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Post by crzhrs on Jan 5, 2006 10:52:51 GMT -6
I thought LAKOTA NOON was well done and easy to read. The Indian accounts are excellent and provide much info on different parts of the battle and little tid bits of extra info on certain individuals (white & red)
Michno's conclusions are another thing . . . and the chronology is a little suspect . . . but overall a great source of Indian testimony.
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Post by fred on Jan 5, 2006 12:48:23 GMT -6
Leyton--
I agree w/ you about Michno's Lakota Noon. When it comes to the Indian side of things, it's about the only book I have & I like the way Michno organizes things. He states right from the beginning that he is using Gray's timing scenarios, but he includes the various Indian comments about what time of day they thought it was when various events unfolded. That is extremely helpful. I don't agree w/ everything Michno concludes (for example, his theory that Custer kept moving away from Benteen & support so he could draw the Indians to him & catch them between himself & Benteen, is about as far-fetched as Liddic's securing Ford B concept), but his developing of Indian commentary & the placing of people, times, & events-- to me-- makes the book a classic.
Best wishes, Fred.
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Post by Tricia on Jan 5, 2006 13:01:17 GMT -6
Fred--
I absolutely agree with you. After finishing Michno, I received Hardorff's Cheyenne Memories of the Custer Fight, and found it hard to put the events in any kind of order! I guess the drawback is that the keen organisation Michno uses makes one sort of spoiled. I also enjoyed his guesstimate of the size of the Indian village. Made a heck of a lot of sense to me.
Regards, Leyton McLean
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Post by fred on Jan 5, 2006 13:48:32 GMT -6
Leyton--
I think Michno's work on the Indian village is the best there is. My only problem w/ him in this regard is I believe this village was vastly larger than most people-- including Michno-- think. I've done some work on this & while Greg's stuff is kinda like stating the obvious, no one else that I know of has ever tackled it the way he's done. First of all, he simply measured the known distances. It's mind-boggling to me that so many writers have insisted the village was, let's say, 3 miles long, when a simple look at a map will tell you differently. What so many people fail to understand, is that the village was set up for defense, meaning there was no distance between circles! This is completely different from the Washita & I believe it to be one of the mistakes Custer made. He failed to realize that more Indians were crammed into a mile and a half distance than ever previously thought. Willert mentions this defensive posture throughtout his book, & he's right!
Another thing is that Michno mentions the pony herd & he feels the soldiers exaggerated its size; but that may not have necessarily been true. If there were 20,000 horses, there could have been 4,000 warriors! And I think there's something to that.
Now, both West & Twomoons disagree w/ me about that-- & they are both pros at this-- but I still maintain there were more Indians in that village than could fit on that battlefield.
Best wishes Leyton, Fred.
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Post by crzhrs on Jan 5, 2006 13:53:16 GMT -6
Elisabeth:
I would at least give Miller's book a read . . . he did interview elderly Indians from the battle and was one of the first to use them for an account of the Indians' side of the story.
If you don't want to buy it borrow it from your local library . . . I do that with a lot of "questionable" books.
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Post by crzhrs on Jan 5, 2006 13:58:39 GMT -6
Fred:
Not all warriors were fighting at the same time. Many were going back and forth with captured horses, rest, helping a wounded comrade, checking on family, etc.
How long did it take for warriors at one end of the village to respond to an attack at the other end? It was said that many warriors in the northern part of the village did not take part in the Reno fight and Crazy Horse was taking so much time getting his "magic" together that his warriors grew impatient.
I still go with approximately 2,000 warriors, and that might be a stretch. With the command separated into small units and in unfavorable terrain, it would not take huge number of warriors to defeat and/or wipe them out.
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Post by fred on Jan 5, 2006 14:26:07 GMT -6
Crzhrs--
I agree w/ everything you've said, but I don't think everyone got into the fight. I think many able-bodied men were helping the families get away, I agree that not everyone in the northern end got into the Reno fight (Michno's "characters"-- if you will-- are testimony to that), & I believe many of them took their sweet time getting themselves ready-- in whatever fashion you want to call it, i.e., dressed, psyched, etc.-- many were securing the pony herds, & on & on.
