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Post by mcaryf on Oct 25, 2007 2:06:54 GMT -6
I do not really think there is any great mystery about Terry's intentions because he actually carried them out.
It seems to me that Terry expected that the Indians would move into the valley of the LBH from the original position on the Rosebud where Reno saw their signs.
There were, however, some other possibilities one of which was that they might spend some time on Tullocks Creek.
Terry's action in initially starting his force up Tullock whilst scouting ahead makes his interest in Tullock quite clear. In addition of course we know of the instruction he gave to Custer. In this context it would not be a surprise if Custer had been made aware that Terry might initially start up Tullock and then move across to LBH which is what he did do.
My argument about the failure to send Herendeen relates to the help it could have given to Terry to know both that Tullock was clear and that the Indians were somewhere near the confluence of Ash/Reno Creek and the LBH. It is also possible that Herendeen's own knowledge of the area might have helped prevent Terry's delay on the divide between Tullock and the Big Horn.
Herendeen could have gone with the Crow scouts during the afternoon of the 24th and travelled down Tullock that night. Thus he could have been with Terry early morning of the 25th. This would not have prevented the disaster on the 25th but might have had some impact on events during the 26th, particularly if escaping warriors had been flooding down towards Terry's unsuspecting strung out command.
As I have posted before it is not clear why this did not happen and Herendeen may be equally at fault with Custer. However, my view remains that Custer was at fault in not ensuring that Herendeen was sent.
Regards
Mike
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Post by "Hunk" Papa on Oct 26, 2007 13:57:51 GMT -6
I do not really think there is any great mystery about Terry's intentions because he actually carried them out. There were, however, some other possibilities one of which was that they might spend some time on Tullocks Creek. Terry's action in initially starting his force up Tullock whilst scouting ahead makes his interest in Tullock quite clear. In addition of course we know of the instruction he gave to Custer. In this context it would not be a surprise if Custer had been made aware that Terry might initially start up Tullock and then move across to LBH which is what he did do. My argument about the failure to send Herendeen relates to the help it could have given to Terry to know both that Tullock was clear and that the Indians were somewhere near the confluence of Ash/Reno Creek and the LBH. It is also possible that Herendeen's own knowledge of the area might have helped prevent Terry's delay on the divide between Tullock and the Big Horn. Regards Mike
If this is all true, and I don't concede that it is, why did Terry then divert the Montana Column over Tullock's Divide after marching about an hour and covering only 3 miles? Best wishes Hunk
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Post by mcaryf on Oct 27, 2007 2:21:36 GMT -6
Hi Hunk
I think Terry's expectation was always that the village would be in the valley of the LBH.
A brief move up Tullock should not have cost too much time, in fact it did, and would guard against the possibility that the village was somewhere in that area.
I have not seen it suggested but it is perhaps a possibility that his subsequent move to march along the divide between Tullock and Big Horn was still to keep the option of covering Tullock open.
Regards
Mike
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Post by AZ Ranger on Oct 27, 2007 6:04:53 GMT -6
Scouts could do the job without tying everyone up. Maybe Terry thought it would provide concealment and could enter LBH valley any time he desired. A recon in force in rough country is not a good idea. You move as slow as the weakest link in your outfit then.
AZ Ranger
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Post by "Hunk" Papa on Oct 28, 2007 12:59:03 GMT -6
A brief move up Tullock should not have cost too much time, in fact it did, and would guard against the possibility that the village was somewhere in that area.
