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Post by Deleted on Mar 8, 2014 5:37:50 GMT -6
Point taken Ian. The six (?) moved from the top of LSH weren't moved too far. Best, c.
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Post by tubman13 on Mar 8, 2014 6:07:09 GMT -6
Chris/Tom; I was talking about the soldiers who arrived on the battlefield on the 27th, they had to bury their dead comrades who had been badly mutilated, these poor souls had left out in the hot sun for two days, now I have heard that Reno and Benteen had only two spades on Reno hill and I don’t know how many Terry had, so I don’t think that they would move the bodies very far from where they were found, you do hear of the odd exception when the ground was too rocky, but I cannot see any Officers giving out orders to shattered men to start hauling their dead friends around, they would just try and cover of bury them almost in situ. Ian. Point taken, shovels are a bigger issue. I don't think, though, they left bodies where they lay for posterity sake. Movement could very well have been more than we would like to think. Maybe not enough to throw off the overall scheme of things. Later movements are the bigger issue.
Regards, Tom
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Post by AZ Ranger on Mar 8, 2014 9:18:44 GMT -6
Fred/DC; I have looked at quite a few images of that battlefield and none of the markers look like corn scatter, they do follow what looks like lines and in certain spots groups, but not spread out over a large area similar to throwing seed around. Ian. Ian you have a view from above and Benteen horizontal. I suspect that throwing corn in time when it was planted that way had more lines to it with some clumping. I don't think he meant throw it up in the air and have it land randomly. Just my two cents. There is a thin line of individual markers closest to the river and from above you see a line on the ground you see individual markers. What do those markers represent? They look like what a herd of elk looks like after hunters shoot at them with the majority moving on. Regards AZ Ranger
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Post by Yan Taylor on Mar 8, 2014 10:20:52 GMT -6
Hi Steve, yes there are a long thin line of markers that skirt along the ground that run along the river border, they seem to run parallel to the larger line on Custer Ridge.
They are numbered; OM128 OM127 OM126 OM125 OM124 OM253 OM254 OM257 With number OM121 further west.
These look like they came from the south, maybe C Company men that fled from FFR or Calhoun Coulee.
Ian.
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Post by Dark Cloud on Mar 8, 2014 10:53:39 GMT -6
yantaylor,
First, in reference to the first post of this thread, and not being picky but it's not a map at all, it's a graphic. Google exaggerates some features and blands out others. With the shadowing you can mistakenly think you're viewing Annapurna from the space station. Which brings up another thing: I've been reading reviews on Amazon of various Custer books and the majority don't know that calling something a novel is calling it fiction. They also don't know which are which. Son of the Morning Star is not fiction.
Second, looking at a 'map' or graphic of the marble markers is not what Benteen saw, which were the actual bodies as found. The markers are bunched and inflated in number, not even representing what the wooden stakes were, and they themselves did not indicate where the bodies were specifically found. Looks very much to me like a right handed guy reached into the bag of seed on his left hip and backhanded a bunch of seed towards the river with the majority hitting LSH.
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Post by quincannon on Mar 8, 2014 11:39:33 GMT -6
Like I said above those markers are both blessing and curse, and to tell you the truth they have become more curse than blessing of late. They are what they are. No one is going to remove them or sort them for historical accuracy at this late date, were that even possible. So we live with it or resume the study of Trafalgar. At least we no the exact spot where Nelson got whacked.
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Post by Yan Taylor on Mar 8, 2014 12:45:09 GMT -6
No problem dark cloud, the source I used for the markers came from Chris, it’s a huge white sheet with maps printed on either side, he sent it to Wild, he didn’t have any use for it so he gave it to me, it’s very large (about 4x3 feet) one side has battle related Artifacts and the other has grave markers, I think maps I think you are referring to the ones I posted for Tom, they are the ones on my hard drive, and not this huge brute I have in my bookcase.
Ian.
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Post by herosrest on Mar 9, 2014 17:33:09 GMT -6
In very real sense, the markers were imposed upon history by O. J. Sweet who developed a theory of what took place. His report is interesting insight to his own model of the battle and the impact of his work was significant. Whilst Kulhman did quite some research, although deaf as a post, the markers played a part in his thinking. Today, through some quite painstaking and hard work by Fox, much of what Kuhlman assembled is questioned and questionable, despite it broadly being in line with the history given by john Stands in Timber.
An example of modern divergence with past ideas is the location broadly accepted for C company's fight, below LSH down near and with Smith. We do not know what data and insight that Sweet had to go on, but Marshall's 1891 map and plot of markers tells a story different to that today. Perhaps Tom Custer's body position had something to do with interpretation by Sweet.'The brothers were buried together and may have lain together before burial. That doesn't mean they fell together near by each other.
The bodies were long removed before Sweet arrived to locate quite a few spurious markers besides those which belong, and one simply really must wonder how well the graves were still marked after 15 years, let alone after 12 months or the ensuing reburials. The markers were and remain symbolic and unique.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 9, 2014 17:44:28 GMT -6
Herosrest, As you mentioned Sweet's report, can you provide it in its entirety? I have been unable to find the original.
Best, c.
