Warfare

The Spanish first became aware of the Dineh in the early 1600s. They sent missionaries to the tribe’s homeland in the mid-1700s, but they had little success in converting the Dineh to Catholicism.

In the late 1700s and early 1800s, the Dineh became involved in a cycle of raids and counterraids with the Spanish and Mexicans, who rode northward for slaves, kidnapping Indian children. In response, Dineh warriors traveled south to prey on Mexican settlements, taking food, livestock, and slaves. The Dineh also made frequent attacks on early travelers of the Santa Fe Trail, the route connecting Missouri to New Mexico.

The Americans occupied New Mexico in 1846 during the Mexican War. Mexico did not formally cede the Southwest to the United States until the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo two years later. Yet it was during the Mexican War that U. S. troops established American policy toward the Dineh. On taking control of the region, Colonel Stephen Kearny informed the Anglo Americans and Mexican Americans that they would henceforth be protected from Indian attacks. He did not inform the

Indians, however, that they would be protected from Mexican slave raids.

During the winter of that same year, Colonel Alexander Doniphan led his Missouri volunteers into Dinetah to punish the Indians for stealing livestock. In their rugged highlands, the Dineh managed to avoid any major engagements. Most of the winter, they hid out in the deep and jagged Canyon de Chelly, their sacred stronghold. In 1846 and 1849, the Dineh signed treaties with the United States government, but they remained militant until the 1860s.

A point of contention between the Dineh and the soldiers during the 1850s was the grazing land at the mouth of Canyon Bonito near Fort Defiance. The soldiers wanted the pastureland for their horses. The Dineh had led their horses there to graze for generations and continued to do so. When soldiers shot the horses, the Dineh raided army herds to make up for their losses.

The issue reached a climax in 1860 when the famous Dineh chief Manuelito and his ally Barboncito led warriors in an attack on the fort. They nearly captured it but were driven back. Colonel Edward Canby led troops into the Chuska Mountains in pursuit of the warriors. Once again, the warriors disappeared in the craggy terrain, appearing only for sudden attacks on the army before vanishing again into the wilderness.

Another fight broke out in 1861, during the Civil War. The incident that sparked this conflict was a horse race at Fort Lyon between Dineh and army mounts. The Dineh claimed that a soldier had cheated by cutting one of their mount’s reins. When the judges refused to hold the race again, the angry Indians rioted. The soldiers fired artillery into the Indian crowd, killing 10.

By 1862, Union troops had driven the Confederate troops out of New Mexico. They then turned their attention to the Apache and Dineh. General James Carleton, the new commander of the Department of New Mexico, chose Colonel Christopher “Kit” Carson as his leader in the field. Carson, a former fur trader, scout, and Indian agent, knew Indian ways well. He moved first against the Mescalero Apache. Then he began his campaign against the Dineh.

Rather than try to defeat the elusive Dineh in battle in their mesa and canyon country, Carson first began a scorched-earth offensive. During a six-month period in

1863,  his men destroyed Dineh fields, orchards, and hogans and confiscated their livestock. Then in January

1864,  as a final blow against the Dineh, his troops advanced on Canyon de Chelly. They blocked the steep-walled canyon at both ends, then flushed out the pockets of resistance.

Detail of a Dineh blanket

The will of the Dineh had been broken. By March, about 6,000 half-starving tribal members had trickled into army posts, and by the end of the year, another 2,000, making the Dineh surrender the largest in all the Indian wars. Manuelito and many of his remaining 4,000 followers surrendered in 1866. In the meantime, the army carried out its plan to relocate the Dineh, along with Apache prisoners, to the eastern part of New Mexico, at Bosque Redondo near Fort Sumner on the barren flats of the Pecos River valley. About 200 Dineh died on the 300-mile trek eastward—the Long Walk, as they call it.

The Dineh were miserable at Bosque Redondo, suffering from outbreaks of disease, shortages of supplies, infertile soil for planting, and quarrels with the Apache. It is estimated that 2,000 Dineh died during their stay there. A delegation of chiefs, including Manuelito, traveled to Washington to plead their case for a return to their homeland. Finally in 1868, the federal government granted the Dineh 3.5 million acres of reservation lands in their ancestral homeland. The Dineh returned westward over the trail of the Long Walk and began rebuilding their lives.