SEPTEMBER 4, 1886
After 30 years of fighting both the US and Mexican authorities, Geronimo, an Apache leader and medicine man, formally surrendered to General Nelson Miles in Arizona.
While well known, Geronimo was not actually a chief but his skills in warfare and raiding meant he often led large numbers of men – typically bands of between 30 and 50 Apaches. During Geronimo’s final period of conflict, from 1876 to 1886, he surrendered three times and promised to live on the Apache reservations in Arizona.
But he found life on the reservation constricting and repeatedly escaped, a fact he noted during his final surrender when he turned to Miles and said: “This is the fourth time I have surrendered.”
Despite holding Geronimo as a prisoner of war until his death 13 years later, the US government was not shy of capitalising on his fame.
In 1898, Geronimo appeared at an exhibition in Omaha, Nebraska, after which he became a frequent visitor to fairs, exhibitions, and other public functions where he made money by selling pictures of himself, bows and arrows, and items of clothing.
In 1905, the Indian Office provided Geronimo for the inaugural parade for President Theodore Roosevelt.
He died at the Fort Sill hospital in 1909 as a prisoner of war and is buried there among the graves of relatives and other Apache prisoners.