Located near the northern limit of the Chiricahua Apache homeland and the southern margins of Western Apache territory, the range is one of the Western Apache ’ s four holiest mountains and is considered sacred by all of the region's Native peoples.

The Chiricahua Mountains are a mountain range in southeastern Arizona which are part of the Basin and Range province of the southwest, and part of the Coronado National Forest.

** Chihuicahui ( lived in SE Arizona in the Huachuca Mountains west of the San Pedro River, in the northwest along a line of today's Benson, Johnson, Willcox, and north along the San Simon River to east of SW New Mexico, controlled the southern Pinaleno, Winchester, Dos Cabezas, Chiricahua, Dragoon and Mule Mountains, southwestern local group )

The Chiricahua Mountains, and other associated ranges, along with Sulphur Springs Valley on the west and the San Simon Valley on the east, form the eastern half of Cochise County in southeast Arizona.

Access to the Chiricahua Mountains and Coronado National Forest is through Wilcox from the north, Douglas from the south, and Rodeo from the east.

When Opatas captured invading Chiricahua warriors that were mature adult males, they would execute them whether they were wounded or not, and place their bodies far enough away from their villages to avoid exposure of the odor of decomposition, and as food for wildlife to consume except for one hand, which the Opata warriors would cut off and wear around their necks on strings of hide as war victory trophies.

Other writers have used this term to refer to all non-Navajo Apachean peoples living west of the Rio Grande ( thus failing to distinguish the Chiricahua from the other Apacheans ).

Mangas Coloradas, or Dasoda-hae (“ He Just Sits There ”) ( c. 1793 – January 18, 1863 ), was an Apache tribal chief and a member of the Eastern Chiricahua nation, whose homeland stretched west from the Rio Grande to include most of what is present-day southwestern New Mexico.

In Arizona there is the Agua Fria National Monument, Canyon de Chelly National Monument, Casa Grande Ruins National Monument, Chiricahua National Monument, Ironwood Forest National Monument, Montezuma Castle National Monument, Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, Petrified Forest National Park, Pipe Spring National Monument, Saguaro National Park, Sonoran Desert National Monument, Sunset Crater Volcano National Monument, Tonto National Monument, Tumacacori National Historical Park, Tuzigoot National Monument, Vermilion Cliffs National Monument, Walnut Canyon National Monument, and the Wupatki National Monument.

On July 14, 1882, Johnny Ringo was found dead in the crotch of a large tree in West Turkey Creek Valley, near Chiricahua Peak, Arizona Territory, with a bullet hole in his right temple and a revolver hanging from a finger of his hand.

On July 14, 1882, Johnny Ringo was found dead in the crotch of a large tree in West Turkey Creek Valley, near Chiricahua Peak, with a bullet hole in his right temple and an exit wound at the back of his head.

Today two branches of the tribe are federally recognized as independent units: the Fort Sill Apache Tribe, located near Apache, Oklahoma ; and the Chiricahua tribe located on the Mescalero Apache reservation near Ruidoso, New Mexico.

Although they had lived peaceably with most Americans in the New Mexico Territory up to about 1860, the Chiricahua became increasingly hostile to American encroachment in the Southwest after a number of provocations had occurred between them.

In late frontier times, the Chiricahua ranged from San Carlos and the White Mountains of Arizona, to the adjacent mountains of southwestern New Mexico around what is now Silver City, and down into the mountain sanctuaries of the Sierra Madre ( of northern Mexico ).

The Chiricahua tribal territory encompassed today ´ s SE Arizona, SW New Mexico, NE Sonora and NW Chihuahua.

* Bedonkohe ( Bi-dan-ku-‘ In Front of the End People ’, Bi-da-a-naka-enda-‘ Standing in front of the enemy ’, often called Mogollon, Gila Apaches, Northeastern Chiricahua, lived in the Mogollon Mountains and Tularosa Mountains between the San Francisco River in the West and the Gila River to the southeast in west New Mexico )

* Mimbreños is an older name that refers to a section of Opler's Eastern Chiricahua band and to Albert Schroeder's Mimbres and Warm Springs Chiricahua bands in southwestern New Mexico.

* Mogollon was considered by Schroeder to be a separate pre-reservation Chiricahua band, while Opler considered the Mogollon to be part of his Eastern Chiricahua band in New Mexico.

In his 1967 book, Sky Island, he demonstrated the concept by describing a drive from the town of Rodeo, New Mexico, in the western Chihuahuan desert, to a peak in the Chiricahua Mountains, away and higher in elevation.

1825 – October 14, 1880 ) was a warrior and chief of the Chihenne band of the Chiricahua Apaches in what is now the American states of New Mexico, Arizona, Texas and the Mexican states of Sonora and Chihuahua.

The Cibecue affair touched off a regional Apache uprising, in which the leading men of the Chiricahua bands, such as Naiche ( c. 1857-1919 ), Juh ( c. 1825 – Nov. 1883 ), and Geronimo ( June 16, 1829 – Feb. 17, 1909 ), left the reservation and went to war in Arizona, New Mexico, and northern Mexico.

