TUCSON INCIDENTS—THE “FIESTAS”—THE RUINED MISSION CHURCH OF SAN XAVIER
DEL BAC—GOVERNOR SAFFORD—ARIZONA MINES—APACHE RAIDS—CAMP GRANT
MASSACRE—THE KILLING OF LIEUTENANT CUSHING.
The Feast of San Juan brought out some very curious customs. The Mexican
gallants, mounted on the fieriest steeds they could procure, would call
at the homes of their “dulcineas,” place the ladies on the saddle in
front, and ride up and down the streets, while disappointed rivals threw
fire-crackers under the horses’ feet. There would be not a little superb
equestrianism displayed; the secret of the whole performance seeming to
consist in the nearness one could attain to breaking his neck without
doing so.
There is another sport of the Mexicans which has almost if not quite
died out in the vicinity of Tucson, but is still maintained in full
vigor on the Rio Grande: running the chicken—“correr el gallo.” In this
fascinating sport, as it looked to be for the horsemen, there is or was
an old hen buried to the neck in the sand, and made the target for each
rushing rider as he swoops down and endeavors to seize the crouching
fowl. If he succeed, he has to ride off at the fastest kind of a run to
avoid the pursuit of his comrades, who follow and endeavor to wrest the
prize from his hands, and the result, of course, is that the poor hen is
pulled to pieces.
Nothing would give me greater pleasure than to describe for the benefit
of my readers the scenes presenting themselves during the “Funccion of
San Agostin” in Tucson, or that of San Francisco in the Mexican town of
Madalena, a hundred and twenty-five miles, more or less, to the south;
the music, the dancing, the gambling, the raffles, the drinking of all
sorts of beverages strange to the palate of the American of the North;
the dishes, hot and cold, of the Mexican cuisine, the trading going on
in all kinds of truck brought from remote parts of the country, the
religious ceremonial brilliant with lights and sweet with music and
redolent with incense.
[Illustration: SPOTTED TAIL.]
For one solid week these “funcciones lasted,” and during the whole time,
from early morn till dewy eve, the thump, thump of the drum, the plinky,
plink, plink of the harp, and the fluky-fluke of the flute accented the
shuffling feet of the unwearied dancers. These and events like them
deserve a volume by themselves. I hope that what has already been
written may be taken as a series of views, but not the complete series
of those upon which we looked from day to day. No perfect picture of
early times in Arizona and New Mexico could be delineated upon my narrow
canvas; the sight was distracted by strange scenes, the ears by strange
sounds, many of each horrible beyond the wildest dreams. There was the
ever-dreadful Apache on the one hand to terrify and torment, and the
beautiful ruin of San Xavier on the other to bewilder and amaze.
Of all the mission churches within the present limits of the United
States, stretching in the long line from San Antonio, Texas, to the
presidio of San Francisco, and embracing such examples as San Gabriel,
outside of Los Angeles, and the mission of San Diego, there is not one
superior, and there are few equal, to San Xavier del Bac, the church of
the Papago Indians, nine miles above Tucson, on the Santa Cruz. It needs
to be seen to be appreciated, as no literal description, certainly none
of which I am capable, can do justice to its merits and beauty. What I
have written here is an epitome of the experience and knowledge acquired
during years of service there and of familiarity with its people and the
conditions in which they lived.
My readers should bear in mind that during the whole period of our stay
in or near Tucson we were on the go constantly, moving from point to
point, scouting after an enemy who had no rival on the continent in
coolness, daring, and subtlety. To save repetition, I will say that the
country covered by our movements comprehended the region between the Rio
Azul in New Mexico, on the east, to Camp MacDowell, on the west; and
from Camp Apache, on the north, to the Mexican pueblos of Santa Cruz and
Madalena, far to the south. Of all this I wish to say the least
possible, my intention being to give a clear picture of Arizona as it
was before the arrival of General Crook, and not to enter into
unnecessary details, in which undue reference must necessarily be had to
my own experiences.
But I do wish to say that we were for a number of weeks accompanied by
Governor Safford, at the head of a contingent of Mexican volunteers, who
did very good service in the mountains on the international boundary,
the Huachuca, and others. We made camp one night within rifle-shot of
what has since been the flourishing, and is now the decayed, mining town
of Tombstone. On still another evening, one of our Mexican guides—old
Victor Ruiz, one of the best men that ever lived on the border—said that
he was anxious to ascertain whether or not his grandfather’s memory was
at fault in the description given of an abandoned silver mine, which
Ruiz was certain could not be very far from where we were sitting.
