THE FIGHT AT CIBICUE

THE FIGHT AT CIBICU ILLUSTRATIONS BY THE AUTHOR

One of the most interesting episodes in the annals of Arizona history occurred August 13, 1881. It was the fight at Cibicu Creek in the White Mountains, staged between several hundred Apache warriors and sixty-eight cavalrymen under the command of Colonel (later General) É. A. Carr, United States Army. The skirmish itself is of interest to the student of military lore and early Arizona history, but there was an additional element involved which in a sense made the affair inevitable, ironic as it might have been. This was that a savage aborigine, schooled in the ways of the white man and conversant with the white man's religion, used his knowledge not for the salvation of his own immortal soul, but as the guarantee for a divine shield against the weapons of his enemies in battle.

Nock-aye-de-klinney was a White Mountain Apache, born about 1845. When he was about twenty-five years old he made a trip to Washington D.C., in the company of several other Apache Indians, and while there had an audience with President Grant. At this meeting he was presented with a silver medal which the President gave him both as a memento of his visit and as a token of friendship. When he died at the Cibicu some ten years later, this medal hung as a pendant from his neck.

Upon his return from Washington, and some of the large cities of the east, he told his people of the tall buildings, the railroads, the bridges, and the scores of wonderful things that he had seen with his own eyes. His listeners were skeptical, and so he turned in his confusion to the white man for understanding and guidance. He attended school in Santa Fe, learning many things. The thing which impressed him most deeply was the story of the Resurrection in the Christian religion. How marvelous it was that one might pass away from this mortal world and yet be brought forth again to eternal life. This thought was in his mind as he returned once more to his home in the White Mountains. He began to absent himself from his fellows, to commune alone with his surroundings, and to brood in bitter silence over the white man whom he had come to despise. Filled with vengeance, and ready to employ his knowledge and his belief against his teachers, he became a medicine man and so was able to exert great influence among his people.

In 1881, this spare, ascetic looking man began to preach that dead Indians were to rise from the grave, and that the white man's bullet could cause no harm to those who would follow him. As the weeks went on, he held ghost dances, eerie affairs in which the aroused Apache warriors would fall exhausted after days of frenzied dancing to the beat of the drums.

About August 1, 1881, a very large dance was held at Carrizo Creek, some eighteen miles from Fort Apache. Present were the people of Nock-aye-de-Klinney's tribe,that the Indians would renew the attack at daybreak, struck out for Fort Apache in the dead of night, carrying his wounded with him over the roughest of terrain. One wounded man named Foran was in his death agonies. Every little while he would slip from his horse and beg to be left, feeling that he would never reach the fort alive. Just as the column reached the mesa overlooking Carrizo Creek, and as the first streaks of dawn appeared over old Baldy, Foran dropped for the last time. Not long after that, Carr and his troopers reached the fort.

The Indians rushed the camp at dawn to find no one there. Subsequent investigation proved that the squaws dug up the several troopers who had been buried where they fell, and hacked them to pieces with axes and knives. The band pursued Carr's command, but was unable to overtake it before it reached the comparative safety of Fort Apache. They surrounded it for three days, yelling, singing, and and firing sporadically at its walls, and retired for good on the night the night of September 3.

Thus ended Nock-Aye-de-Klinney's dream of the resurrection of dead Indian braves and the subsequent annihilation of the hated white man. From the most reliable information obtainable, eighteen hostiles were killed, and eighteen were wounded. Later, some of the renegade scouts were captured and punished. Some of these were hung, others sent to the army prison on Alcatraz Island in San Francisco Bay. Those hung were: Sergeant Dead Shot, Sergeant Dandy Jim, and Corpora! Skitashe, or "Skippy." The trial by court-martial took place in November, 1881, at Fort Grant, and the executions occurred on March 3, 1882.

Extracts from the court martial proceedings in the case of Sergeant Dead Shot read as follows: "Before General Court martial which convened at Fort Grant, Arizona Territory, November 11, 1881, pursuant to special orders No. 125, dated Oct. 31, 1881, Headquarters, Department of Arizona, Whipple Barracks, Prescott, Arizona, and of which Major James Biddle, Sixth Cavalry is president, there was arraigned and tried: Sergeant Dead Shot, Company A, Indian Scouts. Charge I, Violation of the 21st Article of War. Specification: In that he, Sergeant Dead Shot, Co. "A," Indian Scouts, being a duly enlisted soldier in the service of the United States of America, did offer violence by raising his arm against his superior officers, Col. E. A. Carr, 6th U.S. Cavalry; Capt. E. C. Hentig, 6th U.S. Cavalry, 1st Lt. Wm. Stanton, 6th U.S. Cavalry, 1st Lt. W. H. Carter, 6th U.S. Cavalry, and 2nd Lt. T. Cruse, 6th U.S. Cavalry, while in the execution of their rightful office, and did shoot, at the same time with intent to do bodily injury. This, at or near Cibicu Creek, Arizona Territory on or about August 30, 1881."

There are three other charges in Sergeant Dead Shot's case, namely; mutiny, desertion, and murder, in the order named. Dead Shot pleaded "not guilty," but the court found otherwise. The sentence reads: "And the court does therefore sentence him, Sergeant Dead Shot, Co. "A," Indian Scouts to be hanged by the neck until he is dead, at such time and place as the proper authority shall direct, two-thirds of the members of the court concurring therein."

President Chester A. Arthur confirmed the court's finding and sentence on January 31, 1882.

It may be of passing interest to the reader to know that at the time of these proceedings, my grandfather, Col. Gilbert C. Smith, United States Army, was stationed at Fort Grant as post quartermaster. A few days before the execution, my grandmother passed the guardhouse on her way to the Post Trader's store. As she passed, Dandy Jim motioned her to the window, and took a red glass and turquoise string of beads from his neck. He said, "You take, me pretty soon hang." I cannot say what her emotions were, but I have the string of beads in my den, seventy-four years after the incident.