Fort Apache Indian Agency (Arizona)

Guide to  ancestry, family history and genealogy: birth records, marriage records, death records, census records, parish registers, and military records.

Introduction
The Fort Apache Agency is the administrative office of the Bureau of Indian Affairs for the Fort Apache Indian Reservation in eastern Arizona. Its supervising office is the Phoenix Area Office.
 * Address: P.O. Box 560, Whiteriver, AZ 85941

Indian Tribes Associated With This Agency
Apache

History
The White Mountain Reservation was established in 1872, with the northern part under the Camp Apache Agency and the southern part under the San Carlos Agency. The latter took control of both divisions in 1875, but in 1897, the reservation was divided and the Fort Apache Agency was established for the White Mountain Apaches.

Records
Agencies and subagencies were created as administrative offices of the Bureau of Indian Affairs and its predecessors. Their purpose was (and is) to manage Indian affairs with the tribes, to enforce policies, and to assist in maintaining the peace. The names and location of these agencies may have changed, but their purpose remained basically the same. Many of the records of genealogical value (for the tribe and tribal members) were created by and maintained by the agencies.

Some of the agency records are in the Regional Archives of the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) in Laguna Niguel, California. Their holdings include census records, Indian police records, court records, and other records for 1875 through 1952.Some later fiscal records of the agency are in the Regional Archives of the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) in Denver, for the years 1946 through 1967.

Reports of Inspection of the Field Jurisdictions of the Office of Indian Affairs, 1873-1900 have been microfilmed by the National Archives as part of Microcopy Number M1070. The reports for Fort Apache Agency, 1893-1899, are on roll 12 of that Microcopy set. Copies are available at the National Archives, their Regional Archives, and at the Family History Library and its family history centers (their ).

The 1900 federal census included population schedules for the Fort Apache Reservation. The census includes the non-Indian employees of the Fort Apache Agency, as well as many pages of Indian Population Schedules for the native population of the Reservation. They are recorded as District 77, Fort Apache Indian Reservation, in Apache County, Arizona, as District 77, Fort Apache Indian Reservation, in Gila County, Arizona, and as District 77, Fort Apache Reservation, in Navajo County, Arizona.

Microfilm copies of...Narrative and Statistical Reports... for the Fort Apache Agency, 1907-1938, are included in National Archives Microcopy M1011, Rolls 43-44, available in the National Archives system and in the collections of the Family History Library in Salt Lake City, beginning with their.

Annual Indian Census Rolls were taken at this agency for 1898 thru 1939. These rolls have been microfilmed by the National Archives as part of their Microcopy Number M595, rolls 118 thru 125. Copies of these records are also available at the National Archives, their Regional Archives, and at the Family History Library and its family history centers (their ). These census rolls are also available online at Ancestry.com's subscription web site.

Records Available Through the Family History Library
Census Records 1904-1942. FHL film: 1,249,787 items 3-16

School Records, 1937, 1950-1951. FHL film: 1,249,787 items 1-2

Vital Records with Census rolls FHL film: 576,478 and 576,479