Custer for President Craig Repass

CUSTER

FOR

PRESIDENT?

BY CRAIG REPASS

®1985 by The Old Army Press, Inc. All Rights
Reserved

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number LC 85 -
61362

ISBN 0-88342-064-3

Volume Number 12 in the Source Custerlana Series

The Old Army Press

P.O. Box 2243 Ft. Collins, Colo. 80522

UPB

DEDICATION

For their valuable contributions to this work I would like
to thank Doctors John Gilbert, Joseph Hobbs, William
Harris of North Carolina State University, and Doctor
James Barrett of University of Illinois Urbana-
Champaign. Susan McClintock performed admirably as
St. George in our struggles with the dreaded dragon of
interlibrary loan. To my wife Lois “Libbie Custer”
Repass, I can honestly say that I could not have done it
without your support and encouragement.

I. From Sancho Panza to Don Quixote—The
Metamorphosis of

III. The 1876 Sioux Campaign: Custer Marches
to the Little

IV. The Web We Weave: Partisan Politics and the 67

V. Custer at the Crow’s Nest: “The Best Laid
Schemes O Mice

. -
95

103

113

117

125

INTRODUCTION

A general impression has gone abroad, and to some
extent throughout the country today, prejudicial to
General Custer. He has been accused of disobeying
orders, ’ and it has been said that he had made a
forced march, ’ that ‘he was too impatient, ’ that ‘he
was rash, and various other charges have been
made, equally groundless and equally unjust, and all
started and promoted by his enemies.

General Nelson Miles, Personal Recollections and
Observations of General Nelson A. Miles, 1896

Custer told him (Bob-Tailed Bull) that... no matter
how small a victory he could win, even though it was
against only five tents of Dakotas, it would make him
President,

President,

(the) Great Father. . . .

Red Star in the Arikara Narrative, 1920

Custer’s march on the Little Big Horn, which cost his
life as well as the lives of 224 other men, was carried
out

against orders of his superiors.

One Night Stands with American History, Richard
Shenkman and Kurt Reiger, 1982

History has been unkind to George Armstrong (.uster.
Much atten tion has been given to the Lieutenant-Colonel
and his decision to attack a Sioux-Cheyenne village
situated along the banks of the Lit tie Big Horn River on
June 25, 1876. Over the past one hundred years,

explanations have been sought for his behavior on that
day, and several theories have gained general
acceptance. Current theories hold Custer solely
responsible for the Little Big Horn disaster. Allegedly, for

responsible for the Little Big Horn disaster. Allegedly, for
reasons of personal and political ambitions, and in
defiance of orders from his commanding officer, General
Alfred H. Terry, he recklessly attacked the Indian
encampment and was annihilated.

Perhaps no better conceptualization of this theory has
been offered than in Little Big Man, the movie (1970)
and the book (1964). In the Hollywood epic, Custer,
portrayed by Richard Mulligan, executes his ambitions
and suicidal plan to perfection - as he charges into the
Little Big Horn Valley, Mulligan (Custer) exhorts his men
to “Take no prisoners! " Although Little Big Man is
fiction, its stereotyped presentation of Lieutenant Colonel
Custer and the battle is generally accepted today as fact.

Despite the abundance of Custer historiography, very
little of it has actually been written by historians; no
schools of historians have emerged to promote their
scholarly views. Instead, an elaborate Custer myth has
evolved from the strident clashes between Custerphobes
and Custerphiles.

In retrospect, a crucial factor in the evolution of Custer
myth and theory has often been overlooked - the cause

myth and theory has often been overlooked - the cause
and effect of Custer’s involvement in politics. The central
concept of this thesis is that because of Armstrong's
Democratic sympathies and activities in the 18^6 election
year, he became the target of Republican attempts to
discredit his reputation. In the acrimonious atmosphere of
the Little Big Horn aftermath, cooperation between the
army and the Republican party (President Ulysses S.
Grant administration) produced contrived news releases
and official reports designed to promote Custer as a
scapegoat. Since much of the erroneous information
disseminated to the public during that period has been
woven into the fabric of contemporary theories, the
association of Custer with politics and the Little Big Horn
deserves a closer examination

FROM SANCHO PANZA TO DON QUIXOTE:
THE METAMORPHOSIS OF GEORGE
ARMSTRONG CUSTER

The twin influences of politics and the military arts were
evident in George Armstrong “Autie” Custer at an early
age. At the young age of four after a painful tooth
extraction, he emerged from his dentist’s office in Scio,

extraction, he emerged from his dentist’s office in Scio,
Ohio, and proudly proclaimed to his father, Emanuel:
“You and me can whip all the Whigs in Ohio, can t we?

When Emanuel drilled with the hometown New Rumley
“Invincibles militia, Autie imitated their movements and
even “instructed his playmates in military tactics.

As Autie matured, Emanuel’s influence became more
pronounced. Particularly noticeable were three mutual
characteristics: sense of humor, the courage to act on
one’s beliefs, and a propensity to support the
Democratic party. In the New Rumley environs it was no
secret that the Custer clan patriarch was a confirmed
admirer of Andy Jackson and the Democrats.

Armstrong’s vision extended beyond the horizons of
New Rumley, Ohio, and Monroe, Michigan, which were
typically small, rural, and provincial nineteenth century
midwestern towns. Born in New Rumley, raised in
Monroe, he realized that if he were to break restrictive
bonds of past family patterns, he must acquire a college
education. Finances were a problem, but the military
academy at West Point offered a free education that
became an attractive alternative.

became an attractive alternative.

From Hopedale, Ohio, May 27, 1856, sixteen-year-old
George Armstrong Custer wrote to his representative in
Congress, the honorable

John A. Bingham:

Wishing to learn something in relation to the matter
of appointment of Cadets to the West Point Military

Academy, I have taken the liberty of addressing you
on the subject . . .

I am desirous of going to West Point, and I think my
age and tastes would be in accordance with its
requirements . ... I am now in attendance at the
McNeely Normal School in Hopedale, and could
obtain from the Principal, if necessary, testimonials
of moral character.

I would also say that I have the consent of my
parents in the course which I have in view. Wishing
to hearfrom you as soon as convenient.

/ remain,

Yours Respectfully,

G. A. Custer

Representative Bingham was a member of the dreaded
Whig opposition who in later years would effortlessly
transform himself into one of the nation’s most vociferous
Radical Republicans. He was, in short, the political
enemy; however, he admired Armstrong’s spunk, even
though the boy’s next correspondence openly admitted
his family s political sympathies. The appointment for
1856 had already been made, but Bingham promised
Custer careful consideration for the next opening. With
the Congressman’s blessing, Armstrong was appointed
the following year; however, there may have been
another factor involved in his selection. Armstrong had
been courting Mary Holland, but her father, a wealthy
farmer, was not at all pleased with the prospect of
Armstrong as his son-in-law. Since West Point Cadets
could

not marry, the Point provided a perfect Elba for his

not marry, the Point provided a perfect Elba for his
daughter’s suitor.

In June 1857, Custer entered West Point, and this single
event probably had more impact on his destiny than any
other. Without his graduation from the academy, it is
unlikely that he would have been

provided the same opportunities to achieve his meteoric
rise to fame during the Civil War.

Custer was one of the most popular cadets in his class,
and many of his friends were Southerners. His opinions
were openly voiced and were often in sympathy with the
Southern cause. As the I860 presidential election
approached, he supported candidates who were
conservative and agreed with Southerners’ states’ rights
and their right to own slaves. New York’s Daniel
Stevens Dickinson, Virginia’s Robert M. T. Hunter, and
Oregon’s Joseph Lane were acceptable to Armstrong as
Democratic candidates, and he believed the Republicans
would nominate William H. Seward.

In a letter to a

friend written on May 5, I860, he protested against
Black-Brown Republicans who would . either deprive a

Black-Brown Republicans who would . either deprive a
portion of our fellow citizens of their just rights or
produce a dissolution of the Union.”

With the election of Abraham Lincoln and the call to war,
Armstrong, like many of his classmates, faced a difficult
decision. Would he fight for the South - a cause with
which he sympathized - or with the North, in defense of
his home territory? In the end, his conscience would not
permit him to violate his oath taken upon entering West
Point: to defend the government, which had clothed, fed,
and educated him for almost four years.

Once his mind was made up, he did not look back. As
his West Point years drew to a close, he wrote
prophetically to a friend, Annette Humphrey: “It is
useless to hope the coming struggle will be bloodless or
of short duration. Much blood will be spilled and
thousands of lives, at the least, lost. If it is my lot to fall in
the service of my country and my country’s rights I will
have no regrets.

From the first Battle of Bull Run to Appomattox, George
A. Custer cut and slashed his way in defense of the
Union. At the age of twenty-three he became one of our

Union. At the age of twenty-three he became one of our
nation’s youngest commanding generals when he was
appointed Brigadier General of the Michigan Cavalry
Brigade in June of 1863 Between campaigns, he met and
married Elizabeth C. “Libby” Bacon of Monroe,
Michigan. With his dashing good looks, panache,
charisma, and success in battle, he soon attracted the
attention of the Northern press. Pundits of the printed
word referred to him as the “beau sabreur” and as a
knight sans peur et sans reproche.” It remained,
however, for the New York Herald to attach to Custer
the sobriquet which became the most popular - “the boy
general with the golden locks.’

The flamboyant boy general was assisted by the press in
his rise to fame, but he also was fortunate to have the
support of several able and prominent superior officers.
Two of the most notable Custer supporters were
Generals George B. McClellan (a Democrat) and Philip
H. Sheridan, Armstrong’s vocal and well-known support
for the former caused him much grief after McClellan
was permanently dismissed from command by President
Lincoln. Because of Custer’s Southern sympathies and
his close association with McClellan, he was frequently

his close association with McClellan, he was frequently
criticized in the Republican press. During and after the
war, Armstrong found it necessary to defend himself
against charges of “being a Copperhead." Ironically, two
of his most supportive lifelong friends were Senator
Zachariah Chandler from Michigan and Representative
Bingham from Ohio, both avid Radicals, Chandler
defended Armstrong on one occasion as Custer informed
his father-in-law in a letter dated January 1864:

I would have written to you at once when / learned of
the efforts to injure me, but did not want to trouble
Libbie.

You would be surprised at the pertinacity with which
certain men labor to defame me. I have paid but little
attention to them, trusting of time to vindicate me.
And I do not fear the result. It was reported that /
was a 'copperhead’, a charge completely refuted.
Senator Chandler has expressed himself warmly in
my favor*

At the end of the Civil War, Custer was blessed with
fame but not fortune. He and Libbie were fond of the
“good life,” so it came as quite a shock when his income

“good life,” so it came as quite a shock when his income
was reduced from eight thousand to two thousand dollars
per year. In addition, his actual rank reverted from brevet
major general of volunteers to captain in the regular
army. The army had been good to him, but the war had
been even better.

In order to alleviate his financial embarrassment, he
obtained a leave of absence in April 1866 and traveled
alone to Washington, D.C., and New ’i ork City. There
he visited influential friends, such as Secretary of State
William H. Seward, Secretary of War Edwin M.
Stanton, Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase, General Ulysses
S, Grant, and old standby

EDWIN McMASTERS STANTON Courtesy New
York Historical Society

ULYSSES SIMPSON GRANT Photograph by
Alexander Gardner Courtesy Peter A. Fuley & Son

Senator Chandler, in the hopes their patronage would
improve his situation.

Perhaps for the first time since his

graduation from West Point, Custer seriously entertained

graduation from West Point, Custer seriously entertained
the idea of leaving the army. From New York he wrote
to Libbie: “I think it probable that I shall leave the army,
but shall not decide till assured of success. I can obtain
the position of Foreign Minister, with a salary in gold of
from seven to ten thousand dollars per annum,”

“Foreign Minister” was a polite euphemism for
mercenary, for the offer was from the Juarez faction in
Mexico to serve as their Chief of Cavalry. With this in
mind he approached General Grant for a letter of
recommendation, and the future Custer nemesis
responded charitably in a letter to Mexican Minister Don
Matias Romero by writing that: “There was no officer in
that (Cavalry) branch of the service who had the
confidence of General Sheridan to a greater degree than
General Custer, and there is no officer in whose
judgment I have greater faith than in Sheridan’s.”

Mexico was too much of a gamble for Armstrong to
take. His request for a leave of absence was denied, and
he did not wish to resign from the army for what might be
a temporary position in Mexico. Other opportunities
soon materialized. Although his application for position as
Inspector General of the United States Cavalry was

Inspector General of the United States Cavalry was
denied, he was offered and accepted a commission as
Lieutenant Colonel of the Seventh Cavalry. Congress
had recently approved expansion of the army s Cavalry
Corps for service along the western frontier. They had
finally conceded that slow-moving infantry could not
defend settlers moving west against the guerilla tactics of
the “Cossacks of the p atns - the Comanches, Kiowas,
Sioux, and Cheyennes.

Before his exile to the plains, Armstrong was afforded
sufficient time to play Sancho Panza to President Andrew
Johnson’s Don Quixote. It was a matter of conscience
for Custer; his support of the incoln-Johnson
Reconstruction programs against the Congressional
(Radical Republican) programs was an extension of his
earlier support for certain Southern rights and the ideal of
immediate recon-

a . o''

WUh thC Uni

n He did

concern himself

at all with the Radical Republicans’ fear of losing political
supremacy.

For him, it was a question of morality and ethics based

For him, it was a question of morality and ethics based
on perhaps a naive belief that the “golden rule” could be
applied to politics and national affairs.

Just as his father remained loyal to the memory of
Andrew Jackson, Armstrong became totally committed
to Andrew Johnson. He wrote to Libbie’s father: “My
confidence in the strength of the Constitution is increasing
daily while Andy is as firm and upright as a tombstone,
He has grown. He is a very strong Union man Union now
and forever, one and inseparable.”

President Johnson’s basic goals were a swift restoration
to the Union of all rebel states and the restoration of all
constitutional rights to citizens of those states.
Southerners who had participated in the rebellion were
not to be disenfranchised, nor was the Freedmen’s
Bureau to become involved in organizing blacks as a
political force which would perpetuate Republican
dominance in national politics. Johnson, a Southerner
himself, was aware of Southerners’ fear of conflict with
their former slaves.

Johnson antagonized moderate Republicans by his veto

Johnson antagonized moderate Republicans by his veto
of the Freedmen’s Bureau Bill (February 19, 1866). A
complete schism developed between the president and
the last vestiges of moderate Republican support when
he openly opposed the Fourteenth Amendment. This
amendment defined American citizenship and the rights of
citizens, and created a federal constitutional prohibition
upon states to prevent them from denying equal rights
and protection to all citizens, regardless of race.

The 1866 Congressional elections were to provide a
national forum for the issue of the amendment’s
ratification. Johnson hoped to form a third party coalition
of conservative Democrats and Republicans. In April
1866, the National Union Executive Committee was
created as the nucleus of this party. It proved to be a
short-lived creature soon dominated by Democrats, but it
was a movement in which Custer became intimately
involved.

On August 9, 1866, Detroit was the scene of a mass
meeting called to endorse the National Union platform
which called for immediate readmission of Southern
states. Armstrong attended and was

states. Armstrong attended and was

1*1!^

appointed as one of the four delegates to the national
convention to be held in Philadelphia on August 14.

The Philadelphia Convention was an emotional release
for Northern and Southern veterans who believed in their
united effort to effect a restoration of the Union. In an
atmosphere of cooperation they worked to heal the
lingering wounds and divisiveness created by the war.
This new spirit of unity was represented by the delegates
of Massachusetts and South Carolina marching into the
convention hall in pairs with each delegate from the
Northern state locked arm-in-arm with a delegate from
the Southern state.

During the week of the convention, Armstrong publicly
declared his distaste for the Congressional
Reconstruction Plan.

Regarding the Congressional Plan of Reconstruction.
In my opinion as victors we have a right to name the

In my opinion as victors we have a right to name the
terms on which peace shall be established and a
Union restored . ... I believe that every man who
voluntarily engaged in the Rebellion forfeited every
right held under our Constitution to live, hold
property. But I do not agree with you that it is a
flagrant violation of our Constitution not to exact
those penalties in full.. I believe this position— not to
exact such penalties—lies within the provision of that
instrument. For the government to exact full
penalties simply because it is constitutionally
authorized to do so would, in my opinion, be
unnecessary, impolitic, inhuman, and wholly at a
variance with the principles of a free, civilized and
Christian nation, such as we profess to be.

Administration newspapers harangued against the evils of
the National U mon Party and insinuated on a daily basis
that its leaders, including

Cre V

e c

°PP

erhea

*. Undaunted, Armstrong

issued a public defense of the platform’s principles which
he believed could

be summed up in six words: “National Integrity,
Constitutional Liberty, Individual Rights.”

Johnson could not help but notice that Custer was a
kindred soul, and he invited Armstrong and Libbie to join
his entourage on his

ill-fated “Swing around the Circle.” The announced
purpose of the trip was to lay the cornerstone on a
monument honoring Stephen A. Douglas in Chicago and
to visit Lincoln’s tomb in Springfield, Illinois. Johnson’s
ulterior motive was the selling of his reconstruction
program to the American people. He believed that his
oratorical abilities, combined with the visible support of
luminaries such as Secretary of War Gideon Welles,
Secretary of State Edwin Seward, Admiral David A.
Farragut, Major General George H. Thomas, General U.
S. Gram, and the Custers, would convince voters that his
programs were in the best interest of the nation.

Ironically, the two elements that Johnson relied on to win
approval were largely responsible for the tour’s dismal
failure. Stump campaigning may have been his specialty,
but his inflammatory remarks and crowd-baiting tactics

but his inflammatory remarks and crowd-baiting tactics
only exacerbated hostile crowds. Many of those present
at the president’s speeches were agitators paid by the
Republican opposition to create disturbances. The
presence of two very popular military heroes, Grant and
Custer, on the same platform as the president created
unforeseen difficulties. They were much better received
by the crowds than Johnson, and both were often called
upon to play the role of peacemaker between the
president and unruly mobs.

Grant, in particular, found himself in a compromising
position. He was caught in the conflict between loyalty
and obedience to the president he served and his desire
to become the Republican candidate for president in the
forthcoming 1868 elections. In Detroit, Grant issued a
statement that his objective was not to involve the military
in political affairs. In the contest between the president
and his opponents he was neutral; he was along on the
tour only because he was the General of the Army.

Fearful of losing valuable support, Grant finally decided
that discretion was the better part of valor and
abandoned the tour before it completed its circle.

On the afternoon of September 13 at New Market,
Ohio, just over two miles from Armstrong’s birthplace of
New Rumley, Ohio, Custer endured one of his most
embarrassing moments. The hometown folks lustily
cheered their local hero, but drowned out the president
with

a chorus of boos as he tried to speak. This show of
disrespect was too much for Custer; he snapped back
that he was ashamed of them and that they were the
worst class of people he had ever seen. At the same
time, he vowed to Libbie that he would never visit Scio
again. Like all vows Custer made, he honored it.

At Steubenville, Ohio, the Custers parted company with
the president. Before leaving, Armstrong granted an
interview with a reporter for the Detroit Free Press. He
reiterated his endorsement of the National Union
platform and stressed that it was only a rumor that he
was about to run for Congress on the Democratic ticket
in Michigan.

The stage was set for Custer’s final foray into National

The stage was set for Custer’s final foray into National
Union activities before military obligation took precedent.
On September 17 in Cleveland, Ohio, the Soldiers and
Sailors Convention was called to order by Chairman-
elect General Gordon B. Granger. At Cleveland he
continued his organizational activities which began at
Philadelphia. His sentiments were echoed by Granger
when he announced the purpose of the convention was “.
. . to assist in devising means for early restoration of
confidence, unity, good will and cordiality to all sectors
of our distracted country - to achieve a true and
perpetual Union.”

The harmonious atmosphere of

Cleveland was a welcome change for Custer after the
acrimonious debacle of the swing around the circle. For
one of the few times in his public political appearances,
Custer was surrounded by fellow war veterans who
shared his goals and ideals. The New York Times stated
that: On September 26 a delegation of seven members
from the convention, including Custer, held a non-
political convivial reunion with the president. After
which General Custer will retire from the political
arena and join his regiment, the Seventh Cavalry,
when he is Lieutenant Colonel

at Fort Riley, Kansas.

General Custer rode off into the western sunset, not on
his cavalry charger, but on an iron horse. From the fall of
1866 until the sum mer of 1875, he was involved in
remarkably little political activity. During this period he
did achieve fame as one of the army’s premier

Indian fighters. Contributing greatly to this reputation was
his surprise attack on Black Kettle’s Cheyenne village
along the Washita River, Oklahoma Territory, in 1868.
Eight years later he attempted to repeat the same tactics
at the Little Big Horn but with decidedly different results.

Back in the nation’s capitol the Radicals continued to
dominate government and politics. Armstrong’s friends,
Chandler and Bingham, were instrumental in conducting
the impeachment proceedings against Andrew Johnson.
National Unionism was dead in body but alive in spirit in
the revived Democratic party.

In 1868 Ulysses S. Grant replaced the harassed Johnson
as occupant of the White House. Grant’s break with his
former commander-in-chief and his reconstruction

former commander-in-chief and his reconstruction
policies had been opportune and successful. Custer, in
contrast, remained steadfastly loyal to Johnson and his
.deals of National Unionism. When he was convinced of
his cause Custer s course of action was “damn the
torpedoes full speed ahead*” A collision between
Custer, the irresistible force, and Grant, the immovable
object, loomed on the horizon.

CHAPTER I—FOOTNOTES

Elizabeth B. Custer, Tenting on the Plains (Norman,
OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1971), pp. 287-
288.

Frederick F. Van de Water, Glory-Hunter: A Life of
General Custer (Indianapolis, IN: Bobbs-Merrill,
1934), p. 22.

^D. A. Kinsley, Favor the Bold (New York: Holt,
Rinehart and

Winston, 1967), p. 1.

jay Monaghan, Custer: The Life of General George

Armstrong Custer (Lincoln, NB: University of
Nebraska Press, 1959), p- 11.

Ibid., p. 35.

Ibid., p. 36.

Marguerite Merrington, The Custer Story; the Life

and Intimate Letters of General George A. Custer
and His Wife Elizabeth (New York: The Devin Adair
Co., 1950), p. 265.

*Ibid., p. 80.

Monaghan, Custer, p. 266.

Merrington, Custer

Story, p. 179-

"Frederick A. Whittaker, Complete Life of General
George A. Custer (New York: Sheldon and Co., 18 6),
pp. 340-341.

Merrington, Custer Story, p. 179-

J. G. Randall and David H. Donald, The Civil War

and Reconstruction (Lexington, MA: D. C. Heath and

and Reconstruction (Lexington, MA: D. C. Heath and
Co., 1969), pp-

575-591. . .

James M. McPherson, Ordeal by Fire, the Civil War

Reconstruction (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1982), p.
518.

New York Times, 10 August 1866.

x(>

Ibid., 15

August 1866.

‘"Merrington, Custer Story, pp. 187-188.

Ibid., p. 186.

