THE SIERRA MADRE CAMPAIGN AND THE CHIRICAHUAS—“CHATO’S” RAID—CROOK’S
EXPEDITION OF FORTY-SIX WHITE MEN AND ONE HUNDRED AND
NINETY-THREE INDIAN SCOUTS—THE SURPRISE OF THE APACHE
STRONGHOLD—THE “TOMBSTONE TOUGHS”—THE MANAGEMENT OF THE
CHIRICAHUAS—HOW INDIANS WILL WORK IF ENCOURAGED—GIVING THE
FRANCHISE TO INDIANS; CROOK’S VIEWS—THE CRAWFORD COURT OF
INQUIRY—“KA-E-TEN-NA’S” ARREST ORDERED BY MAJOR BARBER—TROUBLE
ARISES BETWEEN THE WAR AND INTERIOR DEPARTMENTS—CROOK ASKS TO BE
RELIEVED FROM THE RESPONSIBILITY FOR INDIAN AFFAIRS—SOME OF THE
CHIRICAHUAS RETURN TO THE WAR-PATH.
When the Chiricahuas did break through into Arizona in the early
days of March, 1883, they numbered twenty-six, and were under the
command of “Chato,” a young chief of great intelligence and especial
daring. They committed great outrages and marked their line of
travel with fire and blood by stealing horses from every ranch they
were enabled to cover not less than seventy-five miles a day, and by
their complete familiarity with the country were able to dodge the
troops and citizens sent in pursuit. One of their number was killed
in a fight at the “Charcoal Camp,” in the Whetstone Mountains, and
another—“Panayotishn,” called “Peaches” by the soldiers—surrendered
at San Carlos and offered his services to the military to lead them
against the Chiricahuas. He was not a Chiricahua himself, but a
member of the White Mountain Apaches and married to a Chiricahua
squaw, and obliged to accompany the Chiricahuas when they last left
the agency.
Crook determined to take up the trail left by the Chiricahuas and
follow it back to their stronghold in the Sierra Madre, and surprise
them or their families when least expected. “Peaches” assured him
that the plan was perfectly feasible, and asked permission to go
with the column. By the terms of the convention then existing
between Mexico and the United States, the armed forces of either
country could, when in pursuit of hostile Indians, cross the
frontier and continue pursuit until met by troops of the country
into whose territory the trail led, though this convention applied
only to desert portions of territory. Crook visited Guaymas,
Hermosillo (in Sonora), and Chihuahua, the capital of the Mexican
State of the same name, where he conferred with Generals Topete,
Bernardo Reyes, and Carbo, of the Mexican Army, Governor Torres, of
Sonora, and Mayor Zubiran, of Chihuahua, by all of whom he was
received most hospitably and encouraged in his purposes.
He organized a small force of one hundred and ninety-three Apache
scouts and one small company of the Sixth Cavalry, commanded by
Major Chaffee and Lieutenant Frank West. The scouts were commanded
by Captain Emmet Crawford, Third Cavalry; Lieutenant Gatewood, Sixth
Cavalry; Lieutenant W. W. Forsyth, Sixth Cavalry; Lieutenant Mackay,
Third Cavalry, with Surgeon Andrews as medical officer. Crook took
command in person, having with him Captain John G. Bourke, Third
Cavalry, and Lieutenant G. J. Febiger, Engineer Corps, as
aides-de-camp; Archie Macintosh and Al Seiber as chiefs of scouts;
Mickey Free, Severiano, and Sam Bowman as interpreters. The
expedition was remarkably successful: under the guidance of
“Peaches,” “To-klanni,” “Alchise,” and other natives, it made its
way down to the head waters of the Yaqui River, more than two
hundred miles south of the international boundary, into the unknown
recesses of the Sierra Madre, and there surprised and captured,
after a brief but decisive fight, the stronghold of the Chiricahuas,
who were almost all absent raiding upon the hapless Mexican hamlets
exposed to their fury. As fast as the warriors and squaws came home,
they were apprehended and put under charge of the scouts.
