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Post by biggordie on Aug 23, 2008 19:16:34 GMT -6
Ah, Mister Fong san, so glad to see you here. Ne Ho Mah:
Time for another AAAARRRRGGGGH!! Only louder.
Hello - Earth to Clair: What happened from Luce Ridge On??? There is already a thread for panic or no panic. Please move your posts to that thread, or have Diane do it for you. Or just delete them in toto. Did you notice the thought about removing the spurious markers? Do you understand that there are 50 odd markers that don't belong on Custer Field? There are not a lot of clusters around any of the officers when you remove those 50 spurious [except maybe Keogh]. And three of the officers were missing, eh?
As an artist friend of mine might ask: "What color is the sky in your model?"
Gordie
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tatanka
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Live for today like there was no tomorrow
Posts: 125
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Post by tatanka on Aug 24, 2008 3:29:44 GMT -6
Having read the posts from members I don't believe there was much, if any, panic from the soldiers. There are stories of soldiers throwing away their weapons and running toward the Indians begging for mercy. There may have such isolated incidents but I believe if there had been mass panic it would mean a slur on the officers as well as a far lower rate of casualties among the Indians.
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Post by ozcuster on Aug 24, 2008 6:33:44 GMT -6
As a new member admittedly I would have thought there would have to be some leeway as to where these threads go. It's usually multifactorial somewhere in the discussion.
brokensword was on the money in regard to Custer withdrawing to a central command role. But it highlights one of areas that has always bugged me about this particularly because I cant fully understand the officer system of the day. And it is relevant.
Who would lead a third wing? Captain so and so. Ok . However, where are all the bloody senior officers? Lieutenants acting as captains. Sergeants as lieutenants. Even a lieutenant colonel as colonel . What sort of system could have a regiment with well known serious intentions go campaigning with half its officers on various leaves and detachments? I've never seen this seriously examined but I would be pleased for input.
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tatanka
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Live for today like there was no tomorrow
Posts: 125
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Post by tatanka on Aug 24, 2008 7:07:18 GMT -6
Which officers, apart from Sturgis, are you talking about? I would have thought the officers in Custers'command were competent enough.
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Post by AZ Ranger on Aug 24, 2008 7:20:39 GMT -6
AZ, Do you think it could be panic if the men were in clusters around their officers? In a panic, especially where Soldiers have horses, shouldn't the men have been spread around for miles and miles? To me, the fact that they are clustered so tightly around Calhoun and Custer Hills (within a mile of the top of each) says that there was no panic here, at least not on any "unit" scale. It is a military history rule that units and armies that panic early have the most survive the immediate battle...many get away. It is the units with the best cohesion that die to the last man. Clair I would not expect to find them around their officer. I think it would be most helpful as DC has suggested many a time to have definitions. If a skirmish line degrades to clumps of troopers then discipline is beginning to fail. Rout to me does not mean there is necessarily panic just an overwhelming defeat. If an order was given to move out at the charge and rally, regroup on LSH then I would expect to find what is there. I think with lots of Indians using tactics to scare the horses that the horses could panic while the troopers were following an order. Standing on LSH and looking toward the river I can see that as possible. AZ Ranger
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Post by ozcuster on Aug 24, 2008 8:14:28 GMT -6
tatanka ,forgive my brevity because I'm about to go to bed over here but the senior majors were absent together with multiple officers resulting in lieutenants leading companies, and off the top of my head I think I Comp may have even had a sergeant.
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Post by BrokenSword on Aug 24, 2008 8:17:14 GMT -6
OZ- G’day mate.
The armed forces of United States has almost ALWAYS had to play ‘catch-up’ when it has found itself confronted with armed conflict between itself and other nations. The Plains Wars with the various Indian nations was no different.
The government (even today) has no money. It produces no marketable product with which to earn an income. A government gets its money from tariffs, taxes and by way of loans. After any war, governments tend to cut back severely on spending in areas where it feels it can. Usually, the first target is the military. Wise or not, that’s where governments try and skin to the bone.
The American Civil War had left the Federal government with a huge war debt. The large army and navy existing at war’s end were reduced greatly in size, naturally. The question was just how far it could be reduced to pinch any additional pennies from its overall budget. The result was that while authorized a certain strength (warm bodies in uniform), all regiments found themselves at only about 50% of that authorized strength in what today would be called ‘effectives.’