'"Monaghan, CwsJer, pp. 271-272; McPherson, Ordeal
by Fire, p. 520; William S. McFeely, Grant: A
Biography (New York: W. W Norton and Co., 1981),
pp. 250-252.

McFeely, Grant: A Biography, p. 281.

“‘New York Times, 14 September 1866.

Monaghan, Custer, p. 275.

New York Times, 26 September 1866.

New 'i ork Times, 26 September 1866.

McPherson, Ordeal by Fire, pp. 519-521

Shortly after the Cleveland Convention, Grant expressed
to a reporter from the New York Times his contempt for
one of the candidates in the 1866 election for governor in
Pennsylvania:

Southern men he could make allowances for, and he
could ride through the South and get out on a
platform and shake hands in friendship with such
men as Lee, Johnson, or Forrest, because though
they had been almost educated into secession. They
were now truly honest and loyal in their adherence to
the Union, and were seeking to strengthen it. But he
did not feel in that way toward Northern men who

did not feel in that way toward Northern men who
had once been disloyal, and neither desired to
associate with them nor have them for his friends. No
such men should have his support, nor ought they to
be supported by Mr. Johnson s friends throughout
Northern states. He particularly instanced, as a
specimen of this objectionable class of men, Heister
Clymer, the Democratic candidate for Governor of
Pennsylvania, saying that to ask any soldier to vote
for such a man guilty of at one time known
disloyalty, against another who bad served four years
in the Union Army with, credit to himself and benefit
to his country, was a gross insult.

Smoldering enmity

between U. S. Grant and Heister Clymer burst into
flames ten years later in a conflagration that seriously
damaged Grant s reputation. Custer, like a moth
attracted to the glow of a candle, found himself
inexorably drawn into the destructive fire of the Belknap
Affair.

1*1

1*1!

1*!

1*1 ’w&r 1*1

Shortly after William Worth Belknap became Secretary
of War in 1869, he took direct action to reorganize
frontier commercial activities. Prior to 1870 the army
sutler had been appointed by recommendation of a Post
Council of Administration composed of three senior
officers next to the commander. Ultimately, the approval,
supervision, and dismissal of the person selected
remained with the General of the Army, who at that time
was William T. Sherman. Belknap had served under
Sherman during the war, and he had attained his
appointment as Sherman’s superior with the general’s
recommendation.

The harmony between Sherman and his former
subordinate was shattered in 1870 when Colonel Robert
Campbell wrote to Sherman protesting the removal of
Robert Ward as post trader at Fort Laramie. Unknown
to the general, the Secretary of War had personally
removed Ward, and it occurred on such short notice that
Ward could not satisfactorily settle his affairs without
suffering substantial financial loss. Sherman informed
Belknap that the prerogative of removal belonged to the
General of the Army, not the Secretary of War, and then
he promptly reinstated Ward. In the wake of their
confrontation, an act was passed transferring the
appointing power to the Secretary of War.

Effective

control of the post traderships was vested in one man,
William W. Belknap.

I nder the new law the traders were given the exclusive
privilege of trade on military reservations to which they
were assigned. No other persons were allowed to sell or
trade goods on that military reserve. The post
commander was authorized to inspect and approve t e
trader’s rates which should be fair and reasonable and to
report violations to the Secretary of War.

}

report violations to the Secretary of War.

}

his subagent if he would remit to Marsh twelve thousand
dollars per year in quarterly installments. Evans intimated
that one-half of that amount subsequently would be paid
to Belknap or his wife and that Fort Sill was only the tip
of the iceberg. Alarmed, Hazen contacted General James
A. Garfield, Chairman of the Commission on Military
Affairs, in the spring of 1872. Belknap, with the
assistance of the Republican-controlled committee,
quashed attempts at an investigation. To add insult to
injury, Hazen found himself transferred from the relatively
civilized post of Fort Hays, Kansas, to the boondocks of
Fort Buford, Dakota Territory. ‘

Congressional elections of 1874 returned to the House a
Democratic majority. Under the leadership of Speaker
John Kerr, partisan investigations into the conduct and
affairs of President Grant s cabinet members were
initiated. The House Committee for Investigation into
Expenditures of the War Department was chaired by
none other than Pennsylvania Representative Heister
Clymer. By the summer of 1875! rumors were reaching
the nation’s capitol emanating from the army posts

the nation’s capitol emanating from the army posts
stretched along the Upper Missouri River. The principle
theme of those rumors was that Secretary William W.
Belknap, in cooperation with the president’s younger
brother, Orvil Grant, and others, was involved in the
illegal sale of post traderships. Those rumors were like
music to the ears of the congressman from Pennsylvania,
for with one stone he could bring down two prominent
Republican birds - Belknap, who had been his roommate
at Princeton, and Grant, his old antagonist.

The Bismarck Tribune editorialized on July 21, 1875:
“that there are more or less frauds in connection with the
Indian business, those of us who have been on the
frontier for a number of years, and who have kept our ey
es and ears open, are fully aware. Lieutenant Colonel
George Armstrong Custer was one of those who had
been on the frontier for a number of years, and he had
kept his eyes and ears open. In 1875 he was
Commander of Fort Abraham Lincoln, Dakota Territory,
which was situated less than five miles from Bismarck He
shared a harmonious relationship with Clement A.
Lounsberry, editor of the Tribune. Lounsberry
capitalized on their relationship, even to the banal
extreme of recruiting subscribers for his weekly paper,

extreme of recruiting subscribers for his weekly paper,
by promising them “a magnificent chromo-lithograph of
General Custer worth two dollars with each
subscription.”

Lounsberry also provided a link between Custer and
their mutual friend, James Gordon Bennett, Jr., owner of
the New York Herald. In order to verify the rumors of
graft and corruption in the dispensing of post traderships,
Bennett dispatched an undercover investigative reporter,
Ralph Meeker, to Bismarck. From July through October
1875, Meeker operated under the alias of J. W.
Thompson with his true identity known to only a select
few, including Custer. It appears that Bennett funneled
Meeker’s salary through Custer and that Armstrong
cashed drafts in Bennett’s name at the Fort Lincoln sutler
s store. Meeker’s exposds were published in the New
York Herald; and although they were a combination of
rumor, heresay, and fact, they served to focus public
attention in the east on the problems of corruption.

Custer’s distaste for the Secretary of War was evident
when Belknap

and his entourage visited Fort Lincoln on their return
from

Yellowstone Park in the late summer of 1875 Instead of
personally

escorting the Secretary from the reservation boundary to
the fort,

Armstrong delegated that responsibility to his brother
Tom. After a

perfunctory welcome for Belknap in his office,
Armstrong left the

Secretary in the capable hands of Libbie for the
remainder of his visit.

If Belknap's reception at Fort Lincoln was lukewarm, it
turned positively frigid in Bismarck. There, he was
confronted by a barrage

O printed circulars designed as circus programs which
heralded “Bilk-nap, rant and Company and their

heralded “Bilk-nap, rant and Company and their
aggregation of acrobats as hav-g no lung but the most
costly jewels and (Indian) rings. ’

The u or o t e

handbills was never positively identified. Clement

unknow'7 w

“u

°'°

‘

he Trtbune and

conceded that,

H^susnecl r

had

on the paper’s presses.

liquor merrt f

WasJames A

™>®, »local wine and

liquor merchant. Some pointed the finger a, Lounsberry,
or Ralph

Meeker, but Washington cronies of Belknap charged
Custer with the offense, a charge not substantiated.

111

In the fall of 1875 the Custers journeyed east on a two-
month leave of absence. Both of them loved the
stimulation, diversity, and culture of New York City.
Evenings were spent at the opera or theatre. When
possible, Armstrong visited an old friend, actor

possible, Armstrong visited an old friend, actor
Lawrence Barrett, who was currently performing in
Julius Caesar.

Extensions of leave were granted in November and
January. Armstrong was well aware of the army’s plans
for a campaign against recalcitrant bands of Sioux led by
Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse. From New York he wrote
to brother Tom in January: “I have no idea of obtaining
my promotion this spring or summer. On the contrary, I
expect to be in the field in the summer with the Seventh,
and I think the Seventh Cavalry may have its greatest
campaign ahead."

Armstrong’s trip to New York was for more than
entertainment. He was offered a contract with Redpath’s
Lecture Bureau for five lectures per week at the princely
sum of one thousand dollars - not bad for a man with a
stammer when he talked. Custer put the offer on “hold”
until after the summer campaign when he would have
more time to prepare his material.

On the negative side,

Custer became involved in a civil suit which threatened to
bankrupt him if the decision was not in his favor. In order
to provide testimony in his defense, he pleaded with

to provide testimony in his defense, he pleaded with
General Alfred H. Terfy and Lieutenant General Philip

H. Sheridan for an extension of his leave until April 1, 18
6. Terry believed that he might need Custer in the field
before then and adamantly refused his request. After a
flurry of confidential telegrams from Armstrong to
Sheridan, a compromise was finally reached that granted
Custer leave until February 15-

To facilitate his return,

the Northern Pacific provided a special train from New
York to Bismarck.

Custer’s return to Fort Lincoln was brief. Shortly after
his arrival, he received a subpoena on March 15 to
appear before the Clymer Committee. Two competent
Custer biographers, Jay Monaghan and Edgar I.
Stewart, contend that his outspoken opinions gained the
attention of Democrats while the Custers were on their
New Y ork vacation. Stewart expresses the view that “..
. it would seem possible

that Custer, who was not without political ambitions of
his own, was at least partially responsible for the
commencement of the whole campaign against
Belknap.”

While Stewart’s statement is plausible, he

Belknap.”

While Stewart’s statement is plausible, he

fails to produce evidence of Custer’s political ambitions
in his study.

Another theory, favored by historian John Gray, involves
a rather eccentric former captain of the Second Cavalry,
George A. Armes. In 1870 as a result of a court-martial,
he had been dismissed from the army, and he believed
Belknap was remiss in not suspending his sentence. For
almost six years he waited for an opportunity to avenge
himself against the Secretary. While employed as a real
estate agent in Washington, D.C., the chance came.
Representative B. B. Lewis of Alabama, a Democrat,
was in need of housing. He was referred to Armes.
During the search for a house, Armes intimated to Lewis
that with the assistance of a member of Congress he
could produce facts so detrimental to Belknap that he
would be forced out of office. A meeting was arranged
by Lewis between Armes and Clymer at which Armes
presented a list of potential witnesses against the
Secretary.

Armes, in another version, claimed he had

originally been given the list by General Hazen on January

originally been given the list by General Hazen on January
11, 1876.

W hether the list was compiled by Armes or

Hazen, Custer’s name appeared on it. Consequently,
Clymer summoned him to Washington.

Upon receipt of the summons, Custer’s immediate
reaction was to consult General Terry for legal advice.
The general had been a lawyer m civilian life. Neither
Terry nor Custer desired Custer’s absence from ort
Lincoln. Terry had been instructed on February 10,
1876, by

eri

i8°

the Secretaf

of War

to begin hostilities against the

Sioux. The honor of commanding the Dakota column in
the field

CuterTl °r i ^ ^

n CUStCr Acting on Tcrf

s advice

’ Custer

telegraphed Clymer on March 16:

While 1 hold myself in readiness to obey the summons
of

your committee, I telegraphed to state that I am
engaged

engaged

TZZ‘:T!r

ant

“W™ to operate against

e hostile Indians. I expect to take the field early in
April

Z%7„

e <sa

ned

nec

™

’y. m ,L TL

uouldu not be satisfactory for you to forward to me
such

questions as may be necessary, allowing me to return
my replies by mail?'

This was followed by a second message to Clymer later
that day: “After further consideration, fearing my request
to be relieved from obeying summons may be construed
into a desire to avoid testifying, I have concluded to
prefer no request to that effect.”

By the time Armstrong arrived in Washington on March
28, the major damage to Secretary Belknap and the
Grant administration had already occurred. On February
29 before a closed hearing, Caleb Marsh, the

29 before a closed hearing, Caleb Marsh, the
Democrat’s star witness, testified against Belknap. His
testimony incriminated Belknap, as well as the
Secretary’s second and third wives, for accepting
payments totaling twenty thousand dollars from Marsh in
return for his control of the post tradership at Fort Sill.

Later that afternoon, an obviously shaken Belknap
appeared before the committee, but he said little to justify
belief in his innocence. Reportedly, a Republican member
of the committee, Lyman K. Bass, informed the
Secretary of the Treasury, Benjamin H Bristow, of
Belknap’s precarious situation on the morning of March
2. Dutifully, Bristow immediately rushed to the White
House to warn the president. After a brief discussion,
Bristow departed and Belknap soon appeared at the
president’s doorstep accompanied by close friend and
Secretary of the Interior Zachariah Chandler. Grant, in
one of his most astute moves as a politician, accepted
Belknap’s resignation at 10:20 a.m. that morning.

that adroit maneuver the disgraced Secretary of War
ultimately escaped the humiliation of impeachment.
Undaunted by the Secretary’s evasive maneuver, the
Democratic-controlled House unanimously adopted a
resolution calling for Belknap’s impeachment. The Senate

resolution calling for Belknap’s impeachment. The Senate
on August 1, 1876, finally decided that since the
Secretary had resigned they had no jurisdiction over him.

George Armstrong Custer was not the most effective
witness before the Impeachment Board, but he was one
of the most prominent. Because of this, friends of
Belknap believed it imperative to discredit him, and on
March 29, 1876, the sparring began with his first
appearance before the Impeachment Committee. In
1873 when

wts. yA*\

Armstrong began his tenure as Commander of Fort
Lincoln, the post traders were S. A. Dickey and Robert
Wilson. On July 1, 1874, Robert

C. Seip was appointed by Belknap to replace Dickey
and Wilson. Perturbed by his loss of the post tradership,
Wilson wrote a letter to A. C. Leighton, post trader at
Fort Buford, which accused the Secretary of War of

Fort Buford, which accused the Secretary of War of
being involved in the same firm.

Dickey confided to him

that they were removed because they did not “divide” in
order to maintain their proprietorship. When Seip’s
prices became exorbitant, a captain of the Seventh
purchased supplies in St. Paul to sell to his men at cost.
Seip protested this act of competition to the Secretary of
War, who wrote to remind Custer of the War
Department circulars prescribing the rights and privilege
of traders. Belknap pointedly referred to one clause:

They will be allowed the exlusive privilege of trade
upon the military reserves to which they are
appointed, and no other person will be allowed to
trade, peddle, or sell goods, by sample or otherwise,
within the limits of the reserve. ’

That clause is plain, clear, and explicit, and means
what it says.

Custer confronted Seip with reports that he, along with
other traders, was forced to pay a tax to outsiders for the
privilege of doing business. Accordingly, Seip informed
him that the yearly profits were fifteen thousand dollars,
and

and

. . . that about one-third of it was paid to Hedrick of
Iowa,

that another portion of it was paid to a man named

General Rice, who was supposed to be an intimate
friend

of the Secretary of War. . . and that the division of
those

profits was such that the trader was finally left with
but

about $2,500 or S3,000 out of the $15,000. He said
that

he positively only paid to Rice and Hedrick, but he
was

always under the impression that a portion of it went
to the Secretary of War,

With the Secretary conveniently implicated. Armstrong
next coned the president s younger brother, Orvil,

the

scandals. Orvil's opportunity came in the fall of 1874
when an order was issued

suspending the licenses of all traders on the Upper
Missouri. As if by magic, Orvil and his partner, A. L.
Bonnafon, appeared on the frontier to negotiate the price
for license renewals. On their way to conduct business
the two entrepeneurs shared a train ride with Armstrong
from St. Paul to Bismarck. While enroute they intimated
to Custer that they were visiting several trading posts.
Out of respect for the president, Custer provided a
wagon and scout for the posts. According to Custer,
Bonnafon claimed equal interest with Orvil in four posts
and that they were going to effect the transfer of the
current owner. Fort Berthold created problems which
were cleared up when Orvil returned to Bismarck and
telegraphed Secretary of the Interior Columbus Delano
to renew the license of J. W. Raymond. Supposedly,
Raymond showed the telegram Orvil sent requesting his
appointment to several people in Bismarck and claimed
he paid Orvil one thousand dollars for the renewal.

he paid Orvil one thousand dollars for the renewal.

Custer did not witness the exchange of telegrams and it
appears likely his source of information was the
disgruntled Robert Wilson who later testified before the
committee that Raymond showed the telegrams to him.

Custer’s testimony concerning Orvil’s illicit activities was
based on direct knowledge. Although it implicated the
president’s brother, Orvil had already done that much
more efficiently in his own appearance before the
committee on March 9- His involvement and character
were accurately assessed in The Nation.

Mr. Grant appears to be an unsuccessful man, who,
when all else failed, tried to get a living in some easy
way out of the Government, and accordingly applied
to his brother to license him as an Indian trader ....
He told him of posts at which the traders were going
to be removed, and Orvil accordingly applied for
licenses not for one, but for

4, and obtained them. This was in 1874, and he at
once put ‘partners’ of his in all the vacancies, who
were to pay a heavy share of the profits .... Orvil

confessed to the committee in the plainest manner
that what was regrettable in his eyes in the whole
affair was, not his use of his influence, but the
smallness of the amount he made out of the trader
ships.

Those statements were printed eleven days before
Armstrong arrived in Washington to testify. His testimony
did not damn Orvil Grant; to Orvil alone the credit
belongs.

Custer’s rambling testimony also criticized President
Grant. In January of 1875, by presidential proclamation,
the Great Sioux Reservation had been extended to
include the west bank of the Missouri River. The reason
given for the extension was to limit the supply of rum to
the residents of the reservation, but Armstrong hinted at
another purpose. The proclamation increased the value
of traderships by establishing a monopoly in that territory.
Instead of improving the morals of the Indians, the only
effect was to increase the profits of the traders, and that
was the real motive behind the extension,

Custer s next target was the Indian Bureau. After

Custer s next target was the Indian Bureau. After
receiving a shipment of 8000 bushels of corn in sacks
suspiciously marked “Indian Department,’ Armstrong
refused delivery, “Detective” Custer suspected that an
unscrupulous contractor had made an agreement with the
Indian agent to certify delivery of the shipment and then
illegally transfer it to Fort Lincoln for double payment.
Accordingly, Armstrong reported the irregularity to
General Terry’s headquarters in St. Paul, and in return
received orders from Secretary Belknap to accept the
corn.

For some reason this particular testimony by Custer
upset the hierarch) of army command. From General
Sherman to General Sheridan, to General Townsend to
General Terry, telegrams were exchanged to verify the
incident. Custer wired the committee on May 6, 1876,
after consulting w

ith General Terry that:

General Terry, commanding the Department of
Dakota, informs me that the report I forwarded from
Fort Lincoln, regarding certain com delivered at that
post for the use of the Army, in Indian sacks, was
received at his headquarters in this city, and after

received at his headquarters in this city, and after
due investigation was acted upon finally by his
authority; and that it was he and not the late
Secretary’ of War who sent the order to Fort Lin-co
n directing that, under certain restrictions to protect
the Government, the corn in question should be
received.

The receipt of the order was reported to me and I at
the same time derived the impression that the order
emanated from the War Department*

Actually,

Terry’s “investigation” did not ascertain whether fraud
was involved, and those . . certain restrictions . . were
never clarified.

Armstrong concluded his testimony the 29th by agreeing
with Clymer’s statement that if the Secretary of War had
been a man of purity of character and integrity of
purpose, frauds could not have continued.

They could not possibly have been carried on to
anything like the extent they were without the
connivance and approval (of the Secretary), and
when you ask me how the morale or character of the

when you ask me how the morale or character of the
Army is affected, ... I think it is one of the highest
commendations that could be made of the service, to
say, that it has not been demoralized, when the head
has shown himself to be so unworthy}

The die was

cast. Friends of Belknap, Republicans, and personal
enemies of Custer sought chinks in the knight errant’s
armor. A March 31 article entitled “Belknap’s
Anaconda,” which appeared in the New York Herald
dated March 21 from Bismarck, afforded the Custer
opposition their first opportunity for attack. Custer had
been in Bismarck on March 21. The content of the article
was similar to previous diatribes against the Secretary
and Orvil Grant and included a reproduction of the circus
program which had insulted Belknap on his earlier visit to
Bismarck. Circumstantial evidence was introduced
before the Clymer Committee in an attempt to prove that
Armstrong was the author of that article and a paid
correspondent for the New York Herald as well. The
chief witness against Custer was the Fort Lincoln trader,
Robert Seip, who testified on April 13- Seip made vague
references to material that had been given only to Custer
which appeared in the Herald article. In addition, a
telegram in the Herald of March 15 included an

telegram in the Herald of March 15 included an
expression used by Seip only in the presence of Custer at
Bismarck. Still, Seip admitted that he could not swear
that Armstrong was the author of the “Anaconda article.

Further questioning of Seip by a Republican member of
the Impeachment Board was aimed at establishing Custer
as a Herald correspondent- The witness admitted that
on at least one occasion he had cashed a draft made out
to the general from James Gordon Bennett. That
information, though, was hardly incriminating since Ralph
Meeker, Herald correspondent, had already clarified
circumstances where Custer cashed drafts for Meeker’s
benefit. Earlier on the 13th he testified that Armstrong
had been doing him a favor by cashing drafts which were
in reality the correspondent’s salary.

Who then authored the “Belknap Anaconda’’ article?
Historian John Gray in his Centennial Campaign
attributes the article to Meeker’s pen.

The Herald

correspondent, however, testified before the
Impeachment Committee that he had written the original
“Anaconda” article referred to in the article of the 31st,
but he did not know who had written the latest attack on

but he did not know who had written the latest attack on
Belknap. Meeker stated positively that at no time was
Custer employed by the Herald. While it is true that
Armstrong possessed certain literary talents, and he did
have a longstanding relationship with James Gordon
Bennett, the evidence that connects him to authorship of
the “Anaconda” article remains circumstantial at best.

On April 4, Custer was recalled before the Impeachment
Committee. Apparently this phase of his testimony was in
response to administration newspapers which questioned
why Custer and his fellow officers had failed to report
alleged improprieties earlier. Armstrong referred to an
order issued by the Secretary of War, March 15, 1873:
No officer, either active or retired, shall directly or
indirectly, without being called upon by proper
authority, solicit, suggest, or recommend action by
members of Congress for or against military affairs.
Second, all petitions to Congress by officers relative
to subjects of military character will be forwarded
through the General of the Army and the Secretary
of War for their action and transmittal. Third, an
officer visiting the seat of Government during a
Congressional session will, upon his arrival, register
his name at the Adjutant-General’s Office

his name at the Adjutant-General’s Office

<» now required; and in addition, address a letter to
the Adjutant General of the Army reciting the
purpose of and time that will be embraced by his writ
and the authority under which he is absent from his
command or station.

The purpose of object so recited will be the strict
guide of the officer during his stay. '

Those

restrictions amounted to a “gag" order which . . sealed
the mouths and tied the hands of the officers of the Army
about as effectively as it could be done.”

As an

example of possible consequences, Armstrong referred
to the tribulations of General Hazen who, because of his
request for an investigation into corruption at the Fort Sill
post tradership, was transferred to Fort Buford. In his
opinion, if any army officer . . should report anything
against the Secretary of War, of course when it reached
his hands he would pigeon-hole it, and he would
probably pigeon-hole the officer at the same time.’’

