Excerpts from Civil War and the Indian Wars by Roy Bird (forthcoming 2007, Pelican Publishing Company)

                Art Work by: Michael Almond, art professor, Washburn University

Apache Pass

In June, 1862, as summer dried up the water holes and turned the little grass in the desert crisp, Apache noticed soldiers coming from the west instead of the east. Cochise called his Chiricahua and Mangas Coloradas gathered the Mimbres to cope with the white men. The combined Apache force numbered about seven hundred Apache, the largest group of warriors the Apache ever mustered. Cochise and Mangas had their men line the slopes of Apache Pass to ambush the California Column led by General James Carleton. The lead element of the Californians entered the meandering pass on July 15, headed for Apache Springs which were the sole water sources for more than a day’s ride in any direction.

Capt. Thomas F. Roberts, 1^st California Infantry, led the advance unit, followed at some distance by part of the supply train under command of Capt. John Cremony. Three companies of infantry, a detachment of cavalry, two mountain howitzers, and the civilian freighters entered the pass with all proper precaution. As Roberts’ command approached the overland mail station to which Cochise’s people had once provided wood, a hail of bullets and arrows poured down on the bluecoats from both sides of the gap.

Hundreds of miles to the east, on a peninsula leading from Jamestown to Richmond, Virginia, other Union artillery massed on an incline at Malvern Hill blasted a Confederate assault to smithereens. Likewise, here in the West, Capt. Roberts unlimbered his mountain howitzers. In haste to follow those orders, one of the pieces overturned, and Apache fire from above sent its crew scampering for shelter. Sgt. Titus B. Mitchell of the cavalry contingent led a half-dozen of his men on foot to the howitzer, returned it to its carriage, its crew came out from hiding, and both of the guns opened fire with explosive shells, and equally explosive results. “We would have done well enough,” one Apache told a white officer later, “if you had not fired wagons at us.”

 Mangas Coloradas

As the winter of 1862-1863 deepened, Mangas Coloradas was again leading his Mimbres Apache against the miners of Pinas Altos, Arizona Territory. He has recovered sufficiently from wounds he received at the Battle of Apache Pass to lead his men, thought not without pain. But in January, 1863, as both sides grew weary of fighting, Mangas allowed himself to be lured by a white flag of truce to parley with Col. Joseph R. West. This treacherous white officer in short order accomplished what hundreds of white-eye soldiers had failed to do. West seized the giant Mangas Coloradas, accused the Apache leader of recently plundering wagon trains, and sent him from West’s tent as a prisoner.

In the earshot of another soldier, West issued orders about Mangas to two soldiers: “Men, that old murderer has got away from every soldier command and left a trail of blood five hundred miles along the old stage line. I want him dead or alive tomorrow morning. Do you understand? I want him dead!”

That night, as Mangas Coloradas tried to sleep under guard by a camp fire, the guards heated bayonets and touched them to the soles of the old chief’s bare feet. Rising to his elbows in pain and angry protest, Mangas said he “was not a child to be played with.” He was then cut down in a hail of musketry, pierced by four musket balls, killed, according to his captors, while attempting to escape. Then, as reported by one of the Pinos Altos miners who witnessed the events that night, the soldiers scalped and decapitated the old chieftain’s corpse.

 Canyon de Chelly

Most of New Mexico Territory fell under the jurisdiction of Kit Carson. His 1^st New Mexico and his Indian and civilian allies had thrust deep into Navajo country, according to one authority killing 78 people, wounding 40 more, and rounding up about 5,000 head of sheep, goats, and mules. Now Carson’s forces were poised at the brink of the last bastion of that proud nation, Canyon de Chelly.

Col. Carson’s command consisted of 650 infantry and cavalry of the 1^st California and his own 1^st New Mexico, two mountain howitzers which could be dismantled and carried on pack mules, Ute and Mescalero Apache scouts, and a supply train drawn b sturdy but slow oxen. With that force he proposed to subdue an estimated 10,000 Navajo in their strongest citadel.

The Navajo were not the only obstacles the white column confronted. Heavy snow slowed the oxen to a snail’s pace of a mere five miles per day; 25 of the oxen died of exhaustion in as many miles. Cavalry horses faltered as grain gave out, forage disappeared with no grazing available, and some collapsed and had to be destroyed. Occasional brushes with the Navajo who made only brief defensive stands before retreating further impeded the column’s progress toward the canyon.

