Forgotten Moral Foundations of Custer’s Opponent
For the inevitable climactic showdown of the 1876 Campaign, the upcoming confrontation was much more than a stereotypical clash of civilizations, cultures, races, and societies. It was an encounter between not only two worlds based on antithetical values and belief systems, but also on widely divergent religious views. While the Great Plains Indians wanted only to be left alone to roam free and hunt the buffalo, the whites still embraced a deep-seated cultural belief (which went hand-in-hand with westward expansion) of conquering nature. Even more, New Englander Herman Melville, the author of Moby Dick who based his view on a broad historical perspective, described one of these cultural views as “the metaphysics of Indian-hating.”1
Indeed, even in June 1876 and for the last two centuries in America, the conquest of native people in the course of western expansion was viewed as a moral “achievement made in the name of humanity—the triumph of light over darkness, of good over evil, and of civilization over brutish nature.”2
In this sense, Custer was widely viewed as the nation’s cutting edge of the sword that was to cut its way through the obstacles like Great Plains warriors, who stood in America’s path of expansion toward the setting sun. As Sheridan and Sherman fully appreciated, Custer and his mobile strike force (7th Cavalry) was the army’s sharpest tool in its relatively small post–Civil War arsenal. A Cheyenne woman described Custer in detail, revealing how his charismatic appeal cut across racial and cultural boundaries, especially with regard to women: “Our people gave him the name of Hi-es-tzie, meaning Long Hair [and he] had a large nose, deep-set eyes, and light-red hair that was long and wavy [and] [a]ll of the Indian women talked of him as being a fine-looking man.”3 Certainly, wife Libbie thought so with regard to her bold cavalier. In a Civil War letter to Custer, she had implored with a sense of humor: “Old fellow with the golden curls, save them from the barber’s. When I’m old I’ll have a wig made from them.”4
Ancient enemies of the Sioux in the struggle for diminishing natural resources on the Northern Great Plains were Custer’s Crow scouts, who referred to white soldiers as “Light Eyes” and called Custer “Son of the Morning Star.”5 This name had been bestowed because Custer had struck Black Kettle’s Cheyenne village along the Washita at sunrise when the Morning Star Voohehe was still high in the sky at daybreak.6 Meanwhile, the Lakota people, or the Western Sioux Nation, knew Custer by the name of Pehin Hanska.7
Although he had been named after a Methodist preacher in the hope that he would one day enter the ministry, Custer was not entirely adhering to the belief that God and Manifest Destiny had ordained this land for whites only like most Americans. Instead, he looked toward the past. So many past successes during America’s defining moment (the American Illiad of 1861–1865) still exerted a strong pull over him. Because it had been the key to so many past victories, Custer was obsessed with one tactical thought and winning formula: the headlong cavalry attack. Quite simply, the cavalry charge was something that Custer had always relied upon because it had brought him so much success. This faith had never failed him in the past.
Demonstrated repeatedly against the South’s finest cavalrymen, including gifted Confederate commanders educated at West Point and military academies across the South, Custer’s undying faith in the tactical wisdom of the frontal and flank attack had early transformed him into an authentic American hero. Custer described his well-publicized attack on the sleeping Cheyenne village at the Washita: “The moment the charge was ordered the band struck up ‘Garry Owen’ and with cheers that strongly reminded me of scenes during the war, every trooper … rushed toward the Village.”8
Custer’s obsession with this time-tested tactical formula for success against either whites or Indians was carried faithfully with him all the way to the Little Bighorn. However, what Custer failed to fully realize was that a new day had dawned. It was no longer 1865, when impressive victories had been relatively easy against an outgunned army and manpower-short nation devastated by nearly four years of war. Confident that he and his 7th Cavalry could beat any number of Indians, Custer’s tactic of headlong and flank attack was his reliable ace in the hole, or so he believed. Consequently, this reliable tactical formula for success was something that he held close, especially if a crisis situation developed.
Prophetic Visions
Meanwhile, a lesser-known popular leader possessed another vision that he viewed as a special message straight from the Great Spirit. Sitting Bull was the most respected Sioux leader to emerge, not only because of his longtime defiance that mocked the accommodating agency—or reservation—chiefs, but also because he was the most revered holy man. He now served as a defiant symbol of resistance that united the tribes around him. Sitting Bull advocated a strict adherence of ancient cultural and religious ways as the best means to save a people under tremendous pressure.9
In pursuit of the buffalo herds that moved relentlessly in search of fresh bluestem grasses the covered the open prairie below the Yellowstone, Sitting Bull’s band moved farther south and up the picturesque valley of the Rosebud from late May to early June. During the June Sun Dance at a medicine lodge on the Rosebud River (south of the Yellowstone and just east of the Little Bighorn River) and symbolically in the heart of buffalo country, a most significant event took place. A Cheyenne named White Bull, the nephew of Sitting Bull born in the Black Hills, recalled his uncle’s inspirational vision that was greeted with deep reverence. The forty-five-year-old Sitting Bull, the most revered Hunkpapa Sioux holy man (wicasa wakan) who spoke excellent French, which he had learned from Catholic missionaries in Canada, sought to gain a revealing vision that might offer salvation to his beleaguered people. He hoped that this vision would come during what the Cheyenne called the “Great Medicine or Great Spirit Dance” (the “Sun Dance” to whites). He prayed for a great vision because he knew that the pony soldiers were on the move north of the Yellowstone and heading his way.