Army pay was below scale compared to the civilian world, but was steady. Army food was incredibly bland (beans, salt pork and hardtack three times a day) and poor quality. In 1876 the troopers were being feed surplus hardtack left over from ten years before, but your plate wasn’t empty everyday. Economic condition moved on a roller coaster of ‘good times’ and ‘bad times’ so enlistment, by enlarge, came by way of those on the lower end of the population. Uneducated, recent immigrants with no social standing or resources and those with only common skills or no skills filled out the ranks of the armed forces.
Health care was little advanced beyond leaches and magical vapors at that time. Many of the officers had real health issues from the Civil War’s living conditions and wounds and were, quite frankly, unfit for a life of soldiering on the American Plains. Since each regiment was more of less responsible for its own recruitments, officers acted as recruiting agents in the larger Eastern cities, and of course had small staffs there were drawn from the various regimental roles. Each had to have an official regimental assignment however, and so many had company assignments, but never served a day with the company they were in command of.
The Great Plains are millions of square miles in size. Small clusters of soldier from the various under strength regiments were scattered over these vast areas in ’forts’ of all sizes and assigned to patrol their particular area of responsibility. It was not at all uncommon for a sergeant or even a corporal to lead a small patrol for weeks at a time. Such conditions had become standard operating procedure.
Such was the condition of the Seventh Cavalry at the time of the Little Bighorn fight. The preceding years of dealing with a sloppy manpower system of operations and ad hoc nature of the command structure had lulled most everyone to think that since it had more or less worked before - it would continue to work in the Summer of 1876.
The Indian warriors proved it was otherwise on June 25, 1876, and the government had to suddenly get serious and play catch up with the realities of the war that was being fought.
BrokenSword
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Post by elisabeth on Aug 24, 2008 8:27:54 GMT -6
Oz,
Agree, it does seem a shambolic way to run things. But maybe it's worth considering that at first, when it was to be a winter campaign, it was only the Fort Lincoln companies that were going to be involved -- indeed, I'm not even sure that it wasn't just three of those. Then the Fort Rice companies got added; then those at Totten; it was really only at the last minute that those stationed in the south were authorised to join as well. So it was all a bit ad hoc in the end. As for the missing officers: well, there are differences of opinion as to how much they'd be missed. Tilford was aged and ailing and (from his photos) unlikely to be able to sit a horse for long, to his own comfort or that of the horse; Ilsley was summed up by Benteen as making a fine illustration of how a cavalry uniform was worn, but nothing more; Merrill and Custer were at daggers drawn, so his presence wouldn't have added much to harmony in the regiment; and so it went on. Admittedly, drafting in an ex-naval cadet who couldn't ride (Reily) and an infantry officer who'd managed to blow his own eye out (Crittenden) doesn't strike one as ideal, nor does equipping Co. A with a lieutenant (DeRudio) its own captain won't speak to ... and perhaps we saw the results of that last on Reno's skirmish line. But as far as Custer's five companies were concerned -- and they're the ones where we're having to guess at command-and-control issues -- it may not have been too bad. Co. C had only had Tom Custer a comparatively short time, so if he was indeed detached to HQ, they'd be used enough to being commanded by Harrington; it might have made no serious difference. Co. E had baby Sturgis, true, but Smith was on old hand; new to them, but not new to command, and they'd have known or sensed that. Yates and F went way back, so a green lieutenant alongside him wouldn't be too much of a problem. Co. I had had the same commanding officer since 1866, and Porter had been around for several years, so no problem with them. Co. L: more difficult, perhaps. They hadn't seen hide nor hair of Mike Sheridan for ages, so his absence wouldn't be felt; but Calhoun was seconded from Co. C, and Crittenden effectively from outer space, so they should have been the dodgiest outfit ... Yet if we're to believe the reports of those who saw the ground, they seem to have done more than OK. Perhaps some six weeks on the march is enough to shake a company down? At all events, I don't know that there's a single absent officer anyone's been able to point to and say "ah, if only he'd been there ...". Merrill's the only one who sometimes gets mentioned, but it's hard to imagine what difference he'd really have made (apart from dissension); he didn't distinguish himself much later.
Sturgis, now: there, perhaps, is the unknown quantity. True that he -- allegedly -- did poorly at Cañon Creek, but that was with the knowledge of the Custer disaster (and his son's death) in his mind. Had he been given field command of the 7th in 1876 ... interesting to wonder if it might have worked out differently?
