The 7th Cavalry, George Custer and the Greasy Grass Fight: the Indians get to name the battle, 'cause they won.



Last Stand

I have been fascinated by the Custer story all of my life. I do not share the view that Custer was an idiot, a homicidal maniac, or to some degree even remiss, given the information he had at the time and in light of his prior experience. George Custer was considered a fine officer and an aggressive fighting man by his superiors – experts like General Winfield Scott, General Phil Sheridan, General William T. Sherman, and grudgingly, General (and President) Ulysses S. Grant.

If you read Custer's own books, you'll find he was much smarter and more complex than he has been made out to be; it is also apparent based on overwhelming primary evidence that Custer's character as portrayed by some revisionist historians (and Hollywood) is largely distorted and incorrect. It is most unfortunate that this revised view has been uncritically accepted by so many.

He was at times appreciated and, at times, respected by his fighting men and he was known to look out for them. I readily admit there were inconsistencies in these things, which I think was a result of his meteoric rise to divisional command before he was wise or mature enough to handle some of the accompanying responsibilities. He, at times, could be an insensitive boor. By our standards, he was in fact a racist.  That wasn't uncommon then, just as it isn't now; but given the world view of someone of his time, perhaps that was more understandable in his time.  While he had respect for the abilities of those he was sent to fight, and as well a certain amount of empathy for their situation, like many others of his time he steadfastly performed the sometimes onerous duties assigned to him.

His loyalties lay with his country and his duty. If you do not believe this, read what the man himself wrote and what others of his time wrote about him. What he was, not surprisingly, was a mixed bag like most of the rest of us. But George Custer had a stellar record during the years of the Civil War; he demonstrated a seemingly innate knowledge of tactics and coolness under fire. His reports were clear and concise -- and proved accurate and perceptive enough that his commanders eventually accepted them as basis for battlefield orders -- Custer told them what they needed to know and they believed and trusted him because he was rarely wrong in his assessments (Custer's job as a commander of cavalry was reconnaissance). He was promoted, ultimately, to (brevet) divisional command during wartime -- one of the youngest Union generals of his time.

Custer

I do not believe that George Custer was perfect or never made a mistake; he was known to be impetuous, even reckless occasionally. He was cocky. But these traits are fairly common to effective soldiers. George S. Patton, for one, comes to mind. When I read about Custer, I can see traits that were most definitely common to both soldiers. 

On that June day in 1876 he was generally prosecuting the orders he was given as he understood them, thinking on his feet and aggressively seeking what he considered the best outcome. His actions were not necessarily reckless given what he thought he knew (but was wrong about), the Army’s tactics book of that era, the objectives of that particular sortie, and his ten years of experience fighting on the Plains. He was a product of that experience and this was partly behind his final failure on the Greasy Grass. But that is not the whole story; if he’d had a few more Capt. Weirs that day and fewer Capt. Benteens and Major Renos, he might have survived the day and had a few more photos taken with Libby and his hunting dogs on the porch back at Fort Lincoln. I don't believe a victory was possible for the 7th that day, but more of them might have survived to soldier another day.

The causes of the fight were wrapped in 100 years of failed U.S. government policy toward the Indians, the attitude of the American public that Indians were sub-human, had no rights and needed to just get the hell out of the way, and promise after promise made to Indian people and never kept. In the summer of 1876, the people and government of the United States were in the middle of breaking yet another verbal and written promise to the Northern Plains Indians -- see the Treaty of Fort Laramie and read the sections on "the unceded lands" and the Black Hills. Is it any wonder they decided to fight, when they were plainly faced with not only the loss of their lands, but their way of life and even the loss of their lives altogether? If you consider their plight in those days from their point of view, most reasonable people would acknowledge they had no real choice. They were damned if they fought, and just as damned if they didn't.

At the same time, the flood of American miners, settlers, ranchers and farmers was a force that simply could not be stopped. The viewpoint of white America at that time was that the existing inhabitants were not “utilizing” the land in any recognizably civilized way – and therefore they had no legitimate claim to it in the face of the “superior” white way of life, the white way of using the land and its resources. The government ultimately had no choice but to facilitate the peoples' "manifest" expansion into these unsettled lands; the Army was one of the main instruments of that national will and the results were inevitable, whether we today think that was moral or not. 

There was no way for the indigenous peoples to stand against that overwhelming national "destiny" other than temporarily. The Army marched to secure the goals of the American people and government then just as it does today; the Army exists to protect and defend the American people. Nations and governments do not always act morally, or righteously, even today in this more politically correct and much more enlightened age, because our human perceptions of "morality" are always framed by our own point of view, our lifeway and our goals.

In this fight I believe George Custer did about as well as he could have, given that the sum of injustice and the Army's conflicting responsibilities all converged along the Greasy Grass in the summer of 1876. The Indians were angry; the government's broken promises and its new plans for the Lakota and Northern Cheyenne inflamed them. How could these white "newcomers" come into their lands and tell them how to live and what to do? The Indians Custer met along the Greasy Grass were among those who were most resistant, most offended, most rebellious; Indian patriots like Tatanka Iyotake (Sitting Bull), Gall, Tashunka Uitco (Crazy Horse) and Ve'ho'enohnenehe (Lame White Man).

Lame White Man

Lame White Man, for example, was a Southern Cheyenne who witnessed the attack and the killing of many of his people by a Colorado militia led by the murderous John Chivington at Sand Creek in 1864. Tashunka Uitco had seen respected leaders of his people treacherously murdered when those leaders were parleying with the Army under a truce flag. Others present on that June Montana day remembered how the Army had attacked and murdered a number of old men, women and children, including their Cheyenne leader Black Kettle (who had never fought the newcomers) on the Washita River in Oklahoma. The people killed along the Washita were mostly trying to live in peace with the whites, and many of them had been survivors of the earlier Sand Creek Massacre. After all of this (and more), the Plains Indians had every reason to believe that it was kill or be killed.