After hallucinating from intense pain caused by the tortuous Sun Dance, and then praying for a heaven-sent vision while atop a butte that overlooked the Rosebud, Sitting Bull gained his powerful vision: a good many enemies falling from the sky and into an Indian village full of well-armed warriors, who then destroyed them. In White Bull’s words that described Sitting Bull’s haunting vision that foretold of a great victory, “the Great Power had told him that his enemies would be delivered into his hands. He did not profess to know who these enemies were, but [he] explained that perhaps they might be [white] soldiers.”10 Ironically, in an eerily prophetic fashion, Libbie had gained a comparable vision of her husband rising into the midst of bellowing white clouds as if his soul was ascending to heaven. This pampered socialite and outgoing daughter of a respected Michigan judge was haunted by dreams like Sitting Bull’s, and her dashing husband was caught in the middle.11
The Lakota’s “Great Power” was named Wakan Tanka, and Sitting Bull had asked for assistance from this most revered spirit to save the Lakota people from destruction. Sitting Bull believed that his vision of soldiers attacking from the east (although the Terry–Custer Expedition was now located to the north above the Yellowstone) was bestowed to him, as he believed, from that most sacred source.12 The Lakota people and their Cheyenne allies were told of Sitting Bull’s vision guaranteed by Wakan Tanka that if the white soldiers had the audacity to attack the sizeable village (now larger than ever before), then they would be vanquished.13
Sitting Bull’s spiritual vision gave the people new hope, especially with regard to the permanent return to ancestral and nomadic ways. The real name of this middle-aged holy man, who refused (like Crazy Horse) to be drawn into the seductive trap of the agency system or sign any treaties, was “A Buffalo Bull Lives Permanently among Us.” Sitting Bull had long possessed his own sensible solution to avoid warfare: “to remain entirely out of touch with the whites” in every way. Therefore, he had led his people deeper in buffalo hunting grounds, the Powder River country, where they could roam free far from white government agencies, rules, or regulations.14
However, Sitting Bull was not the only voice that eventually proved prophetic. The Sioux believed in that the howls of the wolves were timely warnings. As late as “on June 24 [the day before Custer’s attack], Box Elder, a Cheyenne prophet [who was also known as] Dog Stands on Ridge, sent a crier [through the village along the Little Bighorn] to warn the people to hold their horses [in preparation for an attack because] [h]e saw soldiers coming,” in the words of Young Two Moons.15 Lamenting that these words fell on deaf ears of a complacent people who felt secure in the safety of numbers, Young Two Moons sent a crier to warn the people … “but people did not listen because they did not believe him.”16
Indeed, as in the past when large numbers of Indian people were gathered in one place, these timely warnings were seen as unnecessary, and ignored. Low Dog, a tall Oglala Sioux warrior who had old scores to settle with Custer’s men because one brother had been killed by the 7th Cavalry in a previous fight, said it best with regard to the representative view at the villagers along the Little Bighorn: “I did not think it possible that any white men would attack us, so strong as we were. We had in camp the Cheyennes, Arapahos, and several different tribes of the Teton Sioux—a countless number.”17
By this time, the Northern and Southern Cheyenne were now united as one with their Sioux cousins, adhering to the wise adage of strength in numbers. Most importantly, these veteran hunters and warriors were well armed. Destined to fight Custer at the Little Bighorn like Low Dog, Brave Bear, a Southern Cheyenne Dog Soldier, was a typical warrior. He was proud of his painted war shield and colorfully decorated lodge that displayed designs of his past visions. Brave Bear was destined to lose his son to a trooper’s bullet later that year during the attack on Dull Knife’s village, located on the Red Fork of the Powder River, on November 26, 1876.18
The Oft–Overlooked Cheyenne
In relative terms, the Cheyenne, especially the Southern Cheyenne, were the most overlooked warriors at the Little Bighorn compared to the better-known Sioux, whose numbers were far higher. Since the Sioux were the principal opponents of the 7th Cavalry in this campaign, the far fewer number of Cheyenne oral histories have been long neglected by historians. Most importantly with regard to the final showdown, the Cheyenne were no ordinary warriors. In fact, they possessed a well-deserved warlike reputation and ferocity in battle that was equal to the Sioux.
