The Apache Wars by Paul Andrew Hutton

Author:Paul Andrew Hutton
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Crown/Archetype
Published: 2016-05-02T16:00:00+00:00

“No enemy is near,” she declared.

“For that we thank Usen,” said Nana.

Nana and Lozen were at a new stronghold in the Sierra Madre when they first heard of the Dreamer. In the spring of 1881, Nock-ay-det-klinne, a leader of the Cibecue band of the Western Apaches, began to hold dances and to preach a new religion. This was the man the White Eyes called the Dreamer. He said that the people could dance back to life the great chiefs of the past—Mangas Coloradas, Cochise, and Victorio—and that this would lead to the restoration of their homeland. Nana was intrigued.

After Victorio’s death at Tres Castillos, the surviving Chihennes and Mescaleros had lived by raiding the mining camps and isolated ranches around Silver City. They had quickly replenished their horse and cattle herds and had been joined by several more Mescalero and Warm Springs fugitives. Nana slipped back into Mexico, where they captured a large train of nineteen wagons just to the north of Galeana, killed all thirty of the Mexicans with it, and hurried west to the mountains of Sonora loaded down with booty. Nana then established a rancheria near Juh’s old stronghold in the Sierra Madre to the west of Casas Grandes.

With his people well supplied and relatively safe, Nana decided to journey north to San Carlos to learn for himself the truth of this new religion. Kaytennae went with the old man. They traveled in secret to San Carlos, where they enjoyed the simple hospitality of Cochise’s son Naiche. He agreed to go north with them to listen to Nock-ay-det-klinne and observe this new dance firsthand. His camp was in the White Mountains about forty miles northwest of Fort Apache.

The Dreamer’s gatherings featured a liberal distribution of tiswin before the dance commenced. People brought offerings to this new prophet to support the dance, not unlike the pilgrims to the backwoods camp meetings of frontier preachers. Men and women danced in lines that faced a common center like the spokes of a wheel. Hoddentin, the pollen of the tule plant used as a sacrificial powder, was sprinkled upon them as they moved to the rhythmic beat of the drums.

Nana and Kaytennae, reluctant at first, finally joined in. It was almost dawn when the Dreamer halted the dance. Accompanied by a handful of followers, including Nana and Kaytennae, the Dreamer walked up to the crest of a nearby hillside to confront the dawn. He halted just below the crest and raised his arms in prayer to Usen. Nana watched in awe as the ethereal forms of the great lords of Apacheria—Mangas Coloradas, Cochise, and Victorio—rose out of the ground above them all on the hilltop. They were visible to their knees before they retreated back into the earth as the sun rose.

“Nana said that he had seen this,” remembered Juh’s son Daklugie, “and the word of Nana was not to be questioned.” Geronimo and Juh met with Nana, Kaytennae, and Naiche back at San Carlos and were told of what they had witnessed.

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