page_title: C. S. Fly
section_title: Pictures of Geronimo
hierarchical_section_title: C. S. Fly / Life in Tombstone / Pictures of Geronimo
caption_attribution_description: English: Printed on Back of Photo: "Scene in Geronimo's camp, the Apache outlaw and murderer. Taken before the surrender to Gen. Crook, March 27, 1886, in the Sierra Madre mountains of Mexico, escaped March 30, 1886."
context_page_description: Camillus "Buck" Sydney Fly was an Old West photographer who is regarded by some as an early photojournalist and who captured the only known images of Native Americans while still at war with the United States. He took many other pictures of life in the mining boom town of Tombstone, Arizona and the surrounding region. He recognized the value of his photographs to illustrate periodicals of the day and took his camera to the scenes of important events where he deliberately recorded them and resold pictures to editors nationwide.
  He was an eyewitness on October 26, 1881 to the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, which took place outside his photography studio. He took pictures of a number of Tombstone residents including Tombstone founder Ed Schieffelin, pioneer surgeon Dr. George E. Goodfellow, Wyatt Earp's wife Josephine, and others.
  He served as Cochise County Sheriff from 1895 to 1897. Most of his negatives were destroyed by two fires that burned his studio to the ground. His widow, photographer Mary E. "Mollie" Fly, donated his remaining images to the Smithsonian Museum before she died in 1925. His photographs are legendary and highly prized.
context_section_description: In March, 1886, Department of Arizona General George Crook received word that the Apache leader Geronimo would meet him in Cañon de los Embudos, in the Sierra Madre Mountains about 86 miles (138 km) from Fort Bowie. Fly learned of the meeting and on March 20, 1886, took his equipment and attached himself to the military column. During the three days of negotiations, Fly took about 15 exposures on 8 by 10 inch glass negatives.
  One of the pictures of Geronimo with two of his sons standing alongside was made at Geronimo's request. Fly's images are the only existing photographs of Geronimo's surrender. He coolly posed his subjects, asking them to move and turn their heads and faces, to improve his composition.
  John Bourke described how Fly took the historic photographs:
  Tombstone photographer Fly kept busy with his camera, posing his Apache models with a nerve that would have reflected undying glory on a Chicago drummer. He coolly asked Geronimo and the warriors with him to change positions, and turn their heads or faces, to improve the negative. None of them seemed to mind him in the least except Chihuahua, who kept dodging behind a tree, but at last caught by the dropping of the slide.
  The Mayor of Tucson, C. M. Strauss, was present. He later wrote that:
  Fly is an excellent artist and he was not a respector of persons or circumstances, and even in the midst of the most serious interviews with the Indians, he would step up to an officer and say, ‘just put your hat a little more on this side, General. No Geronimo, your right foot must rest on that stone,’etc., so wrapped was he in the artistic effect of his views.
  Geronimo, who was camped on the Mexican side of the border, agreed to the surrender terms. A soldier who sold them whiskey said that his band would be murdered as soon as they crossed the border. Geronimo and 25 of his followers slipped away during the night, costing Crook his command.
caption: "Scene in Geronimo's camp, the Apache outlaw and murderer. Taken before the surrender to Gen. Crook, March 27, 1886, in the Sierra Madre mountains of Mexico, escaped March 30, 1886."
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