McComas Incident

Chatto's party of twenty-six had ridden out of Mexico's Sierra Madre on March 21, 1883, looking for guns and ammunition. A week later Judge Hamilton McComas, his wife Juniata and their son Charley, bound from Silver City to Lordsburg on mining business, stopped for a picnic near the mouth of Thompson Canyon and met them there. The killing gave General Crook his reason to take troops into Mexico that spring. Accounts of Charley's fate conflict; Ramona Chihuahua, a chief's daughter captured in the soldiers' attack, later said he was killed during it, and he was never found.

What the plaque says

Official Scenic Historic Marker McComas Incident In March 1883, Judge and Mrs. H. C. McComas were killed in this vicinity by a group of Chi- ricahua Apaches led by Chatto. An extensive manhunt failed to rescue their six-year-old son, who had been taken captive. This in- cident was part of a violent out- break toward the end of the Apache wars.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Santa Rita Copper Mine — 30 mi
  The copper pit east of Silver City that swallowed the town it was named for, beneath a spire of volcanic rock long said to look like a nun at prayer.

More markers nearby

• Anita Scott Coleman — 20 mi
• Lordsburg-Hidalgo Library — 20 mi
• Lordsburg — 20 mi
• Silver City — 20 mi