Naturally enough, we all volunteered to go with him in his search, and
in less than ten minutes we had reached the spot where, under a mass of
earth and stone, was hidden the shaft of which our guide had spoken.
The stories that have always circulated in Arizona about the fabulous
wealth of her mineral leads as known to the Spaniards have been of such
a character as to turn the brain of the most conservative. The Plancha
de la Plata, where a lump of virgin silver weighing over two thousand
pounds was exhumed; the “Thorn Mine,” or the “Lost Cabin Mine,” in the
Tonto Basin; the “Salero,” where the padre in charge, wishing to
entertain his bishop in proper style, and finding that he had no
salt-cellars ready, ordered certain of the Indians to dig out enough ore
to make a solid silver basin, which was placed in all its crudity before
the superior—all these were ringing in our ears, and made our task of
moving the rocks and débris a very light one.
Disappointment attended our discovery; the assays of the ore forwarded
to San Francisco were not such as to stimulate the work of development;
the rock was not worth more than seventeen dollars a ton, which in those
years would not half pay the cost of reduction of silver.
We were among the very first to come upon the rich ledges of copper
which have since furnished the mainstay to the prosperity of the town of
Clifton, on the border of New Mexico, and we knocked off pieces of pure
metal, and brought them back to Tucson to show to the people there, on
returning from our scouts in the upper Gila.
On one occasion the Apaches ran off the herd of sheep belonging to
Tully, Ochoa & DeLong, which were grazing in the foot-hills of the Santa
Teresa not two miles from town. The young Mexican who was on duty as
“pastor” kept his ears open for the tinkle of the bell, and every now
and then would rouse himself from his doze to look around the mesquite
under which he sat, to ascertain that his flock was all right.
Gradually, the heat of the day became more and more oppressive, and the
poor boy, still hearing the tintinnabulation, was in a delightful
day-dream, thinking of his supper, perhaps, when he half-opened his
eyes, and saw leering at him a full-grown Apache, who had all the while
been gently shaking the bell taken an hour or two before from the neck
of the wether which, with the rest of the flock, was a good long
distance out of sight behind the hills, near the “Punta del Agua.” The
boy, frightened out of his wits, screamed lustily, and the Apache,
delighted by his terror, flung the bell at his head, and then set off at
a run to gain the hills where his comrades were. The alarm soon reached
town, and the sheep were recovered before midnight, and by dawn the next
day were back on their old pasturage, excepting the foot-sore and the
weary, too weak to travel.
Our scouting had its share of incidents grave, gay, melancholy,
ludicrous; men killed and wounded; Apaches ditto; and the usual amount
of hard climbing by day, or marching by night upon trails which
sometimes led us upon the enemy, and very often did not.
There was one very good man, Moore, if I remember his name correctly,
who died of the “fever”—malaria—and was carried from the “Grassy Plain”
into old Camp Goodwin, on the Gila, near the Warm Spring. No sooner had
we arrived at Goodwin than one of the men—soldier or civilian employee,
I do not know now—attempted to commit suicide, driven to despair by the
utter isolation of his position; and two of our own company—Sergeant
John Mott and one other, both excellent men—dropped down, broken up with
the “fever,” which would yield to nothing but the most heroic treatment
with quinine.
In a skirmish with the Apaches near the head of Deer Creek, one of our
men, named Shire, was struck by a rifle ball in the knee-cap, the ball
ranging downward, and lodging in the lower leg near the ankle bone. We
were sore distressed. There was no doctor with the little command, a
criminal neglect for which Cushing was not responsible, and there was no
guide, as Manuel Duran, who generally went out with us, was lying in
Tucson seriously ill. No one was hurt badly enough to excite
apprehension excepting Shire, whose wound was not bleeding at all, the
hemorrhage being on the inside.
Sergeant Warfield, Cushing, and I stayed up all night talking over the
situation, and doing so in a low tone, lest Shire should suspect that we
had not been telling the truth when we persuaded him to believe that he
had been hit by a glancing bullet, which had benumbed the whole leg but
had not inflicted a very serious wound.
Our Mexican packers were called into consultation, and the result was
that by four in the morning, as soon as a cup of coffee could be made, I
was on my way over to the Aravaypa Cañon at the head of a small
detachment in charge of the wounded man, who was firmly strapped to his
saddle. We got along very well so long as we were on the high hills and
mountains, where the horse of the sufferer could be led, and he himself
supported by friendly hands on each side. To get down into the chasm of
the Aravaypa was a horse of altogether a different color. The trail was
extremely steep, stony, and slippery, and the soldier, heroic as he was,
could not repress a groan as his horse jarred him by slipping under his
weight on the wretched path. At the foot of the descent it was evident
that something else in the way of transportation would have to be
provided, as the man’s strength was failing rapidly and he could no
longer sit up.
