The Apache Wars - by Paul Andrew Hutton (Paperback)

About the Book

Publication date inferred from publisher's website.

Book Synopsis

In the tradition of Empire of the Summer Moon, a stunningly vivid historical account of the manhunt for Geronimo and the 25-year Apache struggle for their homeland.

They called him Mickey Free. His kidnapping started the longest war in American history, and both sides--the Apaches and the white invaders--blamed him for it. A mixed-blood warrior who moved uneasily between the worlds of the Apaches and the American soldiers, he was never trusted by either but desperately needed by both. He was the only man Geronimo ever feared. He played a pivotal role in this long war for the desert Southwest from its beginning in 1861 until its end in 1890 with his pursuit of the renegade scout, Apache Kid.

In this sprawling, monumental work, Paul Hutton unfolds over two decades of the last war for the West through the eyes of the men and women who lived it. This is Mickey Free's story, but also the story of his contemporaries: the great Apache leaders Mangas Coloradas, Cochise, and Victorio; the soldiers Kit Carson, O. O. Howard, George Crook, and Nelson Miles; the scouts and frontiersmen Al Sieber, Tom Horn, Tom Jeffords, and Texas John Slaughter; the great White Mountain scout Alchesay and the Apache female warrior Lozen; the fierce Apache warrior Geronimo; and the Apache Kid. These lives shaped the violent history of the deserts and mountains of the Southwestern borderlands--a bleak and unforgiving world where a people would make a final, bloody stand against an American war machine bent on their destruction.

Review Quotes

"Where The Apache Wars really shines is in the richness of its details, well researched and deeply understood. . . . In terms of colorful characters, there is an embarrassment of riches."--The Wall Street 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

"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

"Well researched . . . Engrossing . . . Hutton's excellent book can help many readers get a much better understanding of a long, complicated, and still-disturbing chapter in American history."--Dallas Morning News

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

"An important contribution to boosting everyone's understanding about the consequences of the longest war in the nation's history . . . Hutton has written what will certainly be long regarded as a definitive history of the almost three-decades-long war between Apaches and white Americans."--New Mexico Magazine

"Hutton . . . is an engaging storyteller who . . . puts a nice finishing touch on the fascinating saga."--Wild West

"The long, often harsh story of the Apache wars in the hands of solid researcher and masterful storyteller Paul Andrew Hutton becomes fast-paced and more gripping than a Cochise and General O. O. Howard handshake."--Roundup

"Vivid and dramatic prose . . . Hutton's masterful chronicle of The Apache Wars is both a homily and a eulogy: a homily about the scourge of Conquest, War, Famine, and Death, and a long-overdue eulogy for windswept spirits of the dead long forgotten in the dark, blood-stained canyons of Apacheria."--True West

"[A] sprawling, fascinating tale of conflict in the late nineteenth-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

"The accounts of armed conflict are stirringly told and often read like a Western thriller. . . . Thoroughly 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

"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

About the Author

PAUL ANDREW HUTTON is an American cultural historian, author, documentary writer, and television personality. He is also a professor of history at the University of New Mexico, a former executive director of the Western History Association and former president of the Western Writers of America.