" A Chiricahua Apache Account of the Geronimo Campaign of 1886 ", New Mexico Historical Review, October, 13 ( 4 ).

Mescalero-Chiricahua ( also known as Mescalero-Chiricahua Apache ) is a Southern Athabaskan language spoken by the Mescalero and Chiricahua tribes in Oklahoma and New Mexico.

Before the arrival of Europeans, New Mexico's current borders overlapped the areas of the Navajo, Mescalero, and Chiricahua tribes.

As Spain and later Mexico attempted to gain dominion over their lands, the various Chiricahua groups became increasingly resistant.

In 1915 renegade Chiricahua Apaches still lived in the Sierra Madre of northern Mexico.

What today is Ft. Huachuca was a new fort to counter the Chiricahua threat and to secure the border with Mexico.

In 1877, about three years after Cochise's death, the US moved the Chiricahua and some other Apache bands to the San Carlos Apache Indian Reservation, still in Arizona.

Other outdoor sightseeing and recreational opportunities that are nearby include the San Pedro Riparian National Conservation Area, the Coronado National Memorial in the Huachuca Mountains, Cochise Stronghold in the Dragoon Mountains, Chiricahua National Monument, Madera Canyon, Kartchner Caverns State Park, Parker Canyon Lake, and Patagonia Lake State Park.

* San Carlos Apache of the San Carlos Reservation ( Tsékʼáádn-“ Metate People ”, lived on both sides of the San Pedro River and in the foothills of the Santa Catalina Mountains near Tucson ), a federally recognized tribe composed of the San Carlos Apache proper and several groups of the Cibecue Apache ( excluding the Tca-tci-dn (“ red rock strata people ”) clan of the Carrizo band ), some Tonto Apache, Lipan as well Chiricahua Apache peoples.

* Tonto Apache ( autonym: Dilzhé ` e, the Chiricahua called them Ben-et-dine-‘ wild ’, ‘ crazy ’; neighboring Western Apache called them Koun ` nde-‘ Those who you don ’ t understand ’, ‘ wild rough People ’, the Spanish adapted this as Tonto-' loose ', ' foolish ', the Dine called the Tonto Apache and neighboring Yavapai Dilzhʼíʼ dinéʼiʼ-‘ People with high-pitched voices ’, lived from the San Francisco Peaks, East Verde River and Oak Creek Canyon along the Verde River into the Mazatzal Mountains and to the Salt River in the SW and the Tonto Basin in the SE, extending eastwards towards the Little Colorado River, were the most westerly group of the Western Apache )

In a change of policy, the U. S. government decided to move the Chiricahua to the San Carlos reservation in 1876.

On April 19, 1882, another Chiricahua chief named Juh attacked the San Carlos reservation and forced Chief Loco to break out.

The US established a Chiricahua Apache Reservation with Jeffords as US Agent, near Fort Bowie, Arizona Territory.

They made a stronghold in the Chiricahua Mountains, part of which is now inside Chiricahua National Monument, and across the intervening Willcox Playa to the northeast, in the Dragoon Mountains ( all in southeastern Arizona ).

From Bowie Station, Arizona, they were entrained, along with most of the other remaining Chiricahua ( as well as the Army's Apache scouts ), and exiled to Fort Marion, Florida.

Rocky Mountain Douglas-fir conesLeft: Shuswap Lake, British Columbia, CanadaRight: Chiricahua Mountains, Arizona, U. S.

The fourth and current hospital was named after Brigadier General Bernard John Dowling Irwin " The Fighting Doctor " who won the Medal of Honor for distinguished gallantry in action during an engagement with the Chiricahua Indians near Apache Pass Arizona in February 1861.

It is abundant in such areas as the Chiricahua Mountains of Arizona.

* Chiricahua are one of the seven major Apachean groups, ranging in southeastern Arizona.

Goodwin's formulation: " all those Apache peoples who have lived within the present boundaries of the state of Arizona during historic times with the exception of the Chiricahua, Warm Springs, and allied Apache, and a small band of Apaches known as the Apache Mansos, who lived in the vicinity of Tucson.

Set in 1880s Arizona, it portrays a brutal raid by Chiricahua Apaches against European settlers.

Spherulites in rhyolitic ash, Hailstone Trail, Echo Canyon, Chiricahua Mountains, Arizona.

Much earlier, the sky island concept was mentioned in 1943 by Natt N. Dodge in an article in Arizona Highways magazine when he referred to the Chiricahua Mountains in southeastern Arizona as a ".

::* Forces: Confederate Arizona Guards and civilians, Chiricahua, Minibreno, and allied Apaches

Three hundred and seventy-five avian species have been recorded from the Chiricahua Mountains ; some are largely Mexican species for which southern Arizona is the northern limits of their ranges.

From 1886-1887, approximately 491 Apaches were held prisoner at Fort Marion ; many were of the Chiricahua and Warm Springs Apache bands from Arizona.