end of this century of struggle was the campaign against the Apaches in the Southwest along the Mexican border, where they made their last stand under their able leader Geronimo.

The young doctor was detailed at once for duty on a broiling fourth of July under Captain--afterwards General--Henry W. Lawton, and the next day he rode a horse over thirty-five miles. That incident to the initiated is noteworthy, but even more so is the fact that shortly afterwards in a hard drive of five succeeding days he averaged eighteen hours a day either in the saddle or on foot, leading the horses. It was a stiff test. To make it worse he was given the one unassigned horse--that is to say, a horse that was known as an "outlaw"--whose jerky gait made each saddle-sore complain at every step. The sun beat down fiercely; but, burned and blistered fore and aft, Leonard Wood could still smile and ask for more action.

The stoicism of the tenderfoot who had come to play their game was not lost on the troopers {27} with whom he was to spend the next two years fighting Indians. He "healed in the saddle" at once and a few weeks later was out-riding and out-marching the best of Captain Lawton's command, all of whom were old and experienced Indian fighters.

This was not to be the last time that Leonard Wood was to find himself faced at the outset by tacit suspicion and lack of confidence on the part of the men he was to command. Years later in the Philippines he was put up against a similar hostility, with responsibilities a thousandfold more grave, and in the same dogged way he won confidence--unquestioning loyalty--by proving that he was better than the best. "Do it and don't talk about it," was his formula for success. It was this quality in him that made it possible for Captain Lawton to write to General Nelson A. Miles, who had then succeeded General Crook, after the successful Geronimo campaign: "... I can only repeat that I have before reported officially and what I have said to you: that his services during the trying campaign were of the highest order. I speak particularly of services {28} other than those devolving upon him as a medical officer; services as a combatant or line officer voluntarily performed. He sought the most difficult work, and by his determination and courage rendered a successful issue of the campaign possible."

General Crook, who commanded the troops along the border, characterized the Apaches as "tigers of the human race." Tigers they were, led by Geronimo, the man whose name became a by-word for savagery and cruelty. For a time these Indians had remained subdued and quiet upon a reservation, and there can be no question but what the subsequent outbreaks that led to the long campaign in which Wood took part were due largely to the lack of judgment displayed by the officials in whose charge they were placed. Both the American settlers and the Mexicans opposed the location of the Indians on the San Carlos reservation and lost no opportunity to show their hostility. When General Crook took command of that district he found he had to deal with a mean, sullen and treacherous band of savages.

The American forces were constantly embroiled with the Chiricahuas. Treaties and agreements {29} were made only to be broken whenever blood lust or "tiswin"--a strong drink made from corn--moved the tribe to the warpath and fresh depredations. Due to General Crook's tireless efforts there were several occasions when the Indians remained quietly on their reservation, but it was only a matter of months at the best before one of the tribes, usually the Chiricahuas, would break forth again. Not until the treaty of 1882 with Mexico was it possible for our troops to pursue them into the Mexican mountains where they took refuge after each uprising. In 1883 General Crook made an expedition into Mexico which resulted in the return of the Chiricahuas and the Warm Springs tribes under Geronimo and Natchez to the Apache reservation.

Two years of comparative quiet followed. The Indians followed agricultural pursuits and the settlers, who had come to establish themselves on ranches along the border, went out to their plowing and fence building unarmed. In May, 1886, the Indians indulged in an extensive and prolonged "tiswin" drunk. The savagery that lurked in their hearts broke loose and they escaped from {30} their reservation in small bands, leaving smoking trails of murder, arson and pillage behind them. Acts of ugly violence followed. General Crook threatened to kill the last one of them, if it took fifty years, and at one moment it seemed as though he had them under control. "Tiswin" once again set them loose and they stampeded.

Their daring and illusiveness kept the American and Mexican troops constantly in action. One band of eleven Indians crossed into the United States, raided an Apache reservation, killed Indians as well as thirty-eight whites, captured two hundred head of stock and returned to Mexico after having traveled four weeks and covered over 1,200 miles.

It was into such warfare that Wood was plunged. No sooner had he arrived and begun his work than he put in a request for line duty in addition to his duties as a medical officer. This was granted immediately, because the need of men who could do something was too great to admit of much punctiliousness in the matter of military custom. Before the arrival of his commission as Assistant Surgeon, January, 1886, he {31} had served as commanding officer of infantry in a desperately hard pursuit in the Sierra Madres, ending in an attack on an Indian camp. He was repeatedly assigned to the most strenuous, fatiguing duty. After having marched on foot one day twenty-five miles with Indian scouts he rode seventy-three miles with a message at night, coming back at dawn the next day, just in time to break camp and march thirty-four miles to a new camp. He was given at his own request command of infantry under Captain Lawton, and this assignment to line duty was sanctioned by General Miles, who had recently taken over the command of the troops along the border.

General Miles was one of the greatest Indian fighters the country has ever known. He was peculiarly fitted to assume this new job of suppressing the Apache. He judged and selected the men who were to be a part of this campaign by his own well-established standards. As its leader he selected Captain Lawton, then serving with the Fourth United States Cavalry at Fort Huachuca, primarily because Captain Lawton believed that these Indians could be subjugated. {32} He had met their skill and cunning and physical strength through years of such warfare under General Crook, and possessed the necessary qualifications to meet the demands of the trying campaign that faced him. After speaking of Captain Lawton, General Miles says in his published recollections:

"I also found at Fort Huachuca another splendid type of American manhood, Captain Leonard Wood, Assistant Surgeon, United States Army. He was a young officer, age twenty-four, a native of Massachusetts, a graduate of Harvard, a fair-haired, blue-eyed young man of great intelligence, sterling, manly qualities and resolute spirit. He was also perhaps as fine a specimen of physical strength and endurance as could easily be found."

"... His services and observations and example were most commendable and valuable, and added much to the physical success of the enterprise."

General Field Orders No. 7, issued April 20, 1886, by General Miles for the guidance of the troops in his command, tell clearly and concisely the character and demands of the time.

{33}

"The chief object of the troops will be to capture or destroy any band of hostile Apache Indians found in this section of the country, and to this end the most vigorous and persistent efforts will be required of all officers and soldiers until this object is accomplished.

"... The cavalry will be used in light scouting parties with a sufficient force held in readiness at all times to make the most persistent and effective pursuit.

"To avoid any advantage