Hi, some months ago I wrote a little essay about Camillus Fly and the Santiago McKinn photograph for a german magazin. Here comes a quick & rough translation of parts of this essay. The quotations are re-translated from German (so, not the original wording!).
This is the textOn
30 March 1886 the
New York Times printed the following message:
Willcox , Arizona, 29 March 1886
“With the Chiricahuas under Geronimo was a white boy , 10 years old . He says his name is Santiago McKinn and his father was Irish , his mother Mexican ; he had been captured near Mimores [ Mimbres ] , New Mexico".
In May 1885 Geronimo escaped with 134 Apaches the terrible conditions on the San Carlos Reservation in Arizona - including Chokonen , Chihenne , Bedonkohe and Nednhi Apaches.
At the beginning of September 1885 - coming from Mexico - Geronimo had reached the Mimbres Valley in south-western New Mexico. North of today's Black Range Highway 152, at the height of today's village Mimbres the Apaches reached the area of the McKinn Ranch.
12 September 1885 (Saturday)On a range, on the west side of the Mimbres Mountains, the 17 year old Martin McKinn and the 11 year old James " Jimmy" McKinn guarded the cattle of their family.
Jimmy, who was called Santiago by his Spanish mother, lay under a tree and dozed in the late summer heat of New Mexico. The Apaches must have surprised Jimmy or he had no way to hide. When they reached him, they questioned him in English and Spanish. How many men are at the ranch? How many horses did they have? Trembling with fear Jimmy replied evasively. The leader of the Apaches, identified by some sources as Geronimo, by others as Chihuahua, ordered the boy to mount a horse .
13 September 1885 (Sunday)On Sunday, Martin McKinns corpse was found. The circumstances and the exact cause of his death remain vague. It is said the young man has been found shot "in the desert ". "A day later," Martin was buried .
15 September 1885 (Tuesday)The
Silver City Enterprise newspaper reported the first of the events in the Mimbres Valley:
"On Saturday morning, a story came in, that a family had been killed by Apaches.... and near San Lorenzo a Mexican named Evaristo Abeyta was killed by the Apaches ... on Sunday evening came more news from Georgetown that three other men were killed... and two sons of J. McKinns , who live on a ranch on Gallianas Creek [? Gallinas Creek ] were killed ... the Elder was shot through the forehead and the younger in the neck ... "
The report based obviously on hearsay . But a few days later the
Silver City Enterprise announced:
"The body of Mr. McKinns youngest son, who is believed he was killed along with his older brother, could not be found ... it is hoped that the boy is still alive and has been kidnapped by Apaches "
On
December 11, 1885, a search command of the U.S. Army crossed the Mexican border at Agua Prieta in south-east Arizona.
In January 1886 Apache scouts under Lieutenant Marion Maus discovered an abandoned camp of Apaches and on January 13 Maus met Geronimo. The Apache warrior declared he was ready to return to San Carlos. Geronimo agreed to meet with General Crook at Cañon de los Embudos two months later.
25 March 1886: Geronimo had kept his word and gathered with his group at Cañon de los Embudos . The camp had been pitched above the meeting point on a hill. Crook was there and Geronimo too. Furthermore, the photographer C. S. ( Camillus Sidney ) Fly. At the beginning of the negotiations Fly asked Geronimo if he could photograph the meeting. Geronimo agreed. Fly was even allowed to photograph near the Apache camp. When he tried to take a picture of several children in front of a Wickiups, he discovered a white boy , apparently a prisoner.
This is Santiago with the Apache kids
Bourke, who accompanied Crook, wrote about this meeting in his book
“On the Border with Crook”:
"A group of young boys raged together freely and safely around ; one of them seemed to be of Irish and Mexican descent . After a little persuasion, he told ... that his name was Santiago Mackin (sic) and he had been kidnapped in Mimbres , New Mexico ; of his young companions , he seemed to be treated kindly , and no one tried to stop our conversation ... Beyond its smart looks which made it clear that he had fully understood everything we told him in Spanish and English, he took no further notice of us . He was about 10 years old , slim, straight and wiry , blue-gray eyes , full of freckles , light eyebrows and eyelashes , tanned and sunburned , and wore an old and formerly white scarf on the head, so you could not see the hair . He was later returned to his relatives in New Mexico. "
On March 28 Geronimo flees again to Mexico. Chihuahua and Nana stay behind with their people and also members of the Geronimo group. Santiago McKinn is also with this group.
02.April 1886On April 2 the Apaches officially surrender at Fort Bowie. Fletcher Lummis, a reporter for the
Los Angeles Times is present. Lummis reached the Fort on March 31 , a day after Crook’s return from the Cañon de Los Embudos.
Lummis reported for the
Los Angeles Times "live" from these events with regard to Santiago McKinns :
"When they told him that he should be taken back to his father and mother, Santiago began to cry violently . He said in Apache, which the little rascal masters quite fluently , that he would not return , he wants to stay with the Indians forever "
"Santiago McKinn , the 11- year-old white prisoner was sent home today . With a white man, he would not leave the [Apache] camp and had to be taken to the Fort by some Chiricahuas. He screamed terribly, when he was told that he was sent back to his parents, and said he wanted to stay with the Indians."
Silver City Enterprise ,
April 9, 1886" On Wednesday, John McKinley [sic] the father of Jimmy McKinley [sic], the thirteen- year-old prisoner of Geronimo and his band ... came to Deming to pick up his boy. The little guy arrived there on Tuesday in deplorable condition, having put on a train in Fort Bowie, Arizona. "
In the
El Paso Times of
16 April 1979 the family of McKinn delivered an opinion to Santiago's living conditions during his captivity. Dora Morales , a niece of the boy, denied that Santiago was allowed to play with Apache children , and said,
"He was forced to work with the squaws. He had been tied with his legs to an old Indian woman , because they feared he would flee .. "
Dora Morales visited her uncle "Jim" for the last time in the early 1950s in Phoenix.
From census records it is assumed that Santiago remained in Grant County until the turn of the century, married and had children.
The
1900 census contains an entry for a James McKinn , born in New Mexico in 1873 ( with a father from Ireland and a mother from New Mexico) , who lived in Grant County with his wife Victoria ( maiden name Villanueva ) and the daughters Josefa , four years , and Baby Victoria. His occupation was given as "miner ".
In 1930 he was recorded in the census of the city of Phoenix, along with his wife Victoria , daughter Josefina and the sons Pete and John. The next entry was his married son Prospero with his wife and two children , Santiago’s grandchildren.
CU Gregor