Lieutenant Cushing’s orders were for me to leave the party just as soon
as I thought I could do so safely, and then ride as fast as the trail
would permit to Camp Grant, and there get all the aid possible. It
seemed to me that there could be no better time for hurrying to the post
than the present, which found the detachment at a point where it could
defend itself from the attack of any roving party of the enemy, and
supplied with grass for the animals and fuel and water for the men.
Shire had fainted as I mounted and started with one of the men, Corporal
Harrington, for the post, some twelve miles away. We did not have much
more of the cañon to bother us, and made good speed all the way down the
Aravaypa and into the post, where I hurriedly explained the situation
and had an ambulance start up the cañon with blankets and other
comforts, while in the post itself everything was made ready for the
amputation in the hospital, which all knew to be a foregone conclusion,
and a mounted party was sent to Tucson to summon Dr. Durant to assist in
the operation.
Having done all this, I started back up the cañon and came upon my own
detachment slowly making its way down. In another hour the ambulance had
rolled up to the door of the hospital, and the wounded man was on a cot
under the influence of anæsthetics. The amputation was made at the upper
third of the thigh, and resulted happily, and the patient in due time
recovered, although he had a close call for his life.
The winter of 1870 and the spring of 1871 saw no let up in the amount of
scouting which was conducted against the Apaches. The enemy resorted to
a system of tactics which had often been tried in the past and always
with success. A number of simultaneous attacks were made at points
widely separated, thus confusing both troops and settlers, spreading a
vague sense of fear over all the territory infested, and imposing upon
the soldiery an exceptional amount of work of the hardest conceivable
kind.
Attacks were made in southern Arizona upon the stage stations at the San
Pedro, and the Cienaga, as well as the one near the Picacho, and upon
the ranchos in the Barbacomori valley, and in the San Pedro, near Tres
Alamos. Then came the news of a fight at Pete Kitchen’s, and finally,
growing bolder, the enemy drove off a herd of cattle from Tucson itself,
some of them beeves, and others work-oxen belonging to a wagon-train
from Texas. Lastly came the killing of the stage mail-rider, between the
town and the Mission church of San Xavier, and the massacre of the party
of Mexicans going down to Sonora, which occurred not far from the
Sonoita.
One of the members of this last party was a beautiful young Mexican
lady—Doña Trinidad Aguirre—who belonged to a very respectable family in
the Mexican Republic, and was on her way back from a visit to relatives
in Tucson.
That one so young, so beautiful and bright, should have been snatched
away by a most cruel death at the hands of savages, aroused the people
of all the country south of the Gila, and nothing was talked of, nothing
was thought of, but vengeance upon the Apaches.
Cushing all this time had kept our troop moving without respite. There
were fights, and ambuscades, and attacks upon “rancherias,” and
night-marches without number, several resulting in the greatest success.
I am not going to waste any space upon these, because there is much of
the same sort to come, and I am afraid of tiring out the patience of my
readers before reaching portions of this book where there are to be
found descriptions of very spirited engagements.
The trail of the raiders upon the ranch at the “Cienaga” (now called
“Pantano” by the Southern Pacific Railroad people) took down into the
“Mestinez,” or Mustang Mountains, so called from the fact that a herd of
wild ponies were to be found there or not far off. They did not number
more than sixty all told when I last saw them in 1870, and were in all
probability the last herd of wild horses within the limits of the United
States. In this range, called also the “Whetstone” Mountains, because
there exists a deposit or ledge of the rock known as “novaculite” or
whetstone of the finest quality, we came upon the half calcined bones of
two men burned to death by the Apaches; and after marching out into the
open valley of the San Pedro, and crossing a broad expanse covered with
yucca and sage-brush, we came to a secluded spot close to the San José
range, where the savages had been tearing up the letters contained in
one of Uncle Sam’s mail-bags, parts of which lay scattered about.
When the work-oxen of the Texans were run off, the Apaches took them
over the steepest, highest and rockiest part of the Sierra Santa
Catalina, where one would not believe that a bird would dare to fly. We
followed closely, guided by Manuel Duran and others, but progress was
difficult and slow, on account of the nature of the trail. As we picked
our way, foot by foot, we could discern the faintest sort of a mark,
showing that a trail had run across there and had lately been used by
the Apaches. But all the good done by that hard march was the getting
back of the meat of the stock which the Apaches killed just the moment
they reached the cañons under the Trumbull Peak. Two or three of the
oxen were still alive, but so nearly run to death that we killed them as
an act of mercy.
