Settlement, not just soldiers
Accounts of the nineteenth-century Southwest often focus on soldiers and battles. Settlement was at least as important. Ranchers, miners, farmers and town builders moved onto land that Apache peoples had used for generations, and they did so mostly after 1848, when the United States took over much of the region from Mexico. In many places the arrival of newcomers changed the landscape well before any treaty or reservation line was drawn.
This article covers that process in general terms. Timing differed greatly: some areas saw heavy settlement in the 1860s and 1870s, others only later, and Mexican settlements in Sonora and Chihuahua followed their own timeline.
Water: the first pressure point
In dry country, springs, streams and seeps decide where people can live. Apache groups moved through the year between lower and higher elevations, using particular water sources and plant and game areas in each season. Settlers needed the same water for homesteads, stock and mills, and they often built permanently at reliable springs and river crossings.
A farm or town at a major spring did more than occupy a small piece of ground. It could cut a group off from a seasonal camp, divert the water, or make a route unsafe. Many conflicts of the period began with disputes over a single water source, though the full causes of any given episode were usually complicated.
Game and wild foods
Settlement also reduced the animals and plants that many families relied on. Hunting for settlements and army posts, along with livestock grazing, put pressure on deer and other game in some areas. Grazing could also reduce the grasses and plants that were gathered for food, though how much depended on the place and the number of animals. Details of the Apache food economy are covered elsewhere, but the point here is simple: when game and gathering areas shrink, a mobile economy becomes harder to sustain.
Ranching
Cattle ranching spread through parts of southern Arizona and New Mexico after the Civil War and especially in the 1870s and 1880s. Herds needed large areas of grassland and reliable water. Livestock also offered something new to Apache people under pressure: in some periods, stock raids became part of the cycle of conflict, and ranchers and military officials treated them as grounds for punitive action. Many Apache communities later took up cattle raising themselves, and livestock remains important on some reservations today.
Mining
Mining camps appeared where silver, copper and gold were found. Notable examples in or near Apache country include areas of southwestern New Mexico and southern Arizona, where copper deposits drew long-term operations. Mining brought roads, wagon traffic, wood cutting and a steady flow of new arrivals. It also brought pressure on the federal government to protect miners and to restrict Apache access to nearby mountain areas. Some of the sites involved remain important to Apache communities, a subject that continues in modern debates over places such as Oak Flat and Apache landscapes.
Towns, roads and military posts
Town growth followed ranches and mines. Stage and wagon roads, and later railroads in the 1880s, linked remote areas to markets and made settlement easier. Army posts were built both to protect newcomers and to enforce federal policy, and they became centers of trade and employment, as well as of conflict. Settler communities often lobbied for troops, and the presence of soldiers could shape local economies.
Conflict and its causes
Historians generally avoid reducing the violence to a single cause. Raiding, captive-taking, broken agreements and retaliation by all sides were part of it, but so was the basic competition for land and water. The result was the series of events grouped as the Apache Wars. Civilians on all sides suffered, including Apache families who were attacked without having taken part in any conflict.
Longer-term effects
As settlement increased, federal policy moved toward confining Apache groups on reservations, often on land that settlers did not yet want. Over time, even some reservation land was reduced or opened to outside use. The long-term outcome was the Apache land loss that shapes the map today. Apache nations continue to manage lands, water and grazing under their own governments, and the broader legal history is discussed under Apache land rights and related topics. For current information on any nation’s lands and resources, readers should consult that nation’s official website.