This is the story of the Greasy Grass fight the way I think it happened, at least in the larger sense. The finer the detail the more likely it may not be certainly factual. But I’d bet a week’s pay that it's pretty close to the truth. Of course, most of my conclusions come from reading and thinking about the writing and research of others – historians and authors like Gregory Michno, John S. Gray, Robert Utley, and perhaps most importantly, the accounts of the Lakota and Cheyenne participants themselves.

I visited the battlefield where George Custer lost his last fight in November, 2003. I had been to the Greasy Grass once before with my wife in 1975 on a vacation trip. But there was much new information and many new books written on this battle since then (’75) – some as a result of the fires that burned the area in the late 70s, early 80s and "bared" the terrain for the first time since 1876. After the fires, the archaeologists went to work and they were able to get a clearer sense of the battle. Their work resulted in a more widespread realization that previously-discounted Indian participant accounts have much truth and value in them. This shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone; why would the Indians lie about a fight they won, and in general, these Indian peoples valued truthfulness and loathed a liar, whether Indian or white, just as most people do.

In 1975, my "sense" of the battle and how it unfolded was shaped by what I learned at Last Stand Hill  – the only part of the battlefield I visited. In 2003, I wanted to see how that earlier more limited perception held up against the more recent knowledge and also I wanted to view the entire battlefield area, as I had only seen a small part of it on that first visit. I wanted to compare what I’d read to the actual ground and see it more completely. I was certain that my initial understanding of the battle was too narrow -- and therefore inaccurate, incomplete.

John S. Gray's book [see references below], in particular, was written using time/distance studies which show the possible (and the impossible) among the many legends and accounts of the unfolding battle. Many theories about who did what and when can be dismissed by the use of these studies that show they would have been impossible based on other known and confirmed positions at specific times (as best we know them), leaving the remaining theories as perhaps more likely and thereby defining the chronology more soundly. In other words, if we know from official Army records that Custer was at a place at a given time, and given he rode or marched at a certain speed (roughly 3 mph), we can deduce whether it was possible for him to have been present at another place and time when he was supposed to have done something there. This is detective work at a basic and logical level. Conclusions based on such studies assume, of course, that the premises and underlying assumptions of these studies are correct in the first place. So, since no one present at the battle possessed a "quartz timepiece," my conclusions can never be more than conjecture.

I used my visit in 2003 to traipse over as much of the field as I could in 1½ days – I walked over the Custer battlefield end to end and I meandered along the river where the village was located, also over the high ground between the Rosebud and Little Bighorn valleys. I wanted to come away with a good feel for the ground and in order to do so, I retraced Custer's progress during those hours just prior to the battle, from the Busby Bend to Last Stand Hill.

Michno's Book

My interest had been ignited once again by a book I'd read a couple of years before, The Mystery of E Troop that used Indian accounts and new archaeological evidence to theorize that E Troop wasn't missing after all (as they were thought to be), but the victims of mistaken geography in that their “last stand” was made in a deep ravine instead of THE Deep Ravine. [see Greg Michno, reference at end]

In order to visually track and quickly understand a battlefield situation and troop deployment, Custer mounted his companies on like-colored horses. E Troop was Custer's gray horse company and they were seen prominently during the battle by different witnesses, and the bodies of many E Company troopers were located by troops after the battle in a place they called a "deep ravine." When later searches were made of the battlefield, these troops were generally assumed to have been buried at the location now known as the "Deep Ravine." But archaeological searches did not find them there. The mystery, then, was what had happened to them? Michno thought they might lie in a different area near one of Custer's skirmish lines close to Last Stand Hill and he set out to see if this was true. Bones and artifacts were found in a "deep" ravine at that location -- so Michno thought that could have caused the confusion with the other site.

Most intriguing for me, one of Michno's assertions was that while the Indian accounts are dissimilar, they can be reconciled by the witnesses' different vantage points about the field. After all, the Indians had Custer surrounded so they were watching from all different directions over possibly fifteen square miles. The possible truth in this seems so obvious, but many Indian accounts have been discounted for many years (by white historians) because they did not seem to corroborate each other.

The Gray book is also an account of the frontier life and activities of the scout, Michel Bouyer (Mitch Boyer), who first accompanied the Gibbon command and was later detached to Terry and Custer. He was the only leading scout to remain with Custer during the final battle. The others left immediately after Custer discharged them prior to engaging the Lakota and Cheyenne that day; we might surmise from this that they knew (or feared) what was about to happen. There were also a few scouts with Reno's command that remained with the troops and fought; Bloody Knife was one of these. Bouyer was highly regarded - perhaps only Jim Bridger had a better reputation (or more fame) in his own time. Bouyer was the son of a French trapper and a Lakota mother -- his father and brothers also had colorful and prominent lives on the northern Plains.

Bouyer

Bouyer's relevance to Michno's book is that he played a large role in scouting activities and had provided information which could have influenced the ultimate plan and outcome, had it been seriously considered. This information was suppressed, or perhaps overlooked, by Colonel Gibbon, perhaps because Gibbon had made some command mistakes at that time and disclosing the one would reveal the other; he maybe didn't want to call attention to himself and his lack of aggressiveness or action (Some think this, anyway).

Specifically, Gibbon had repeatedly failed to seek out and attack "a large Sioux village" discovered by Bouyer and Lt. Bradley's command on the lower Rosebud about two or three weeks before the Custer battle. The Lakota and Cheyenne camped at that location were the same that defeated Crook on the Rosebud and Custer on the Greasy Grass. It is also possible that Gibbon simply did not recognize the importance of the reconnaissance information he had been given. Whatever the cause, the significance of his failure should be glaringly apparent, given the subsequent events. Then again, had Gibbon been more "successful," we might have been reading about Gibbon's "last stand" all these years, rather than Custer's.  We know that even small changes in events can change the course of history completely.

After digesting this new information from these books (and others) and reading how it had been forensically applied to the battle and the ground, I wanted to go back to the battlefield and look at it again to see if a fresh look could help me to understand better what happened there.

