I was listening to Geronimo's story that he told before he died. He was a native American warlord around the late 1800s. He emphasized how he had accepted the Christian God and how the white man had a superior culture to the natives. He wished his people could be given forgiveness and allowed to form their own country. As he saw they were all dying off, and he was very sad about that.
He also emphasized how he never had a wife like the white man did. His wives would leave him with her children at a whim.
The reason the male had any influence in the Tribe was because they were superior fighters, and could use bravery in war to secure food and territory. He said no one followed him until he "went on the war path." Which he went on about 15 times, almost dying numerous times.
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His first encounter with a white man was positive. He was amazed at the man's height, his strength, and his generosity. He didn't begin hating white men until he encountered a colonel from the US army (probably a pussy-whipped loser) who lied to him about a treaty.
So for twenty more years he resisted white men in battle. Until he was captured. Then he, his friends and his wife and children spent five years in Alabama. Where he said the weather was so hot and the work was so bad that his friend killed his wife, and then killed himself.
He let his wife and children leave him. Never to see them ever again. He was eventually transferred to Oklahoma where he met another US soldier. Perhaps this was the soldier who changed his views on white men. The soldier was kind and generous to him. He was amazed at Geronimo's life story and asked him to tell it all from the beginning so he could put it in a book. It was published around 1910.
Before the book was written another man, a businessman, took Geronimo to the fare. Where he saw and described contraptions like a Farris wheel for the first time. He was totally amazed. They had the idea to make Geronimo a part of the fare. Which made him very wealthy. He spent the last few years of his life enjoying his money, freedom, peace, church, and probably a lot of adoring white men (and enjoying women for sure) just as amazed at him as he was at the modern world.
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He had nearly died numerous times. He was shot, beaten, and captured and enslaved. But he survived it all. He personally killed hundreds of people before the US army captured him. Broken down by the slavery and the isolation after his friend killed himself and his wife left him, he began to change.
He called Christianity the greatest religion on earth. How his people's religion was obscure and said nothing about the afterlife. (Perhaps the natives bravery sufficed and they didn't need tales to imbibe them with courage. A testament to superior genes rather than primitive stupidity.)
In his heart of hearts he never fully understood white culture...why they would deceive instead of fighting bravely, or why they would marry one woman. But he knew that it fostered peace and that peace is superior to war. His one regret was not realizing that sooner. Because it led to the extinction of his people. He was a nationalist and there's nothing wrong with that at all.
There was never anything wrong with Geronimo. He did nature's will. He fought his enemy with all his heart and submitted to the Victor, who offered him a second chance at life. (They say slavery was bad, but natives didn't enslave anyone. They killed who they beat in war. Slavery was a moral upgrade.)
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There is absolutely nothing more amazing than a man who doesn't overvalue himself.
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