BS: Geronimo

Subject: BS: Geronimo
From: GUEST,Beachcomber
Date: 28 Dec 12 - 09:45 AM

The Sunday Times CULTURE Magazine of 23/12/'12 has a review of a new book by Robert M. Utley, on the Apache Chief Geronimo. The reviewer is Brian Schofield and the headline poses the question "Hero - or Thug ?"
I have always read sympathetic accounts of his activities in the mid to late 1800s. The few movies that I have seen have also been, in general, in sympathy with his war on the Mexican and US armies and civilians in his former tribal territory. What do Native Americans believe about him ?

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: pdq
Date: 28 Dec 12 - 09:51 AM

"Hero - or Thug ?"

Nothing inbetween?

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: Little Hawk
Date: 28 Dec 12 - 12:02 PM

Apaches were generally merciless in war...but so were most of the people they were fighting against. I suspect Geronimo was not particularly unusual as an Apache warrior, except that he proved to be a very effective war leader and he went on fighting against overwhelming odds for a very long time. He'd have been a hero to those on his own side, a thug (and murderer) to those he fought against, and something in between those 2 extremes to someone with a neutral viewpoint.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: Jack Campin
Date: 28 Dec 12 - 12:19 PM

Is that the same Brian Schofield who used to be a computer journalist and spent 20 years saying DOS and Windows were the only way and Apple would never produce anything worth buying?

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: Mrrzy
Date: 28 Dec 12 - 01:29 PM

Apparently he is very hard to research as nobody had heard of him till he was fairly middle-aged...

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: Mrrzy
Date: 28 Dec 12 - 01:32 PM

oops but how did HE get to be whose name's shouted when you jump over a cliff? Perhaps this book is really about fiscal matters?

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: Jeri
Date: 28 Dec 12 - 02:09 PM

There's a lot more to the story. I think I might have known some of it at one time.

Geronimo's Cadillac, written by Michael Martin Murphy and sung by
Bill Miller.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: gnu
Date: 28 Dec 12 - 02:27 PM

Excelent song, Jeri. Thanks.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 28 Dec 12 - 02:31 PM

His story is complex, hard to capture in a paragraph.
Suggested reading-
Ralph Moody, 2008 (updated printing). Geronimo: Wolf on the Warpath. Sterling Pub.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: pdq
Date: 28 Dec 12 - 02:32 PM

I have a basic understanding of Geronimo's history, and I can tell you that most of the entries you will get on a web search are politicized and are crap.

This is reasonable:

"A legend of the untamed American frontier, the Apache leader Geronimo was born in June 1829 in No-Doyohn Canyon, Mexico. At the age of 17 Geronimo had already led four successful raiding operations. Around this same time he fell in love with a woman named Alope. The two married and had three children together.

Then tragedy struck. While out on a trading trip, Mexican soldiers attacked his camp, killing his family.

The murders devastated Geronimo. In the tradition of the Apache, he set fire to his family's belongings and then, in a show of grief, headed into the wilderness to bereave the deaths. There, it's said, alone and crying, a voice came to Geronimo that promised him: "No gun will ever kill you. I will take the bullets from the guns of the Mexicans … and I will guide your arrows."

Backed by this sudden knowledge of power, Geronimo rounded up a force of 200 men and hunted down the Mexican soldiers who killed his family. On it went like this for 10 years, as Geronimo exacted a brutal and cruel revenge against the Mexican government.

By the 1850's the enemy had changed face and it was now the new US settlers and cavalry that felt the brunt of Geronimos savagery and it wasn't until 1877 that he was caught and confined to The San Carlos Reservation. Within 4 years Geronimo led a small band of Chiracahua off the reservation and for the next 5 years engaged in what proved the last of the Indian wars against the US.

He finally died in 1909 after being thrown from his horse and spending a cold night in the desert , he was found the following day but his health rapidly deteriorated and he died six days later..."

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: pdq
Date: 28 Dec 12 - 02:43 PM

The change in venue to the Chiricahua Mountains was done by Mexican Apache tribal leaders who asked Cochise to hide Geronimo from the Mexican soldiers.

