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Post by conz on Jul 24, 2008 7:43:03 GMT -6
I would like to add another choice not offered in this pole Keogh's main Mission at Calhoun Hill was: Seeing no sign of Benteen, and hundreds of warriors on almost every flank, he placed Keogh and his three companies on the (relative speaking), high point at Calhoun Hill to act as a look out for Benteen and, to protect Custer's rear as he moved further north on Custer's ridge. I think that is the crux of the number TWO choice in the poll, and well put! Clair
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Post by BrokenSword on Jul 24, 2008 13:34:12 GMT -6
I have yet to hear a good reason as to just why Custer would think he needed to leave THAT large a part of his force to ‘wait for Benteen.’ Maybe Custer was afraid that when Benteen arrived, any fighting going on perhaps a mile away, or 2 miles? - couldn‘t be seen or heard? An entire wing to tell Benteen, “See that dust and hear those distant guns? That’s where the fighting is Captain.” Nope.
Benteen was to bring up ammo and replacements. I am not certain that Custer was necessarialy looking for Benteen to come to him rather than Reno. Just to return from the scout and to 'pitch in to anything that he found,' according to previous orders. Benteen's role was important but not necessarily critical - at the time Custer sent the 'be quick' note.
I think (and all of this is my opinion, of course) that Custer knew Benteen was a solid enough officer to find the fighting and make himself useful on his own. Any novice, or even a moron, can see that Custer was trying to strike the village at multiple points. Reno on one end and himself on the other. I still believe that the physical size of the encampment was a last minute surprise to Custer.
Keogh was left there to attack the middle village (at ford B) when Custer hit the upper end (at ford D). The ford (B) had been checked out, and was apparently judged to be crossable for the cavalry. They fell back out of range of the Indians guns and waited for Custer to get into position and attack across ford D. Reno was thought to have the lower-end otherwise occupied and Keogh’s middle-village attack in combination with Custer’s upper end attack were to be the surprise party for Sitting Bull.
I also still maintain that at least twice the number of warriors were in the village than Custer expected to encounter. Many more warriors than anticipated, sitting on far more real estate than expected caused the 7th to become TOO spread out. Custer just kept dividing and sub-dividing, as well as putting distance between his troops. The surprise party for him was the mood for a fight that the warriors were in.
There were simply enough warriors to blunt each attack, with plenty left over to fill the gaps between Custer‘s divided forces and keep them from re-consolidating. Sitting Bull didn’t need to send notes around telling warriors what to do or where to go. They saw where they needed to be and knew what to do once they got there. And - they did it.
M
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Post by Dark Cloud on Jul 24, 2008 15:03:01 GMT -6
Simplicity. Coherence. A Custer known to history. No inexplicable line dances of complicated manuever for which the 7th has no record of training or practice. No conspiracy, treason, or cowardice. You hate America, don't you. Why?
You need to go view Strange's photos of himself on the other board to understand the real meaning and importance of the Last Stand. View by reflective device only.
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Post by clw on Jul 24, 2008 16:37:56 GMT -6
I don't know what all that ^ was about...
Anyway, Michael -- very interesting reasoning that makes a great deal of sense.
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Post by BrokenSword on Jul 24, 2008 20:15:02 GMT -6
Yes, in Switzerland I’m certain that I am considered quite an ‘America hater.’
The real world fact is that the Little Bighorn fight counted for little in the grand scheme of ‘white’ history or destiny. Manifest or otherwise. But, to the Indians is was perhaps everything. At least everything there was for them to have. A great victory over the white man’s army. Their own proud declaration that they would 'not go quietly into the good night.'
People need heroes, and yes many believe that they would be every bit as heroic as those they have come to idolize - if they only had the opportunity. Custer is only one of many heroic creations. Football and baseball stars serve to fill the need as well. How many people speak of their local team as if they were actually a part of it? “We‘re going all they way! Just try and stop us now!!” Few things have less significant impact on people’s lives than the weekend games. For the most part it’s just harmless fun.
I have indeed seen the photos that Strange has posted of himself. He’s harmless as well, and I find him fun. Whatever purpose the ‘Last Stand’ serves in people’s heads, they are welcome to it as far as I’m concerned.
M
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Post by BrokenSword on Jul 24, 2008 20:23:58 GMT -6
clw - thank you.
M
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Post by Dark Cloud on Jul 24, 2008 20:38:03 GMT -6
And yet, those cyclical calendar thingies they made don't indicate the fight made the top ten to them even that year. And, all things considered, they did go rather quietly in the end. Very few made any 'last stands' in actuality. Why would they?
