Al Sieber


Al Sieber was a German-American immigrant who fought in the American Civil War, and in the American Old West frontier against the Native Americans in the later American Indian Wars of the mid to late 19th century. He became a prospector and later served as a decorated Chief of Scouts for the United States Army during the subsequent Apache Wars of 1849 - 1886 in the southwestern United States.

Early life

Albert "Al" Sieber was born in Mingolsheim, Baden as the 13th of 14 children. He was baptized on March 1, 1843, in St. Lambertus Church, Mingolsheim. His father Johannes died on September 16, 1845. Between March and April 1851, three years after the "Badian Revolution", his mother Eva Katharina née Fischer, emigrated with her still living eight children to Lancaster, Pennsylvania. The family moved to Minnesota several years later.

Civil War service

He enlisted on March 4, 1862, in Company B, 1st Minnesota Volunteer Infantry during the American Civil War. Sieber was severely wounded on July 2, 1863 in the Battle of Gettysburg, on the battlefield's westside heights of Cemetery Ridge. He fought in several key engagements, including the earlier Battle of Antietam,, Battle of Gettysburg,, then the post-war conflicts in the American Indian Wars later phase in the American Southwest territories of the Apache Wars,, with the Battle of Cibecue Creek, and Battle of Big Dry Wash. After the wars, he became a mineral prospector in California, Nevada, and in the old Arizona Territory, where he also managed a cattle ranch from 1868 to 1871.

Army scout and guide

In July 1871, U.S. Army General George Stoneman, hired Sieber as Chief of Scouts and he served for much of the Apache Wars. He participated in General George Crook's Tonto campaign. When the Camp Verde, Arizona Territory Indian reservation was closed, Sieber was told to move Yavapais and Tonto Apaches to the San Carlos Reservation in the middle of winter. He remained employed there and participated in several engagements with Apache groups that had abandoned and left the reservation.
On October 24, 1874, the Arizona Miner newspaper, reported, "Al Zieber, Sergeant Stauffer and a mixed command of white and red soldiers are in the hills of Verde looking for some erring Apaches, whom they will be apt to find." Three days later, Sieber and Sgt. Rudolph Stauffer found the Apaches that had escaped the reservation at Cave Creek and fought them. Josephine Marcus Earp, wrote that when she arrived in the Arizona Territory, coming to Tombstone, she learned that "some renegade Yuma-Apaches had escaped from the reservation to which they had been consigned and had returned to their old haunts on the war-path" and that Sieber was tracking the escaped Apache. She said Sieber and his scouts led her stagecoach and its passengers to a nearby adobe ranch house where they remained until the Indians were captured.
In February, April, and May 1877, Sieber acted as a guide for Pima County Marshal Wiley Standefer, who was pursuing outlaws in the region.
In 1883, General Crook with a unit of American cavalry went south into the Sierra Madre Mountains of northern Mexico pursuing Apache renegade chief Geronimo, with a band of rebelling Indians in the Geronimo Campaign. Sieber was Crook's lead civilian scout and mentor to Tom Horn, whom he taught to speak German, as well as fighting together during the battles at Cibecue Creek, and Big Dry Wash. Sieber was in the field but not present when the Apache leader and renegade Geronimo surrendered to young Lt. Charles B. Gatewood, and commanding General Nelson Miles, in September 1886, finally ending the Indian Wars in the old Southwest.
Sieber stayed on at San Carlos as Chief of Scouts for the Army for another 13 years.

Wounds

In 1887, Sieber was shot and wounded when the Apache Kid and his followers escaped the reservation to prevent being jailed again. During his various battles and fights over the course of his life, Sieber received 28 wounds.

Perjury and revenge on the Apache Kid

A few days after the Apache Kid surrendered, he was found guilty of mutiny and desertion and sentenced to ten years at the military prison on Alcatraz Island in San Francisco Bay, California. The then U.S. Secretary of War, William Crowninshield Endicott reviewed the court-martial file of the Apache Kid and came to the conclusion that the trial had not been fair. On October 20, 1888, six months after his arrival on Alcatraz, the Apache Kid was released and headed back to San Carlos, Arizona Territory. Unhappy with military law, Sieber decided to retry the Kid, this time for attempted murder in the local territorial court. On October 29, 1889, according to the official records as the star witness, Sieber testified that the Apache Kid had shot him, even though he knew the Kid was not wearing a weapon at that moment. Witnesses saw Curley, another Apache scout, shoot at Sieber, but none were called to testify. Al Sieber's perjury resulted in a sentence of seven years in the infamous Yuma Territorial Prison in Yuma, for the Apache Kid and 3 other scouts.

Post army life and death

Sieber was fired from his San Carlos Chief of Scouts position in December 1890 by Major John L. Bullis. He left San Carlos and took up prospecting for the next eight years until 1898.
On February 19, 1907, Sieber was leading an Apache work crew that was building the Tonto road to the new Roosevelt Dam site on the confluence of the Salt River and Tonto Creek on the border of Gila County and Maricopa County in Gila County. The project was under the supervision of another famous frontier scout, "Yellowstone" Luther Kelly at Apache Trail, a separate downstream road, in Maricopa County, Arizona. Sieber was killed when a boulder rolled on him during construction. He was buried with military honors at the cemetery in Globe, Arizona.

In film and media

Sieber has been portrayed in a number of Hollywood productions and releases of Western feature films, plus television series