Blood and Thunder

Following Captain John Reid’s “love-in” with the Navajo, the long anticipated sit-down between Colonel Alexander Doniphan and the Navajo took place at Bear Springs on the morning of November 21, 1846.

Doniphan explained that the United States had conquered and absorbed New Mexico. As the New Mexicans were now considered Americans, the United States would react with violence to continued raiding by the Navajo. He also underlined the desire of the United States to create a pact of peace between the U.S., Mexicans, and Navajo. This offer of peace, he said, was a one-time deal—refuse it, and it would be off the table.

Cultural differences quickly became obvious. One young Navajo chief, Zarcillos Largos, protested the Americans had just recently had a fight with the New Mexicans and asked why the Navajo shouldn’t be permitted to continue theirs.

Doniphan explained the American concept of surrender. An agreement seemed to be reached, a treaty ratified, though “it is doubtful that the Navajo had much of an idea of what they had signed” (214-5). A week later, a band of Navajo killed a New Mexican and stole his sheep, then killed two Missourian privates who gave chase. They were “the first American soldiers to be killed by Navajo Indians” (215).