D e s e r t E x p o s u r e
August
2008
Hiking Apacheria: Apache chief Mangas Coloradas.
Page: 2While not directly Mangas' people, these Apache were nonetheless influenced by him. That incident, and another that historian Sweeney considers apocryphal, are cited as deal breakers for Mangas. That "incident," cited by many as "the last straw," was when Mangas was allegedly whipped by miners at Pinos Altos. Whether it really happened or not, Mangas had had enough.
On May 18, 1860, gold was discovered in Pinos Altos. Miners swarmed like African bees: aggressive, hostile, more than willing to kill any Apache who got in their way. Bear Creek, a principal drainage that heads in the Pinos Altos "mountains" and dumps into the Gila River two miles from the towns of Gila and Cliff, was a primary conduit for Apache travel. The reopening of Santa Rita del Cobre mine had also opened the area to Anglos and Mexicans.
When Steck returned in September 1860, he'd secured permission to have a reservation surveyed for Mangas' group. The reservation included Agua de Santa Lucia. Its dimensions were: "beginning one and a half miles southeast of Agua de Santa Lucia, ran 15 miles, beginning north, then west, then south, then east, from that corner. The corners [are] marked by large stone monuments, and stone mounds were placed at each intervening mile."
Miners protested to Steck, alleging the reservation encroached their mine lands. Steck challenged them, saying the reservation was 30 miles west of Pinos Altos.
Meanwhile, the Butterfield Stage Line had begun running, nearly parallel with today's I-10, in 1858 — through Mangas' Apacheria, from at least the Goodsight Mountains on the east, to the Burros and Peloncillos on the western New Mexico line. New Mexico had the greatest number of stage stations after Texas. Until February 1861, the Apaches — most notably, Mangas' son-in-law — allowed the stages to travel through Apache country. That delicate balance was upset when Lieutenant George N. Bascom captured several of Cochise's relatives and warriors, and ultimately hanged them. (See the May 2008 Desert Exposure.)
By the summer of 1861, all this was moot: Confederates had invaded New Mexico Territory, and Unionists, including Steck, were fleeing from Franklin, Texas (El Paso). By July, Mangas had decided to join forces with Cochise, and agreed to interdict the stage line by cutting it through southern New Mexico and Arizona. No more Americans would travel that route, if it were up to Cochise and Mangas.
On July 20, 1861, seven gallant Unionists, some of whom had also been associated with the Overland stage (formerly the Butterfield Stage), took the last Celerity coach out of Franklin. George H. Giddings had taken over the stage line and renamed it the San Antonio & San Diego Mail Line. Its route, too, went through Cooke's Canyon and on to Tucson. The seven Unionists had decided to get out of Franklin before they were arrested as Union spies; Tucson was safely in federal hands.
The Mesilla Times of July 27, 1861, contains a detailed account: "An express from Pino Alto [sic] brings the intelligence that the Mail bound for Los Angeles, California, which left Mesilla on the 20th July, had been taken near Cook's [sic] Springs by the Apaches, and the guard murdered. The Express passed the Cook's Springs on the 27th July, and found six [sic] bodies in the canyon; three were scalped. The coach had been destroyed.
"The following persons left Mesilla with the coach and are supposed to have been murdered: Conductor Free Thomas, Joe Roacher, M. Champion, John Portell, Robt. Avlin, Emmett Mills, and John Wilson. They were experienced frontiersmen, picked for the dangerous duty they had to perform, and undoubtedly gave the Indians a most desperate struggle.
"From Messrs. Daguerre and Thibault, who last week passed the scene of the late massacre at Cook's Springs, of the San Antonio & San Diego Mail party, we have received further particulars of that terrible deed. These gentlemen buried the bodies. They described the encounter as having evidently been a most desperate struggle. It had occurred several days before they passed. It would seem that the Indians succeeded in stampeding the mules, the coach was upset and the pole broken. The Indians probably followed the mules, giving the mail party time to secure their arms and retreat to a hill where they built a small rock wall. The fight appeared to have lasted two days. All about this wall the ground was strewed with battered bullets. Every rock and stone within many yards, which could have partially secreted an Indian, had bullets lying near. One small tree, some 150 yards from the wall, had the marks of 11 bullets on it. Nearly all had their arms broken — all were wounded in the arms and had been shot through the head. Four of the bodies were found within the wall, one in front of it, and two some 50 yards to the rear. It is supposed that the Indians numbered at least a hundred."
Having been in Cooke's Canyon in June, I can only guess how it felt in July. The fact that several bodies were found 150 yards away from their parapet led me to believe the last two had said to one another: "Might as well die trying for a drink of water!" After several days of fighting, with several men already dead, their bodies reeking in the heat, vultures circling like black shiny pinwheels overhead, the last two must have tried to run for it.
Normally, stage drivers drove their coaches through Cooke's Canyon at night. Unfortunately, some speculate that Freeman Thomas' mules needed to be re-shod. They had to have worked at night to shoe the mules, and likely left the corral as soon as possible. The Apaches who survived the fight — and later talked about it in Janos — passed on enough detail to provide a decent account of the incident.
Apaches told how they'd begun the ambush in the "narrows," a gap no more than 50 feet wide, bordered by rock walls on the east and west sides of the canyon. It's likely Thomas and some of the other stage employees knew where trouble might begin.
Recently, my writer/historian friend Neta Pope and I stopped so I could take photographs of that section of the defile. At its narrowest, the canyon is no more than 150 feet in width, with the roadbed no more than 30 feet wide. Steep rocky slopes are on both sides, and I've found likely firing positions on both slopes.
It's believed the coach was driven hard out of the narrows and onto "the flats," that spread the west of the defile. Likely, Thomas had long before reconnoitered places he'd drive to if ever ambushed. The coach was turned on its side and the mules cut loose, as a sacrifice to the Apache. The men must have gathered weapons, water, food and any other supplies they felt were needed to fight off the Apache and made their run up that "small hill or ridge."
Of all the supplies gathered, after guns and ammo, water would have been the most precious. Cooke's Canyon in July is a blast furnace, crawling with rattlesnakes, tarantulas and ants. The Giddings Station was unmanned; employees had left at the announcement of the Civil War's eruption. Cooke's Spring, undoubtedly with plenty of water and a bare two or two and a half miles east, might as well have been on the Moon.
Although the Freeman Thomas fight was well known along the border, its location was soon lost to memory. Unfortunately, contemporary accounts do not provide specific descriptions of the battleground. Various accounts by the men who buried the party — recorded in newspapers later — point to a ridge or hill about a half-mile south of the road. Later studies seem to favor the west canyon as the most likely location of the last stand. A recent examination of the high ground south of the road uncovered the foundation of a small rock enclosure that may have been related to the fight. No graves or other relics, however, have been found to corroborate the site.