This was one of the boldest and most successful strokes ever
achieved by an officer of the United States Army: every man, woman,
and child of the Chiricahuas was returned to the San Carlos Agency
and put to work. They had the usual story to tell of ill-treatment,
broken pledges, starvation, and other incidentals, but the reader
has perhaps had enough of that kind of narrative. The last straw
which drove them out from the agency was the attempt to arrest one
of their young men for some trivial offence. The Chiricahuas found
no fault with the arrest in itself, but were incensed at the
high-handed manner in which the chief of police had attempted to
carry it out: the young buck started to run away and did not halt
when summoned to do so by the chief of police, but kept on in his
retreat among a crowd of children and squaws. The chief of police
then fired, and, his aim not being good, killed one of the squaws;
for this he apologized, but the Chiricahuas got it into their heads
that he ought not to have fired in the first place; they dissembled
their resentment for a few days until they had caught the chief of
police, killed him, cut off his head, played a game of football with
it, and started for the Mexican boundary in high glee.
Crook’s expedition passed down through the hamlets of Huachinera,
Basaraca, and Bavispe, Sonora, where occurred the terrible
earthquake of the next year. Mexican eye-witnesses asserted that the
two or three ranges of mountains which at that point form the Sierra
Madre played hide-and-seek with each other, one range rising and the
others falling. The description, which had all the stamp of truth,
recalled the words of the Old Testament: “What ailed thee, O sea,
that thou didst flee? And thou, O Jordan, that thou wast turned
back? Ye mountains, that ye skipped like rams; and ye hills, like
the lambs of the flock?”
General Crook was about this time made the target of every sort of
malignant and mendacious assault by the interests which he had
antagonized. The telegraph wires were loaded with false reports of
outrages, attacks, and massacres which had never occurred; these
reports were scattered broadcast with the intention and in the hope
that they might do him injury. Crook made no reply to these
scurrilous attempts at defamation, knowing that duty well performed
will in the end secure the recognition and approval of all
fair-minded people, the only ones whose recognition and approval are
worth having. But he did order the most complete investigation to be
made of each and every report, and in each and every case the utter
recklessness of the authors of these lies was made manifest. Only
one example need be given—the so-called “Buckhorn Basin Massacre,”
in which was presented a most circumstantial and detailed narrative
of the surrounding and killing by a raiding party of Apaches of a
small band of miners, who were forced to seek safety in a cave from
which they fought to the death. This story was investigated by Major
William C. Rafferty, Sixth Cavalry, who found no massacre, no
Indians, no miners, no cave, nothing but a Buckhorn basin.
There was a small set of persons who took pleasure in disseminating
such rumors, the motive of some being sensationalism merely, that of
others malice or a desire to induce the bringing in of more troops
from whose movements and needs they might make money. Such people
did not reflect, or did not care, that the last result of this
conduct, if persisted in, would be to deter capital from seeking
investment in a region which did not require the gilding of refined
gold or the painting of the lily to make it appear the Temple of
Horrors; surely, enough blood had been shed in Arizona to make the
pages of her history red for years to come, without inventing
additional enormities to scare away the immigration which her mines
and forests, her cattle pasturage and her fruit-bearing oases, might
well attract.
It was reported that the Chiricahua prisoners had been allowed to
drive across the boundary herds of cattle captured from the
Mexicans; for this there was not the slightest foundation. When the
last of the Chiricahuas, the remnant of “Ju’s” band, which had been
living nearly two hundred miles south of “Geronimo’s” people in the
Sierra Madre, arrived at the international boundary, a swarm of
claimants made demand for all the cattle with them. Each cow had, it
would seem, not less than ten owners, and as in the Southwest the
custom was to put on the brand of the purchaser as well as the vent
brand of the seller, each animal down there was covered from brisket
to rump with more or less plainly discernible marks of ownership.
General Crook knew that there must be a considerable percentage of
perjury in all this mass of affidavits, and wisely decided that the
cattle should be driven up to the San Carlos Agency, and there
herded under guard in the best obtainable pasturage until fat enough
to be sold to the best advantage. The brand of each of the cattle,
probable age, name of purchaser, amount realized, and other items of
value, were preserved, and copies of them are to be seen in my
note-books of that date. The moneys realized from the sale were
forwarded through the official military channels to Washington,
thence to be sent through the ordinary course of diplomatic
correspondence to the Government of Mexico, which would naturally be
more competent to determine the validity of claims and make the most
sensible distribution.
There were other parties in Arizona who disgraced the Territory by
proposing to murder the Apaches on the San Carlos, who had sent
their sons to the front to aid the whites in the search for the
hostiles and their capture or destruction. These men organized
themselves into a company of military, remembered in the Territory
as the “Tombstone Toughs,” and marched upon the San Carlos with the
loudly-heralded determination to “clean out” all in sight. They
represented all the rum-poisoned bummers of the San Pedro Valley,
and no community was more earnest in its appeals to them to stay in
the field until the last armed foe expired than was Tombstone, the
town from which they had started; never before had Tombstone enjoyed
such an era of peace and quiet, and her citizens appreciated the
importance of keeping the “Toughs” in the field as long as possible.
