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Post by elisabeth on Oct 15, 2007 10:48:50 GMT -6
Anybody have a clue as to who the Custers' young lady guests were at Leavenworth in the fall/winter of 1869/70?
There's a Libbie Manning, from St. Louis, staying with them at Camp Sturgis in October 1869, but I don't know when she went home. Anne Northrop Bingham, a cousin of Libbie's, visits over Christmas. Julia Thurber, from Monroe, is with the Custers when Rebecca Richmond arrives in February 1870, as is Maggie Custer. But was there anyone else in between?
This is prompted by Benteen's assertion (B-G Letters, p. 261/262) that both Cooke and Custer had been "criminally connected" with a guest of Custer's during this period. He may have got the timings wrong, and be referring to Anna Darrah the previous winter. It's possible. But it would be nice -- evil gossip that I am -- to know for sure ...
The young lady in question, Benteen tells us, was later arrested with her mother for shoplifting in "a western city" - if that's any clue.
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Post by Melani on Oct 15, 2007 11:17:05 GMT -6
My goodness, that is certainly is a lot of fascinating dirt! Definitely go to get Benteen-Goldin. Shoplifting? "Criminally connected?" Wouldn't Cooke and Custer have gotten kicked out for that sort of behavior? Any clue what Benteen meant by that?
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Post by elisabeth on Oct 15, 2007 13:45:46 GMT -6
Well, "criminally" in 19th-century terms doesn't mean rape or anything; just a carnal connection. But yes, do get Benteen-Goldin -- you'll love it!
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Post by "Hunk" Papa on Oct 15, 2007 13:54:24 GMT -6
Elisabeth, in 'Harvest of Barren Regrets' by Charles K. Mills, page 199, there is a reference to the "criminal connection" you mention. Apparently in July 1870, a 2nd Lt. Charles H. Rea had moved to Fort Hays where Benteen was stationed from Fort Leavenworth where Custer was stationed. According to Benteen, Rea related a story to him about Custer. The book then reads as follows:- "Rea had become smitten with a certain lady of easy virtue and had 'paid her assiduous court - on C.O.D. order. One day, while riding with her outside Leavenworth, Rea was startled by a group of officers and some women, one of whom Rea named for Benteen. This woman was known to be another lady of easy virtue, though Rea was unaware of it at that time. Rea fled at their approach, leaving his prostitute behind. But he lost his forage cap in getting away and Custer (who was in the approaching group) found the cap and 'persisted in demanding the resignation' of Rea. Benteen concluded from this story and others he had heard that Custer was 'criminally connected' with the second prostitute and 'criminally initimate with a married woman' at Fort Leavenworth."
The 'criminal' descriptions are puzzling. Presumably the offence was adultery with the married woman, but what is meant by the first I am at a loss to explain, unless Army officers were forbidden from consorting with known prostitutes.
I hope this helps.
Hunk
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Post by elisabeth on Oct 16, 2007 2:01:10 GMT -6
Hunk, thanks -- this does flesh out (if that's not all too appropriate a word) Benteen's story of the episode. In his version, which is otherwise very similar, there's no mention of Rea naming the woman in the Custer party -- though logically I suppose he must have done so, for Benteen to be able to tell the tale. Benteen suggests the easy virtue right enough, by referring to "ladies (?)"; but says she's "a guest of Custer's". I took that to mean she was staying with the Custers. Maybe he meant only that she was Custer's guest on that excursion. Not sure.
Officers could get court-martialled for consorting with known prostitutes; Wallingford was charged with that in, I think, 1869. (It wasn't so much the fact of it in his case as the public manner in which he did it, and that enlisted men were also present. The headline charge was "conduct unbecoming", while the "consorting" was just one of several specifics on which it was based.) But I rather think there may have been laws against fornication still on the statute books at the time. In British law in the 19th century, there was the offence of "criminal conversation", meaning, basically, sex; I'm pretty sure it could be applied to unmarried persons as well as to adulterous liaisons.* If US law followed UK law in that, we have our explanation.
Benteen, I think, uses the word to indicate that these relationships had -- in 1950s parlance -- "gone all the way" rather than being mere flirtations. Quite a useful word for that, really; he can make his meaning clear, and imply censure, without having to be vulgar. (Benteen does love words, doesn't he ...)
*P.S. Having now looked it up, I find I'm wrong; "criminal conversation" appears to apply only in cases of adultery. But it appears there are still laws against fornication in many US states, so Benteen could safely use the word to cover both kinds of relationship.
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Post by rch on Oct 17, 2007 9:53:07 GMT -6
My dictionary lists the 4th definition of adjective "criminal" as shameful, disgraceful. Perhaps someone with access to the OED can check to 19th century usage of "criminal."
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Post by elisabeth on Oct 18, 2007 6:10:20 GMT -6
On further checking, we can probably narrow down the time-frame for this episode, as Custer spent very little time at Leavenworth in late 1869; he was really only there from New Year 1870 (or thereabouts) until early May, when he went into the field. So the entanglements Benteen's talking about must have taken place in those first four months.
The only guests under the Custers' roof at this time are Maggie Custer (obviously not a candidate), Rebecca Richmond (ditto), and Julia Thurber. Apart from them, there's a Miss Couch (who she?) who stays the night on at least one occasion; and assorted others -- a Miss Young, a Miss Armstrong -- who are occasional "guests" in the sense of coming to dinner once in a while.
If it weren't that Rea apparently doesn't join the 7th until 1869, thus doesn't get to Leavenworth until the winter of that year, I'd think Benteen's simply muddling up the year, and it's Anna Darrah who's being referred to. Cooke was besotted with her, it seems, and visited her in Monroe on Custer's trip back there in December 1869. In Frost, General Custer's Libbie, p. 186-7, Custer writes to Libbie: "Tom thinks Anna will have Cooke 'on the string' again before he leaves town. If he does become smitten I never want to see him again". He then adds, sinisterly: "If he is goose enough to bite at the bait that is held out I'll tell him something that will make him think twice". Which sounds as if Anna had indeed had "criminal" relations with someone, but not (yet) Cooke. (She'd been engaged to Moylan at some point, but assured Cooke that she'd broken off the engagement.) From Libbie's descriptions of Anna's flirtations in her books, and her perhaps ironic choice of the name "Diana" for her -- (a) huntress, (b) goddess of chastity -- one gets the impression that she's "no better than she should be". If the dates only fitted, she'd be the obvious person. But it seems that the last time the Custers have her to stay is early 1868.
Unless anyone can pin down a subsequent shoplifting charge for any young lady of the Custers' acquaintance, I'm coming reluctantly to the opinion that "a guest of Custer's" might mean simply "his guest that day" ...
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Post by conz on Oct 18, 2007 8:17:39 GMT -6
Indeed, officers cavorting with prostitutes is a criminal offense under UCMJ. It would normally be charged, as indicated above, as "Conduct Unbecoming an Officer."
As true today as it was then, and as then, only used if you really want to get rid of an officer who gets his hand caught in the till...
Clair
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Post by "Hunk" Papa on Oct 18, 2007 15:32:38 GMT -6
Elisabeth, according to Benteen the candidate was a married woman. The single ladies you mention are therefore not in the frame. Was Julia Thurber married? From what you say, Anna Darrah was single, so if Benteen is right that makes two reasons she cannot be the one.
Hunk
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Post by elisabeth on Oct 18, 2007 15:45:51 GMT -6
Benteen, bless him, was nothing if not even-handed. He had two accusations. One was that there was a young lady (?) -- his question-mark -- guest of Custer's with whom Cooke was known "by ocular demonstration" to have been intimate, and the popular supposition was that Custer had long been similarly connected. The other was that "it was notorious that Custer was criminally intimate with a married woman, wife of an officer of the garrison". So there's one of each. (At least.)
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