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Post by fred on Mar 9, 2014 18:25:18 GMT -6
... Sweet's report, can you provide it in its entirety? Chris, I do not have the full report, but I do have this: CAPTAIN OWEN JAY SWEET COMPANY D, 25TH INFANTRY Letter from Sweet to Walter Camp, November 24, 1912. Hardorff, Richard G., On the Little Bighorn with Walter Camp. 1. In addition to erecting the headstones, Sweet spent several weeks at the battlefield surveying the boundaries. [124] 2. Sweet also spent several days on the Reno fields, including the valley, the ravines, and the hilltop. [125] 3. GEN (formerly MAJ) Brisbin was with him. [125] 4. Sweet wrote, “It was he [Brisbin] who gathered up the notes and data found near and on the remains of Mark [sic, Marc] Kellogg… and who made the first reports of the fight to the press….” [125] 5. Regarding the headstones, he wrote, “Each headstone shows where one or more bodies were buried after the battle and the remains, i. e., what was left of them, were still lying there when the headstones and markers were placed in 1890…. The heads and parts of limbs being cut off. In many instances these members were found missing from the balance of the remains found in the graves.” [125] 6. Sweet tried as best he could to place the marker near the body’s head. [125 – 126] 7. Sweet found board markers with officers’ names. It was the same “as in the case of the civilians who fell with Custer.” [126] 8. In the letter, Sweet mentioned he was last at the field in September 1897. “At that time there had been no change in the configuration of the nearly level plat of ground on which the monument stands. I cannot believe the ground has been graded down or any change made whatever….. You may recall the point of ridge on which the monument stands is wider than at any other place back for over 100 rods, and from a military standpoint it might be called level as the ground slopes but the slightest.” [126] 9. In digging around the valley, Sweet found a board with LT McIntosh’s name on it, then discovered bones beneath. [126] 10. He placed a headstone on McIntosh’s grave. [126] 11. The only other marker placed in the Reno area was where Dr. DeWolf was believed to have fallen. [126] 12. Sweet said where he placed two markers at a grave site, two or more bodies were buried there. [127] 13. As for Dr. Lord, Sweet wrote, “To show an extreme case, one is that of Asst. Surgeon C. E. Lord, U. S. A., whose headstone is set in a group of four near the big deep-cut ravine. I found no mark to indicate where he fell, [but] in digging into the remains at this spot I found pieces of clothing, a staff officer’s button or two which Dr. Lord was known to wear, hence the headstone was erected.” [127] What I find interesting here is that while Sweet's report on Dr. Lord contradicts some of the accounts we have, viz., LT Thompson's (K/6I) that Lord lay about twenty feet southeast of Custer on side of the hill (a Camp interview, February 14, 1911), Lord's marker seems correctly placed today... that is, if it is still where Sweet says he found the relics. That grouping today is actually markers 14 - 17, with # 16 considered spurious. Best wishes, Fred.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 9, 2014 18:36:55 GMT -6
Thanks Fred.
Curious that Sweet tried to place markers at the head (your 6 above) when the remains (more or less) were placed in the mass grave years earlier.
Damn, I'd like to read the original report! Best, c.
Edit: Another man at Arlington...link
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Post by Dark Cloud on Mar 9, 2014 18:37:52 GMT -6
hr's posts, while still ghastly, are beginning to read more and more like Wiggs', which is worse. Gaseous phrasing to impart a whiff of intellect to this user ID who once tried to convince us a ravine was a building. "Whilst?" How cosmo of you. So British. My lips purse just reading this post.
"In very real sense, the markers were imposed upon history by O. J. Sweet who developed a theory of what took place." In a very real sense Sweet only erected the marble markers, whose locations were imposed upon Sweet - oh, and 'history' - by previous burials and were so marked. The superfluous markers were added as he saw fit, whatever that format was.
"His report is interesting insight to his own model of the battle and the impact of his work was significant." Must be. Although, even Gray didn't read it, but got a quote from it from Fox via, I think, Welch. So, where did hr read it and what was Sweet's "insight" into his own "model of the battle." And where was the impact even noticed, and became significant?
"....and one simply really must wonder how well the graves were still marked after 15 years, let alone after 12 months or the ensuing reburials." I visualize hr breaking out a hand fan to calm himself. Don't try to follow that sentence, but returning to coherence and the matter at hand Sweet said he could find 217 marked graves. He organized his men in skirmish order to look for decayed or broken markers or indications of burial - he says - and believed he obtained the 29 missing graves.
Eh.
Further, we have several accounts alluding to the locations of the Custer brothers' bodies, and they were not found lying together, but in proximity around the summit.
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Post by fred on Mar 9, 2014 18:54:27 GMT -6
hr's posts, while still ghastly, are beginning to read more and more like Wiggs', which is worse. Gaseous phrasing to impart a whiff of intellect to this user ID who once tried to convince us a ravine was a building. "Whilst?" How cosmo of you. So British. My lips purse just reading this post. So, do you think HR's posts are riddled with error, like he believes of mine? Best wishes, Fred.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 9, 2014 19:26:37 GMT -6
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Post by quincannon on Mar 9, 2014 20:44:22 GMT -6
Fred: You know you are dealing with the Elwood P. Dowd of the Little Big Horn. Why in the bloody hell should you concern yourself with what he might say or think? That latter takes a great leap of faith, going where no man has gone before.
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