The commanding officer, of the “Toughs” was a much better man than
the gang who staggered along on the trail behind him: he kept the
best saloon in Tombstone, and was a candidate for political honors.
When last I heard of him, some six years since, he was keeping a
saloon in San Francisco.
All that the “Tombstone Toughs” did in the way of war was to fire
upon one old Indian, a decrepit member of “Eskiminzin’s” band, which
had been living at peace on the lower San Pedro ever since
permission had been granted them to do so by General Howard; they
were supporting themselves by farming and stock-raising, and were
never accused of doing harm to any one all the time they remained in
that place. White settlers lived all around them with whom their
relations were most friendly. The “Toughs” fired at this old man and
then ran away, leaving the white women of the settlements, whose
husbands were nearly all absent from home, to bear the brunt of
vengeance. I have before me the extract from the _Citizen_ of
Tucson, which describes this flight of the valiant “Toughs”:
“leaving the settlers to fight it out with the Indians and suffer
for the rash acts of these senseless cowards, who sought to kill a
few peaceable Indians, and thereby gain a little cheap notoriety,
which cannot result otherwise than disastrously to the settlers in
that vicinity.” “The attack of the Rangers was shameful, cowardly,
and foolish. They should be taken care of at once, and punished
according to the crime they have committed.” It is only just that
the above should be inserted as a proof that there are many
intelligent, fair-minded people on the frontier, who deprecate and
discountenance anything like treachery towards Indians who are
peaceably disposed.
By the terms of the conference entered into between the Secretary of
the Interior, the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, the Secretary of
War, and Brigadier-General Crook, on the 7th of July, 1883, it was
stipulated that “the Apache Indians recently captured, and all such
as may hereafter be captured or may surrender, shall be kept under
the control of the War Department at such points on the San Carlos
Reservation as may be determined by the War Department, but not at
the agency without the consent of the Indian agent—to be fed and
cared for by the War Department until further orders.... The War
Department shall be intrusted with the entire police control of all
the Indians on the San Carlos Reservation. The War Department shall
protect the Indian agent in the discharge of his duties as agent,
which shall include the ordinary duties of an Indian agent and
remain as heretofore except as to keeping peace, administering
justice, and punishing refractory Indians, all of which shall be
done by the War Department.”
In accordance with the terms of the above conference, five hundred
and twelve of the Chiricahua Apaches—being the last man, woman, and
child of the entire band—were taken to the country close to Camp
Apache, near the head-waters of the Turkey Creek, where, as well as
on a part of the White River, they were set to work upon small
farms. Peace reigned in Arizona, and for two years her record of
deaths by violence, at the hands of red men at least, would compare
with the best record to be shown by any State in the East; in other
words, there were no such deaths and no assaults. That Apaches will
work may be shown by the subjoined extracts from the official
reports, beginning with that of 1883, just one year after the
re-assignment of General Crook to the command: “The increase of
cultivation this year over last I believe has been tenfold. The
Indians during the past year have raised a large amount of barley,
which they have disposed of, the largest part of it being sold to
the Government for the use of the animals in the public service
here. Some has been sold to the Indian trader, and quite an amount
to freighters passing through between Wilcox and Globe. Their corn
crop is large; I think, after reserving what will be needed for
their own consumption and seed for next year, they will have some
for sale. The only market they have for their produce is from
freighters, the trader, and the Q. M. Department here. They are
being encouraged to store their corn away and use it for meal; for
this purpose there should be a grist-mill here and one at Fort
Apache. They have cut and turned in during the year to the Q. M.
Department and at the agency about four hundred tons of hay cut with
knives and three hundred cords of wood, for which they have been
paid a liberal price.” Attached to the same report was the
following: “Statement showing the amount of produce raised by the
Apache Indians on the White Mountain Indian Reservation during the
year 1883: 2,625,000 lbs. of corn, 180,000 lbs. of beans, 135,000
lbs. of potatoes, 12,600 lbs. of wheat, 200,000 lbs. of barley,
100,000 pumpkins, 20,000 watermelons, 10,000 muskmelons, 10,000
cantelopes. Small patches of cabbage, onions, cucumbers, and lettuce
have been raised. (Signed) EMMET CRAWFORD, _Captain Third Cavalry_,
Commanding.”
