Hero? Villain? Both?

1851 a real life John Wick was born.

In northern Mexico a group of Chiricahua Apache had traveled from Arizona down to Janos, Mexico to trade beef, spices and tobacco with local Mexicans. Janos was a meeting place used often for trade between the Apache and Mexicans.  The Apache men took their entire families with them and camped outside of Janos then would bring goods into the town to trade and sell. This went on for weeks then the Apache would return home to Arizona. 

One morning, Colonel Jose Maria Carrasco and 400 Sonora Mexican militia men quietly surrounded then attacked the camp while most of the Apache were away at Janos. They killed indiscriminately, women, children it did not matter. They were angry over stolen cattle and horses, which they blamed on the Apache.

Returning from Janos to the camp was a 21-year old medicine man named, Goyahkla.  Goyahkla found his wife, mother, and three young children in a pool of their own blood.  All of them had been scalped.

          Goyahkla and the others returned home to Arizona, Goyahkla was surrounded by his wife’s paintings and is children’s clothes and toys. It saddened him greatly to be reminded of the loss so he took everything of theirs and burned it.  In a hysterical state of grief, the young man had a vision that no bullet would hit him and that his arrows would be guided to help take revenge.  It sounds like a comic book origin story for a greatly wronged hero but all of this actually happened.  This man would terrorize Mexico and later the US for 25 years. He would escape from custody four times and tie up a quarter of the US army usually with less than 2 dozen men.

 Mexican authorities claimed he and is band of rebels killed over 500 people across that 25 year span.  The first of which were the very troops responsible for the death of his wife, mother and children.  Goyahkla got permission to go on the war path and many were eager to join including Chief Cochise. They tracked the Mexican militia easily and found them.

Goyahkla killed with his bow and arrow and then with his knife. The battle lasted two days and the Mexican force was reinforced by two companies of cavalry and 2 companies of infantry on the second day. They still lost. Most of the Mexicans escaped and the Apache also took heavy losses, but they were clearly the winners. It was the Mexicans crying out for St. Jerome during this battle against Goyahkla that would give this man the name you know him by, Geronimo. Mexico has messed with the wrong Chiricahua.   Geronimo was Mexico’s problem until the Bascom Affair, which shifted hate toward the US.