The Spanish explorer Father Marcos de Niza visited the Akimel O’odham in 1589. Father Eusebio Kino entered their territory on several occasions more than a century later from 1694 to 1698. He grouped the Indians in missions and introduced them to livestock and wheat. Another Spanish explorer, Father Francisco Garces, traveled deeper into Akimel O’odham country from 1768 to 1776.
Although the Akimel O’odham could be warlike—as the Apache who mounted raids against them well knew— they were generally friendly toward the Spanish. During the 1600s, Spanish officials organized Pima territory into the district of Pimeria Alta, establishing missions, presidios (forts), ranches, and mines among them. And the Spanish began imposing taxes on the Indians, demanding a percentage of their crops as well as labor from them. In 1695, the Lower Pima rebelled, carrying out some violence against missionaries as well as looting and burning of Spanish property. Spanish officials sent in soldiers, who quickly put down the rebellion. Some Lower Pima escaped northward and joined the Upper Pima on the Gila and Salt Rivers.
Some descendants of the rebels revolted again in 1751. An Akimel O’odham by the name of Luis Oacpicagigua, who served the Spanish as a captain-general against other Indians, began to resent Spanish treatment of his people. He saw that the Spanish ranching and mining frontier was expanding northward into Upper Pima country, and he knew that more and more forced labor would follow. He plotted a rebellion, send-
Akimel O’odham basket with labyrinth design
Ing word to neighboring tribes—Tohono O’odham, Apache, and Sobaipuri—to join his cause.
On the night of November 20, the rebels struck. Luis and his war party attacked and killed 18 Spaniards at the settlement of Saric. A missionary managed to escape and spread word of the uprising. Still, small groups of Akimel O’odham and Tohono O’odham plundered a number of other missions and ranches. The Apache and Sobaipuri did not join the fight, however. And the majority of insurgents, fearful of Spanish reprisals, refrained from violence.
Spanish officials ordered presidio captains and troops into the field. They quelled the revolt in several months, executing some of the rebels. Luis Oacpicagigua saved himself by agreeing to supervise the rebuilding of churches destroyed in the uprising.
After that, the Akimel O’odham generally were peaceful toward non-Indians. During the California gold rush, when starting in 1849, many Anglo-Americans passed through their territory, they even provided food and supplies for weary travelers.
Tribal territory came under United States authority with the Gadsden Purchase from Mexico in 1853. In the following years, many Euroamerican farmers began settling along the Gila River. The settlers, despite friendly overtures from of the Akimel O’odham, took advantage of them. They appropriated the best farmland. They diverted the tribe’s water supply for use on their own crops. A reservation on the Gila River was established in 1859. Many Gila
River inhabitants ended up resettling to the north on the Salt River, where a reservation was established in 1879.
World History