He was probably #1 on the Mexican government's "most wanted" list.

He transferred his hostility to the Anglos who had done nothing to him or his family.

He was never a legal resident of the US, certainly not ever a citizen

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 28 Dec 12 - 02:52 PM

...how did HE get to be whose name's shouted when you jump over a cliff?

Because "Frank" doesn't have enough syllables.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: Rapparee
Date: 28 Dec 12 - 03:55 PM

Rumors persist that Geronimo's skull, some bones, and some of his horse's tack reside in the "Tomb" of Yale's Skull and Bones Society. His grave is at Ft. Sill, Oklahoma.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: pdq
Date: 28 Dec 12 - 05:03 PM

That rumor is total crap.

The groundskeeper at Ft. Sill (I think that's the place Geronimo's remains are) said that the grave has never been distubed and is in a guarded area.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: gnu
Date: 28 Dec 12 - 05:42 PM

No matter any of it. He was a brave and honourable man who did what he had to do. He is a hero and deserves respect.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: GUEST,DDT
Date: 28 Dec 12 - 06:54 PM

"The groundskeeper at Ft. Sill (I think that's the place Geronimo's remains are) said that the grave has never been distubed and is in a guarded area."

Oh, well, then, it must be true.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: Little Hawk
Date: 28 Dec 12 - 10:39 PM

pdq - "He was never a legal resident of the US, certainly not ever a citizen"


OOOOOHHH!!!!!!!!!!! Horrors! How shocking! Yes, that was the FIRST thing migratory Native Americans such as Geronimo, Cochise, Crazy Horse, Sitting Bull, Crowfoot, Red Cloud, etc asked themselves in the wee hours of the night when searching their sin-burdened souls...."Am I a legal resident of the United States of America? Am I a citizen??? Do I have a legal right to be here?????"

The common expression "Fuck me!" (combined with a disbelieving rolling of the eyes) comes to mind... They were a free people. They didn't live or die in terms of your steenkin' borders.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 28 Dec 12 - 10:52 PM

If you get into who had a "right" to be there in the first place that would exclude all the settlers from Europe in all the Americas.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: GUEST,999
Date: 28 Dec 12 - 10:56 PM

Fuck him with all due respect, but Cochise was the bad ass. You White folks have to stop thinking you write history. Y'all just part of it, no offense.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 28 Dec 12 - 11:04 PM

And of course Geronimo wasn't "a citizen of the United States". It was only in 1924 that apaches were allowed to be "citizens" by the newcomers into their continent.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: katlaughing
Date: 28 Dec 12 - 11:05 PM

Geronimo's Cadillac is one of my fav. songs. We have the original MMM LP. He's added some parts to it, but I still like his version best: CLICK HERE.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: pdq
Date: 28 Dec 12 - 11:07 PM

That is one of the worst posts that Liberal Squawk has ever made.

Geronimo was a victim of the Spanish aristocracy that ran Mexico.

He transferred his violence and haterd to the Anglos in the US who came here to farm and raise livesock.

Geronimo deserves respect as a brave fighter, but not as a visionary.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: Jeri
Date: 28 Dec 12 - 11:22 PM

Thanks for posting a link to that version, Kat. He does talk quite a bit about how it came to be. I think the photo might be the one used in the Bill Miller video.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 29 Dec 12 - 04:41 AM

Seems to me that the least you all could do is to respect him by using his given name which is Goyathlay, the Spanish called him Heironimus which the Americans corrupted to Geronimo.

A brave and noble freedom fighter.

Dave H

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 29 Dec 12 - 05:58 AM

Goyathlay not his original given name, tho; but a tribal nickname referring to an irritating personal habit ~~ it means' the man who keeps on yawning'.

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: GUEST,Beachcomber
Date: 29 Dec 12 - 07:40 AM

Heironimus to "Geronimo" eh ? that sounds like a very likely transition, but can anyone say what Heironimus meant ?
I wonder what interpretation modern medicine could put on his yawning habit ?
There's no doubt however that he must be respected for his courage.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 29 Dec 12 - 09:59 AM

Hieronimo is the Spanish form of Latin Hieronymus, known in English as Jerome. St Jerome, along with Sts Augustus, Benedict and Ambrose, are known collectively, because of their early commentaries and interpretations of the Gospels and Epistles, as the four Doctors of the Church. An odd name to have been foisted by posterity upon an Apache chief and warrior!