Custer's Last Fight

In 1876, the Army was charged with tracking down the remaining off-reservation Indians on the northern plains and forcing them into the reservations and agencies. The strategy was to trap the wandering tribes -- those refusing to submit to government authority -- between the paths of three armies. General Crook led his troops up from Wyoming but got waylaid by Crazy Horse at the Battle of the Rosebud a week or so before the Greasy Grass fight. He was soundly whipped and retired southward to regroup and therefore did not contribute to the coordinated plan thereafter. His line of communication to General Terry's (and Gibbon's) commands in the Yellowstone Valley was back south to the Wyoming forts along the Oregon trail, then east to Ft Leavenworth, north to Ft Lincoln and then west up the Missouri. This cumbersome and lengthy process meant that the two armies under Gibbon and Terry had no immediate knowledge of what had happened to Crook.

In May 1876, General Alfred Terry (with Custer and the 7th Cavalry) marched west from Fort Abraham Lincoln and Col. John Gibbon marched eastward from the Bozeman, MT area. All three armies were to converge in the vicinity of the Yellowstone River valley where the Bighorn River flows into it, intending to trap, defeat and capture as many Indians as possible in the process. But Crook had marched back south after the Rosebud fight, taking his troops out of the planned convergence (and crippling the effectiveness of the overall campaign). Gibbon and Terry joined at the mouth of the Rosebud in June, 1876, and General Terry, assuming overall command, made his headquarters on a steamboat ("The Far West") moored to the Yellowstone River's bank.

Major Reno led a scout south up the Rosebud and reported he'd found the recently deserted camp of the large group of Indians for whom they were searching (the same one that Gibbon had failed to attack). General Terry then sent the entire 7th Cavalry under Custer back up the Rosebud on June 21st, with orders to locate that group. He would scout south, then cross over the mountains to the west, to the Little Bighorn and follow that river (a tributary of the Bighorn) back north toward the Yellowstone, joining with Terry and Gibbon at some point on the Bighorn as they moved south to meet him. Custer's objective was to find whether the Indians had continued moving up the Rosebud toward present-day Wyoming, or whether they had turned west and crossed the divide into the valley of the Little Bighorn. Custer and his scouts soon discovered the Indians had moved west and crossed the mountains into the Little Bighorn Valley, where he found them on June 25th.

As Custer and his troops reached the final hours before the battle – they bivouacked in the Rosebud valley for a time on the afternoon of June 24th and after moving on in the early evening hours, they stopped to rest on the high ground (near the Crow's Nest) between the Rosebud and the Little Bighorn valley. This is where the commander viewed the Little Bighorn Valley for the first time. His scouts pointed out a large village, far distant in the valley, but in the poor light, great distance and haze Custer said he couldn't see much.

At that moment, he faced the crucial decision whether to wait for General Terry to arrive with the rest of the Army’s force and risk being discovered in doing so (and having the Indians scatter), or to attack and force a battle without the additional manpower.  This was where his ten years of Plains Indian Wars experience led him perfectly astray. He didn't know the Indians had no intention of running. His logic and situational knowledge was not as much flawed as it was dated; they had always run before when they could, but the “rules” had changed.

Keep in mind that "running" has no connection to cowardice -- the Plains Indian in the 1800s was among the finest mounted cavalry that ever lived and they were certainly not faint-hearted. But engagement in a fight for them was of necessity guerrilla warfare -- hit and run with as little risk of casualties as possible. They could not afford to lose anyone, man, woman or child. But the spiritual leader Tatanka Iyotake had had a vision -- one that foretold a great victory over the soldiers; in his dream the soldiers were falling into the Lakota camp. The Lakota and Cheyenne were also flushed with victory after the Rosebud fight with Crook a few days before; their blood was up and they were ready to fight.

But many of the Indians later said they hadn't known there were any new soldiers in the vicinity; they thought the troops that were being sighted by scouts and hunting parties in those days just before the Greasy Grass fight were remnants of Crook's troops whom they had already driven away, from the Rosebud Creek camp, a few days before.

Custer was an aggressive soldier and he chose the first option (attack immediately), which choice was reinforced as small parties of roaming Indians in the area “discovered” the troops. Had Custer possessed the sure knowledge that his quarry would not run, he might have made a different decision. The one he did make sealed his fate and that of nearly three-hundred others (plus over fifty wounded) -- but while it was full of fight, it does not appear to have been vain-glorious or even imprudent based on the knowledge he had at that moment. He didn't know what we know now; he didn't have a spy in the "enemy" camp.

His decision, if hastily made, was based on his (and the Army’s) past on-the-ground experience with Plains Indians; he intended to capture the women and children and herd them to a reservation, effectively ending the willingness of the resistant fighting men to stay "off-reservation." He made some of the same decisions at the Greasy Grass that he had made almost nine years before at the Washita.

The Army's primary goal during this campaign, from the beginning, was to encircle the Indians and force a battle that would destroy their desire and means to remain off the reservation on the unceded lands. Given all of that, Custer's tactical decision, though flawed in hindsight, wasn't unreasonable. His plans for this sortie did weigh heavily on his mind (based on surviving witness’ accounts); he had been solicitous of others' opinions and political in terms of being careful not to alienate his fellow officers in the days leading up to the battle, apparently because he felt he would not be successful without their active support. It is also apparent, that in light of the events of that last day, he perhaps had valid reasons for those concerns. But he was trying to mend some of those sour relationships that had existed, some for years.

It was no secret that he was disliked and resented by some subordinates -- but he was also a successful and courageous soldier who placed a high value on achieving a campaign's goals and objectives (if not a strict adherence to orders) and his reputation with his commanders was solid, so solid that even though President Grant was furious with him at the time of the 1876 summer campaign because of comments Custer had made that were critical of government policy (and some related scandals), his superiors still made an appeal to the President asking that he be allowed to lead his men during the summer campaign. Grant had ordered him to be left behind, but Sheridan entreated the President to reconsider. Grant did, apparently out of respect for Sheridan. So Custer led the 7th Cavalry out of Fort Lincoln that last time in mid-May, 1876. 