There are 2 major projects I am determined to work on, both of which will take an inordinate amount of time (I believe). I am not quite ready for either. One is to re-do the Gray timing thesis, comparing it to any number of different & various scenarios espoused by different authors. The problem you have w/ so many of these modern-day authors, e.g., Gray, Michno, Pennington, Liddic, et al, is that almost every one of them has to put some sort of personal stamp on this battle. For example-- & I have posted this numerous times-- Pennington. He has Custer killed at Ford B; he has the column moving down what he calls Middle Coulee rather than Cedar; he has a 40-minute crossing for Reno at Ford A; he has a 10am crossing of the divide. Some of this is off the wall; some is not. Liddic has Custer column on the back side of Sharpshooters' Ridge, rather than between Weir Peak & Sharpshooters'. And so it goes. I believe-- at least at this time-- much of this can be reasonably resolved through re-plotting some of Gray's times & the distances involved + adding the testimonies. DeRudio, for example, is suspicious. He has to have the world's best eyes to be able to see what he reportedly saw, unless he used his fine Austrian field glasses, which were, when last heard of, in Custer's possession.
The 2nd thing I want to work on-- & a lot of this depends on Ephriam Dickson because I have no means of identifying the people he can, nor do I have the access he has to all the pertinent documents-- is who by name, was in that village? How's that for a task? Yet someone like Ephriam can do it! The guy's brilliant!
So, anyway, we're in agreement, to a point. I still think the number is closer to 4,000, & the more I read, the more I dig up little tidbits that, added to previous tidbits, seem to point to higher & higher numbers. West blew my socks off some time ago when we discussed this, claiming that many were out hunting rather than at the village, but I think he's wrong & I think I may eventually be able to prove it. Like Elisabeth says, it's one big detective story, maybe the best of all time.
Best wishes my friend, Fred.
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Post by crzhrs on Jan 6, 2006 6:54:25 GMT -6
Fred:
I have never heard much about large numbers of warriors out hunting, especially when it was known by many that soldiers were in the area. One thing to remember about warrior count by white survivors: their original numbers were far lower than their later numbers . . . probably having to come up with explanations why the 7th was defeated or defending their actions.
Also Indians mostly did not attack in any coordinated manner or in any organized "units," it was usually small groups of warriors zipping all over the battlefield, almost impossible to get an accurate number of Indians.
One old time frontiersmen said about counting the number of Indians: "Try stirring up an ant hill and counting the number of ants coming out, that's like counting Indians."
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Post by elisabeth on Jan 6, 2006 9:03:29 GMT -6
Crzhrs, thanks for the Miller recommendation. Not so easy to find these books in UK libraries, but I'll give it a go!
On numbers: I know Benteen's account is suspect once he gets to his all-time-record estimate of 9,000 warriors ... but there's one thing he says that's corroborated by Indian accounts, and that's his description of Indians queueing up to find space to shoot at the Reno Hill guys. Of course, that doesn't prove absolute numbers -- but certainly suggests there were one hell of a lot. Plus by then, with Custer's command safely dead, anyone who wanted a go was free to join in; even the young kids, no doubt. Could the bigger estimates have been coloured by that, as well as by the need to "explain" the defeat?
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Post by crzhrs on Jan 6, 2006 9:19:58 GMT -6
Elisabeth:
Once the men of Reno/Benteen dug in on the hill they did not have Indians storming them. There were several attempts to "probe" the soldiers' defense with a couple of counters by the troops, but mostly it was half-hearted attempts due to the risk of casualties, especially when the soldiers were trapped and there was no danger to the village.
Most of the fighting was long range so it would be very difficult to estimate how many warriors there were who were involved.
I have heard about the lack of space for warriors to fight in but that could mean "adequate" space as opposed to actual space.
Another consideration is how the soldiers could determine male from female, non-coms from combattants from that distance, especially when non-coms could be only observing rather than fighting.
Too many what ifs as usual to come up with real numbers . . . but the likelihood is there for inflated numbers by the military to justify their defeat and lack of response to Custer's "come quick" message.
