Greasy Grass

by Johnny D. Boggs

  “How are things on the line?” I asked him.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Well, hell, find out. And let me know.”

  He ran. I figured I’d never see him again.

  Cowards. Surrounded by cowards. Surrounded by Indians. Damn, there were thousands of them. Arrows whistled overhead. I smelled the odors of hell. Like Satan had opened the door.

  Where was Custer? And Benteen? Had they both forsaken me and us?

  Some Rees rode into the trees. Dismounted. One ran to me, signed that they had reached the village, killed some Sioux.

  Angrily, I snapped at him, “Why didn’t you stay and kill more?”

  I didn’t sign this, but my tone must have been enough. He signed back, “Too many.”

  Some damned sergeant ran up to me. “Sir, the Indians have killed about a dozen horses in the rear.”

  I just stared at the arrow shaft sticking through his left shoulder.

  In control. I remained in control, was not panicked. But I knew this. This was clear. If we stayed in these damned woods, we’d all be BUTCHERED. “Tell Captain Moylan to mount up. Column of fours.” He ran, the sergeant, and I could see the bloody trail he was leaving from that arrow. That arrow. In his arm. God.

  “Hodgson!” I hurried over to Benny. “Benny, find French. Tell him we’re retreating. Column of fours. Be ready.”

  “Retreating?” Hodgson asked. “Where?”

  “How the hell do I know? Just find French.”

  A bullet clipped a branch over his head, and Hodgson needed no other inspiration to skedaddle. I found McIntosh, gave him those orders, mounted my own horse, rode over to Moylan.

  I could hear, above those damned Indian whistles, above the screams of my soldiers, my boys. They were yelling out names, the names of their horse holders. Varnum was shouting at them. “For God’s sake, don’t leave the line. Don’t leave the line. Boys, boys, boys, we have enough here to whip the whole Sioux nation!”

  Who was he kidding?

  I found Moylan, but the fool wasn’t in his saddle. He held the reins to his nervous horse in one hand, a revolver in his right. Saw me. Aimed. Fired at some Indian.

  “Where should we go?” I asked him.

  He didn’t answer. Kept shooting that revolver. I pointed to the ridge. “There,” I said. “That’s where Custer was.”

  Yes. We might make it there. Get there. Regroup. Maybe Custer and Benteen would find us.

  Moylan swung into the saddle. A bullet tore off his hat. His horse sidestepped, but Moylan got the gelding under control. Fired again.

  “Major!” I turned. It was Varnum. He yelled, “Where are you going?”

  Where did he think we were going? We were getting out of this death trap.

  The noise. The damned noise. Eagle whistles and bullets. Men screaming. Indians yipping. I’d barely heard Varnum.

  Bloody Knife came to me. I had to sign to him. Was trying to find out where the Indians would go once we left these woods. Bloody Knife was trying to figure out what I’d asked him.

  His mouth opened. And … and …

  God.

  Jesus.

  Son of a bitch.

  His face exploded. Blood. Brains. My face was drenched. The front of my tunic. I spit out the carnage. Wiped my face. Bloody Knife was dead. Dead. Dead.

  I dismounted. I had to. Had to wipe the gore away. I don’t know. I guess I ordered, “Dismount,” because a lot of the boys were doing just that.

  “Mount!” I yelled. “Mount.” I climbed back into the saddle.

  Some boys didn’t obey. I yelled again, but they didn’t move. Then I understood.

  They were dead.

  Dead.

  God.

  One poor guy was on the ground, gut shot. A dead man, for sure. But his pards wouldn’t leave him, even though he kept telling them to go on, that he was dead, to save themselves.

  Yes. Save themselves. Save us. That’s what we had to do.

  “Any of you men who wish to make your escape,” I said, “draw your revolvers and follow me!”

  I gouged my horse’s flanks with spurs and bolted out of those woods.

  I pray I shall be able to finish this letter later.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Pretty White

  Buffalo Woman

  It was said that we Lakota tricked the wasicus. That we led them into a trap. Hear me. We did not know the wasicus were coming. At least, we did not expect them to come so soon. To attack us. We were not ready. The wasicus surprised us that afternoon. They could have captured us. They could have killed us all.

