Geronimo Read online

  Horsemanship and skill in hunting were part of the preparation. Geronimo began serious hunting at the age of ten, about the time his father died. The prairies at the foot of the Mogollon Mountains abounded in deer, antelope, elk, and buffalo. Geronimo found buffalo the easiest to kill, using both bow and arrow and spear. Deer were the hardest. They had to be stealthily approached from downwind. “Frequently we would spend hours in stealing upon grazing deer.” Once within range, the boys could often bring several down before the rest stampeded. The deer provided both meat and hide. “Perhaps no other animal was more valuable to us than the deer.” Apache taboos barred eating the flesh of the fish swarming in the streams and the bears roaming the forests.

  Special techniques applied to wild turkeys and rabbits. The hunters drove the turkeys from the woods into the open and pursued them slowly until they tired. Then the boys prodded their mounts and dashed on the birds, sweeping them from the ground with a hand. If a bird took to flight, they raced their horses beneath and struck with a hunting club. Rabbits posed a contest in speed, as the horses galloped after a fleeing animal and the rider either scooped it up by hand or threw the hunting club to strike it down. “This was great sport when we were boys, but as warriors we seldom hunted small game.”12

  The novitiate that ended in formal acceptance as an adult and fighter required participation in four war expeditions. When the youth felt ready, he volunteered. How long the process took depended on how many war expeditions occurred, as well as how many for which he volunteered. It could last several years or as little as one year or even less. Geronimo completed the trial at the age of seventeen, but he revealed nothing about his experiences or when he first volunteered.13

  A “bow shaman,” endowed with powers to locate and defeat an enemy and grant invulnerability from harm, instructed one or more youths in the host of rituals and taboos that governed their conduct throughout a raid or war expedition. He made the jacket, hat, and other appurtenances that protect a man in battle. He told of the hardships and dangers and the behavior expected by full fighters. He imparted the special warpath vocabulary that must be used, in which eighty or more words were substituted for the usual conversation. A special drinking tube attached to a skin scratcher, ornamented with special designs, was presented to each novice and required to be used throughout the experience and returned to the shaman afterward. For violations of each of the prescribed rites, bad luck resulted, and for some, permanent impairments of character.

  One or more shamans accompanied most raiding or war expeditions to ensure their sacred character and to advise on strategy and tactics. They gave particular attention to the novices. More important, each novice had a mentor to guide him through the process and whom he served as a personal attendant. Novices had to perform all the usual chores of camping, such as carrying water, gathering wood, building and maintaining fires, cooking, erecting shelters, and performing quickly any task any man might assign. Novices above all had to display courage, although mentors usually held them aside or sent them to the rear in actual combat. The death or injury of a novice reflected badly on their leadership.

  Not all novices passed the test. “If a boy is unreliable and doesn’t show improvement,” disclosed an informant, “they don’t take him out any more. They just drop him.” But after the fourth expedition, if the novice had performed satisfactorily, he was admitted to the status of fighting man. He was free to join future expeditions as a full fighter, to marry, and in camp to think and behave as he pleased.

  Geronimo absorbed and practiced the traditions, rituals, and taboos imparted by his mother. As an adolescent, he aspired above all else to become a fighter and be accepted by others as a brave and capable leader and follower. He followed all the rules of the novitiate and gained full approval of the council.

  As Geronimo recalled in old age, on completion of the novitiate, “I was very happy, for I could go wherever I wanted and do whatever I liked.” Since his father’s death, he had been under no one’s control. On the contrary, he had assumed full responsibility for his mother’s support; she had never remarried. Now, however, he could go on the warpath. “This would be glorious. I hoped soon to serve my people in battle. I had long desired to fight with our warriors.”14

  TWO

  APACHE MANHOOD

  EVERY ADULT WHO PASSED the required tests and grew to manhood had been trained to be a fighter. It was a way of life mandated by Apache culture. Now that he was a man, Geronimo could join other men in expeditions as he had long desired. First, however, he had another mission: marriage.

