a people. Foucault (1970, 1972) de¤ned discourse as a form of power because discourse refers to ways of constituting knowledge, along with the social practices that support this knowledge. The Girl’s Puberty Ceremony is a form of discourse, as a social practice that supports knowledge about the world and the way it works. By af¤rming identity, who people believe themselves to be, the ceremony in®uences how they think, feel, and act. Exiles, as discussed in Chapter 3, are outsiders who have been banished from their homeland forever. From this outsider status comes a deep and urgent need to be part of an ideology that heals the brokenness of disrupted lives. To compensate for disorienting loss, for being cut off from one’s roots, one’s land, one’s past, certain rituals that embody and re®ect this ideology take on even deeper and more profound meaning as they carry the identity of a people. Where once land and ritual both held identity, after a people have been torn from their homeland, ritual becomes even more weighted with identity. For the Chiricahuas, this shared ideology and identity became embodied by the Gáhe dancers and the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony. These were things that the whites did not understand and could not penetrate or take away from them as they had severed them from their homeland. In choosing the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony as his subject, in the act of creating his paintings of this ceremony, Naiche was appealing to a power far older and greater than the United States. White Painted Woman, Child of the Waters, Ussen, and the Gáhe were—and are today—very real forces in the lives of the Chiricahuas. These sacred beings continue to exist and sustain them in today’s world. A people without the ¤erce determination to live and to survive would have perished, given the appalling circumstances in which the Chiricahuas found themselves. Nearly three decades of imprisonment and subjugation by a dominant power, the devastation of disease, hav-

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ing their children taken from them: all of these conditions imposed upon them would have annihilated almost any other group of people. The Chiricahua Apache not only endured as a people, but also kept alive their culture. Keeping in mind the model of change that this book is based on, that “culture” is not, by de¤nition, pre-modern and traditional and unchanging, but rather has always been dynamic and actively adapting to changing circumstances, Chiricahua culture is indeed ®ourishing. Culture is always in ®ux, always changing, and individuals are always actively choosing what parts of their culture to invest with meaning and to keep alive, sometimes at the expense of other parts. Fredrik Barth’s model of ethnicity and culture (1995) provides insights into understanding how societies and individuals accommodate and adapt to ongoing change, as previously noted. Looking at culture globally, Barth holds that culture shows continuous variation. What he means by this is that in the contemporary world, no two single individuals, even within the same family, ever have the same identical set of concepts and ideas. For example, Chiricahua individuals participate—and have always participated—in much that was not Chiricahua. They adopted raiding from Mexican ranches as a subsistence strategy. After living in houses at Mount Vernon Barracks, they found that they preferred houses to wickiups when they moved to Fort Sill. Barth discusses this cross-culturally when he says: Being an indigenous person does not mean that you carry a separate, indigenous culture. Instead, it probably means that at some times, at some occasions, you say, “This is my ethnic identity. This is the group to which I wish to belong.” And you will cherish some particular signs that this is your identity. And it surely means that you will have learned some things that show a cultural continuity of tradition from previous generations of the indigenous population. But that knowledge, those ideas and skills, are certainly not exhaustive of what you have learned, of the culture you command. [1995:4]

Everyone makes active choices about what he or she chooses to privilege as part of his or her identity. The audience that ¤lled the auditorium for the 1998 seminar, “Cultural Continuance in a Traditional Chiricahua Community,” were the direct descendants of Naiche, Geronimo, and the warriors who had ridden with them, a group known as the Chiricahua Apache Prisoner of War Descendants. One of the speakers was a man whose grandfather had ridden with Geronimo and had survived the 27-year imprisonment to settle at Whitetail on the Mescalero Reservation in 1913. He spoke of the leadership role that the Chiricahuas have taken on the Mescalero Apache Reservation. Nearly all people on the reservation today are mixed descen-