By the afternoon of April 4, Custer’s testimony before
the Impeachment Committee had concluded, but the

the Impeachment Committee had concluded, but the
Manning Committee on military affairs soon thrust him
back into the spotlight. It began innocently enough with
his testimony on March 31 concerning proposals for
reorganization of the army. After the appearance of
Major Lewis Merrill, Seventh Cavalry, before the
committee on April 3, it degenerated into a vendetta
against Custer by Merrill, supported by administration
newspapers. Merrill had been summoned before the
committee to answer two charges against him. The first
concerned his acceptance of twenty thousand dollars
from the South Carolina legislature as reward for
assistance in the arrest and conviction of Ku Klux Klan
members. This practice was considered improper
behavior for army officers, but it was not illegal. The
second allegation concerned the major’s acceptance of a
bribe in 1870 while acting as Judge Advocate at the
court-martial of Samuel B. Lauffer in Texas.

This

“bribe” proved to be nothing more than payment of a
gambling debt that Lauffer owed Merrill. The committee
found no evidence of Merrill’s wrong-doing and dropped
the investigation. Merrill believed Custer was the
instigator of the investigation, and

^**1^ ^1*1

the New York Times surmised that Custer disliked the
major because Merrill had once testified before an army
hearing that Custer was too harsh a disciplinarian.

' In

1872 Armstrong had brought to the attention of Colonel
Samuel D. Sturgis, Commanding Officer of the Seventh
Cavalry, the two allegations against Merrill. Sturgis
decided not to investigate the issues, and Custer
considered his responsibility and involvement ended.
Once again, however, the energetic George A. Armes
entered into the picture, and he appears to have been
Merrill s real nemesis. His motive, as usual, was revenge
because the major had been the Judge Advocate at his
court-martial. When questioned by Armes for
information he could use against Merrill, Armstrong
unwisely mentioned the KKK payment and the possible
bribe from Lauffer With that information, Armes pushed
for an investigation into Merrill's conduct.

Armstrong was well aware of the liabilities of becoming a

Armstrong was well aware of the liabilities of becoming a
political

football that could be kicked around by Democrats and
Republicans

or their own benefits. His efforts to avoid partisan politics
were

expressed to Libbie: “I have been invited to a dinner at
the Manhattan

Club the Democratic Club of New York, with the
promise that it

would be nonpolitical with no speeches. My duties here
prevent my accepting.

41 }

With his testimony before the Manning and Clymer
Committees completed. Armstrong considered his duties
done, and he was anx-

nf H

° '|

X ,Urn l

rI ijnco

n Custer w

as informed on a

regular basis of developments at the fort in his absence,
and he was not pleased

and he was not pleased

, .

of hls

subordinate, Major Marcus A. Reno. The

major

for wT

COmraand of ,he

Seventh with Armstrong's

departure

from h\ 2

" -

ThC posslbllit

>’

that Cus

<er would not be

released

marehed t “il‘° "*

eachm

™‘ Board before the Seventh

telegraphed

"4°“ ” “S"'

5, by R

™°

llZn'TT*!

e,egram and the

M“rs « that he

is makin fi

,he

the expedition here

.making large expenses and S. Bull is waiting on the
Little

~ -

feel Iwiil tU> credit

Terry’s reply was not encouraging, so on April 16, Reno

Terry’s reply was not encouraging, so on April 16, Reno
pleaded to General Sheridan to intercede; but the general
tersely replied that Terry was in charge of the expedition
and he did not wish to interfere with his plans.

As the impeachment trial opened on April 17, attacks on
Custer increased. The New York Herald, under the
heading “Effect of Custer’s Exposures - A Counter
Attack in Progress - The General Ready for the Fray,”
described the point-counterpoint.

Ex-Secretary Belknap and his friends are collecting
material to make out a case against General Custer
with a view to having him tried by court-martial
before General Terry at St. Paul. Belknap has
secured copies of the testimony given before Proctor
Knott’s and Clymer’s committee, and he is collecting
the testimony given by General Custer concerning
the post tradership and Indian frauds of the Upper
Missouri River. It is charged that Custer swore
falsely and it is on that ground that an attempt is to
be made to court-martial him. The General does not
seem to be alarmed. He says he is willing to have his
record examined with the closest scrutiny and every

record examined with the closest scrutiny and every
official act of his life thoroughly investigated. He did
only what he considered his duty, and he does not
regret that he exposed any irregularities that came to
his knowledge.

Despite their threats, evidently the

material collected by Belknap and friends was not
sufficient to warrant a court-martial at St. Paul or
elsewhere.

Finally, probably with a feeling of great relief, Armstrong
telegraphed Terry on April 20 that he was enroute to St.
Paul via New York and Detroit.

His joy was short-

lived. On April 22, Sergeant-at-Arms of the Senate,
George A. French, telegraphed to General Sheridan in
Chicago requesting the location of Custer. Sheridan, who
did not care at all for the political pyrotechnics in
Washington or for the absence of Armstrong from his
command, snapped back: I do not know where General
George Armstrong Custer is. I thought he was in
Washington. It is possible General A. H, Terry at St.
Paul, where

Custer belongs, can tell you.”

On April 24, Armstrong

was unpleasantly surprised in New York by a deputy

was unpleasantly surprised in New York by a deputy
sergeant-at-arms who delivered to him another
summons. Custer considered his delay to be only
temporary since he doubted the impeachment managers
needed additional testimony from him. To facilitate his
release, Armstrong requested that Terry telegraph the
managers and stress the necessity of his presence at Fort
Lincoln.

Optimistically, Armstrong wrote to Libbie on

the 28th:

There is a strong possibility - I certainly hope well-
founded - that the Senate will decide, General
Belknap having resigned, the case lies outside its
jurisdiction. I saw General Sherman today at the War
Department, also had an interview with the Secretary
of War who will write the Impeachment Board,
requesting my release to return to my duties. Do not
be anxious. I seek to follow a moderate and prudent
course, avoiding prominence. Nevertheless,
everything I do, however simple and unimportant, is
noticed and commented on. This only makes me more
careful.**

Armstrong’s attempt to walk softly was a little late, for

Armstrong’s attempt to walk softly was a little late, for
unknown to him earlier on the 28th, Terry had received
the following telegram from Sheridan: “The General of
the Army telegraphs me that instructions have been
received through the Secretary of War coming from the
President to send someone other than Custer in charge of
the expedition from Fort Lincoln.”

After an exchange

of telegrams it w as agreed that Terry should command
the expedition in person.

rant was clearly the moving force behind the removal of
Custer rom field command. Realistically, the entire affair
should have been one of the president’s business; it was
not his decision, but rather

me impeachment Board’s concerning the testimony.
While it is true that Grant wa< of our nation’s armed
forces, the decision the Dakota column belonged with the
two Sheridan and Terry. Terry, with Sheridan designed
the operation with Custer in chart

necessity of Armstrong’s s the commander-in-chief on
who should command department commanders, s

who should command department commanders, s
blessing, had originally je, and they had no reason

to replace him if he could be released from his duties in
Washington.

In reality, Grant had two reasons for replacing Custer:
partisan politics and personal revenge. Grant was still
considered by some as a possible candidate for a third
term in the White House, and the popular Custer’s
presence before the Clymer Committee indirectly
damaged Grant’s chances, in particular, and
Republicans, in general. Although the president was not
overly fond of his younger brother, Orvil, he was family,
and Custer had implicated him in the illicit sale of post
traderships. Yes, Grant had enough motivation for
replacing Custer, and he exercised the power of his
office to that end.

No one could say that Custer was not a fighter, and he
was not about to roll over and play dead. On the 29th he
obtained his release from the impeachment managers and
followed Sherman’s advice to confer with the president
on May 1 before departing from Fort Lincoln. The

on May 1 before departing from Fort Lincoln. The
afternoon of the 29th he confidently telegraphed Terry
that he would depart Monday, the first of May, for duty
with his command since he had been granted authority
that day.

Even though the proper authorities, the

impeachment managers, and the General of the Army,
Sherman, had granted Custer permission to return to
Fort Lincoln, the president was determined to undermine
his plans.

In compliance with Sherman’s wishes, Armstrong
appeared at the White House on the morning of May 1.
His card was sent to the president at 10:00 a.m., but it
solicited no response. Custer cooled his heels in an
anteroom until 3:00 p.m. when he finally received word
that Grant would not see him. Frustrated and angered,
Custer left a written note for Grant before departing:

Today for the third time I have sought an interview
with the president - not to solicit a favor, except to
be granted a brief hearing - but to remove from his
mind certain unjust impressions concerning myself
which I have reason to believe are entertained
against me. I desire this opportunity as a matter of

against me. I desire this opportunity as a matter of
justice, and I regret that the president has declined to
give me an opportunity to submit to him a brief
statement, which justice to him, as well as to me,
demanded.

General Sherman was in New York and was expected
to return that evening. Armstrong made three attempts to
contact Sherman, but he failed; however, he had already
received, as noted, his permission to return to Fort
Lincoln. In accordance with the proper military
procedures, Custer obtained approval from Adjutant
General Edward D. Townsend and Inspector General
Randolph B. Marcy to leave.

Following the maxim that the best defense is a good
offense, Custer fired one last salvo at Grant before
departing Washington. Both the New York World and
the New York Herald headlines on May 2 screamed:
Grant’s Revenge. He Relieves General Custer of His
Command. T he General’s Reward for Testifying Against
the Administration.” The president was accused of . .
high-handed abuse of his

o icial power.” When General Sherman defended Custer

o icial power.” When General Sherman defended Custer
by telling Grant that Armstrong was the best qualified
man to lead the expedition, the president allegedly replied
that . . this man Custer had come here both as a witness
and a prosecutor in the Belknap matter to besmirch his
administration, and he proposed to put a stop to it.” In
conclusion, the article postulated that Grant would
defend his action by claiming Custer would not be able to
return to Fort Lincoln in time to assume command of the
expedition before it marched. Since

mam

h *****

fr0m sub

™ by the impeachment

was Ime Th

W3S

n HiS Way t0 FOft LinC

’

Grant

’

S eXCUSe

Custer’s

arU

001 designed to

P^cate the president, and n J

gY produccd the

opposite desired effect.

he ignored^

0 rep

rtCd an intef

view with Custer in which

his remrn tott

COnt

H°

^ ^

InStead he chose to trum

command of h'1 ' ^ °

rmm8 the

ubIi

c that he was ready to

take “r “

field 0pera

“°

ns a

‘ 'he Sioux.'

But

en™,e

°2T„

CIrCUraVCn,ed

' °

n May 3 Whi,e

™

™ ™r

‘sHe “rc sCr ’

,he foi,owin8

iZiin™rrT

vised ,hat

Generai cu

«"

2, ISwZ ,

hon

^»“>n Lincoln. He was

otjustified ,n leaving without seeing We President
and

myself. Please intercept him and await further
orders; meantime, let the expedition proceed without
him.

As noted, Grant refused to see Custer, and

Sherman had previously given Armstrong permission to
depart for Lincoln. Pressure on Sherman originated with
the occupant of the White House.

Oblivious to the gathering storm, Armstrong was already
aboard the train bound for St. Paul when Sheridan’s
Adjutant Colonel James A. Forsyth arrested him on the
morning of May 4. If Custer had previously been
frustrated and angered by Grant, now shock and
humiliation could be added to the list. An exchange of

humiliation could be added to the list. An exchange of
telegrams among Custer, Terry, Sheridan, and Sherman
resulted on May 5 with the following message from
Sherman to Sheridan and Terry:

Have just come from the President who orders that
General Custer be allowed to rejoin his post, to
remain there on duty, but not to accompany the
expedition supposed to be on the point of starting
against the hostile Indians under General Terry.

Custer arrived at Terry’s headquarters in St. Paul on
May 6. For Armstrong, it was not only a question of how
far his friendships with Terry, Sheridan, and Sherman
would carry him, but also how effective would pressure
from anti-administration newspapers be in winning back
his command. The combination of the two ultimately
tipped the scales in Custer’s favor for a marginal victory.

From all indications, Armstrong remained in constant
communication with the New York Herald, which took
the lead in Custer’s counterattack. On May 4 it opened
up with:

Suddenly he (Custer) is deprived of a command
which he has always held with distinguished honor,
and sent back to his regiment disgraced
professionally, so far as an order of the President can
disgrace him. We have no reason assigned for that
act except we read in the Washington column of a
contemporary that the President did not mean to
allow Custer to smirch the administration.

If the

fourth was a skirmish against the president by the
Herald, then the sixth was an all-out frontal assault.
Headlines read, “Custer

Sacrificed, Interception in Chicago by the President’s
Order, Stripped of His Command, and the Indian
Expedition to Go Forward without Him.” In its effort to
discover why Custer was dismissed from command, the
Herald concluded that:

If appears that the only reason given for this step
was that George Custer had left Washington without
first paying his respects to the president. No formal
charges are preferred against Custer, and he is

charges are preferred against Custer, and he is
disgraced simply because he did not crook the
pregnant hinges of the knee’ to this modem Caesar,

While opposition newspapers hammered away at Grant,
Custer appealed to Terry for his personal intercession.
With Terry’s assistance, the following telegram was
drafted as a final plea on Custer’s behalf and forwarded
through military channels to the president: To His
Excellency, the President:

I have seen your order transmitted through the

General of the Army directing that I be not permitted

to accompany the expedition to move against the

hostile Indians. As my entire regiment forms a part

of the expedition and as I am the senior officer of

the regiment on duty in this department I respectfully

but most earnestly request that while not allowed to

go in command of the expedition I may be permitted

to serve with

regiment in the field. I appeal to

you as a soldier to spare me the humiliation of seeing

my regiment march to meet the enemy and I not
share its dangers.

G. A. Custer-

was

cautiously endorsed by Terry:

ZmZT

T “

b0Ve

Wi5h

‘°

Say

’ that /

aZ Z ,7“ T" ‘°

queMon ,be

°fa» m*!-

ColonelCuTJ ZTj*

SUperiors

Whether Lieutenant umn

or not it n *

’

ermi,,e

‘

*> accompany the col-

the reasons uhonf° 1"

COmmand

°f <*■

1 d

° not know

reasons upon wh,ch the orders given rest; but if these

reasons’ do not forbid it, Lieutenant Colonel Custer’s
services would be very valuable with this regiment,

Alfred H. Terry.

The sordid affair was drawn to a close on May 8 when
Sherman telegrammed to Terry:

The dispatch of General Sheridan enclosing yours of
yesterday touching General Custer’s urgent request
to go under your command with his regiment, has
been submitted to the President, who sends me word
that, if you want General Custer along, he withdraws
his objections. Advise Custer to be prudent and not
to take along any newspapermen, who always work
mischief and to abstain from any personalities in the
future.

The source usually cited for that telegram is

Robert Hughes’ “Campaign Against the Sioux,” written
in 1896 in defense of his brother-in-law, General Terry.
Hughes served as captain and aide to Terry during the
1876 Sioux campaign, and he was never an ardent
admirer of Custer. Since the 1896 publication of Hughes’
article, subsequent writers have relied on his version of
Sherman’s telegram. However, in the National Archives
the unedited telegram concluded with some revealing
personal advice from Sherman: “Tell him 1 want him to

personal advice from Sherman: “Tell him 1 want him to
confine his whole mind to his legitimate office and trust to
time. That newspaper paragraph in the New' York
World of May second, compromised his best friends
here, and almost deprived us of the ability to serve
him.”

Here, then, is tacit confirmation from an

authoritative source, Sherman, that Grant’s decision to
replace Custer was precipitated by the New York
World article of May 2.

The extent of Custer’s involvement in the Belknap Affair
is difficult to ascertain. Insufficient evidence exists to
substantiate charges that Armstrong initiated the Belknap
investigation. His first priority was the organization of the
expected Sioux campaign, and he reluctantly obeyed his
summons to appear before the Clymer Committee.

Although most of his testimony was based on hearsay
and contained little of intrinsic value, Custer’s
prominence imparted a significant value to it for the
purpose of partisan Democratic propaganda. Vi hen

President Grant removed Armstrong from command of
the Dakota column, he played into the Democrats’

the Dakota column, he played into the Democrats’
hands. Whether Custer desired it or not, he became a
hot political issue in an election year, and that is the key
to understanding attempts to discredit Custer in the
aftermath of the Little Big Horn disaster.

1*1 1*1^_______^11*1

CHAPTER II - FOOTNOTES
w^w^w

★

w^w

CHAPTER II - FOOTNOTES

'New York Times, 17 September 1866.

New York Times, 6 March 1876; Edgar I. Stewart,

Custer’s Luck (Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma
Press, 1955), pp. 120-121.

U. S. Congress, House, Index to Reports of

Committee of the House of Representatives, Serial
No. 1715, 44th Cong., 1st sess., 1876.

'New York Times, 6 March 1876; Monaghan, Custer,
p. 368; John

S. Gray, Centennial Campaign, the Sioux War of
1876 (Ft. Collins, CO: The Old Army Press, 1976), p.
59.

Bismarck Tribune, 21 July 1875.

Ibid.

John Gray, Centennial Campaign (Ft. Collins, CO:

The Old Army Press, 1976), p. 61.

* Reports of Committee, p. 157.

"Gray, Centennial Campaign, p. 60.

Ibid., p. 61.

"Monaghan, Custer, p. 362.

Merrington, Custer Story, p. 278.

‘^Whitakker, Complete Life of General George A.
Custer, p. 638. ^Department of Dakota, Miscellaneous
File: Little Big Horn Expedition, 1876, Record Group
93, National Archives Record Service, Washington, D
C.

Stewart, Caster’s Luck, p. 121.

''’New York Times, 3 March 1876.

Gray, Centennial Campaign, p. 61.

partm<

;

nt ot Dakot

a, Letters Received, 1876, Record

partm<

;

nt ot Dakot

a, Letters Received, 1876, Record

Group - '3, National Archives Record Service,
Washington, D.C.

New York Herald, 6 May 1876.

thlM /v"

“

“’

Thf

Campaign Against the Sioux,"

Journal of tbe MMtary Service Institution 17 (January
1896V8 New York Times, 3 March 1876.

“McFeeley, Grant. A Biography, p. 433.

Reports of Committee, p. 153; Stewart, Custer's

Luck, p. 126.

/bid., p. 154.

Ibid., p. 154; Stewart, Custer’s Luck, pp. 127-128.

Ibid., p. 155; Stewart, Custer’s Luck, p. 129; Gray,

Centennial Campaign, p. 60.

Ibid., p. 179-

2ti

The Nation, 16 March 1876.

‘Reports of Committee, pp. 155 and 158; Stewart,
Custer’s Luck, p. 129-

Ibidp. 159; Stewart, Custer’s Luck, p. 128.

Ibid„ p.

164.

Ibid., p. 162.

Ibid., pp. 230 and 234; Gray, Centennial Campaign,

pp. 65-66.

Gray, Centennial Campaign, pp. 65-66.

Ibid., pp. 162-163.

i(,

Ibid.

Ibid., p. 163.

New York Times, 5 April 1876; Gray, Centennial

Campaign, pp. 64-65.

New York Times, 5 April 1876.

Gray, Centennial Campaign, pp. 63-65.

^'Merrington, Custer Story, p. 284.

Charles Francis Bates, Custer’s Indian Battles

(Bronxville, NY: By the Author, 1936), p. 28.

^Department of Missouri: Letters Sent, 1876, Record
Group 393, National Archives Record Service,
Washington, D.C.

^New York Herald, 18 April 1876.

Hughes, “Campaign Against the Sioux,” p. 8.

Missouri Letters Sent, RG 393, #266.

~Hughes, “Campaign Against the Sioux,” p. 8.

Merrington, Custer Story, p. 292.

Hughes, “Campaign Against the Sioux,” p. 9.

Monaghan, Custer, p. 367; Gray, Centennial

Campaign, pp. 67-68; Stewart, Custer’s Luck, pp.
132-134.

’’Hughes, “Campaign Against the Sioux,” p. 9.

General George A. Custer, Note to President Ulysses

S. Grant, 1 May 1876, William J. Ghent, Library of
Congress, Washington, D.C.

^Hughes, “Campaign Against the Sioux,” p. 10.

New York World, 2 May 1876; New York Herald, 2

May 1876.

^Hughes, “Campaign Against the Sioux,” p. 10.

J. P. Dunn, Massacres of the Mountains. A History

of the Indian Wars of the Far West 1815-1875 (New
York: Archer House, 1886), p. 513; Gray, Centennial
Campaign, pp. 70-71; Monaghan, Custer, p. 367;
Stewart, Custer’s Luck, pp. 133-134.

“’’Hughes, “Campaign Against the Sioux,” p. 11.

New York Herald, 4 May 1876.

Ibid., 6 May 1876,

Hughes, “Campaign Against the Sioux,” p. 13.

Ibid., p. 13.

Ibid., pp. 13-14.

^Department of Dakota, Letters Received, 1876,
Record Group 393, National Archives Record Service,
Washington, D C.

THE 1876 SIOUX CAMPAIGN: CUSTER
MARCHES TO THE LITTLE BIG HORN

The Bismarck Tribune on May 10, 1876, informed its
readers: It now seems certain that General Terry will
command in person the Black Hills expedition,
General Custer detained in Washington as a witness
in the impeachment case. The expedition will consist
of twelve companies of cavalry under command of
Major M. A. Reno.

Shock and disappointment must

have registered on Reno’s face when Custer strutted into
his Fort Lincoln headquarters the following day and
signed General Order Number Seven, thereby assuming
command of the regiment.

command of the regiment.

Impetus for the 1876 expedition against recalcitrant
bands of Sioux and Cheyennes lay in Custer’s 1874
Black Hill expedition. Ostensibly, that expedition was
organized for the purpose of charting the basically
unknown region for potential fort locations and possible
routes for the erection of telegraph lines. Unofficially, the
trip was a quest for confirmation of gold deposits.

For the Sioux who owned the Black Hills, that region
was the sacred “Pa Sapa,” the hunting ground of the
“Great Spirit,” and they adamantly refused to relinquish
title to the territory. In 1868, when the United States
government had no use for the Black Hills, it was ceded
to the Sioux as part of the Great Sioux Reservation under
the Treaty of Fort Laramie. Article twelve of the treaty
required approval by three-fourths of all adult male Sioux
before any part of the reservation could be ceded. In
response to government requests, approximately twenty
thousand Sioux, Cheyennes, and Arapaho met with a
government commission near Camp Robinson,
Nebraska, September 1875. The military representative
on the commission was General Terry, and for the Sioux,

on the commission was General Terry, and for the Sioux,
Spotted Tail (Brule) and Red Cloud (Oglala) were
spokesmen. Conspicuously absent were the Sioux’s
most prominent war leaders, Sitting Bull (Hunkpapa) and
Crazy Horse (Oglala); they refused to be enticed by the
government’s promise of free gifts. For mineral rights to
the Black Hills the Sioux were offered four hundred
thousand dollars per annum, and for outright sale the
offer reached six million dollars. Speaking for the Sioux,
Spotted Tail indignantly rejected both offers; the Black
Hills were not for sale at any price.