As often in these threads, I commend the Flashman novels of George MacDonald Fraser as being an excellent, though lightly fictionalised, source of information on the historical backgrounds of the C19 events each novel deals with, meticulously researched and copiously and informatively annotated. The one to read in connection with this thread is Flashman & The Redskins.

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: bobad
Date: 29 Dec 12 - 10:12 AM

Geronimo's Cadillac was actually a 1904 Locomobile Model C

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 29 Dec 12 - 10:15 AM

Same name as Jeremy.    But I suppose that would sound a bit strange, rather too Home Counties.

"I hear that Jeremy is on the warpath"...

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 29 Dec 12 - 10:18 AM

My source was ' Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee ' by Dee Brown, I have no reason to doubt this, what is your source Michael ?

Dave H

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: GUEST,Beachcomber
Date: 29 Dec 12 - 10:41 AM

M of H , that would be something like , to quote Tony Hancock (was it ?) "being savaged by a dead sheep !" (Perhaps Jeremy Thorpe had a darker side too ?)

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 29 Dec 12 - 10:55 AM

No,that was Dennis Healy said that about Geoffrey Howe. It was ironic that the woolly creature later managed effectivly to destroy Margaret Thatcher.

And it appears true enough at Jeremy Thorpe said have a pretty dodgy side which led to him being put on trial for alleged consptracy to murder. He was acquitted...

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 29 Dec 12 - 11:08 AM

Were the Apache actually a tribe? I heard, probably incorrectly, that the term was more akin to 'Viking' - IE a person of any one of a number of tribes who went raiding and pillaging. Only idle curiosity.

As to the argument Hero or Thug - Well, probably one we don't want to go near. It has already been said that he was an honourable and brave man. How many people would apply that to Osama bin Laden? Quite a few I suspect although given the background of Mudcat I suspect not many here will agree! How about -

Che Guevara
Fidel Castro
Martin McGuiness
Gerry Adams
Jim Gray
Charles Smith
Nelson Mandella
Steve Biko
Vladimir Lenin
Nestor Makhno
Muhammad Youssef al-Najjar
Abu Daoud

...and so on.

All depends what side of the fence you are on and who wrote the history books!

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: Jeri
Date: 29 Dec 12 - 11:13 AM

Bobad, thanks. That IS the photo used in the Miller vid.

Here's some biographical material as well as a link to a full-length History Channel video. I don't know if they discuss his name as I'm only partway through it.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 29 Dec 12 - 12:55 PM

DaveH ~~ No 'source', as such: I do not deny that "Perpetually Yawning Man" was, as Dee Brown states, the name by which the adult warrior was known thruout the tribe. But it is surely not the sort of name that would be 'given' to a child from birth, but more suggestive of a nickname acquired later. As I understand it, a warrior would be known by a name, nickname or cognomen, given by the tribe on his being accepted as a full member, often related to some attribute. I take it that Crazy Horse or Bloody Sleeves [Mangas Colorado] were not birth names either, but given on achieving manhood and full tribal status.

But that is not the same as 'given name', is it, which implies 'birth name'. Though what was his birth name? - does anyone know?

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: Jeri
Date: 29 Dec 12 - 01:51 PM

"Goyakla" apparently means "yawn". This website says it was his birth name.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 29 Dec 12 - 02:27 PM

Indeed it does. Thank you. A particularly yawny baby, perhaps?

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: Jeri
Date: 29 Dec 12 - 04:32 PM

Or one who just yawned at a significant time.

I see that Cochise, whom 999 says was "the bad ass" was Geronimo's father-in-law. I love threads like this that go for a while before they turn into fights, because I have an opportunity to poke around and learn things.

This song doesn't have much to do with Geronimo, other than saying something about the mindset of white Americans at the time. Although it's a convenient mindset for any people who have an upper hand and don't want to think too hard about it. I'd like to think I'd behave better than people who were actually there, but I don't think it's realistic to believe any of us would have. Anyway, here's Nancy Griffith singing Deadwood, South Dakota.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: pdq
Date: 29 Dec 12 - 05:37 PM

Amazing how "truth" mutates with time.

