Blood and Thunder

On August 16, 1849, John Washington led an army of 400 troops from Fort Marcy into Navajo territory. Despite American promises to stave them, Navajo raids had persisted and even escalated; they had “apparently decided that Narbona was wrong, that these ‘New Men’ were no different than the Spanish and Mexicans before them” (270-2). Washington and his officers, including future Vice President John Calhoun, called for a show of might.

The expedition was primarily military in nature, to teach the Navajo, in Washington’s words, to “cultivate the earth for an honest livelihood, or be destroyed” (272). It was also meant to survey and map Navajo terrain, which was still terra incognita. For this job, three men were hired: James Hervey Simpson and the Kern brothers, Richard and Edward.

Simpson was a member of the U.S. Corps of Topographical Engineers. A child prodigy of engineering and “an annoying fuddy-duddy” (274-7), Simpson hated the Southwest, but loved the work of mapping the land. In contrast, the Kern brothers had long been at home in (and in love) with the New Mexican wilderness. Edward “Ned” Kern was an expedition artist in a time before field photography. His brother Richard (“Dick”) was also an amateur scientist and scientific illustrator.