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Post by wild on Oct 31, 2008 15:49:45 GMT -6
they can't get close enough for accurate direct fire. But they are close enough for long range fire, beyond the "effective" range of the bow. So they use a less accurate method at a greater distance.Good thinking. 2) the targets are behind cover, so direct fire is ineffective. But indirect fire coming down vertically is effective, if fired at an area by a large group of Warriors. In your model are the Indians behind cover?
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Post by conz on Oct 31, 2008 17:59:43 GMT -6
they can't get close enough for accurate direct fire. But they are close enough for long range fire, beyond the "effective" range of the bow.So they use a less accurate method at a greater distance.Good thinking. I don't understand why you find this so difficult...direct fire effectiveness is about 70 yards for the best shots. Using indirect fire massed fire against a mass target you can get hits at 200+ yards. Why would you want to get closer?! This is not unique to the NA's...it is a time-honored tactic going back to the very beginning of the bow era. MOST bow fire in military history is long-range area fire, not close range direct fire. They may or may not be, depending upon the situation. At LSH where I believe this mainly took place, I think that they did have cover in the nearest ravines to the F Troop/HQ mass. I believe hundreds of Warriors were firing bows from 100-250 yards away. I don't think Custer Hill was overrun until it was saturated with arrows, pointing vertically out of the ground and everything that occupied it. Clair
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Post by AZ Ranger on Nov 1, 2008 6:37:24 GMT -6
Apparently the arrows missed Custer. Area fire and indirect fire are different. You target can an area directly and/or indirectly. You don't bunch up because it attracts area fire and increases the chance of a hit.
How close were the Indians concealed before engaging in close quarter battle? 200 yards is a long distance to close on foot.
AZ Ranger
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Post by conz on Nov 1, 2008 9:20:23 GMT -6
Apparently the arrows missed Custer. We don't know that they missed Custer. I think we have a report that Custer only had two holes in him, yet everyone else was poked full of holes, mutilated, stripped, etc. I don't think we can trust the Custer wounds report. If true, it would mean that no knife touched him, only two bullets, in the middle of a crazy melee, and Warriors and women going all over the dead field shooting into bodies, cutting them up, etc. But then, Custer was a very lucky man. <g> I don't care what you call it...leave that argument to the redlegs. The arrows kill you just the same regardless what you call them. The Cavalrymen bunched up to resist close combat. The Warriors bunched up because there were too many for the small space, and they all wanted to get in range to fire arrows at the massed target. I think there were hundreds within 100-200 yards of the Troop F perimeter. They would not go forward until arrows had incapacitated enough Troopers to do so relatively safely. They were too far away to hurt the Troopers, many behind horses, with direct fire...they had to use arching fire. To creep in any closer would make the Trooper's carbine fire too effective. These are the same Warriors that fought at Fetterman and Wagon Box, right? Wouldn't you expect them to fight the same way? Clair
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Post by clansman on Nov 1, 2008 9:28:37 GMT -6
"I think we have a report that Custer had only two holes in him." It's possible that the actual state of Custers' body was deliberately toned down to spare Libbys' feelings. After all the "arrow in the penis" was not officially reported. I remember reading that his features were calmly composed, as if he was just asleep.
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Post by conz on Nov 1, 2008 10:11:45 GMT -6
"I think we have a report that Custer had only two holes in him." It's possible that the actual state of Custers' body was deliberately toned down to spare Libbys' feelings. After all the "arrow in the penis" was not officially reported. I remember reading that his features were calmly composed, as if he was just asleep. Aye, and there are lots of other problems with the casualty reports. I know you can tell the difference between bullet holes and arrow holes upon close inspection, but I wonder if the good Dr. and other observers really checked him and the others that closely. Most arrows would have been removed from the ground and bodies, of course, by the women. Clair
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Post by AZ Ranger on Nov 2, 2008 6:51:19 GMT -6
I think its important to distinguish between direct and and indirect fire with arrows because it would demonstrate technique and a skill level that I don't think existed. I think the Indians were good enough with direct fire at long range to accomplish what they wanted to do. I do think the organized in mass groups and practiced indirect fire over objects.