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dants of Chiricahua, Mescalero, and Lipan Apache, and their political identity has been subsumed under that of the Mescalero Apache Tribe. However, they privilege their Chiricahua blood by mentioning it immediately when describing their heritage. “We call ourselves Mescalero Chiricahuas. We’re different from the other Chiricahuas, the ones who stayed in Oklahoma,” he said proudly. “We still practice our traditional ceremonies and we’ve always placed a high value on the oral history traditions and the culture of our people” (Grif¤n-Pierce 2000:364). I ended my presentation about Naiche’s hide paintings of the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony with photographs of the actual ceremony. I interspersed slides taken by a friend at Mescalero with ones taken among the Western Apaches. A young Chiricahua woman in the audience was quick to point out, “We have our own way of doing it. I just want people to understand that there’s not just one Apache way. The Chiricahuas have our own way to do the ceremony.” Later, we sat down and talked at greater length. Gesturing to the young girl beside her, she said, “I want her to know the right way because she’ll be having her feast soon” (Grif¤n-Pierce 2000:365). (The Chiricahuas refer to this ceremony as a feast.) It takes roughly an hour and three-quarters to drive to Mescalero from El Paso. The 86-mile stretch between El Paso and Alamogordo seems as ®at as a pancake, without towns to break up the monotony. Just before reaching Alamogordo, off to my left, I can see White Sands National Monument, a glistening sea of sparkling white gypsum that covers nearly 300 square miles. To my right the Lincoln National Forest, with its apple and cherry orchards and forested mountains, rises abruptly from the eastern edge of Alamogordo. I continue on to Tularosa and make the turnoff toward Ruidoso, which is just on the other side of the Mescalero Apache Reservation, where many of the Chiricahuas now live. Soon I am climbing, and, almost immediately, Sierra Blanca Peak is visible, reaching close to 12,000 feet. The mountain has a commanding presence, for it stands alone, so perfectly shaped that it could have been molded by a giant teacup. Pine trees grow along its sides in lush abundance, and, in winter, the mountain is white with snow. Signs tell me to “Ski Apache,” an enterprise centered in Ruidoso and to be sure not to miss the Apache Gold Casino. The Inn of the Mountain Gods, which is undergoing renovation, is next to the casino (Figures 52 and 53); both are enterprises of the Mescalero Apache Tribe. Framed by tall pines, a spacious golf course spreads out over rolling hills (Figure 54). After exploring the area, I drive on to Ruidoso, passing the unmarked turnoff to Whitetail (Figure 55), the community on the Mescalero Reservation where the Chiricahuas settled. Then I turn around and return to the

Figure 52: Inn of the Mountain Gods Resort and Casino, New Mexico. Photo by author.

Figure 53: Lake and grounds at Inn of the Mountain Gods Resort and Casino, New Mexico. Photo by author.

Figure 54: Golf Course, Inn of the Mountain Gods Resort and Casino, New Mexico. Photo by author.

Figure 55: Road to Whitetail, Chiricahua Apache community at the Mescalero Apache Reservation, New Mexico. Photo by author.

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town of Mescalero, where the Mescalero Apache Cultural Center is located. A small building framed by pine trees, the cultural center tells the story of all three Apache tribes that comprise what is now the Mescalero Apache Tribe. The exhibit that greets the visitor is a row of mannequins in Mescalero, Chiricahua, and Lipan Apache clothing. The old mannequins, perhaps donated by a department store, are incongruously out of place, for they have white skin and the unrealistically anorexic bodies that were popular in the 1950s. The women’s wasp waists and affected poses, their long eyelashes and chiseled faces with pointed noses and chins, provide a sharp contrast with their loose, functional clothing. While the clothing is ideal for an outdoor life, the mannequins wearing it, had they come to life, could never have managed to survive far from the luxuries of an urban existence. There is a poignancy and an earnestness to the ¤gures, for they have been clothed in shirts, breechcloths, and dresses that have been donated from Apache families. The clothing has an authenticity that shows that it was worn by previous owners rather than replicated by a museum staff. Decidedly low-tech exhibits feature typed labels and old museum cases in which belongings from each of these three groups have been carefully placed. One section of the cultural center is devoted to the Chiricahuas, while another tells of the Mescalero Apache’s imprisonment with the Navajos at Bosque Redondo in 1862. One museum case features photographs and clothing from the Lipan Apaches. The elaborately decorated buckskin dress from a girl’s “Coming Out” festival, as the puberty ceremony is identi¤ed in the accompanying text, has been lovingly laid in the bottom of a waist-high glass case. The last and, to me, most signi¤cant exhibit in the museum displays black and white photographs on every wall of a small room. In October 1988 Chiricahuas from Mescalero and Fort Sill traveled to Cañon de los Embudos in Mexico, retracing the places where their ancestors had lived, including Sierra Azul and the Sierra Madres in Chihuahua, Mexico. They saw where Naiche’s band had surrendered in March 1886, as well as other places important to their people. For the ¤rst time, a hundred years later, the descendants of these warriors visited the places where their loved ones had gathered food, hunted, raided, and fought for their lives and their way of life. There children had been born, women had prepared food over cooking ¤res, girls had come of age and celebrated their puberty ceremony. Men had died there defending their families while others had returned from victorious raiding and warfare expeditions. As I know from Alicia Delgadillo, who accompanied them on the expedition, this trip was incredibly moving for everyone. This is evident from the photographs that show people proudly posed on boulders and at the base of rock faces, a look of deep satisfaction on their faces. In one picture,