I have seen Indian bucks carrying on their backs great bundles of
hay cut with knives, which they sold in the town of Globe to the
stable owners and keepers of horses.
During that winter General Crook wrote the following letter, which
expresses his views on the subject of giving the franchise to
Indians; it was dated January 5, 1885, and was addressed to Mr.
Herbert Welsh, Secretary of the Indian Rights Association,
Philadelphia:
“MY DEAR MR. WELSH:
“The law prohibiting the sale of liquor to Indians is practically
a dead letter. Indians who so desire can to-day obtain from
unprincipled whites and others all the vile whiskey for which they
can pay cash, which is no more and no less than the Indian as a
citizen could purchase. The proposition I make on behalf of the
Indian is, that he is at this moment capable, with very little
instruction, of exercising every manly right; he doesn’t need to
have so much guardianship as so many people would have us believe;
what he does need is protection under the law; the privilege of
suing in the courts, which privilege must be founded upon the
franchise to be of the slightest value.
“If with the new prerogatives, individual Indians continue to use
alcoholic stimulants, we must expect to see them rise or fall
socially as do white men under similar circumstances. For my own
part, I question very much whether we should not find the Indians
who would then be drunkards to be the very same ones who under
present surroundings experience no difficulty whatever in
gratifying this cursed appetite. The great majority of Indians are
wise enough to recognize the fact that liquor is the worst foe to
their advancement. Complaints have frequently been made by them to
me that well-known parties had maintained this illicit traffic
with members of their tribe, but no check could be imposed or
punishment secured for the very good reason that Indian testimony
carries no weight whatever with a white jury. Now by arming the
red men with the franchise, we remove this impediment, and provide
a cure for the very evil which seems to excite so much
apprehension; besides this, we would open a greater field of
industrial development. The majority of the Indians whom I have
met are perfectly willing to work for their white neighbors, to
whom they can make themselves serviceable in many offices, such as
teaming, herding, chopping wood, cutting hay, and harvesting; and
for such labor there is at nearly all times a corresponding demand
at reasonable wages. Unfortunately, there are many unscrupulous
characters to be found near all reservations who don’t hesitate
after employing Indians to defraud them of the full amount agreed
upon. Several such instances have been brought to my notice during
the present year, but there was no help for the Indian, who could
not bring suit in the courts. Every such swindle is a
discouragement both to the Indian most directly concerned and to a
large circle of interested friends, who naturally prefer the
relations of idleness to work which brings no remuneration.
“Our object should be to get as much voluntary labor from the
Indian as possible. Every dollar honestly gained by hard work is
so much subtracted from the hostile element and added to that
which is laboring for peace and civilization. In conclusion, I
wish to say that the American Indian is the intellectual peer of
most, if not all, the various nationalities we have assimilated to
our laws, customs, and language. He is fully able to protect
himself if the ballot be given, and the courts of law not closed
against him. If our aim be to remove the aborigine from a state of
servile dependence, we cannot begin in a better or more practical
way than by making him think well of himself, to force upon him
the knowledge that he is part and parcel of the nation, clothed
with all its political privileges, entitled to share in all its
benefits. Our present treatment degrades him in his own eyes, by
making evident the difference between his own condition and that
of those about him. To sum up, my panacea for the Indian trouble
is to make the Indian self-supporting, a condition which can never
be attained, in my opinion, so long as the privileges which have
made labor honorable, respectable, and able to defend itself, be
withheld from him.”
Chancellor Kent has well said that unity increases the efficiency,
by increasing the responsibility, of the executive. This rule
applies to every department of life. The dual administration of
the Apache reservation, by the Departments of War and the
Interior, did not succeed so well as was at first expected: there
were constant misunderstandings, much friction, with complaints
and recriminations. Captain Crawford had won in a remarkable
degree the esteem and confidence of the Indians upon the
reservation, who looked up to him as a faithful mentor and friend.
