Chased to Ground by Michael Norman

Victorio’s Camp—Tres Castillos, Mexico

October 14, 1880

Chief Victorio sat quietly in front of his brush wickiup as the first hues of pink and orange dusted the eastern sky. A small fire provided warmth to his aged bones as he smoked a cigarette and drank a cup of chicory coffee. His thoughts turned to the plight of his people. Ammunition and food were in short supply. The Apache god, Ussen, had provided them with an ample supply of water from the recent monsoons that filled every depression, hole, and crevice around Tres Castillos. This was good.

Days before, he had dispatched his segundo, Nana, and a dozen fighters to raid surrounding farms and ranches to steal cattle to be used for food and to purchase or steal additional ammunition. Nana had not yet returned, and Victorio, while concerned, felt safe in this desolate desert landscape. Surely, the predictable Mexican and U.S. Army would be searching for him where they always did—in the mountainous regions.

As the autumn sun climbed into a cloudless azure sky, Sanchez appeared at his fire and reported that all was quiet. He had changed the overnight lookouts and had posted three boys to watch over the horse herd. “Four more left during the night,” said Sanchez.

Victorio nodded. “It is to be expected. The People have endured many hardships in the struggle against our enemies, and I fear we are nearing the end. I worry about what will become of us.”

“Should we choose to surrender, we must not do so in Mexico,” said Sanchez. “Better to cross the border and return to the reservation.”

Victorio paused. “Our people must choose their own path. As for me, I will never return to San Carlos. I would sooner die fighting my enemies, whether it be here or across the border.”

“As would I, my chief.”

Unbeknownst to the Apache, the peaceful tranquility of that autumn day would take a violent turn as the afternoon wore on. Mexican Army Colonel Joaquin Terrazas and his second-in-command, a veteran Indian fighter named Juan Mata Ortiz, met a short distance from Tres Castillos with their Tarahumara scouts. The scouts had discovered Victorio and his followers camped on a wide plain near a small lake that had formed during the recent monsoons. Above the plain were three low, rocky hills people erroneously called the Tres Castillos Mountains. In reality, none of the rocky hills stood more than one hundred feet tall.

Later that day, Apache lookouts spotted the large dust cloud from the approaching troops about one-half mile from Victorio’s camp. The chief immediately dispatched around thirty warriors to contest the approach. A short engagement ensued in which shots were exchanged.  The Apache quickly withdrew when they realized how badly they were outnumbered by the Mexican forces.

Victorio quickly ordered the women and children to scale the nearest of the three-rock formations and prepare for an attack. He directed Sanchez to call in the youth guarding the horse herd to assist moving the women and children to higher ground. Meanwhile, Victorio spread his warriors throughout the lower portion of the rock formation to act as a rear guard against the pursuing Mexican army.

The Mexican troops quickly seized the horse herd and then launched a full-frontal assault against the now dug-in Apache. The bloody battle raged into the night with Victorio and his followers grudgingly surrendering ground to the much larger and better armed Mexican troops. As the night wore on, the fighting intensified into close-quarter, hand-to-hand combat. Near dawn, Victorio moved his remaining people to the southernmost rock where they made their final stand. They built rock defenses and retreated to caves. By 10:00 that morning, the fighting was over. The bodies of the last two Apache were discovered in a cave. Between them, only one spent cartridge was found. Unofficially, Mexican forces counted sixty-two dead Apache fighters including Victorio, with an additional sixteen women and children killed. The Mexican army reported three dead soldiers.

After the battle, Terrazas gathered the sixty-eight captured prisoners, women and children mostly, and marched them to Chihuahua City where they were paraded in front of the local citizenry. The Apache scalps were hung on poles and displayed behind where the captives stood for photographs. As the celebration wound down, the children were separated from their mothers, and all were subsequently sold off as slaves to wealthy Mexican families.

—

El Paso, Texas—October 20, 1880

George Baylor sat alone at a small table, his back against the wall, facing the front door of the café. After so many years of chasing down renegade Indians, horse and cattle thieves, robbers and killers, all over Texas, he never sat in any public place with his back to the door. Just plain common sense he figured. Baylor held the rank of Captain, Company A, of the Texas Rangers.

