Long March (Diné)

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Route of the Long March (yellow)

The Long March (Engl. The Long Walk ) refers to the way the Diné , or Navajo, a Native American people in the southwestern United States, they had to travel between the winter of 1864 and 1866 in 53 marching groups in their forced displacement. The route led from their home in northeast Arizona to Bosque Redondo (Spanish for round wood ) in eastern New Mexico .

prehistory

The Diné, who is related to the Apaches , had learned the basics of agriculture and sheep breeding from the Pueblo Indians and the Spanish . When they heard in 1861 and 1862 that the whites were tearing themselves apart in the American Civil War , they gave up their peaceful way of life and began raiding and looting American and Mexican settlements, as the Apaches did.

The government in Washington decided to resolve the conflict by military means. Troops were to escort the Indians from their residential areas in northeast Arizona and northwest New Mexico east to a reservation on the Pecos River called Bosque Redondo. There was a military post there at Fort Sumner , and a group of Mescalero rebels had already settled there.

Kit Carson

A key role in this action played called Christopher Carson, Kit Carson , one of the most famous trackers, hunters and traders in the American West, who was in the US Army as a colonel (Engl. Colonel served). His superior was the Supreme Commander in New Mexico, Brigadier General James Henry Carleton . Carson set up a regiment of volunteers made up of experienced trappers and scouts, who were supported by some Ute , Zuñi and Apache scouts.

General Carleton issued an ultimatum on June 23, 1863, according to which the Diné should volunteer until July 27 to be relocated to Bosque Redondo. After that date, the army will consider every diné caught as a hostile Indian and treat them accordingly. Most of the scattered Diné never heard of this ultimatum, and General Carleton made no attempt to track them down. Instead, he ordered Kit Carson to destroy the economic foundations of the Diné.

Only about 600 Diné had followed the call by the end of July and Kit Carson then moved with his 730-strong troop to the land of Diné. His job was to destroy all orchards, cornfields, food supplies, hogans and watering holes, to confiscate the cattle herds and to kill male Diné who resisted. In order to avoid the rage of the soldiers and the Indian scouts allied with them, some of the Diné fled to neighboring tribes, the Jemez and Western Apaches. The remaining Diné under the chiefs Barboncito and Delgadito withdrew into the Canyon de Chelly , which is considered impregnable .

On January 14, 1864, Carson attacked the Diné's hiding place in Canyon de Chelly. The huge canyon is still the sacred area of ​​the Diné and was explored by army scouts at the time, but largely unknown terrain for whites. Carson occupied the entrance on the west side while another division was to advance from the east end. The Diné were now trapped between two enemy detachments and gave up. Hunger and cold had worn them down, and in the end they hadn't dared to light campfires in order not to betray their position.

The long march

In the spring of 1864 the majority of the Diné gradually gathered at Fort Canby, formerly Fort Defiance , and Fort Wingate, and by the summer the number grew to 8,000 tribesmen. The forced relocation took place in several convoys . In March 1864, the 480-kilometer route to the southeast, known by the Diné as the Long March, began with the first convoy. First it went through the Tunicha Mountains , through impassable areas to the Rio Grande , over the river and from there back to the southeast to Fort Sumner on the Pecos River. The US Army escorted the convoy and provided some ox wagons for the elderly and the sick, while everyone else had to march. Clothing and food were inadequate. Of the 2500 people, 126 died of cold and hunger at the beginning of the march, and another 197 died during the march. Sick and exhausted people, even women in labor, were killed. Those who finally arrived at the reservation knew what to tell of hardship and despair.

The following convoys suffered similar losses, and some Diné were even kidnapped by Mexicans or other Indians and taken into slavery. In the end, more than 9,000 Diné, in addition to 400 Mescalero Apaches, crowded the reserve.

In Bosque Redondo

Those who had survived the Long March were now on a pathetic strip of alkaline , sandy land along the Pecos River. Most of the trees in the circular grove had been felled to build the neighboring Fort Sumner, and besides, there was nothing but barren land. The Diné dug trenches and holes in the ground to protect themselves against sun, wind and cold. The little wood was burned up quickly and the Indians had to walk for miles to dig up mesquite roots that they used as firewood. In addition, the alkaline water of the Pecos River was almost inedible.

Hundreds of Diné died during the first year in Bosque Redondo. After three years of bad harvests, after nearly 1,000 deaths and the flight of many desperate Indians, it was obvious that Carleton's resettlement campaign had failed, and the Diné were increasingly demanding that they return to their old home. The American government, which had invested $ 10 million in the company, hired General Tecumseh Sherman to investigate the situation - not only for reasons of humanity, but also to save money. Shaken by the state of Diné, Sherman sent a report to General Ulysses S. Grant , who was soon to become President of the United States. On June 1, 1868, Navajo chiefs signed a treaty in Fort Sumner, in which the US government granted the Diné people a reservation in their old country and allowed the survivors to return. In return, they pledged to live in peace with the American settlers from now on.

epilogue

So the Diné returned to their homeland. The Hogans were destroyed and burned, the fruit trees chopped off, the corn fields devastated, the cattle gone, and the wells poisoned. Under these circumstances, the Diné found their way back to their old rhythm of life only slowly.

Kit Carson fought the united tribes of the Kiowa, Comanche, and Cheyenne in the Battle of Adobe Walls in 1865 . He then left the army to run a ranch in Colorado . He died in Boggsville , Colorado on May 23, 1868 , at the age of 59. James Carleton continued to serve in the Army as a lieutenant colonel after the Civil War. He is the author of several books on military subjects and died at the age of 58 on January 7, 1873 in San Antonio , Texas .

Memorial March 2015

In 2015, a few dozen young Diné gathered on their own initiative for four different memorial marches with a total distance of around 1,000 miles in eastern New Mexico. Firstly, this action was intended to commemorate the long march 150 years ago and to revive the spiritual traditions; second, as the “Journey for Existence”, set a sign for survival as a people; and thirdly, a protest march against today's threats to their livelihoods from coal and uranium mining, fracking and other resource depletion as well as against the violence against Indian women in Canada.

See also

literature

  • Editor of Time-Life Books: The Spanish West , Time-Life Books Inc., 1976
  • Alvin M. Josephy jr .: 500 Nations , Frederking & Thaler GmbH, Munich 1996, ISBN 3-89405-356-9
  • Alvin M. Josephy jr .: The world of the Indians , Frederking & Thaler GmbH, Munich 1994, ISBN 3-89405-331-3
  • John Gattuso (Ed.): Indian Reservations USA , APA Guides, RV Reise- und Verkehrsverlag 1992
  • Dee Brown: Bury my heart at the bend of the river , Hoffmann and Campe, Hamburg 1972

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Leigh Cuen: Navajo Women Walk 1,000 Miles To Protest Pipeline . In: vocativ.com, July 4, 2015.
  2. ↑ Monika Seiller: Memory of the "Long Walk" . In: Coyote, Indianische Gegenwart , No. 27th year - 105, Action Group Indians & Human Rights eV, Munich, spring 2015, ISSN  0939-4362 , p. 8.