Bear Springs Treaty

The Bear Spring (Ojo del Oso) Treaty was signed on November 21, 1846 between Chief Narbona and 13 other Navajo leaders and Colonel Alexander Doniphan representing the US Government at Bear Springs, New Mexico in the Navajo country. It was never ratified by the U.S. Senate.

The traditional Navajo homeland spans from Arizona through western New Mexico, where the Navajo had houses and raised livestock. There was a long historical pattern in the Southwest of groups or bands raiding and trading with each other. This included Navajo, Spanish, Mexican, Apache, Comanche, Ute, and the "new men" (Anglo-Americans), as Chief Narbona called them in 1846. Events before 1863, included a cycle of treaties, raids and counter-raids by the US Army, the Navajo and a civilian militia, with civilian speculators often on the fringe. Most of the militia involved were longtime enemies of the Navajo, like Spanish descendants from northern New Mexico, where Spain had established several settlements beginning in the late 16th century during the New Mexico's Colonial period.

The Navajo continue to raid despite the arrival of the US Military in 1846. General Stephen W. Kearny ordered the Navajo to attend a council in Santa Fe in September 1846. The Navajo did not show up. On October 2, Kearny sent a note to Col. William Doniphan, his second-in-command in Santa Fe to take all prisoners held by the Navajo and property which may have been stole from the inhabitants" of New Mexico. On October 5 while on his way to California Kearny stopped in Socorro, New Mexico. He wrote a proclamation there that authorized "all the inhabitants (Mexican & Pueblos) ...to form war parties, march into the country of their enemies, the Navajoes, to recover their property, to make reprisals and obtain redress for the many insults received from them. The old, the women and the children of the Navajoes must not be injured." In late October, Kearny ordered Doniphan to send a regiment of soldiers into Navajo country and secure a peace treaty with them.

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