APPENDIX A.
Being a Further Discussion of General Custer’s Course in the Little Big Horn Campaign.^[112]

I.

Whether General Custer did, or did not, obey General Terry’s orders; whether these orders were, or were not, well considered, and such as could be carried out; whether, if General Custer did disobey General Terry’s orders he was warranted in so doing by the circumstances in which he found himself, are questions of the deepest interest to the student of military matters and the historian thereof. I presume the problem they present will never be authoritatively settled, and that men will continue to differ upon these questions until the end of time.

The matter has been discussed, pro and con, at great length on many occasions. A number of books and magazine articles have been written upon different phases of the situation. I have come to the conclusion indicated in my own article, as I said, against my wish. In view of his heroic death in the high places of the field, I would fain hold General Custer, for whom I have long cherished an admiration which I still retain, entirely innocent. I have only come to this conclusion after a rigid investigation including the careful weighing of such evidence as I could secure upon every point in question.

This evidence consists, first, of a great variety of printed matter; second, of personal conversations with soldiers and military critics, which, as any record of it would necessarily be hearsay and secondhand, I have not set down hereafter save in one instance; third, of letters which have been written me by officers who, from their participation in the campaign, or from unusual opportunities to acquire knowledge concerning it which they have enjoyed, have become possessed of information which they were willing to give to me.

The object of this appendix is to set down, so that it may be here preserved in permanent and available form for future reference, such evidence in these letters as may be pertinent and useful; also to refer the student, who desires to go deeper into the subject, to some of the more valuable printed accounts which are easily accessible.

I am glad that some of the communications I have received, notably those from Colonel Godfrey, make a stout defense of General Custer. Perhaps upon consideration of Colonel Godfrey’s points and arguments, which are not only strong and well taken, but also admirably put, the critic may be inclined to differ from my conclusion. For the sake of General Custer’s fame, I sincerely hope so. I should be glad to be proved to be mistaken.

Without specifically noting the various descriptions of the campaign and battle, which are interesting, but irrelevant to my purpose,^[113] Custer’s conduct has been critically considered at some length—by persons whose standing requires that their opinions should be respectfully received—in several publications which I note in such order as best serves the purpose of this discussion without regard to the order in which they appeared.

Colonel Edward S. Godfrey,^[114] U. S. A., now commanding the Ninth Cavalry, who, as a lieutenant, commanded K Troop, in Benteen’s battalion, which joined that of Reno in the battle of the 26th of June, 1876, wrote a most interesting account of the battle, containing some valuable reflections upon some disputed points, which was published in the Century Magazine, Vol. XLIII., No. 3, January, 1892. To this article, in the same number, were appended certain comments by Major-General James B. Fry, U. S. A., since deceased.

This article and these comments came to the notice of Major-General Robert P. Hughes, U. S. A. (retired), then Colonel and Inspector-General. General Hughes was General Terry’s aide-de-camp during the Little Big Horn Campaign. He wrote an exhaustive criticism on Fry’s comments to Godfrey’s article, which was in effect a discussion of the main proposition that Custer disobeyed his orders and thereby precipitated the disaster, for which he was therefore responsible. This campaign was also considered in an article by Dr. E. Benjamin Andrews, president of the University of Nebraska, who was then president of Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, which appeared in Scribner’s Magazine for June, 1895. A fuller reference to Dr. Andrews’ position will be made later.

General Hughes’ article was offered to the Century, but was not accepted, and was finally published in the Journal of the Military Service Institution, Vol. XVIII., No. 79, January, 1896.

Among the many books in which the matter has been discussed, three only call for attention.

In “The Story of the Soldier,” by Brigadier-General George A. Forsyth, U. S. A. (retired), the following comment appears:

“Under the peculiar condition of affairs, bearing in mind the only information he could possibly have had concerning Sitting Bull’s forces, was Custer justified, in a military sense and within the scope of his orders, in making the attack?

“In the opinion of the writer he was within his orders, and fully justified from a military standpoint in so doing.”

General Forsyth gives no reason for his decision, but it is to be presumed that he did not arrive at that decision hastily and carelessly, and as he is a very able and distinguished officer and military critic, due weight should be accorded his views.

In “The United States in our Own Time,” by Dr. E. Benjamin Andrews, published by Chas. Scribner’s Sons, edition of 1903, pages 190–1–2–3, there is a concise discussion of the question, based on the article in Scribner’s Magazine, referred to above, with some additional reflections on General Hughes’ paper.

In “Personal Recollections of General Nelson A. Miles, U. S. A.,” chapter xv., pages 198–210, there is a further discussion by the Lieutenant-General, lately in command of the United States Army.

In order clearly to understand what follows the student should refer to each of the sources mentioned and examine carefully into what is therein set forth. It is not practicable to quote all these authors at length. I have corresponded with every one of the authors mentioned except General Fry. I print their letters to me, having made no change except once in a while breaking a page into paragraphs and supplying a missing word here and there which had no especial bearing upon the point at issue. Some of the letters were written in pencil amid press of duties. Most of these documents I print without comment. It is necessary, however, that I should call attention to some features brought out by the correspondence.

President Andrews says, in the book referred to:

“Much turns on the force of Custer’s written orders, which, judged by usual military documents of the kind, certainly gave Custer a much larger liberty than Colonel Hughes supposed. There is an affidavit of a witness who heard Terry’s and Custer’s last conversation together at the mouth of the Rosebud, just before Custer began his fatal ride. Terry said: ‘Use your own judgment and do what you think best if you strike the trail; and whatever you do, Custer, hold on to your wounded.’”