In order to achieve control of the Black Hills, an
ingeniously simple plan was adopted by the War
Department in cooperation with the Department of the
Interior and President Grant. First of all, mining areas in
the Black Hills were opened for prospectors; the army
would remain neutral and no longer evict trespassers on
the Sioux Reservation. Logically, the government
assumed that increased intrusions into their territory
would induce the Sioux to retaliate, whereupon the
government could claim previous treaties to be violated.

In order to ensure success, on December, 3, 1875,

In order to ensure success, on December, 3, 1875,
Secretary of Interior Zachariah Chandler addressed a
request to Secretary of War Belknap requesting action
be taken against hostile Sioux who roamed outside their
reservation. Those errant groups, the largest of which
were the Hunkpapa band led by Sitting Bull, and an
Oglala band led by Crazy Horse, were delivered an
ultimatum: move to the nearest agency January 31, 18

or military force would be dispatched to compel them to
obey the order.

As expected, the plan progressed, and

on February 1 Chandler notified Belknap that since the
Sioux under Sitting Bull s leadership had failed to comply
with the 3rd of December directive the date specified
(January 31, 1876) the War Department would direct
the army to force Sitting Bull into compliance.

Overall, responsibility for organizing the plan of attack
was given to General Philip H. Sheridan, Commander of
the Military Division of the Missouri. Within his division
were the Department of the Platte under General George
Crook and the Department of the Dakota under

eneral Alfred H. Terry; they were notified by Sheridan on
February

February

SPOTTED TAIL Courtesy Mercaldo Archives

RED CLOUD Courtesy Mercaldo Archives

SITTING BULL Courtesy McrcaJdo Archives

1*1^ -x- w

10, 1876, from the Secretary of War to initiate hostilities
against the Sioux. At that point Sheridan’s only advice to
Terry was that Crook would move from his base in
Wyoming north towards the headquarters of the Powder
and Big Horn Rivers. In addition, department lines were

and Big Horn Rivers. In addition, department lines were
to be disregarded by the commanders and operations
were not to be in concert.

Originally, Sheridan’s plan was based on the same idea
that had proven successful in 1868 and had resulted in
Custer’s attack on Black Kettle’s village along the
Washita River.

As before, strategy called for a winter

campaign with an incursion of three attacking columns
into Indian territory. Planning could not be precise
because the exact location of the two main hostile camps
was not known, but at least during winter they were less
likely to be roaming the wilderness. Possibly, then, the
hostiles could have been anywhere in a vast triangular
region encompassed by the Yellowstone, Big Horn, and
Little Missouri Rivers.

The best early intelligence reports placed Crazy Horse
on the Rosebud River and Sitting Bull on the Little
Missouri, and so plans were made accordingly. Crook’s
responsibility was Crazy Horse, so he was to march from
Fort Fetterman, Wyoming, northward into the Powder
River-Rosebud River area. Colonel John Gibbon, with a
small force, was to move eastward from Fort Ellis,

small force, was to move eastward from Fort Ellis,
Montana, along the \ ellow stone. Custer, with twelve
companies of the Seventh Cavalry, w as to move
westward from Fort Lincoln to the Little Missouri River
where it was believed Sitting Bull was waiting for him.
Eventually, t e Dakota and Montana columns united, but
two elements delayed t e Dakota column - bad weather
and the absence of its scheduled ie d commander,
Custer, who was in Washington.

rook s Wyoming column was first into the field on March
1. With

com

es an

d two infantry companies,

approximately

’

arte

d Fort Fetterman

northwards towards the Big fumed!?

Unta

S Aittlou

was in

charge of the expedition, Crook I i»

eCliV C

comman

d of the column to elderly General John

temn<-r it ^

Cal

ler was ni

ghtmarish with blinding blizzards

and mperatures of 25 degrees below zero; however, on
March 16, a

village was detected on the Powder River. Crook
ordered Reynolds to take three battalions, surround the

ordered Reynolds to take three battalions, surround the
village, and attack at dawn. Initially, the surprise attack
was successful, but the stunned Sioux and Cheyennes
quickly regrouped and provided strong resistance. After
suffering only four killed and with frigid temperatures
approaching 30° below zero, Reynolds decided to retire
from the field and reunite with Crook. The combined
columns then struggled back to Fort Fetterman where the
disgruntled Crook promptly preferred court-martial
charges against Reynolds.

While Crook procrastinated at Fort Fetterman, Terry
prepared to march with Custer as his cavalry
commander. Terry informed Sheridan of his plans in a
May 15 letter:

Information from several independent sources seems
to establish the fact that the Sioux are collected in
camps on the Little Missouri and between that and
the Powder River.

I have already ordered Colonel Gibbon to move
eastward and suggest that it would be very desirable
for General Crook’s column to move up as soon as
possible. It is represented they have 1500 lodges, are

possible. It is represented they have 1500 lodges, are
confident, and intend to make a stand. Should they
do so, and should the three columns be able to act
simultaneously, I should expect great success. We
start tomorrow morning.

Although Terry preferred to plan cautiously, Sheridan
was less concerned about their opposition. He
telegraphed Terry on the 16th: Your telegram received.
I will hurry up Crook, but you must rely on the ability
ofyour own column for best success. I believe it to be
fully equal to all the Sioux which can be brought
against it, and only hope they will hold fast to meet
it. Keep me as well posted as you can, and depend
upon my full assistance in every respect. You know
the impossibility of any large number of Indians
keeping together as a hostile body for even one
week.

! 1

Sheridan’s belief in the superiority of the

American soldier over his Indian counterpart and his
opinion that any large number of Indians could not remain
together for very long were typical of the

PHILIP HENRY SHERIDAN Courtesy New York
Historical Society

Historical Society

GEORGE CROOK

(:nun

**y Utovty of Confess Bnufy-Hatuty Collection

WR TEKBY

Courtesy National Archives Brady Collection

stereotyped and ethnocentric views that contributed
greatly to the Little Big Horn disaster.

In answer to Terry’s request, Sheridan informed Crook
on the 16th that Terry was departing and urged him to
move into action as quickly as possible. Unfortunately for
Crook, he did march on May 29- On June 17, in the
Rosebud valley, his thirteen hundred-man column was
struck by a numerically inferior force of Sioux and
Cheyennes directed by Crazy Horse. The battle was a
definite moral victory for the hostiles who were intent on
stopping Crook’s advance on their encampment which
was less than fifty miles away. Staggered by the loss of

was less than fifty miles away. Staggered by the loss of
nine men killed, Crook retreated to the familiar sanctuary
of Wyoming. To make matters worse, Crook failed to
communicate with Terry concerning the battle, location of
hostiles, or, most importantly, their newly revealed
aggressive tactics.

On May 17, 1876, the Dakota column marched out of
Fort Lincoln as the regimental band played "Garry Owen
and The Girl I

Left Behind Me.” Libbie accompanied her husband for
the first day’s journey and camped with him that night. In
the dawn light of the following morning, she waved
farewell to her beloved Autie for the last time.

If Custer was depressed about his “humiliation” at the
hands of Grant, it was not discerned by reporter Mark
Kellogg. Although the president had warned Armstrong
to stay away from newspapermen, Kellogg, who
represented the Bismarck Tribune and New York
Herald, was allowed by the expedition’s commander,
General Terry, to join them. The intrepid reporter was
doomed to die with Custer at the Little Big Horn, but
much of his correspondence was published posthumously

much of his correspondence was published posthumously
by the papers for which he wrote. From camp on the
Heart River, May 17, 1876, he described Armstrong:

General Custer is full of life and spirit, the same true
soldier, exhibiting the dashing bravery of a man who
knows no fear, true to the life in him. His energy is
unbounded. Fatigue leaves no traces on him, and
whatever care passes him is hidden within his inner
self.

His men respect him, and will do brave things under
his

leadership.

Perhaps Armstrong was merely acting carefree, but in
reality he had every reason to be happy. Washington,
with its byzantine politics, was far behind him and ahead
was his greatest thrill - the promise of battle. Although
Terry was in overall command, Armstrong did march at
the head of his Seventh Cavalry, and accompanying him
were his brothers, Tom and Boston, and nephew, Autie
Reed. Financially, his prospects were at their zenith,

Reed. Financially, his prospects were at their zenith,
thanks to the Redpath offer. Two developments of which
he was never to learn would have perhaps pleased him
the most. On May 29, 1876, U. S. Grant formally
announced that he would not seek a third term, a
decision partially induced by revelations of the Belknap
scandal. In mid-June the House passed a bill authorizing
the president to retire Colonel William H. Emory, Fifth
Cavalry, with the rank of Brigadier General. Lieutenant
Colonel Wesley Merritt replaced Emory as Colonel of
the Fifth; consequently, the next senior lieutenant colonel
and first on the promotion list was G. A. Custer.
Ironically, whether Custer found his quarry or not, he
soon would have received his first promotion in ten
years.

May 29 it became obvious that Sitting Bull was not

to be found

on the Little Missouri River. Terry then moved west
paralleling the

Yellowstone River to join with Colonel Gibbon who had
been in the

field since April 1 with his Montana column. On the
evening of June

8 aboard the supply steamer Far West, Terry received
reports from

Gibbon’s chief scout, Lieutenant James Bradley, of the
presence of

a large \ illage containing about four-hundred lodges in
the Rosebud valley.

Acting on that information, Terry dispatched Major
Marcus A. Reno on a scouting mission down the Powder
River and across to the Tongue River Reno discovered
an old trail and followed it to the Rosebud, in clear
violation of Terry’s specific orders. The hapless major
further complicated his difficulties by not following the
trail ar enough to ascertain if it diverged westward from
the Rosebud towar s t e Big Horn River. Terry
expressed his disgust at Reno’s course of action in his
diary entry of June 19:

In the afternoon received dispatches from Major

In the afternoon received dispatches from Major
Reno in forming me that he had been to the mouth of
Rosebud

CAPTAIN THOMAS W. CUSTER Courtesy of
Custer Battlefield Mrs. E.B. Custer Collection

LT. COLONEL G.A. CUSTER Courtesy of the
National Archives

BOSTON CUSTER Courtesy of Custer ttattieftek/

HARRY ARMSTRONG REED Courtesy of Custer
BattlefieUi

^1*1

.... sent Hughes to meet Reno .... Reno gave him no

.... sent Hughes to meet Reno .... Reno gave him no
reason for his disobedience of orders.

★

Custer, as per Special Field Order Number 12, was
impatiently awaiting Reno’s arrival at the mouth of the
Tongue River.’

Terry’s original plan called for him to

march up the Tongue with nine companies of cavalry and
then across and down the Rosebud, while Gibbon
moved up the Rosebud.

Reno’s reconnaissance

invalidated that plan, so in order to coordinate a new
effort, Terry called for a conference.

On June 21 aboard the Far West the final planning
session took place with the chief officers, General Terry,
Lieutenant Colonel Custer, Colonel Gibbon, and Major
Brisbin, in attendance. General Sheridan, in Philadelphia
for centennial festivities, received news by telegram via
Chicago of Terry’s plan on the 4th of July:

No Indians have been met with as yet, but traces of a
large and recent village have been discovered 20 or

large and recent village have been discovered 20 or
30 miles up the Rosebud. Gibbon’s column will move
this morning on the north side of the Yellowstone for
the mouth of the Big Horn, where it will be ferried
across by the supply steamer, and where it will
proceed to the mouth of the Little Horn, and so on.
Custer will go up the Rosebud tomorrow with his
whole regiment and thence to the headwaters of the
Little Horn, thence down the Little Horn.

I only hope that one of the two columns will find the
Indians. I go personally with Gibbon.™

I hose last two sentences are very important. They
indicate that the exact location of the hostile village was
not known, that Terry expected the columns to operate
independently, and that Custer cer-tamly had permission
to find the Indians with his column of twelve ca\ alr\
companies. W hen that statement was released two days
later < t e eastern newspapers, the last two sentences
were mysteriously

efr

S WaS

ast

°®cial information received by

Shendan and .he War Department prior to news of

Shendan and .he War Department prior to news of
Custer s defeat which occurred on June 25, 1876.

Lieutenant Janies Bradley, who served with Gibbon’s
column, entered in his diary on June 21, 1876:

It is understood that if Custer arrives first, he is at
liberty to attack at once if he deems prudent. We
have little hope of being in at the death, as Custer
will undoubtedly exert himself to the utmost to get
there first and win all the laurels for himself and his
regiment.

Bradley described Custer’s subsequent

behavior accurately, and implicit in his statement was the
belief that Custer had authorization to attack the hostiles
if he discovered their village.

On the morning of June 22, Custer wrote his last article
for the New York Herald. By previous arrangement with
that paper he agreed to supplement Kellogg’s reports.
Like a voice from the grave Custer dramatically informed
the Herald readers of his plan in an article that was
published over a month after his death:

Yesterday, Terry, Gibbon, and Custer got together,
and with unanimity of opinion decided that Custer

and with unanimity of opinion decided that Custer
should start with his command up the Rosebud valley
to the point where Reno had abandoned the trail,
take up the latter and follow the Indians as long and
as far as horse flesh and human endurance could
carry his command. Custer takes no wagons or tents
with his command, but proposes to live and travel
like Indians; in this manner the command will be able
to go wherever the Indians can.

Gibbon s command has started for the mouth of the
Big Horn. Terry, in the Far West starts for the same
point today, where, with Gibbon’s force and the Far
West equipped with thirty days' supplies, he will push
up the Big Horn as far as navigation of that stream
will permit, probably as far as Old Fort C. F. Smith,
at which point Custer will reform the expedition after
completing his present scout.

Custer’s command takes with it, on pack mules,
rations for fifteen days. Custer advised his
subordinate officers, however, in regard to rations,
that it would be well to carry an extra supply of salt,
because, if at the end of

because, if at the end of

fifteen days the command should be pursuing a trail,
he did not propose to turn back for lack of rations,
but would subsist his men on fresh meat - game, if
the country afforded it, pack mules if nothing better
offered.

His article revealed two important facts: his

fierce determination to locate the village, and that his only
tentative limitation was the fifteen days after which he
was to rejoin the Terry-Gibbon columns around Fort C.
F. Smith on the Big Horn. No mention was made of
cooperating with the Terry-Gibbon columns at any
specific destination for a coordinated attack on a hostile
village.

Terry noted in his diary that he gave Custer his orders on
the morning of June 22, and that he marched out around
12:00 noon.

Those orders were the final instructions

received by Custer, and as such they remain supremely
important. Because of their nature, although lengthy, they
must be quoted.

The Brigadier General commanding directs that, as
soon as your regiment can be made ready for the

soon as your regiment can be made ready for the
march, you will proceed up the Rosebud in pursuit of
the Indians whose trail was discovered by Major
Reno a few days since.

It is, of course, impossible to give you any definite
instructions in regard to this movement, and were it
not impossible to do so the Department Commander
places too much confidence in your zeal, energy, and
ability to wish to impose on you precise orders which
might hamper your action when nearly in contact
with the enemy. He will, however, indicate to you his
own views of what your action should be, and he
desires that you should conform to them unless you
shall see sufficient reason for depart-wgfrom them.
He thinks that you should proceed up the Rosebud
until you ascertain definitely the direction in which
the trail above spoken of leads. Should it be found
(as it appears almost certain that it will be found) to
turn toward the Little Horn, he thinks that you
should still proceed southward, perhaps as far as the
headwaters of the ngue, and then turn toward the
Little Horn, feeling

constantly however, for your left, so as to preclude

constantly however, for your left, so as to preclude
the possibility of the escape of the Indians to the
south or southeast by passing your left flank. The
column of Colonel Gibbon is now in motion for the
mouth of the Big Horn. As soon as it reaches that
point it will cross the Yellowstone and move up at
least as far as the forks of the Big and Little Horns.
Of course, its future movements must be controlled
by circumstances as they arise, but it is hoped that
the Indians, if upon the Little Horn, may be so nearly
enclosed by the two columns that their escape will be
impossible.

The Department Commander desires that on your
way up the Rosebud that you should thoroughly
examine the upper part of Tullock’s Creek, and that
you should endeavor to send a scout through to
Colonel Gibbon’s column, with information of the
results of your examination. The lower part of the
creek will be examined by a detachment from
Colonel Gibbon’s command. The supply steamer will
be pushed up the Big Horn as far as the forks of the
river if found to be navigable for that distance, and
the Department Commander, who will accompany

the Department Commander, who will accompany
the column of Colonel Gibbon, desires you to report
to him there not later than the expiration time for
which your troops are rationed unless in the
meantime you receive further orders.

Semantics aside, it appears that much was left up to
Custer s discretion. Terry, not knowing of the village
location, realized the necessity for flexible orders. Again,
no rendezvous point was discussed other than the mouth
of the Little Horn at the end of Custer s fifteen-day ration
period. As Custer led his regiment out on the 22nd, he
was not worried about the consequences if he
encountered the enemy; his main concern was whether
his column would be the first to discover the hostiles. It
was the first, and by the afternoon of June 25, 1876, the
bodies of Custer and five companies under his immediate
command lay scattered along a ridge too far.

CHAPTER III—FOOTNOTES

'Bismarck Tribune, 18 May 1876.

Seventh Cavalry Order Book, 11 May 1876, Record

Group 391, National Archives Record Service,
Washington, D.C.

Dee Brown, Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee (New

York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1971), pp. 264-270;
Dunn, Massacres of the Mountains, pp. 503, 504, 510.

New York Times, 4 November 1875; Gray,
Centennial Campaign, pp. 23-24; McFeely, Grant,
pp. 437-438.

Department of Dakota; Letters Received, 1876,

Record Group 393, National Archives Record Service,
Washington, D C.

Ibid., 1 February 1876.

Ibid., 10 February 1876.

Stan Hoig, The Battle of the Washita (Lincoln, NE:
University of Nebraska Press, 1976), pp. 90-94.

Gray, Centennial Campaign, pp. 47-57; Dunn,
Massacres of the ountams, P 511; John G. Bourke, On

Massacres of the ountams, P 511; John G. Bourke, On
the Border with Crook (New York: Charles Scribner’s
Sons, 1891), pp. 254-280

™

°f Missouri, Letters Received, 15 May 1876,

Record

Department of Dakota: “General and Special Orders,”

Special Order Number 12, Record Group 393, 1876,
National Archives Record Service, Washington, D.C.

Terry, “Diary,” 4 July 1876.

Secretary of War “Annual Reports,” 1874-1877,

Washington,

D.C.

Journal of James H. Bradley, vol. 2, Contributions to

the Historical Society of Montana, Helena, 1896, p.
215-

New York Herald, 23 July 1876.

215-

New York Herald, 23 July 1876.

Alfred H. Terry, “Diary of 1876,” p. 29

General Alfred H. Terry, Secretary of War Annual

Reports, House, Doc. 1, 44th Cong., 2nd session, 1876,
pt. 2.

THE WEB WE WEAVE: PARTISAN POLITICS
AND THE U.S. ARMY

In the early morning hours of June 26, Terry received his
first news of Custer’s fate. His informants were three of
Custer’s Crow Scouts who had fled the battle in its early
stages, and Terry listened to their dire accounts of the
events of June 25 with considerable skepticism. Terry,
however, could not afford to ignore the possibility of the
Seventh’s defeat. His forces were divided: Brisbin’s
cavalry was five miles in the lead, while Terry, in the
company of Gibbon’s infantry, lagged behind almost
twenty miles from the mouth of the Little Big Horn. In his
last orders to Custer, Terry had promised to bivouac at
that location by the evening of the 26th, but the news
from Custer’s scouts invalidated that plan. Acting on the
Crows’ directions, Terry doggedly pushed forward

Crows’ directions, Terry doggedly pushed forward
towards the rumored battlefield. By 8:30 p.m. the
infantry had been pushed nearly thirty miles, and with
daylight fading, Terry bivouaced for the night. At 10:30
a.m. the following morning, after a nine-mile march, Terry
reached the survivors of the Little Big Horn disaster.

Remnants of seven companies were entrenched on bluffs
above the Little Big Horn about four miles southeast from
the site of Custer’s last stand. Since the afternoon of the
25th, they had been surrounded and beseiged on what is
now known as Reno Hill by hordes of Sioux and
Cheyenne w

arriors. The survivors were commanded by

Major Marcus A. Reno and Captain Frederick W.
Benteen; none among them professed to know the
location or fate of their commanding officer, Custer. The
joy and relief of their rescue was quickly transformed into
despair with news from Lieutenant Bradley that he had
discovered almost two hundred mutilated bodies, bloated
by the hot summer sun, on a ridge only four miles
distant.

That evening after conferring with the principal surviving
officers, Terry wrote his first reports of the battle. On the
27th, Muggins Taylor, a scout attached to Gibbon’s
column, was entrusted to deliver this first set of official
reports to Captain D. W. Benham, the acting
commander of Fort Ellis, Montana. That fort was
situated within a few miles of Bozeman, Montana, where
the closest telegraph line to the battlefield was located.

Enroute to Fort Ellis, Taylor passed through Stillwater,
Montana, on the night of July 1 where he gave a brief
version of the battle to W. H. Norton who represented
the Helena Herald.

On the afternoon of July 3, Taylor

arrived in Bozeman on his way to the fort. In Bozeman
he related another brief version of the battle, this time to
the editor of the Bozeman Times. So, to the Bozeman
paper belonged the honor of printing the first account of
the events of June 25, 1876, which it did in a July 3 extra
released at 7:00 p.m. The Times story was sensational
and highly inaccurate; most significantly it contained
erroneous information which appeared to make Custer
the scapegoat. According to the Times:

the scapegoat. According to the Times:

The battle was fought on the 25th, 30 or 40 miles
below the Little Horn. Custer attacked the Indian
village of from 2500 to 4000 warriors on one side
and Col. Reno was to attack it on the other. Three
companies were placed on a hill in reserve. General
Custer and fifteen officers and Every Man Belonging
to the Five Companies was killed.

Reno retreated under the protection of the reserve.
The whole number killed was 315. General Gibbon
joined Reno ....

The situation now looks serious. Gen. Terry arrived
at Gibbon’s camp on a steamboat and crossed the
command over and accompanied it to join Custer,
who knew it was coming before the fight occurred
....*’

What? Custer knew Gibbon’s command was coming
before the fight occurred? That piece of information was
neither accurate nor relevant, and it gave the reader the
impression that Custer attacked without waiting for

impression that Custer attacked without waiting for
Gibbon’s forces to join him.

Immediately after Captain Benham received Terry’s
dispatches from Taylor, he rode into Bozeman in order
to transmit them. Arriving around 6:00 p.m. he conferred
with telegraph operator J. W. Taylor for over an hour on
the message to be sent and then departed before its
transmittal. Unfortunately, by the time Taylor began his
transmissions, the line to Helena, south, had been closed
for the evening by the Helena office. To complicate
matters, the following morning Taylor learned that during
the night the line had been broken around Ross Fork,
Montana, and no messages could be sent.

Ultimately,

Terry’s supremely important Official Report arrived at
the War Department around 9:00 p.m. on July 7.