If they'd been fed and treated civilly or an attempt was honestly made to honor our word, they might have even gone rather willingly, romance aside, and become, like the Scots to the English, more American than the Americans.
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Post by clw on Jul 24, 2008 22:31:22 GMT -6
You know perfectly well they're called wintercounts. But hey, lets not miss an opportunity to disrespect another culture. And you're wrong anyway. from A STUDY IN LAKOTA PICTOGRAPHY by Linea Sundstrom found on the Buechel Museum website in a discussion of the Thin Elk wintercount... 1876 General Custer was killed. General Custer was killed.
P‛ehin hanska ktepi. Long Hair [Custer] was killed.
The pictograph shows a man in a Euroamerican style hat and the blue jacket of the U.S. Cavalry, holding a rifle. The man has extremely long hair and is shown in the standard "killed in battle" manner--that is, with red marks on the chest and scalpline. The subject of this pictograph is General George A. Custer. His Lakota nickname was Long Hair and only he would have been shown in wasicu soldier garb and long hair; thus, the long hair in the picture is a personal identity marker.
Several other winter counts give the battle with Custer as the year name for 1876. In addition to those listed below, the Mandan winter count belonging to Butterfly lists "Long Hair was killed by the Sioux."
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Post by bc on Jul 25, 2008 0:00:57 GMT -6
Custer attacked the Washita with four columns. One going around the left end, one around the right end, one left of center, and Custer's column to the right of center of the village.
At the lbh, could we have Reno going around the left end at ford A, Custer & Yates, going around the right end at ford D, leaving Keough to attack right of center along with Benteen attacking left of center of the village when he arrives? It makes sense to me. Too bad the NAs attacked them first.
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Post by BrokenSword on Jul 25, 2008 8:38:04 GMT -6
The various Plains tribes and smaller bands did go quietly in the end. It was, and is, the only logical choice left to those defeated and captured in any arena of conflict (excepting the few fanatically inspired individuals) but, 25 June was not that day. For the white world LBH was not goal shattering. It was more insult than strategic setback. To the Indians it was, I suspect, far more important, and they thought better than to go around bragging on it or even admitting to having had in part in it - in front of white people anyway. “Sitting Bull? Sitting Bull who?” I certainly can’t say with expertise or any particular insight, but sense that it still holds a prominent place of pride and importance in the Indian consciousness today.
We all know that LBH was the high-water mark of Indian resistance against a colliding culture that was smothering them into non-existence. It was the day when their people stood up and defied the destruction of customs and ways of freedom that were their birthright. It was the day when they almost completely destroyed what many in the white world considered to be the ‘best’ it had to impose its will on ‘inferior’ people.
Old ways die hard and new ways are painful to learn. Both of them come with a cost. 25 June on the LBH was the day when the Indian collected, from the white world, on an large invoice for the old ways being taken from them.
I do agree that had the word of the white man to the Indian tribes (along with other peoples) been honored fully, things and attitudes would be completely different today. It goes without saying that ill will begats ill will. Wounds to the mind or to the heart, penetrate into the soul, and can take generations to heal much less earn forgiveness - if they can ever be forgiven. I know they can never be forgotten.
M
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Post by Dark Cloud on Jul 25, 2008 9:10:12 GMT -6
Nothing I've said denigrates anyone. Forgetting a word while typing isn't a putdown, nor does it require a defender. Nothing I could do or say demeans and defames more than obese Ambulatory Action Figures mocks those they claim to honor.
I doubt there were many fat Indians previous to the reservation life, being nomadic warriors, but if they're the same as white kids today, as photos on this board sometimes suggest, they're guilty of the same. If you're so concerned about being seen as a heroine, do something about all that. It's neither heritage, healthy, nor respectful of the ancestors to resemble a fat tick unable to turn over. Most whites are, these days. Revolting.
There's no index worthy of the name, and I'm not spending time on it, but in SOTMS Connell has an example of a contemporary winter count where the battle isn't mentioned at all, and it's from the Sioux, and he remarks on it. With later wintercounts when the importance had been underlined (plus interest from white purchasers, perhaps) it may have elbowed its way in.
It might give everyone an authentic thrill to write out current Sioux, but it's irrelevant. They themselves didn't know how to write back then, especially in a language - their own - that hadn't been conformed for writing yet, and they didn't know Custer was a General nor know what General would mean, which in aggregate with the merely approximate clothing doesn't suggest the calendar creator and the event had much in common. If you're postulating that they were doing wintercounts for more than their immediate tribe, for The People in general, then I suggest it was a way late creation meant for a market, not the history of their tribe/family, and is different in kind.
