jag
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Caption: IRAQI PHOTO'S -- (arrow to gun port) LOOK HERE -- SMILE -- WAIT FOR -- FLASH
Posts: 245
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Post by jag on Aug 6, 2011 6:39:16 GMT -6
There are arguable foothills from where the scout turned north to Ash Creek where the train was. Don't see the importance here for the italics and underline. That's all roughly correct. He's off after that. He's wrong about the sequence of the tipi, is all. It's odd to apply more surety to the testimony than the participants or the court did. What soldier said under oath there was MORE than one tipi encountered? One of the things that's always annoyed about this is that the standard level of memory lapses and errors that occur all the time in combat and trauma are viewed as unique and evidence of some mass error or plot with the LBH. CLEARLY, the Army and the soldiers were not feeling guilty or remiss in not having noted the distances or the time or the geography in great detail. Unlike the CW, there were no roads, nothing unique to the area to fix attention and be used as reference. Just big bloody sky and a river than looked like every other western landscape or close enough that after a short time things melded together. That seems to have been known and accepted. In testimony to this point it has been pretty much established that Martin met Benteen about 1 1/2 to 2 miles from the river, and I think, even you stated about that same mileage figure in your post. I don't think he's all that far off on some of what he said. I can agree that this was 3 years after the battle and that their memories may not have been as sharp if they had testified to these things even a year after the battle. But I don't think in the case of this lone tepee burning he was all that far off the mark. And this is what he said after that meeting with Martin. "There was no halt or delay, but we went on, Capt. Benteen putting the order in his pocket. About a mile or two from there, we came to a lone tepee burning." That would mean that this lone tepee burning would have been from about a half mile to a mile from the river, and he wasn't far off from being right about its location as was estimated by about 4 or 5 others who testified to its existence there. He confirms that this was the tepee Benteen looked into. I don't know how fast raw hide burns, tepee poles are another matter, but raw hide? So to this point I see nothing at all wrong with his statements, with one caveat which might be discussed, if need be. We then went to the head of the column again- after we passed that tepee we saw Indians off to our right on points, which we afterwards found were our own scouts watching the result of the battle. 1 supposed at the time they were hostiles. When we came to within about a mile of where Major Reno crossed the river (this would have been near the lone tepee burning), we saw mounted men in the bottom. We could not see whether they were Indians or white men. About half a mile from the crossing, we saw a body of men going over the bluffs. We went on towards the crossing (Benteen said he went to the crossing, the company's didn't), and there saw an Indian scout named Half Yellow Face, and he beckoned us to come to the right and we did so. (exactly the same as Benteen's statements said), and the Indians commenced firing at us from the bottom. None of them did us any harm. A few of the bullets struck at our horses feet. We went up about half a mile and found Major Reno on top of the hill with his command. None of this is out of line with Benteen's own statements of what happened after he met Martin about 1 1/2 to 2 miles from the river.
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Post by Yan Taylor on Aug 6, 2011 8:32:18 GMT -6
Hi, where is the best place to find Martini's account of the battle, did he leave Custer at Medicine tale Coulee and was the command split into wings before he left ?. Regards Ian.
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Post by rosebud on Aug 6, 2011 9:11:05 GMT -6
So why didn't Edgerley give the location of the FIRST lone tepee, everyone else did. Why didn't he say that was the second or third lone tepee. Hmmmmm I will agree that he has distances right, just in the wrong order. Do you think he missed the first burning lone tepee.. Evidently you do. They are horseback, they don't fly by in a flash.
650 soldiers passed right by that lone tepee. Benteen,Custer,Reno, McDougall, Varnum,Gerrard. Every single group passed close enough that someone looked into the "burning" tepee. Yet not a single soldier speaks of a SECOND lone tepee. And they also never describe a second burning tepee.
I have said this before and will say it again and again and again.They are rotten judges of distance and time.
Here is some Indian wisdom that you can either throw away or use it.