On this day, Baylor sipped Arbuckles’ coffee and devoured a leather-tough steak, biscuits and gravy, and canned peaches. He sat in the café at the Hotel Sheldon in El Paso, awaiting the arrival of George Gaston, editor of the El Paso Daily Herald.

An open copy of the newspaper lay in front of him. The front-page story that held his attention concerned the death of the feared Chiricahua Apache leader, Victorio, and the massacre of 250 of his warriors by the Mexican Army at Tres Castillos several days before. The story read like one of those cheap dime store novels sold across the American frontier as God’s truth to gullible settlers and storekeepers. Instead, they were full of exaggerated, factually inaccurate tales intended to glorify the exploits of prominent wild west characters. Baylor recognized the gross inaccuracies of this story for one simple reason. He had just returned from northern Mexico’s Chihuahuan Desert and those three piles of rocks people called the Tres Castillos Mountains.

Baylor glanced at his watch and muttered an inaudible expletive directed at the tardy Gaston. He hated tardiness in people and felt genuinely irritated at the newspaper editor. That said, the two men had known each other for years, and Baylor knew all too well Gaston’s penchant for never getting anywhere on time.

As he groused, the café door burst open and in strode a harried looking George Gaston breathing heavily from obvious exertion. His unkempt mutton chop mustache, tweed suit, and bowler hat made him look like a citified dandy. “Right on time, George.”

“Oh, for God’s sake, Baylor, give it a rest, would you? This Victorio story is going to be the death of me. My readers are rightly celebrating the death of that heathen, but they’re pestering me for more information—information I don’t have but hope you do.”

Baylor used his index finger and tapped the story in front of him. “After reading the gibberish you got in this here story, you obviously need my help, or somebody’s. I assumed that’s why you offered to buy my breakfast this morning.”

Gaston raised his eyebrows then heaved an audible sigh. “I didn’t offer to buy your breakfast, Captain Baylor, but I will, reluctantly, mind you.”

“Well, I appreciate that, George. You know with the shoddy wages we Texas Rangers receive we need all the help we can get.”

“Yes, I suppose that’s true.”

The waitress came over and Gaston ordered potatoes, runny eggs, biscuits, and coffee. Glancing at Baylor, he asked, “So, tell me, Captain, how was it that you and your Rangers happened to be in the vicinity of Tres Castillos when the big fight broke out?”

“It was like this, George. Me and a dozen of my Rangers were part of a coordinated operation that included a bunch of U.S. Cavalry troops, mostly from them Negro units of the Ninth and Tenth Cavalry, as well as about three dozen Apache scouts from Arizona, and, of course, the Mexican Army.

“The thinking was that ol’ Victorio was resting his people somewhere in the mountains cuz that’s what he’d always done. In particular, he liked the Black Mountains. The Blacks were close to their home in Warm Springs so his fighters knew every canyon, valley, butte, and mesa thereabouts.”

Gaston looked puzzled. “If what you say is true, why wasn’t the search concentrated in the mountains?”

“Oh, they’d been huntin’ for him in the mountains o’ course, but found nothin’, and that’s cuz the sneaky rascal wasn’t there. It just so happened the Mexican Army commander, Colonel Terrazas, and his soldier boys didn’t trust the Chiricahua scouts—figured they were men of divided loyalties. Terrazas used Tarahumara scouts instead. It was the Tarahumara scouts who tracked the Apache across northern Mexico’s Chihuahuan Desert to the Tres Castillos area. Victorio likely figured that resting his people in the desert instead of the mountains would fool the soldiers, which it likely would have, were it not for the Injun scouts—best damn trackers I ever saw. I dare say that without them, nobody would have ever run ol’ Victorio to ground. And as for Victorio, well, he was probably the best Indian field general to ever set foot on the American continent. That’s only my opinion, o’ course.”

“Opinion accepted. So, then what happened?”

“Well, this Terrazas abruptly told the U.S. Cavalry commander they were no longer needed in Mexico and should immediately return to U.S. soil. He also included my Rangers in that order. So, that’s what we did, well—all except me and Sergeant Dale Kittridge. We decided to stick around and watch the festivities from a distance.”

“I don’t understand. Why would Terrazas send the U.S. Cavalry home?”