They complained that certain cows which had been promised them
were inferior in quality, old and past the age for breeding, and
not equal to the number promised. This complaint was forwarded
through the routine channels to Washington, and the Interior
Department ordered out an inspector who reported every thing
serene at the agency and on the reservation. The report did not
satisfy either Indians or whites, but upon receiving the report of
its inspecting officer the Interior Department requested that
Captain Crawford be relieved, coupling the request with remarks
which Crawford took to be a reflection upon his character; he
thereupon demanded and was accorded by his military superiors a
court of inquiry, which was composed of Major Biddle, Sixth
Cavalry, Major Purington, Third Cavalry, Captain Dougherty, First
Infantry, as members, and First Lieutenant George S. Anderson,
Sixth Cavalry, as Recorder. This court, all of whose members were
officers of considerable experience in the Indian country, and one
of whom (Dougherty) had been in charge of one of the largest Sioux
reservations in Dakota, set about its work with thoroughness,
examined all witnesses and amassed a quantity of testimony in
which it was shown that the Apaches had good ground of complaint
both in the character and in the number of cows supplied them:
they were in many cases old and unserviceable, and instead of
there being one thousand, there were scarcely six hundred, the
missing cattle being covered by what was termed a “due bill,” made
out by the contractor, agreeing to drive in the missing ones upon
demand.
There was only one serious case of disturbance among the Chiricahua
Apaches: the young chief “Ka-e-ten-na” became restless under the
restraints of the reservation, and sighed to return to the wild
freedom of the Sierra Madre. He was closely watched, and all that he
did was reported to headquarters by the Indian scouts. General Crook
was absent at the time, by direction of the Secretary of War,
delivering the address to the graduating class at the Military
Academy at West Point; but Major Barber, Adjutant-General, carried
out Crook’s methods, and the surly young man was arrested by his own
people, tried by his own people, and sentenced to be confined in
some place until he learned sense. He was sent to Alcatraz Island,
in San Francisco Harbor, where he remained twelve months, the
greater part of the time being allowed to see the sights of the city
and to become saturated with an idea of the white man’s power in
numbers, wealth, machinery, and other resources. He became a great
friend, and rendered great help, to General Crook later on.
Under date of January 20, 1885, General Crook wrote as follows to
his military superiors:
“In the event that the views of the Indian agent are approved, I
respectfully request that matters referred to in the agreement be
relegated to the control of the Interior Department, and that I be
relieved from all the responsibilities therein imposed.”
In forwarding the above communication to Washington, General John
Pope, commanding the Military Division of the Pacific, indorsed the
following views:
“Respectfully forwarded to the adjutant-general of the army. It is
needless to reiterate what the authorities in Washington and
everybody in this region know perfectly well now. General Crook’s
management of these Indians has been marked by unusual and
surprising success, and if matters are left in his charge a very
few years longer all fears of Indian trouble in Arizona may be
dismissed.
“One of the difficulties (and the principal one) he has met with
is the constant discord between the civilian Indian agents and the
military. It is not even hoped that a stop may be put to such
controversies so long as there is a joint jurisdiction over the
Arizona Indians. It is not human nature that such an anomalous
relation should escape such troubles, but in view of General
Crook’s superior ability and experience, and the great success he
has met with, I must emphatically recommend that, instead of
relieving him as he suggests, the entire control of the Indians be
turned over to him.
“(Signed) JOHN POPE, _Major-General_.”
For people interested in the question of Indian management and of
Indian pacification, no more important document can be presented
than General Crook’s Annual Report for the year 1885. As this
document will not be accessible to every reader, I will take the
liberty of making a number of extracts from it, at the same time
warning the student that nothing will compensate him for a failure
to peruse the complete report.
In answer to the letter forwarded with an indorsement by
Major-General Pope, given above, General Crook received a telegram
dated Washington, February 14, 1885, which directed him, pending
conferences between the Interior and War Departments with a view of
harmonizing matters, “not to interfere with farming operations of
Indians who are not considered as prisoners.”
General Crook replied in these terms:
“I have the honor to say that the agreement of July 7, 1883, by
which ‘the War Department was intrusted with the entire police
control of all the Indians on the San Carlos reservation,’ was
entered into upon my own expressed willingness to be personally
responsible for the good conduct of all the Indians there
congregated. My understanding then was, and still is, that I
should put them to work and set them to raising corn instead of
scalps. This right I have exercised for two years without a word
of complaint from any source. During all this time not a single
depredation of any kind has been committed. The whole country has
looked to me individually for the preservation of order among the
Apaches, and the prevention of the outrages from which the
southwest frontier has suffered for so many years.
“In pursuance of this understanding, the Chiricahuas, although
nominally prisoners, have been to a great extent scattered over
the reservation and placed upon farms, the object being to quietly
and gradually effect a tribal disintegration and lead them out
from a life of vagabondage to one of peace and self-maintenance.