In the meantime, the Helena Herald published an “extra”
on July

4, thereby becoming the second newspaper to report the
Little Big Horn disaster. Their version, since Taylor was
the same source, varied little from the Bozeman Times’

the same source, varied little from the Bozeman Times’
)u\y 3 issue. More importantly, the Herald editor,
Andrew Fisk, telegraphed the news to the “Associated
Press in Salt Lake City. The east first learned of Custer’s
death from the reports emanating out of Salt Lake City
which were published in a few late eastern editions on
July 5, 1876. By the morning of July 6 most of the nation
was shocked by headlines such as The New York Times
Massacre of Our Troops,” or The New York Herald’s
“General Custer Killed-A Blood Battle,” but the
accompanying articles were the same sketchy reports
from the Bozeman, Helena, and Salt Lake City source—
Muggins Taylor.

By the morning of July 7 the press had a new source of
information, and the standard reports either criticized
Custer or implied he had disobeyed Terry s final orders.
Bismarck emerged as the new lountainhead of
information. The army carefully controlled releases to the
eastern newspapers from its nerve centers at Department
of Missouri headquarters in Chicago, the War
Department in Viashington, and the Continental Hotel in
Philadelphia where

enerals Sheridan and Sherman were quartered. The
army’s oracle in Bismarck was Terry’s Adjutant Captain
E. W. Smith who had been assigned by his commander
to answer inquiries concerning the recent disaster.
Captain Smith had accompanied the Seventh’s

wounded aboard the Far West, while Terry and his
forces remained in the field. At approximately 11:00 p.m.
on July 5, the Far West docked in Bismarck, and Smith
began his telegraph transmissions to the division
headquarters in Chicago.

Terry’s official report, written on the evening of June 27,
had been sent via Muggins Taylor. Because of a
telegraph line breakdown, it had not been received by
the army command or released to the public. At the
mouth of the Big Horn on July 2, Terry prepared a
second “confidential’’ report for Smith to telegraph to
General Sheridan This report became the first official
news from Terry and was released to most of the eastern
newspapers on the morning of July 7. Terry’s confidential
report was controversial in its content and intent: it
focused responsibility for the Little Big Horn on Custer
by claiming he disobeyed orders and attacked twenty-

by claiming he disobeyed orders and attacked twenty-
four to forty-eight hours ahead of schedule.

The very nature of the report’s release to the public was
controversial. Smith telegraphed it to Chicago on the
morning of July 6, and from there it was relayed to
General Sheridan at the Continental Hotel in Philadelphia.
Sheridan gave it to General Sherman to read, and in his
haste to transmit the report to the Secretary of War, he
reportedly entrusted it to a courier whofalsely
represented himself as a proper messenger. (One would
think a proper military messenger would have been
easily recognized by his uniform.) In reality, the
“messenger” was employed by the Philadelphia Inquirer,
and before he delivered the dispatches to the telegraph
office he took the opportunity to copy them for
publication. Not only did the Inquirer print the report on
July 7, but nearly all major eastern newspapers ran it.

Two curious elements of the “mysterious messenger story
emerge. First, Generals Sheridan and Sherman never
made any statements implicating a reporter for the
Inquirer or any other newspaper as the culprit
responsible for the release of the confidential telegram.

responsible for the release of the confidential telegram.
Robert Hughes appears to be the subsequent source for
that version, and he did not make that claim until 1896.
Two public statements were made by Sheridan and
Sherman which were perhaps related to the issue. On
July 7, Sheridan claimed in the New York Herald that
dispatches had either been lost or repressed, and that no
word had been received from Terry since June 21

Who

had the opportunity to repress information? Army
command and the War Department -no one else. Why
suddenly the inclusion of the concept of repression of
evidence? Terry’s official report was still circulating
somewhere in the “twilight zone,” but there was no
reason for Sheridan to believe it had been repressed.
Most pointedly, if no news had been received from
Terry, then what was the confidential report he had read
and was that very day plastered on the front pages of
newspapers everywhere? Sherman was equally vague in
a statement to the New York Times on July 7:

Gen. Sherman says that he thinks the first dispatch
giving the details of the battle was mislaid, or else
some enterprising newspaper correspondent bought
up the messenger and sent the account East, thus

up the messenger and sent the account East, thus
keeping the War Department in ignorance of the
occurrence.

For some reason he chose to mention an

“enterprising newspaper correspondent in connection
with the delayed original report from Terry, but not the
confidential report just released.

It is possible that Terry’s confidential report was
“leaked” to the press and not the result of deception by
an unscrupulous correspondent. Perhaps the most
compelling evidence is the fact that the report released to
the newspapers differed in significant details from Terry’s
report as it was originally written. As a result of the
editing, Terry’s

report became even more critical of Custer. The
newspaper version was as follows:

I think I owe it to myself to put you more fully in
possession of the facts of the late operations. While
at the mouth of the Rosebud I submitted my plan to
Gen. Gibbon and Gen. Custer. It was that Custer,
with his whole regiment, should move up the Rosebud
till he should meet a trail Reno had discovered a few
days before but that he should not follow it directly

days before but that he should not follow it directly
to the Little Big Horn; that he should send scouts
over it and keep the main force further toward

the south, so as to prevent the Indians from slipping
in between himself and the mountains. He was also to
examine the head waters of Tollaska Creek, as he
passed it, and send me word of what he found there.
A scout was furnished him for the purpose of
crossing the country to me. We calculated it would
take Gibbon's column until the 26th to reach the
mouth of the Little Big Horn, and that the wide
sweep I had proposed Custer should make would
require so much time that Gibbon would be able to
cooperate with him in attacking any Indians that
might be found on the stream. I asked Custer how
long his marches would be. He said they would be at
the rate of about 30 miles a day. . . .

The movements proposed by Gen. Gibbon ’s columns
were carried out to the letter, and had the attack
been deferred until it was up, I cannot doubt we
should have been successful. The Indians had
evidently prepared themselves for a stand but as I

evidently prepared themselves for a stand but as I
learned from Captain Ben-teen that on the 22nd the
cavalry marched 12 miles; on the 23rd 25 miles;
from 5 a.m. till 8 p.m., of the 24th, 45 miles, and then
after night 10 miles further, resting, but without
unsaddling, 23 miles to the battlefield. The proposed
route was not taken, but as soon as the trail was
struck it was followed. ... I cannot learn that any
examination of Tollaska Creek was made. I do not
tell you this to cast any reflection on Custer, for
whatever errors he may have committed Custer s
action is unexplainable in the case.'

The original version concluded with:

I do not tell you this to cast any reflection upon
Custer for whatever errors he may have committed
he has paid

the penalty ....

In the action itself so far as I can make out, Custer
acted under a misapprehension, and thought, I am
confident, that the Indians were running. For fear
that they might

that they might

get away he attacked without getting all his men up
and divided his command so that they were beaten in
detail,

Logically, there would be no reason for a reporter who
supposedly copied the report verbatim to change its
wording, or for his editor to delete the very important last
paragraph. That paragraph would have been, in the
absence of Terry’s official report on June 27, the first
definitive account from an officer in the field of Custer’s
last battle. Surely it was information the newspapers
would have been dying to publish, but it was not included
in the report released to them by General Sherman.

In the coordinated effort by the army and the Grant
administration (who controlled the army) to promote
Custer as a scapegoat, the release of Terry’s confidential
report was only the tip of the iceberg. Attempts were
made to give the public the impression that Custer was
not only rash in disobeying Terry’s orders, but practically
suicidal in attacking an Indian village of such
overwhelming numbers. "It is the opinion of Army

overwhelming numbers. "It is the opinion of Army
officers in Chicago, Washington, and Philadelphia,
including Generals Sherman, and Sheridan, that General
Custer was rashly imprudent to attack such a large
number of Indians. Sitting Bull’s force being 4,000
strong.”

That was followed by a dispatch from Chicago

which estimated that 10,000 Sioux were in position
waiting for Custer, and that “officers of experience”
condemned the attack as rash.

That was an increase of

150 percent for the Sioux in the space of one paragraph.

Sheridan s headquarters in Chicago released information
critical of Custer; most of that information originated in
Bismarck with Terry s adjutant, E. W. Smith. Reports
emanating from there claimed that Custer was guilty of
“that foolish pride which so often results in the defeat of
men.”

* The principal theme was that General Gibbon

with his force was known by Custer to be moving up to
reinforce him, and that he knew Gibbon was to arrive by
the day follow ing the battle. Terry had ordered Custer to
march toward t it Little Big Horn and join with an infantry
column moving diagonally across the country to that
same point. After uniting, the two columns were then to
launch a coordinated attack. Instead of marching twenty

launch a coordinated attack. Instead of marching twenty
or thirty miles per day as ordered, Custer deliberately
made a forced march of seventy miles in twenty-four
hours in order to reach the destination point two or three
days before the infantry, and foolishly attacked the
enemy.

None of the information contained in those

releases from Chicago was true. Terry’s final orders to
Custer only stated that he would be at the mouth of the
Little Big Horn by the 26th, and Custer should join him
there after the fifteen-day period for which he was
rationed. Gibbon was not marching diagonally across the
country to a specific destination point from which he
would cooperate with Custer in an attack on the hostiles.

The source of information for the claim that the Seventh
endured a forced march of seventy-eight miles in twenty-
four hours was the only man, who for personal reasons,
hated Custer even more than Grant - Captain Benteen.
Terry, probably innocently, included Benteen’s tale of the
forced march in his confidential report, but Benteen had
lied. Although participant’s accounts of the June 24—
June 25 march do not agree unanimously on the number
of miles traveled, the following numbers appear to have a
consensus of opinion: until sundown of the 24th, twenty-

consensus of opinion: until sundown of the 24th, twenty-
eight miles; eight-ten miles during the night in a twenty-
two hour march, six hour rest; maximum twenty miles on
the 25th over a fourteen hour period. In a forty-eight
hour period, with frequent rest breaks, the Seventh
marched fifty-eight miles; not the seventy-eight miles in
twenty-four hours with no sleep that Benteen complained
about. On the day of battle, neither soldier nor horse
should have been incapacitated due to lack of rest

or forced march.

July 8 was no kinder to Custer than the 7th had been.
The New York Times included a special dispatch from
Washington that concluded “the facts as now understood
dispose most people here to lay the blame for the
slaughter upon General Custer s imprudence and
probable disobedience of orders. Cited again was the
fact that Custer had pushed his men and horses to their
physical limits by a seventy-eight-mile forced march.

One of the most curious articles appeared in the
Philadelphia Inquirer on the 8th released by army
headquarters in Chicago via Bismarck. It was originally

headquarters in Chicago via Bismarck. It was originally
written on July 1 at the mouth of the Big Morn, and
although it was published anonymously, certain facts
contained in the article indicate it was probably written
by someone who accompanied the Terry-Gibbon
column. The most likely candidate is Major Brisbin, and
he is the known author of several other articles which
were published anonymously in eastern newspapers.
According to the author:

At noon on the 22nd of June, General Custer, at the
head of his fine regiment of 12 veteran companies,
left camp at the mouth of the Rosebud to follow the
trail of a very large band of hostile Sioux leading up
the river and westward in the direction of the Big
Horn. The sign indicated that the Indians were
making for the eastern branch of the above named
river, marked on the maps as the Little Horn. At the
same time General Terry with Gibbon s command of
five companies of infantry, four of cavalry, and the
Gatling battery, started to ascend the Big Horn,
aiming to assail the enemy in the rear. The march of
the two columns was so planned as to bring Gibbon s
force within cooperating distance of the anticipated

scene of action by the eve of the 26th. In this way
only could the infantry be made available, as it would
not do to encumber Custer’s march with foot
soldiers. ... It was

not expected an attack would be made earlier than
the 27th . . .

... In closing my hasty narrative of this affair, in
certain respects the most remarkable in modem
history, I purposely refrain from comments. The
naked facts, so far as they are known, must guide
your readers to a conclusion as to the cause of the
calamity. The force under General Terry 's immediate
command was designed, not only to cutoff the retreat
of the Indians, but to afford support

o uster if needed. Its march was made in accurate

accordance with the plan communicated to each of
the subordinate leaders before the movement
commenced. It had reached the point where the
battle was expected at the time proposed, and had
not the action been precipitated for reasons as yet

not the action been precipitated for reasons as yet
unknown, a force would have been present on the
field sufficient to retrieve any repulse of the
attacking columns.

This remarkable letter provided the first lengthy narrative
account of the battle of the Little Big Horn. The intention
of its author is clear: General Terry and his plan were not
at fault - Custer was “the cause of the calamity.”
Particularly obnoxious and inaccurate is the last sentence.
Terry’s column had not reached the “point where the
battle was expected at the time proposed” because the
battle was not expected at any specific location or at any
fixed time! The account was written one day prior to the
writing of Terry’s confidential report. It indicated that
between the dates of June 27 when Terry wrote his
official report and July 2 when he wrote his confidential
report,” the mood of Terry and his coterie of subordinate
officers had changed. Terry was pushed by Hughes,
Gibbon, Smith, and Brisbin to make Custer the
scapegoat and protect his own reputation. If so, the army
command aided and abetted that cause since it was
responsible for the release of all information pertaining to
the battle.

the battle.

On July 10 the Secretary of War, J. W. Cameron,
continued the army’s attack on Custer with this rambling
release:

For some reason as yet unexplained, Gen. Custer,
who commanded the 7th Cavalry, and had been
detached by his commander, General Terry, at the
mouth of the Rosebud, to make a wide detour up the
Rosebud, a tributary to the Yellowstone, across to the
Little Horn, and down it to the mouth of the Big
Horn, the place agreed on for meeting, attacked
enroute a large Indian village with only a part of his
force, having himself detached the rest, with view to
intercept the expected retreat of the Indians, and
experienced an utter annihilation of his immediate
command.

The forces of General Terry and Gibbon reached the
field of battle the next day.

The agreed place of

meeting was the mouth of the Big Horn? Terry and
Gibbon reached the field of battle the next day?

Like variations on a theme, the littany against Custer

Like variations on a theme, the littany against Custer
continued; but on July 9 a break occurred. Finally,
Terry’s official report which the War Department had
received the night of July 7 was released to the press.
Terry’s report was not only benign, it was bland. No
criticism of Custer’s action appeared. Included was
general information on the battle garnered from
eyewitnesses, and for once the simple truth about Terry’s
plan. Custer’s commanding officer wrote: At the mouth
of the Rosebud informed General Custer that I
should take the supply steamer Far West up the
Yellowstone to ferry General Gibbon’s column over
the river; that I would in all probability reach the
mouth of the Little Big Horn on the 26th . „ . ,

That

was all. No charge that Custer had disobeyed his orders
and attacked the hostiles before the two columns could
cooperate as planned. Terry’s official report adhered to
the facts. His confidential report exonerated Terry, his
staff, and the army from contributing to the Little Big
Horn debacle, and in the process placed the blame on
Custer. It fit nicely into the army-Republican efforts to
discredit Armstrong.

The army s assault on Custer slowed down after the first

The army s assault on Custer slowed down after the first
week’s media blitz. One final blast appeared in the New
York Times on July 12, 1876. As usual, it followed the
Bismarck-Chicago axis and contained the, by then,
familiar charge of disobedience. However, a new
dramatic twist towards the article’s end made it much
more graphic than previous stories:

°ff*

cer

informs me General Terry did not expect or

desire General Custer to attack the Indians until he
should reach the Little Horn and gain a position from
which to upport him. Custer attacked forty-eight
hours in advance t e time Terry was to reach that
point. An officer injorms your correspondent when
Custer came in sight

of the 1800 lodges, a village of 7000 Indians, he
swung his hat and said - ‘Hurrah! Custer’s Luck! The
biggest Indian village on the American Continent!’

Who was the original source of information for that
quote? At the time Custer supposedly made that
statement, only four men who could possibly have been
present to hear it survived the annihilation of his five
companies. None of these men subsequently attributed to

companies. None of these men subsequently attributed to
Custer the same quote, nor were they in Bismarck at the
time the quote was released to the press. Captain E. W.
Smith, Terry’s adjutant, was probably the author of the
statement and manufacturer of Custer’s quote. A similar
statement known to have been made by him appeared in
the Bismarck Tribune on the same day: “. . . though the
trail leading to it (the village) was five times as great as his
own, he swung high in the air his hat, and congratulated
those men near him that they were about to strike the
biggest Indian village on the American Continent.”

Smith could have been the source for much of the
erroneous and disparaging information about Custer, but
his releases were ultimately controlled by his superior
officers.

A dead Custer was as useful to the Democrats as a live
Custer, perhaps even more useful. As a result of his
tragic death, he had become a martyr for the Democrats
beyond even the scope of the Belknap Affair. With the
1876 presidential election pending, the issue of
responsibility for Custer’s death was waved like a
bloody shirt by the Democrats. Typical of the anti-
administration barrages was the New York World’s

administration barrages was the New York World’s
editorial of July 8: “If Custer had retained his command
of the Big Horn expedition, taken from him to punish him
for his testimony before Clymer’s committee, he would
yet be alive and victorious.”

The blood of Custer and

his men was on Grant’s hands!

In contrast the Philadelphia Inquirer defended the Grant
administration. They editorialized that not only was
Custer at fault but the Democratic House was directly
responsible because it reduced the size of the army and
destroyed its efficiency. Congressional refusal to turn
supervision and control of Indians to the VC ar
Department was the chief cause of the Indian wars.

Perhaps the most effective and certainly the most vocal
Democratic organ was the New York Herald. Its bold
headlines inquired “Who Slew Custer?” and rhetorically
answered: “The celebrated peace policy of Grant . . .
that nest of thieves, the Indian Bureau, with its thieving
agents and favorites as Indian traders . . that is what
killed Custer.

The following day it took aim at the

pregnant silence of President Grant.

Had Sheridan been killed by the Indians instead of
Custer, President Grant would have published an
address on the subject. But for Custer, who made
Sheridan, and did more than any one man to make
Grant president, the Sitting Bull of the White House
has never a word to offer.

Not until September 2, 1876, did the president break his
public silence. With expected rancor towards Custer, he
promoted the official army line and even contributed
more erroneous elaboration: I regard Custer’s
massacre as a sacrifice of troops, brought on by
Custer himself, that was wholly unnecessary - wholly
unnecessary. He was not to have made the attack
before effecting the junction with Terry and Gibbon.
He was notified to meet them on the 26th, but instead
of marching slowly, as his orders required, in order
to effect the junction on the 26th, he enters upon a
forced march of eighty-three miles in twenty-four
hours, and then thus has to meet the Indians alone on
the 25th,

Grant was not known for his charity towards

political or personal enemies, and Custer qualified on
both counts.

both counts.

The army was content with its early version of the events
of June 25, 1876, and had no desire to investigate the
affair. Custer was readily sacrificed, Terry and
Sheridan’s reputation defended, and Reno was eft on his
own hook. Considering the Little Big Horn disaster and t
e ismal tactical failures of the Centennial Campaign, the
army emerged relatively unscathed. Custer’s head was
the only one to roll, a eit posthumously; the recalcitrant
bands of Sioux and Cheyennes eventually returned to
their reservations because they were starving to death,
and Sheridan finally received a S200

000 appropriation

from

Congress to build forts on the Tongue River and mouth
of the Big Horn. On July 8, a bill was reported by the
Committee on Indian Affairs that declared the country
north of the North Platte River and east of the Big Horn
mountains in Wyoming Territory open for exploration
and settlement. This was a unilateral decision to cede
previously unceded territory.

In the aftermath of the Little Big Horn, biased Republican
attempts to discredit Custer were simply a continuation

attempts to discredit Custer were simply a continuation
of their earlier response to his participation in the
Belknap affair. From army headquarters in Bismarck, St.
Paul, Chicago, and Washington, D.C., contrived releases
obscured the facts and promoted Armstrong as a
scapegoat. Despite the fog created by partisan politics
and self-interest, a rational explanation of Custer’s
decision to march into the valley of the Little Big Horn
gradually emerged.

CHAPTER IV—FOOTNOTES

‘General Alfred H. Terry, Secretary of War Annual
Reports, House, Doc. 1, 44th Cong., 2nd session, 1876,
pt. 2, pp, 463-464.

Edward S. Godfrey, “Custer’s Last Battle,” The

Century Magazine XLIII, January 1892, p. 383; Fred
Dustin, The Custer Tragedy (Ann Arbor, MI: Edwards
Bros., Inc., 1939), pp. 170-176; Monaghan, Custer, p.
390.

'Department of Missouri: Letters Received, 5 July 1876,
Record Group 393, National Archives Record Service,

Washington, D C.

^Helena Herald, 4 July 1876.

’Bozeman Times Extra, 3 July 1876.

'’Department of Missouri: Letters Sent, July 1876,
Record Group 393, National Archives Record Service,
Washington, D.C.

Hughes, “Campaign Against the Sioux,’’ p. 20.

New York Herald, 7 July 1876.

New York Times, 7 July 1876.

“'Philadelphia Inquirer, 7 July 1876.

'Department of Missouri: Letters Sent, 6 July 1876,

Record Group 393, National Archives Record Service,
Washington, D.C.

New York Times, 7 July 1876.

Ibid.

‘''Godfrey, “Custer’s Last Battle,” pp. 358-370; Nelson
A. Miles, Personal Recollections of General Nelson A.
Miles (Chicago: The Werner Co., 1896), pp. 198, 205;
“General Godfrey’s Narrative,” in The Custer Myth, ed.
W. A. Graham (New York: Bonanza Books, 1953), pp.
147-148; Dunn, Massacres of the Mountains, pp. 527-
529;

New York Herald, “Statement by Scout George
Herendeen,” 8 July 1876; Monaghan, Custer, p. 379;
Frederick Whittaker, A Complete Life of General
George A. Custer (New York: Sheldon and Co.,
1876), p. 579.

New York Times, 8 July 1876.

Philadelphia Inquirer, 8 July 1876.

Ibid., 10 July 1876.

New York Times, 9 July 1876.

Ibid., 12 July 1876.

Bismarck Tribune, 12 July 1876.

New York World, 8 July 1876.

^Philadelphia Inquirer, 8 July 1876.

New York i/eraW, l6july 1876.

Ibid.

17 July 1876.

Ibid., 2 September 1876.

r CUSTER AT THE CROW’S NEST: V “THE
BEST LAID SCHEMES

Y O’ MICE AND MEN”

Unless one took it for granted that Custer callously
disregarded Terry’s orders and pursued a mono-
maniacal, suicidal charge merely for the sake of glory, the
question of why Custer attacked the hostiles still was
unanswered. Critical information from Seventh Cavalry
survivors favorable to Custer was slow to be released.
The Reports of November 1876 to the House of
Representative 44th Congress, 2nd Session, contained
the official reports of Terry, Gibbon, Reno, and Benteen.
Terry’s dispatches to Sheridan were included, but his
confidential telegram was noticeably absent.

In his expanded report Terry basically contradicted
earlier army releases to the press and the various
statements made by “officers in the know.” According to
Terry the plan agreed upon called for Gibbon’s column
to arrive at the mouth of the Little Big Horn on the 26th
of June. Custer was to allow time for Gibbons to reach
that point by following the Rosebud south of the Indian
trail before turning toward the Little Big Horn.
Somewhere on the Little Big Horn the Sioux should be
found, but there was no known fixed objective point. By

found, but there was no known fixed objective point. By
the use of scouts it was hoped the two columns could
cooperate, but it was necessary to divide the command
because Gibbon s slow-moving infantry would only
hinder Custer’s movement.