Three of our party were hurt in the mêlée, and we scored three hits, one
a beautiful shot by Manuel, who killed his man the moment he exposed
himself to his aim, and two wounded, how seriously we could not tell, as
by the time we had made our way to the top of the rocks the enemy had
gone with their wounded, leaving only two pools of blood to show where
the bullets had taken effect.
The trail leading to the place where the Apaches had taken refuge was so
narrow that one of our pack-mules lost his footing and fell down the
precipice, landing upon the top of a tree below and staying there for a
full minute, when the branches broke under him and let him have another
fall, breaking his back and making it necessary to blow his brains out
as soon as the action was over and we could take time to breathe.
Then followed the fearful scene of bloodshed known as the “Camp Grant
Massacre,” which can only be referred to—a full description would
require a volume of its own. A small party of Apaches had presented
themselves at Camp Grant, and made known to the commanding officer that
they and their friends up in the Aravaypa Cañon were willing and anxious
to make peace and to stay near the post, provided they could get food
and clothing. They were told to return with their whole tribe, which
they soon did, and there is no good reason for supposing that the
greater portion of them were not honest in their professions and
purposes. The blame of what was to follow could not be laid at the doors
of the local military authorities, who exerted themselves in every way
to convey information of what had happened to the Department
headquarters, then at Los Angeles. As previously stated, there was no
mode of communication in Arizona save the stage, which took five days to
make the trip from Tucson to Los Angeles, and as many more for a return
trip, there being no telegraph in existence.
Weeks and weeks were frittered away in making reports which should have
reached headquarters at once and should have been acted upon without the
delay of a second. The story was circulated and generally believed, that
the first report was returned to the officer sending it, with
instructions to return it to Department headquarters “properly briefed,”
that is, with a synopsis of its contents properly written on the outer
flap of the communication when folded. There was no effort made, as
there should have been made, to separate the peaceably disposed Indians
from those who still preferred to remain out on the warpath, and as a
direct consequence of this neglect ensued one of the worst blots in the
history of American civilization, the “Camp Grant Massacre.”
A party of more than one hundred Papago Indians, from the village of San
Xavier, led by a small detachment of whites and half-breed Mexicans from
Tucson, took up the trail of one of the parties of raiders which had
lately attacked the settlers and the peaceable Indians in the valley of
the Santa Cruz. What followed is matter of history. The pursuing party
claimed that the trails led straight to the place occupied by the
Apaches who had surrendered at Camp Grant, and it is likely that this is
so, since one of the main trails leading to the country of the Aravaypa
and Gila bands passed under the Sierra Pinaleno, near the point in
question. It was claimed further that a horse belonging to Don Leopoldo
Carrillo was found in the possession of one of the young boys coming out
of the village, and that some of the clothing of Doña Trinidad Aguirre
was also found.
These stories may be true, and they may be after-thoughts to cover up
and extenuate the ferocity of the massacre which spared neither age nor
sex in its wrath, but filled the valley of the Aravaypa with dead and
dying. The incident, one of the saddest and most terrible in our annals,
is one over which I would gladly draw a veil. To my mind it indicated
the weak spot in all our dealings with the aborigines, a defective point
never repaired and never likely to be. According to our system of
settling up the public lands, there are no such things as colonies
properly so called. Each settler is free to go where he pleases, to take
up such area as the law permits, and to protect himself as best he can.
The army has always been too small to afford all the protection the
frontier needed, and affairs have been permitted to drift along in a
happy-go-lucky sort of a way indicative rather of a sublime faith in
divine providence than of common sense and good judgment.
The settlers, in all sections of the West, have been representative of
the best elements of the older States from which they set forth, but it
is a well-known fact that among them have been a fair, possibly more
than a fair, share of the reckless, the idle and the dissolute. On the
other hand, among the savages, there have been as many young bloods
anxious to win renown in battle as there have been old wise-heads
desirous of preserving the best feeling with the new neighbors. The
worst members of the two races are brought into contact, and the usual
results follow; trouble springs up, and it is not the bad who suffer,
but the peaceably disposed on each side.
