The McComas Massacre near Lordsburg, New Mexico
At the end of March, 1883, Judge Hamilton C. McComas and his wife,
Juniata, were massacred and their young son, Charley, was kidnapped,
while on a buggy trip from Silver City to Lordsburg. Most historians
believe the outrage was one of the last of the Indian Wars and was
committed by Apache Indians.
General George Crook used the "Hot Pursuit Treaty" signed with Mexico
to follow the hostile Indians down the bootheel in New Mexico and then
across the Mexican border.
Little Charley was never found, and his fate remains unknown to us.