Accompanying Major Brisbin and General Terry would be easier, yet I felt as if I might miss something if I did not accompany Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer, brevet major general. The look on General Terry’s face when I informed him of my decision, pending his approval, told me that he feared I was making a mistake, but Terry’s words earlier that week had convinced me of the path a journalist should take.
“There is to be no child’s play in regard to the Indians,” the general told me. “They must be taught that the government is not to be trifled with, and measures shall be taken to teach them to feel and recognize that there exists in this land an arm and power which they must obey.”
Custer is one to teach the Indians this.
I am not alone in my opinion. Many desire to follow Custer, and not only his civilian relations who have joined this campaign. A rugged but educated scout called Lonesome Charley Reynolds was aboard the riverboat steamer to allow Dr. Henry Porter to treat a serious hand infection. Captain Grant Marsh, able skipper of the Far West, and Dr. Porter recommended that Reynolds stay aboard the ship, but Reynolds would not be deprived of this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
“I’ve been waiting and getting ready for this expedition for two years,” the scout said, “and I would sooner be dead than miss it.”
Since my last dispatch, much has happened. We have traveled from the abandoned Indian village, following the Yellowstone River upstream to the mouth of the Rosebud. The weather has turned blistering hot, and the air is choking with dust. To many soldiers, the land is uninspiring, monotonous, yet I feel alive as we traverse this rugged, windswept region. More importantly, never have I seen a sky so big. Oftentimes, it seems as if it might swallow the entire earth.
Custer has displayed superior marksmanship, bringing down an antelope no fewer than four hundred yards in distance, and practically shooting the heads off several sage hens. The hostile Indians we seek are in grave danger should they find themselves in Custer’s gunsights.
I have dubbed Custer “Iron Britches,” by which I do not refer to the light-colored buckskin attire he prefers. He rides hard, leaving many of his soldiers, and one tired newspaper reporter, perspiring and panting just trying to keep pace with our fearless leader.
Allow me to paint his portrait in words, which I base not only from actual observation, but experience.
George Custer’s courage is undaunted, his temperament is one of quickness but also of nervousness. A leader of quick impulse, he does what he feels is right. He is a man of honest integrity and wit, devoted to his family—which includes his brother, Tom Custer, captain and aide-de-camp; another brother, Boston, serving as a guide and with the pack train; and a nephew, a civilian employee—and writes to his charming wife, Libbie, every evening after retiring to his tent.
Some of those letters were almost lost during a tragic incident a few days back in which a sergeant was drowned while carrying the mail and dispatches to the Far West. Later, after I retrieved the mailbag from the Yellowstone, and, finding Custer’s soaked letters to his wife, I attempted to dry them so that his words might reach Fort Lincoln. I did not do this to win the confidence of Custer; I would have done likewise for any leader of this campaign.
Custer has earned the bitter wrath of some men, including one who sits in the White House in Washington, DC, and perhaps two junior officers whose names will go unmentioned in this report. Most of the soldiers of the Seventh, however, would surely follow Custer into the jaws of hell.
Last night, I left the Far West, where Captain Marsh was handily taking script and coin from Tom Custer and Lieutenant James Calhoun in one stiff poker game during which time many stiff drinks were consumed. Major Marcus Reno, having purchased and consumed much of a half-gallon jug of whiskey, sang sad songs on the deck of the steamboat. His vocals haunted me as I wandered around camp, finding many soldiers excited for the fight certain to come.
Some troopers stuffed their greatcoats into the forks of trees, preferring not to be encumbered with extra weight. Each trooper has been ordered to carry fifteen days of rations and twelve pounds of oats for their mounts.
I overheard Custer telling two officers, “You had better carry along an extra supply of salt. We may have to live on horse meat before we get through.”
On the other hand, Custer was jubilant when he talked to the younger officers, and they shared his excitement.
One lieutenant exclaimed, “Won’t we step high if we do get those fellows?”
Custer responded, “Won’t we? It all depends on you young officers. We can’t get Indians without hard riding and plenty of it.”
There will be much riding, beginning today, which has dawned clear and beautiful, an omen, perhaps, of the great victory to come.
Everything moves like clockwork. That has not changed since I joined the campaign in Dakota Territory on May 14. Yet after more than a month in the saddle, all seem to sense that our hard work shall soon pay massive dividends. In the days to come, surely this campaign will have met and defeated the enemy. For the Indians are soon to be a thing of the past on these Western lands. They go with the buffalo, they go with the bees, they become weaker and cannot stand against the massive force of the white men. When I file my next report, it is likely to include details of the defeat of the red devils. With the noon hour and our departure approaching, I must close and hand this to Captain Marsh for delivery. Major Brisbin has outfitted me with a mule, thus I am ready to ride.
Everyone is confident of victory.
To go with Custer, or stay with General Terry and join the Montana Column? For me, the answer is obvious.
I go with Custer, and will be there at the death.
Chapter Nine
Lieutenant
Francis Gibson
June 22, 1876
My Darling Katherine,
I take pencil in hand to express my everlasting love for you as soon I ride with Colonel Benteen, joining General Custer as we head south down the Rosebud in search of hostile Indians.