Unless the dusts settles carbine fire would not be very accurate.
I believe there would be more arrows in bodies, horses and the ground after all were dead than from indirect overhead dropping arrows. Custer being the example if the arrow was in his body.
AZ Ranger
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Post by AZ Ranger on Nov 2, 2008 7:00:05 GMT -6
Quote:You don't bunch up because it attracts area fire and increases the chance of a hit.
The Cavalrymen bunched up to resist close combat. The Warriors bunched up because there were too many for the small space, and they all wanted to get in range to fire arrows at the massed target.
In order to resist close combat you bunch up and let them fire into a tight knot where it would be hard to miss something? Seems that would lead to fewer enemy casualties and annihilation of your own troops. Why not form a square and walk out slowly?
AZ Ranger
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Post by conz on Nov 2, 2008 11:32:47 GMT -6
bunched up because there were too many for the small space, and they all wanted to get in range to fire arrows at the massed target. In order to resist close combat you bunch up and let them fire into a tight knot where it would be hard to miss something? Seems that would lead to fewer enemy casualties and annihilation of your own troops. Why not form a square and walk out slowly? Now that, my friend, is one of the classic dilemmas of military tactics. You concentrate to fight close combat, so that your fighters outnumber their fighters at a point on the ground, but you make yourself a great target against area or indirect fires. You spread out to make a smaller target, but then you are easily defeated in close combat if a force of greater mass can get to you. Officers have to decide what deployments to use in each situation, and often they are on the horns of a dilemma. When in doubt, though, almost all controlled forces, and usually uncontrolled ones as well, will choose to concentrate for personal close combat security and risk the fire. A "square" is a form of a "massed" formation. Squares concentrate a force into a much smaller area than any line occupies, moreso even skirmish lines. Squares are relatively easy to "shoot down" by fire weapons, directly or indirectly, as long as your weapons can outrange the square's weapons. Now if the square has good flat fields of fire around it, and has longer range effective weapons than the attackers, it will be fairly invulnerable. I'm sure Custer would have used such a formation had he decided to early enough...any good perimeter with decent fields of fire will do. On a technical note, realize that there is a difference between the trajectory of direct long range fire, and deliberate high angle fire, even at close range. Now at very long range, the two trajectories are probably more similar, with similar effects. The key is, if faced with a massed target, the last thing you want to do is go into close combat with it, where you will only have one-to-one odds at any given point, even if you have overall numbers superiority...you can only get so many men against their "perimeter" as they have defending it...the rest will be stacked deep unable to get into contact. In such combats, you will lose as many as the enemy, even though you will eventually win due to numbers. The preferred tactic is to stay out of effective direct fire range, and shower the target with area fire, using high angles if the enemy has any kind of cover (wagons, hummocks, horses, dead bodies, etc.). A little patience will win out and you'll eventually be able to close with a very peppered force unable to resist much. Clair
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Post by keithpatton on Jun 22, 2019 12:09:19 GMT -6
My suggestion to most of the readers here, is to read Scott's and Fox's seminal work on the archaeology of the Little Big Horn. Follow it with Michno's Lakota Noon. Then you will have educated yourself enough that you won't have to ask theoretical questions.
In Michno's work you will hear what the Indians did first hand and won't have to guess or take advice from pundits. Michno did great work in analyzing the true size of the Indian village and from it the real number of Indian combatants (1500-2500). His greatest feat is fitting the multitude of first person Indian accounts into a comprehensible time line. The confusion stemming from Indians using a relative concept of time vs clock time is the reason their accounts were ignored for over eighty years by most Anglo authors.
I have been reading this and other bulletin boards for some time and I feel that most people who have an interest in the subject fail to go the extra mile and read the first hand historical accounts and interviews conducted in the decades after the battle. Instead they read more recent books, by so called experts which are nothing more than the regurgitation and reinterpretation of what others have done before, seasoned with a liberal dash of their own bias and wishful thinking. A fairly recent book is a case in point. The author blatantly misrepresents accounts given by battle participants. He falsely attributes the description of Gibbon's men to those of Custer's. Anyone who has read the first person accounts as presented in Greene, Graham or Marquis work would have picked up on it.
Granted, Scott and Fox's et als academic work isn't for everyone. It reads like textbooks, but it is SCIENTIFIC work based on archaeological evidence and back up with solid statistical analysis. If I had to recommend the best of their work, read Archaeological Perspectives on the Battle of the Little Big Horn, followed by They Died With Custer. The first is an in-depth record of the finds recovered from digs done on the sight to dispel many of the myths surrounding the battle, it goes into in-depth treatment of all the artifacts, as well as analysis of the forensics done on the cartridges and bullets found. It does not limit itself to the digs done in the last thirty years but reports the results of analysis done on the holdings of the battlefield museum entire.
The second book delves into detailed analysis of the bones found on the battlefield and includes those bodies recovered and buried in the Battlefield Cemetery which were disinterred for that purpose. Using army enlistment and medical records comparisons were made between skeletal remains examined and the height, weight, age and dental records to make reduced lists of possible troopers the remains might have been.
The statistical analysis of projectiles and fire arms allows Scott to make estimates of the number of firearms the Indians had at their disposal at the outset of the battle. By sampling the variety and number of projectiles, and matching them to individual weapons, the number of 250-300 firearms was given as the number the Indians had at their disposal. A fair number of them were Henry's and Winchesters, if I recall he projected around 30 percent were repeating. As the battle progressed more and more of the cavalry arms fell into Indian hands, and by the second day had increased by 420 plus: 210 Springfields and 210 Colt pistols lost when Custer's five companies were annihilated. The captured guns were turn on the Troopers as the battle progressed until they were all aimed at Reno and Benteen's seven companies at the Reno battle site.
If you truly have an interest in the battle you own it to yourself to read these three books. It will arm you with more than myths and other peoples opinions.
His more recent book is a summary of the previous two. It is called Uncovering History. It touches on results of all the digs over time, and only superficially touches on the artifacts, statistical analysis and osteological work done in detail in the previous two books.
Don't be the parishioner who has never read the bible yet sits in the pew believing everything the minister tells them because he's been told the minister is the expert and will interpret it all for them.
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Post by shan on Jun 23, 2019 7:34:13 GMT -6
keith,
I agree with you about the two books you recommend, although I think you'll find that there will be those who disagree about the Michno book. I myself am 50/50 about that. I think he did a good job in both assessing that size of the village and the number of warriors who were present ~ a low figure that a lot of contributors didn't want to hear, but we're going to have to take his word for it when he places this Indian or another in a particular place at a particular moment in time.
Again, one can only thank him for the work he put in, and I don't doubt that he may have been right in a number of cases: and to be honest, I'm not altogether sure why I'm taking this stance, it's just that I think the evidence is so ambivalent, i.e. almost every account he gives us has been filtered through an interpreter, with all that that implies, which in turn means that we can't take this as the final word on the subject.
That aside, I think your right. I've been on this board, and indeed the other one for long enough to know that there has been a deep resistance to listening to the Indian evidence, let alone the kind of evidence we find in their art work, which by the way, is unsullied by interpreters. To be fair, it's got much better in recent years, but for reasons that I've never be able to discern, people still ignore the evidence in the art work, evidence which I've been banging on about for years.
