|
Post by johnson1941 on Jul 28, 2024 7:08:37 GMT -6
Cheers! Nope. It isn't. It was 1st labeled "H". And then as "Deep Gully". Now it is called "Deep Ravine"It is almost EXACTLY half way... Has been for a hundred and fifty years. (while where your missing gulch is supposed to have been is like 800ft above it)
|
|
|
Post by lakotadan on Jul 28, 2024 8:41:13 GMT -6
Oh well my friend johnshon1941.
I don't agree with your analysis of the map interpretation of the WM Camp letter (included in one of your previous posts) as being the Deep ravine and not the Forgotten gulch.
On Maguire's maps the Deep ravine is shown to the right of the Forgotten gulch as a "U" shaped geologic feature (as I have stated previously somewhere in this thread!). That feature would be the Deep ravine and Calhoun coulee.
Just my opinion.
But that what makes a forum so interesting!
Onward!
|
|
|
Post by johnson1941 on Jul 28, 2024 8:43:52 GMT -6
OK - simple: There are 4 different images across time that all match EXACTLY in location/distance/direction, with bodies found "HALF WAY" between Custer and the river, in a deep ravine, exactly as described... ...described quite explicitly 28 dead men found in one place, and almost in a heap, in the deep gully about half way where Custer lay and the river."So - what don't you agree with? Nope. Again. On Maguires map, at H, 28 bodies were found in a ravine. MaGuire Report, which that map is associated with... "The column which retreated along the line B H E must have deen dismounted, and fighting along the whole distance, a portion of its men, taken to the ravine H for shelter, must have been surrounded by the indians. There were 28 bodies found in **this ravine. From H to E stretched a line of dead men at skirmish intervals"
That H label - the ravine/branch and what it represents - are exactlly half way between Custer and the river. They are exactly where Camp placed them ("Deep Gully"), and also quite explicitly described the men to be (as he marked in the 'Deep Gully'). WMC has also provided measurements and bearings, as you are aware. They are quite easy to confirm. As has been shown - Maguire and Camp maps/locations are near-exact matches, in distances AND bearing...along with Google Earth, and 1891 Marshall***...all exact matches for 150 years to locate what is now called Deep Ravine. And well they should: Maguire The distance between the two points marked “RENO`S COMMAND” and “E” where General Custer’s body was found is correct. The location of **the ravine and the general direction of the battlefield are correct.
There should be NO mistake or conjecture about which ravine/branch H is. It is still exactly there. It is on his map, and it is correct, cause there were 28 bodies in it. Note Also Maguire decribes the SSL - 'a line of dead men which stretched from H to E' - AKA the Deep Ravine Trail. Why is it called "Deep Ravine" trail? Simple - because the ravine where it starts at the place marked H is now called Deep Ravine.*Note: using your gulch as a point of reference is kind of weird- as no one can find it. And it seems to move. ***1891 Marshall in which YOU located the missing gulch (in black, now highlighted in orange), it is WAY north of "halfway" to the river, and H - clearly it is NOT H. i.e. Camp and Maguire are exactly correct in locating Deep Ravine.
|
|
|
Post by lakotadan on Jul 28, 2024 10:19:29 GMT -6
Well, my good friend johnson1941.
It seems that over the past year we have both done some great research about this Forgotten gulch thing!
Really no use discussing it anymore since it seems that many people are viewing the thread, but no one else is participating anymore (even with a simple opinion like if they agree or disagree!).
Like I stated in another post, I have (quite literally) written the book on the Forgotten gulch!
I stick by my research, statements, and conclusions presented in my book.
Of course, to find out for certain if there is a Forgotten gulch would take only 2 or 3 core samples!
I know, I know! I have stated that several times before in this thread!
Onward my friend!
|
|
|
Post by johnson1941 on Jul 28, 2024 10:23:26 GMT -6
Cheers. Yep - weird about that lack of others chiming in with an opinion. Though HR said he found it - which wasn't. I do wish you luck in finding the truth. I humbly admit I already know it.
|
|
|
Post by herosrest on Jul 30, 2024 8:28:38 GMT -6
From a WM Camp letter / list of questions to Woodruff: 1--Benteen and Moylan have described quite explicitly 28 dead men found in one place, and almost in a heap, in the deep gullyabout half way [---] where Custer lay and the river. The spot is not far from where the marker for Dr. Lord now stands. I have talked with other eye witnesseswho corroborate it , and ,in his magazine article, 16 years ago, Godfrey referred to the same group of dead men.
I am told that a squad of men from the 7th Inf. under Sergeant David Heaton carried these dead men up out of the gully and buried them on the bank somewhere.
[---] tell me whether there was a sergeant of that name in any of the six companies of infantry present, to what company he belonged,and whether he performed the duty just described? If such was the [---] how do you account for the fact that there are no markers in the gully or anywhere near it on the bank? Or were the markers distributed over the ground between the point in ques- tion and where Custer lay, in order to give the appearance of a line of battle?
