Shadows at Dawn: A Borderlands Massacre and the Violence of History

by Karl Jacoby Narrated by Malcolm Hillgartner

Overview

A masterful reconstruction of one of the worst Indian massacres in American history

In April 1871, a group of Americans, Mexicans, and Tohono O'odham Indians surrounded an Apache village at dawn and murdered nearly 150 men, women, and children in their sleep. In the past century, the attack, which came to be known as the Camp Grant Massacre, has largely faded from memory. Now, drawing on oral histories, contemporary newspaper reports, and the participants' own accounts, prize-winning author Karl Jacoby brings this perplexing incident and tumultuous era to life to paint a sweeping panorama of the American Southwest-a world far more complex, diverse, and morally ambiguous than the traditional portrayals of the Old West.

Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly

On April 30, 1871, a posse of Americans, Mexicans and Tohono O'odham Indians descended upon an Apache camp in Arizona and massacred some 150 of its sleeping inhabitants, mostly women and children. Jacoby (Crimes Against Nature), an associate professor of history at Brown University, re-examines what happened in the notorious Camp Grant Massacre and its aftermath in an original way. An unusual wealth of documents about this raid allow him to narrate from four different angles, each centering on a community involved in the massacre, thereby offering a view of the histories, fears and motivations of each group. Some readers might prefer a more conventional and chronological narrative, but Jacoby's structure succeeds in leading readers "toward a deeper revisioning of the American past." Jacoby wants readers to consider the West not just as the seat of America's Manifest Destiny, but as an "extension of the Mexican north and... the homeland of a complex array of Indian communities." For buffs more accustomed to traditional tales of Custer and Wounded Knee, this telling might prove an unexpected delight. Illus. (Nov. 24)

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Library Journal

On April 30, 1871, a group made up of Arizona civilians, Tohono O'odham, and Mexicans slaughtered approximately 150 sleeping Apache, most of whom were women and children. Through this atrocity, dubbed the Camp Grant Massacre, Jacoby (history, Brown Univ.; Crimes Against Nature: Squatters, Poachers, Thieves, and the Hidden History of American Conservation) explores the role of violence in shaping the settlement of the southwestern portion of the present-day United States. He traces the history of the four groups involved in the massacre to show how both real and perceived grievances against the Apache led such ethnically and culturally diverse peoples as Americans, Mexicans, and Tohono O'odham to set aside their differences and turn to unmitigated barbarity. This deftly constructed historical work demonstrates that what appears to have been a minor event can in fact illuminate important historical truths that should not be forgotten. Jacoby's superbly researched monograph is highly recommended for public and academic libraries.
—John Burch

Kirkus Reviews

A searching study of one of the American West's signature massacres, distinguished by the multiethnic nature of its perpetrators and the legal case that ensued. As Jacoby (History/Brown Univ.; Crimes Against Nature: Squatters, Poachers, Thieves, and the Hidden History of American Conservation, 2001) observes, the so-called Camp Grant Massacre, which took place on April 30, 1871, outside of Tucson, "is neither the biggest nor the best known of the flurry of brutal massacres of American Indians that occurred during the closing decades of the nineteenth century." What sets the slaughter apart was not its target-Apaches who, though accustomed to being killed on sight, had nonetheless come to a kind of accommodation with the U.S. government-but its planners, a group of Anglos, Mexicans and Mexican Americans who had various commercial and ideological reasons for wishing the Apaches dead. The bulk of the force, though, was made up of other Indians, O'odham people who called the Apache simply 'O:b, "the enemy." Jacoby skillfully examines the mixed makeup and motivations of this force, walking the thin line between history and legend and the thinner line between sympathy and objectivity. The perpetrators of the massacre, which cost the lives of 150 Apaches, most of them women and children, earned renown nationally in a time of social Darwinist campaigns to deracinate Indians. Though tried for murder, they were swiftly acquitted. Jacoby seeks to assign authorship and responsibility in a time of endemic violence in the outback, but of putative civilization-building in the nearby cities. Longtime Southwesterners remember the massacre today, but it seldom figures in the history texts and inconversation, learned or otherwise. As Jacoby notes, even the descendants of the Apache victims seldom mention it, "out of respect for the . . . custom of not discussing issues that might exacerbate others' despair."A lucid, well-written work of regional history that opens necessary conversation and has broader implications-essential for students of the American West.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940169840865
Publisher:	Blackstone Audio, Inc.
Publication date:	01/15/2019
Edition description:	Unabridged

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