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Post by BrokenSword on Aug 24, 2008 8:40:36 GMT -6
tatanka-
The following officer regularly assigned to the Seventh Cavalry on June 25, 1876 but who were not present at the Little Bighorn that day were:
Headquarters: Col. Samuel Sturgis: Regimental Commander: detached service at St. Louis MO. Maj. Joseph G. Tilford: on leave Maj. Lewis Merrill: detached service at Philadelphia PA. 1st Lt. Henry J. Nolan: Regimental Quartermaster, detached service as Acting Assistant Quartermaster on Brig. Gen. Terry's staff
Company A: 1st Lieutenant William T. Craycroft: detached service
Company D: 1st Lieutenant James M. Bell: Leave of absence
Company E: Captain Charles S. Ilsley: Commanding, detached service
Company F: 1st Lieutenant Henry Jackson: Detached service 2nd Lieutenant Charles W. Larned: Detached service
Company G: Captain John E. Tourtelotte: Commanding
Company H: 2nd Lieutenant Ernest A. Garlington: Graduation leave of absence
Company I: 2nd Lieutenant Andrew H. Nave: Sick leave
Company K: Captain Owen Hale: Commanding
Company L: Captain Michael V. Sheridan: Commanding, Detached service 1st Lieutenant Charles Braden: Sick leave 2nd Lieutenant Edwin P. Eckerson: Detached service
BrokenSword (Not present either - Thank God)
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Post by conz on Aug 24, 2008 8:46:53 GMT -6
What happened from Luce Ridge On??? There is already a thread for panic or no panic. Please move your posts to that thread, or have Diane do it for you. Or just delete them in toto. C'mon Gordie...tired about talking psychology already? This thread is spun from an early model for "what happened after Luce ridge?" based upon mass panic induced by overwhelming Indians that overran the Soldiers and killed them all quickly. So the issue of "panic," and the Soldier's motivation for being there in the first place, is central to this thread, isn't it? I've done this many times, and find zero intimation that doing so changes any model that I've seen. The number of bodies at one specific place, lesser or fewer, makes not on iota of difference, to this military eye. On my own charts I've removed all those spurious markers, and say, so what? So the number of markers is a lot of fluff about nothing, is my judgment. But if someone wants to try to make a case for it, I'm game. Pink and lavender, with a slight green flash on the horizon as the sun goes down... I must say, that even after living in the outdoors for most of my 51 years now, I still find incredible new concoctions in our skies here in Kentucky that God has made...truly infinite is His pallette. Clair
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Post by biggordie on Aug 24, 2008 8:49:07 GMT -6
David:
Sorry. I tried - really I did. The offer is still open.
Gordie
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tatanka
Full Member
Live for today like there was no tomorrow
Posts: 125
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Post by tatanka on Aug 24, 2008 8:57:22 GMT -6
Good point about Sturgis, Elisabeth. He would certainly have been more cautious than Custer. Whether that would have made any difference I don't know. Maybe he would have paid more attention to his scouts. Maybe he would have waited for Terry. A lot of "maybes". To get back to panic thread, I still think Custers' officers were competent enough ; Tom, Keogh, Moylan, Reno, Benteen etc. But as conz says they were just overwhelmed by force of numbers.
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Post by clw on Aug 24, 2008 9:09:26 GMT -6
David? Who's David? Not on my scorecard. And I AM keeping score, boys. Although following 'glory' through 15 threads is a bit complicated. Ask a SF guy about glory sometime. Do it from behind the sofa.
I have a question. Why was Miles left out of the campaign? It seems to me he would have been invaluable. He even liked Custer.
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Post by conz on Aug 24, 2008 9:33:49 GMT -6
My favorite SF guy was my mentor the one year I did ROTC at the Univ. of Vermont. He was our senior NCO instructor/adviser, and us students adored him.
He was single then, because he left his Montengard wife of 8 years back in Vietnam when we pulled out. He had been in Vietnam for seven out of eight years, and some considered him to have "gone native."
In any event, he slept in the closet of his small apartment, sitting up crosslegged facing the door, with a shotgun across his lap. It was the only way he could sleep when alone. I knew this, because one day when he was missing from classes I went to get him, and that's where I found him...his apartment door was unlocked, and I went in looking for him. I'm very lucky to be alive...or rather, lucky that he had very good reflexes not to pull the trigger after I opened the door, having heard his snoring. <g>
He taught us what officers are supposed to do, versus what NCOs are supposed to do. He taught us to rappel, skin a rabbit, sleep in the snow, all manner of fieldcraft, and how to kill a man several ways with bare hands or bayonets. All very cheerfully, of course. Quite a character.
Luckily for all concerned, too, he didn't drink. That is what saved him.
Clair
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Post by clw on Aug 24, 2008 9:35:17 GMT -6
Nevermind. I have a cross reference for David under 'shan'.
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