June 24: 5 p.m. to Midnight: A Road We Do Not Know

[fred]

No more pretenses. This is the beginning.

Go for it: any and everything.

[crzhrs]

Custer tells Varnum the Crows believe the Sioux are in the LBH Valley and wants him to accompany them for verification. Charley Reynolds goes along for assistance. If anything is spotted send a messenger to him. Varnum was to leave about 9 p.m. & Custer would follow at 11 and be at the base of the Crows Nest before morning.

[crzhrs]

While Varnum was heading toward the Crow's Nest Custer visited the Rees to chat with the scouts. He said when the hostile camp was sighted, the Rees would attack the Lakota pony herds, which they could keep as plunder. He seemed more relaxed and confident than he had been in days. There was some teasing done towards Tom Custer.

Around 9 pm a courier from Varnum confirmed the hostiles were camped in the LBH Valley. Custer decides to resume marching at midnight. He planned to take the command across the divide, hide it, spend the following day scouting, then attack at dawn on Monday, the 26th.

The mules were acting up so the start of the march was delayed until about 1 a.m.


There is no doubt Custer is going to attack . . . the only question was under what circumstances and when.

[crzhrs]

I used Robinson's A GOOD YEAR TO DIE as a source. I may have misread the times or confused them . . . book does name the courier, "just a courier" I'll have to go back and double-check (unfortunately, cannot do until tonight at the earliest)

[crzhrs]

Back to A GOOD YEAR TO DIE:

Varnum left at TWILIGHT, not 9 p.m. (my error) for the Crow's Nest to confirm if Indians were in the LBH Valley. Varnum sent a courier at 9 p.m.

[crzhrs]

I'll go back and check out Robinson . . . either I'm not reading correctly or he has confused Varnum's time lines. Won't know until either tonight or Friday.

[crzhrs]

From Varnum's letter (July 4, 1876) to his parents (I posted this in the other thread also):

Custer wanted some intelligent white man to go ahead with them to send him information. I took the six Crows, five Rees, and a white man, who was an old frontiersman, and we marched all night, making about sixty miles. I had rode without rest or any sleep for thirty-six hours. Custer said he would start at 11 p. m., and come somewhere near us by morning. At 2:30 o'clock we reached the hill.

_____

Varnum did not state a start time, only the arrival which brings him to the next day.

[crzhrs]

From A GOOD YEAR TO DIE:

June 24: At twilight Custer halted for coffee just below the present site of Busy, MT and sent for Varnum. He told [him] the Crows believed the hostiles would be found in the valley of the LBH . . . and asked Varnum to accompany Mitch Boyer, Charlie Reynolds, and the Crows to the peak so that if the Lakota-Cheyenne camps were visible, he could estimate their strength. (reference from Custer's Chief of Scouts [Carroll])

About 9 pm a courier from Varnum confirmed the hostiles were camped in the LBH Valley. Custer decided to resume march at midnight . . . take the command across the divide . . . then attack at dawn on Monday, the 26th. (no reference on who the courier was or where the time came from)

________

Since this thread is only for the 24th I hesitate to go home, however:

On the 25th Custer ordered another halt . . . when a second courier arrived with a note from Varnum saying they had seen smoke from the village.

__________

No mention of who the 2nd courier was, but must have been Red Star

[crzhrs]

From THE LBH CAMPAIGN (Sarf):

Varnum reminisced:

"Custer said he wanted an intelligent white man to go with them (Indian Scouts) and get what information he could from them & send him a message . . . he said I was to leave about 9 o'clock and get there before daylight."

Varnum was to send a note from the Crow's Nest detailing what he had seen, returning at noon should he discover no hostiles.

____

If we go by Varnum's "reminiscing" he was to leave at 9 p.m.
_____

Later that evening at Officer's Call Custer told them they were probably about to go into the fight of their lives.

[erkki]

crzhrs said:

From A GOOD YEAR TO DIE:

June 24:
About 9 pm a courier from Varnum confirmed the hostiles were camped in the LBH Valley.

Bottom line: Robinson is a secondary source. As such, his sources need to be checked to see if the source really says what Robinson said he said.

Thus Bray (p.213) stated that Owns Bobtail Horse watched the column until 6:30 a.m. on June 24 when they left the soldiers at the Sundance site. The cite is to Lakota Recollections, p. 109, f.1 which says: "Known that soldiers would come that day. Scouts saw them at sundance ground. Three scouts, one of which [was] Owns Bontail Horse. Scouts saw Custer coming three days before." There is no 6:30 a.m., June 24 in that statement.

[clw]

from Command and General Staff College...

"At 1945 on 24 June 1876, Custer camped at the Busby, bend of Rosebud Creek. Throughout that day's march, he, his soldiers, and his scouts had seen increasing signs of the Sioux village. Still unclear was whether the Indians had continued up the Rosebud or had turned west toward the Little Bighorn River. At 2100, four Crow scouts returned to camp with news that the Sioux trail led westward out of the Rosebud valley. Custer now faced a dilemma. Terry's orders directed him to continue up the Rosebud to its head, then turn west toward the Little Bighorn. Through this maneuver, Terry intended to trap the Indians between Custer's force and Gibbon's colunm. On the other hand, continuing up the Rosebud entailed several risks: possible discovery by Indian scouts, the loss of contact with the Indian village, and the possibility of leaving Gibbon's force to fight the Indians alone. After weighing his options, Custer chose to maintain contact by following the Sioux trail over the divide."

"At 2120, Custer sent his chief of scouts, Lieutenant Charles A. Varnum, to a natural observation point called the Crow's Nest to pinpoint the location of the Sioux village. While Varnum was absent, Custer decided to move his column at night to the divide between the Rosebud Creek and Little Bighorn River. Then, his force would hide there throughout the day of 25 June in a small pocket nestled at the base of the Crow's Nest. That evening, he planned to approach the village, assume attack positions before dawn on 26 June, and attack the Indians at first light."