On the 5th day of May, 1871, Lieutenant Howard B. Cushing, Third
Cavalry, with several civilians and three soldiers, was killed by the
Chiricahua Apaches, under their famous chief “Cocheis,” at the Bear
Springs, in the Whetstone Mountains, about thirty-five miles from Tucson
and about the same distance to the east of old Camp Crittenden.
Cushing’s whole force numbered twenty-two men, the larger part of whom
were led into an ambuscade in the cañon containing the spring. The fight
was a desperate one, and fought with courage and great skill on both
sides. Our forces were surrounded before a shot had been fired; and it
was while Cushing was endeavoring to lead his men back that he received
the wounds which killed him. Had it not been for the courage and good
judgment displayed by Sergeant John Mott, who had seen a great amount of
service against the Apaches, not one of the command would have escaped
alive out of the cañon.
Mott was in command of the rear-guard, and, in coming up to the
assistance of Lieutenant Cushing, detected the Apaches moving behind a
low range of hills to gain Cushing’s rear. He sent word ahead, and that
induced Lieutenant Cushing to fall back.
After Cushing dropped, the Apaches made a determined charge and came
upon our men hand to hand. The little detachment could save only those
horses and mules which were ridden at the moment the enemy made the
attack, because the men who had dismounted to fight on foot were unable
to remount, such was the impetuosity of the rush made by the
Chiricahuas. There were enough animals to “ride and tie,” and Mott, by
keeping up on the backbone of the hills running along the Barbacomori
Valley, was enabled to reach Camp Crittenden without being surrounded or
ambuscaded.
Inside of forty-eight hours there were three troops of cavalry _en
route_ to Crittenden, and in pursuit of the Apaches, but no good could
be effected. Major William J. Ross, at that time in command of Camp
Crittenden, was most energetic in getting word to the various military
commands in the southern part of the country, as well as in extending
every aid and kindness to the wounded brought in by Mott.
When the combined force had arrived at Bear Spring, there was to be seen
every evidence of a most bloody struggle. The bodies of Lieutenant
Cushing and comrades lay where they had fallen, stripped of clothing,
which the Apaches always carried off from their victims. In all parts of
the narrow little cañon were the carcasses of ponies and horses
half-eaten by the coyotes and buzzards; broken saddles, saddle-bags,
canteens with bullet-holes in them, pieces of harness and shreds of
clothing scattered about, charred to a crisp in the flames which the
savages had ignited in the grass to conceal their line of retreat.
Of how many Apaches had been killed, there was not the remotest
suggestion to be obtained. That there had been a heavy loss among the
Indians could be suspected from the signs of bodies having been dragged
to certain points, and there, apparently, put on pony-back.
The Chiricahuas seemed to have ascended the cañon until they had
attained the crest of the range in a fringe of pine timber; but no
sooner did they pass over into the northern foot-hills than they broke
in every direction, and did not re-unite until near our boundary line
with Mexico, where their trail was struck and followed for several days
by Major Gerald Russell of the Third Cavalry. They never halted until
they had regained the depths of the Sierra Madre, their chosen haunt,
and towards which Russell followed them so long as his broken-down
animals could travel.
Of the distinguished services rendered to Arizona by Lieutenant Cushing,
a book might well be written. It is not intended to disparage anybody
when I say that he had performed herculean and more notable work,
perhaps, than had been performed by any other officer of corresponding
rank either before or since. Southern Arizona owed much to the gallant
officers who wore out strength and freely risked life and limb in her
defence—men of the stamp of Devin, C. C. Carr, Sanford, Gerald Russell,
Winters, Harris, Almy, Carroll, McCleave, Kelly, and many others. They
were all good men and true; but if there were any choice among them I am
sure that the verdict, if left to those soldiers themselves, would be in
favor of Cushing.
Standing on the summit of the Whetstone Range, which has no great
height, one can see the places, or the hills overlooking them, where
several other officers met their death at the hands of the same foe. To
the west is Davidson’s Cañon, where the Apaches ambushed and killed
Lieutenant Reid T. Stewart and Corporal Black; on the north, the cone of
Trumbull overlooks the San Carlos Agency, where the brave Almy fell; to
the northwest are the Tortolita hills, near which Miller and Tappan were
killed in ambuscade, as already narrated; and to the east are the
Chiricahua Mountains, in whose bosom rests Fort Bowie with its grewsome
graveyard filled with such inscriptions as “Killed by the Apaches,” “Met
his death at the hands of the Apaches,” “Died of wounds inflicted by
Apache Indians,” and at times “Tortured and killed by Apaches.” One
visit to that cemetery was warranted to furnish the most callous with
nightmares for a month.