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a medicine woman offers a blessing prayer and offering at a particularly signi¤cant spot. Typewritten statements by individuals describe what the trip meant to that person. The exhibit is deeply touching for it says much about the resilience of the Chiricahuas. Even though the federal government denied them a reservation in their ancestral homelands and subsumed their political identity within that of the Mescaleros, they continue to keep their cultural identity alive through their own distinct version of the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony. So essential to their well-being that they stopped to hold it even as they ®ed from federal troops before their surrender, this ceremony, represented in Naiche’s paintings, continues to evoke the enduring power of life for the Chiricahua people. Today, while the puberty ceremony is held less frequently among the Western Apaches and almost never held among the Fort Sill Chiricahuas because of the economic burden, both groups continue to hold the Dance of the Mountain Spirits. As announced on their Web site, the Mescalero Apaches still hold the puberty ceremony, with the public allowed entry to certain parts. A vital embodiment of identity and resistance, the puberty ceremony is still held by the New Mexico Chiricahuas, who do not allow public viewing of their distinctive version of the ceremony. As Kathleen Kanseah, one of the Chiricahua Apache Prisoners of War Descendants, said, “ ‘We’re not like other groups . . . We’re Chiricahuas, and we will never give in, not as long as one drop of Apache blood ®ows in our veins’ ” (Stockel 2004:153).

Epilogue Life after Naiche

T UC SON, A R IZONA , AUGUST, 2005 Leaving Naiche’s world was dif¤cult. The experiences of the Chiricahuas had become intensely real to me as I walked the places that Naiche and his people had walked in Florida, Alabama, Oklahoma, and New Mexico. Only weeks after I left Fort Pickens, in Pensacola Bay, Hurricane Ivan washed away the only road to the fort, which remains closed to the public. The timing of my trip had been extremely fortunate. Soon after I returned to Arizona, I had to set aside the manuscript as I resumed my teaching and faculty responsibilities in late August, 2004. But with the new semester, unforeseen events in my personal life swept me up and totally transformed my life. It is only now, a full year later, that I am able to continue writing. This book might have remained unpublished had it not been for encouragement and help from Tony Paredes and Judith Knight. Their steadfast belief in what this book had to say has made all the difference in the world. Within a month after my return to Arizona from the Chiricahua trip last year, my husband was diagnosed with terminal colon cancer. Fall of 2004 remains a blur in my memory, for so many things happened at once. In addition to a full teaching load, other faculty responsibilities, and being Keith’s caretaker, I also lost the vision in my left eye when my retina spontaneously detached and continued to do so despite repeated surgeries. In November, I was diagnosed with breast cancer and had a mastectomy on the last day of the year. My life is much brighter now. Even though sight has not been restored to my eye yet, there is a good chance that the sixth eye surgery, scheduled for next month, will bring back some vision. I am in the middle of a series of reconstructive breast surgeries. Dr. John Olsen, Head of the Anthropology Department here at the University of Arizona, has been generous in arranging medical leave and alternative service to relieve me of teaching responsibilities while I heal from these surgeries. Keith Pierce, my husband of 25 years, died peacefully March 11, 2005. He was 86 years old. The designer of the McMath-Pierce Solar Telescope, Keith

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will be missed by many people, including those up on the Navajo Nation, where he and I had many ties. Messages of condolence poured in from around the world. Keith’s generosity of spirit and his thoughtful leadership of the Solar Division at the National Observatory brought over 200 people to his Celebration of Life at the end of April. As many shared personal recollections, myriad facets of his personality became clear, and everyone saw a much more complete picture of Keith and the life that he had lived. Just as each person contributed to the whole picture that evening, I hope that this book contributes to the growing literature about the Chiricahua Apache diaspora. My personal experiences of the last year with death, disease, and disability, have deepened my understanding. Yet my experiences barely begin to approach theirs, for the magnitude of their loss included not only the ongoing loss of family members from disease on a major scale but also the permanent exile from their beloved homeland. The continuing vitality of their cultural traditions, especially the Girl’s Puberty Ceremony, is a tribute to their resilience as a people.

