GERONIMO
Every day they measured land with curious instruments and put down marks which we could not understand. They were good men, and we were sorry when they had gone on into the west. They were not soldiers. These were the first white men I ever saw.
About ten years later some more white men came. These were all warriors. They made their camp on the Gila River south of Hot Springs. At first they were friendly and we did not dislike them, but they were not as good as those who came first.
After about a year some trouble arose between them and the Indians, and I took the warpath as a warrior, not as a chief.[1] I had not been wronged, but some of my people had been, and I fought with my tribe; for the soldiers and not the Indians were at fault.
Not long after this some of the officers of the United States troops invited our
- ↑ As a tribe they would fight under their tribal chief, Mangus-Colorado. If several tribes had been called out, the war chief, Geronimo, would have commanded.
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