I further disagree that because the battle had a huge mythic hold on white America that it would have meant much to the Sioux in similar proportion. As they became more focussed on assimilation, all that would have sunk in for better or worse. But at the time and for years after, they had no clue about the Great Tides of History nor Culcha Wars nor much of anything beyond their immediate environment, which was vanishing. Why would it? Why would they be different than anyone else?
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Post by biggordie on Jul 25, 2008 11:16:20 GMT -6
bc:
Custer's attack at the Washita was against a camp of 51 or so lodges, and was made at dawn after a reasonably thorough recon, at least of that camp [he was not aware of the other camps strung out for miles downstream].
At the Little Horn, he had neither the advantage of a dawn attack or of detailed recon - and, of course, the camps numbered a tad more than 51 or so lodges. There really are no similarities other than it was the army versus the NDNs.
Aside from that observation, let me point out that there is no solid evidence for such a scenario as you present, or for Michael's either. There are lots of things that make sense, as witness the varied and many theories of previous published writers on the subject, some of which are diametrically opposed to one another [this may actually be a requirement of anything "new"], and the postings of the members of this forum, whose theories tend to collide with each other, but which [most of them anyway] make sense to the poster, and often to other members as well.
The fact remains that, no matter what we individually or collectively think makes sense, whatever it was that happened was what happened. Maybe it didn't make sense from our point of view; maybe it only made sense in the circumstances as they unfolded on that day. Maybe I'll win the lottery Saturday and head for NYC and the Roundtable............
Attempting to figure out what Custer might have intended to do, or what he might have thought at various points in time [and geography] will mostly be unprofitable. The important thing to determine, as closely as possible [and as directed by the preponderance or totality of the evidence - all in, as it were], is what he actually did, and what actually transpired.
Gordie
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Post by BrokenSword on Jul 25, 2008 12:12:52 GMT -6
Gordie - "...no solid evidence for such a scenario as you present, or for Michael's either. ..."
LIAR! CUSTER HATER! TERRORIST SUPPORTER! POST-MENOPAUSAL FOOL!! ARRRRRGGGGGG!!!!
Thank you. I feel better now.
M P.S. WAR CRIMINAL BLACK KETTLE LOVER! So there.
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Post by bc on Jul 25, 2008 12:13:05 GMT -6
Hi Gordie, Please provide the information you have regarding your "reasonably thorough recon" at the Washita.
Information I have (from Hoig & Barnitz) is that they were following a lodge pole trail and discovered the village. Custer and his officers quietly walked to the crest of a ridge to view the camp and formulated his plan to attack in four columns at daylight when either he has the band begin playing or unless through inadvertant discovery, some gunfire starts or the Indians decide to run. Barnitz said he crossed and recrossed the Washita 10 or 15 times that night while following the lodge pole trail on the Washita. Nothing indicates any scouts went around the camp. Nothing suggests that the scouted around which would have then found the other villages and warriors that eventually cashiered Elliot. Nothing indicates any scouts found the other villages and warriors that necessitated Custer's quick withdrawal with prisoners providing their cover under such harrassing by Indians that Custer had to abandon their winter coats that they dropped prior to battle.
I was shocked to learn from Barnitz that when Elliott took his column out to move to the left end of the camp, that the troopers dogs began following them. Because they needed to be quiet, the dogs were ordered to be "strangled (or muffled) with lariat ropes and dispatched with knives". They were so close to the village when they walked up to the crest of the ridge that Custer ordered them to not talk and to take their hats off as they peered over the ridge (althought Barnitz said they made plenty of noise walking in foot deep snow). They could hear the tinkling of bells from the pony herd from where they were at. Sounds like the reconning done here was done by the Custer and the officers when they crept up the ridge overlooking the camp.
You can enlighten me here. You have a lot more info available to you than I do. What little I have read does not suggest hardly any recon and nothing that would make it a thorough one. My opinion to date anyway. Upon comparison, there was much more reconning at the LBH than the Washita, again my humble neophyte opinion.
Regarding what I said about Benteen joining Keough as a fourth column to attack the middle of the village. I just asked that as a question, throwing it out there to see what others think. It is just another possibility out of a myriad of other possibilities that make sense to me. I don't really know enough to have formed a finite opinion yet regarding Keough and Benteen although it makes as much sense or more than some of the others regarding any plan made in the vicinity of MTC and beyond by Custer.
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Post by clw on Jul 25, 2008 12:36:55 GMT -6
bc, you'd like Washita by Jerome Greene. He discusses in depth the scouting activities of Ben Clarke, Jack Corbin and Rafael Romero the night before the attack.
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