Reno’s official report was written while in camp on the
'Yellowstone River, July 5, 1876; therefore, it predated
his August 8 article for the New York Herald and was
his first written account of the battle. His report reveals
that in spite of the lenient treatment of his commanding
officer in the Herald article, he was guilt\ from the

beginning of disseminating misinformation. He alluded to
the truth but managed to dance around it when he
described Custer’s actions and instructions on the 24th
and 25th of June. According to Reno, around 9:25 p m.
on the 24th, Custer called an officer’s meeting to report
that his scouts had definitely discovered a village in the
valley of the Little Big Horn, and to reach it they would
have to cross the divide between the Rosebud and Little
Big Horn Rivers. Since that would be impossible to do in
the daytime without being discovered by the enemy, they
would be forced to march that night After marching from

would be forced to march that night After marching from
11:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m., the scouts informed Custer the
divide could not be crossed before daylight, so they
rested for three hours. The march was resumed, the
divide crossed, and about 8:00 a.m. on the 25th the
command was in a valley of one of the branches of the
Little Big Horn. Around that time Indians were seen, and
it is certain they could not be surprised, so Custer
attacked at once. Reno attributed Custer’s demise to the
number of opposition, his rapid marching for two days
and one night before the engagement, and the daylight
attack around 12:00 noon instead of in the early
morning.

The facts surrounding Custer’s march into battle were
finally

published, though obscurely, in the report of Lieutenant
George D.

Wallace, Custer’s engineering officer and itinerist of the
June 22-25

march. After a leisurely march of twenty-eight miles on
the 24th, the

the 24th, the

Seventh went into camp at 7:45 p.m., and Custer
awaited word from

his advance scouts concerning the direction the Indian
trail they were

following headed. Around 9:00 p.m. Crow scouts
returned to camp

with the eagerly anticipated information that the trail
crossed the

divide towards the Little Big Horn; however, the village’s
location

^ as not known at that time as Reno’s official report
would have us believe.

From his Crows Custer learned of a vantage point, a
small hill on the divide between the Rosebud and the
Little Big Horn Rivers now known as the “Crow’s Nest.”
It was possible from the Crow’s Nest to peer unseen
into the valley of the Little Big Horn which was fifteen

into the valley of the Little Big Horn which was fifteen
miles away. With a little luck in the dawn's early light, the
village

could be visually located, or at least tell-tale smoke from
its campfires would reveal its presence. Custer
dispatched his chief of scouts, Lieutenant Charles A.
Varnum, and a group of Crow and Ankara scouts on this
mission. Varnum was to inform him immediately if the
village was located, but if by noon his scouts could not
discover it, the group was to return.

Realistically, Custer knew that if a village was camped in
the Little Big Horn valley, it would be impossible for his
column to reach it during the night and equally impossible
to approach it undetected during the daylight of the 25th.
He therefore gave his men notice that they would begin a
night march at 11:30 p.m. towards the Crow's Nest.
Before a gathering of his officers he announced his plan
as Lieutenant Godfrey later related:

The General said that the trail led over the divide to
the Little Big Horn and the march would be taken up
at once, as he was anxious to get as near the divide

at once, as he was anxious to get as near the divide
as possible before daylight, where the command
would be concealed during the day, and give ample
time for the country to be studied, to locate the
village, and to make plans for the attack on the
26th.

Based on the information available to him,

Custer’s plan was rational, logical, and the best he could
have implemented. It allowed for his scouts to
reconnoiter the area and send back their intelligence
information, If the village was in the valley, he planned to
surround it during the night and launch a surprise attack
at dawn on the 26th. It was the same scheme he had
used effectively against the Cheyennes

at Washita in 1868.

As ordered, the Seventh marched approximately eight
miles from 1:00 a.m. to daylight following along either
Davis Creek or Thompson Creek. At the head of the
creek they camped in a ravine to await word from
Varnum.

Varnum arrived at the Crow’s Nest aroun

2:30 a.m. accompanied by half-breed scout Mitch
Bouyer, experience frontiersman “lonesome” Charley
Reynolds, three Crow an ive Arikara scouts. Waiting for

Reynolds, three Crow an ive Arikara scouts. Waiting for
the approach of day light, \ arnum napped. He was soon
awakened by the excited clamor o is n lan

scouts. As he recalled:

Another (stream) led down to the Little Big Horn. On
this were . . . two lodges . . . which I understand were
filled with dead bodies of Indians, probably front
Crook’s fight of the 17th . ... I crawled up (the hill)
and watched the valley till the sun rose. The Crows
tried to make me see smoke from the village behind
the bluffs on the Little Big Horn and gave me a cheap
spy glass but I could see nothing. They said there was
an immense pony herd out grazing and told me to
look for worms on the grass and 1 could not see
worms or ponies either.... About 5 o ’clock I sent the
Rees back with a note to Custer telling him what the
Crows reported, viz-a tremendous village on the
Little Big Horn.'

Reynolds and Boyer agreed with the Crows that a large
village was somewhere in the valley as the smoke and
pony herd indicated; however, due to intervening bluffs
the village itself was not actually visible.

the village itself was not actually visible.

The two Arikara scouts, Red Star and Bull, whom
Varnum had sent to Custer as courier, had not long
departed the Crow’s Nest when Custer's plan began to
go awry. From the Crow’s Nest Varnum and the
remaining scouts spotted two hostiles less than two miles
away who were riding towards Davis Creek where the
Seventh was camped. Vt ith disgust the scouts marked
the location of Custer’s camp easily because of smoke
from a campfire. They judged that if they could see it,
then the Sioux could see it. Soon, six other Sioux were
spotted northeast of the hill; and as the scouts watched,
the Sioux abruptly changed course and dashed towards
the valley of the Little Big Horn.

Custer received Varnum’s message around 8:00 a.m.
and immediately decided to ride to the Crow’s Nest to
verify the information firsthand. With Fred Girard, his
Arikara interpreter, Red Star, and three other Arikaras,
Custer rode the eight miles to the observation point. \\
hile their commander w

as thus occupied, the remainder

of the column moved to within a mile of his destination.

Shortly before 9.00 a.m., Custer had his first look at the

Shortly before 9.00 a.m., Custer had his first look at the
valley of the Little

LIEUTENANT CHARLES A VARNl M Courtesy of
the Custer BaaHfleU Mustum

Big Horn, but in spite of the assistance of field glasses, he
could not perceive the same objects viewed earlier by his
scouts. Varnum recalled later that:

Custer listened to Bouyer while he gazed long and
hard at the valley. He then said, “Well I’ve got about
as good eyes as anybody and I can’t see any village,
Indians, or anything else, ” or words to that effect.
Bouyer said “Well General, if you don't find more
Indians in that valley than you ever saw together you
can hang me. ” Custer sprang to his feet saying, It
would do a damned sight of good to hang you,
wouldn’t it. ” And he and I went down the hill
together. I recall his remark particularly because the
word damn was the nearest to swearing I ever heard
him

come.

There is still confusion as to whether Custer actually
admitted seeing the evidence of a village from the hill.
According to Red Star: Girard called back to the
scouts: “Custer thinks it is no Sioux camp. ” Custer
thought that Charley Reynolds had merely seen the
white buttes of the ridge that concealed the lone
teepee. Charley Reynolds then pointed again,
explaining Custer s mistake, then after another look
Custer nodded that he had seen the sign of a camp.
Next Charley Reynolds pulled out his field glasses
and Custer looked through them at the Dakota camp
and nodded his head

again.

Then Custer was given the unwelcome news that several
separate groups of Sioux had been observed, and they
probablv had discovered the cavalry

presence. Big

Belly, a Crow, asked Custer through the

Custer repHed

tef

Ught

f thc Si

UX Camp

This camp has not seen our army, none of their

This camp has not seen our army, none of their
scouts ave seen ust Big Belly replied.■ “You say we
have not nseen. hese Sioux we have seen at the foot
of the hill, two going one way, and four the other, are
good scouts, they have seen the smoke of our camp.
” Custer said,

speaking angrily: “I say again we have not been
seen. That camp has not seen us, / am going ahead to
wait until dark and then we will march, we will place
our army around the Sioux camp. ” Big Belly replied:
"That plan is bad, it should not be carried out. ”
Custer said: “I have said what I propose to do, I
want to wait until it is dark and then go ahead with
my plan. ”

In contrast to his alleged reckless nature,

Custer appears to have planned cautiously and
conservatively.

To further confuse the situation, Fred Girard, Custer’s
Arikara interpreter, stated that they reached Varnum
around daybreak and . could see the large mass moving
in front and down the Little Horn and a dense cloud of
dust over all and behind. The camp we had found was
the smaller camp (the larger camp was downstream

the smaller camp (the larger camp was downstream
farther), and was on the way to the larger camp and this
led us all to believe that the Indians were stampeded.”

If Girard s statement is true and that moving mass was
the exodus of a small camp where the “lone teepee” was
earlier sighted by Varnum, then Custers greatest fear was
coming true: the quarry was escaping! That called for a
cancellation of his previous plan and necessitated quick
action

to prevent their escape.

Any doubts Custer might have had about marching into
the valley should have been dissipated by the news he
received when he returned to his command. He was
promptly informed by his brother

Tom that during the night march, men of Company F had
lost some

crates of hard tack along the trail. When a detail had
gone to retries e it, they surprised an Indian in the
process of opening one of the boxes, and he managed to
elude them.

From all indications, then, the presence of

elude them.

From all indications, then, the presence of

the Seventh Cavalry in the proximity of the Little Big
Horn Valley was not the world’s best kept secret.

An officer’s conference was convened at which Custer
expressed his belief that their presence had been
discovered and therefore it was not necessary to further
conceal their movements. The\ wou at once attack the
village. Although he originally planned to ^

tta

^ on the

morning of the 26th, the likelihood of their discovery by
the

Sioux made it imperative to march in order to prevent the
hostiles from scattering and escaping.

Probably the

Indians would not make a stand against a regiment of
cavalry, and he expected them to flee.

In retrospect,

one of the officers present at the meeting confirmed that
none of them expected the Indians to make a stand
anywhere; nobody expected any hard fighting. Custer
firmly believed that the Indians would scatter in all
directions with the approach of his troops. In a belated
vote of confidence, Edgerly confessed that he thought
Custer’s plan was all right considering the information he
had.

had.

Even with the fear that the hostiles were escaping Custer
did not dash recklessly into the valley after them. He
ordered Lieutenant Luther S. Hare to reconnoiter in the
advance with the Arikara scouts and Lieutenant Varnum
to do the same with the Crow scouts; Custer acted on
their information as he marched.

After the column

crossed the divide, it averaged barely four miles per hour
in covering the next eight miles. Not until Indians were
actually sighted did their pace quicken.

Up until then

Custer was feeling and probing as he marched, and in his
last analysis of the situation he acted on the
misconception that his opposition was attempting to flee
rather than fight.

Many who have criticized Custer have no concept of the
challenge Indian warfare presented. One who did know
was Lieutenant Godfrey and he vividly described it in
1892:

It is a rare occurrence in Indian warfare that gives a
commander the opportunity to reconnoiter the
enemy’s position in daylight. This is particularly true

enemy’s position in daylight. This is particularly true
if the Indians have a knowledge of the presence of
troops in the country. When following an Indian trail
the signs ’ indicate the length of time elapsed since
the presence of the Indians.

When the signs indicate a hot trail’, i.e., near
approach, the commander judged his distance and by
a forced march, usually in the night-time, tried to
reach the Indian t illage at flight and make his
disposition for a surprise attack at daylight. At all
events his attack must be made

★

with celerity, and generally without other knowledge
of the numbers of the opposing force than that
discovered or conjectured while following the trail.
The dispositions for the attack may be said to be
‘made in the dark', and successful surprise to depend
upon luck. If the advance to the attack be made in
daylight it is next to impossible that near approach
can be made without discovery. In all our previous
experiences when the immediate presence of the
troops was once known to them the warriors
swarmed to the attack, and resorted to all kinds of
ruses to mislead the troops to delay the advance
toward their camp or village, while the squaws and
children secured what personal effects they could,
drove off the pony herd, and by flight put themselves
beyond danger, and then scattering made successful
pursuit next to impossible. In civilized warfare the
hostile forces may confront each other for hours,
days, or weeks, and the battle may be conducted with
a tolerable knowledge of the numbers, position, etc.,
of each other. A full knowledge of the immediate

of each other. A full knowledge of the immediate
presence of the enemy does not imply immediate
attack.

In Indian warfare the rule is ‘touch and goThese
remarks are made because the firebrand nature of
Indian warfare is not generally understood. In
meditating upon the preliminaries of an Indian battle,
old soldiers who have participated only in the battles
of the Rebellion are apt to draw upon their own
experiences for comparison, when there is no
comparison.

Somewhere in the Little Big Horn Valley an unknown
number of Indians were attempting to escape * that was
the “best evidence Custer acted on when he ordered his
column to march. Based on the information available to
him, from that perspective that was a rational decision.
Unlike his critics, Lieutenant Colonel Custer did not have
the luxury of 20/20 hindsight.

CHAPTER V—FOOTNOTES

“Terry, Secretary of War Annual Reports, pp. 461-

“Terry, Secretary of War Annual Reports, pp. 461-
462.

Reno, Secretary of War Annual Reports, pp. 476-

477.

^Lieutenant George W. Wallace, Secretary of War
Annual Reports, 1877.

O. G. Libby, ed., The Arikara Narrative of the
Campaign Against the Hostile Dakotas, North Dakota
Historical Collections, vol. 6 {Cedar Rapids, IA: The
Torch Press, 1876).

’Godfrey, “Custer’s Last Battle,” p. 363; Wallace,
Secretary of War Annual Reports, 1871, pp. 1377-
1378.

Kenneth Hammer, ed., Custer in 76: Walter Camp’s
Notes on the Custer Fight (Provo, UT: Brigham Young
University Press, 1976), pp. 59-60.

Wallace, Secretary of War Annual Reports, p. 1378.

Stewart, Custer’s Luck, p. 273.

’Arikara Narrative, pp. 90-92

Ibid, p. 93-

"Hammer, ed., Custer in 76, p. 60.

Arikara Narrative, p. 92.

Ibidp. 93.

The Arikara Narrative of the Campaign Against the
Hostile Dakotas, vol. 6, quoted in W. A. Graham,
Custer Myth (New York: Bonanza Press, 1953), pp.
250-251.

‘’’Godfrey, ‘Custer’s Last Battle,” p. 368.

Ibid., p. 369.

Hammer, ed., Custer in 76 n 54

"Ibid., p. 53- ‘

*fotd., p. 54; Dunn, Massacres of the Mountains, pp.

529-530.

Gray, Centennial Campaign, p. 302.

-'Godfrey, "Custer s Last Battle,” p. 367.

POINT-COUNTERPOINT: THE DEBATE
RAGES

In order to understand current perceptions of Custer, it is
necessary to examine the evolution of Custer myth.
Partisan politics played an important and active role in
the formulation of early Custer myth, but it was not the
only factor. Debates between Custerphobe and
Custerphile also contributed to those myths.

Although greatly hindered by the lack of information
other than the prejudicial army releases, Custer’s friends
began their counterattack in his defense. Thomas L.
Rosser, former West Point classmate of Armstrong and
ex-Major General in the Confederate Army, was the first
to leap into the fray. In response to articles in the St.
Paul-Minneapolis Pioneer Press and Tribune which

Paul-Minneapolis Pioneer Press and Tribune which
characterized Custer's action at the Little Big Horn as
“reckless indiscretion,” he denounced Major Reno for
failing to support Custer and defended Armstrong from
the charge of disobedience of Terry’s orders. Rosser’s
debate with Reno was only the first shot fired by
Custer’s defenders in a battle that is still being waged
today. If Custer was the army s scapegoat, then Reno
would be their scapegoat.

The “Great Debate,” as Robert Utley so appropriately
termed it, began in earnest with the December 1876
publication of Frederick Whittaker’s A Complete Life
of General George A. Custer. Vthittaker was a
superficial acquaintance of Custer, and he borrowed
heavily from Armstrong’s 1874 autobiography, My Life
on the Plains. Further assistance was provided by the
grieving widow, Libbie, who was understandably
dismayed at earlier efforts to smear her husband s
reputation.

Whittaker's book is important, not only for what it

Whittaker's book is important, not only for what it
contained, but also for key information that it lacked. For
the first time on a large scale, the public was given the
opportunity to review Terry’s final orders to Custer;
however, Lieutenant Wallace’s official account of the
events leading up to Custer’s decision to attack was not
included. A puzzling gap still existed between Custer’s
actions and the reasons for those actions which was not
filled until Wallace's January 1877 engineering report.
Even that remained in relative obscurity until solicited by
the 1879 Reno Inquiry.

In his defense of Custer, Whittaker asserted that his hero
was an innocent pawn used by the Democrats in their
struggle against the Republicans. As prime movers, two
men were to blame: U. S. Grant and Heister Clymer. The
president’s vindictive reaction to Custer’s testimony
before Clymer’s committee upset the delicate balance in
the Seventh Cavalry officer’s corps. This gave birth to
Reno’s delusions of grandeur and hindered Custer’s
effective control of his regiment. Clymer, as the
Democratic chairman of his investigating committee, was
interested only in using Armstrong as a weapon against
the Republicans. He had no concern for the potential
damage to Custer’s career or the possible deleterious

damage to Custer’s career or the possible deleterious
effects on his expedition against the Sioux.

On those assessments Whittaker was at best guilty of
oversimplification, but when he moved on to attack Reno
for his incapacity and Benteen for his “disobedience,” he
was on firmer ground. The author claimed that he had
received information from certain participants in the
battle, which led him to conclude that Custer s two
principal subordinates greatly contributed to Custer s
defeat by their actions. As early as December 1876, he
called for a court of inquiry to clear the air and promised
to protect the names of officers who

provided him information.

In a May 18, 1878, letter to Wyoming Territory
Representative . W. Corlett, Whittaker claimed that he
had uncovered evidence that Custer and his command
lost their lives as a result of his

r m

cowardice. With

Corlett’s assistance, Whittaker requestc ongress to
investigate the Little Big Horn affair- Although Congress

to investigate, Reno finally deemed it prudent to request

to investigate, Reno finally deemed it prudent to request
an official army inquiry to clear his name.

On January 13, 1879, the inquiry convened at the Palmer
House in Chicago. Only a handful of witnesses appeared
to be sympathetic to Whittaker’s cause: civilian scout and
interpreter Fred Girard, who admittedly disliked Reno,
contract surgeon Dr. Henry R. Porter, and Lieutenant
John A. Carland. Of all the officers who survived the
bat-tie, only Captain Thomas B. Weir could have been
considered pro-Custer, and he probably was the original
source for much of Whittaker’s information concerning
the events of 25 June 1876. Unfortunate for the author’s
case, Weir died in December 1876.

During the twenty-six days of conflicting and
contradictory testimony, Lieutenants Wallace, Godfrey,
and Edgerly did elucidate on Custer’s decision to march
into the valley of the Little Big Horn. In general, most of
the testimony concerned Custer’s tactics and the
sequence of action on the 25th rather than his motivations
for attacking. Although no witnesses accused their
Lieutenant Colonel of disobeying Terry’s orders, Reno
and Benteen were given free rein to denigrate their

and Benteen were given free rein to denigrate their
former commanding officer. Typical was Benteen’s
remark that General Custer might have fled the field and
saved a part of his command and I think discretion would
have been the better part of valor had he done that.”

On February 10, Reno made his final statements. The
New York Times expressed the opinion on the following
day that the court would report in favor of a court-martial
for Major Reno.

They had not reckoned on the army’s

desire to let sleeping dogs lie, for on the following day the
court judged it inexpedient to take any further action
against Reno.

Once again the army had the opportunity to clear the air
and to honestly investigate not only the events of June 25,
1876, but its own internal management of the affair’s
aftermath; it failed miserably. Although the Chicago
Times published a daily transcript of the Inquiry
proceedings and the majority of America’s newspapers
contained daily abstracts from the Times account, the
army chose to prohibit further public scrutiny of the
testimony. For seventy*two years, the court transcript
remained inaccessible to the general public since it was

sealed in the confidential files of the Judge Advocate
General’s office until 1941 and then transferred to the
National Archives. Apparently the army was not very
proud of Reno’s conduct or its own.

Fred Girard, one of the civilian witnesses before the
court, voiced his doubts about the legitimacy of its
investigation.

The trial had not proceeded far before it came to be
known among the witnesses, including commissioned
officers, some of whom were outspoken to me in
confidence, that the way of the innocent and truthful
could be made hard.

It was amusing therefore to see how badly some of
the memories had failed in the space of less than
three years since the battle. It was made the business
of certain ones active for the defense to get hold of
all the doubtful witnesses before they were called and
entertain them well.

On such occasions they were cautiously sounded and
discreetly primed.

discreetly primed.

Even the court recorder confided to Libbie in 1897 that:

I want to say in some frankness, that at one time I
was in some degree influenced by the prejudicial
opinions of those whose motives I did not understand
how self-interest influenced opinions; how jealously
being unopposed could unmask its horrid power and
loosen its tongue of calumny—with none to answer;
how the living could extol themselves for prudence
and delay and condemn the

dead as rash and impetuous ...

Through the efforts of

Libbie Custer, Whittaker, Rosser, and others, the
partisan assaults against G. A. Custer’s reputation were
assuaged. In the long run, perhaps Libbie accomplished
as much as anyone in the fight to protect Armstrong’s
reputation. In 1885 she published the first book of a
trilogy dedicated to the glorification of her husband.
Boots and Saddles was followed by Tenting on the
Plains (1887) and Following the Guidon (1890). Few
men have had better

public relations agents.

As the years passed the debate over Custer s alleged
disobe ience

of Terry’s orders faded only to be revived by the death
of General Terry in 1890. In his funeral oration the
Reverend Dr. T. T. Munger proclaimed that:

Custer’s fatal movement was in direct violation of
both verbal and written orders. When his rashness
and disobedience ended in the total destruction of his
command, General Terry withheld the fact of the
disobeyed orders, and suffered an imputation hurtful
to his military to rest upon himself, rather than
subject a brave but indiscreet subordinate to a
charge of disobedience.

Considering the occasion,

Reverend Munger could be forgiven for his distortion of
the facts. In all probability he truly believed his statement,
for his source was none other than Colonel Robert P.
Hughes, Terry’s brother-in-law and aide-de-camp during
the 1876 Sioux campaign. As early as July 1876 Hughes
was instrumental in attempts to discredit Custer and to
protect Terry’s reputation.

protect Terry’s reputation.

In 1892, Captain E. S. Godfrey’s “Custer’s Last Battle”
appeared in Century Magazine with concluding
comments by General James B. Fry. Godfrey’s account
was favorable to Custer and Fry’s statements chastised
Hughes for his contribution to Reverend Munger’s
eulogy. Hughes retaliated with a riposte not published
until January 1896 in thcJournal of the Military Service
Institution of the United States. In his defense of
Terry, Hughes edited official telegrams, perpetuated the
myth of Sherman's accidental release of Terry’s
“confidential” telegrams, ignored the reasons for Custer’s
decision to attack on the 25th, and engaged in a
semantical debate of Terry’s final orders to Custer.

