Where They Bury You

In August 1863, during Kit Carson’s roundup of the Navajo, Santa Fe’s Marshal is found dead in an arroyo near what is now the Hubbel Trading Post. The murder, and the roughly million of today’s dollars in cash and belongings in his saddlebags, is historically factual. Carson’s actual explanation is implausible.

Who did kill Carson’s “brave and lamented” Major? The answer is revealed in this tale of a group of con artists operating in 1861-1863 in the New Mexico and Arizona Territories. As a matter of historical fact, millions of today’s dollars were embezzled from the Army, the Church, and the New Mexico Territory during this time. In this fictionalized version, the group includes a Santa Fe poker dealer with a checkered past claiming to fall in love with one of her coconspirators, and the historically accurate duo of the Marshal of Santa Fe and the aide de camp of the Territories’ Commanding General. It is an epic tale of murder and mystery, of staggering thefts, of love and deceit.

Both a Western and a Civil War novel, this murder mystery occurs in and among Cochise’s Chiricahua Apache Wars, the Navajo depredations and wars, Indian Agent Kit Carson’s return from retirement, and the Civil War. The story follows the con artists, some historical, some fictional, during their poker games, scams, love affairs, and bank robberies, right into that arroyo deep in Navajo country.

Steve Kohlhagen wasn’t convinced after reading Hampton Sides’ nonfiction account, “Blood and Thunder,” that American frontiersman and Indian fighter Kit Carson’s official report of the events in August 1863 was entirely true. And in the 150th anniversary year, Kohlhagen begs the question, “Did the Navajos really shoot Carson’s Marshal?”

His new book “Where They Bury You” puts a different spin on what’s found in the history books. Based on actual facts and a very real murder, this Western murder mystery takes place during the Civil War battles in the New Mexico and Arizona Territories. A former Wall Street investment banker who currently sits on several Board of Directors, most recently joining Freddie Mac’s, Kohlhagen’s retired life in the San Juan Mountains gives him a unique perspective on the region about which he writes.

After researching a group of con artists who did, indeed, embezzle millions of today’s dollars, Kohlhagen sheds fictional light on who committed the actual August 18, 1863 murder of Santa Fe’s Provost Marshal deep in Navajo Territory. The novel vividly depicts battles among Cochise’s Chiricahua Apaches, the Navajo and other Southwestern Indian tribes, Kit Carson, the Union

Army, volunteers from the western Territories, and the attacking Confederate Rebels from Texas.

“Steve Kohlhagen knows the West, knows his history, and combines them here into a fastpaced, irresistible story!” raves Bernard Cornwell, award-winning author of over 50 historical fiction novels who USA Today calls “the reigning king of historical fiction.”

“Where They Bury You” is a thrill ride into the old and mysterious ways of the West, to a place and time in history that provides surprises along the way.

Available in Hardcover ($32.95), Paperback ($24.95) and eBook ($9.99).

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