Removal as a policy
Throughout the 1800s, United States policy often relied on moving Native peoples away from lands that settlers or the government wanted. The best-known examples nationally involve southeastern nations, and they are not part of Apache history, although the phrase “Trail of Tears” is sometimes misapplied to the Apache. The Indian Removal Act of 1830 and the removals it authorized concerned nations in the East. Apache removals took place later, in a different region and under different circumstances, though they shared the underlying idea that Native people could be relocated by force.
Several Apache communities experienced forced moves. This article covers three: removals within Arizona and New Mexico, the confinement of Mescalero people at Bosque Redondo, and the long imprisonment of the Chiricahua.
Moves within the Southwest
In 1875, people from the Camp Verde area, mostly Yavapai and Tonto Apache, were ordered to San Carlos. The Rio Verde removal required a winter march of well over a hundred miles, and accounts say that many people became ill or died on the way and in the early years afterward. Many were later able to return to areas near their homelands, and today the Yavapai-Apache Nation at Camp Verde reflects the return of descendants to that country.
In the early 1860s, many Mescalero were moved to Bosque Redondo, on the Pecos River in eastern New Mexico, alongside thousands of Navajo people held there under Army control. The site had poor water and fuel and limited food, and the shared confinement created tension. The Mescalero left in 1865. Mescalero at Bosque Redondo is a chapter that Mescalero people remember as one of hardship.
The Chiricahua removal, 1886
The most extreme case involved the Chiricahua. In 1886, after the surrender of Geronimo and Naiche’s party, the Army decided to send not only the surrendered fighters but virtually all Chiricahua, including those who had remained at peace, to prison in the East. That included men who had served the Army as scouts, and the Army sent many of them away along with the rest. A number of Chiricahua already living at or near the San Carlos and Fort Apache areas, who had taken no part in the fighting, were also removed. Why peaceful Chiricahua were included is a point many historians treat as a serious injustice.
The Chiricahua prisoners of war were held first in Florida, in fortifications at St. Augustine and Pensacola, often discussed under Fort Marion imprisonment. Climate and crowding led to illness, and deaths were reported, especially among children. Families were separated, and children were sent to the Carlisle Indian School in Pennsylvania, where some died.
In 1887 and 1888 the prisoners were moved to Alabama, to Mount Vernon Barracks, where conditions were also difficult and further illness occurred. In 1894 they were transferred again to Fort Sill in Oklahoma. They were still considered prisoners of war, living in villages near the post, farming and herding, with limited freedom. Geronimo died there in 1909 while still a prisoner.
The 1913 release and what followed
In 1913 the Chiricahua were released from prisoner-of-war status, after roughly twenty-seven years. They were offered a choice. Most moved to the Mescalero reservation in New Mexico, and others chose to stay in Oklahoma. They did not receive the option of returning to their home area in Arizona as a community. The 1913 Chiricahua release created two communities, one at Mescalero and one in Oklahoma. The descendants in Oklahoma are the Fort Sill Apache Tribe, which later became a federally recognized nation with its own government.
Effects
The effects of removal were broad. Families were separated from their homelands, from ceremonial places, from plants and animals they knew, and from burial places. Elders and children died far from home. Language and knowledge were harder to pass on. Many writers also describe lasting grief that was passed across generations. At the same time, communities kept kinship ties, rebuilt their lives, and worked for the right to be recognized as nations. Descendants continue to remember and care for the places connected to this period.
It is important not to read this only as a story of loss. It is also a story of endurance. Still, endurance does not make the removals less harmful, and the people involved did not choose them.
Further reading
Because this history is painful and has been told in many ways, the best accounts are those written by or with Apache communities and the descendants. Official tribal websites and records are the most reliable guides to what each nation wants shared. Readers should be cautious with sensational retellings.