Cochise County Sheriff (Cochise County)

Cochise County is named for the great Apache
chief Cochise (co-cheze), whose name comes from
"cheis," an Apache word for wood. Beautiful and
dramatic, most of the county is covered in desert
grasses, mesquite and oak trees.

Cochise County's ancient history shows that the
Anasazi, forerunners of the Pueblo Indians, lived
along the San Pedro River about13,000 years ago.
Other Native American tribes in the area included
the Hohokam and the Solado (who were drive out by
the Apaches around 1700.)

Don Francisco Vasquez de Coronado, the Spanish
conquistador, was the first European to enter what
would become Cochise County in 1540, searching for
the legendary "Seven Cities of Cibola," whose streets
were paved with gold. Finding nothing monetarily
worth their time, the land was left to the natives
and soon Catholic missionairies tried to convert the
natives. The Apaches drove away nearly all the settlers
and the area was considered too dangerous until the
mid 1850s, when the US army and railroad companies
created outposts.

The "Wild West" chapter of Cochise County history
begins with the movement of American settlers into
the area, and their frenetic clasheswith the Apache.
After valiant efforts to protect their land, the
last Apache warriors, under the great chief Geronimo,
surrendered inthe late 1880s.

After the railroad's completion, tough mining camps
(many of which are now ghost towns) like Charleston,
Contention City, Dos Cabezas,Paradise, and the most
notorious, Tombstone, flourished, along withfabled
figures like Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday.