“Cluke will try hard,” wisely assented Micky. “He will follow them—his trail has only one end. But you cannot turn Apaches into white men all at once. I look to see more fighting.”
In April Delt-che the Red Ant made one last vengeful raid. But the troops and scouts were hot after him. Major George M. Randall of Camp Apache did the final work, this time. In the night of April 21 he and his men climbed on hands and knees up the steep slope of Diamond Peak in the Tonto Basin. Here, on the top of the Yavapais’ “medicine mountain” they surprised the Delt-che band at dawn and drove them over the edges of the precipice.
Delt-che and his surviving people were brought into the reservation at Camp Verde.
At the various posts there was read, to the troops on parade, a message from Division Headquarters:
General Orders No. 7
Headquarters Military Division of the Pacific,
San Francisco, Cal., April 28, 1873.
To Brevet Major-General George Crook, commanding the Department of Arizona, and to his gallant troops, for the extraordinary service that they have rendered in the late campaign against the Apache Indians, the Division Commander extends his thanks and his congratulations upon their brilliant successes. They have merited the gratitude of the nation. There is now occasion for hope that the well-deserved chastisement inflicted upon the Apaches may give peace to the people of Arizona.
By order of Major-General Schofield.
General Crook also issued congratulations, in General Orders No. 14, Department of Arizona: