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Post by alfuso on Jan 16, 2005 16:24:25 GMT -6
why would a right-handed man shoot himself in the left temple?
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Post by JimB on Jan 16, 2005 19:19:27 GMT -6
Cuz if he got hit in the left chest, his first reaction & reflex would be to grab it with his right hand. It would have been quite easy to grab his weapon with his left hand and fired. Remember, the saying of all the troopers back then was, "Save the Last Bullet for Yourself!!!"
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Post by weir on Jul 1, 2005 11:21:03 GMT -6
Cuz if he got hit in the left chest, his first reaction & reflex would be to grab it with his right hand. It would have been quite easy to grab his weapon with his left hand and fired. Remember, the saying of all the troopers back then was, "Save the Last Bullet for Yourself!!!" I read that the Custer's wound on the left temple was not covered by blood nor py gun powder. Conclusion : the wound was post-mortem.
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Post by Realbird on Sept 3, 2005 19:33:49 GMT -6
After the battle was over, Indian, mothers, daughters, sisters, and wives combed LSH with a an animosity and purpose(revenge) that would defy belief in our current, polite society.
Here, for them, was a golden opportunity to wreck havoc upon the Waschitu's who had consistently and, with Maliciousness and Malice Aforethought, collectively, been responsible for depriving these distraught women from their loved ones.
As such, each trooper's body was treated accordingly. Polite society of the era was prone to excluding the "officer Class" when describing the actual condition of the bodies. If Custer was there, and we know he was, his remains were probably mutilated like everyone else. The Indians would not have said to one another, "Hold off buddy, that's Custer, leave him alone.'
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Post by shatonska on Sept 4, 2005 8:27:58 GMT -6
Cuz if he got hit in the left chest, his first reaction & reflex would be to grab it with his right hand. It would have been quite easy to grab his weapon with his left hand and fired. Remember, the saying of all the troopers back then was, "Save the Last Bullet for Yourself!!!" chest wound was fatal , why a dead man would have to kill himself ?
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Post by Realbird on Sept 11, 2005 17:36:42 GMT -6
I recently picked up my copy of Son of the Morning Star by Connell and came upon an interesting passage I had, apparently, missed before.
"But there are said to be unpublished letters detailing various disfigurements: thighs slashed to the bone, ears slit, arrows driven into the groin. Supposedly this information was withheld out of regard for Elizabeth, and even now may be to disagreeable for publication." P410
This information is unsubstantiated as Connell makes no effort to advise the reader where he obtained this information. However, one has to wonder why the body of Custer would have been treated any differently from the others by the incensed warriors and women?
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Post by Timothy Ratliff on Sept 12, 2005 1:30:11 GMT -6
In "The Custer Battle Casualties" parts 1 and 2 by Richard Hardorff, nearly all the accounts (with the notable exception of Godfrey) mention the thigh slash, although their descriptions of its length vary. Several of them mention the temple wound as "bloody" and in part 2 one even mentions that blood was still "oozing" from the wound. No mention of blood is made on the chest/rib wound or the knife slash. Only Godfrey later mentions anything about the arrow through the genitals, and aside from the thigh slash, no other mutilation is mentioned in any account other than the Kate Bighead account of the sewing awl/missing fingertip. Hardorff's speculation about fluid draining from the ears as a result of the temple wound and causing some witnesses to think the shot went clear through the head leads to some fascinating speculation as to whether or not some of the fluid may indeed have been from the Cheyenne hearing aid. Corporal Hammon also mentions his right hand as looking if something had been wrenched from it. Intriguing, but whether it was merely the position the hand had become contorted in or indeed something had been wrenched from it will likely never be known. Certainly the image of Custer blazing away with two pistols is romantic, but as an experienced soldier and frontiersman he likely would have been using his rifle, if he was still alive, until the fighting got pretty close. Blazing away at anyone over 50 yards away with two pistols would be highly unlikely. None of the witnesses mention Custer's left hand being contorted. It is also possible that the Indians mistook someone else for the leader. In Volume II of "Custer Battle Casualties" as well as elsewhere (I can't remember where off the top of my head) one of the Indians mentions a man in a full buckskin outfit and red tie that some of them thought was the leader. Hence they stripped him and some of the women began beating his head in. Tom Custer's head was beaten in, so perhaps he was finally out of his brother's shadow, at least to the Indians who singled him out for particular treatment as they thought he was the leader. As one of the scouts in Skenlar's book mentions Custer taking his jacket off at a halt after dividing the command, and not every man in buckskin the Indians saw HAD to be Custer (after all, somebody killed and stripped the Custer brothers, Smith, Yates, Cooke, Calhoun, Keogh, Porter, and others, all of whom had buckskin either somewhere on their persons or tied to their saddles), I think it's highly likely that George may have been spared simply because people mistook Tom, wearing full buckskins while his brother may not have been, for the leader.
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Post by shatonska on Sept 12, 2005 4:44:16 GMT -6
yes , but SOMEBODY has killed and stripped custer , so it is possible that some indian account is about him , just a question who could have been the officier whit red stripes on arm two moon is talking about in one of his accounts ?
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Post by Scout on Sept 12, 2005 7:56:04 GMT -6
I read one account which mentions a wound in his right arm or wrist, a possible exit wound from the chest shot. This would have made his right hand useless and he, therefore, could have shot himself with his left hand. Has anyone else read this account of the right arm wound? A number of people inspected his body....they all seemed to have seen something different! I've always thought that sewing awl story was a complete fabrication. I do think ol' Kate viewed the whole fight, but she, like a number of participants had the urge to spin a tall tale.
Good point Tim, records indicate in was in the high 90's that day. I doubt if anybody had on a heavy, buckskin coat..it would be like wearing a heating blanket!
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Post by Timothy Ratliff on Sept 12, 2005 9:42:36 GMT -6
Only one person, I believe it was Corporal Hammon, mentions the right forearm wound. Hardorff's theory is that some form of drainage from the ears (he mentions that it is possible from a gunshot wound to the head for the eardrums to rupture and leak fluid) leaked out. Remember that when Custer's body was ORIGINALLY found, it was laying with his right forearm behind and supporting the head. Certainly with two days of the drainage Hardorff mentions, fluid would have leaked from the right ear (we don't know which direction his head was facing when found) and fluid leaking onto the right forearm could theoretically, after two days of decomposition, be mistaken for blood and lead a person to believe there was a wound to the right forearm. One must take into account that no one else mentions it, even Dr. Porter who did an admittedly hasty post mortem. Imagine seeing a dead body maybe once or twice (I doubt highly with the stench, the desire to identify other friends and officers among the fallen, and other tasks any enlisted man or NCO gazed upon their former commander's swollen, putrefying corpse for very long) and then trying to recall its EXACT condition years later, especially when one is untrained in conducting a post mortem. It is not the fault of the men that their accounts conflict. The best one can hope for at this juncture, short of using forensics on Custer's actual skull, is to glean one's own opinion from accounts of the only people who were there. Remember also that the enlisted men and NCO's did not have the political and career motivations to lie that their officers did, and none of them mention any evidence of suicide in later years, either. I highly recommend to anyone interested in the subject that they pick up a copy of Hardorff's "Custer Battle Casualties" volumes I and II-they are an exhaustive compilation of every single account of the condition of the bodies and the subsequent reburials and exhumations that the author could find, organized by soldier. Sadly, with the exception of Custer and his brother Tom, for the most part only tidbits exist for most of the other officers and men. Still, unless there were sources Hardorff overlooked, the two volumes have all the information we will ever have about the condition of the bodies. On a similar note, the rumor that William Fetterman committed suicide, perhaps in a pact with Captain Brown, has persisted due to the fact that both had gunshot wounds to the left temple. First of all, if you are right-handed, try doing a suicide pact "pose" with someone else. The left temple is an odd, unnatural position to place the gun at. Also on that note, the post doctor concluded that Fetterman died of a slashed throat. An Indian, I believe it was American Horse, did indeed mention slashing a man's throat in a location which describes where Fetterman died pretty accurately. The temple wound, at least in Fetterman's case, was most likely a coup de grace. For more on this, go to www.friendslittlebighorn.com/Fetterman-Battle-Photos.htmAnyway, nothing unusual about a right-handed man being shot in the left temple in battle, or in the case of Fetterman even afterwards. Descriptions of head wounds abound in literature of practically every war since the invention of the firearm. Take into account that if Custer was still alive at the end of the battle, he was almost certainly taking fire from all different directions, and even if laying behind a dead horse at the peak of the hill facing east or southeast (the semicircle of dead horses he was found behind faced roughly east, indicating that that was the area of greatest concern when the barricade was made), a warrior on Wooden Leg Hill or crawling up the northeast side of Last Stand Hill would have had a great shot at the left side of his head whenever it poked out. In fact, if he was facing towards the *front* of the men on Last Stand Hill, most of whom form a crude line facing southeast, most of the warriors who would have had a good shot at his left side would have been to his left along Battle Ridge and especially the northeast slope of Last Stand Hill, or at Wooden Leg Hill. I can say this after having toured the battlefield for two days this past week.