Custer's Busby bivouac site

Custer's last camp was near present day Busby, MT, on what is now known as the Busby Bend of Rosebud Creek. After breaking camp at Busby late on June 24th, Custer and his regiment moved west up Davis Creek to its headwaters in the Wolf Mountains and, after a short rest, crossed over the divide toward Reno Creek in the early hours of the morning. It was at this time that the officers and scouts climbed to the Crow's Nest, where Custer was shown dust and smoke on the horizon to the west that his scouts claimed was a large Indian village. Mich Bouyer, the reliable and experienced scout of excellent reputation, told Custer that it was the largest camp he had ever encountered, based on what he could see of it.

Custer then led his command as they advanced at a trot down Reno Creek toward the Little Bighorn Valley, a place the Lakota called "the Greasy Grass;" George Custer didn’t order his troops forward into battle, like most cavalry officers he led from the front. Along the way, in stages, he split his force into four parts. Capt. Benteen was sent with a couple of companies to the left -- southwestward -- to discover and prevent the Indians from attempting to slip away in that direction. He was then to rejoin Custer.  As history recorded, he failed to do so.

Major Reno, with several companies, was given orders to descend Reno Creek on its left bank, ford the Little Bighorn at the mouth of Reno Creek and directly attack the village across the open ground to the south. Custer led another five companies down Reno Creek's right bank, following Reno's detachment at a short distance. At the confluence of Reno Creek with its north branch, about ¾ mile or so above its mouth at the Little Bighorn, Custer led his troops off to the north and ascended the rising ground along a ridge line toward what is now known as the Reno-Benteen defense site. Other than for a couple of brief glimpses of them along the ridge-lines and later on Weir Peak, the men under Reno and Benteen never saw him or his five companies alive again. (The 4th unit was the pack train - it followed after Benteen and his command at a slower pace, later rejoining Benteen and Reno at the height of the battle.)

His intentions are not known with certainty, since all those who were with him at this point perished (at least those who had knowledge of his plans), but apparently he intended to attack the village on its flank or from its north end. He had pledged to back up Reno with the entire command; Major Reno felt this meant Custer would follow him directly into battle from the south, which we know he did not do. It is thought by many that Custer intended to prevent an escape of the Indians by blocking them at both ends of their camp – Reno on the south, he on the north. His subsequent movements support this theory and that tactic was one he had used before.

Valley Fight Battlefield - far distance

Custer was able to observe Reno's valley attack from his position on the bluffs above the Little Bighorn, perhaps from the area of Sharpshooter Ridge. While Reno continued his attack, Custer and his troops moved on to the north and disappeared from view into Cedar Coulee. Custer was once more seen on top of Weir Peak before being lost to the view of Reno's men until much later in the battle. The remaining "mystery" of this battle is the exact nature of the Custer-led companies' movements from this point to their end at Last Stand Hill. We can make educated guesses, but we can never know for sure.

Down in the valley, Major Reno was met by an overwhelming number of Indians, and driven back, first into timber along the river, then ultimately across the river and up the bluffs in full retreat to the high ground above the mouth of Reno Creek and the Little Bighorn River. His troops took many casualties in the process, but in the end, along with Benteen's command and the pack train, they were the only 7th Cavalry troops to survive the day.

At about this time (perhaps about 4:30 pm), the defenders spotted Custer's detachment moving north in the vicinity of Medicine Tail Coulee and the high ridges north of it. Recognizing this developing threat to their families from a different direction and having beaten back Reno's immediate threat from the south, many of the Indians broke off from that fight and moved north to drive Custer's troopers away.



Weir Point

When Custer left Weir Point, he left Mich Bouyer and "Curly" (the young Absaroke scout) as lookouts, as he led his five companies down Cedar Coulee, then to the left down Medicine Tail Coulee. Weir Peak commanded the battlefield; Bouyer could easily track Custer's progress from there and as Custer proceeded, the scout watched the other direction as well, toward Reno's men as they were driven back across the river and onto the high ground to the south. Bouyer perhaps realized this meant the Indians that had been fighting Reno would be free to attack Custer's companies and he and Curly rode down from Weir Point into Medicine Tail Coulee to intercept Custer and give him this bad news. Although he didn't know it yet, Custer's battle plan was starting to fall apart.

Custer may have decided to split his force once again at this point. He sent a message back to Benteen to "come on quick and bring the ammunition packs" (the pack train) as he knew he would need the support. He then sent Captain Yates and Lt. Algernon Smith with Companies E and F down Medicine Tail Coulee to its mouth at the Little Bighorn to attack (or to feint an attack), in order to relieve the pressure on Reno and allow him to consolidate and renew his attack. Custer, with the remaining three companies then moved up the north side of Medicine Tail Coulee onto Nye-Cartwright Ridge. Although this is largely discounted, it is also possible Custer rode with Companies E and F down to the ford; some eyewitnesses reported they saw him there. The Lakota and their allies met these two attacking companies in force at the Medicine Tail Coulee ford, at the very edge of their village, and they drove the soldiers back up toward the high ground, probably to the vicinity of Calhoun Hill where they rejoined with the other Custer-led companies.

At this point, Custer was still on the offensive and expecting a victory. Reno, on the other hand, instead of regrouping and continuing to conduct offensive operations, seemed to be shell-shocked (according to witnesses’ accounts) and he “holed up” on the bluffs leaving Custer to his own resources from this point onward -- he was soon joined by Benteen who failed to prosecute Custer's orders to hurry to join him, doing neither of the two. Finally, the pack train caught up to the other two groups; it also stayed put and drove no further north to aid the commander and his troops.

The setting where the “last stand” took place: Calhoun Hill forms the southeast corner of an up-sloping amphitheater -- with Custer (or Battle) Ridge forming the high side, north to south, and with Last Stand Hill on the northeast corner, Cemetery Ridge forming the north side, and Calhoun Hill and ridge forming the south side and running east and west. The river forms the 4th side, quite some distance to the west. A couple of coulees rise up-slope from the river within the amphitheater and toward the ridges and hills, providing means of concealment for fighters streaming out of the village and up the hills to join the battle (Deep Ravine, for one). 