An early pervasive attitude that evolved into one of the most cherished value systems of Cheyenne warrior society had been “let us fight all people we meet [then] we shall become great men,” or warriors. The superiority of the Cheyennes’ warlike ways was revealed by the fact that they were arguably the most mixed-race tribe (more than other tribes, including the Sioux), because so many past successes had garnered large numbers of captives over centuries. These war prisoners were then adopted into the tribe and married, with many different people becoming one. Consequently, and quite unlike the Sioux, almost every Cheyenne warrior had the blood from another tribe in his veins.19
The powerful meaning of Sitting Bull’s and Box Elder’s visions can only be fully understood within the context that they stemmed from perhaps the most spiritually focused and obsessed people in America. The Cheyennes’ all-consuming spiritual nature combined with Spartan-like warrior ways to serve as the central foundation of their highly respected warrior societies that had long been the very heart and soul of the tribe: the Elk Soldiers (also called the Elk Horn Scrapers); the Fox Soldiers (also known as the Kit Fox men and the Coyote Soldiers); the Red Shield Soldiers; the Bowstring Soldiers (also called the Wolf Soldiers); and the Northern Crazy Dogs (Dog Men). Members of this last warrior society were called “Cheyenne Dog Soldiers” by whites, who had grown to fear them like no other Great Plains warriors. Hotamitaneo was the Cheyenne name for these fierce Dog Soldiers. Quite simply, the Dog Soldiers were the most warlike of the Cheyenne warrior societies. These warrior societies functioned as separate military units that operated and fought independently of each other to foster intense rivalries.
Serving as the traditional camp police and guardians of the village, these were crack fighting men of the warrior societies. Therefore, they possessed the greatest influence and commanded the most respect. These warrior societies were also the keepers of the tribe’s rich heritage and ancient traditions, which were considered sacred. Consequently, besides protectors, these warriors were culturally important in the tribe like no other fighting men. Society members ensured the maintaining of order as much on the buffalo hunt (each family unit was entitled to an equal part in the hunt for their equal share of the meat) as in camp. All in all, each warrior society represented an esprit de corps of fighters to protect the people in wartime and preserve their nation’s life. From an early age, members of these highly disciplined societies had been well–prepared well prepared for battlefield challenges, especially emergency situations when the tribe’s very existence was in peril.
Representing the best fighting men of their respective warrior societies, the Cheyenne warriors wore clothing and possessed war regalia that distinguished them from other societies: a situation that fostered competition between warrior societies that heightened pride, morale, and war-waging capabilities to enhance the overall chances for the tribe’s survival. Each warrior society possessed an easily recognizable tradition and legacy.
For instance, the warriors of the Red Shield Society were the only ones who carried a round battle shield, which was painted red. The Red Shield Society warriors believed that this distinctive shield have been a special gift from the Great Prophet. The shield’s leather covering was made of the hide from a buffalo’s hindquarters, including the long black tail that hung down from the shield’s bottom to bestow a distinctive look. Most of all, this special shield spiritually linked these fighting men to the revered animal upon which the tribe’s culture and survival was based. For these reasons, the Red Shield Society’s warriors garnered the popular name of “buffalo warriors” among the people. They wore buffalo horn headdresses with horns attached during sacred ceremonies and dances, while bestowing God with thanks for the plenty provided by the buffalo herds and natural world.
The warriors of the Coyote (Fox) Society performed sacred ceremonies in the hope of gaining the legendary endurance and cunning of the coyote, which was one of the Plains’ most stealthy, clever hunters. Meanwhile, the Dog Men Society was the Cheyenne tribe’s largest warrior organization, its popularity stemming from its lengthy record of wartime successes. The waging of war was very nearly a full-time occupation among members of this highly respected society. Most of all, these men were the elite of the elite of these respective warrior societies. The society’s symbol or emblem was the dog, which was a sacred animal. The reputation and prestige of the Cheyenne Dog Soldier Society exceeded all other tribal warriors.
Meanwhile, maintaining an exceptionally high moral code, the warriors of the Bowstring Soldier Society remained caste and morally focused. These men never married for the express purpose of remaining totally “pure” (more so than other society members) so that they stayed strong and were focused solely on nature’s beauty to more clearly view God’s masterful handiwork and the purity around them. The Cheyenne Dog Soldiers were not only stoic warriors, but also the sage philosophers among their people. Symbolically, they wore stuffed screech owls to signify the depth of their wisdom, which reminded them that their personal conduct in all matters should always be wise like the owl. In much the same way, the warriors of the Bowstring (Wolf) Society believed that they drew their power from the wolf’s strength, cunning, and hunting skills.
Each warrior society of the Cheyenne nation had been created by a different holy man. He instilled moral qualities and strict codes of behavior. Acting independently of each other as separate entities, each warrior society performed actions that were focused on ensuring that the Great Prophet would bestow victory upon them. Warrior society members were truly the most Spartan of the Great Plains warriors. They were required to lead extremely strict, upright moral and virtuous lives (putting even some European monks to shame) in order to please the Great Prophet and guarantee his bountiful blessings, especially in wartime.20
Performing heroics in this crucial mission—their people’s survival—brought greater respect and higher status for the individual warrior. Serving as the very “war force” of the Cheyenne tribe, these warriors bolstered military spirit among not only the society but also among the tribe in general.
Sacrificing their lives in order to save the people, especially defenseless women and children, was the greatest honor for these dedicated warriors of courage and faith. Against enemies regardless of their race and color, they fought with their hearts. Especially against white soldiers, these experienced warriors and veteran hunters expected no quarter and gave none in a Darwinian-like life-and-death struggle to the bitter end. Consequently, the war of the Sioux and Cheyenne warrior was a total one, against either whites or their ancient Indian enemies like the Crows.21
This situation of the Cheyenne was now especially desperate after the sacred Black Hills had been desecrated by the white miners. To these religiously obsessed warriors, too many whites had repeatedly proven that they “had no honor; they were lied to as Sitting Bull said [and therefore in] Lakota councils, the leaders talked of war.”22 Even white religious leaders demonstrated un-Christian qualities as the Cheyenne had discovered. A ruthless former minister, Colonel John M. Chivington, was the primary architect of the Sand Creek massacre, during one of the bloodiest days in the Colorado Territory’s history where so many Cheyenne innocents had been killed on November 29, 1864. He had sworn to exterminate every Cheyenne that he and his Colorado men encountered, including even youths, if not infants (future warriors), because of the frontier philosophy that “Nits make lice.”23 Reflecting the day’s common thinking, especially on the western frontier where racial hatred (on both sides) reached its savage peak, Chivington was convinced that “it is right and honorable to use any means under God’s heaven to kill Indians.”24
In contrast to the merciless Coloradoans, the Cheyenne warriors served and fought for the Great Prophet (God) to secure his blessings that were necessary for their people’s survival. Everything that these warriors did was to honor this highest spirit and divine force as much as possible. Clearly, to a fanatical degree, these were true holy warriors who possessed a religious zeal. After all, these warriors knew that everything depended on God’s favor for the people’s salvation, especially at this time when their culture, society, and way of life were under threat from mounting white pressures as never before. By 1875, the majority of the buffalo herds had been decimated, and the white man was responsible for this systematic decimation of the most sacred animal for sport and profit. Quite simply, the situation was increasing desperate for the Northern Great Plains people by spring 1876.
Therefore, practically every thought and heroic deed of these society warriors was ordained by a powerful spiritual faith to save what was little was left of what they considered most precious and necessary to the people’s survival. Quite simply, to these premier fighting men, the very life of the entire tribe depended upon the blessings of Divine Providence, which was believed to always direct the immense buffalo herds on their seasonal migrations straight to the people exclusively for their benefit. The people’s mutual reliance and existence on this animal could not have been greater.
To their horror, the Southern Cheyenne had already witnessed the wiping out of the vast buffalo herds on the Southern Great Plains. Now, that same fate awaited the northern herds. Therefore, it was most of all necessary for these true holy warriors to stay in God’s good graces to combat the evil that now threatened everything, especially the buffalo’s mass destruction. The Great Spirit had always faithfully answered the ceremonial buffalo “calls” of the shamans by faithfully sending the herds on their annual migrations to the Sioux and Cheyenne to give them life, health, and vitality. However, now those herds were rapidly vanishing.25
While these warriors worshipped the buffalo, Custer was a battle-hardened military professional and war lover. In part because he had won so many victories during the Civil War, Custer worshiped at the altar of “the God of battles,” as he had emphasized to his hard-riding troopers during the Civil War.26 Reflecting their society’s and leaders’ prevalent views, the men of the 7th Cavalry already envisioned the final sunset of the Plains Indians as inevitable. Like everyone else, reporter Mark Kellogg embraced this widely shared view of a triumphant Anglo-Saxon race on the march west. While serving as a progress-minded member of the expedition to the Little Bighorn, he wrote philosophically about the fast-approaching end of an era with the inevitable extinction of a free people without remorse or a hint of sympathy: “the bee, the buffalo and the Indian are ever crowded ahead as civilization advances … the buffalo have gone [and] [t]he Indian must soon follow. The chiefs want the country and the Great Spirit has decreed that the red man must pass on.”27
Even the number of warrior societies had diminished over the years. By the time of the battle of Little Bighorn, Wooden Leg, the Cheyenne warrior of the Elk Warrior Society and whose father defiantly refused to take his family to the reservation, concluded how there were “three warrior societies [which were] the Elk warriors, the Crazy Dog warriors and the Fox warriors.”28 He also emphasized how the “warrior societies were the foundation of tribal government among the Cheyennes [because] the members of the warrior societies elected the chiefs who governed the people. … The Elk warriors, the Crazy Dog warriors and the Fox warriors were the ruling societies of the Northern Cheyennes [and] those three were the only actives one in our northern branch of the double tribe,” Northern and Southern Cheyenne.29
Custer understood the reputation of the enemy he was about to face along the Little Bighorn. With a hint of respect for their warrior ways that were not unlike those of the bright and the brightest from West Point, he wrote that the Cheyenne “Dog Soldiers [was] a band composed of the most warlike and troublesome Indians on the Plains ….”30 He had early seen the warriors’ formidable qualities. As an impressed Custer had confided to his wife in a November 1868 letter: “They are painted and dressed for the war-path, and well-armed with Springfield breech-loading guns. All are superb horsemen.” Ironically, Custer, an excellent horseman himself, had been described by an eastern newspaperman after he lost control of his horse during the 1865 Union victory parade in Washington, DC, as having galloped ahead of the troops “like the charge of a Sioux chieftain.”31
A Lengthy, Arduous Campaign
What had been now unleashed against the unwary Sioux and Cheyenne was a spring and summer 1876 campaign that was “an unprovoked military invasion of an independent nation that already happened to exist within” territory that later became part of the United States.32 With a gift for understatement, the cynical Captain Marcus William Benteen, Custer’s senior company commander, described this campaign as one not “initiated by the army for glory going purposes … but rather, was a little gentle disciplining which the Department of the Interior (the Department of the U.S. Government having charge of the Indian Bureau), had promised would be given the Indians if they, the nomads of the plains, declined to come in to agencies in the Spring; be good, and draw their pay.”33
While the troops of the Terry–Custer Expedition continued to move relentlessly westward under adverse conditions and over rough terrain, the seeds of disaster at the Little Bighorn had already been deeply sown because of dysfunctional internal regimental dynamics and serious missteps of top leadership, both within the 7th Cavalry and higher up. As he desired, Custer continued to possess complete control of the 7th Cavalry, after Sheridan had made sure that the regimental commander, Colonel Samuel Sturgis, remained on detached service at the Cavalry Depot in St. Louis (more than 1,000 miles away) since 1873. One of the most confident military ventures ever launched in United States military history, the Terry–Custer Expedition consisted of two parts: the Dakota Column of the 7th Cavalry under Custer, and the Montana Column under Colonel John Gibbon—another hero of Gettysburg like Custer—at the northern edge of the unceded territory above the Yellowstone.
Before departing Fort Abraham Lincoln, Custer had divided the 7th Cavalry into two separate wings for greater tactical flexibility to meet the summer campaign’s challenges. One wing was led by Major Marcus Albert Reno, a decorated Civil War veteran without Indian fighting experience, and the other wing was commanded by one of the regiment’s best officers with ample experience in Indian warfare, Benteen. As if still fighting in the Civil War, Custer was taking some inherent risks in the overall name of regimental harmony and proper military protocol in this arrangement. Custer also made himself vulnerable because of his “forgiving nature,” and tendency to overlook the depths of hatred among his personal enemies in his own ranks.
An extremely proud and haughty officer not revealed by the placid face of a schoolboy, the calculating Benteen was Custer’s arch-enemy, second to none. Therefore, Custer should have known that Benteen could not be completely relied upon in a crisis situation. However, as during the Civil War years, when unity of purpose was paramount, he was hoping for the best in the overall name of the regiment, honor, and duty. For a variety of reasons, personal and professional, Benteen had been Custer’s principal foe for years. The roots of this deep-seated animosity lay partly in jealousy stemming from Custer’s glowing Civil War exploits and in what happened during Custer’s attack at the Washita. On that late November day in 1868, a small mounted detachment under Major Joel Elliott, Benteen’s friend, had been annihilated at the Washita. After Elliott and his men strayed and became heavily engaged in a hot fight after having chased fleeing warriors, Benteen believed that they had been abandoned by the regiment’s commander to a cruel fate.
Captain Benteen also denounced Custer for having attacked recklessly without knowing the layout of the villages that spanned a long distance along the Washita, endangering the entire regiment. Custer’s charge at the Washita was indeed a very close call. Custer’s attack was unleashed without proper reconnaissance and knowledge of the enemy’s strength and positions: a recipe for disaster. Still seething that Custer had ordered no search for the missing Elliott and his men from whom “nothing had been heard,” in Custer’s words, Benteen’s open hostility toward Custer ensured that Benteen thereafter received the most remote assignments: a situation that led to the disease deaths of four of his children until only one lucky child, Fred, remained alive. This family tragedy was something that Benteen never forgot, or forgave.
For these reasons, Benteen’s hatred of Custer was intense. He literally basked in his role as the leader of the 7th Cavalry’s anti-Custer faction. Benteen fairly delighted in opposing what this native Virginian (born in Petersburg on the Appomattox River) derided as the “Custer Gang.”34 As late as October 1891, the depth of Benteen’s bitterness toward Custer can be seen in his sad words that revealed the high personal price he paid for opposing Custer with such relish: “I lost four children in following that brazen trumpet around.”35
The Summer Campaign
Custer and his men now expected a swift final victory this early summer on the high plains south of the Yellowstone. One of the most overlooked factors not taken into consideration to explain Custer’s disaster was the grueling nature of this lengthy and demanding campaign. Indeed, this campaign seemed destined to leave the 7th Cavalry’s exhausted men and horses (both out of prime battle shape in the aftermath of the long Northern Plains winter) at the very ends of their physical capabilities before the final showdown on June 25, when every ounce of energy and strength was needed.
Since departing Fort Abraham Lincoln on May 17, after riding west for nearly 300 miles east over wide stretches of rugged terrain in twenty-two days, the troopers now realized that this exhausting campaign was anything but “another pleasant summer outing.” Custer and the 7th Cavalry reached the Powder River on June 7, after the long journey, having crossed from the Dakota Territory to the Montana Territory in late May.36 In a letter to his wife on June 9, Custer wrote without a hint of danger: “We are now in a country hitherto unvisited by white men.”37
Custer then turned north for a relatively short ride toward the Yellowstone—whose heavy silt bestowed upon the river its yellowish color and its name—and to where it meets the Powder. To support the expedition deep into Indian country, the Powder River Depot and encampment were established near the mouth of the Powder River.38 Confident reporter Mark Kellogg wrote on June 10 that this concentration of troops “are so thoroughly organized that if the Indians can be found they will be taught a lesson that will be a lasting one to them [and] It is believed they INTEND TO FIGHT but they are no match for the force sent against them.”39
On this same day, Kellogg described the newly formed strategy to subdue the wayward tribes in the unceded territory of the Powder River country:
Taking the supposition that if the Indians have moved southward, that Gen. Crook [commanding the southern column from the Wyoming Territory] will meet and look after them. Gen. [Colonel John B.] Gibbon’s four companies of cavalry were ordered to, and will arrive at the mouth of the Rosebud tonight to prevent the crossing of Indians at that point if any should attempt it. Major Reno, with a battalion of cavalry … is ordered to march up the Powder river to its forks, then to push across the country [on a scout to locate the Indian’s trail and then] Custer will outfit nine companies and with pack mules for transportation, will rampage all over the country, taking in the Rosebud and the Big Horn rivers, valleys and ranges. Gen. Custer declined to take command of the scout on which Maj. Reno is now at the head of, not believing that any Indians would be met with in that direction. His opinion is that they are in bulk in the vicinity of the Rosebud range.40
Consisting of half a dozen companies, Reno’s scout began on June 12. He headed south up the Powder and to its headwaters and then farther west to the Tongue River, searching for signs of Indian movements to ascertain their location.41 On Thursday morning, June 15, Custer led the 7th Cavalry’s left wing (six companies) west along the south bank of the Yellowstone, after crossing the Powder River. Custer was directed to ride west to the Tongue River. The plan was for Custer to rendezvous with Reno’s right wing about thirty miles to the west, where the Tongue River entered the Yellowstone. Custer reached the mouth of the Tongue River without incident.42
General Terry then joined Custer’s encampment on June 16. Here, they waited three days for information from Reno’s scout deep into buffalo country.43 At this time, the Indians were continuing to move generally west because the buffalo migrated west across the arid high plains in search of fresh water and new prairie grasses that now stood high in the bright sunshine.44 So far, most things had gone relatively well in this expedition. However, Boston Custer, the youngest of the Custer clan, who had never been a soldier, had gained more sober reflections that were right on target. Custer and brother Tom enjoyed nothing more than playing practical jokes on younger brother “Bos,” continuing the teasing that was a Custer family tradition. On Thursday, June 8, the young man had written to his mother, Maria: “I do hope this campaign will be a success, and if Armstrong [George Armstrong Custer] could have his way I think it would be, but unfortunately there are men along whose campaign experience is very limited, but, having an exalted opinion of themselves, feel that their advice would be valuable in the field … I don’t think we will get back to [Fort] Lincoln before September ….”45
On June 17, a delighted Custer wrote to Libbie how “I don’t know what we would do without ‘Bos’ to tease.” Ironically, on this very day when Crook was defeated along the Rosebud by Crazy Horse and his warriors, the overall situation was becoming far more serious and deadly than imaged by the fun-loving Custer. Back at Fort Abraham Lincoln, consequently, Libbie’s fears had grown with each passing day. In one of her last letters to her husband, Libbie had prophetically written, in the third week of June: “I cannot but feel the greatest apprehension for you on this dangerous scout.”46 Perhaps she feared the worst also because Custer was not as religious as she thought he should be. Libbie admitted how her husband “though not a professional Christian yet [he] respects religion.”47
Acting on the latest intelligence gained from Reno’s lengthy scout—which discovered an extensive Indian trail that proceeded west all the way to the Tongue River and farther away from the Powder River than ordered—Terry formulated a plan for Custer to cross the Tongue River with six companies and link with Reno’s six companies (the 7th Cavalry consisted of a dozen companies). He was then to pick up the Indian trail that had been discovered, after pushing south and up the Rosebud, west of the Tongue River.
Aboard the steamboat Far West at the Rosebud’s mouth on the Yellowstone, Terry held a conference with his commander on the evening of June 21 to issue official instructions. By this time, it was clear that the Indians were located neither on the Powder or the Tongue. They were even farther west in the Rosebud, Little Bighorn, or Bighorn River (from east to west) country, where the buffalo roamed in greater numbers in the heart of the Indians’ prime hunting grounds. Consequently, General Terry envisioned the three columns (General George Crook the Wyoming Column from the south [Terry did not know of his defeat and withdrawal], Custer the Dakota Column from the north, and Colonel John Gibbon with the Montana Column from the north) converging on their prey. Hopefully, the Indians then could be snared before they slipped away as so often in the past.
Therefore, on June 22, Custer and the 7th Cavalry rode south up the unspoiled landscape of the Rosebud Valley and away from Terry’s command, after a formal review that impressed one and all. However, Custer’s column was laden with its extensive pack train of heavily burdened mules, which was guaranteed to slow down movements and required too many guardians (one officer and six men) from each company’s ranks. Therefore, at total of 130, including all of Company B, were either part of the train or its guardians, representing twenty percent of the 7th Cavalry: vital manpower that was not part of Custer’s two upcoming offensive strikes at the Little Bighorn.
The 7th Cavalry’s march would be conducted about twenty to thirty miles per day, based on calculations formulated during Terry’s conference aboard the Far West. Most importantly as if worried that he would be able to gain full support from his top lieutenants in a crisis situation, Custer specifically emphasized at a commanders’ conference that he would need the loyalty and cooperation of every officer for their mission to succeed.
Following the trail of obviously a large number of Indians, Custer steadily led his troopers up the beautiful valley of the Rosebud, which was “clear running.” Along the river’s twisting course, the valley was radiant with new life, including an abundance of colorful spring flowers. As he desired, Custer had been allowed a free reign by Terry to locate the Indians, who were now expected to be either at the head of the Rosebud or on the Little Bighorn farther west. The morning (June 18) after the battle of the Rosebud, the immense village had moved west to the Little Bighorn River. These two parallel river valleys were separated by a fifteen to twenty-mile divide of high ridges on the open, rolling high plains. Now at the head of only the fast-moving cavalrymen, Custer had been given discretion to attack immediately or wait for the arrival of Gibbon’s column, which was about half infantry and of less strength (like Terry’s column), depending on the tactical situation that he found. Of course, since infantry moved more slowly and Custer always struck as soon as possible, there actually existed little possibility that he would wait, especially if he discovered a good opportunity to strike as seemingly everyone at headquarters fully realized.
Indeed, General Terry had emphasized to Custer that he was not imposing “precise orders which might hamper your action when nearly in contact with the enemy”: a very clever way to delegate considerable authority to Custer, while avoiding direct responsibility. Of course, this situation now ensured that if disaster occurred, then the crafty Terry, like an experienced lawyer skillfully orchestrating a favorable outcome for himself regardless of Custer’s fate, would not be held responsible if Custer disobeyed his orders or acted rashly as in the past.
Hoping “of accomplishing great results,” as he penned in a June 22 letter, Custer was so confident of victory that he might not have fully grasped the somewhat sinister implications of Terry’s carefully worded order. If Custer succeeded, then Terry, after having cunningly created a situation that reflected the well-honed survival skills of a career officer in a cut-throat military hierarchy long dominated by political maneuvering, would be looked upon as brilliant by allowing his aggressive subordinate to reap victory with an independent command. If America’s popular hero failed, then only Custer would become the solo scapegoat for defeat.48
Newspaperman Kellogg described the orders that directed Custer’s movements that began on June 22:
Custer, with twelve cavalry companies, will scout from its mouth up the valley of the Rosebud until he reaches the fresh trail discovered by Major Reno, and move on that trail with all rapidity possible in order to overhaul the Indians, whom it has been ascertained are hunting buffalo and making leisurely and short marches [and Gibbon’s column] will march up the Big Horn Valley in order to intercept the Indians if they should attempt to escape from General Custer down that avenue [and] the hope is now strong [now] [th]at this band of ugly customers, known as SITTING BULL’S BAND will be ‘gobbled’ up and dealt with as they deserve.49
Kellogg’s excessive optimism was not simply the result of his civilian status, because this underestimation of the Indian was universal among whites. Even General Sheridan saw these lethal warriors of the Northern Great Plains as little more than troublemaking “rascals” who only needed a good spanking from the 7th Cavalry.50 Ironically, Custer was actually less optimistic than Kellogg at this time, because he feared that Reno’s extensive scout too far west had alerted the Indians. As he penned in his letter to Libbie that revealed his fears at this time: “[Reno’s] scouting party has returned [but] I fear their failure to follow up the trails has imperilled our plans by giving the village an intimation of our presence [and] [t]hink of the valuable time lost.”51
With his men well-equipped for a fifteen-day expedition, Custer believed that he had the enemy on the run while following the trail. A feeling that an easy success was all but inevitable allowed some 7th Cavalry troopers to more fully appreciate the beauty around them. For protection against the searing sun, a number of cavalrymen, including officers, now wore new straw hats recently purchased from an opportunistic sutler aboard the Far West. They proved light and comfortable in the scorching weather, compared to the standard-issue heavy slouch hats.