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Post by Tricia on Sept 12, 2005 10:16:20 GMT -6
I read one account which mentions a wound in his right arm or wrist, a possible exit wound from the chest shot. This would have made his right hand useless and he, therefore, could have shot himself with his left hand. Has anyone else read this account of the right arm wound? A number of people inspected his body....they all seemed to have seen something different! I've always thought that sewing awl story was a complete fabrication. I do think ol' Kate viewed the whole fight, but she, like a number of participants had the urge to spin a tall tale. Good point Tim, records indicate in was in the high 90's that day. I doubt if anybody had on a heavy, buckskin coat..it would be like wearing a heating blanket! Scout-- I first read about the right arm "injury as possible exit wound from chest bullet hit" in Sklenar, pg. 330. However a source is not listed for this particular injury, so Sklenar covers his bases well with the word "possibly and related." Re-reading that section of Sklenar does bring up another ugly possibility. I noticed the author mentioned that congealed blood had formed in the corners of GAC 's mouth--does the scenario of a dying Custer crawling about coughing up blood gives the Von Schmidt painting a better sense of urgency/reality? Ugh. Given that grisly idea, perhaps the wound to the temple was a mercy shot by a fellow soldier ... well, so much for lunch today. Regards, Leyton McLean
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Post by Timothy Ratliff on Sept 12, 2005 10:26:44 GMT -6
Once again, for anyone curious as to the condition of Custer's corpse, find "Custer Battle Casualties" volumes I and II. I know the battlefield museum has them both, and part I is at my university library, but I understand it's kinda hard to find. The congealed blood in the corner of the mouth offers an interesting possibility-an Arapaho named Waterman thought he saw Custer at the end on his hands and knees, saying he had been shot through the side and had blood coming from his mouth and that the Indians then closed in around him. Remember that while Waterman would not have known Custer at the time, I again bring up the possibility of the Indians seeing multiple men in buckskin and thinking they were Custer afterwards from descriptions. All the translators who spoke to these men while alive unfortunately, for the most part, wanted it to be Custer and probably didn't much consider the possibility that any of these men were anyone else; after all, nobody except for maybe Annie really cared who killed George Yates or how he died. But given the evidence, it is possible that Waterman did indeed see Custer at the very end. Not the glorious Hollywood ending, but if so, he did fight to the last.
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Post by crzhrs on Sept 12, 2005 12:06:02 GMT -6
Tim:
Very true about what whites WANTED the end of Custer to be like. Can you imagine if it really was an Cheyenne woman warrior that either dispatched Custer or inflicted a mortal wound, or if Custer was killed early in the fight, rather than fighting to the end. Too many interviewers, newspapers, and early book writers gave their own spin to what happened at the LBH. If you have seen any of the newspaper reports from that time you will see many inaccuracies or "glorious stands" talked about, or Custer chopping off the heads of Indians with his saber!
We have only the Sioux & Cheyenne to tell us what they saw or experienced. To discredit what they said because it does not fit our way of thinking of what MUST have happened is only fooling ourselves and not solving the many mysteries that have surrounded the LBH because of what whites wanted to have happened, half truths, cover ups, and protecting one's rear.
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Post by shan on Sept 12, 2005 16:37:08 GMT -6
I had a friend over to stay from the United States last week who has been practising pathologist for many years. I showed him the accounts of Custers body in the 2 Hardorff books and asked him if he could shed any light on the subject. The first thing he said was that given amount of time that had passed before the bodies were viewed, not to mention the heat and the sort of wounds and mutilation they suffered, it was a wonder that anybody could A, spend very long actually looking, or even being near the bodies, and B, unless you looked very very closely, it would be hard to identify individuals. He said he might see such a case maybe once every couple of months, and that in many cases, especially if gunshot wounds are involved, their own mother wouldn't know them. One other thing though, and this pertains to something that has been mentioned on this board. He said that after the Gases have blown up the body, this can cause certain ruptures within, which in turn, often lead to fluids oozing out of the orifices, most of which are a brownish colour, which in turn might lead the observer to think that it was blood. I wonder why so many people feel it important that the Indians recognised Custer. One would assume that very few had ever seen the man, and the chances of them being amongst those that were on that particular hill seems every more remote. If they had recognised anybody, I would think it likely to have been Bouyer. Shan
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Post by Realbird on Sept 18, 2005 19:22:35 GMT -6
You ask a very salient question for which there is probably no answer. However, allow me to speculate. It was necessary, for many, that Custer's body be identified so that his manner of death could be, in turn, elaborated upon.
A celebrity of his time, admired by many for an abundance of courage, he exemplified an image that most men, of this era, wished to emulate. while it is fashionable to denigrate the General's efforts in our contemporaneous society, he was a hero of his.
Mankind is fascinated, and always has been, by the unknown. Particularly when it pertains to those we admire. Thus, explanations must be found to explain the unknown. It was imperative to the social psyche of 1875 that the General fell in a gust of glory,defiant to the end.
Once identified, possible slayers could be identified. Men who could tell the world how wonderfully and vigorously the Cavalier in Buckskins fought to the end. One can almost here the echo's of the horn of "Rollo" sounding in the distance.
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