Map by Robert Schaller



Notes on the battle map:

Black Arrows represent the initial approaches of 7th Cavalry troops on June 25, 1876 under Col. Custer and Maj. Reno. Reno took the left bank of Reno Creek and crossed the Little Bighorn River to attack the village directly from the south.

Custer followed, moving down the right bank and up onto the bluffs and ridges east of the river, then moved north to attack the other end of the village (from the northeast).

Captain Benteen was ordered farther around to the south to scout possible Indian movements in that direction. He later joined Reno at his position, along with the supply train. Custer was worried that the Indians would slip away somehow and he wanted to make sure he had them blocked.  He succeeded completely in that, although not with the results he envisioned.

On the south end, the black arrows show Reno’s attack initiating the “valley fight.” The heavy-dashed path shows his subsequent retreat to the bluffs above and the defensive position he assumed there. He had initially taken a position in a wooded area just before retreating across the river. The Arikara scout Bloody Knife was killed in this part of the fight; his gruesome death is thought to have been part of what un-nerved Major Reno. Ultimately, Reno felt that the "woods" position could not be held, so these troops retreated to the top of the bluffs along the river, where they set up defensive positions. The Indians chased them all the way.

Brown arrows are paths of the Lakota and Cheyenne counter attacks.

The dashed lines north of Weir Peak show the conjectured path of Troop E and F down to the Medicine Tail Coulee ford, and their subsequent retreat.

The GREEN lines are the final positions of the Custer-led companies along Battle Ridge and the location of the fight on Last Stand Hill. It is thought that E Troop moved closest to the village, before being driven back up the hillsides to Last Stand Hill. 

Along what we now call "Battle Ridge," Custer left Captain Miles Keogh with Companies C, I and L and then moved on toward Last Stand Hill with Companies E and F. Over a period of time (it is conjectural in what order these movements took place), these companies deployed along the U-shaped perimeter, with the open side facing the river at the bottom of the slope and companies C and I held in reserve out of sight of the village, on the east side of Battle Ridge (Battle Ridge is roughly indicated by the heavy green stripe on the map).

Company C was ordered out of reserve and up and over Calhoun Ridge as the battle reached its peak. Company L held the corner of the high ground at Calhoun Hill, an "anchor" position. Company F held Last Stand Hill. Company E rode beyond that toward the river, down Cemetery Ridge; the troopers of Company E may have even reached the river on the north end of the village, or close to it, before being forced back.

Custer's End

During this time, a tense “stand-off” developed, a waiting game, with the soldiers holding their ground but likely being pressured all along their lines and Indian defenders massing into positions all around them. As time passed, perhaps an hour or two at most but probably much less, hundreds of Indians infiltrated the area to the front, sides and behind the troops. The terrain is such that the defenders could creep up very close to the soldier positions without being seen and that is what the evidence showed they did. The Indians' later accounts also confirmed this.

Finally, some of the Lakota (and Cheyenne) got tired of the game and a more heated action began on the center-south side of the battlefield; Lame White Man led the “Suicide Boys” in an attack up the coulee and toward the troops deployed along Calhoun Ridge, or possibly Battle Ridge. These C Company troops gave way under the pressure and retreated northeast along the ridge toward the "corner" position held by Company L. 

This was the beginning of the end for the engaged companies of the 7th Cavalry; you cannot run and fight at the same time. These five trapped companies of US cavalry began to fall like dominoes. Some of the Indians lost their lives in the action as well; both veteran Lame White Man and young Noisy Walking were killed there. Crazy Horse, Gall and others attacked the Calhoun Hill position from the south (an area now known as “Henryville,” because many of the Indians' expended Henry rifle cartridge cases were found there). As the Co. L troops turned west to face the threat posed by Lame White Man's warriors (as they over-ran Company C's position down-slope); the Indians at Henryville quickly overran Company L's position from its flank.

Battle Ridge

The surviving troops of Companies C and L then fled northwest on foot along the spine of the ridge to join with the soldiers on Last Stand Hill and Cemetery Ridge, like “stampeding buffalo” according to Indian witnesses. The soldiers were vulnerable to attack while in retreat and many were killed as they fled north along the ridge. The reserve troops holding the horses on the hillside (over the top of battle ridge and on the eastern slope) also panicked and scattered and over 70 troopers were killed there (33% of Custer's strength). A few survivors reached the command post on Last Stand Hill.

One of the goals of the Indian combatants was to run off the horses -- putting the soldiers afoot and thereby trapping them. In this they succeeded. Around this time, perhaps as the many attackers increased pressure on the remaining troops, Co. E retreated from its position on Cemetery Ridge and moved back up the slope toward Last Stand Hill and joined with Co. F troops and the survivors of the earlier engagements. Company E appears to have then attempted one last counter attack toward the river but was driven off course (at an angle) toward a deep ravine – and those who were left were all killed above and in that ravine.

As the battle neared its denouement, others attempted to flee in different directions but were all killed in their attempts. Finally, the women, old men and teenagers too young for battle moved in among the dead and dying troopers and finished off those still alive with stone clubs, with knives and pistols, mutilating the bodies and stripping them of anything useful as they went.

As the distant sounds of gunfire and some concentrated rifle volleys reached the troops under Reno about 4 miles to the south, a desperate Capt. Weir requested permission from Major Reno to ride north toward the battle sounds to aid Custer. Reno rebuffed him -- but Weir went anyway (reportedly not his first heroic, but insubordinate act that day). He was followed by others including Reno (perhaps with just a twinge of shame?). He reached Weir Peak (now named for him), about a mile to the north, and from there was able to see through the dust and smoke the  “Indians shooting at objects on the ground."

