Pinos Altos (N.M.) -- History; Pinos Altos (N.M.) -- Social life and customs
Jack Swilling, who had been among the first people to come to the camp,
enlisted with the Confederate Army, was commissioned a lieutenant and
assigned to protect the settlement. He was very popular with Americans
and Mexicans alike. He had been friendly with Mangas Colorado and once
was accredited with saving the chief’s life. One night, in a drunken
brawl, he shot and killed his best friend—a man named Printer. This
friend was buried in the cemetery near Captain Marston but his grave was
not marked. People of the camp, thinking that Swilling’s shock and grief
were sufficient punishment, did nothing about the affair. Later Swilling
went to Arizona where he started the development of the Salt River
Valley. However, when in 1867, Dan Diamond, over a trivial matter and in
cold blood, killed Schwartz, a butcher, the men took action. The nearest
court was at Mesilla so they decided to give Diamond a fair trial. He
was permitted to select his own jury and a man to defend him. He was
found guilty as charged and sentenced to hang. Sunrise next day saw him
hanging from a large juniper tree on the “Mill Site.”
Mangas Colorado was a wise and worried chief of the Warm Spring Apaches,
and he was getting old. He had watched the hard rock miners at Santa
Rita and the slow-moving pipe-smoking “Los Goddammies” in the arroyas in
the Pinos Altos mountains and noted that they came in ever increasing
numbers, that every day parties of hunters were killing deer, antelope
and turkey and driving game farther back into the mountains. He wondered
what would become of his people. He went to parley with the miners and
learned that they were interested only in obtaining the bright metal. In
an effort to get them to leave the country he offered to lead them to a
rich gold field south of the border which Victorio had found. On one
occasion he was bound and whipped, which he said he “could never
forgive”. As he was let go one husky miner, who had been tormenting him,
called, “Send over Apache girls, no whip their backs”. He went to a
secret place where he rested and recuperated from his injuries, sick
with humiliation and bitter about the loss of his son and of his friends
through the treachery of the Americans. A plan formed in his mind.
Returning to Warm Springs, he began his preparations. He sent for
Cochise “Not for war but for counsel”. Cochise told of long wagon trains
coming into the country with more and more men. If ever the miners were
to be driven out now was the time. Cochise returned to his mountains.
Mangas Colorado had the herds brought in and driven to secret places,
braves and women were given instructions, and suddenly Warm Springs was
deserted. One day, on the long slope above the miners’ camp, a bevy of
Apache girls and young squaws appeared. They paid no attention to the
settlement nor to the miners who were working nearby, but combed and
braided their long hair. Once in a while the girls left the group to run
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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