He served as an aide to General George Crook in the Apache Wars from 1872 to 1883. As Crook's aide, Bourke had the opportunity to witness every facet of life in the Old West—the battles, wildlife, the internal squabbling among the military, the Indian Agency, settlers, and Native Americans.
Portrait of Bourke that accompanied a eulogy published in American Anthropologist (July 1896)
Work
Observer
Bourke kept a diary in sequential journals throughout his adult life, documenting his observations in the West. He used these notes as the basis for his later monographs and writings.
During his time as aide to General Crook during the Apache Wars, Bourke kept journals of his observations that were later published as On the Border with Crook. This book is considered one of the best firsthand accounts of frontier army life, as Bourke gives equal time to both the soldier and the Native American. Within it, Bourke describes the landscape, Army life on long campaigns, and his observations of the Native Americans. His passages recounts General Crook's meetings with Sitting Bull, Crazy Horse, and Geronimo as the General attempted to sign peace treaties and relocate tribes to reservations. Bourke provides considerable detail of towns and their citizens in the Southwest, specifically the Arizona Territory.
In 1881 Bourke was a guest of the Zuni Indians, where he was allowed to attend the ceremony of a Newekwe priest. His report of this experience was published in 1888 as The use of human odure and human urine in rites of a religious or semi religious character among various nations.
While in Washington he was on the board of the Anthropological Society.
Scatalogic Rites of All Nations
Several subsequent studies led in 1891 to the completion of his major work Scatalogic Rites of All Nations: A Dissertation upon the Employment of Excrementicious Remedial Agents in Religion, Therapeutics, Divination, Witch-Craft, Love-Philters, etc. in all part of the Globe. This work was distributed only among selected specialists. A revised German translation by Friedrich S. Krauss was published posthumously in 1913,[2] with a preface by Viennese psychiatristSigmund Freud who wrote:
He was recognized in his own time for his ethnological writings on various indigenous peoples of the North American Southwest, particularly Apachean groups.
Bourke married Mary F. Horbach of Omaha, Nebraska, on July 25, 1883. They had three daughters together.
Bourke died in the Polyclinic Hospital in Philadelphia on June 8, 1896, and is buried at Arlington National Cemetery.[3] His wife was buried with him after her death in 1927
Charles M. Robinson III (ed.). The Diaries of John Gregory Bourke: Vol. I – November 20, 1872, to July 28, 1876, Vol. II – July 29, 1876 to April 7, 1878, Vol. III – June 1, 1878 to June 22, 1880.
^Der Unrat in Sitte, Brauch, Glauben und Gewohnheitrecht der Völker, von John Gregory Bourke. Verdeutscht und neubearbeitet von Friedrich S. Krauss und H. Ihm. Mit einem Geleitwort von Prof. Dr. Sigmund Freud. Leipzig: Ethnologischer Verlag, 1913.
Bell, William G. (1978). John Gregory Bourke: A Soldier-scientist of the Frontier. Washington: Potomac Corral, The Westerners.
Bourke, John G; & Condie, Carol J. (1980). Vocabulary of the Apache or 'Indé language of Arizona & New Mexico. Greeley, CO: Museum of Anthropology, University of Northern Colorado.
Porter, Joseph C. (1980). John Gregory Bourke: Biographical notes. Greeley, CO: University of Northern Colorado, Museum of Anthropology.