These soldiers thus witnessed the final moments of the battle either on Calhoun Hill, which was closer, or possibly even on Last Stand Hill itself, a bit farther away. The Indians saw these troops on the top of the mountain and some raced south to attack them. Perhaps, if the battle with Custer had not been essentially over (or victory assured), they wouldn't have left it. The officers and men on Weir Point hastily retreated to the defensive position they had taken up earlier, losing at least one trooper along the way -- farrier Private Vincent Charley was shot through the hips and was not able to mount or ride. He was left behind by the others as they retreated. His mutilated body was found and was buried where he fell. Many years later, his remains were found and he was moved to the National Cemetery located at the battlefield.

Mutilation of enemies' bodies was common and typically done after death; there was a purpose for it. Indian beliefs held that such mutilation would afflict the victim's body in the afterlife, so it was one way to further the insult of their defeat and cause them indignity and suffering later in the spirit world. Morality lessons for the living could also be forcefully taught this way -- for example, some Indians believe that Custer's ears were punctured (although reportedly he was not otherwise mutilated) so that he could "hear better" when he got where he was going. He had obviously not listened to Indian advice before when it might have been beneficial to him. But many Indian participants said they did not know who was in command of the U. S. troops until after the battle, so there may or may not be truth in the stories. It is true that George Custer went into action that day with much shorter hair -- his long golden locks had been shorn and he may not have been wearing his usual buckskins (I have read this). Of course, it is also possible that the Indian woman who did the "mythic" deed did recognize him when others did not -- many of them had encountered him before during his ten years on the Plains.

Meanwhile, the Indians besieged and harried Reno and Benteen's troops through the night of June 25th and nearly all day on June 26th. The courageous fighter Long Road was killed during this part of the fight. Late in the afternoon of the next day (June 26th), the Indians resigned the field and left as they moved their people south toward the Bighorn Mountains of Wyoming. Perhaps they knew by then that a larger body of troops was approaching, but in any event the area's natural resources had been depleted and as was their custom, they moved to find fresh ground. General Terry's command arrived the next morning to find the carnage the Lakota and Cheyenne left behind.

Lt. Col. George Custer and some 210 men under his direct command, plus roughly 50-60 other troops with Reno and Benteen had been killed and their stripped bodies left to burn and bloat in the sun. The total number of dead is thought to be 268. The survivors under Major Reno and Capt. Benteen were assigned to provide hasty field burials for their comrades and the wounded were taken to Fort Lincoln to recover. Not all did.

The last soldier to die of wounds received in the battle succumbed in the fall; Private Frank Braun, 27, a Swiss immigrant, had been in the Army less than a year. He was wounded on Reno Hill during the battle (in the hip and cheek), and he died at Fort Lincoln on October 4th. He was taken back to the Little Bighorn Natl. Cemetery (Section A) for reburial when the frontier closed and the associated Army posts were abandoned in the 1880s and 1890s.

It's fairly easy to find the names of the U.S. troopers killed and wounded during this battle; also the Indian scouts who fought with the troops that day. Not so well known are the other Americans who fought and died on the Greasy Grass - protecting the lives of their families and their homes from what they naturally saw as an invader. Reliable accounts of the allied Indian casualties in the battle range from twenty to sixty, with most accounts falling right about forty. We should not forget their names, they are our people too.

Bear With Horns fell here

Some of them were Cloud Man, Elk Bear, Deeds (a young boy), Lame White Man, Long Road, Noisy Walking, Swift Bear, One Dog, Dog's Back Bone, Owns Red Horse, Flying By, Kills Him, Bear with Horns, Roman Nose... and probably thirty other Cheyenne and Lakota men, women and children. I find no record of any Arapaho killed, although that is possible as several were present during the battle.

Gall reported his wife and two children had been shot and killed at the beginning of the battle, outside their lodge. The bodies of six women and some children were found in a ravine after Reno's valley attack. Some estimates of the Indian dead say that more than two-hundred were killed that day. I believe that to be an exaggeration; several witnesses at the time specifically named thirty or forty people. No one has ever named two-hundred, as far as I know.  Had that many Indians been killed that day, I doubt they would have considered the Greasy Grass fight to be any kind of a victory at all; that number of casualties would have been considered catastrophic.  

The Indians won the fight, no question. But the defeat of the 7th Cavalry at the Greasy Grass was the harbinger of death for the Indians’ free life as their own masters on the Great Plains; there really was no victor. The Army’s resulting resolve (for revenge) and relentless pursuit, fall, winter, spring and summer, along with destruction of the buffalo herds and a flood of settlers across and eventually into their lands, resulted in the complete, planned and methodical destruction of the Indians’ way of life and their imprisonment on government reservations. Those peoples found, as others have down through history and since, that it is dangerous to awaken a sleeping giant. "Right" often has no bearing on an outcome.

On the Great Plains, 1876 was about the last free year for any of them -- Sitting Bull and Gall fled to Canada after the Greasy Grass fight, but when they could not get what they wanted from Canada's government they later returned to captivity in the USA after the immediate "heat" died down. Some Lakota eventually went back to the Red Cloud Agency at Fort Robinson where Crazy Horse was killed under a cloud of suspicious circumstances and intrigue the next year. Except for the Ghost Dance "rebellion," the shame of Wounded Knee (the 7th Cavalry's revenge) and the pageantry of Buffalo Bill's "Wild West" show, the Indian wars on the Great Plains were over. The fierce and strong Tatanka Iotake was also later killed near his Standing Rock (reserve) home by his own people. He was reportedly resisting arrest.

7th Cavalry Monument

Most of the 7th Cavalry's enlisted casualties, buried hastily where they fell right after the battle, were reburied under the monument on Last Stand Hill (all those that could be found). Soldier remains are still occasionally unearthed on the battlefield. The officers' remains (those which could be identified) were transferred to their families elsewhere or buried on existing frontier posts. In recent years, a memorial for the Indian combatants was placed on Last Stand Hill. The remains of the officer thought to be George Custer, Civil War hero and one of the youngest men ever appointed a general in the American army, were removed from their initial resting place near the Greasy Grass and on October 10, 1877, were re-interred in a place of honor at U.S.M.A. (West Point). 

