His name was Goyaałé. It means “one who yawns.” The Mexicans called him Geronimo — perhaps a corruption of his name, perhaps a cry to Saint Jerome as they fled from him. His enemies chose his name, and then his enemies made it their word for courage. [1]
He was born Bedonkohe Apache around 1829 near the headwaters of the Gila River in what is now New Mexico. In 1851, Mexican soldiers attacked his camp while the men were away trading. They killed his mother, his wife Alope, and his three children. He said later that he could still hear his children crying in the darkness. [1]
He spent the rest of his life at war.
For over thirty years, Goyaałé fought the governments of Mexico and the United States — sometimes alongside other Apache leaders like Cochise and Victorio, sometimes with a band so small it defied belief. At its smallest, his group numbered thirty-eight: men, women, and children, moving through the Sierra Madre and the deserts of the American Southwest. [1]
Against them, the United States deployed five thousand Army troops and five hundred Apache scouts. Mexico sent three thousand soldiers. They built heliograph networks across mountaintops to track his movements. They offered bounties. They burned crops. They imprisoned his relatives. [1]
He surrendered for the last time on September 4, 1886 — the last Native American leader to formally surrender to the United States. He and his people were shipped as prisoners of war to Florida, then Alabama, then Fort Sill, Oklahoma. He was never allowed to return home. He died at Fort Sill on February 17, 1909, still a prisoner of war, twenty-three years after his surrender. [1]
The United States Army named its most lethal attack helicopter the Apache. Paratroopers shout his name when they jump from aircraft. The operation that killed Osama bin Laden was codenamed “Geronimo.” His enemies cannot stop speaking his name.
Bibliography
[1] Wikipedia. “Geronimo.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geronimo