Geronimo's surrender Skeleton Canyon, 1886 Last updated on
Thursday, January 09, 2003 On May 17, 1885, Mangus (son of
Mangus Colorado), Chihuahua, Nachite, old Nana, the shaman
Geronimo, and their followers fled the San Carlos reservation in
Arizona in an attempt to regain the freedom they had known
before the reservation system was instituted by the United
States government. The restrictions of reservation life were
difficult for these semi-nomads, and they longed for the
openness of the land the Spaniards had called Apacheria.
Although the Chiracahuas could not have foreseen it, this was to
be their last attempt to recapture the old ways that many of
their cousins had already forsaken. On Route 80 south of Rodeo,
New Mexico, near Apache, Arizona, stands a marker commemorating
Geronimo's surrender. The "renegades," or "hostiles," as they
were called, consisted of thirty-five men, eight boys, and one
hundred and one women and children. They would occupy the
attention of five thousand troops, five hundred Indi