The tragedy of Custer's last campaign quickly became a legend known around the western world.



Causes of the 7th Cavalry's defeat...

As I see it, a combination of factors led to the Army losses in this fight.

(1) Indian attitude: The rules had changed, but Custer didn’t know it. The Indians were gathered in large numbers and spoiling for a fight. Unlike other times, they weren't in any mood to run; their backs were "to the wall."

(2) Bad ground and bad timing: Custer was trapped into a fight on ground that he was not able to defend (unlike Reno, whose position four miles south was not perfect, but was somewhat stronger and that made all the difference for his troops). This was bad timing and bad luck. Adding to this may have been Custer's attempt to assist Reno by sending troops down to attack the village at the Medicine Tail Coulee ford, delaying his own actions. That delay, along with Reno's disengagement, allowed the Indians time to gather in large numbers and trap Custer's companies on that indefensible ground. It is by no means certain that the 7th Cavalry could have been successful if Reno and Benteen had joined him, but they did not and there was no way for Custer to survive the day without at least their attempt to do so.

(3) Outnumbered: While the number of Indians present was not as high as some exaggerated accounts indicate, the 7th Cavalry was overwhelmingly outnumbered -- maybe even by seven to one. Combined with the other factors, this ensured defeat.

(4) Culpable Subordinates: Part of the outcome can be tied to the failure of Reno and Benteen to act in the manner Custer expected them to; i.e., their (perhaps willful) failure to aggressively carry out their orders. The failure of Reno and Benteen to support Custer in the attack ensured his defeat. In short, Reno and Benteen were perhaps a couple of hateful skunks who may even have deliberately abandoned Custer to his fate because of their dislike and animosity toward him. With reservations, I would be more inclined to believe this of Benteen than of Marcus Reno. Reno may have instead been suffering from the debilitating effects of shock, inflicted upon him by the events of the day. To wit...

"Reno proved incompetent and Benteen showed his indifference – I will not use the uglier words that have often been in my mind. Both failed Custer and he had to fight it out alone." -- Little Bighorn veteran William Taylor, in a letter to Lieutenant (by then, a General) E. S. Godfrey, February 20, 1910.

Frederick Benteen had been present at the Battle of the Washita River where Custer left the field without determining the fate or where-abouts of Major Joel Elliott and his small command (about 20 men). Benteen felt that Custer had abandoned these men and they were later found dead; Elliott was Benteen's close friend. This had similarity to what Benteen did at the Little Bighorn in 1876. Payback, perhaps? Custer's failure to support Elliott at the Washita caused deep divisions between the officers of the 7th that lasted right through to their final battle and Benteen, although professionally capable, has an enduring reputation as a bitter and vindictive man.

We should not too hastily conclude that Custer was remiss in his dedication to honor and duty as that concerned Elliott and his men at the Washita -- he did send a search party out looking for them, ultimately unsuccessfully but the remaining portions of the command were at that time under threat of immediate counter-attack by a large force of Indian defenders when Custer led it from the field that day. Later, as these facts were considered, Custer's commanders chose not to censure or otherwise note any command failure in that engagement. Perhaps this was unwillingness to rebuke their "golden boy," or perhaps it was recognition that the commander really had no other choice, given the circumstances.

Reno, an otherwise respected and competent, if somewhat "pedestrian" soldier, was seemingly in shock and incapable of effective command by the critical point in the events of the afternoon of the battle. In particular, the violent death of Bloody Knife was thought to have unhinged him. I believe it is possible (as do many others) that both Reno and Benteen later lied about the events of the day at the Army's inquest, in order to protect their own reputations.

[In the interest of fairness, an alternative interpretation follows at the end of this essay].

The '73 Springfield Carbine

(5) Weaponry: The Indians were better armed for this kind of a fight. They had a variety of weapons, including many repeating rifles – while the soldiers had Springfield single-shot carbines. Their sabers had been boxed and left behind. Even the bow and arrow was used in this battle with greater effect and with better results than the soldiers could achieve with those carbines (a skilled Indian fighter could arc an arrow into a position they couldn't even see, as long as they had a sense of where it was). At the end, the fighting was close-quarters and brutal. The Springfield single-shot carbine effectively became an "M-1 Stick" in such a fight. By that time, a good number of the soldiers probably wished their sabers had not been left behind.

(6) Soldier discipline: The soldiers were tired and demoralized and they had not had sufficient training for any learned (habitual) military discipline to help overcome their debilitated mental condition and abilities; many of them had less than one year of service. When faced with an opposing, angry, overwhelming horde of determined defenders at close-quarters, defenders who had the "home field advantage," some of the troops quit fighting and broke and ran in panic. Given the circumstances they faced, that is at once understandable from a purely human perspective.

When recent archaeologists searched the field, there were not large numbers of spent Army cartridge cases at any 7th Cavalry position on the battlefield. Apparently, the troopers did not fight very hard, and at the same time, the numbers and effectiveness of the Indian combatants, to use late and popular terminology, resulted in a large amount of "shock and awe." This does not mean that the soldiers all acted with cowardice. 

Indians who fought that day told many stories of the courage and bravery of these soldiers, so much so that it was their general recollection that the soldiers for the most part had conducted themselves well. They considered the battle a glorious one, although their point of view may have been tinted by the afterglow of their perceived victory. But in an overall sense, battlefield discipline among the soldiers apparently was not optimum. I am hesitant to assert that this was a major cause of the defeat. More correctly, I think the soldiers’ lack of battlefield discipline and experience hastened the Indians' inevitable victory.

An alternative possibility concerning Major Reno and Captain Benteen.

A songwriter, Gordon Lightfoot, once wrote that a soldier "must be dead to be admired." Major Marcus Reno and Captain Frederick Benteen were both seasoned officers who each served many years on the Plains. Is it possible that even though they hated George Custer personally, that they still conducted themselves on the battlefield with honor and good judgment? Is there any evidence available that supports that conclusion?