Last night, Benteen and General Custer quarreled again. They hate each other, a hatred that dates all the way back to the Battle of the Washita of 1868 in the Indian Territory. General Custer accused Benteen of killing an Indian child during that affair, to which the colonel replied that he had no choice, and that at least he did not abandon his men to be slaughtered by the Cheyennes.
In all likelihood, we are about to engage in a great battle, one for the history books, yet the captain of my troop and the leader of this campaign still fight over events that transpired eight years earlier. I pray that their disposition toward one another will play no part in the outcome of a fight between our soldiers and the Sioux.
I have been told that the general slept not at all last night. Nor did I.
My insomnia came not because of the argument between Benteen and Custer. I dare say I have seen far too much bickering between those two men to keep me from slumber.
No, last night, Lieutenant William Cooke, our regimental adjutant, approached me with an unnerving request.
“This is my last will and testament,” he said as he handed me a piece of paper. “I would like you to witness it for me.”
I tried to make light of this. “What? Getting cold feet, Cookie? After all those years amongst the savages?”
For the longest while, he stared at me, his lips trembling, before he said in a ghostly whisper, “No. But I have a feeling that the next fight will be my last.”
I signed his paper.
We are about to depart into uncertainty. Most of the command seems confident of victory, and, indeed, I feel no sense of dread or doom, yet Cookie’s comments of last night, and that resigned look on his face, stay with me. I have no last will and testament, and fear that, should I die, I leave you nothing other than my name, my devotion, my love.
Don’t fear the worst for me, my love. I will su
rvive this campaign for no other reason than to feel your lips once more.
Your loving husband,
Francis
Chapter Ten
Black Elk
It was said that the first wasicus came from the place of water all over. Perhaps, after our great victory over the wasicus on the Rosebud, we have driven them back to the water, and now they shall let us live in peace.
I will speak of our camp. We had moved from the rugged hills of Ash Creek because our ponies had eaten most of the grass there, and so we put up our lodges across the Greasy Grass. It was Wipazuke Waste Wi, the Moon When Berries Are Good, and the grass here was good, high, feeding the thousands of ponies of our camp.
The Hunkpapas set up their lodges before the ford at the Dry Creek. At the far side of the camp, across from the ridge, were our friends, the Sahiyelas. Between the Sahiyelas and the Hunkpapa came the villages of the Sicangus, we Oglalas, the Minneconjous, and the Itazipacolas. Of the other Lakotas, the Oohenunpas and Sihasapas were so few in number, they joined other camps, as did some Gros Ventres, and maybe five warriors of Mahpiya To, the Arapahoes, who came looking for some Shoshones to fight.
It was funny. I must tell you of this. When the Arapahoes arrived, we did not know them, and thought they were wolves of the wasicus, come to find us, to tell the wasicus where we were, so that they might attack and kill our women and ponies and dogs. Our warriors took their weapons, and were about to turn the strangers over to our women to be killed, when a Sahiyela called Two Moon stepped forward. He told us that, yes, these men were Mahpiya To, and meant no harm to us. So we did not kill them. We gave them back their weapons. We let them stay with us. We did not let them leave, just in case Two Moon was wrong, and that these men were wolves for the bluecoats.
In my twelve summers, never had I seen so many of the People of the Buffalo Nation and our friends together. It was good. More joined our village every day. Tired of living with the wasicus at the reservation called Standing Rock, Gall arrived. So did Crow King. Another one hundred and twenty lodges went up. Then Rain-In-The-Face came to join us. More lodges. More warriors. More friends. I could not count them all.
“Remember this,” my father said to me. “It is unlikely that you or I or your sons or the sons of your sons shall ever see such a gathering.”
The Greasy Grass was a good place. There were deer. There were antelope. There were cottonwoods, some ash, some willows. There were ravines, some very deep, and coulees, in which a boy like me could play, and hunt, and hide from my friends, or practice shooting grasshoppers with bow and arrow. The bluffs protected our village, and the Greasy Grass flowed wide and deep from much snow melt, much rain. The water tasted good, and cool. Here, we felt safe from the wasicus. It was a good place to be.
One of the wives of Sitting Bull, the Hunkpapa holy man, gave birth to twin boys, and there was much to celebrate. Yet not all could celebrate. Not all could be happy. Many remained in mourning, their hair shorn, their arms cut, some fingers chopped off for their loved ones lost in the big fight against the wasicus south along the Rosebud.
It was strange, moving across this great village, where singing and laughter came from the inside of one lodge to another where the wails of women and children filled me with much sadness.
Sitting Bull kept praying for peace, but some of the older warriors sang their strong-heart songs and did the Dying Dancing. If more wasicus come, they said, they were ready to fight. Many weapons, including the fast-shooting holy irons that could kill many without reloading, were in camp, although we had not many bullets for those weapons. I had only bow, arrows, and a knife. That was enough.
