c. 1880s
Offered for offer is an albumen stereoview of an armed San Carlos Apache Warrior by Henry Buehman of Tucson, Arizona Territory. He wears a bandana, gunbelt, and aims a percussion rifle. Arizona Scenery orange mount with Buehman's Tucson studio imprint. Bumping to corners.
San
Carlos Apache Indian Reservation
Wikipedia
TheSan Carlos Apache Indian
Reservation,
in southEasternArizona, United States, was
established in 1871 as a reservation for the Chiricahua ApachetribeIt was referred to by some
as "Hell's Forty Acres," due to a myriad of dismal health and
environmental conditions.
PresidentU.S. Grantestablished the San Carlos
Apache Reservation on December 14, 1872. The government gave various religious groups
the responsibility for managing the new reservations, and theDutch Reformed
Churchwas given charge of the San Carlos Apache
Indian Reservation. They sought out a candidate to run the reservation atRutgers Collegeand were connected withJohn Clum, who had attended the church while in school
inClaverack, New York. Clum knew that a number of Indian Agents sought the
position only as a means to line their own pocket, selling government-supplied
food and clothing and keeping the profits for themselves.
The Apaches, who were
supposed to be fed and housed by their caretakers, rarely saw the results of
the federal money and suffered as a result. The U.S. Army showed both animosity
toward the Indians and disdain for the civilian Indian Agents.Soldiers and their
commanding officers sometimes brutally tortured or killed the Indians them for
sport. After turning the position down twice, Clum relented and on February 16,
1874, Clum accepted a commission as Indian Agent for the San Carlos Apache
Indian Reservation in theArizona Territory.
To the distant politicians
in Washington, D.C., all Indians were alike. They did not give consideration to
the different tribes, cultures, customs and language. They also ignored prior
political differences and military alliances. They tried to apply a
“one-size-fits-all" strategy to deal with the “Indian problem”. As a
result, friends and foes alike were forced to live in close proximity to one
another.
Clum arrived at the
reservation on August 4, 1874. During his tenure at San Carlos, he struck a
lifelong friendship withEskiminzin, an Aravaipa Apache chief, and persuaded
many of the White Mountain people to move south to San Carlos. He visited
Apache camps without soldiers and fiercely defended the Apaches against the
military's interference. In this way Clum gradually and grudgingly won the
Indians's confidence. They responded by turning in their weapons, using a
tribal court to try minor infractions, and joining theTribal Policeorganized under Clum's
command, forming a system of limited Indian self-rule. The agent soon attracted
4,200 Apaches and Yavaais Indians to the semi-arid reservation. The Army
bristled at Clum's actions because they prevented them from raking off part of
the funds that passed through the reservation.
On April 21, 1877 Clum
along with 100 of his best Apache Police captured the maraudingGeronimoat theOjo CalienteReservation in theNew Mexico Territory. The U.S. Army, which had
mounted intense efforts to track-down and capture Geronimo, was seriously
embarrassed by his success and their failure. Indian Bureau
administrators and U.S. Army commanders disliked his methods and continually
frustrated his efforts. He finally resigned. The reservation's new
administrators released Geronimo, resulting in more than 15 years of conflict
across the American southwest.
Tribes
Consolidated
After the Chiricahuan
Apache were deported east to Florida in 1886, San Carlos became the reservation
for various other relocated Apachean-speaking groups. These
included thePinal Coyoteroof the northernGila Riverarea, the former San Carlos
Apache ApacheorTiis Ebah Nnee),Apache Peaks(also calledBichi Lehe Nnee), andSan Carlosproper (alsoTiis Zhaazhe Bikoh- ′Small cottonwood canyon
People′), the formerCanyon Creek, Carrizo Creek andCibecuebands of the Cibecue Apache, various bands ofSouthern Tonto side people”, a
clan or band of the Chiricahua Apache, associated with and hence taken to be a
part of the Pinaleño),Dzil Dlaazhe(Mount Turnbull Apache,
a mixedKwevekapaya- San Carlos Apache band),
some Eastern White Mountain Apache (Dził Ghą́ʼ oder Dzil Ghaa a - ‘On Top of
Mountains People’ ) and theLipan. After theIndian Reorganization Actof 1934, they formed a
government together and became federally recognized as the San Carlos Nation.Grenville Goodwin, ananthropologistwho had lived with the
Western Apache since the late 1920s, helped them to decide what government they
wanted to form under the new law to gain back more sovereignty.
In 2011, theSan Carlos Apache Tribe’s
Language Preservation Program, located inPeridot, Arizona, began its outreach to the "14,000
tribal members residing within the districts of Bylas(Eastern White Mountain
Apache, San Carlos and Southern Tonto), Gilson Wash, Peridot and Seven Mile
Wash (Apache Peaks band).
Henry
Buehman
arrived from California in 1874, purchasing Rodrigo's gallery in 1875 and
beginning a family dynasty that would serve Tucson for several generations.
Buehman traveled extensively throughout Arizona and Mexico making images,
promoting his work in local papers, and building his business selling frames,
moldings, prints, and photographs including cartes-de-visites, cabinet cards,
stereographs, and large format images of Arizona and the West.
Buehman offered several series of stereographs marketed as
"Arizona Scenery", and Scenes in Arizona" including hundreds of
images of Tucson, mines such as Silver King , Toltec, and Picket Post,
personalities such as John Clum, Diablo, and Eskiminzin, apache police and
scouts at the San Carlos reservation, and studio still lifes of the cactus and
reptiles of Arizona.
Exerpt from A Photographic
History of Arizona 1850 – 1920 by Jeremy Rowe
