ONEOFMANYFEATHERS'
Great Leaders, Warriors and People
Geronimo
"I was born on the prairies where the wind blew free and there was nothing to break the light of the sun. I was born where there were no enclosures."
To the Apaches, Geronimo portraied the very essence of the Apache values. Agressiveness and courage in the face of difficulty. These qualities are what the settlers of Arizona and New Mexico feared. The Chiricahuas were mostly migratory following the seasons, hunting and farming. When there was little food, it was the custom to raid neighboring tribes. Raids and vengence were an honorable way of life among the tribes of this region.
By the time American settlers began arriving in the area, the Spanish had become well settled in the area. They were always looking for Indian slaves and Christian converts. One of the most important moments in Geronimo's life was in 1858 when he returned home from a trading excursion into Mexico. He found his wife, his mother and his three young children murdered by Spanish troops from Mexico. This reportedly caused him to have such a hatred of the whites that he vowed to kill as many as he could. From that day on he took every opportunity he could to terrorize Mexican settlements and soon after this incident he received his power, which came to him in visions. Geronimo was never a chief, but a medicine man, a seer and a spiritual and intellectual leader both in battle and out. The Apache chiefs depended on his wisdom.
In 1875 all Apaches west of the Rio Grande were ordered to the San Carlos Reservation. When the Chiricahua were forcibly removed in 1876 to the desolate land at San Carlos, in eastern Arizona, Geronimo fled with a band of followers into Mexico. Soon he was arrested and returned to the new reservation. For the remainder of the 1870s, he led a quiet life on the reservation, but with the slaying of an Apache prophet in 1881, Geronimo and his band returned to full-time activities from a secret camp in the Sierra Madre Mountains. Sensationalized press reports exaggerated Geronimo's activities, making him the most feared and infamous Apache. The last few months of the campaign required over 5,000 soldiers, one-quarter of the entire Army, and 500 scouts, and perhaps up to 3,000 Mexican soldiers to track down Geronimo and his band.
In May 1882, Apache scouts working for the U.S. army surprised Geronimo in his mountain sanctuary, and he agreed to return with his people to the reservation. After a year of farming, the sudden arrest and imprisonment of the Apache warrior Ka-ya-ten-nae, together with rumors of impending trials and hangings, prompted Geronimo to flee on May 17, 1885, with 35 warriors and 109 women, children and youths. In January 1886, Apache scouts penetrated the seemingly impenetrable hideout. This action caused Geronimo to surrender on March 25, 1886 to General George Crook.
Geronimo later fled but finally surrendered to General Nelson Miles on Sept. 4, 1886.
Geronimo's final surrender in 1886 was one of the last great Indian guerrilla actions in the United States. At the end, Geronimo's group consisted of only 16 warriors, 12 women, and 6 children. Upon their surrender, Geronimo and over 300 of his fellow Chiricahuas were shipped to Fort Marion, Florida. One year later many of them were relocated to the Mt. Vernon barracks in Alabama, where about one quarter died from tuberculosis and other diseases. Geronimo died on Feb. 17, 1909, a prisoner of war, unable to return to his homeland. He was buried in the Apache cemetery at Fort Sill in Oklahoma.
"I cannot think that we are useless or God would not have created us. There is one God looking down on us all. We are all the children of one God. The sun, the darkness, the winds are all listening to what we have to say."