  He had long admired a young woman he called “the fair Alope.” He described her as slender and delicate and long a “lover,” although the term likely does not connote sexual relations. Her Bedonkohe father, No-po-so, demanded many ponies in return for her hand. Geronimo returned “in several days” with many ponies. The several days were probably several weeks as he participated in his first raid as a fighter and gathered them at some Mexican ranch or town. He delivered the animals at the lodge of No-po-so and departed with Alope. With no other ceremony prescribed, Geronimo erected a wickiup of buffalo hide near his mother’s dwelling, carpeted it with robes and hides, and moved in with Alope and his arsenal of bows, arrows, spears, knives, and shields. Alope completed the decoration with beads and wall paintings.

  “She was a good wife, but she was never strong. We followed the traditions of our fathers and were happy. Three children came to us—children that played, loitered, and worked as I had done.”1

  While still a youth, possibly while Geronimo was undergoing novitiate training, a Nednhi youth came up from the Sierra Madre for a visit with the Bedonkohes. His name was Juh (Hoo, although other variants are common), and the two became friends. With a playful disposition, Juh and other boys often hid themselves in the woods and teased girls gathering acorns. They waited until the girls had accumulated a supply and then confiscated them. This came to the attention of Chief Mahco’s widow, who instructed Geronimo and some of his friends to ambush Juh and his cohorts and give them a sound punishment. The teasing ended.

  Juh lived with the Bedonkohes long enough to grow to adulthood, possibly taking his novitiate with the band. Like Geronimo, Juh sought an admired young woman for a wife. He married Ishton, Geronimo’s favorite “sister,” one of his youthful victims. Ultimately Juh took Ishton back to his homeland in the Sierra Madre, where he rose to become the most powerful Nednhi chief.

  In white-man terms, Juh would be considered a military genius. He exercised absolute control over his people and maneuvered his fighters expertly in both defensive and offensive conflicts. Stocky, muscular, like Mangas Coloradas tall by Apache standards, well over six feet. When excited, he stuttered so badly that in battle he had to use hand signals to communicate. Even so, he could sing lustily without stuttering.2

  Roughly the same age, related through Juh’s marriage into Geronimo’s family, the two would be intimate comrades until Juh’s death.

  The long period of relative peace with Mexicans that permitted Chief Mahco to be remembered as a man of peace depended largely on Mexico’s intermittent policy of maintaining “feeding stations” in northern Chihuahua. Here Apaches could draw rations as the price of remaining at peace. Parts of some Chiricahua bands settled near towns such as Janos (Han-os), Corralitos (Core-a-lee- tos), and Galeana (Gal- e-ana), where authorities occasionally issued rations. Since raids, as contrasted with war, aimed at replenishing provisions, the feeding stations helped offset the need for raids. Sonoran authorities, always more belligerent than Chihuahuan, rarely rationed Apaches, and Sonora therefore suffered the consequences.

  Relations had begun to deteriorate in the late 1820s because of diminishing rations. They collapsed altogether in 1831, when Mexico, no longer able to afford the cost, abruptly terminated the feeding stations. Although some Chiricahuas continued to reside near the stations in hope of their revival, all the Chiricahua bands resumed the old pattern of plundering raids. Now and
then Mexico doled out enough rations to encourage some of the Apaches to remain in Chihuahuan camps, but throughout the 1830s raiding gained momentum. With some of the bands still hoping for peace and rations, the Chiricahuas broke into war and peace factions. Mangas Coloradas headed the war faction of all the Chiricahua bands. Geronimo grew to manhood during these years, his Bedonkohes firmly anchored to Mangas Coloradas. Geronimo participated in some of the raids as part of his novitiate training.3

  Raids gave way to full-scale war in 1837. Sonoran officials recruited an Anglo trader named John Johnson to launch a war of extermination against the Chiricahuas, his recompense half the stock and plunder he gained. With seventeen mercenaries, Johnson accidently came across a party of Nednhis with a few Chokonens and Chihennes in the Animas Mountains of southwestern New Mexico. Mangas Coloradas and some of his followers had come down from their winter camps in the Mogollons and joined the Nednhis. The Indians knew Johnson as a trader, and for two days they traded amicably with him and his men. On the third day, April 22, 1837, as the Apaches approached Johnson’s camp, a small cannon loaded with scrap metal blasted them, and his men opened fire with musketry. More than twenty Apaches fell dead, including a Nednhi chief. Mangas escaped, but two of his four wives died. The Johnson massacre put the Apaches on notice that Sonora had declared war, and that demanded revenge. For the growing war factions of the Chiricahuas, war rather than raids became the norm. It stoked the fury of Mangas Coloradas toward Sonora.4