  They were fools.

  That is why we drove them away.

  Oh, we saw Mila Hanska, the Long Knives. Saw them on the hills, across the Greasy Grass. We could see the sun, low in the afternoon, reflecting light off their weapons. “Wasicus! Mila Hanska!” The cry spread across our circle of lodges.

  These Long Knives were more than a long-gun shot from the river, so our warriors knew we had time. Time for our brave young men to run to their horses. We had time. Time to get ready to fight before the wasicus attacked our Hunkpapa circle.

  What we did not see were the other wasicus. Those are the ones who surprised us. We planned to move. We busied ourselves. I was taking down my tepee. And then, just like that, the Long Knives were upon us.

  I dropped the pole, and turned to look. Dust. Long Knives. Yes, they were far away, but not so far that their long guns could not do damage. Tepee poles were splintered. Bullets tore through our homes.

  Sitting Bull came out of his lodge, yelling that we should talk to those wasicus, that we should see what they wanted.

  We did not listen to our great holy man. Perhaps we were too frightened, or confused. Maybe, however, we knew what Sitting Bull did not.

  That these wasicus came not to make peace, not bearing gifts. They came to kill. To butcher. To destroy us.

  With my own eyes, even I, just a plain Lakota woman, could see what the Long Knives wanted. I did not have to ask some wasicu. They were not here to talk to us. They wanted to break our spirit.

  I saw one warrior—for most of our men were away gathering the ponies—run toward his painted pony. But he never made it. He stumbled. He fell dead in front of his tepee.

  Women screamed in terror. Our little ones cried for their mothers. The mothers called out the names of their children.

  It was a time of crying. Of fear. Of death.

  Others, brave men, many of them old, rode back and forth. To hide the village from the wasicus. Those devil Palani came into the village. They killed our women. They killed our children. But by then, some of our men had come back, and they drove these bad Indians back toward the timber.

  Still, I figured we would be dead soon. I heard death songs being sung all around me.

  I turned around. How could this be? How could those soldiers, riding on the other side of the river, be attacking we Hunkpapa now. But, no, there they were, those wasicus on the ridge, the sunlight still bouncing off their weapons. Some of them I could see were waving their hats toward the other wasicus, the ones near our village, the ones killing my friends. Then I knew. I knew that this wasicu leader was one of cleverness. His warriors were attacking us from this side while other wasicus rode toward the other side of our great Indian village.

  Little ones, boys and girls, ran naked from the Greasy Grass, where they had been swimming. Through all this noise, all the smoke and dust, the children somehow could recognize the voices of their mothers, who cried out their names.

  This I knew: We would soon be dead.

  Wakan Tanka, however, came to save us. He stopped the Long Knives. I could not believe my eyes, but the wasicus halted. They could have ridden into our village. They could have destroyed the spirit of the Lakota. They could have—would have—
killed me.

  Yet they stopped their horses. Some of those in blue coats held three or four horses. Or tried to. For many horses pulled away and fled from our village. Some horses carried their riders right into our camp.

  These men, our warriors killed. They were fools.

  But more foolish were those who stopped.

  That is when I heard Sitting Bull say, “I don’t want my children fighting until I tell them to. The wasicus may be here to make peace. They may be bringing rations to us.” I turned away from the wasicus, saw Sitting Bull take a long holy iron from one of his nephews and give his nephew his shield.

  Since the Long Knives no longer charged into our village, but still fired their guns, Sitting Bull prayed. Afterward, he told his two nephews, One Bull, to whom he had given his shield, and Good Bear Boy: “Go make peace with the wasicus.”

  So One Bull and Good Bear Boy mounted their ponies and rode. But the fool wasicus would not let them make peace. They almost killed Good Bear Boy. One Bull saved him. They rode back to our circle.

  By that time, Sitting Bull had mounted his pony, but a wasicu bullet killed his pony. This angered Sitting Bull. He yelled, “Now my best horse is shot! It is like they have shot me.”

  He pointed the holy iron he had taken away from One Bull. He shouted, “Attack them!”