Shan (David}
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Post by noggy on Jun 24, 2019 2:14:16 GMT -6
keith, I agree with you about the two books you recommend, although I think you'll find that there will be those who disagree about the Michno book. I myself am 50/50 about that. I think he did a good job in both assessing that size of the village and the number of warriors who were present ~ a low figure that a lot of contributors didn't want to hear, but we're going to have to take his word for it when he places this Indian or another in a particular place at a particular moment in time. I struggle just a little with his numbers, which if I recall correctly suggest there were a maximum of 1 000 warriors there. I assume the whole "people per tipi math" which he uses to come to his number of warriors is based on what a average tipi household would be in normal times. First of, this wasn`t a normal time. This was war. Many of the warriors leaving the reservations would be joining family already with Sitting Bulls growing village, and would crash on their couches. This means you more than likely could add from 100 additional warriors (probably too few )and upwards. In addition, we know the soldiers saw numerous wikiups in the valley after the battle. How many were these? Michno, as far as I can remember, does not mention these either. Could we be speaking of 100-200? Less? More? Who knows. Not me But they are an unknown factor, if my mathematical terminology isn`t failing me totally. Come to think of it, could not a wikiup house two people, say buddies or brothers going on a last free roam? pretty sure i read one warrior referring two the wikiup he and is brother stayed in. Hm. That being said, I`m not miles off as far as agreeing goes, and don`t buy the 3 000 + numbers either. I just feel more comfortable with operating around the 1 500 mark. But I wasn`t there. All the best, Noggy
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Post by noggy on Jun 24, 2019 2:25:01 GMT -6
The statistical analysis of projectiles and fire arms allows Scott to make estimates of the number of firearms the Indians had at their disposal at the outset of the battle. By sampling the variety and number of projectiles, and matching them to individual weapons, the number of 250-300 firearms was given as the number the Indians had at their disposal. A fair number of them were Henry's and Winchesters, if I recall he projected around 30 percent were repeating. As the battle progressed more and more of the cavalry arms fell into Indian hands, and by the second day had increased by 420 plus: 210 Springfields and 210 Colt pistols lost when Custer's five companies were annihilated. The captured guns were turn on the Troopers as the battle progressed until they were all aimed at Reno and Benteen's seven companies at the Reno battle site. What is the most updated research done on this? I have the books you mention, but they aren`t exactly steaming fresh. I think i read something by Fox or Scott from 2012, but that`s it. I for one feel too often we focus on the number of guns held by the NAs. The warriors would still in the 1870s use muskets and stuff nearly a century old, since the did not throw away anything which worked. Their arsenal of fire weapons could have been assembled over many decades. But ammunition would constantly be in demand, even though they could make basic balls for powdered oneshooters (here, my English fails me but I`m too tired to care). A Winchester could be emptied very qouckly, and without ammo it was nothing more than a really fancy club.
All the best, Noggy
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Post by herosrest on Jun 24, 2019 10:11:06 GMT -6
There is a 1903 publication by Dr. William A. Allen as 'Adventures with Indians and game, or, Twenty years in the Rocky Mountains'. Chapter V, p62, includes a description of the battlefield as he found it during two days investigation in early August 1877. linkHe theorized the battle in an interesting way and resembling the very first Cheyenne description given in Indian Country by returning participants to Maj. John D. Miles - Indian Agent. He had never seen the terrain and the account is considerable jumbly (my term for this battle's jumbled up translations and guestimates of what Sioux and Cheyenne were saying). It's interesting to fathom but not the stuff 'science' cares to regard. Allen, like Philetus P. Norris who was there the month before to gather Charlie Reynolds remains on his way to take up stewardship of Yellowstone as Superintendent, collected hundreds of battle relics during their visits. Norris left us a most excellent book and map dating to 1877 from his visit and that is online also. I link it here as possibly the best ever battle related writing - full of wonderful anecdotes if you have the time for it. I suspect that Orin G. Libby greatly regarded Norris and that is apparent (perhaps) from his 1920 published work of participant accounts. LINKHopefully, Miles information can be read here and gained if needs be with wampum. Basic battle stuff which the World, its science and students broadly ignore because of the headaches inherent to native accounts of events. Enjoy. Hardorff did not interpret the Miles account correctly. It is difficult to do.
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