What changed in 1821
Mexican independence in 1821 ended Spanish rule over the northern frontier. For Apache nations in Chihuahua, Sonora, New Mexico and Coahuila, the change mattered less as a political event than for what it did to a working arrangement. Under the Spanish peace establishments of the late 1700s, Apache families camped near presidios and received regular rations in exchange for keeping the peace. That system required reliable supply and payment, and the new Mexican state, short of money and divided by internal disputes, could not maintain it.
In the Apache Mexico conflict that followed, a gradual breakdown of the old system is usually dated to the late 1820s and early 1830s, though the timing differed from place to place and the sources do not agree. Some groups remained at peace near towns such as Janos for years after rations shrank. Others returned to the mountains. As rations declined, raiding for livestock became more important to many families’ food supply, and military posts had fewer resources to respond.
The border states take over
In practice the northern states, not Mexico City, bore the weight of frontier defence. Chihuahua, Sonora and neighbouring states ran their own militias and policies and sometimes blamed each other for failures. Treaties made by one state were not always honoured by another. A band granted peace in Chihuahua could be attacked in Sonora, and Apache leaders learned that agreements with one authority did not protect them elsewhere. This fragmentation helps explain why peace efforts so often collapsed.
Bounties and their consequences
Several states resorted to bounty systems, paying for Apache scalps or captives. In 1837 Chihuahua adopted such a law, and Sonora had similar measures around the same period. Payments were reportedly graded by the age and sex of the victim, though the exact schedules differ among sources and are best checked in specialist histories. A bounty cannot easily distinguish a raider from a peaceful camp member, and the system created incentives for killing people who had not harmed anyone.
An event often connected with this period is the killing at Santa Rita del Cobre in 1837, when a party of American scalp hunters led by John Johnson invited Chihenne Apache people to a gathering and attacked them. A well-known Chihenne leader, Juan José Compá, is generally reported among the dead, and the number of victims is uncertain. Another American, James Kirker, was later employed by Chihuahua to hunt Apache people. Apache groups responded to such events with retaliatory raids, and some leaders, including Mangas Coloradas, are often said to have been deeply affected by what happened at Santa Rita. The details of cause and effect are debated, and the surviving narratives were mostly produced by outsiders.
Cross-border raiding and U.S. entry
After the Mexican-American War ended in 1848, the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo included a clause (Article XI) obliging the United States to restrain Native raids into Mexico. In practice the United States was neither able nor especially willing to do so, and Mexican leaders complained about the failure. When the Gadsden Purchase treaty of 1853-54 replaced that article, the matter did not go away. Apache groups north of the line, including those who had no quarrel with American settlers at the time, sometimes continued to deal with Mexican towns through trade or conflict. Later, as the U.S. Army began to pursue Chiricahua bands, the Sierra Madre of northern Mexico became both a refuge and a target, a pattern described in the article on Sonora and Chihuahua raids.
Peace attempts
It would be wrong to describe the period as constant war. Evidence shows truces, ration agreements and trading at towns such as Janos at various times. Some Apache leaders appear in Mexican records as partners in negotiation, and some bands gained periods of quiet. Equally, Mexican communities suffered raids, and civilians on both sides were killed or taken captive. People on the Mexican side included ranchers, miners and farmers with little control over state policy, while Apache families included women, children and elders caught up in campaigns against their camps.
Looking at the record
Historians draw on Mexican state archives, newspapers, American traveller accounts and Apache oral traditions. Each has gaps. Mexican documents usually highlight raids and omit negotiations, and American accounts sometimes inflate numbers. Anyone using these sources should compare them, and should keep in mind that Apache peoples were not one group with one policy. The Chiricahua experience in Mexico differed from that of, for example, Lipan communities in Coahuila.
For earlier background on the system that collapsed, see the discussion of Apache and Spanish relations. The fuller story of the Apache Wars in the United States, and how Apache scouts, treaties and reservations fit into it, appears elsewhere in this site.