What years does this movie take place in?

Quien sabe? It's a story, not history. "When Cochise died" has no bearing. My best guess would go like this. Ward Bond says he's been in the Army 15 years. He probably enlisted in 1861 when the 69th New York was mustered. Therefore it is 1876 or thereabouts, which places it in the same time context, post-Civil War wise, as Custer.

It takes part in a fictional alternate universe history, so it is hard to say. Fitting Cochise's back story in with either his real biography or that in other movies about him would be difficult. In real history Cochise died in 1874 and Geronimo became a famous hostile leader in the 1880s, a longer gap than the one between the main story and the epilogue.

Robert E Lee is famous, so it has to be after 1862 when he began his string of victories, and it is after the war, so in 1865 or after.

If Collingwoood was stationed at Fort Apache for all the three years that Cochise has been leading every soldier in the southwest on a wild goose chase, and began after the Civil war, the date would be 1868 or later.

Thursday and Collingwood had a big break up due to some incident in the Mexican wAr of 1846-48 or the Civil war of 1861-1865. Mrs. Collingwood was Philadelphia Thursday's mother's best friend before that.

Philadelphia claims to be nineteen years old when she says she'll be twenty one in two years and old enough to marry without her father's permission. And Mrs. Collingwood tells Philadelphia: "You won't remember me..", so Philadelphia must have been very young, perhaps aged 0 to 4, when Thursday and Collingwood split up during the Mexican War of 1846-48 or the Civil war of 1861-1865, making Fort Apache about 15 to 19 years later. Or about 1861-1867, or more likely 1876-1884. And I guess the epilogue is about three to five years later or about 1864-1887. But probably in or after 1879-1881.

in Rio Grande , whose Colonel Kirby Yorke may or may not be the same person as Captain and later Colonel Kirby York in Fort Apache , Yorke's son has entered West Point (minimum age 17.0 years) and flunked out. Yorke's son was a babe in arms fifteen years ago when Yorke burned down his wife's plantation in the Shenendoah Valley, which should have been in the fall of 1864. So Rio Grande should happen in 1879 or 1880, and it should happen after the epilogue to Fort Apache (dated 1879-1881 or later) if York and Yorke are the same person. Possibly York/Yorke grew a mustache for Rio Grande and shaved if off again for the epilogue to Fort Apache , however.

Yes, it's quite a puzzle.

(Added 01/02/11)At one point Thursday asks Sergeant Major O'Rourke how long he has been in the army and O'Rourke says: "The US Army -- fifteen years". Since O'Rourke was a volunteer officer in the Civil war of 1861-1865, If he meant his total service in any American military organization, Fort Apache could be no later than 1876-1880. Possibly earlier if O'Rourke served in the regular army for a time before the civil War.

But if O'Rourke meant the regular army when he said the US Army than Fort Apache would take place no later than 1876-1880 depending on when O'Rourke's Volunteer service ended, and possibly later. Unless, for example, O'Rourke served for five years in the US Army from 1857-1852, served in the 69th NY Infantry from 1862-1865, and served in the Regular Army again for ten years from 1865 to 1875, or something like that.

So depending on the interpretation of O'Rourke's words, Fort Apache should be either IN OR BEFORE 1876-1880, or IN OR AFTER 1876-1880.

In another thread it is said that the number of stars on a flag is consistent with 1876-1889. But that flag was a national standard being carried in the cavalry charge and could be years or decades old, with an obsolete number of stars. The flag on the flag post at Fort Apache and the flag at Meacham's place are more likely to have had the contemporary number of stars.

Since Thursday mentions three companies of cavalry when making an attack plan and there is visual evidence for four companies in his disaster, the number of men killed in Thursday's charge and last stand should be about 120 to 240, and thus near the approximately 210 men killed in Custer's Last Stand and possibly counting about forty more lost by the other detachments of the seventh cavalry on June 25, 1876.

Thursday is said to have become the idol of every schoolboy in America in the few years between the battle and the epilogue. If Thursday's Last Charge or the Battle of Thursday's Canyon happened in 1876 about the same time as The Little Big horn Thursday might have been ignored due to the slightly bigger news of the more famous Custer's disaster. This implies that both the main story and the epilogue happened either before 1876 or some years after 1876.

So Fort Apache might be in 1865-1870 and the epilogue in 1870-1875, or Fort Apache might be about 1880 and the epilogue about 1884 or 1885.

The beginning narration of She Wore a Yellow Ribbon tells of the death of Custer. In the movie Fort Starke receives the final report on the disaster as winter nears ("Fort Starke, always the last to know"). The narrator at the beginning says that "every stage driver and pony express rider knew that another such defeat as Custer's and it would be a hundred years before another wagon train dared to cross the plains" (or until 1976). So if Fort Apache and She Wore a Yellow Ribbon happen in the same fictional universe, as many people believe, it is absolutely certain that Thursdays's Disaster ("another such defeat as Custer's") did not happen between June 25 1876 and the events of She Wore a Yellow Ribbon later that year.

So I've managed to possibly eliminate 6 months out of the period 1865 to 1890.

Of course the same buildings used for Fort Apache in Fort Apache were also used for Fort Apache again in the television series The Adventures of Rin Tin Tin , which is said to be set in the 1880s but seems to be really in the 1870s since Grant is president in two episodes. An entirely different fort set is used in Taza, Son of Cochise , set in 1874, so if you imagine all three productions taking place in the fictional universe of the Wild West you can imagine that Fort Apache was rebuilt in a different location, as many real forts were.