At last Carson’s troops closed on Canyon de Chelly itself. Detachments of bluecoat soldiers broke off to seal its entrance and any other means of entrance—or more importantly, egress—as well as manning the rim with a thin line of white men. Col. Carson’s subordinates were thorough planners, and they left little to chance, and even less chance for any Navajo to escape. At one end, a party of soldiers entered along an incredibly steep trail.

While these troops were clambering down the impossible trail, others with Col. Carson forced the western entrance to the canyon. As the enrage Navajo fired arrows and bullets from old trade muskets from hiding places on the walls of the sheer red sandstone walls, the Bluecoat soldiers thrust through the canyon. The Navajo fell back before them when faced with superior weapons, discipline, and strategy. A part of the Navajo who attempted to escape through a side canyon was met by 50 white men led by Sgt. Andreas Herrera, a New Mexico noncom often mentioned in dispatches. The blue columns on the canyon rims paralleling the Navajo retreat assured they could not scale the cliffs, while Carson’s troops navigated the sandy floor of the canyon. The last hope for the Navajo was through the eastern natural gateway.

But Carson had cautiously provided for that eventuality. A force commanded by a redoubtable Indian fighter, Capt. Alfred Pfeiffer, who had given Apache fits in 1862 and 1863, closed in on the eastern entrance. The trap had closed on the hapless Navajo

 Adobe Walls

The Comanche and Kiowa raiders were under the impression that they were secure from white vengeance. In the fall of 1864, Carson was ordered to launch a punitive campaign against the plains tribes like the one he had conducted that spring against the Navajo.

By November 1864, most of the Kiowa and Comanche were in their winter camps, with their marauding suspended as their ponies, subsisting on the dried, sparse winter grass and cottonwood bark, were unfit for war parties. Carson led his regiment of 14 officers, more than 300 troopers, and about 70 Ute and Jicarilla Apache scouts out of Cimarron, New Mexico Territory. Totally unsuspecting, Kiowa led by Little Mountain were camped with some Comanche on the Candian River the Texas Panhandle.

Carson’s mounted troops attacked on the bitterly cold morning of November 26, 1864. Little Mountain’s people reacted quickly in spite of the surprise. The Kiowa leader promptly organized warriors in an orderly retreat, protecting noncombatants while sending a rider with a plea for help to other Kiowa and Comanche encampments up and down the Canadian. Little Mountain directed the defense from horseback until his pony was shot from beneath him. He clambered to his feet and rallied his braves until reinforcements arrived from the other camps.

Suddenly, Kit Carson found himself on the defensive. The battle raged up and down the valley. Carson’s column was stretched over the river bottoms and surrounding hills, with almost 30 vehicles and infantry scattered, desperate to defend themselves from the growing number of Comanche reinforcements. Carson pushed on to Adobe Walls, a fortified, Spanish-style trading post built by William Bent some two decades earlier.

The New Mexican veteran soldiers might well have been overwhelmed if not for a pair of 12-pound mountain howitzers commanded by Lt. George H. Pettis. The young officer had the big guns loaded with exploding shells to break up concentrations of Kiowa. Little Mountain ably helped by Stumbling Bear, Iron Shirt, and Satanta, completely circled his forces around Carson’s position. To maintain contact with his scattered forces the soldiers used bugles, but it is said Satanta, who had acquired a bugle of his own during his raiding, sounded bugle calls back to Carson’s men until the soldiers were utterly confused.

The Kiowa re-entered the camp they had fled in the morning. Because the wagons had not yet caught up to the attacking columns, soldiers’ ammunition ran low by the afternoon. Carson withdrew his troops to protect the lines back to the supply train. Kiowa warriors tried to block the withdrawal by setting a prairie fire between the troops and the river, but Carson ordered back fires and withdrew to a commanding knoll where the howitzers continued to disconcert the Kiowa. The Indians finally pulled back, taking their pony herd with them, but the soldiers came back into the village where 170 tepees were burned, along with all the buffalo robes, winter provisions, and clothing stored in them. Iron Shirt died when he refused to abandon his lodge.

Continued with the continuing sporadic attacks and realizing that there were literally thousands of Kiowa and Comanche in the valley, Carson ordered a retreat. The united parts of his command camped overnight and on the morning of November 27 the celebrated mountain man led a general withdrawal form Texas, having been fought to a draw. According to the official report, the 1^st New Mexico and Indian scouts lost three killed and 25 wounded three of them fatally. According to Carson’s account, the Indians lost 60 killed and 150 wounded. One Comanche scalp was reportedly taken by a young Mexican recruit among the soldiers.

