Cochise's War raged on for a decade.  By 1871 he had emerged the most feared and hated Indian in the entire country.  The U.S. Army had succeeded in forcing virtually all other native peoples onto reservations, but had had no luck when it came to this legendary Apache known as Cochise. 

     General George Crook was called in -- a man with the magnanimous reputation as the country's best Indian fighter.  Ed Sweeney writes in his Cochise biography that Crook himself was reluctant to accept the assignment because he was "tired of fighting Indians."  Little did he know that in years to follow he would be mired in Indian fighting once again as Geronimo's chief pursuer.  For now, Crook, his reluctance notwithstanding, waded into the fray with characteristic fervor and prompty set out to bring defeat to the feet of the great Cochise -- if only the government would allow it. 

     Crook was well aware of the new policies suddenly popular back east -- policies that favored a more Christian approach to subjugating Indians.   While he had true compassion and sympathy for the Indian people on the whole, he was a realist and felt strongly that their continued existence could only be assured by defeating them in battle.  To this he was committed, and he immediately set out from Tucson into Cochise's territory, prepared to wage war.

     But Crook's campaign was cut short by a new Indian policy coming out of Washington.  Word of the infamous Camp Grant massacre, in which a small band of peaceful Apaches was brutally attacked in the night by citizen vigilantes out of Tucson, had incensed the civilized population back east.  Pressure from civil groups and religious institutions served to convince Washington that a more Christian approach was called for.  Crook was told to stand down while a new peace commissioner by the name of Vincent Colyer was given opportunity to travel west and attempt to contact the warring Apaches -- particularly Cochise.  Part of the grand plan was to locate the mighty chief and pursuade him to visit Washington -- an idea in retrospect that sounds almost surreal.

     Seething, Crook stood aside, frustrated that a sure victory had been snatched from him by his own superiors. 

     But Cochise remained elusive.  Colyer's attempts to locate him were futile, though he managed to find other important Apaches and even managed to placate many of them, convincing hundreds of them to give reservation life a chance.  A large tract of land near Cañada Alamosa (now Monticello, New Mexico) was set aside for the wayward Apaches -- a bit of news that soon reached Cochise, coming at a time when the great chief was tiring and eager for peace.  He sent a runner to the one American he had learned to trust -- a man by the name of Thomas Jeffords.  Cochise was asking Jeffords' help.  He would make an appearance for talks at Cañada Alamosa, but only with Jeffords as an escort.  The story of this unlikely association is part of the lore of the Great Southwest . . .