“Simple enough, George. The colonel had a large force of his own and didn’t want to share the credit.”

“Makes sense, I guess. So, what did you and Kittridge do then?”

“Kittridge and me grabbed our spy glasses and found us an elevated patch o’ ground so’s we could watch the so-called Battle of Tres Castillos.”

Gaston scowled. “What do you mean the ‘so-called’ Battle of Tres Castillos?”

“Well now, George, that brings me to this here story in your paper which claims the Mexican Army killed 250 Apache warriors. How in hell did you ever come up with that number? Victorio didn’t have near that many fighters, even if you counted all the men, women, and children. He might’ve had sixty to seventy fighters, if you included some of the women and children who fought alongside the men.”

“Look, I had to go to press with something, so I went with what I had—speculation and rumor mostly. I admit it.”

Baylor shook his head in disgust. “Not only were the Apache badly outnumbered, but as the fight wore on, it became clear that they were also running out of ammunition. By the time the fightin’ ended the next morning, Victorio and his boys weren’t hardly shootin’ back at all.”

“Well, I can’t print that,” replied Gaston.

“And why not?”

“Because, my friend, I’m in the business of selling newspapers. What will my readers think if they read the Injuns ran out of ammo in the middle of the fight?”

“Why, maybe they’ll think the whole thing was more like a massacre, rather than the so-called battle you newspaper boys have concocted,” replied Baylor.

“Sometimes, Captain Baylor, talking to you is so damned frustrating. Go ahead and tell me what you and the sergeant saw next.”

“First thing we noticed was that Terrazas split his forces in two. He ordered his second-in-command, Ortiz, to swing his troops out wide around Tres Castillos and come in    from the north. Terrazas led his soldiers in from the south—a pincer movement you might say. As soon as Victorio spotted the huge dust cloud comin’ his way, he sent out a couple dozen fighters to engage the Mexicans, probably so he’d have time to move his women and children to safer ground. That initial engagement didn’t last but a few minutes. I think, when the Apache fighters realized the size of the force they was up against, they retreated pretty damn quick.”

Gaston hurriedly scribbled notes into a bound notebook. “All right. Go on.”

“The Mexican soldiers ran off the Apache horse herd and that kinda sealed Victorio’s fate. No possible escape now except on foot.”

“And the time frame?” Gaston asked.

“The real fightin’ started early evening and continued til it was dark. We figured with darkness there might’ve been a pause in the battle. Apache don’t like to fight at night. Superstitious lot, they are, but they will fight at night when they must. Terrazas had no intention of suspending the fight until daylight, so the battle raged on all night. But as the night wore on, we noticed something began to change—the volume of shooting had declined.”

“Couldn’t that be because it had gotten dark and nobody could see what they were shooting at,” declared Gaston.

“Surely possible,” replied Baylor, “but after a while, it became clear that the reduced firing was coming mostly from the Apache side, not the Mexicans.”

“And that’s when you concluded the Apache were running out of ammunition?”

“Yep. By mid-morning, it was all over but the lootin’. The Mexican troops and Tarahumara scouts were busy rummaging through Injun belongings taking whatever they wanted, scalps included. The Mexican government, of course, is still payin’ a bounty on Apache scalps—men, women, and children.”

“And Victorio?” asked the newspaper man.

“Oh, he was dead, all right,” said Baylor. “There’s some question about exactly how he died. Some say a Tarahumara scout shot him, but some others say Victorio fell on his own knife—killed hisself. Apparently, he had no intention of being taken alive.”

Gaston set his pencil down on the table and stretched the stiff fingers on his right hand. “Well, Captain Baylor, I must say with this new information, I can write a story for the newspaper that will make my readers happy. And it was well worth the cost of a breakfast, Captain Baylor. Thank you.”                   

Thus ended the historic battle of Tres Castillos. Many historians have argued that the Victorio War all but ended the Apache threat with respect to large numbers of hostiles banding together to attack civilian or military targets. Most assuredly, smaller Apache attacks continued until, and even after, the final surrender of Geronimo in the fall of 1886.

—

Author’s Note

Context matters in stories and this one is no exception. What follows is my attempt to place Victorio’s War into an historical perspective because this war, like so many wars, did not start in a vacuum. The backstory explains actions taken by the U.S. Government that precipitated Victorio’s final decision to declare war against the U.S.