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Index

Indians known primarily by one name, or one set of names/sounds, are indexed under that name. Assigned ¤rst names, alternate spellings, ranks, and relationships appear in parentheses following the entry. Page numbers in italics refer to ¤gures. Ahnandia, 44, 76, 114; wife of, 77 Alcatraz, 61 Apachean tribes, 17, 20–21 Apache Pass, 2, 11, 13, 14–15, 60, 136. See also Cochise Stronghold Art, Plains Indians, 117–123, 130 Ball, Eve, 5–6 Bascom, Lieutenant, xi, 13, 60, 136 Bascom incident, xi, 13, 136. See also Free, Mickey Bedonkohe, 22, 31–32 Beshe, 72, 76 Betzinez, ( Jason), 6, 33, 47–48, 134, 152 Biyaneta, 19 Bonneville, Colonel B. L., 39 Bourke, Captain John, 122 Bowman, Samuel, 62 Butter¤eld Overland Mail Stage Station (Apache Pass Stage Station), 13, 15 Camp Grant Massacre, 40 Carleton, Colonel James, 39–40 Carlisle Indian Industrial School, Carlisle, Pennsylvania, 1, 6, 9, 25, 53, 65, 77, 86, 93, 95–106, 151–152 Catawba Indians, xiii, 89 Catle, 19 Chappo. See Geronimo Chato, (Alfred, scout), 43, 46, 59–60, 64–65 Cherokee, xiv Chihuahua, (chief, scout), 46, 57, 60, 77, 103, 113; Eugene (son of ), 6, 24– 25, 46, 57, 87–88, 103, 107; Ramona, (daughter of, sister of Eugene, wife of Daklugie), 25

Child of the Waters, 32–33, 64, 162 Chiricahua, xiii, 5, 16, 20–21, 37–39, 130; art, 131–132, 148; clothing, 103–104; hair, 104–105; kinship, 27; leadership, 23–25; marriage, 25–27; Power, 35–36; sense of place, 80–84; subsistence, 28–30; training boys 63–64, 115. See also Girl’s Puberty Ceremony Chiricahua, Central, (Tcokanen, Chokonen or Tall Men), 22, 41; leaders, 22 Chiricahua, Eastern, (Tcihene, Chihenne, Red Paint People, or Warm Springs Apache), 4, 22, 29, 39, 41, 80; leaders, 22 Chiricahua, Southern, (Nednhi, Ndndai, Nednai, or Enemy People), 4, 21–22, 31, 41, 58 Chiricahua, Western, (White Mountain), 20–21, 41, 80, 136, 162, 164, 168 Chiricahua Apache Indian Agency, 13, 15–16 Chiricahua Apache Prisoners of War, 1, 47, 58–59, 63, 67–69, 75–76, 84, 94, 109– 110, 114, 116–117, 140–141, 156, 161 Chiricahua Apache Prisoners of War Descendants, xiv, xvi, 3, 163, 167–168 Chiricahua Reservation, xi, 2, 16, 41, 136 Chiricahua Tom, 113 Cibecue Apache, xvii, xviii, 41 Cleveland, President Grover, 44, 57–58, 61, 63, 67–68 Cochise (father of Naiche), xi, xiv, 4, 11, 12, 13, 14, 16, 22–24, 28, 32, 39–41, 57, 94, 134, 136–137 Cochise Stronghold, xi, 11, 12, 13, 23 Comanche, Edna, 6 Congregation of the Sisters of Saint Joseph, 53, 99