Indians always said that MOST white people get lost and get confused in the country because they will never look back to see where they have been. They can only remember the lay of the land if they see it from the same spot and looking the same direction as the first time they saw the land.
I would credit Martini as more accurate because he had to look back and travel that country 3 times. He looks back for a reason. Benteen's soldiers have no reason to look back.
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Post by bc on Aug 6, 2011 10:07:22 GMT -6
Hi, where is the best place to find Martini's account of the battle, did he leave Custer at Medicine tale Coulee and was the command split into wings before he left ?. Regards Ian. RCOI, who knows & what is your guess?, and who knows & what is your guess?. bc
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jag
Full Member
Caption: IRAQI PHOTO'S -- (arrow to gun port) LOOK HERE -- SMILE -- WAIT FOR -- FLASH
Posts: 245
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Post by jag on Aug 6, 2011 10:37:32 GMT -6
So why didn't Edgerley give the location of the FIRST lone tepee, everyone else did. Why didn't he say that was the second or third lone tepee. Hmmmmm Oh but he did. Do I have to do all your research for you? Are you that incompetent? Or are you just arguing to be arguing. I will agree that he has distances right, just in the wrong order. Do you think he missed the first burning lone tepee.. Evidently you do. They are horseback, they don't fly by in a flash. 650 soldiers passed right by that lone tepee. Check that. No one said anything about a lone tepee. The only one who did, as I informed you, was Lt. Edgerly and he stated it as a lone tepee burning. You obviously didn't check into the entomology of the term 'lone tepee'. Benteen,Custer,Reno, McDougall, Varnum,Gerrard. Every single group passed close enough that someone looked into the burning tepee. Yet not a single soldier speaks of a SECOND lone tepee. And they also never describe a second burning tepee. Nope, you've done it wrong again. Not "lone tepee". And only one mentions a lone tepee burning. Do I have to do all the research on this? I have said this before and will say it again and again and again.They are rotten judges of distance and time. Here is some Indian wisdom that you can either throw away or use it. Say it all you want. Saying it doesn't make it true. And just as obvious, you haven't correlated as many of the statements as I have, they are remarkably near enough to establish a pretty decent timeline down that creek. Probably the only place in that entire battle where it can be done with an 80% degree of accuracy than any other place. As for your Indian sage words of wisdom. I'll pass, they were a whole lot worse than the whites ever were at expressing themselves when it came to this battle.
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Post by rosebud on Aug 6, 2011 12:11:39 GMT -6
As for your Indian sage words of wisdom. I'll pass, they were a whole lot worse than the whites ever were at expressing themselves when it came to this battle. jag
In your case, that would be a wise choice. You are having a hard enough time with written white statements. I would not expect you to be able to understand what the Indians are telling the translators. Please don't give up yet though. You still have time.
I will give you a little clue to help you out.....Indians use landmarks to remember.....Whites like to guess about miles, using movable landmarks like a tepee. Hope that helps you out a little.
Feel free to do some research for me.....Get back to me when Edgerley describes the location of 2 tepees. Something like...there was a lone tepee a few miles from the morass and ANOTHER tepee a mile from the river. Will be looking forward to your reply with that kind of information, not a misplacement of ONE lone tepee. I think even you should be able to understand that. If you can't do that, PLEASE don't waste any more of my time on this.
Happy hunting RB
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Post by Dark Cloud on Aug 6, 2011 12:54:38 GMT -6
On page 390 of the RCOI, Edgerly says "the" burning tipi was about 3.something to the river and about the same in the other direction to the watering place. That's about right in the ballpark but totally conflicts with what he'd said a page or so before. It's also pretty obvious he'd forgotten Kanipe totally till queried and had to wedge him into his story with little success, and trying to give the details of time and mileage that make no sense and conflicts with what he says later.
He remembers events but gets them out of sequence. Not surprising.
Again the Recorder and the attorney for Reno spend time eliciting detail that they don't seem to acknowledge is in utter mutual exclusion. What was, then, the point? The impression of detail gives an impression of competence that doesn't survive a run through. Was anyone paying attention?
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