In reality, Hughes contributed no new historical facts;
however, in the 1930’s a trio of Custerphobes
considered his contrived account along with certain
questionable and biased testimony before the Reno
Inquiry to be the gospel. E. A. Brininstool (Captain
Benteen’s Story of the Battle of the Little Big Horn
June 25-26, 1896), Frederick Van debater (Glory-
Hunter: A Life of General Custer, 1934), and Fred

Dustin (The Custer Tragedy, 1939) were the disciples
of Hughes, Reno and Benteen. They expressed an
intense hatred of Custer in their writings, and their
invective has been incorporated into current public
understanding of Custer and the battle of the Little Big
Horn.

Beginning with the 1955 publication of Edgar I.
Stewart’s Custer’s Luck, the next three decades
produced several well-researched and less biased
accounts of Custer’s life and the battle of the Little Big
Horn. Jay Monaghan’s Custer: The Life of General
George Armstrong Custer (1959) remains one of the
most complete and balanced biographies of Lieutenant
Colonel Custer, but it provides little information on the
battle or its aftermath. In a category of its own is Stephen
E, Ambrose’s Crazy Horse and Custer, the Parallel
Lives of Two American Warriors (1975)- His unique
approach illuminates and bridges the cultural and
ethnocentric gaps between the worlds and lives of his
two subjects. John Gray placed Custer and the Little Big
Horn in proper perspective with his Centennial
Campaign (1976). It could be considered the best and
most complete analysis of the battle yet produced. Four

most complete analysis of the battle yet produced. Four
writers have contributed significantly to our understanding
of the development of Custer myth and legend. W. A.
Graham began it all with his opus, The Custer Myth
(1953) Robert M. Utley {Custer and the Great
Controversy, 1962), Brian W. Dippie (Custer’s Last
Stand: The Anatomy of an American Myth,

1976), and Bruce A. Rosenberg (Custer and the Epic
of Defeat, 1974)

followed in his footsteps.

Hero-worshipping biographies by Custer’s defenders,
such as his wife, Libbie, and Frederick Whittaker, did as
much to obscurc the truth as did the biased ramblings of
Custerphobes Benteen, Sandoz, Dustin, Brininstool, and
Van deWater. Both sides were guilty of disservice to
Custer and Clio. From all indications, many contributors
to Custer historiography took seriously Mark Twain s
satirical ad\ ice to fellow journalists: “Get your facts first,
and then you can distort ‘em as much as you please.”
Nowhere was this more prominent than in the
“presidential candidate Custer’ myth.

“presidential candidate Custer’ myth.

CHAPTER VI—FOOTNOTES

New York Herald, 11 July 1876 (reprinted from).

George A. Custer, My Life on the Plains (New York:

The Citadel Press, 1962).

Whittaker, Complete Life of General George A.
Custer, p. 591. W. A. Graham, Abstract of the
Official Record of Proceedings of the Reno Court of
Inquiry (Harrisburg, PA: The Stackpole Co., 1954), p.
51.

Graham, Abstract of the Reno Court of Inquiry, p.
156.

^New York Times, 11 February 1879.

Hammer, ed., Custer in 76, p. 239.

Lawrence A. Frost, Custer Legends (Bowling Green,
OH: Bowling Green University Popular Press, 1981), p.
99.

99.

Elizabeth B. Custer, Boots and Saddles (New York:
Harper and Brothers, 1885); Tenting on the Plains
(New York: Charles L. Webster

and Co., 1887); Following the Guidon (New York:
Harper and Brothers, 1890),

“'Godfrey, “Custer’s Last Battle,” p. 387.

'^Stephen E. Ambrose, Crazy Horse and Custer, the
Parallel Lives

%7<\°»

eriCan WatTiors

(

<-den City. NY: Doubleday

& Co.,

, o ert M. Utley, Custer and the Great Controversy,
the Origin

^Development of a legend

Westcrnlore Press l962)

, .

PP ’ Custer s Last Stand: The Anatomy of an

American

ZSTr ,

m l,niV

Sity

>976); Bruce A.

r-?;

Epic of Defeat (University Park. PA: Penn

sylvania State University Press, 1974)

CUSTER FOR PRESIDENT?

Strangely enough in the acrimonious debates following
Custer’s demise, none of his contemporary enemies,
either political or personal, attributed his decisions to
pursue and attack the hostile village to his political
ambitions. That charge has emerged as one of the most
perfidious and at the same time ridiculous twentieth
century Custer myths. The central theme that dominates
the myth of the political Custer involves the following
scenario: Lieutenant Colonel Custer, backed primarily by
his friends, James Gordon Bennett, owner of the New
York Herald, and Jay Gould, owner of the New York
World, was actively pursuing the 1876 Democratic
presidential nomination. He had already captured their
hearts by his struggle with Grant as a consequence of the
Belknap investigation. In order to ensure his success, he
shrewdly calculated on a sensational and total victory

shrewdly calculated on a sensational and total victory
over Sitting Bull to stampede delegates at the Democratic
nominating convention which was due to open in St.
Louis June 27, 1876, into voting in his favor. Mark
Kellogg, the Bismarck Tribune-New \ ork Herald
correspondent, accompanied the Custer expedition for
the purpose of writing an account of the glorious victory
which was to have been carried swiftly by courier to the
nearest telegraph station. From there the news was to
have been relayed to the delegates in St. Louis, who
undoubtedly were waiting in breathless anticipation for it.
Forget Tilden! Forget Hendricks! Custer was the man!

When and how did that ludicrous scenario develop? In
1920, forty-four years after Custer’s death, the first
word of his presidential aspirations appeared in the
Arikara Narrative edited by Orin G. Libby as part of
the North Dakota Historical Collection Series. This
narrative

GEORGE JAY GOULD Photograph by Pach
Brothers

was based on Libby’s interviews in 1912 with nine of the

was based on Libby’s interviews in 1912 with nine of the
surviving forty Arikara scouts who accompanied Custer
on his Little Big Horn campaign.

At the time of the battle, Red Star was eighteen years of
age, and when interviewed by Libby he was fifty-four.
Red Star remains our sole source of information
concerning Custer’s political ambitions. With Libby
transcribing the Ankara’s words, the following account
emerged:

Custer had gone to Washington and returned . . .
then there was a rumor of a call to meet Custer at
Fort Lincoln, the regular headquarters, but he is not
certain of such a meeting . . . (Custer told Bob-Tailed
Bull that he had been to Washington and that he had
been informed that this would be his last campaign in
the West among the Indians. He said that no matter
how small a victory he could win, even though it was
against only five tents of Dakotas, it would make him
president, the Great Father, and he must turn back
as soon as he was victorious. In case of victory he
would take Bloody Knife back with him to
Washington.)

On one other occasion Custer allegedly

made a similar statement: Once Custer was eating with

made a similar statement: Once Custer was eating with
them when he said through Girard, the interpreter:
He said he had made up his mind to go on this
expedition to fight. He said he had been to
Washington and had been given instructions to
follow the Dakotas. Now that he was on the war-
path, if he had a victory, he said: “When we return, I
will go back to Washington, and on my trip to
Washington I shall take my brother here, Bloody
Knife, with me. I shall remain in Washington and be
the Great Father.

In his first statement the scout clearly denied his presence
at or even certain knowledge of the meeting at Fort
Lincoln - he “heard the rumor of a call.” The scout
Custer allegedly directed his words to, Bob-Tailed Bull,
was killed at the Little Big Horn; therefore, he was not a
direct source of information in 1912.

Red Star possibly could have been present at the time of
Custer’s second statement. It has a theme similar to the
previous statement, but no specific place, time, or date
was given. Bloody Knife suffered the same fate as Bob-
Tailed Bull; they, along with Little Brave, were the only

Tailed Bull; they, along with Little Brave, were the only
fatalities among Custer’s Indian scouts. Fred Girard, the
Arikara interpreter, never verified that he translated any
conversations between Custer and the Arikaras that
indicated the Lieutenant Colonel’s presidential
aspirations.

As a result of Red Star ’s tales, certain twentieth century
writers have judged Custer guilty of recklessly attacking
the Sioux village due to his inordinate desire to become
president. Those historians who sneered at Custer s
hearsay testimony before the Clymer Committee were
perfectly willing to accept Red Star’s hearsay evidence
as the gospel. Through a combination of poor research,
bias, and distortion, the myth of "presidential candidate
Custer” has thrived. One can forgive writers of fiction,
such as Douglas C. Jones (The Court Martial of
George Armstrong Custer), Thomas Berger (Little Big
Man), and George MacDonald Fraser (Flashman and
the Redskins), for incorporating this fantasy into their
books. They at least admitted to the writing of fiction. No
such excuse exists for writers who claim they reveal the
real truth” about Custer, such as Mari Sandoz (The
Battle of the Little Big Horn), David H. Miller

Battle of the Little Big Horn), David H. Miller
(Custer’s Fall), and Will Henry (Custer’s Last Stand)}

Sandoz elaborated on Red Star’s tale:

It was an excellent time to defeat the warring Sioux,
and today the best time of all, with the Democratic
Convention opening the day after tomorrow,
andJames Gordon Bennett of the New York Herald or
his lieutenant surely prepared to stampede the
convention for his friend, General George Armstrong
Custer. Or Jay Gould of the New York World and the
western railroads might be as effective. Victory now
would leave two days and three nights to get the
news to the telegraph office and to the Convention at
St. Louis. Charley Reynolds could reach the telegraph
office at Bozeman in less than two days with a terse
account that Custer would write. There would be
additional messengers for insurance, Herendeen and
others, each taking a different route, Boyer to spur
down to the telegraph at the North Platte River, with
Custer himself probably making the run to the
Missouri River -Custer for this run and Mark
Kellogg. A victory telegram read at the Convention
the morning of the 25th would do it, so he must

the morning of the 25th would do it, so he must
succeed by sundown this evening, even if the
defeated were only a small camp, only the half a
dozen Sioux lodges that he had told the Ree scouts
would make him the Great Father, the President '

History? No! Fiction? Yes! How did Ms. Sandoz obtain
knowledge of Custer’s master plan to inform the
convention and the world of his victory? Perhaps she
was as adept at conducting seances as she was at
fabricating the truth; Custer, Reynolds, Bouyer, and
Kellogg all died at the Little Big Horn. Of those
mentioned by Sandoz, Herendeen was the only survivor
and he never acknowledged such a plan. Since Sandoz
never developed the habit of footnoting her sources, it is
impossible to ascertain where, outside of The Arikara
Narrative,

she developed her information.

In order to create the illusion of continuity in Custer’s
pursuit of political office, Sandoz concluded The Battle
of the Little Big Horn with her own “massacre” - of the
facts, that is.

facts, that is.

There is a recurring interest in the presidency in
Custer s juvenile letters and utterances from before
West Point on, augmented powerfully by the
colonel’s success as a speaker from Johnson's
presidential train, where he heard the cry not for
Johnson but for Grant and Custer. He had listened to
the suggestion several times in the fulsome praise of
newspaper and railroad owners. Now the sense of
destiny

that often appears in youths intolerant of discipline
and restraint was upon him, a sort of desperate
destiny. The mood permeates all the speeches and
flattery of the luncheons and dinners the winter
of1875-1876 in New York.

The later corroboration by the scouts in Libby s 'I he

Arikara Narrative came as no surprise to anyone who
had followed the stories of the Indians and the white
men of the Plains, or Custer’s own writings. The
Narrative is the story of the Ree scouts with Custer to
the Little Big Horn, and contains theirfirsthand

the Little Big Horn, and contains theirfirsthand
accounts of Custer’s promises to Bloody Knife when
he was made the Great Father, the President, if he
could win even a little victory over a few Sioux.*'

Custer did display normal interest in national and
presidential affairs as a youth, but at no time did he
express a desire to become president. He did
accompany Andrew Johnson on his inauspicious swing
around the circle, but that only served to discourage
Armstrong. None of his New York speeches of record
during the winter of 1875-1876 even hint of his intention
to become the Democrats’ 1876 presidential candidate.
Sandoz conveniently forgot to mention the thirty-six-year
time lapse in the scout’s statements contained in the
Narrative, or the hearsay nature of Red Star’s account.

David H, Miller, in his Custer’s Fall, added his own
touch of Hollywood to Red Star’s story. In his version,
Red Star, leading Custer, Bloody Knife, Bob-Tailed
Bull, and Fred Girard to the Crow’s Nest on the morning
of June 25, 1876, heard Custer make the following
statement: “ If we beat the Sioux, I will be president of
the United States - the Grandfather. If you Arikara do as

I tell you and kill enough Sioux for me and capture many
Sioux ponies, I will take care of you when I come into
power!’ ”

Miller lists his sources as seventy-one Indians

who participated in the battle: 54 Sioux, 16 Cheyennes,
and

1 Arapaho. Conspicuously absent from that total are any
Arikaras; and if The Arikara Narrative was his source
of information, he definitely embellished the original
account given by Red Star.

Departing from his imaginative Narrative account, Miller
charged that the army needed a scapegoat to keep
Custer’s name in the clear, so Sheridan allowed Major
Reno’s reputation to be sacrificed. The army was guilty
of just the opposite. They protected Reno for as long as
his actions allowed, and deliberately edited and released
information to the press designed to promote Custer as
the scapegoat.

In the best tradition of Sandoz, Miller accused Custer
and James Gordon Bennett of conspiring to replace
Samuel J. Tilden with Custer as the Democratic nominee
for president. Of course, the expedition against the Sioux

for president. Of course, the expedition against the Sioux
was to serve as the launching pad for Custer s
nomination. In order to make the whole scenario
logistically feasible, Miller had the St. Louis Convention
open in July when in reality the meeting convened on
June 27 and closed on June 29.

What did happen at St. Louis? On June 27 the
convention was called to order with Thomas F. Bayard
(Delaware), Allen A. Thurman (Ohio), Winfield S.
Hancock (Pennsylvania), Thomas A. Hendricks
(Indiana), and Samuel J. Tilden (New York) as the
viable candidates. Hendricks and Tilden appeared to be
the front runners, with Tilden the favorite entering the
convention. The New York governor had achieved a
national reputation as a reformer as a result of his attacks
on the corrupt Tammany Hall faction in New York.
However, some politicos feared that in a national election
he could not carry his key home state because of
Tammany Hall anti-Tilden opposition. In addition, Tilden
was a “hard money” man who opposed the government s
continued printing of “greenbacks.

continued printing of “greenbacks.

In contrast, Hendricks expected to draw his support
from the midwest (Ohio, Illinois, and Indiana) and was a
confirmed “soft money” man. It was perhaps this last
element which gained Hendricks a public vote of
confidence from Custer. The New York Times of

February 18, 1876, reported of:

a lively interview with General Custer . . . When as e
how he thought General Sherman would do for
President, he is said to ha ve replied, "Capital
suggestion! He is trump anyway you take him. Very
intelligent views of men and affairs and
unquestionably a great general. He would run like a
steer. . . Some western man and a civilian will most
likely be the Democratic nominee. Of course this is
confidential, as we regular army chaps don't talk
politics^ but I think Hendricks has the best show of
any of them. Scarcely any statement made by
Armstrong in the last stx — s his life was confidential
This particular statement illustrated C.ust

astute awareness of the utility of newspaper releases; he

astute awareness of the utility of newspaper releases; he
managed not only to praise his superior officer, Sherman,
the commanding general of the army, but also to soft-sell
Hendricks.

Of the potential candidates other than the favored duo of
Tilden and Hendricks, Winfield Scott Hancock was the
best longshot. His reputation as a Northern general
during the Civil War was sterling, but his later escapades
chasing Indians of the plains were notoriously
unsuccessful. The public perceived him as a military hero,
but unfortunately his military background was in fact an
albatross around his neck. The Democrats were leery of
nominating anyone with a reputation as a war hero
because they believed that the voters, disenchanted with
U. S. Gram, would not support another war hero-
politician. If that were the case, the Lieutenant Colonel
George A. Custer presented the same liabilities as
Hancock.

In spite of the preliminary hype, the nominating
convention proved to be almost anti-climactic. After
minimal in-fighting on the opening day, the 28th
witnessed the nomination of Tilden on the very first

ballot, and on the 29th Hendricks was confirmed as his
running mate. The Democratic ticket was an intelligent
compromise, and their champions almost ended
Republican rule in the closest and wierdest of American
elections.

During the convention, no motion was made to nominate
G. A. Custer - not even by his adopted state’s Michigan
delegation. No wild rumors circulated concerning a
hypothetical swing of votes to the b°y general with the
golden locks” if he could only win a victory over the five
tents of the Dakotas. Delegates in St. Louis had no
conception of what Custer was doing eight hundred miles
away in the wilds of Montana. Terry was in charge of the
expedition and there was no reason to expect Custer to
have any opportunity to engage the hostiles in a separate
operation. As events developed, St. Louis did not
receive news of the Little Big Horn until the evening of
July

5, and by then the Democratic delegates had concluded
their business almost one week earlier.

For a man who was allegedly supported by the owners

For a man who was allegedly supported by the owners
of two prominent New York newspapers, The Herald
and The World, those

tabloids remained remarkably mute on the subject of
Custer for president in their daily editions. Not one
sentence proposing Custer as the Democratic
presidential candidate was printed in either paper.
Bayard was the choice of The World, and Bennett’s
New York Herald advised its readers on June 3, 1876,
that it supported Tilden because he was the only
candidate that could possibly bring Democratic victory.

If for some reason Tilden could not obtain the necessary
voters for nomination, then the Herald believed a “Great
Unknown w

as needed. Custer? No. New Jersey

Governor Joel Parker was The Herald’s “Great
Unknown.” G. A. Custer was not even publicized as a
dark horse.

The facts are that no documented statements by Custer,
either private or public, pertaining to his presidential
aspirations exist. No support was in evidence at the St.
Louis Convention. The newspapers of his two alleged
backers, Jay Gould and James Gordon Bennett,

backers, Jay Gould and James Gordon Bennett,
announced their support of other candidates. No
organizing committee promoting Custer as a candidate
ever developed. Evidence that Custer rushed into the
valley of the Little Big Horn as part of a plan to become
the “Great Father” does not even qualify for the category
of circumstantial.

CHAPTER VII—FOOTNOTES

'Arikara Narrative, p. 57. (Note: For added emphasis,
underlining in quote is mine.)

Ibid., p. 62.

^Douglas C. Jones, The Court Martial of George
Armstrong Custer (New York: Werner Books, 1976);
Will Henry, Custer’s Last Stand {New York: Bantam
Books, 1962); George MacDonald Fraser, Flashman
and the Redskins (New York: New American Library,
1982); Thomas Berger, Little Big Man (New York:
Werner Books, 1964).

"Mari Sandoz, The Battle of the Little Big Horn
(Lincoln, NB: University of Nebraska Press, 1978), pp.

(Lincoln, NB: University of Nebraska Press, 1978), pp.
54-55.

Ibid., pp. 181-182.

David H. Miller, Custer’s Fall: The Indian Side of the

Story (New York: Duell, Sloan, and Pearce, 1967), p.
13.

New York Times, 20 February 1876; McPherson,
Ordeal by Fire, pp. 597-598.

New York Times, 18 February 1876.

^McPherson, Ordeal by Fire, pp. 597.599.

New York Herald, 3 June 1876.

CONCLUSION

One cannot deny that throughout his life George
Armstrong Custer was involved in political activity, and
that he was essentially an ambitious person. However, it
does not necessarily follow that he was a politically

ambitious individual who engineered the Belknap
investigation and thundered into the valley of the Little
Big Horn because he was a slave to those ambitions.
Custer was not naive and he did contribute to political
controversy during the last six months of his life. There is
strong evidence that he was aware of his abilities to
manipulate the anti-administration press for his own
purposes, but by his death he became a political martyr
for the Democrats and a tool to be used.

Current perceptions of Custer as a nihilistic
megalomaniac are based largely on Hollywood fantasy
and novels of fiction. Those perceptions have their
antecedents in two factors: Custer was a supporter of the
Democratic party which in 1876 was engaged in a bitter
struggle with the Republican party for supremacy;
consequently, Armstrong became a pawn on the political
chess board. At the battle of the Little Big Horn on June
25, 1876, he lost.

Prior to his involvement in the Belknap Affair, Custer
was not publicly referred to as “reckless” or “imprudent.
” After his demise those labels were continually applied
to him in the army s efforts to discredit him. In the

to him in the army s efforts to discredit him. In the
aftermath of the Little Big Horn disaster, the army found
it expedient to promote Custer as a scapegoat to protect
its own reputation and the reputations of Generals
Sherman, Sheridan, and Terry, and to serve its master,
the Republican-Grant administration. Among those
contributing to the army’s efforts due to personal

enmity were President Grant, Major Reno, and Captain
Benteen.

The army’s role, method, and bias in the dissemination of
information pertaining to the battle of the Little Big Horn
has been overlooked. Public awareness of the events of
June 25, 1876, was based on contrived releases and
edited official reports designed to discredit Custer. In the
absence of an official and impartial investigation of the
mystery surrounding the battle, speculation, rumor, and
innuendo prevailed.

When Custer attacked the Sioux-Cheyenne village in the
valley of the Little Big Horn, he did so not in defiance of
his superior officer’s orders, nor because it was a
calculated maneuver in his quest for the White House.

There is no evidence that at any time in his life Custer
seriously considered running for political office. While
other Civil War heroes such as U. S. Grant, Winfield S.
Hancock, and George B. McClellan chose to enter
politics, Armstrong was content to limit his career to the
military. His former Civil War mentor, George B.
McClellan, provided an astute assessment of Custer’s
last campaign: In the battle of the Rosebud (sic!),
against the Sioux, where he lost his life and the whole
of his immediate command was destroyed, no one
survived to tell the story of the disaster. On that fatal
day he simply repeated the tactics that he had so
often successfully used against large bodies of
Indians; it is probable that he was deceived as to the
strength and fighting capacity of his opponents ....

Those who accused him of reckless rashness would,
perhaps, have been the first to accuse him of timidity
if he had not attacked, and thus allowed the enemy to
escape unhurt. He died as he had lived, a gallant
soldier, and his whole career was such as to force me
to believe that he had good reasons for acting as he
did.

Seeds of distortion and misinformation sown by the
United States Army and their Republican rulers in 1876
have been complimented tor o\ er one hundred years by
prejudice and poor research. Custer was no saint, nor
was he a military genius. He was a knight errant ft ho
marched to the sound of a different drummer, and
because of

GEORGE BRINTON McCLELLAN Courtesy New
York Historical Society

that, his reputation has suffered. The battle of the Little
Big Horn may have cost Custer his life, but politics cost
him his reputation. For Custer, political activity was not
an end in itself. It was a means of expressing his
conscience, of protesting against corruption within the
Grant administration, specifically in “Indian Ring,” and of
ameliorating what he perceived as harsh penalties and
injustices of Radical Republican Reconstruction. In
following the dictates of his conscience, he did nothing
illegal, immoral, or dishonest; he was guilty only of being

illegal, immoral, or dishonest; he was guilty only of being
a good Democrat in the golden age of Radical
Republicanism.

