Author: NewMexiKen

Several sources give June 16, 1829, as Geronimo’s date of birth. It’s not clear to NewMexiKen that the Apaches were using the Gregorian calendar at that time. And, indeed, one of those sources, The New York Times, stated in its obituary of Geronimo in February 1909 that he was nearly 90 — not 79 as this birth date would indicate. But, he had to be born some time. So why not June 16?

In her excellent 1976 biography of Geronimo, Angie Debo concludes:

Geronimo was born in the early 1820’s near the upper Gila in the mountains crossed by the present state boundary [Arizona-New Mexico], probably on the Arizona side near the present Clifton. …

He was given the name Goyahkla, with the generally accepted meaning “One Who Yawns,’ why or under what circumstances is not known.

As an adult in battle he was called Geronimo by Mexican soldiers, perhaps because they could not pronounce Goyahkla, or perhaps to invoke Saint Jerome (Geronimo is Spanish for Jerome). The name was adopted for him by his own people.

In its obituary of Geronimo, The Times provided this quote:

Gen. Miles, in his memoirs, describes his first impression of Geronimo when he was brought into camp by Lawton, thus: “He was one of the brightest, most resolute, determined-looking men that I have ever encountered. He had the clearest, sharpest dark eye I think I have ever seen, unless it was that of Gen. Sherman.”

Some have wondered what motivated Geronimo to fight so fiercely. Perhaps this from his autobiography (written with S.M. Barrett in 1905) explains a little:

In the summer of 1858, being at peace with the Mexican towns as well as with all the neighboring Indian tribes, we went south into Old Mexico to trade. Our whole tribe (Bedonkohe Apaches) went through Sonora toward Casa Grande, our destination, but just before reaching that place we stopped at another Mexican town called by the Indians Kas-ki-yeh. Here we stayed for several days, camping outside the city. Every day we would go into town to trade, leaving our camp under the protection of a small guard so that our arms, supplies, and women and children would not be disturbed during our absence.

Late one afternoon when returning from town we were met by a few women and children who told us that Mexican troops from some other town had attacked our camp, killed all the warriors of the guard, captured all our ponies, secured our arms, destroyed our supplies, and killed many of our women and children. Quickly we separated, concealing ourselves as best we could until nightfall, when we assembled at our appointed place of rendezvous–a thicket by the river. Silently we stole in one by one: sentinels were placed, and, when all were counted, I found that my aged mother, my young wife, and my three small children were among the slain. There were no lights in camp, so without being noticed I silently turned away and stood by the river. How long I stood there I do not know, but when I saw the warriors arranging for a council I took my place.

Scholarly estimates have run from 8 million to 112 million. Europe, by way of comparison, had about 70 million people at the time.

In the 1830s artist George Catlin estimated there had been 16 million Indians in North America at the time of contact. He was in the minority. In 1894, the Census Bureau suggested the number had been more like 600,000.

In the 20th century experts used counts at the time of contact (as reported by explorers, etc.) to estimate the pre-contact population. In 1928, Smithsonian ethnologist James Mooney guessed 1.15 million persons were present in 1492 in what is now the U.S. and Canada. Anthropologist Alfred Kroeber further refined Mooney’s work and concluded there were 4.2 million inhabitants in North America and 4.2 million inhabitants in South America before Columbus.

The problem with these estimates is that, among other things, they failed to account for the incredible loss of life due to disease BEFORE direct contact; that is, before the explorers and first settlers could make a count. Diseases unknown in the Americas (foremost being smallpox) may have killed as many as 90 percent of the indigenous people in some areas BEFORE any Europeans arrived.

In the past 40 years the estimates of indigenous population have been much higher than before (and much higher than what most of us learned in school). In 1966, anthropologist Henry Dobyns calculated there had been more than 10 million Indians in North America and 112 million altogether. Most critics felt he oversimplified (and overestimated the loss to disease). Subsequent estimates have moderated Dobyns’s count, but have been much higher than those that preceded him.

In the 1990s, geographer William Denevan attempted to reconcile various estimates. He concluded there were about 54 million people in the hemisphere; 3.8 million of these were in what is now the U.S. and Canada.