184 Coronado, Francisco Vasquez de, 37 Crook, General George, 5, 16, 44, 57, 59– 60, 66–68, 85, 95, 130, 154 Dah de glash, 4 Daklugie, (Asa, Ace, nephew of Geronimo, son of Juh), 1, 5–6, 24–28, 38–40, 46, 61, 77–78, 85, 101, 103–105, 134, 136, 138, 152; Ramona (wife of ), 6 Davidson, Congressman Bob, 67 Davis, Lieutenant Britton, 5, 42–43, 60– 61, 139 Delgadillo, Alicia, xiii–xv, 167 DeSmet, Father, 121 Disease, 1, 8–9, 16, 21, 30, 33, 35–36, 51, 53, 56, 62, 77, 83–85, 93, 95–96, 127, 138, 144, 151, 156; malaria, xi, 4, 42, 53, 75, 85, 88; smallpox, xi, 40, 42, 96; tuberculosis, 53, 86, 89, 93–94; Yellow Fever, 75 Endicott, Secretary of War, 68 Etahdleuh Doanmoe, 125–126 Eyelash, 59 Fitahat, 77 Fly, C. S. (Camillus Sidney), 16–17, 18–19, 130, 154 Fort Apache Reservation, xvii, 41, 47, 59, 93 Fort Bowie, 2, 13, 16–17, 57, 108, 137 Fort Marion, St. Augustine, Florida, xi, 2, 8, 44, 46–51, 50–52, 56, 58, 62, 64, 66, 68–69, 71–72, 75–77, 85, 87, 92, 94–95, 98–99, 101–102, 105, 115, 117, 122–127, 129, 131–132, 141, 154, 161 Fort Pickens, Pensacola Bay, Florida, xi, 2, 8, 56, 61–62, 65–66, 68–69, 71–72, 73, 77, 79, 85, 92–93, 99, 115, 131, 139, 141– 142, 154, 169 Fort Sam Houston, San Antonio, Texas, 67 Fort Sill, Oklahoma, xi, xiv, 2, 6, 8, 25, 61, 65, 82, 87, 93, 95, 107–109, 112, 113–117, 140, 144, 152, 156, 163 Fort Sill Apache Tribe, 111–112, 113–114, 134, 162, 168 Free, Mickey, (scout), 43, 60, 136. See also Bascom incident Fun, (Yanozha’s half-brother, cousin of Geronimo), 18, 19, 44, 59, 76–77, 114

Index Gáhe. See Mountain Spirits Garditha, 19 Gatewood, Lieutenant Charles B., 44, 58– 59, 70 Geronimo, (grandson of Chief Mahko), xi, xiv, 1, 4, 16–17, 18, 19, 22, 31–32, 36, 42– 46, 56–59, 61, 65–71, 73, 76–77, 81, 84, 89–92, 113, 117, 137–142, 144, 154, 163; Alope (wife of ), 31; Chappo (son of ), 18, 76, 77, 86; wife of Chappo, 77; Dohn-say, (daughter of ), 92; Eva (daughter of ), 6; Ga-aa (She-gha) wife of, 77 Girl’s Puberty Ceremony (the womanhood feast), xv, xvii, 33–35, 64, 117, 128, 130, 131, 133–134, 137, 141, 144–148, 150, 152– 154, 158–162, 164, 168, 170 Gosa, (Ira), 77, 86 Hampton, (Normal and Agricultural Institute, Hampton, Virginia), 65, 98–99 Haozous, (Old Sam, grandson of Mangas Coloradas), 36, 134 Howard, General Oliver O., 41, 94, 136– 138, 143 Howard, First Lieutenant Guy, 94, 143 Hunlona, (Eli), 76, 86 Janos, 22, 31; leaders of, 22 Jeffords, Thomas, 16, 41, 94, 136–138 Jicarilla Apache, 20–21, 162 Johlsanni, (Richard, son of Ulsanna), 6 Juan, (brother of Cochise), 137 Juh, (chief ), 24–28, 31, 42, 58 Kanseah, ( Jasper), 6, 57, 59, 77 Kayitah, (Martin, scout), 6, 44, 58–60, 68, 113 Kaytennae, ( Jacob, scout), 4, 60–61, 77, 113 Kaywaykla, ( James, son of Juh, stepson of Kaytennae), 4, 6, 23, 29, 32, 40, 43, 61, 99–100, 138–139, 146–147; his wife, 146 Kaywaykla, (Lew), 110 Kennon, Lieutenant Lyman Walter Vere, 109 Kenoi, (Sam), 48, 92, 138 Kilthdigai, 76 Kiowa Agency, 116