They have ramified among the other Apaches to such an extent that
it is impossible to exercise jurisdiction over them without
exercising it over the others as well. At the same time trusted
Indians of the peaceful bands are better enabled to keep the
scattered Chiricahuas under constant surveillance, while the
incentive to industry and good conduct which the material
prosperity of the settled Apaches brings to the notice of the
Chiricahuas is so palpable that it is hardly worth while to allude
to it. As this right of control has now been withdrawn from me, I
must respectfully decline to be any longer held responsible for
the behavior of any of the Indians on that reservation. Further, I
regret being compelled to say that in refusing to relieve me from
this responsibility (as requested in my letter of January 20th),
and at the same time taking from me the power by which these
dangerous Indians have been controlled and managed and compelled
to engage in industrial pursuits, the War Department destroys my
influence and does an injustice to me and the service which I
represent.”
The indorsement of Major-General John Pope, the commander of the
military division, was even more emphatic than the preceding one had
been, but for reasons of brevity it is omitted excepting these
words.
“If General Crook’s authority over the Indians at San Carlos be
curtailed or modified in any way, there are certain to follow very
serious results, if not a renewal of Indian wars and depredations
in Arizona.”
These papers in due course of time were referred by the War to the
Interior Department, in a communication the terminal paragraph of
which reads as follows, under date of March 28, 1885:
“I submit for your consideration whether it is not desirable and
advisable in the public interests, that the entire control of
these Indians be placed under the charge of General Crook, with
full authority to prescribe and enforce such regulations for their
management as in his judgment may be proper, independently of the
duties of the civil agents, and upon this question this Department
will appreciate an early expression of your views.
“(Signed) WILLIAM C. ENDICOTT, _Secretary of War_.”
One of the principal causes of trouble was the disinclination of the
agent to permit the Apaches to excavate and blast an irrigating
ditch, which had been levelled and staked out for them by Lieutenant
Thomas Dugan, Third Cavalry, one of Captain Crawford’s assistants,
the others being Parker, West, and Britton Davis of the Third
Cavalry, Elliott of the Fourth Cavalry, and Strother of the First
Infantry. Captain Crawford, feeling that his usefulness had gone,
applied to be relieved from his duties at the San Carlos and allowed
to rejoin his regiment, which application was granted, and his place
was taken by Captain Pierce, of the First Infantry, who was also
clothed with the powers of the civil agent.
It was too late. The Chiricahuas had perceived that harmony did not
exist between the officials of the Government, and they had become
restless, suspicious, and desirous of resuming their old career. A
small number of them determined to get back to the Sierra Madre at
all hazards, but more than three-fourths concluded to remain. On the
17th of May, 1885, one hundred and twenty-four Chiricahuas, of all
ages and both sexes, under the command of “Geronimo” and “Nachez,”
the two chiefs who had been most energetic in their farm work, broke
out from the reservation, but the other three-fourths listened to
the counsels of “Chato,” who was unfriendly to “Geronimo” and
adhered to the cause of the white man. It has never been ascertained
for what special reason, real or assigned, the exodus was made. It
is known that for several days and nights before leaving, “Geronimo”
and “Nachez,” with some of their immediate followers, had been
indulging in a prolonged debauch upon the “tizwin” of the tribe, and
it is supposed that fearing the punishment which was always meted
out to those caught perpetuating the use of this debasing
intoxicant, they in a drunken frenzy sallied out for the Sierra
Madre. Lieutenant Britton Davis, Third Cavalry, under whose control
the Chiricahuas were, telegraphed at once to General Crook, but the
wires were working badly and the message was never delivered. Had
the message reached Crook it is not likely that any trouble would
have occurred, as he would have arranged the whole business in a
moment. To quote his own words as given in the very report under
discussion:
“It should not be expected that an Indian who has lived as a
barbarian all his life will become an angel the moment he comes on
a reservation and promises to behave himself, or that he has that
strict sense of honor which a person should have who has had the
advantage of civilization all his life, and the benefit of a moral
training and character which has been transmitted to him through a
long line of ancestors. It requires constant watching and
knowledge of their character to keep them from going wrong. They
are children in ignorance, not in innocence. I do not wish to be
understood as in the least palliating their crimes, but I wish to
say a word to stem the torrent of invective and abuse which has
almost universally been indulged in against the whole Apache race.
This is not strange on the frontier from a certain class of
vampires who prey on the misfortunes of their fellow-men, and who
live best and easiest in time of Indian troubles. With them peace
kills the goose that lays the golden egg. Greed and avarice on the
part of the whites—in other words, the almighty dollar—is at the
bottom of nine-tenths of all our Indian trouble.”