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Post by shatonska on Jan 6, 2006 10:09:33 GMT -6
many were hunting (2 of 3 of Beard's uncles ...) many were protecting the non-coms and many remained around the fighting ground , probably no more than 1.500 were involved on battle ridge but the number of able to fight men (15 to 40 years old) was larger than modern theories say the hundreds of warrirs without family escaped from the reservations to hunt and fight (young red cloud too) are often forgotten , tens of wickups were full of them
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Post by fred on Jan 6, 2006 10:09:55 GMT -6
crzhrs--
Liddic does a great job in describing the defense of Reno Hill. It may be the best part of his book, & certainly the part w/ the fewest inconsistencies. He brings up an Indian assault of the northern or NE part of the "ring" on 26Jun76, plus he describes Benteen's 2 charges.
What say you, my friend?
Best wishes, Fred.
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Post by crzhrs on Jan 6, 2006 10:47:42 GMT -6
Fred:
I am aware of the counter charges by Benteen what with his "One two three here we go boys" (or something like that). Benteen had to almost threaten Reno to get him to order the counter charges. The troopers' action surprised the Indians and they retreated. Another warrior got so close that he almost touched one of the soldiers with his coup stick and Reno said the warriors were so close they could throw stones at them.
Once the warriors realized the soldiers were entrenched and would cost heavy casualties to get them they kept their distance and picked them off via long-range firing.
If the warriors wanted to overrun the soldiers they would have but at a heavy lose of life. They were satisfied to keep the soldiers trapped on a hill with no where to go. The village was protected and the soldiers were no threat.
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Post by fred on Jan 6, 2006 16:54:57 GMT -6
Crzhrs--
You are correct, my friend. If you haven't read the Liddic stuff on the defense of Reno Hill, you should; it's really good.
Shatonska--
While I think I'd like to, I am not willing to argue your point on this size. You may be absolutely correct. One of the things I recently learned-- in Willert-- is that when the Indians crossed the divide & headed down Reno/ Ash/ Medicine Dance Creek, they headed up the LBH valley. If you look at the topo map (available at the Park's book store), you will see the LBH River coming out of the Wolf Mountains & snaking across the broad valley. When the Sioux & Cheyenne reached the valley, they made a left & camped on the eastern side of the river. That way they wouldn't have to ford it. Apparently, they intended to head up the valley, just as Terry & crew suspected, but their scouts reported large antelope & elk herds down the valley.
There could have been numerous hunters out that day & I do believe that many warriors were busy helping their families try to escape. I think that may have been Custer's big prize!: the warriors with the families. So if you're going to use 1,500 at the battle-- & I don't know who originally came up w/ that number-- I won't make an issue of it. I do think, however, the number increased as the fight went on.
Best wishes, Fred.
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Post by shatonska on Jan 7, 2006 6:13:55 GMT -6
Crzhrs-- You are correct, my friend. If you haven't read the Liddic stuff on the defense of Reno Hill, you should; it's really good. Shatonska-- While I think I'd like to, I am not willing to argue your point on this size. You may be absolutely correct. One of the things I recently learned-- in Willert-- is that when the Indians crossed the divide & headed down Reno/ Ash/ Medicine Dance Creek, they headed up the LBH valley. If you look at the topo map (available at the Park's book store), you will see the LBH River coming out of the Wolf Mountains & snaking across the broad valley. When the Sioux & Cheyenne reached the valley, they made a left & camped on the eastern side of the river. That way they wouldn't have to ford it. Apparently, they intended to head up the valley, just as Terry & crew suspected, but their scouts reported large antelope & elk herds down the valley. There could have been numerous hunters out that day & I do believe that many warriors were busy helping their families try to escape. I think that may have been Custer's big prize!: the warriors with the families. So if you're going to use 1,500 at the battle-- & I don't know who originally came up w/ []ithat [/i] number-- I won't make an issue of it. I do think, however, the number increased as the fight went on. Best wishes, Fred.[/quote] the number increased after Reno retreated , many weren't ready many other who had escaped for fear gained confidence and came back to fight , Custer probably confronted a doubled number of warriors than Reno
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