  Chihuahuan authorities soon followed the lead of Sonora. In December 1839, Chihuahua enlisted an Indian trader named James Kirker to raise a band of thugs and wage war on the Apaches. Like Johnson, Kirker would keep half the plunder and establish his claim through scalp bounties—pesos for Apache scalps. His campaign was ruthless and profitable, so successful that some of the Chiricahuas still living in Mexico put out peace overtures. As they negotiated with Chihuahuan authorities, Mangas Coloradas continued his war expeditions, which doubtless now included the newly ordained fighting man Geronimo.5

  On July 4, 1842, Chihuahuan authorities at Janos finally signed a treaty with leaders of the Chihenne and Chokonen peace factions. The state resumed issuing rations, and depredations in Chihuahua declined dramatically. Early in 1843, influenced by the peace faction and the overtures of Mexican officers, even Mangas Coloradas cautiously accepted the treaty and drew rations.6

  The ration rolls at Corralitos dated August 13, 1843, bear the name Geronimo. By this time, twenty years old, he had assumed the name Geronimo among the Mexicans and even his own people. He had been a full-fledged fighting man for three years and had ridden in many raids and battles that established his stature. Students debate how he came to acquire this name, but it seems to have emerged simply as a common Mexican name, the equivalent of the English Jerome. Whatever the origin, Geronimo bore that name for the rest of his life.7

  From early adulthood to middle age, Geronimo’s life is almost impossible to follow. An occasional event is documented, but rarely supporting more than the fact that he was there. His autobiography, however, recounts raid after raid into Mexico, with cattle, horses, and other plunder the objective, as well as the lives of their owners. Combat with Mexican troops also figures prominently. The details of these expeditions are too explicit to be ignored, although the years specified are plainly wrong. If the traditional distinction between raid and war governed his actions, he either ignored or applied a highly elastic standard of need for raids. War, on the other hand, could always find a reason for revenge. He tells of receiving eight wounds, describing how and where inflicted. As for the victims, “I have killed many Mexicans; I do not know how many, for frequently I did not count them. Some of them were not worth counting.” If he were young again, he declared, “and followed the warpath, it would lead into Old Mexico.”8

  Sonorans had long been convinced that the Apaches ravaging Sonora came from the supposedly peaceful camps around Janos and Corralitos and that they traded the plunder from their Sonoran raids in the Chihuahuan towns. Some probably did, but most rode from the north under Mangas Coloradas and a rising Chokonen leader, Cochise, drawn into alliance with Mangas by marriage to his daughter.

  Cochise proved a powerful ally—and friend as well as son-in-law. Born about 1810 and thus twenty years younger than Mangas and thirteen older than Geronimo, he swiftly evolved into a superior fighter and leader. Like Mangas and Juh, Cochise was unusually tall for an Apache, and his shoulder-length black hair, high forehead, Roman nose, prominent cheekbones, and slender, powerful physique made him a conspicuous presence among the Chokonens. He lacked Mangas’s political skills and did not pursue alliances, although he frequently fought in concert with other Chiricahua bands. By the 1840s, he gave evidence of ultimately rising to the stature of his father-in-law.9

  As Geronimo matured into his twenties, he evolved into an accomplished fighter. Thick, squat, of medium height, muscular, with a grimly assertive face, he was coached by Mangas Coloradas in the skills of the fighter. He possessed the Apache virtues of courage, endurance, energy, cunning, ruthlessness, stealth, and mastery of bow and arrow, knife, and lance. He enhanced the Apache ability of living, traveling, and fighting in a landscape of deserts, rocks, and mountains. He could mobilize every harsh feature of this land as weapons in raid and war. He had led his own raids against Mexicans—some successful, some not—and he rode in war expeditions with Mangas Coloradas.

