Description: As a definitive study of the poorly understood Apaches de paz, this book explains how war-weary, mutually suspicious Apaches and Spaniards negotiated an ambivalent compromise after 1786 that produced over four decades of uneasy peace across the region. In response to drought and military pressure, thousands of Apaches settled near Spanish presidios in a system of reservation-like establecimientos, or settlements, stretching from Laredo to Tucson. Far more significant than previously assumed, the establecimientos constituted the earliest and most extensive set of military-run reservations in the Americas and served as an important precedent for Indian reservations in the United States. As a case study of indigenous adaptation to imperial power on colonial frontiers and borderlands, this book reveals the importance of Apache-Hispanic diplomacy in reducing cross-cultural violence and the limits of indigenous acculturation and assimilation into empires and states.
Brief description: Matthew Babcock earned his Ph.D. from Southern Methodist University, Texas, his M.A. from the University of New Mexico, and his B.A. from Dartmouth College. He is currently Assistant Professor of History at the University of North Texas and is a recipient of a prestigious Dornsife Long-Term Research Fellowship at the Huntington Library. He has written numerous journal articles and book chapters, which have been published in Spain, Canada (Quebec), and the United States, and is a member of the American Historical Association, the American Society for Ethnohistory, the Western History Association, and the Texas and East Texas State Historical Associations.
Review Quotes: '... Babcock's thoroughly documented, clearly written, and cogently argued essay is a mandatory reference for specialists, and highly recommended for scholars and educated readers interested in the US - Mexico borderlands as well as Native American, western US, and colonial Latin American history. It can also be profitably used to teach undergraduates.' Joaquín Rivaya-Martínez, Southwestern Historical Quarterly