View AttachmentThere is something of a difficulty with this data since............ it was M cDougall's company which buried Company E found on that terrain togethher with any others there. So, again there is a pinch of salt required since Reno didn't know what was biting him when he opened his mouth. It killed him in the end. This cynicism aside, Reno was not wandering about counting up putrifying corpses on the ground. Oh no, he had far more important interests. Moylan was adecent good soldier who made it through the ranks to an outstanding career but he was neither popular with Officers or men. You would have thought that he and Benteen would get on like a barn on fire but no..... another slap him in the face, rivalry. Moylan was a born soldier proven over, and over, and over, again. He left the ACW as brevet Major, having risen from private in the ranks. Previously he did exact same rising to 2LT in 5th Cavalry. In January 1866, he enlisted as private into the Army, and was appointed regimental sergeant major of newly formed 7th United States Cavalry and then promoted to a first lieutenant. He married James Calhoun's sister. At Little Bighorn, Calhoun was temporary commander of L Company, whose commander was on detached service as aide to General Philip H. Sheridan, (say what!) and killed with most of the company. Evidence at the hill where he died, later known as Calhoun Hill, showed that he and his men fought fiercely before they were killed. He and his second in command, Lt. John Crittenden, were found within feet of each other and their men initially had been deployed in a defensive perimeter on the hill. His remains were initially buried on the battlefield, but reinterred in Fort Leavenworth National Cemetery in 1877. A marble slab on marks the place where his body was discovered and initially buried.
|
|
|
Post by johnson1941 on Aug 19, 2024 9:12:19 GMT -6
W.R. Logan, WMC Correspondence
"You say that you have been told that the Seventh Infantry buried the dead in a deep coulee on the battlefield, this coulee lying about six or seven hundred yards over the ridge from where the body of the General was found; that your information is that a squadron of men under Seargent Heaton carried these men’s bodies out of the coulee and buried them in the vicinity.
Your information on that point is not correct. The bodies were buried where found. The men were killed in bunches, principally each company by itself, and in some cases in company formation i e skirmish formation. We buried the bodies, as I have said, about where they fell. "
|
|
|
Post by herosrest on Aug 19, 2024 12:50:34 GMT -6
There are some problems relying upon Logan's ideas of things. He was the son. I think the father was killed within a year or two later. Logan Jnr, wrote a book and it's quite a read.
|
|
|
Post by herosrest on Aug 19, 2024 19:30:54 GMT -6
William Logan Interesting history. It was the son whom WMC interviewed, well, chatted with. He went on to become the Indian Agent at Ft. Belknap, I think. Might have been Berthopld. He was present with Montana Cplumn, and the packers and others running with Matt Carroll's supply train. He was along with dad, who commanded one of the Inf. Company's. I think it was I Company. When they arrived and camped on the retreat ford, the stench and flies was so bad that Snr. had the dead horses dragged off and the dead, including Lt. McIntosh buried. This was how McIntosh's grave is where it is rather than near the water. I'll dig out the son's book and link it up, if I didn't before. He kept a deep secret about the battle for all his days but penned it for posterity, in the end.
|
|
|
Post by lakotadan on Aug 22, 2024 9:18:07 GMT -6
So, johnson1941 (on another thread to this forum) brought up an article that was written in the New York Herald, Sunday, July 15, 1877, page 9. It can be found here- tile.loc.gov/storage-services/service/ndnp/dlc/batch_dlc_crowfoot_ver01/data/sn83030313/00271743968/1877071501/0185.pdfThe information can be found under the article titled "CUSTER'S REMAINS". A great newspaper article! I don’t remember if it was referred to somewhere else in this thread! What I found interesting in the first column about the 8th paragraph, is where the reporter talks about the troopers being trapped in a washout coulee below last stand hill and how there was a hidden network of coulees. I think what he could be referring to is that the coulee (or coulees) was (were) hidden from view, maybe behind small hills or something like that. Just some interesting stuff!
|
|
|
Post by lakotadan on Aug 23, 2024 12:36:26 GMT -6
I know I am the only one still talking about this, but it is interesting!
So, referring to my last post and the newspaper article referred to (from 1877)-
Again, what I found interesting in the first column about the 8th paragraph, is where the reporter talks about the troopers being trapped in a washout coulee below last stand hill (as explained below) and how there was a hidden network of coulees.
So, the guy was a newspaper man. I figure that he had a command of the English language.
Why would he use “ravine” and then “coula” (the way he spelled coulee)?
Now, ravine and coulee could probably be used interchangeably.
Although the article stated that “to scale the towering bluff to assist Custer in his death struggle”. Notice that he specially states “the towering bluff to assist Custer”.
That would indicate to me that the troops were below Last Stand Hill (LSH) trying to climb the bluff to get to LSH.
He also says the troops were “entrapped in one of those deep, narrow and utterly impassable washout coulas”.
Further, he goes on to say that “I believe that in my next I shall try to show that a hidden network of coulas played a very prominent, perhaps decisive part in all the lamentable transactions of that eventful day”.
Notice he states, “hidden network”. In my last post I described how he may have used the word “hidden” to describe something that could not easily be seen because it may have been behind a small hill, or something like that.