  The Sonoran military commander Colonel Elías González resolved to smash the culprits suspected of the raids in Sonora. Without consulting or even alerting Chihuahuan officials, González led an army of about six hundred men across the Sierra Madre and on August 23, 1844, struck the rancherías—the Apache term for village—at Janos and Corralitos. About sixty-five Chiricahuas died, mostly women and children, and twenty-five fell captive. The survivors fled north to their homelands.10

  With the ration program lapsing and the Apaches resuming raiding from the north, in the autumn of 1845 Chihuahua again declared war. James Kirker went back on the payroll and began rampaging across Apache country, seeking scalps for the promised bounty. Geronimo’s Bedonkohes remained aloof in their Mogollon and Burro mountain refuges.

  Kirker, however, engineered another disaster that would reverberate among all Chiricahuas. In the summer of 1846 Chokonens and Nednhis came to Galeana under a truce. The Mexicans invited them to a feast in town and got them drunk. Early in the morning of July 7, Kirker swept into town and fell on the helpless Chiricahuas, slaughtering 130 men, women, and children as the men lay in drunken stupor. Preceded by the governor and a priest, Kirker’s little army marched into Chihuahua City to public acclaim. They bore poles adorned with scalps to be exchanged for the scalp bounty. The massacre united Chiricahua war and peace parties and unleashed unremitting war on both Chihuahua and Sonora.11

  The Kirker massacre mandated a revenge expedition. Chihenne chief Cuchillo Negro (Coo-chi-yo Na-gro) took the lead in calling together an alliance. Both Mangas Coloradas and Cochise with their followers united with the Chihennes. In November 1846, about 175 Apaches, Geronimo included, clashed with Mexican soldiers and civilian defenders at Galeana, quickly defeating and routing them in a savage fight. As recounted by Jason Betzinez, “The whole tribe were tremendously proud of their fighting men and for years thereafter loved to hear the stories of the battle retold. Among those who increased their reputations in the battle were Cochise, Mangas Coloradas, Benito, my cousin Goyakla (Geronimo), and my grandfather.” In the revenge raid on Galeana, to be singled out by his people as a man of special distinction, together with Mangas Coloradas and Cochise, was a high Apache tribute to Geronimo’s fighting qualities.12

  Critical to any successful Chiricahua was Power. When and what Powers came to or were sought by Geronimo is not clear. Geronimo told no one of his Powers, simply demonstrating enough to lead his followers to believe that he was highly endowed. A successful medicine man he undoubtedly became, for he performed curing ceremonies in plain view of anyone
who wished to watch.

  One Power for which he became most noted was a revelation that no bullet or other projectile would ever kill him. As Juh’s son Daklugie explained this attribute, “Geronimo did not tell them he could not be hurt by a bullet but their imagination made them think he could not be hit. But he was meat and bones just like any other man, only he had more courage than the others.”13

  Perico, one of Geronimo’s most loyal followers, explained another widely held perception:

  Many medicine men can make it rain or stop raining. Geronimo had strong power. He could make it rain, and he could even make night last longer. To make it rain, he sang, without using pollen. He even remained seated. He sang about water, and it rained in an hour. When on the warpath Geronimo fixed it so that morning couldn’t come so soon. He did it by singing. They were going to a certain place, and Geronimo didn’t want it to be dawn before he reached his objective. He saw the enemy while they were in a level place and he didn’t want the enemy to spy on them. He wanted the morning to break after they had climbed over a mountain, so that the enemy couldn’t see them. So Geronimo sang, and the night remained two or three hours longer. I saw this personally.14

  To which the anthropologist Morris Opler added, in a discussion of cultural and personal determinism: “Shamanism is an important part of Apache religion, but the use of Geronimo’s ceremony in this context was particularly crucial because it happened to be a ritual considered useful for locating the enemy, hiding from him, or confounding him. Geronimo’s ability to command a following was likewise due to a combination of cultural and personal attributes.”15