The Apache Wars: The Hunt for Geronimo, the Apache Kid, and the Captive Boy Who Started the Longest War in American History - Couverture rigide

Hutton, Paul Andrew

Couverture rigide

ISBN 10 : 0770435815 ISBN 13 : 9780770435813

Editeur : Random House Inc, 2016

A propos du livre

Revue de presse

"Paul Hutton is one the great scholars of Western Americana, but he's also a natural born storyteller, with a rare gift for locating the deep ironies that suffuse history. Hutton has brought this sere landscape—and this classic clash of the borderlands—to pungent life on the page." —Hampton Sides, author of Blood and Thunder and In the Kingdom of Ice

“A fast-paced, well-written page-turner. Hutton gives an excellent account of individuals, both Native American and White, who contested for control of the Southwest in the 19th Century.” —R. David Edmunds, Watson Professor of American History, University of Texas at Dallas
 
“Hutton captures the intensity and drama of the history of both sides in this vibrant segment of western history.” —Robert M. Utley, author of Geronimo and The Lance and the Shield
 
“After reading this masterfully researched and written book I thanked my lucky stars for Paul Hutton. It took an author and historian of his caliber to at long last deliver the definitive explanation of the longest war in the nation's history. The wait was worth it. By using the legendary Apache scout and manhunter Mickey Free as a vehicle to tell the story, Hutton cuts through layers of myth exposing one of the most exciting and pivotal episodes in the annals of the American West.”  —Michael Wallis, author of The Wild West: 365 Days

"Humane, insightful, and vivid, The Apache Wars immerses readers in the rugged landscape of Apacheria, the meeting ground and battlefield of nations. In telling the gripping story of the Apaches' long fight against Mexico and the United States, Hutton proves once again why he is a great writer as well as a great historian." —T.J. Stiles, Pulitzer-prize winning author of Custer's Trials: A Life on the Frontier of a New America

“[A] sprawling, fascinating tale of conflict in the late 19th-century American southwest...Hutton moves beyond standard descriptions of battles between Apache warriors and American troops (though there are plenty of those) to paint a larger, more detailed picture of Southwestern life... Hutton provides an unexpected twist that keeps the story fresh until the end.” —Publishers Weekly 

"“His prose is equal to the vastness of his landscape and the clash of so many era-defining personalities...Mr. Hutton is also terrier-like in his persistence in tracking and deconstructing every significant skirmish in the conflict, and there are plenty of them. In terms of colorful characters, there is an embarrassment of riches...Where The Apache Wars really shines is in the richness of its details, well researched and deeply understood.”—Wall Street Journal

"The accounts of armed conflict are stirringly told and often read like a Western thriller... [T]horoughly researched.”—Kirkus Reviews

"An outstanding, comprehensive overview of the Apache Wars of Arizona and New Mexico...This recounting of the Southwestern battles for Apacheria will be valued by general readers and researchers alike for its colorful personalities and strong representation of the cultural context of historical events.”—Library Journal

"“[A] major work of history on a much-neglected subject... The Apache Wars is an epic tale filled with Homeric scenes and unforgettable characters. It's a quintessential American story that too few Americans know.”—Chicago Tribune

""A comprehensive narrative, as encompassing as the American West itself."—Denver Post

"Sharply and unflinchingly explores the many years of bloody, thunderous conflicts between soldiers based in camps and forts and elusive Apaches in New Mexico and Arizona.”—Albuquerque Journal

Extrait

Prologue

On a crisp morning in late January, the boy tended his stock as he watched the dust cloud rising to the south, at the far end of the narrow timbered valley. Felix was almost twelve, but short and scrawny for his age, with a mop of red hair and fair skin. When the boy saw riders emerging one by one from the cloud of dust, their ponies splashing across the shallow creek, he ran to the little grove of peach trees some three hundred yards from the ranch buildings where his mother and sister were. He knew this area was contested ground, in the heart of what the Mexicans, and the Spanish before them, had named Apacheria. The Mexicans had failed to settle the valley, driven out by the fearsome Apaches who lived in the mountains to the east and north.

A dozen Apaches, wildly painted and heavily armed, galloped onto the ranch. They swept past the buildings to gather up all the horses and cattle. His heart pounding, Felix climbed a peach tree and hid himself as best he could. The Apache leader rode up to the tree as his men began herding the horses and cattle back down the valley and looked up at the terrified boy. Felix expected to be killed instantly, but instead the Apache laughed and motioned for him to climb down. Felix obliged. The Apache, who was called Beto, had a heavily scarred face that bore the imprint of some terrible battle in which he had lost an eye. Felix also had but one eye. The Apache pulled him onto the back of his pony, and off they galloped after the warriors.

These Apaches were of the Aravaipa band, who lived to the northeast of the Sonoita Valley. The Aravaipa would come to call the kidnapped boy Coyote, after their trickster god, because they could never decide if he was friend or foe. Years later, white men would name him Mickey Free. The boy’s kidnapping started the final struggle for Apacheria—the longest war in the history ofthe United States. This conflict would leave a trail of blood from the Pecos River in Texas through New Mexico and Arizona and deep into Mexico from 1861 to 1886. All sides in that conflict blamed Mickey Free for starting it. In time, the boy would come to play a pivotal role in the war, moving back and forth between the harshly conflicted worlds of the Apache and the white invader, never really accepted by either but invaluable to both.

This is Mickey Free’s story, but it is also the story of his contemporaries—both friend and foe, red and white—whose lives were shaped by the violent history of the deserts and mountains of the American Southwest and northern Mexico. It was a land where every plant bore a barb, every insect a stinger, every bird a talon, every reptile a fang—an inhospitable, deadly environment known to the outside world as Apacheria. In this bleak and unforgiving world, the one-eyed, deeply scarred Mickey Free was at home.

Détails de l'édition

• Éditeur: Random House Inc
• Date d'édition: 2016
• Langue: anglais
• ISBN 10: 0770435815
• ISBN 13: 9780770435813
• Reliure: Relié
• Nombre de pages: 528
• Coordonnées du fabricant: non disponible