(continued from last week’s post. Find it here.)
After Victorio’s attempts to obtain permission for his people to return to the Mescalero Reservation failed, he and Lozen took action. They encouraged their people to flee in different directions. Lozen took charge of a group of women and children and headed to Mexico. When they approached the Rio Grande, swollen with the season’s earlier rainfall, many of the women and children did not want to cross. Lozen took the lead. With her rifle raised above her head, she struck the shoulder of her horse with her foot and they plunged into the water, swimming upstream through the raging river. Impressed by her bravery, the group followed her to safety. Knowing they had reached safety, Lozen went back across the river to find her brother and their band of warriors.
They traveled to Chihuahua, Mexico. Hoping to gather more ammunition and Apache warriors, Lozen left Victorio and his band to travel back to the Mescalero Reservation with the U.S. and Mexican cavalries on her heels. She took with her a young pregnant woman who wanted to return to her family. On the way, the young woman went into labor. Fearing capture from the Mexican or U.S. Armies, Lozen hid the woman in the brush and delivered her baby. Because of their delay, they ran out of food. Lozen, using her knife, single-handedly killed a longhorn and butchered it. When the woman could travel a few days later, Lozen, stole two horses and other supplies they needed to return to Tularosa.
Once they’d arrived, Lozen learned that Mexican forces had ambushed her brother. It is believed among the Apaches that instead of being taken hostage and killed at his enemies’ hands, Victorio committed suicide.
After Victorio’s death, Lozen returned to the San Carlos Reservation with chief Nana, only to leave again in 1882 where they joined forces with Geronimo. Together they raided the San Carlos Reservation and freed over 600 people. Lozen and Geronimo again raided San Carlos in early 1885–the last campaign of the Apache wars. Later in 1885, Geronimo negotiated an Apache surrender with the U.S. Government. Unable to come to terms, the Apaches spent several more months running from U.S. and Mexican forces until they ran out of ammunition and supplies. Geronimo surrendered and he, Lozen, and approximately 40 others, including another renown Chiricahua woman warrior, Dahaste, became prisoners of war and were hauled off to a concentration camp in Florida. In 1887, Lozen was later transferred to Alabama where she died of tuberculosis at 50 years of age.
Sources:
https://southernarizonaguide.com
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