Mike, a pleasure to 'meet' you here and I hope it can be in person one day. As the Tullock's Creek (TC) argument has been ongoing for over a century, I doubt we are going to settle it in the course of a relatively few words in this thread, so we may eventually have to agree to disagree after an amicable debate. My problem interpreting what happened in TC on June 25th stems from my belief that the Montana Column (MC) should not have been there in the first place. In a previous post you said 'I do not really think there is any great mystery about Terry's intentions because he carried them out." Not according to the wording in Custer's 'orders' he didn't. "The lower part of this creek will be examined by a detachment from Colonel Gibbon's command." There is no wording either before or after that sentence which qualifies it in any way so the meaning is unequivocal. A detachment, probably Bradley and his scouts, was originally meant to be the only part of the MC to be in TC on June 24th, the main body by extrapolation, would be elsewhere. That elsewhere could only be the Big Horn valley, the route referred to in Terry's June 21st dispatch to Sheridan and confirmed by Kellogg's NY Herald dispatch of the same day, Custer's June 22nd dispatch to the same newspaper, Terry's 'orders' to Custer that same day and the dispatch to the NY Herald attributed to Brisbin, published post-battle. Herendeen also confirmed the route in his January 1878 letter to the same newspaper. I think that at the June 21st conference, the smoke seen on June 16th somewhere in the TC location, prompted the checks of that creek written into Custer's 'orders' as a precaution, but that there was no real expectation of any large force of Indians being there because if there had been, Terry would have no choice but to build a contingency plan for that possibility into the 'orders' especially as in such a case, Herendeen could not have been expected to try and get past the Indian village to reach the MC. Also the records show that the Far West got behind schedule as it was expected to pass the MC as it marched, initially to Fort Pease, but the steamboat actually only caught up on the morning of June 24th. That this caused Terry to re-think his options is evidenced by the fact that it took him some hours to get the MC moving, which, if Hughes was right with his comment that the plan came to the conference fully matured in Terry's mind, meant that something had happened to change things. Otherwise, if TC was the original route chose by Terry, all he had to do was to issue orders as soon as the infantry arrived at 7.30 a.m. to get his fully matured plan into operation. Two other factors reflect Terry actual last minute planning. First, Lt. McClernand who had been on Capt. Ball's April scout that went through TC and would have been consulted at the June 21st conference if TC was a major issue, was not seconded to Terry's staff until late on June 24th. Secondly, In his diary entry written late on June 24th Terry says "Determined to move up the valley at 5 a.m. tomorrow." That means that late on June 24th he decided to make that move, yet if the TC route was originally chosen, there was nothing to decide at that point, it had all been finalized on June 21st. The whole argument is much more complex than the brief points I have made here, but I hope I have given you some food for thought. Regards. Hunk
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Post by mcaryf on Oct 29, 2007 4:38:43 GMT -6
Hi Hunk
I do not suppose you are in UK on Nov 10th but if you were to be, then I am addressing a session of the Custer Association of Great Britain meeting in Birmingham about the two papers I published in their Journal. These were variants of the ones I have previously publicised on here and which can be found at [ftp]http://homepage.ntlworld.com/adam.fox57/MikeFox/LBH/LBHmcaryf[/ftp]
With respect to Terry's route I do not have any special research knowledge of this so I merely try to apply logical deduction.
If Terry wished to have the TC area scouted then he must have thought there was a possibility that some of the Indians might be found there. The fact that Custer had not sent a scout slightly increased that possibility, because, as you say, he would not be able to do that if the Indians were there in force.
If Indians had been found by his scouting party, then it would make sense for the main force to be in a position to react to this discovery. My assumption is that Terry thought he could move relatively easily up TC and then switch across to his true target of the LBH. By following this route he effectively covers the possibility of the Indians being on TC but still gets to LBH by his target date of 26th June. I added another hypothesis, for which I have no documentary evidence, that the somewhat strange decision to march down the divide might also have been influenced by the possibility that it allows Terry still to cover TC whilst heading for LBH.
Regards
Mike
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Post by "Hunk" Papa on Oct 30, 2007 16:03:30 GMT -6
Hi Hunk 1) I do not suppose you are in UK on Nov 10th but if you were to be, then I am addressing a session of the Custer Association of Great Britain meeting in Birmingham about the two papers I published in their Journal. These were variants of the ones I have previously publicised on here and which can be found at [ftp]http://homepage.ntlworld.com/adam.fox57/MikeFox/LBH/LBHmcaryf[/ftp] With respect to Terry's route I do not have any special research knowledge of this so I merely try to apply logical deduction. 2)If Terry wished to have the TC area scouted then he must have thought there was a possibility that some of the Indians might be found there. The fact that Custer had not sent a scout slightly increased that possibility, because, as you say, he would not be able to do that if the Indians were there in force. 3)If Indians had been found by his scouting party, then it would make sense for the main force to be in a position to react to this discovery. My assumption is that Terry thought he could move relatively easily up TC and then switch across to his true target of the LBH. By following this route he effectively covers the possibility of the Indians being on TC but still gets to LBH by his target date of 26th June. I added another hypothesis, for which I have no documentary evidence, that the somewhat strange decision to march down the divide might also have been influenced by the possibility that it allows Terry still to cover TC whilst heading for LBH.
