Battle of Hembrillo Basin

Over four days in early April 1880, from the 5th through the 8th, American troops clashed with a joint force of Chiricahua and Mescalero Apaches under Chief Victorio at Hembrillo Basin. This engagement stands as the largest single fight of Victorio's War, though neither side suffered heavy losses. Despite facing army soldiers and Indian scouts who outnumbered his warriors, Victorio managed to fend off their assault, safely move his women and children away from the fighting, and pull back without losing the field. Today the site sits within the boundaries of White Sands Missile Range, where public entry remains tightly controlled.

Though driven from one of his key strongholds, Victorio was far from finished. He continued waging a mobile campaign against thousands of pursuing American and Mexican forces, a struggle that finally concluded months later when Mexican troops killed him and brought his resistance to an end.

Background

Rather than accept transfer to the San Carlos Apache Indian Reservation in Arizona, the seasoned Mimbres Chiricahua Apache leader Victorio broke away from the Mescalero Reservation in Otero County, New Mexico, on 21 August 1879, taking with him roughly 80 fighting men along with their families. Word of his defiance spread, and his ranks swelled as more people from the Mescalero and other Apache groups joined the cause. Troops of the U.S. army set out after him, and repeated clashes followed, none of them decisive, as the Apaches repeatedly slipped away, ranging across the southern part of New Mexico before pushing into western Texas and across the border into Mexico.

By March 1880, Pueblo scouts working with the army located Victorio's hiding place in Hembrillo Basin, tucked against the western face of the San Andres Mountains. Colonel Edward Hatch, commanding the pursuit, split his troops into four separate columns for the coming strike. Major Morrow would lead the principal thrust, roughly 100 men reinforced by a handful of Indian scouts, coming in from the north, while Captain McClellan brought 85 soldiers and 40 Indian scouts under Lt. Charles B. Gatewood up from the south. Meanwhile Captain Carroll, heading more than 100 men of the 9th Cavalry made up of African-American troops, was tasked with pushing up the Hembrillo Valley from the west to back the main effort. Captain Hooker, commanding over 100 soldiers together with several Navajo scouts, was to take position east of the San Andres range and seal off any Apache retreat in that direction. April 8 was set as the date to strike the camp, the intent being to close every avenue of escape around Victorio.

The scheme unraveled almost immediately. Morrow's column, meant to come from the north, was held up by a shortage of water and failed to reach the fighting at all. Not knowing this, Carroll pushed his Buffalo Soldiers forward into the Hembrillo Valley on April 5. Ahead of the main body, he dispatched Lt. John Conline with 29 men and two Indian guides to scout the terrain. Conline came across tracks left recently by horses and cattle and pressed onward with caution.

Battle

At half past five in the morning on April 5, Lt. Conlin moved his men up Hembrillo Valley and spotted a force of Apaches, numbering somewhere between 35 and 50, coming toward his position. He formed his men into a skirmish line, and gunfire broke out between the two sides. Two of his soldiers suffered wounds in the exchange. When darkness fell, the Apache disengaged, and Conlin pulled his men back to join Captain Carroll's main body of troops. During the encounter, one of Conlin's scouts identified Victorio himself directing the assault.

Concerned that the Apache would slip away, Carroll planned a pursuit for the following day, April 6. His initial plan called for dividing his command, sending two companies along the path Conlin had used while he personally led another two companies, 71 men in total, on a different route from the northwest in hopes of catching the Apache off guard. He then reconsidered this division and ordered his troops reunited, though he kept moving forward regardless. By late afternoon he had reached Hembrillo Basin with his pair of companies, with the remaining two trailing behind at some distance. Once there, Carroll arranged his men in a V formation and pushed ahead, but the Apache held elevated terrain and fired down on the soldiers from far off. Although Carroll managed to seize a small ridge, his men soon found themselves encircled, cut off from a spring that represented the only water source in the vicinity. As night arrived, the Apache ceased fighting, leaving Carroll's men to make camp under difficult conditions.

The night passed miserably for Carroll's command, without any access to water, and by morning on April 7 the Apache had begun tightening their circle around him. Disaster was averted when reinforcements of soldiers and scouts reached the scene. The two companies that had lagged behind the previous day had remained ignorant of Carroll's dangerous situation and had camped outside the basin overnight, but they pushed into the basin that same morning. That morning also brought Capt. McClellan into

Aftermath

After withdrawing from Hembrillo Basin, Victorio and his band vanished from view for weeks, resurfacing on April 28 when their warriors took the lives of as many as 41 civilians in what became known as the Alma Massacre, and again on May 14 when they struck Fort Tularosa, near what is now Aragon, New Mexico, some 200 kilometres (120 mi) to the northwest of where the fighting had occurred.

Army officers held a well founded suspicion that certain Mescaleros residing on their reservation, roughly 70 kilometres (43 mi) from the scene of battle, had been furnishing Victorio with both supplies and manpower. Once word came that Victorio had slipped away from Hembrillo Basin, Colonel Hatch directed every available U.S. force in the region to converge on the Mescalero reservation situated near Fort Stanton. Within days of the engagement, a thousand troops had massed there. The reservation's population of 400 Mescaleros, among them 65 men, scattered in fear, convinced that removal from their homeland was imminent. Beginning on April 16, Hatch launched a campaign to round up the Mescaleros, seizing their weapons and horses in the process. Fourteen Mescalero men lost their lives during this operation. Those taken captive were first confined in a horse stable where manure covered the floor to a depth of six inches. Roughly a week later they were let out of the stable, though their confinement continued for about four more months in total. Some among them eventually escaped into Mexico or made their way to join Victorio's ranks.