On the evening before the remembered Greasy Grass Fight, Sitting Bull stopped where I played with a dog’s puppies. He spoke to me, a great honor, and said that he had seen me around the Oglalas, that he saw something deep in me, that he saw me becoming a holy man for the People of the Buffalo Nation. I was humbled, but proud. I stopped playing with the puppies. He handed me his pipe, and asked me to follow him.
I did.
We climbed a hill. The sun was setting. The wind blew warm, and the smell of the sweet grass mingled with the smoke from our cook fires, the smell of good food. It was good.
Sitting Bull had carried a robe with him, which he laid on the ground. To Wakan Tanka, he made offerings, and, standing on the robe, prayed.
This is what he said:
“Great Spirit, pity me.
In the name of the tribe I offer this pipe.
Wherever the sun, the moon, the earth, the four points of the winds, there you are always.
Father, save the tribe, I beg you.
Pity me, we wish to live.
Guard us against all misfortunes or calamities.
Pity me.”
After he had smoked, letting me partake, too, we gathered his robe, and descended into camp.
“Will the wasicus come?” I asked him.
“If they do, they will die.”
I had heard of his vision. Everyone had heard of his vision.
“Why do they fight us?” I asked.
He stopped, shook his head, and told me that years ago, perhaps even before I came to be with the People of the Buffalo Nation, the wasicus had attacked a village at Takahokuty, the Place Where They Killed the Deer, far to the east. During that fight, Sitting Bull said, he cried out to the enemy: “The Indians here have no fight with the wasicus. Why is it the wasicus come to fight with the Indians?”
I thought of that, and wondered how a wasicu might answer should I ask him those words.
Soon, however, I forgot all about that, what Sitting Bull had said, how I had felt, for we were back in camp. Sitting Bull retired to the circle of Hunkpapa lodges, and I stayed with my Oglalas. I found my friends. I was twelve years old. I was hungry. I was excited.
I was a boy.
The next morning, other boys and I went to the Greasy Grass. We wanted to swim, to play in the cool water, to cleanse ourselves.
Before I left the lodge, my father told me to take our stallions to graze. Then I could go swimming. “If anything happens,” my father said, “you must bring the horses back as fast as you can, and keep your eyes on the camp.”
So we took the stallions by the grass near the river, and then we went in to swim.
It was there, in that water, where I first would see the bluecoats, the people who came from the place of water all over. It was there that the Greasy Grass Fight was to begin.
Chapter Eleven
Lieutenant
George Wallace
The bad feeling struck me after our first day’s ride south along the Rosebud. Our pace had been unhurried, perhaps due to the slow, worn-out pack train, and we had covered twelve miles before General Custer called a halt, and we set up camp at the base of a towering bluff where the water tasted of alkali, but at least it was drinkable. On a hot day such as June 22, that was enough.
At sunset, “Officers’ Call” sounded, and we gathered outside of the general’s tent. General Custer said we would hear no more trumpets, except in an emergency, and that our troops should be prepared to march at five hundred hours each morning. “Reveille” would be silent. Rest halts would be at the discretion of troop commanders, but all troops should stay within supporting distance in case of a surprise attack.
“Husband your rations, gentlemen, and the strength of your livestock, for we might be out for a great deal longer than for which we have been rationed.” He let those words sink in. “For I intend to follow this trail until we find the Indians, even if it takes us to the agencies on the Missouri River or all the way into Nebraska.”
I glanced at Lieutenant Ed Godfrey, but said nothing. Those were not our orders.
“Any questions?”
“Why did we not bring the Gatling guns, sir?” someone behind me asked.
“For the same reas
on I declined Major Brisbin’s offer of his troops. The Seventh, mister, can handle any Indians, and, believe me, when we meet those hostiles, there will be plenty to go around.”
“I, for one, am very sorry you didn’t take them,” Colonel Benteen said, and Custer frowned. “Not so much the Gatlings, but I fear we might have need of those extra troops of cavalry.”
“How many Indians do you anticipate, sir?” Lieutenant Godfrey asked.
“One thousand,” he said cheerfully. “Mayhap fifteen hundred, but no more. As I say, plenty for all of us.”
That was brash, confident, typical George Armstrong Custer, but what he said next troubled me.
“I will be glad to listen to suggestions from any officer of this command,” he said, and I straightened, my mouth slackening. The general never asked to hear anything, especially a suggestion, from a junior officer. He told us what he was doing, and we knew what he expected from us. Always.
“Just make such a suggestion in the proper manner.” He raised his hand, almost wagging his gauntleted finger. “But I want it distinctly understood that I shall allow no grumbling, and shall exact the strictest compliance with orders from everybody. I don’t want it said of this regiment that it would be a good one if he could get rid of the old captains and let the lieutenants command the company.”
Benteen stepped forward. I sucked in a breath.
“And who do you mean when you say ‘grumbling’?”
“I want the saddle to go just where it fits,” Custer shot back.
“Lieutenant Colonel Custer, do you know of any criticisms or grumblings from me?”
That was like Benteen, not only challenging the general, but refusing to bow to common military courtesy and refer to him by his brevet rank. Benteen would always remind the general that, according to his pay, he was a lieutenant colonel.
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