Hi Mike, I have numbered the paragraphs of your Reply #25 and will answer them in that sequence. 1) I am in fact no longer a member of the CAGB but in any event the costs of flights and hotels are prohibitive for short stays. It would have been great to meet you and to hear your talk, especially as I very much enjoyed your first article 'Custer's Mission for Benteen.' I do hope that the meeting and your talk go well. 2) The references to Tullocks (TC) in Custer's 'orders' are indications enough that the Creek needed to be checked. By using the wording 'a detachment from Gibbon's command', Terry, noted for his meticulous use of words, makes it plain that a small group of Gibbon's men were to be used for that purpose in the lower part of Tullocks. If the plan was that the whole of the Montana Column (MC) was to start up TC, then Terry would have had no need to use the word 'detachment'. Also, as I have said before, if the Indians had been expected in any force in TC, then Custer's 'orders' would have reflected that fact with some reference to a contingency plan. The non-appearance of Herendeen could have been for any reason, to assume that it meant there might be Indians in force in TC was a quantum leap in the absence of any fresh intel. Neither the Crows on June 24th or Bradley on June 25th had seen any signs of large numbers of the 'hostiles' and Terry in any case did not wait for news from Bradley before making the detour, so he could not have had any strong feeling that Indians were present or, in accordance with his dispatch to Sheridan, he would have taken the MC to intercept them and been the 'one column' that found them. Let us look at another sensible proposition. If the MC is actually meant to be in the Big Horn valley, the non-appearance of Herendeen could mean that Custer had run into the Indians who were fleeing from him north up the Big Horn, there has been no time to send the messenger and now the blocking force is in TC by default so the Indians escape. How would Terry have explained that? 3) As already mentioned in 2) as Terry made his detour without waiting for any news from Bradley he could not have entertained any serious belief that his target was in TC. Whilst your hypothesis makes sense IF Terry had always meant to be in TC, as the records make it much more likely that the Big Horn was his intended route, what he actually did was to cross the divide in order to get the MC to the Big Horn valley, where it could best perform its role as the blocking force. After all, one thing is for sure, the MC could not be in two places at once. When considering what Terry had in mind for the MC, I am of the opinion that we cannot assume that just because that command ended up in TC, it was by design. Best wishes. Hunk
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Post by mcaryf on Oct 30, 2007 18:01:20 GMT -6
After all, one thing is for sure, the MC could not be in two places at once. When considering what Terry had in mind for the MC, I am of the opinion that we cannot assume that just because that command ended up in TC, it was by design.
Hi Hunk
This seems rather a strange thing to write, if it was not Terry's intention for the MC to be in TC then why did it go there?
The Crow scouts had already scouted about 7 miles of TC the previous day when they had returned with wild stories of a wounded buffalo. Terry was aware of this. On the morning of the 25th Bradley had set off an hour or so before the main column which itself stopped its march up TC after 3 miles and turned towards the Big Horn. Bradley actually travelled about 9 miles before stopping to see if the main column was following. Thus his "detachment" was about 1/3 of the way up TC and this pretty well covered Terry's intention that the MC would scout the lower reaches. Obviously the fact that Bradley had not sent back any messengers would tell Terry that the lower reaches of TC were clear so a move to the Big Horn and LBH was appropriate. Thus Terry's move was effectively in response to no news from his scouts.
I really have to ask you why Terry would want to have TC scouted unless he thought there was some possibility that some Indians might be found there? Once it appeared they weren't there he turned to approach LBH. This all seems quite rational to me and I am not sure what your objection to the idea is. He had declared his intention of scouting TC and ordered Custer to do the same so surely he would have his main column in some position to react if the scouts had reported positively. He took his main column about 6 miles up TC and sent his scouts up it for 12 or so. What else would you have had him do different that would fit better with the plan he had discussed with Custer?
Regards
Mike
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