Sand Creek

The 3^rd Colorado Volunteer Cavalry regiment was raised was raised to avenge a purported Indian atrocity and to punish the tribes of the Southern Plains. The enlistees in the unit were 100-day volunteers. The governor of Colorado Territory assured them that they would not depart the territory but would only fight poorly armed Indians instead of seasoned Confederate veterans as the other two Colorado regiments were doing. The governor said: “They have been raised to kill Indians, and they must kill Indians.”

In military command of the volunteers was Col. John M. Chivington. He had been a Methodist Episcopal minister in Kansas and a missionary to Indians. After moving to Denver he became politically connected and espoused the militarism of the era. He was a hero of Glorietta Pass against rebels, and now he and his men were primed to extract a terrible punishment on peace-seeking Indians. Chivington himself echoed the territorial governor when asked later about the extermination policy: “Nits make lice.”

With the blessing of  higher authorities, Chivington organized a campaign late in the year but before his 100-day soldiers’ recruitments expired. In November, 1864, he marched with 750 cavalrymen, two-thirds of whom were new recruits, and several field pieces. At sunrise on November 29, 1864—just three days after Kit Carson’s surprise attack on the Kiowa village—the 3^rd Colorado fell upon the combined villages of Black Kettle and the Arapaho chief White Antelope. There was about the same number of Cheyenne and Arapaho in the Sand Creek village. Two-thirds of then were noncombatants—women, children, old people, and peaceful warriors. Black Kettle pointed out the Stars and Stripes and a smaller white flag in the freezing morning sun. He told his people gathered around him not to fear, and called the attention of the soldiers to the flags on his lodge pole at the center of the camp.

No scraps of cloth could save them. Chivington ordered a three-armed assault, one column swinging out to cut off the horse herd while the other two surrounded Black Kettle’s camp of about 130 lodges. Rifle fire crackled, minie balls cut through the air, and the field pieces boomed gutturally, belching explosive shells. Some of the Cheyenne and Arapaho escaped by slipping up the creek bed, while others made a determined defense for almost two hours. Then the guns were brought into play to scatter and rout the Indians. A five-mile running fight ensued until dusk. Two women and five youngsters were all that were captured. Estimates of Indian deaths range from a conservative hundred women and children and 28 men to over 300 killed, half of them warriors. Casualties among the Coloradans amounted to seven killed, 47 wounded—seven of the latter died later.

 Platte River Bridge Station

The troops on the Platte River road that connected the Missouri River towns to Denver in 1865 were scattered in small contingents miles apart from each other. Cheyenne leader Roman Nose saw that the largest force remained at the Platte River Bridge Station, and once it was reduced he could eliminate the others at his leisure. The forces at the station were commanded by Maj. Martin Anderson and included parts of five companies of the 11^th Kansas Volunteer Cavalry, part of a company of Galvanized Yankees, a single howitzer, who were joined on June 25, 1865, by a company of the 11^th Ohio who reported that they had passed a wagon train protected by troops under a Sgt. Custard.

Maj. Anderson ordered up a 25-man detail to warn and assist Sgt. Custard at Willow Spring. Roman Nose’s Cheyenne tried to spring a trap, but the 25 troopers raced back to the relative safety of the station. The soldiers at the station dared not fire their carbines or howitzer for fear of injuring their retreating comrades.

Sgt. Custard’s escort and the wagon train were attacked. Five men had ridden ahead when the column heard the howitzer of the fort—only three made it through to the bridge. Custard circled his wagons. Custard’s escort and the wagons’ teamsters opened up with carbines as Cheyenne on horseback swarmed around them. A few dropped from their horses, and the rest drew out of range.

Then Roman Nose personally took the field. He rode slowly around the beleaguered wagon corral. He then had his Cheyenne dismount and every one of them with a gun crept as close to the enclosure as possible. Even though Plains Indians were not remarkable as marksmen, the withering fire had the desired effect. About midafternoon, Roman Nose ceased the firing and rode again alone around the wagons to draw fire. When no shots sounded, he entered the circle. Those whites who were not dead were seriously wounded. The dead were the fortunate ones as the Cheyenne took more revenge for Chivington’s folly.

Maj. Anderson and Capt. Walker watched with field glasses as the wagon train was demolished. They expected the Cheyenne to turn on their stockade next. They were cut off from any help. They were surprised moments after the wagons were fired by the Cheyenne victors to see three men leading their mounts, trailed by about 50 Indians. At first it was assumed that this was another decoy to draw soldiers from their cover, but then it was realized that they were three survivors of the wagon train, so they were met by a rescue party. As night fell, the Indians drew off, having inflicted 26 dead and seven wounded casualties among the 11^th Kansas.

END