(end of 01/02/11 addition).

01/05/11 addition. The Indians mentioned in Fort Apache have the names of historical Indians.

Cochise, chief of the Chokonen band of the Chiricahua Apache was born around 1805 and lived at peace with the Americans from 1850 to the Bascomb Incident in 1861. Cochise was at war the Americans for most of the period 1861-1872. He made his peace treaty with General Howard on Oct. 12,1872 and was at peace with the American from then until his death on June 8, 1874 -- that is the period when the events of the tv series Broken Arrow would have taken place if real.

Satanta's name was not satanic. it was Kiowa for "White Bear", since Satanta was a Kiowa. On May 18, 1871 Satanta was in a raiding party which ignored a small group including General Sherman and attacked the larger Warren Wagon Train, killing seven men. When accused at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, in the presence of General Sherman, General Mackenzie, colonel of the Fourth cavalry, and General Grierson, Colonel of the Tenth Cavalry, Santanta and others boasted of their part in the massacre, and then were surprised at being seized and arrested for murder.

Satanta was sentenced to hang by a Texas State court, but eastern humanitarians pressured the Governor to commute the sentence to life imprisonment at Huntsville State Prison, and then to release Satanta in 1873. When Satanta surrendered in October 1874 during the Red River War, he was returned to Huntsville Prison for violating the terms of release by being present at the Second Battle of Adobe Walls. Satanta committed suicide on October 11, 1878 by diving out an upper story window of the prison hospital. He is believed to be the inspiration for Larry McMurty's fictional Blue Duck.

Diablo's name was satanic, of course. He was a Cibeque Apache leader who was killed in battle on August 30, 1880 by feuding White Mountain Apaches, including Alchesay. For a while I thought that didn't make any sense and Diablo should have been alive for years after 1880. Then i realized I had confused Diablo with Loco (1823-1909).

Geronimo was born June 16,1829, if you can believe such a precise date, and surrendered to the US army for the very last time on September 4, 1886. He died Feb 17, 1909.

Alchesay or Alchise, or however you spell it, was a Coyotero or White Mountain Apache, supposedly born May 17, 1853, which seems suspiciously precise to me, and died August 6, 1928. Like all the Western Apaches, he would have become hostile to the Americans during the 1860s, In November i869, when Alchesay was about 16, Major John Green of the First US Cavalry negotiated a peace treaty with the White Mountain Apache tribe. Thus the White Mountain Apache were friendly to the Americans since 1869. If Alchesay was as young as claimed his first war could have been service as Sergeant of Indian Scouts during the Tonto Campaign of 1872-1873. On April 12, 1875, Alchesay was awarded a medal of Honor for gallantry in that campaign.

If Alchesay had lived for another twenty years he could have sued the makers of Fort Apache for libel in depicting him as a leader of hostile Apaches fighting and massacring the US Cavalry alongside Geronimo.

So the latest year in which all these men were alive, and free, and hostile to the United States would seem to be 1869, which was eleven to thirteen years after the Mexican war of 1846-1848. If Philadelphia Thursday was 19 in 1869 she would have been born in 1849-1850, and thus about 6 to 8 during the Mexican War, perhaps too old for Mrs. Collingwood to assume that she wouldn't remember her. So perhaps the split between Thursday and Collingwood occurred during some (no doubt fictional) Indian battle a few years before the Mexican War.

Sergeant Major O'Rourke would have served most of his years in the Regular Army before the Civil War in this chronology.

Collingwood would have been given few chances to prove his courage in battle after his big goof, while Thursday would have had success after success in the Mexican War and the Civil War of 1861-1865. If the events of Fort Apache happened during a few weeks or months after Washington's Birthday in February 1869, it could be before Major Green's peace treaty with the White Mountain Apaches in November, and while Alchesay was a remarkable precocious war leader (or else he was actually about a hundred when he died).

Of course in real history Fort Apache was not established until 1870 as a result of Green's treaty with the White Mountain Apache and not named Fort Apache until later.

Thus we could suppose that in the Wild West of the movies and Television, Cochise was on a reservation from about 1864-1866 and went back on the warpath when Meacham became the Indian agent in 1866. Sometime after Thursday's disaster his regiment (the Thirteenth Cavalry?) was assigned to another post, and the 101st US Cavalry was assigned to Fort Apache for the events of The Adventures of Rin Tin Tin in the early 1870s. (The same location was used for Fort Apache in both productions).

Then the 101st Cavalry was reassigned, and the old Fort Apache was abandoned and a new Fort Apache built somewhere else by 1874, since Taza, Son of Cochise , set in 1874, uses another location for Fort Apache. And possibly the new Fort Apache was later abandoned and the old Fort Apache was reoccupied, possibly by the 101st Cavalry for further Adventures of Rin Tin Tin if some of the episodes seem to be after 1874.

The epilogue of Fort Apache may have happened in 1873 or 1874, after the 101st Cavalry moved out of Old Fort Apache and before the establishment of New Fort Apache. Or possibly it occurred after Taza, Son of Cochise , when New Fort Apache might have been abandoned and Old Fort Apache reoccupied.

If Kirby York and Kirby Yorke were the same man, his regiment would have been moved to a different fort by 1879-1880, the date of Rio Grande .

But I am not sure it makes sense to use real history and biography to date events in the wild west of the movies and television shows.