Document text
Edith L. Crawford,
Carrizozo, N. Mex.
PIONEEP STOTIT.
Date: April 28, 1939
Words: 900 A
Topic: Pioneer Story
Source of Information:
Jose Apodaca, Carrizozo,N.M.
193q
My father was Severanio Apodaca and my mother was Juanita
Sanchez, both more born in Old Mexico and were married there.
They came to the United States soon after they were married. (I
do not know when they were born or when they married or the year
they came to the United States.) They came to Lincoln County e
New Mexico, about 1871 and lived at Picacho, New Mexico, for
a while and moved from there to Ague Azul, New.Mexico, (which is
now called Blue Water, New Mexico.) Ague Azul in located on the
south side of the Capita* Mountains. Father moved there about
the year 1872, and took up a piece of land and built a two roomed
hut on the place.
He had a few head of horses and cattle and farmed the pleats.
There was lots of wild game in the Capitan Mountains in those days
and they always had all the fresh meat that they wanted.
About the first of January, 1873, while my parents were living
at this place, a friend of theirs by the name of Marcial
Rodri-
guez came to go on a hunting trip with my father. They got up
at day -break one morning and went out to look for their horses.
The men had to cross a flat which was between the mountain and
a big arroyo. The juniper trees which covered this place had
limbs that grew very close to the ground. While my father and
Marcial were crossing this flat a band of Indians were hidden
in the juniper trees, and as the men came out in the open the
Indians began shooting at them. They hit Marcial in the back and
my father in the leg. The two men fought with the Indians all
day and as it began to get dark Maroial told Father to make a run
for the arroyo and try to get away and save himself, as Marcial
felt that he was going to die and there was nothing that Father
could do to help him. It was best for Father to go for help.
Father made a run for the arroyo with the Indians after him,
but as it was dark he was able to get away from them. Father
wailed most of the night and came out at the Casey Reach, which
was about four miles north of Meech°. He told the Casey men about
the Indians and that he had left Maroial Rodriguez seriously
wounded on the flat at Agua Azul. Father was anxious to get back
to his home and to my mother.
The Casey's formed a posse and sent word up and down the
Rio Bonito for every man that could go, to meet them at Agua Azul
to fight the Indians. The posse left the Casey Ranch just at
day -break and went as fast as possible to Father's house to see
about my mother, who was expecting a baby. When they got there
they found that the Indians had been there and taken my mother
away with them. The posse, headed by my father, took up the
trail of the Indians. Alen they got to the flat at Ague Azul
they found the body of Marcial Rodriguez. The Indians had scalp•
ed him and cut off his right arm. The posse dug a grave and buried
him where he lay. By this time several others had joined them
and they started out after the Indians again. They overtook them
at the west end of the Capita* Mountains and the Indians and posse
had a fight. Several of the Indians were killed but some of them
got away. Some one in the posse noticed two squaws on the side of
the mountain and started after them. The two squaws had my mother
and when they saw the white men coming and knew that they could
not get away with my mother, they split her head open with an
5.
axe and the squaws made their get away. then the men got to my
mother she was dead and they found that she had given birth to
her baby, which was alive and a boy. The posse dug a grave aid
buried my mother right there on the mountain side.
My father took the baby to Lincoln, New Mexico, and gave
it to a woman named Tulle Gurule Stanley to care for. She raised
this baby and called him dose Apodaca.
The Indians that killed my mother were the Mescalero Apaches.
My father was killed by the Harrell Brothers, on the Ruidoso
River, about where the town of San Patricio, New Mexico, now is.
My father was on his way to the.Dowlin Mill, which was on the up-
per Ruidoso. He was taking a wagon load of grain to the mill to
be ground. This was about a year after my mother was killed.
The Harrell Brothers were from Texas and had settled on
the Ruidoso River. They had trouble with the Mexican people over
water rights, which terminated into what is known as the Farrell
War.
I grew up in Lincoln New Mexico and was married there
to Evangelesta Gamboa, in 1900. There were no children born to
us and my wife died in Lincoln in 1916 and was buried at Raventon,
New Mexico. I have lived all my life in Lincoln County. I am now
living at Carrizozo, New Mexico.