Good name in man and woman, dear my lord,

Is the immediate jewel of their souls:

Who steals my purse steals trash; ‘tis something,
nothing;

‘Twas mine, 'tis his, and has been slave to thousands;

But he that filches from me my good name Robs me
of that which not enriches him,

And makes me poor indeed, Shakespeare-Othello Act
III, Sc 3

It is time historians restored to George Armstrong Custer
his good name.

CONCLUSION—FOOTNOTE

’George B. McClellan, McClellan ’s Own Story: The
War for the Union (New York: Charles L. Webster

War for the Union (New York: Charles L. Webster
and Co., 1887), p. 365.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Primary Books

Bourke, John G. On the Border with Crook. New
York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1891 Carroll, John M.,
Ed. The Benteen-Goldin Letters on Custer and His
Last Battle. New York: Liverright, 1974.

Custer, Elizabeth B. Boots and Saddles. New York:
Harper and Brothers, 1885-

Custer, Elizabeth B. Following the Guidon. New York:
Harper and Brothers, 1890.

Custer, Elizabeth B. Tenting on the Plains, General
Custer in Kansas and Texas. New York: Charles L.
Webster and Co., 1887. Custer, General George A. My
Life on the Plains, new ed. New York:

The Citadel Press, 1962.

Dippie, Brian W., ed. Nomad, George A. Custer in
Turf, Field and Farm. Austin, TX: University of Texas
Press, 1980.

Finerty, John F. War-Path and Bivouac, or the
Conquest of the Sioux.

Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1896.
Reprint 1961. Frost, Lawrence A., ed. With Custer in
'74, James Calhoun Diary of the Black Hills
Expedition. Provo, UT: Brigham Young

University Press, 1979.

Graham, W. A., ed. Abstract of the Reno Court of
Inquiry. Harrisburg,

PA: The Stackpole Co., 1954.

Grant, Ulysses W. Personal Memoirs ofU. S. Grant,
vol. 2. New ^ ork:

The Century Co., 1909.

Howard, James H., ed. The Warrior Who Killed

Howard, James H., ed. The Warrior Who Killed
Custer, the Personal Narrative of Chief Joseph White
Bull. Lincoln, NB: University of Nebraska Press, 1965-

Hunt, Frazier and Robert. I Fought with Custer, the
Story ofSgt. Win-dolph, Last Survivor of the Battle of
the Little Big Horn. New York: Charles Scribner’s
Sons, 1947.

Libby, Orin G., ed. The Arikara Narrative of the
Campaign Against the Hostile Dakotas, 1876.
Bismarck, ND: North Dakota Historical Collection, VI,
1920.

Marquis, Thomas. Memoirs of a White Crow Indian,
Thomas H. Laforge. Lincoln, NB: University of
Nebraska Press, 1974.

Marquis, Thomas. Wooden Leg, a Warrior Who
Fought Custer. Lincoln, NB: University of Nebraska
Press, 1931.

McClellan, George B. McClellan’s Own Story, the
War for the Union. New York: Charles L. Webster and

Co., 1887.

Merrington, Marguerite, ed. The Custer Story, the Life
and Intimate Letters of General Custer and His Wife
Elizabeth. New York: The Devin Adair Co., 1950.

Miles, Nelson A. Personal Recollections and
Observations of General Nelson A. Miles. Chicago,
IL: The Werner Co., 1896.

Pray, Issac C. Memoirs of James Gordon Bennett and
His Times. New York: Amo and the N. Y. Times,
1970.

Sheridan, P. H. Personal Memoirs, vols. I and II. New
York: Charles L. Webster and Co., 1885.

Wagner, Gwendolin D. OldNeutriment. New York: Sol
Lewis, 1973.

Willert, James, ed. The Terry Letters, the Letters of
General Alfred

H. Terry to His Sisters During the Indian War of
1876. La Mirada, CA

James Willert Pub., 1980.

1876. La Mirada, CA

James Willert Pub., 1980.

Secondary Books

Ambrose, Stephen E. Crazy Horse and Custer, the
Parallel Lives of Two American Warriors. Garden
City, NY: Doubleday and Co., Inc., 1975.

Bates, Charles F. Custer’s Indian Battles. Bronxville,
NY: By the author, 1936.

Boatner, Mark M. The Civil War Dictionary. New
York: David McKay Co., 1959.

Brininstool, E. A. Troopers with Custer, Historic
Incidents of the Battle of the Little Big Horn.
Harrisburg, PA: The Stackpole Co., 1952.

Brown, Dee. Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee. New
York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1970.

Brown, Jesse, and Willard, A. M. The Black Hills
Trails. New York: Arno Press, 1924. Reprint 1975.

Carlson, Oliver. The Man Who Made the News, a

Carlson, Oliver. The Man Who Made the News, a
Biography of fames Gordon Bennett, Sr. New York:
Duell, Sloan and Pearce, 1942. Carroll, John M., and
Price, Byron, eds. Roll Call on the Little Big Horn, 28
fune 1876. Fort Collins, CO: The Old Army Press,
1974.

Dellenbaugh, Frederick S. George Armstrong Custer.
New York: The Macmillan Co., 1917.

Dippie, Brian W. Custer’s Last Stand, the Anatomy of
an American Myth. Missoula, MT: University of
Montana Publishers, 1976. Dixon, Joseph K. The
Vanishing Race, the Last Great Indian Council. New
York: Popular Library, 1913-Dustin, Fred. The Custer
Tragedy, Events Leading Up to and Following the
Little Big Horn Campaign of 1876. Ann Arbor, MI:
Edwards Bros., Inc., 1939-Fougera, Catherine G. With
Custer’s Cavalry. Caldwell, ID: The Cax-

ton Printers, 1942.

Frost, Lawrence A. The Court Martial of General
George Armstrong Custer. Norman, OK: University of
Oklahoma Press, 1968. Frost, Lawrence A. The Custer

Oklahoma Press, 1968. Frost, Lawrence A. The Custer
Album, a Pictoral Biography of Gen.

George A. Custer. Seattle, WA: Superior Pub. Co.,
1964. Graham, W. A., ed. The Custer Myth, a Source
Book of Custeriana.

Harrisburg, PA: The Stackpole Co., 1953-Graham, W.
A. The Story of the Little Big Horn, Custer s Last
Fight, 5th ed. New York: Bonanza Books, 1959-Gray,
John S. The Centennial Campaign, the Sioux War of
1876.

Ft. Collins, CO: The Old Army Press, 1976.

Greene, Jerome A. Evidence and the Custer Enigma:
A Reconstruction of the Indian-Military History.
Reno, NV: Outbooks, 19 9.

Hammer, Kenneth, ed. Little Big Horn Biographies.
Custer Battlefield Historical Museum Association, 1964.

Hammer, Kenneth. Custer in ‘76, Walter Camp’s
Notes on the Custer Fight. Provo, UT: Brigham Young
University Press, 1976.

University Press, 1976.

Hofling, Charles K. Custer and the Little Big Horn, a
PsychobiographicalInquiry. Detroit, MI: Wayne State
University Press, 1981.

Hoig, Stan. The Battle of Washita. Lincoln, NB:
University of Nebraska Press, 1976.

Kinsley, D. A. Favor the Bold: Custer in the Civil
War Years. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston,
1967.

Kinsley, D. A. Favor the Bold—Custer the Indian
Fighter. Provo, UT: Promontory Press, 1965.

Kuhlman, Charles. Legend into History, the Custer
Mystery: An Analytical Study of the Battle of the
Little Big Horn. Harrisburg, PA: The Stackpole Co.,
1951.

Marquis, Thomas B. Keep the Last Bullet for Yourself
the True Story of Custer s Last Stand. New York: The
Two Continents Publishing Group Reference
Publications, Inc., 1976.

Publications, Inc., 1976.

Masters, Joseph G. Shadows Fall Across the Little
Horn. Laramie, WY: University of Wyoming Library,
1951.

McFeely, William S. Grant, a Biography. New York:
W. W. Norton and Co., 1951.

McLaughlin, James. My Friend the Indian. Boston.
MA: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1910.

McPherson, James. Ordeal by Fire, the Civil War and
Reconstruction. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1982.

Miller, David H. Custer’s Fall, the Indian Side of the
Story. New York: Duell, Sloan and Pearce, 1957.

Monaghan, Jay. Custer, the Life of General George
Armstrong Custer. Lincoln, NB: University of
Nebraska Press, 1959.

O Connor, Richard. The Scandalous Mr. Bennett.
Garden City, NJ: Doubleday and Co., 1962.

Randall, J. G., and Donald, David H. The Civil War
and Reconstruction, 2nd ed. Lexington, MA: D. C.
Heath Co., 1969.

Rickey, Don, Jr. Forty Miles a Day on Beans and Hay.
Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1963-

Rosenberg, Bruce A. Custer and the Epic of Defeat.
University Park, PA: The Pennsylvania State University
Press, 1974.

Sandoz, Mari. The Battle of the Little Big Horn.
Lincoln, NB: University of Nebraska Press, 1966,

Seitz, Don C. The James Gordon Bennetts, Father
and Son Proprietors of the N. Y. Herald. Indianapolis,
IN: The Bobbs-Merrill Co., 1928.

Shenkman, Richard, and Reiger, Kurt, eds. One-Night
Stands with American History. New York: Quill
Publishers, 1982.

Stewart, Edgar I. Custer 's Luck. Norman, OK:
University of Oklahoma Press, 1955-

University of Oklahoma Press, 1955-

Utley, Robert M. Custer and the Great Controversy:
The Origin and Development of a Legend. Los
Angeles, CA: Westernlore Press, 1962.

Utley, Robert M. Custer Battlefield National
Monument, Montana. Office of Publications, National
Park Service, U, S. Dept of Interior, Washington, D.C.
Custer Battlefield Historical Handbook

Series No, 1. 1969.

Van deWater, Frederick F. Glory-Hunter: A Life of
General Custer. New York: Argosy-Antiquarian Ltd.,
1934. Reprint 1965

Vaughn, J. W. Indian Fights; New Facts on Seven
Encounters. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma
Press, 1964.

Vestal, Stanly. Sitting Bull, Champion of the Sioux.
Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1932.

Walker, Judson E. Campaign of General Custer in the

Walker, Judson E. Campaign of General Custer in the
North-West and the Final Surrender of Sitting Bull.
New York: Promontory Press, 1881. Reprint 1966.

Whittaker, Frederick. A Complete Life of General
George A. Custer. New York: Sheldon and Co., 1876.

Willert, James. Little Big Horn Diary, Chronicle of the
1876 Indian War. La Mirada, CA: James Willett Pub.,
197^

Articles and Essays

Bradley, James H, “Journal of Lt. James H. Bradley.”
Contribution to the Historical Society of Montana,
vol. 2, Helena, 1896, pp. 140-226.

Godfrey, General Edward S. “Custer’s Last Battle.”
Century Magazine 43, January 1892, pp. 355-387.

Hughes, Colonel Robert P. “The Campaign Against the
Sioux."Jour-nal of the Military Service Institution of
the United States XVIII (January 1896).

The Nation. “The Week.” N. Y., March 16, 1876.

Reno, Major M. A., “The Custer Massacre.”
Americana Magazine 7, 1912, pp. 225-266.

Official Records and Reports

Belknap, William W. Trial in Senate of United States.
1876. 44th Congress, 1st Session. Washington, D C.
1976.

Benteen, Captain Frederick W. “Report July 4, 1876, to
Major Reno.” Executive Document 1, Part 1, House of
Representatives, 44th Congress, 2nd Session.

Captain Thomas B. Weir. 7th Cavalry, ACP File Box
851, Record Group 91. National Archives, Washington,
D.C.

Clymer, Heister, Chairman. Report of Committee on
Sale of Post Traderships. Aug. 5, 1876. House Report
Nol 799, 44 Congress, 1st Session.

Dakota, Department of. “General and Special Orders.”
1876 RG 393 NARS (National Archives Record
Service).

Service).

Dakota, Department of. “Letters Received.” 1876 RG
393 NARS.

Fort Abraham Lincoln. “Letters Sent.” 1874-77. RG
393 NARS.

Missouri, Division of. “Letters Received.” 1876 RG 393
NARS.

Missouri, Division of. “Letters Sent.” 1876 RG 393
NARS.

Montana, Department of. “Letters Sent.” 1876 RG 393
NARS.

Reno, Major Marcus A. Report of July 5, 1876,
Executive Document

1, Part 2, House of Representatives, 44th Congress, 2nd
Session.

Secretary' of War. “Annual Reports.” 1874-77.
Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C.

Se\enth, U. S. Cavalry Regiment. “General Orders and
Special Orders.” 1876 RG 391 NARS.

Sheridan, General Philip H. “Report of Nov. 25, 1876,
Executive Document 1, Part 2, House of
Representatives, 44th Congress, 2nd Session.

Sherman, General William T. Report of November 25,
1876, Executive Document 1, Part 2, House of
Representatives, 44th Congress, 2nd Session.

Terry, General Alfred H.. Report of November 21,
1876, Executive Document 1, Part 2, House of
Representatives, 44th Congress, 2nd Session.

Wallace, Lt. George D. Report of June 22-25 Annual
Report, Chief of Engineers, 1876, Appendix PP.

Newspapers

Bismarck, Tribune 1874-77.

Bozeman (Montana), Times 1876.

Helena, Herald, 1876.

New York, Herald 1875*76.

New York, Times 1866-76.

New York, World 1876.

Philadelphia, Inquirer 1876.

Unpublished

Ghent, William J., Papers. Library of Congress,
Washington, D.C.

Terry, Alfred H. “Diary of the Expedition of 1876 (May
17—August 22).” Library of Congress, Washington,
D.C.

Fiction

Berger, Thomas. Little Big Man. New York: Fawcett
Books, 1964.

Henry, Will. Custer’s Last Stand. New York: Bantam
Books, 1966.

Jones, Douglas C. The Court-Martial of George
Armstrong Custer. New York: Warner Books, 1976.

MacDonald, George F. Flashman and the Redskins.
New

York: New American Library, 1982.

1*1 INDEX |*|

Copperhead Coriett, W. W. Crazy Horse Crook, Gen.
George Crow’s Nest Custer, Boston Custer, Elizabeth
C.

Ambrose, Stephen E. Arikara Narrative Armes,
George A.

Barrett, Lawrence Bass, Lyman K.

Battle of the Little Big Horn Bayard, Thomas F.

Belknap, William W.

Berger, Thomas Big Belly Big Horn River

Bingham, John A. Bismarck Tribune Black Hills
Expedition Black Kettle Bloody Knife Bob-Tailed Bull
Bonnafon, A. L. Bouyer, Mitch Bozeman Times
Bradley, Lt, James Brininstool, E. A. Brisbin, Maj.
James Bristow, Benjamin H.

58, 60, 61, 71, 78 70 43 33 32, 37 54, 69 54

34, 40- 42, 51, 54 31, 37 61, 62 106 39 100

77 26 51 98

14, 15, 22, 31, 52 14, 15 98

29, 41, 45, 79, 106

29 31

67-94 109, HI 26- 31, 34, 39 - 42, 47, 52 Benham,
Capt. D. W_ 69, 70

Bennett, James Gordon Jr. 28, 36, 103, 104, 106, 109,
111 Benteen, Capt. Frederick W. 67, 68, 73, 75, 97 -
101, 114 106 90, 91

54, 58, 60 - 63, 76, 77, 81 11, 12, 14, 22 27, 28, 51,
57, 79 51 22

105, 106, 108 9, 105, 106, 108 33

87, 88, 90, 107 69, 70

58,

Cameron, J. W.

Campbell, Col. Robert Camp Robinson, Nebraska
Cariand, Lt. John A. Chandler, Zachariah Chase,
Salmon P.

Salmon P.

Chicago Times Clymer Committee

Clymer, Heister 25, 27, 30, 31, 34, 9 Continental Hotel

101

103,107,108 30, 38

61, 69 100

76, 77 31

Evan, John 26, 27

Davis Creek 87, 88

Farragut, Adm. David A Far West Fisk, Andrew
Forsyth, Col. James A.

Fort Berthold Fort Buford Fort Ellis Fort Fetterman Fort
Lincoln Fort Sill

Fort C. F, Smith Fraser, George MacDonald French,
George A.

Fry, Gen. James B.

Custer, Lt. Col. George Armstrong

11 - 21, 28 -44, 59-63, 76-81, 85 - 100, 103 - 105,
109, 110

Custer, Thomas W. 28, 58, 59, 91

14, 18

29, 52, 54, 57 54, 55, 57, 58, 88 86 - 88, 108 58, 59

‘Libby” 14, 20, 28, 40, 57, 95, 96, 99, 101 11

Custer, Emanuel

37 32 30 103 13

63, 67, 88, 91 54, 55, 58 90, 91 27, 28

60, 62 ■ 78, 85

30, 36, 101 35, 51

42 26, 30 14, 115 , 29, 36 37, 38 58 16 9

08, 109 35

29, 30, 101 10 100 95

14, 1 28

106, 1

National Archives National Union Party New York
Herald 35, 36, 39, 42 - 44, 57, 61, 70, 72, 80, 85, 86,
103, 106, 110, 111 New York Times 21, 25, 70, 78,
98, 109 Norton, W. H. 69

17, 18, 21

Hancock, Winfield S.

109, 110, 114

Hancock, Winfield S.

109, 110, 114

Hare, Lt. Luther S.

Hazen, Gen. William B. 26, 27, 30, 37

Helena Herald

Hendricks, Thomas A.

103, 109, 110

Henry, Will

106

Herendeen, George B,

107

Holland, Mary

Hughes, Robert P. 45, 71, 72, 77, 100

Humphrey, Annette

Indian Bureau

Impeachment Committee 31, 36, 37

Johnson, Andrew

17-20, 22, 108

Jones. Douglas C.

106

Juarez

Garfield, Gen, James A. 27

Gibbon, Col. John 54, 55, 58, 60, 6l, 63, 68, 69, 72 -
78, 85 Girard, Fred 90, 91, 98, 99, 105, 106,

108

Godfrey, Lt. Edward S. 87, 92, 93, 100 Gould, Jay
103,104,106,111

Graham, W. A. ioi

Granger, Gen. Gordon B. 21

Grant, Orvil 27, 32 - 35, 41

Grant, Ulysses S. 14, 15, 19, 22, 25, 27, 31, 34, 40 -
47, 52, 58, 79, 80, 97, 107, 110, 113, 114

Gray, John Great Sioux Reservation

Marcy, Randolph B.

Marsh, Caleb

McClellan, Gen, George B. Meeker, Ralph Merrill, Maj.
Lewis Merritt, Lt. Col. Wesley Mexico

Miles, Gen. Nelson A, Miller, David H.

Missouri River Monaghan, Jay Mulligan, Richard
Munger, Reverend T. T. My Life on the Plains

Lauffer, Samuel B. Leighton, A. C. Lewis, B. B.

Libby, Orin G. Lincoln, Abraham Little Big Horn River

Little Missouri River Lone Teepee Lounsberry, Clement

Official Reports Reno, Maj. Marcus Terry, Gen. Alfred
H.

60, 69 - 72, 74, 77, 78

Kellogg, Mark 57, 61, 103. 104, 107

Kerr, John

Palmer House Parker, Governor Joe! Philadelphia
Inquirer Porter, Dr. Henry R. Powder River

ill

71, 76, 79 98 54, 55

Raymond, J. W. 33

Reconstruction Plan I, 16, 18, 19

Redpath’s Lecture Bureau 29

Red Cloud 52, 53

Red Star 9, 88, 105 - 108, 111

Reed, Arthur 58, 59

Rend Court of Inquiry 97 - 99

Reno, Maj. Marcus 38, 39, 51, 58, 60, 61, 67-69, 72,
73, 85, 86, 95, 97, 108, 114

90, 106, 107 54, 55 16

Reynolds, Charley Reynolds, Gen, John j. Romero, Don
Mali as

Tongue River Townsend. Edward N. Treaty of Fort
Laramie Tullock’s Creek Twain, Mark

Rosebud River 60, 62. 63, 72, 78, 85, 86

101

95, 96, 99

Rosenberg, Bruce A. Rosser, Thomas L.

Stanton, Edwin M. !4, 15

Stewart, Edgar I. 29, 30, 101

Taylor, Muggins 69 - 71

Terry, Gen Alfred H. 30, 34, 35,

38 - 45, 51, 52, 54 - 63, 67, 69 - 79, 85, 95, 98, 100,
110, 113 Thomas, Maj. Gen. George H. 19

Tilden, Samuel j. 109 - 111

Tollaska Creek (see Tutlock's Creek)

58, 60, 81 34, 42 51

63, 73 101

Saint Louis Democratic Convention 103, 106, 109-111

Saint Paul-Minneapolis Pioneer Press

and Tribune Sandoz, Marie Seip, Robert C. Senate
summons Seventh Cavalry

101, 106, 107, 109 32, 35

30, 45, 73, 75 16, 21, 29, 37, 38, 51 - 65, 85 - 88, 91,
97 Seward, William H. 13 - 15, 19

Sheridan. Gen. Philip H. 14. 16. 29,

39, 40, 42, 43, 52, 54 - 57, 60, 70 - 72, 74, 80, 85,
108, 113 Sherman, Gen. William T. 26. 34,

40 - 43, 45, 47, 74, 113 Sitting Bull 29, 38, 52 - 54,
77, 88

7, 79 21

Smith, C.apt. E- W. ”0, 71, 4 Soldiers & Sailors
Convention Spotted Tail

52, 53 Yellowstone River 54, 58, 60

8, 86

Utley, Robert

95. 101

100, 101 87 - 92

86, 97 26

18. 54, 87 98 19

95, 97 - 99 32

Van deWater, Frederick Varnum, Lt. Charles A.

Wallace, Lt. George D. Ward, Robert Washita River
Weir, Capt. Thomas B Welles, Gideon Whittaker,
Frederick Wilson, Robert

Wyszukiwarka

Podobne podstrony:
Lepper for President
Hacking for Beginners Craig Benson
Harrison, Harry SSR 05 The Stainless Steel Rat for President
Hillary Clinton and the Order of Illuminati in her quest for the Office of the President(updated)
Exclusive Hillary Clinton and the Order of Illuminati in her quest for the Office of the President
Is There Historical Evidence for the Resurrection of Jesus A Debate between William Lane Craig and B
Hillary Clinton and the Order of Illuminati in her quest for the Office of the President(2)
Gardner, Craig Shaw Arabian 2 A Bad Day for Ali Baba
Figures for chapter 5
Figures for chapter 12
GbpUsd analysis for July 06 Part 1
Figures for chapter 6
The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty
AME Stds for NATO Seminar
American government presidential elections
Herbs for Sports Performance, Energy and Recovery Guide to Optimal Sports Nutrition
Japanese for busy people I (ch26 end)
Biomass Fired Superheater for more Efficient Electr Generation From WasteIncinerationPlants025bm 422

więcej podobnych podstron