Index

185

Langdon, Colonel Loomis, 62–63, 65, 69, 75, 77 Lawton, Captain, 66–67 Laziyah, 19, 76 Little Chief, 130 Loco, (chief ), 40, 42, 113 Lozen, 139

Patterson, Bruce (younger brother of Eli Hunlona), 86 Perico, (Leon, cousin to Geronimo), 18, 44, 76, 113, 146; wife of, 76, 146; Isabel Perico Enjady (daughter of ), 6, 76 Pratt, Captain Richard Henry, 1, 83, 95, 97– 101, 104, 117, 125–126, 128

Mangas Coloradas, (chief ), 22, 24, 31–32, 39–40, 134, 137 Mangus (Carl, son of Mangas Coloradas, aka Mangas), 43, 77, 113–114, 140 Martine, (Charles, scout), 6, 44, 58–60, 68, 77, 113 Martine, (George), 6 Mescalero Apache, xi, 1, 20–21, 40, 61, 162, 164, 167 Mescalero Apache Reservation, New Mexico, xi, xiv, 2, 5–6, 8, 77, 110, 140, 163–164, 166 Miles, Brigadier General Nelson A., 44–45, 57–58, 63, 65–66, 81 Mimbrenos, 80 Miscegenation, 16 Mithlo, 65 Motsos, 76; wife of, 77 Mountain Spirit Dance/Dancers, 34–35, 65, 141, 146–147, 153, 158, 160, 162, 168 Mountain Spirits (Gáhe), 33, 110, 111, 130– 131, 160, 162; Ga’an, (Western Apache), xvii–xviii, 160 Mount Vernon Barracks, Alabama, xi, xvi, 2, 8, 60, 62, 64–65, 69–70, 77, 82, 87, 92–94, 101–102, 113, 115, 134, 143–144, 151, 156, 163

Reed, Dr. Walter, 93, 144 Roosevelt, President Theodore, 84, 90

Nahi, (Nah-bay), 19 Naiche, (Christian, son of Cochise, grandson of Mangas Coloradas), xi, xiv, 4, 9, 16–17, 18, 42–46, 57–59, 61, 65, 67–68, 73, 76–77, 79, 92, 113–114, 130–131, 134– 142, 163; Amelia (daughter of ), 6; Christian (son of ), 6; Haozinne (wife of ), 19 Naiche’s hide paintings, xv–xviii, 117, 128, 141–154, 156–161, 164 Nana, (chief ), 22, 38, 40, 57, 60, 77, 113 Napi, 76 New Orleans, 67–68 Noche, (George), 113

San Carlos Apache Reservation, xi, 2, 4, 16, 25, 41–44, 46, 53, 60, 62, 70, 109, 138 Scott, Colonel Hugh Lenox (aka Captain), 107, 113, 115, 140 Searcy Hospital, 88. See also Mount Vernon Barracks Sheridan, General Philip, 40, 58 Shipping League (Convention), 69 Stanley, General, 68 Steck, Michael (Indian agent), 39–40 Sun Dance, 128, 130–131 Taza, (son of Cochise, brother of Naiche), 24, 134, 138, 142 Tissnolthos, 76; wife of, 77 Toclanny, (Roger), 113 Trail of Tears, xiv Tres Castillos, 4, 42 Tsisnah, 18, 19, 114 Tularosa Reservation, 40–41, 164 Tzoe, (scout), 60 Ussen, 32–33, 38, 83, 139, 150, 160, 162 Victorio, (chief ), 4, 22, 24, 40, 42; Charles Istee (son of ), 6; Evans Istee (grandson of ), 6; Eveline Gaines (daughter of ), 6 Webb, Dr. DeWitt, 53, 85 White Painted Woman, (Ish son nah glash eh), 32–33, 64, 130–131, 146–148, 160, 162 Wohaw, 126–127, 127, 129, 129–131 Wratten, George (interpreter), 59, 143, 148 Yanozha, 6, 18, 19, 59, 76–77 Zhonne, (Calvin), 76, 86 Zotom, 117–118, 119, 122, 124, 124, 127–128