Gila Expedition

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The Gila Expedition was an 1857 attack on the Quechan Indians on the Gila River in Arizona.

In the 1850s the Quechan's setup a ferry business to ferry people across the Gila river on their way to the California Gold Rush. Members of a rival ferry operation beat the local Quechan chief and in revenge the Quechan's attacked and killed most of those involved in the rival operation.

The Californian government agreed to pay men $6 a day to attack the Quechan and on April 16 142 men commenced the expedition. However, the military operation went badly and the expedition members were besieged until September 16.

The cost of the operation reached $113,000, nearly bankrupting the state of California.