  “Hokay hey!” our warriors cried out. They rode or ran. They fired holy irons. They fired arrows.

  Sitting Bull found another pony. He mounted it. He yelled to our warriors, “We have everything to fight for. And if we are defeated, we shall have nothing to live for. Therefore let us fight like brave men.”

  I could hear more death songs. So I began to sing a strong-heart song.

  Most of the wasicus fled into the trees. Our warriors attacked. More warriors came. From the pony herds. From the other circles. Oglalas and Minneconjous, even Sahiyelas and other tribes, other Lakota bands. We would fight Mila Hanska together.

  We numbered many. Far more than those wasicus who had tried to surprise us.

  I turned around, still singing, but wondering about those other wasicus. Yes, they had disappeared from the ridge. They would be attacking other circles soon, but many of our warriors were running off in that direction. We would be waiting.

  Yes. It was a good day to die.

  Louder I sang my strong-heart song.

  As I sang, a young Sicangu ran past me. He stopped. He turned and came to me. I stopped singing. He kissed me. He stepped back. He shouted, “It is a good day to die!” He ran, and I could not see him through all the smoke from the guns and the dust from the horses.

  I sang my strong-heart song for this Lakota boy. This boy who I did not know.

  Chapter Seventeen

  George Herendeen

  Ah, ain’t it grand to be Irish!

  How else could I be alive?

  Up until three days ago, I was scouting for John Gibbon, but he assigned me to Custer’s boys, and Custer sent me off with Major Reno. Let me put it down for the record that I don’t truly blame the major for this bloody fiasco. You get warm blood and gore splashed across your face and see how much nerve you still have. Nay, the lad did all he could, and I am not one to begrudge a man for taking a nip or two. But, Mary, Jesus, and Joseph, never should he have ordered us out of those woods.

  Granted, things were getting ticklish, but Custer and Benteen would be coming soon, and the trees offered shelter, and Indians didn’t care much to go charging into woods. Only then I heard Reno’s booming voice, “Any of you men who wish to make your escape, draw your revolvers and follow me!”

  Some of those green recruits must have been jumping the gun a mite, or they were raring to go, for they didn’t follow the major, they bolted out of those woods even before Reno charged out.

  Theirs not to reason why,

  Theirs but to do and die.

  Into the valley of Death

  Rode the six hundred.

  Well, maybe not six hundred, but Lord Tennyson, English dung though he may be but one grand poet, could bloody well have been writing about the Little Bighorn and not Balaklava.

  I swung onto me blue roan, and joined the horde of white men, scared witless.

  We hit the flats and, like madmen, rode for the Little Bighorn. At first the Indians did not give chase, likely because they could not figure out what we were doing. Indians aren’t ones to leave their women and children, so I believe they thought we might plan on swinging around and hitting their camp. Yet when they understood that attack wasn’t our prevailing sentiment, but saving our arses was, they came charging.

  Cannon (Indians) to right of them,

  Cannon (Indians) to left of them,

  Cannon (Indians) in front of them

  Volley’d and thunder’d;

  Storm’d at with shot and shell,

  Boldly they rode and well,

  Into the jaws of Death,

  Into the mouth of hell …

  Ah, but then we hit the prairie dog villages. Holes. Deadly holes. Horses went down, sending blue-clad troopers into the dirt. Down fell me roan, snapping her leg, and over her neck I flew, figuring: Well, ’tis the end of me. Farewell, old friends from Parkman Township, Ohio. To all the lasses I never had a chance to kiss …

  Up I came, if only to me knees, revolver in hand. Horses thundered past me. Some fell. Many made it through. I heard screams of terror. I tried to call out for one of the troopers to stop, but they couldn’t have heard me if I had a voice as strong as Major Reno’s, and nobody in his right mind would have stopped.

  Through the dust I saw Lieutenant McIntosh shot off his horse. Near him, down went a fellow scout, the black man who once lived with the Indians, Isaiah Dorman. I’d join them soon.

  With cocked revolver, I turned to face me death, maybe take a few braves with me, to prove me bravery to these wild bucks, only to freeze at the sight of twenty, nay, thirty Sioux braves, yipping and yelling, brandishing coup sticks or rifles with beaded stocks and forearms. Me breath I held. ’Twas no need to fire. Just watch them ride over me—grand, they looked; no shame in being killed by the likes of warriors as handsome, as bold, as these.