But what about the word “network”?
So, what did he see?
Now, a definition of “network” is “an arrangement of intersecting horizontal and vertical lines.”
So, is he referring to a connection point between the ravines and coulees?
I don’t know.
Nobody in 1877 had a clue that the Little Bighorn Battlefield would be such a mega visitor attraction, and that researchers would study it even to this day! Maybe if they had an idea about that in 1877, maybe there would have been more accurate reports with compass bearings being taken, measured distances, and or more accurate sketches!
Just some more interesting stuff!
|
|
|
Post by johnson1941 on Aug 23, 2024 14:22:24 GMT -6
The Indians apparently took great advantage of the coulees and ravines around Custer hill to infiltrate the various segments of the command. And also when moving towards the Weir advance at Weir Peaks, and the Reno command on Weir's Hill. See Benteen's "gorge" AKA Cedar Coulee. Not real hidden - unless you can't see 'em. Kuhlman's takeSeems the correspondent was debating whether the troopers were retreating from Custer Hill towards the river, or trying to get back to Custer from the river/"valley" retreat. It is speculation. Key is he describes "the massacre" - NOT whether he actually saw bodies in there. We actually have a few of these...1879 Wilson, 1891 US Geo, Camp's surveys...even Benteen's sketch has a scale. Worse is more recently they destroyed vital landmarks in creating the roads. They leveled most important hills, etc. "After the US Army took control of the Reno-Benteen site in 1930, a 5-mile road, now called Battlefield Road, was created connecting it to the Custer Battlefield (Greene, 69). Battlefield Road does not follow an historic alignment, and the lack of sensitivity paid to the historic landscape during its construction between 1938-40 caused damage to the primary landscape. As noted in Jerome Greene’s Stricken Field, an administrative history of the monument, construction of the two lane gravel-based roadway (twenty feet wide with five foot shoulders on each side) “materially affected the original condition of the battlefield and possibly altered interpretive conclusions about the site” due to “the lack of period sensitivity regarding historic landscapes”. (Greene, 69) Construction of a reinforced concrete culvert over Medicine Tail Creek resulted in a significant realignment of the creek channel from its probable 1876 configuration. At Weir Point, a formerly modest dip in the terrain where Reno and Benteen’s forces gathered to watch action on Custer Hill was drastically altered with a road cut.
Finally, grading of the road terminus near the Reno-Benteen memorial likely flattened significant battle-related landforms. (Greene, 69)" Greene "Similiar construction seems to have demolished several hillocks that appeared on the 1891 topographic map of the field"
|
|
|
Post by lakotadan on Aug 23, 2024 15:24:15 GMT -6
Yep, johnson1941
We are back to construction, the tearing up and possibly filling in of historic geological features on the battlefield (possibly including coulees or gulches!).
Also, I know there are many maps out there with placement of the fallen soldier markers shown.
But like I stated somewhere else on this thread the scale of the maps is too small.
Like on the map you showed in your previous post.
According to the scale of the map each one of those black dots representing a fallen soldier is at least 20 feet (or more in diameter -just a guess!).
If the scale of the maps was larger, maybe it would show more details of the topography?
Maybe minor topographical features that could have played a significant role in the battle?
But I guess we will never know for sure!
|
|
|
Post by lakotadan on Aug 25, 2024 8:19:19 GMT -6
This question is for herosrest or johnoson1941- Yep, so I am still talking about this! So, on another thread I found a map by Wilson of the battlefield evidently done in 1882. I have included it below. Now, towards the left side of the map where it states “Custers Hill” (and I figure that is Last Stand Hill) can you circle where you think the Cemetery Ridge Ravine is and also circle where you think the Deep Ravine is? I have my own thoughts on the subject but would like to compare where I think they are to where you think they are. Hey, just some more interesting stuff! Attachments:
|
|
|
Post by herosrest on Aug 25, 2024 9:34:59 GMT -6
Hi LD, I'll leave J41 deal with the location issues since he will identify where Walter M. Camp thought those places were. He (WMC), like others before, and after, renamed existing places with other existing place names. Some simply dreamed them up amd Medicine Tail Ck. used to be on the opposite side of the valley in 1907, when Medicine Tail Ck. was known by some as Reno. Ck. You will see this in Wilson's map. You will also find Yates' Ck. That was also called Custer's Ck. There are people who believe that Custer went up it. Benteen's CK. was also Ash Ck. and became Reno Ck. Reno Ck. became Medicine Tail Ck. Medicine Tail Ck. had a north fork at its head. This is today known as Deep Coulee. It was also called Custer Ck. It really is wonderfully complicated and this process has itself become an instrument of deploying elements of Custer's battalion and those who founght it. Oooo, nearly forgot Muskrat Creek and Black Butte.
The map, was surveyed in August 1879, under orders from St. Paul, and reported in that years Report to the Chief of Engineers. Sgt. Wilson laid out and mapped the Fort Custer, and Battlefield, reservations (1879). He really should have a greater anecdote, in post battle history of the battlefield. It's an interesting report, and his party then went onto Fort C.F. Smith.
Over to J
|
|