Geronimo was born south of Janos, Mexico, approximately 100 miles from the present US border.

He was born in 1829, yet one website says he was born in 1809 and another says 1805, even claiming he lived to be 104.

A few sites are now saying he was born near Clifton, Arizona.

Various stories have him with one brother, others with one sister, others have him as the fourth child born out of a total of eight.

Pick the "facts" you like, I suppose.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: LadyJean
Date: 29 Dec 12 - 11:24 PM

The Apache had an oral tradition, not a written record. So, facts will be hard to come by. Goyateleh lead a raid on the feast of St. Geronimo, hence the nickname. Like most of the western Indians, Apache were occasional raiders, going after horses and other livestock. Not to different to what my Celtic forbearers did for fun. But white farmers on either side of the Rio Grande were not amused.

The lady I had for anthropology in college did some of her field work among the Navaho, (Dineh) She implied that Apache were kind of nuts. (Of course I've heard that said about Celts too.)

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: pdq
Date: 30 Dec 12 - 05:13 PM

If people want to understand what happened in the Southwest, you need to know who were the players.

The true Mexicans are from the middle portion of the present country of Mexico. They once were the Aztecs:

                                                                                                         map of Aztec Empire

The area north of the Aztec empire was sparsely populated by small tribes of people we call Indians. They are fairly similar all the way into present day Canada, to the Mississippi River on the east and to the Pacific Ocean on the west.

The Spanish came to conquer and were brutile, killing thousands of the Aztecs and claiming most of the land in North America for Spain.

Originally, there were millions of Aztec, many of whom died of small pox, influenza and other diseases brought from Europe.

Even though the Spanish are European to us, the Indians and Mexican did not consider them the same people as Anglos. They have black hair, dark eyes and usually large noses. The Indians learned to fear them and live as third class citizens under the Spanish control.

From the eastern US came the Anglos, the name that most prefer in this region. It means anyone with blue eyes or light skin.

The Anglos came to the Southwest to farm and raise livestock but they were taking land that the Indians were used to cotrolling and that caused problems.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: GUEST,Beachcomber
Date: 31 Dec 12 - 06:23 AM

Thanks pdq for linking to that map. I note that it shows the territory of the Mayans further south. Where/when did the Inca flourish or otherwise, in relation to the Aztec and Maya ? Were they all contemporary ?

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: pdq
Date: 31 Dec 12 - 10:22 AM

Not to split hairs, but the Mayan Empire was due east of the Aztec Empire, not south.

Both were quite distinct from the small bands scattered across the southwest US and the northen half of Mexico.

The Incas were a long way from all of them, claiming the whole western coast of South America, centered in present day Peru.

The three great civilizations of the New World produced some amazing architecture.

Some buildings were razed by the Spanish and their new buildings set on the old foundation.

Much of the Mayan ruins are still lost due to the extremely fast growth of the jungle in that area.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: pdq
Date: 31 Dec 12 - 11:52 AM

From the initial post:

"...a new book by Robert M. Utley, on the Apache Chief Geronimo. The reviewer is Brian Schofield and the headline poses the question 'Hero - or Thug ?'"


First, Geronimo was never the chief of anything. He is sometimes called a 'medicine man', but he was a simple farmer and trader.

Once his family was murdered by Mexicans sent from Mexico city to pacify the Indians, he went crazy, spending almost 30 years killing as many people as he could, getting many others to help him. Spanish and Mexicans at first, Anglo settlers later.

Most Apaches consider Chief Chochise their finest man, but some feel he settled for less than he should have with the San Carlos Reservation deal.

Some view Geronimo as their finest warrior, others feel he caused years of needless bloodshed. His actions led to the destruction of the Chiricahua band.

Just a note: the Apache roamed over parts of western Texas, all of Arizona and New Mexico and parts of southern California and northern Mexico.