Reno and Benteen’s actions (and intentions) at the Greasy Grass can be reasonably interpreted this way, without stretching credibility. It occurs to me that when viewing an event, or judging a person’s character or motives based on a set of historical facts, one should be careful not to get too wedded to only one possibility, especially when we are looking back at a person’s character through the shades of time and through the lenses of many different “perceptions” -- some recorded by those whose point of view may not have been entirely, if at all, objective. Sometimes people have their conclusions all figured out before they begin to look at the facts.

There is direct evidence to corroborate the point of view that Reno and Benteen were not as culpable as some believe. If this is closer to the truth, then their later deceit at hearings and boards of inquiry might have a different explanation; perhaps it was defensive in nature. While it is possible they were trying to cover up their failures of that day, or their cowardice, it is also possible that they simply feared others would draw wrong conclusions from their testimony and therefore chose not to provide that testimony in order to avoid the ensuing criticism that they judged would be unjustified.  Still wrong (and lacking in integrity), but quite different than "cowardice under fire." What I am saying is that battlefield bravery may sometimes exist separately from honor and duty. 

Benteen, for example, had that long standing enmity with Custer because of Custer’s failure, as he saw it, to "save" Major Elliott at the Washita battle. When Benteen failed to find and join Custer in the same way some eight years later at the Little Bighorn, maybe it was turn-about – or maybe it was simple recognition that there were larger issues. As a commander and as an advisor to Major Reno, perhaps Benteen did the same thing Custer had done because he now recognized it was the correct thing to do.

Benteen carried the responsibility for his men and had to weigh his actions to obtain the best outcome, based on the situation at hand. At the Washita, Benteen wasn’t commanding; Custer made the hard choices during the stress and heat of battle that day. Benteen had at that time the luxury of second-guessing him. With almost ten more years of experience by the time they reached the Greasy Grass, perhaps Benteen felt the same choices Custer had made were the appropriate ones. And maybe they were. We must try to see things the way he did at that time, with the knowledge he had at that point.

During the valley fight earlier in the afternoon, Reno was fighting next to Bloody Knife when the scout was hit in the face by a bullet. His head exploded, to put it bluntly. Those in proximity, including Reno, were splattered with blood and gore from Bloody Knife's fatal wound. Marcus Reno may very well have suffered extreme shock from that occurrence – and it may have taken hours for him to recover his presence of mind. I am not sure that this very human nature under such conditions and circumstances should damn him – not when viewed in concert with his many years of "gallant" (a word that had been used to describe him) and dedicated service.

The battle on the Greasy Grass was a desperate one from beginning to end. Some of the experienced soldiers present on that Montana day gave credit to Benteen and to a lesser extent, Major Reno, for their survival. We know with the certainty of much study over many years, that had these men made the courageous and more reckless choice to continue their advance down those bluffs and ridges to Custer’s aid, it could have been their “last stand” as well. And we also know that Custer’s men, by that time, were probably already dead. While Reno and Benteen could not have known those things with certainty, they did know that they were still in a fight for their own survival. Of course, had they continued to advance, whether they were later judged reckless or not, at least their reputations would not have been attacked and tarnished by the all-knowing "arm-chair" tacticians. Instead, they fell back to a defensible position and their remaining men mostly survived the battle as a result.

1st Sergeant John Ryan, who recounted his long experience with the 7th Cavalry in his memoir Ten Years with Custer, said this about Benteen’s actions during the battle: 

“Too much cannot be said in favor of Captain Benteen. His prompt movements saved Reno from utter annihilation and his gallantry in clearing the ravines of Indians and opening the way for water...[helped save]... the suffering wounded. In Captain Benteen, Reno found one whose advice and assistance were invaluable.”

"Prompt movements" and "gallantry?" Sgt. Ryan was writing about an officer he completely disliked. Benteen had demoted him just before this battle. Those who know the realities of military service know that the "top kick" is the one who knows what’s going on and Ryan was a respected first sergeant. Sgt. Ryan was with Reno that day; he saw Benteen's and Reno's actions and he executed their orders under enemy fire. You have to give credence to what he has to say about those officer’s actions, especially when his objectivity cannot be called into question.

The problem with Benteen is that in many ways he was unlikable – and that makes it easy to attribute unsavory things to him. These things may not be even partly true, or perhaps the truth lies somewhere in the middle. The more I read about these soldiers, especially things written about their actions on days other than that day in Montana, the more I am inclined to give them the benefit of some reasonable doubt. There is no doubt these were flawed men. But perhaps they did the best they could on that day – and we can recognize some positive results from their conduct and their actions that some are so quick to denigrate.

Suggested Reading:

Custer, Elizabeth B. Boots and Saddles or Life in Dakota with General Custer, Santa Barbara: The Narrative Press. 2001.

Godfrey, E. S. Custer's Last Battle 1876. [monograph] Silverthorne [CO]: NPS & Vistabooks. 1976

Gray, John S. Custer’s Last Campaign: Mitch Boyer and the Little Bighorn Reconstructed. Lincoln: Univ. of Nebraska Press. 1993.

Hardorff, Richard G. Hokahey! A Good Day To Die! The Indian Casualties of the Custer Fight. Lincoln: Univ. of Nebraska Press. 1993.

Michno, Gregory F. Lakota Noon - The Indian narrative of Custer's Defeat. Missoula: Mountain Press Publishing Co. 1997.

Michno, Gregory F. The Mystery of E Troop: Custer’s Gray Horse Company at the Little Bighorn. Missoula: Mountain Press Publishing Co. 1999.

Ryan, John. Ten Years with Custer: A 7th Cavalryman's Memoirs. Terre Haute: AST Press. 2001.

Sklenar, Larry. To Hell With Honor - Custer and the Little Bighorn. Norman: Univ. of Oklahoma Press. 2000.

Utley, Robert M. Cavalier in Buckskin; George Armstrong Custer and the American Military Frontier. Norman and London: Univ. of Oklahoma Press. 1988.

Utley, Robert M. The Indian Frontier of the American West 1846-1890. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press. 1984.

Updated on June 26, 2017