Apache Campaigns - Fort Huachuca - U.S. Army

get food and replenish our ammunition in readiness for pushing on next morning after the
hostiles. None of us realized how completely we had smashed Na-ti-o-tish’s band.
It was terribly hard to transfer our wounded. We must lower them from ledge to ledge
in the darkness, cross the stream, and raise them from ledge to ledge. But at two in the
morning we straggled into the main camp, fagged out. 98
* * *
Blacksmith John Martin of my troop...received the Medal of Honor for the Dry Wash
fight. I was heartily glad, for I had believed him entitled to the medal at Cibicu. Martin was
walking proof that a man cannot be gauged by his external appearance. He was small and
pale blond, and his Swedish accent and perennial good humor made him the butt of countless
jokes. It was Martin who went to draw his “Saber ammunition,” Martin who dressed himself
point-device and went solemnly (as instructed) to call socially upon the Colonel, Martin who
sat upon the cold prairie holding the bag for snipe, Martin who would loan anyone his last
dollar and never hint that he would like it back. 99
Those who managed to escape slipped back to the reservation. This fight, called the Battle
of Big Dry Wash, marked the last time the U.S. Army would engage any Apaches north of the
Gila. The theater of operations had now shrunk to the southeast corner of Arizona, the southern
part of New Mexico, and the Sierra Madre Mountains of Chihuahua, Mexico. This was the
traditional home of the Chiricahua and Warm Springs Apache.
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Apache Campaigns: Sierra Madre Campaign
During the winter of 1882-83 the Chiricahuas holed up in Mexico and conducted most of
their raids there. But on 21 March, 25 warriors under Chato (“Flat Nose” in Spanish) and Benito
crossed into the U.S. near Fort Huachuca. (Apache descendants claim that the real leader of this
raid was Chihuahua, not Chato who was only his lieutenant.) They killed three men at a charcoal
camp about ten miles southwest of Tombstone, and swung eastward into New Mexico. Twenty
miles north of Lordsburg, in Thompson’s Canyon they swept down upon a family of three
traveling through the pass. They were Federal Judge H. C. McComas and his wife and their sixyear-old
son Charlie. Mother and father were killed. Charlie was kidnapped, never to surface
again. The crime attracted national attention. The ammunition raid lasted just a week, but by the
time they reentered Mexico, they had killed some twenty-five Americans and completely frustrated
Army pursuit by a total of 500 troops. Apache stories have it that Chato, ever on guard,
did not sleep during the entire week, except for brief naps in the saddle. Chato’s raid terrorized
the citizenry. Sherman in Washington ordered Crook into the field.
HUACHUCA ILLUSTRATED