Total population of Apache Nation in 1860:    8000

Present recognized population:    40,000

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 31 Dec 12 - 04:04 PM

Like most mudcat below the belt threads, no attempt is made by contributors, myself included, to stick to the subject.

The Aztecs (an umbrella term) were in a state of population crash before the arrival of the Spaniards, possibly due to hemorrhagic fever and population pressures.
http://www.galtoninstitute.org.uk/Newsletters/GINL9709/population_crises.htm
This is not an attempt to diminish the serious effects of European diseases, but these were only a part of the story.

The skin color of most Spaniards was light, and hair color varied from dark brown to reddish to blond; in other words fair compared to the peoples of Mexico, perhaps (this story may be legend) the light "gods" predicted in Aztec stories.
Cortes was from Castile (Estremadura). Contemporary portraits show a man with fair skin and dark brown hair. The viceroy, Mendoza, was fair-skined, but portraits show very dark hair.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: GUEST,999
Date: 31 Dec 12 - 08:03 PM

"Like most mudcat below the belt threads, no attempt is made by contributors, myself included, to stick to the subject."

Hear, hear.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 31 Dec 12 - 08:48 PM

So the instructor said to the recruits. "When I tap you on the shoulder, you jump out of the open door. You yell Geronimo, and then pull the ripcord. If your parachute fails to develop, pull the emergency chute D ring."
Out go the guys, one after the other, when the last one is gone, he slides the doors shut, and sits down. Just then there's a knocking on the door, seems to come from the outside. Instructor slides the door open again, and there's this recruit flapping his arms like mad. He said "Hey sarge, what was the name of that fucking Indian?"

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: GUEST,Big Al Whittle
Date: 31 Dec 12 - 09:05 PM

I knew the man personally. Like all good fighters - he was actually Irish.

Ger O'Nimmo from Clonmel.

he was wasn't Jeremy - sounds like someone from a John Betjeman poem. Ger was short for 'Gurrier'. A title he well deserved - he was a dirty fighter.

He used to sneak out of the Dog and partridge in Coventry when they were playing the anthem, and be waiting with a brick, or a tomahawk, as the mood took him.

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: GUEST
Date: 31 Dec 12 - 09:22 PM

Lozen was a great woman. Tough ol' broad even when she was young. Her brother was Victorio. I am tired of you white people talking about us like we lost because we didn't know how to fight. We lost because you outnumbered us 100 to one. No offense, but fuck you!

999

Subject: RE: BS: Geronimo
From: pdq
Date: 31 Dec 12 - 09:58 PM

"Lozen (c. 1840-1890) was a skilled warrior and a prophet of the Chihenne Chiricahua Apache. She was the sister of Victorio, a prominent chief...{shortened to fit in a normal post}

Late in Victorio's campaign, Lozen left the band to escort a new mother and her newborn infant across the Chihuahuan Desert from Mexico to the Mescalero Apache Reservation, away from the hardships of the trail.

Equipped with only a rifle, a cartridge belt, a knife, and a three-day supply of food, she set out with the mother and child on a perilous journey through territory occupied by Mexican and U.S. Cavalry forces. En route, afraid that a gunshot would betray their presence, she used her knife to kill a longhorn, butchering it for the meat.

She stole a Mexican cavalry horse for the new mother, escaping through a volley of gunfire. She then stole a vaquero's horse for herself, disappearing before he could give chase. She also acquired a soldier's saddle, rifle, ammunition, blanket and canteen, and even his shirt. Finally, she delivered her charges to the reservation.

There, she learned that Mexican and Tarahumara Indian forces under Mexican commander Joaquin Terrazas had ambushed Victorio and his band at Tres Castillos, three stony hills in northeastern Chihuahua.

According to Stephen H. Lekson in his monograph Nana's Raid: Apache Warfare in Southern New Mexico, 1881, Terrazas, on October 15, 1880, 'surprised the Apaches, and in the boulders of Tres Castillos, Victorio's warriors fought their last fight. Apache tradition holds that Victorio fell on his own knife rather than die at the hands of the Mexicans. Almost all the warriors at Tres Castillos were killed, and many women died fighting; the older people were shot, while almost one hundred young women and children were taken for slaves. Only a few escaped.'"