The Jicarilla War was fought in 1854 and 1855 between the Jicarilla Apaches, their Ute allies, and the United States military in northern New Mexico. The war began in February when the Jicarillas and Utes began raiding against settlers on the Santa Fe Trail. Eventually the American army retaliated which resulted in a series of battle that ended when a large military expedition managed to quell most of the violence, however, skirmishing contiuned into 1855.^[1]^[2]

War

In February of 1854 a government beef contractor near Fort Union, New Mexico reported to the army that several of his cattle had been stolen by the Jicarillas so in reponse, a troop of dragoons from the 2nd Cavalry were sent to retrieve the stolen property. On March 5, Lieutenant Bell encountered a group of warriors under Chief Lobo Blanco, out on the Canadian River. It was uncertain whether Lobo Blanco and his followers were responsible for the stolen property but the army had long suspected Lobo Blanco's band of killing white and Hispanic settlers. A battle then ensued which left the chief and four of his warriors dead while the Americans lost two men. On the next day, the conflict escalated when a band of Jicarillas and Utes raided a herd or cattle near Fort Union, killing two herdsmen in the process. After that the United States Army 1st Cavalry Regiment launched an expedition into Apacheria. The first engagement was fought on March 30 when First Lieutenant John Davidson's launched an unauthorized attack on a Jicarilla village near the present day Pilar, New Mexico.^[3]

In the ensuing Battle of Cieneguilla, sixty American cavalrymen fought an estimated 250 Apaches and Ute warriors under the war chief Flechas Rayada. Fighting began at around 8:00 am and lasted for over three hours, by the end of which, twenty-two soldiers were killed and another thirty-six were wounded. Davidson's command was forced to retreat having inflicted about twenty deaths on the native force. A week later, on April 8, a large force of about 200 American cavalrymen, 100 men of the 3rd Infantry, and thirty-two scouts, found the Jicarillas of Chief Chacon in Ojo Caliente Canyon. In the battle that followed commander Philip St. George Cooke defeated about 150 warriors, killing five of them and wounding six others without sustaining any casualties. The Jicarillas where dispersed at that point and without a camp many of them dies in the extreme cold weather. The battle was also notable for having involved Kit Carson, who guided the American army during the expedition, and First Lieutenant George Sykes, who later commanded the Army of the Potomac in the American Civil War. After the Ojo Caliente battle the war was basically over with the exception of a few more raids and counter raids over the next several months.^[4]^[5]^[6]

War

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