  But, by the saints, those Indians rode right by me, as if I were invisible. Maybe it was the dust. Maybe it was because I was low to the ground, maybe because me hair was dark and long and greasy from sweat. Or maybe it was because those Indians were bound and determined to kill anyone wearing blue, and donned I was in duck trousers and a dark brown shirt.

  They rode past me, firing at the soldiers, and I rose like Phoenix and sprinted for the timbers, before the next wave of Indians galloped by.

  Dived, I did. Flew what seemed like thirty rods, but in reality no more than a few feet, into the woods. A branch almost scalped me.

  Scalped me. Wouldn’t that have been something! Surrounded by three thousand five hundred warriors, and get me topknot lifted by a tree branch!

  Hearing shouts, twigs snapping, I came up, leveled me revolver, and almost put a bullet in Sergeant Charles White’s gut.

  “Good God!” I came to me feet, glanced over my shoulder as more Indians galloped after those fleeing soldiers, then turned back to the sergeant, whose right arm was a bloody mess. “What the devil are you still doing here?”

  “Where is everybody, George?” he asked. “Where’s Reno?”

  Damnation. “Retreating.” He and other lads from M Troop hadn’t heard the order.

  “Retreating?” White was a short man, fair-skinned with gray eyes and light hair. A Hun by birth, but a man, as the cowboys often put it, to ride the river with.

  “Back across the Little Bighorn.” I pointed the Colt’s barrel in the general direction. “To find Benteen or Custer. To regroup.”

  White spun. “Men,” he yelled to the handful of troopers still in these woods, “we’re mounting!”

  Shoving the Colt into my
waistband, I barked out something, stepped over a dead body, waving my hands. “No, no, no, no, no.”

  The sergeant stopped.

  “You ride out now,” I pleaded with the boys, “you’ll all be killed.”

  I had to catch me breath. Lonesome Charley Reynolds was mounting his horse, and a lot of the soldiers stared at him. Without begging the sergeant’s pardon, I hurried over to the scout. “Charley,” I cried, “don’t ride out! We can’t get away from this timber.”

  Maybe he didn’t hear me. Maybe he was too scared. I don’t know. He swung into that saddle, spurred his horse, almost ran me over. Now that I think of it, now that I again picture the last time I stared into Charley’s face, I don’t think he even saw me.

  His horse plunged from the woods. I chased after him, stopping at the timber’s edge.

  “Sergeant!” I turned back to White, but by then most of his men had mounted, some of them riding double, though Sergeant White didn’t have the strength to climb up behind a trooper. Figured to walk, he did.

  I looked back, saw Charley’s horse go down in the prairie dog village, just a rod from where me roan now lay dead. Charley came up, brave he was, firing at a mass of Indians. I heard the yippings, the cries, saw the war clubs raising in the air, saw the Indians and the dust surround Charley. And I never saw him again.

  Sergeant White witnessed all of this, too. Which might have saved all of our lives.

  Those boys in blue no longer appeared so eager to get out of these woods.

  “Listen,” I said, now that I had their attention. “We’ll go back deeper into this thicket. Sioux and Cheyennes, they don’t like charging into woods. Lie down. Don’t move. Don’t talk.”

  “Hide?” a corporal said with arrogance and contempt.

  “Damn right. We hide!” I moved deeper into the woods, wondering what would happen now.

  God bless Sergeant White. He might have been born a miserable Hun, but he wasn’t a fool, and showed himself to be a damned fine soldier with common sense in his noggin. “Follow Herendeen,” he ordered.

  So we burrowed ourselves under leaves and grass, hid behind rotting logs, trees, brush. Outside the woods, the screams of our dying comrades, the pops of pistols, the guttural war cries and songs of Indians pricked our nerves. Some of the lads stuffed grass into their horses’ mouths, blindfolded them, did anything and everything humanly possible to keep them quiet. Damn. Those horses could mean the death of us, but nary a thing could I do about it now.