Historical locations can make for some intensely boring photos.
In this vicinity in 1871 a stage rolled through the area on it’s way to Prescott, Az. Suddenly, a band of Apache Mohave Indians sprang from nowhere and savagely attacked the little stage killing 6 men. A young lady, Mollie Sheppard died of her wounds a day later.
There are no such group of people as the Mohave Apache. In that time all Indians were called ‘Apache’, which means ‘enemy’ in the Hopi Indian language. The Yavapai Indians were the masters of this region. They would not have tolerated an Apache intrusion. The Apache territory was far to the east, and it didn’t matter that no Indians may have been involved in the raid anyway.
I believe it was something that Mollie said, that they didn’t look like real Indians. There was speculation that white men had masqueraded as the ‘Apache’ and perpetrated the attack to gain the U.S. Army’s attention. By slaughtering some of the travelers through the area, they could assure themselves that a war would be waged upon the local natives, killing them off to give white men free and unfettered access to the gold and land in the area.
The dream world was as important to the Mohave People as was the physical world. It was from this dream state instruction was given that would guide them to their destiny.
The Mohave Warrior was as brutal and violent in battle as his enemy. Even more so, not only because of strength and endurance but because those who had bad dreams; dreams of death and misfortune, were left behind in the villages with the women so not to bring a curse to the war.
Among the small and dangerous bands were mixed the Kwanamis. They were the elite warrior captains. The Kwanamis were said to have dreamed of war and the death of their opponents in the womb before their birth. Their dreams would be of ripping lion and bear creatures apart with bare hands and emerging from the dust victorious and unscathed.
The Kwanamis lived apart from the rest of the Mohave People, in the south of the valley where Mastamho, the God-son, fought with the serpent under the three peaks. It was here they would fast and meditate on the death of their opponents and the art of warfare.
These men who were stoic and impervious to heat, cold, hunger, and pain, would practice with their war bows and clubs in order to be the most effective in ministering death to their foes. Those Kwanamis who were to make the first kill in a fight were given the honor of wearing an eagle feather in their hair.
Learn more about the Mohave Indians
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