A people without a secure homeland
When the United States took control of New Mexico in the late 1840s, the Jicarilla Apache had lived in northern New Mexico and southern Colorado for generations. Yet it was roughly four decades before they had a reservation that they could count on. This delay is typical of how federal policy treated many Native nations, and it left the Jicarilla in an unusually uncertain position.
The dates in this article are given in general terms. Reservation histories involve many orders, boundary changes and agency decisions, and sources differ on details, so the outline here is meant as a guide and not as a legal record.
Unratified treaties
In the early 1850s, U.S. officials negotiated treaties with several New Mexico peoples, including the Jicarilla, in part to set aside land and keep the peace. The United States Senate did not ratify these treaties, so the promises did not become law. Meanwhile, settlement in northern New Mexico and the nearby San Luis Valley of Colorado increased, and the Jicarilla lost access to farmland, hunting grounds and water. Conflicts occurred, including military campaigns in the early 1850s.
During the following years, many Jicarilla received supplies at agencies in the region, and the government at times tried to settle them near other Native communities. These arrangements were temporary and often poorly supported.
The 1870s and 1880s
By the 1870s, the federal government was increasingly using executive orders to create reservations. An order in the 1870s set aside land for the Jicarilla in northern New Mexico, but the order was later cancelled, and the families were again left without clear title. A further order in the early 1880s created a new reservation, and the decade saw continued debate over whether the Jicarilla should remain in the north or be moved elsewhere.
In the early 1880s, the government moved many Jicarilla to the Mescalero reservation in southern New Mexico, generally dated to 1883. The move separated people from their northern homeland and exposed them to illness and hardship. It also showed how little the Jicarilla’s own preferences counted. Many Jicarilla were unwilling to remain there, and over the following years they returned north.
Return to the north
In the late 1880s, a reservation in northern New Mexico was set aside by executive order, generally dated to 1887, in the area of Rio Arriba County near the present community of Dulce. Later orders and acts adjusted the boundaries over time, and further land additions have occurred since. Readers who need exact legal descriptions should consult official or specialist sources.
The reservation was in a region of mountains and mesas that the Jicarilla knew, but it did not include all of their old country, and much of the earlier range, especially along the Plains side, was lost. The Jicarilla also had to adapt to new conditions: reliance on farming and sheep or cattle in some periods, limited supplies, and agency rules about movement and religion.
Hardship and population loss
The decades between the 1850s and the early 1900s were marked by sickness, hunger and loss. Disease was severe in some years, and the Jicarilla population fell. Exact figures vary by source and are not given here. The effects of poverty and displacement were long-lasting, and they are part of the background to later community efforts at recovery.
Schools and pressure to assimilate
As on other reservations, federal policy sought to change Jicarilla life. Children were sent to schools run by the government or by churches, and traditional practices were discouraged at various times. These policies are examined more generally in the history of Apache boarding schools and the wider assimilation policy. Each family’s experience differed, and this article does not attempt to describe individual cases.
Allotment and land
Federal land policies of the late 1800s and early 1900s, such as allotment under the Dawes Act, affected many reservations. How these policies applied to the Jicarilla is a technical matter that should be checked against specialist sources. The Jicarilla ultimately retained a land base as a nation, which later allowed them to organise a tribal government under federal law in the twentieth century.
Why the history matters
The Jicarilla story shows that the creation of a reservation was not always a simple event but could be a long process full of reversals. It also shows people who kept returning to their homeland despite official pressure. Today the Jicarilla Apache Nation is a living, self-governing nation, and its reservation is a home with its own institutions and community life.
For present-day information, consult the nation’s official website. For the earlier history of the Jicarilla and their two traditional divisions, see the article on the Jicarilla Apache people.