On a hot day on which a vast network of converging Indian trails were all leading in the same direction—revealing that far more hostiles were on the move from the reservations than originally thought—Private William O. Taylor described with some awe on June 24 how “the whole valley [of the Rosebud] was scratched up by trailing lodgepoles [and therefore] [o]ur interest grew in proportion as the trail freshened and there was much speculation in the ranks as to how soon we should overtake the apparently fleeing enemy.”52 What the Indians and Custer’s men were following was the ancient buffalo trail, always traversing the most favorable terrain for easy passage, that ascended up the picturesque valley of the Rosebud and ever farther from the Yellowstone to the north.53
In a recent letter to his mother, Boston “Bos” Custer looked upon the 7th Cavalry’s confident advance deeper into the heart of Indian terrain as little more than a frolicking adventure. He expected little trouble with the region’s migratory inhabitants (like the buffalo), who knew this land like the back of their hands, unlike the bluecoats. He wrote,
Armstrong takes the whole command … on a Indian trail with the full hope and belief of overhauling them—which I think he probably will, with a little hard riding [and then] [t] hey will be much entertained [as] I hope to catch one or two Indian ponies with a buffalo robe for Nev [and] [j]udging by the number of lodges counted by scouts who saw the trail there are something like eight hundred Indians and probably more. But, be the number great or small, I hope I can truthfully say when I get back, that one or more were sent to the happy hunting-grounds.54
Custer’s lofty expectations for achieving “great results” were highly–inflated, in part because he almost seemed to think that the 7th Cavalrymen were now comparable to the highly motivated troopers who he had led with distinction during the Civil War years: a dangerous assumption because these 7th Cavalry troopers were inferior in overall motivation, experience, and training, to those who fought to save the Union. During this exhaustive campaign and especially as the weather grew warmer with summer’s arrival, conditions became harsher, diminishing the overall combat capabilities of the 7th Cavalry troopers. Under the broiling sun, officers and enlisted men rode onward mile after weary mile, moving south up the valley. With stoic resolve, the troopers steadily followed their officers on a grueling campaign, while half-choking on the yellow haze of sediments of finely grained dust. Some meager protection from the rising dust was provided by cotton scarves and bandanas that covered the noses and mouths of the hard-riding troopers.55
Now that his most aggressive cavalry officer had been unleashed to win laurels for him if he succeeded, General Terry had placed a smart high-stakes bet on the hardest-hitting cavalry commander in the United States Army. One officer marveled how Custer “was so full of nervous energy” that he had no patience whatsoever—the same kind of energy that had played a role in reaping so many Civil War victories.
What was largely overlooked was the fact that the 7th Cavalry was now not only in overall bad shape, but also far too few in number—less than 600 troopers—for the daunting task ahead. Custer was about to meet the largest concentration of Indians in the history of the Great Plains. In a most revealing letter to General Sheridan and unknown to Custer, a concerned Terry had recently warned prophetically how with regard to the 7th Cavalry’s diminished strength that drastically reduced combat capabilities: “This number is not sufficient for the end [victory] in view. For if the Indians who pass the winter in the Yellowstone and Powder River country should be found in one camp (and they usually are so gathered) they could not be attacked by that number without great risk of defeat.”56
Meanwhile, unknown to Custer in contrast to his growing confidence in following the Indian trial through the Rosebud Valley (the result of a movement that had been based on the annual pursuit of the buffalo and certainly not from fear of pony soldiers as assumed by the 7th Cavalry)—made especially vivid by colorful wild rose bushes in full bloom, which added to the almost festive mood—the strength of the Indians grew more imposing with each passing day. All the while, agency Indians continued to steadily arrive in the collective camp of Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse. They headed out of the reservations to not only hunt the buffalo in the Powder River country (the richest hunting grounds) but also to join Sitting Bull in partaking in the ways of their forefathers, including the Sun Dance, one last time, before everything seemed destined to be destroyed or consumed by the whites. Many departing warriors feared that this might be the last summer to enjoy the old life that was now on the road to extinction.
These gathered young warriors were of prime fighting age. Most importantly, for the first time they had come together in a united front against the whites. Sitting Bull’s Hunkpapa Sioux, and Crazy Horse’s Oglala Sioux, formed the heart of the resistance effort. This irresistible call to unite to fight against the common enemy especially appealed to the Cheyenne, who had old scores to settle. They were totally committed to defending the ancestral homeland that they loved. As never before, these warriors were prepared to fight to the death—to the last man, as Sitting Bull had declared. Therefore, Sitting Bull had wisely cautioned the ever-restless young warriors to remain patient and inactive while the pony soldiers steadily advanced toward them: sage advice that caused Custer to incorrectly conclude that the Indians were in flight from the 7th Cavalry. Instead of going forth to engage in the tantalizing prospect of harassing the Terry–Custer column, Sitting Bull, who headed the most militant Sioux tribe and bragged how he would never go to a reservation or sign a treaty as long as the buffalo roamed free, stood his ground, defiant in the unceded territory. He had wisely declared with regard to the advancing white soldiers, “Let them come” forth if they dare to receive the righteous wrath of a people, who had been pushed to the breaking point. Clearly, as the result of the sacred Sun Dance on the Rosebud, Sitting Bull’s life-affirming vision of soldiers tumbling into the village (an attack from which they would never return) remained vibrant, inspiring an entire people with the faith of winning the ultimate victory. Therefore, it was now time for patience for even the youngest warriors. Sitting Bull’s Sun Dance visions were derived from the Great Spirit, who had bestowed a vision of the enticing possibility of the “Long Knives” falling into their village “like grasshoppers” and then being destroyed like locusts who had invaded a ripe cornfield.57