Victorio was the longtime chief of the Chihenne band of the Chiricahua Apache tribe. He and his people lived in southwestern New Mexico Territory in a place called Warm Springs, or  Ojo Caliente, for those who prefer Espanol. They believed that Warm Springs had been given to them by the Apache God, Ussen, for the benefit of the People, and as such, they should protect and care for it.

Unfortunately for the Chiricahua, government bureaucrats in Washington had other ideas. In 1871, the government ordered the relocation of Victorio’s people to a newly created reservation some fifty miles west of Warm Springs at the foot of the Tularosa Mountains. In 1872, the army escorted the Chihenne to the new reservation. Unhappy with the place, the disgruntled Apache soon returned to their beloved Warms Springs while the government dithered about what to do. Finally, in 1874, the government relented and established the Chihenne Reservation at Warms Springs. Victorio and his people were elated.

However, the federal government in 1877, decided that all Apache tribes should be moved to Arizona’s San Carlos Reservation—a hot, parched, and desolate strip of land bordering the Gila River. The army drove Victorio and his people across the mountains, forcing them to share that horrid place with other Apache tribes, some of which were enemies of the Chiricahua. The men stayed for only a few months before breaking out and returning to their homes. Army patrols pursued Victorio and gradually pushed him north until he surrendered at Fort Wingate. There, unwilling to care for the Chihenne so close to their traditional enemy, the Navajo, the army soon decided the Chihenne could return to Warm Springs pending the Government’s final decision about their future.

Victorio and his people awaited the decision with growing fear, anger, and frustration. After two years of uncertainty, when a new rumor circulated that they would again be returned to San Carlos, Victorio had had enough. In late summer, 1879, he declared war against the United States government. For the next fourteen months, parts of New Mexico, Texas, and Northern Mexico ran red with the blood of civilians from both countries, the armies of Mexico and the U.S., and, of course, the Apache.

Victorio led those armies on a brutal, arduous chase, from deserts to mountains and back again, and ultimately to the killing ground of northern Mexico’s Chihuahuan Desert, at the place called Tres Castillos.   

This story is a work of fiction, and while I confess to having taken some literary license for entertainment’s sake, I made every effort to accurately portray what historians have learned about what actually happened at the Battle of Tres Castillos.

The character of El Paso newspaper editor, George Gaston, was fictional, as was the breakfast meeting between him and Texas Ranger Captain George Baylor. Baylor himself is not a fictional character but rather a former Confederate Army officer, who, after the Civil War, developed a distinguished career in Texas law enforcement, including service as a captain in the Texas Rangers. Baylor and a dozen of his Rangers were at Tres Castillos alongside elements of the Tenth U.S. Cavalry “Buffalo Soldiers,” all of whom were ordered out of Mexico by Colonel Terrazas before the fighting began.

The Mexican Army characters of Colonel Joaquin Terrazas and Juan Mata Ortiz are not fictional characters. Both were seasoned Indian fighters. Ortiz was killed a couple of years after Tres Castillos in an Apache revenge attack led by Chiricahua Chief Juh. Colonel Terrazas lived a long life. He died in 1901, reportedly in bed. Chihuahua City erected a statue of the colonel in 1910, to honor his military exploits against the Apache at Tres Castillos.

Michael Norman is the author of five murder mysteries, three of which are traditional stories, and two that are contemporary Western novels set in the desert of Southern Utah. His debut novel, The Commission, received a starred review and was named by Publisher’s Weekly as one of its best 100 books of 2007. His other traditional novels include, Silent Witness and Slow Burn. Michael’s contemporary Western novels have been declared by some as reminiscent of the late Tony Hillerman’s southwestern mysteries. These titles include, On Deadly Ground and Skeleton Picnic. Recently, Michael has written seven Western short stories, the first two of which won Copper and Gold medals from the Will Rogers Medallion organization. The award winners included, “A Death of Crows” and “Lozen’s War.” “A Death of Crows” also was declared the winner of the first and now annual Longhorn Prize from Saddlebag Dispatches magazine for best western short story of 2023. Michael currently resides in Mexico with his wife, Diane, and their pit bull, Kady.