General Miles says, in his book:

“But we have positive evidence in the form of an affidavit of the last witness who heard the two officers in conversation together on the night before their commands separated, and it is conclusive on the point at issue. This evidence is that General Terry returned to General Custer’s tent,^[115] after giving him the final order, to say to him that on coming up to the Indians he would have to use his own discretion and do what he thought best. This conversation occurred at the mouth of the Rosebud, and the exact words of General Terry, as quoted by the witness, are:

“’Custer, I do not know what to say for the last.’

“Custer replied: ‘Say what you want to say.’

“Terry then said: ‘Use your own judgment, and do what you think best if you strike the trail; and, whatever you do, Custer, hold on to your wounded.’

“This was a most reasonable conversation for the two officers under the circumstances. One had won great distinction as a general in the Civil War; was an able lawyer and department commander, yet entirely without experience in Indian campaigns. The other had won great distinction as one of the most gallant and skilful division commanders of cavalry during the war, commanding one of the most successful divisions of mounted troops; he had years of experience on the plains and in handling troops in that remote country, and he had fought several sharp engagements with hostile Indians.”

If General Terry spoke such words to General Custer the last thing before Custer’s departure, those remarks have a very important, almost a decisive, bearing on the matter at issue. The only question then existing would be, how far the verbal order ought to be considered as superseding the written one. It is my opinion that the charge that Custer disobeyed orders would fall to the ground if the truth of the alleged remarks could be established. By giving him this verbal order, Terry would make Custer an absolutely free agent. The vital importance of establishing this affidavit is therefore obvious.

I call attention to the fact that Terry nowhere refers to this conversation, which it would be incumbent upon a gentleman to declare immediately Custer was charged with disobeying Terry’s written order, and that Terry, in that portion of his report which is quoted by me on page 225, virtually not only fails to exculpate but actually charges that Custer did disobey his order, by saying he did the very thing that he was not expected to do.

To establish this affidavit, I wrote to President Andrews, asking his authority for stating that such an affidavit existed and requesting a copy of it. Here is his reply. I insert it without comment.

Replying to your esteemed favor of the eleventh inst. I regret to say that I have no means of recalling with certainty the source of my information touching the Custer affidavit. My impression is, however, that my informant was Gen. Miles, with whom I communicated on the subject while I was writing my account. I also conversed personally with Hughes and with a very intimate friend, now deceased, of Gen. Terry’s.

I shall be extremely pleased to read your views upon this subject.

I also wrote to General Miles and received the following reply from him:

In reply to your two letters, you will find in my book, “Personal Recollections, or from New England to the Golden Gate,” published by Werner & Co., Akron, Ohio, perhaps all the information you will require. I can not give the time now to going over the campaign in detail. I presume you will find the book in most libraries.^[116] You will notice in it a chapter on the Custer campaign. General Custer did not disobey orders. When General Terry divided his command, taking one portion of it with him up the Yellowstone, and sending General Custer with the other portion far out in the Indian country, it necessarily put from seventy-five to one hundred miles between the two commands, and therefore placed upon General Custer the responsibility of acting on the offensive or defensive, for he could have been attacked by the whole body of the combined tribes, and, on the other hand, if he allowed them to escape without attacking them, he would have been severely censured. It would be silly to suppose that Indian chiefs like Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse would permit two columns to march around over the country with infantry, cavalry, wagon trains, etc.,^[117] and wait for them to come up on both sides simultaneously, and one must believe the American people very gullible if they thought such a proposition had military merit.

I immediately wrote General Miles a second letter asking him for the name of the affiant and any statement he might be willing to make about the affidavit. I pointed out to him what he very well knew—the prominence given to the story in his own book indicates that—the importance of the affidavit in establishing General Custer’s position and defending him against the charge of disobedience. I received no answer to this letter.

Meanwhile the question of the affidavit was taken up by General Hughes in his several communications to me which appear below.

In order not to break the thread of the discourse I will anticipate events and here insert a third letter which I wrote to General Miles, after carefully considering General Hughes’ remarks. The letter was sent to General Miles by registered mail. I hold the registry receipt showing that he received it. To this inquiry I have as yet received no reply.

A few months since I addressed to you a letter asking you for the name of the person, alluded to in your book, who made the affidavit as to the last remark of General Terry to General Custer. This letter has probably never reached you since I have never received any answer to it.

The statement is questioned by a number of officers, and in the interest of historical accuracy and for the sake of bringing forward every particle of evidence tending to clear General Custer of the charges which are made against him in that campaign, I most respectfully ask you to give me the name of the affiant together with such other statements concerning the affidavit as may be conclusive. How did you become possessed of the affidavit, for instance? Did you see it? Did you know the affiant? Was he a person whose testimony was to be implicitly relied upon? Is he alive now? In short, any information concerning it will be most acceptable as well as most useful.

I do not desire to comment on General Miles’ refusal further than to say that if he has in his possession the affidavit he should either submit it to the inspection of impartial observers, give it to historians, state who made it, where it was made, furnish a certified copy of it to the public, or otherwise establish it. If he is not willing to do this he should at least say why he is not willing. I submit that no man, whatever his rank or station, ought to make statements which affect the fame and reputation of another man without giving the fullest publicity to his sources of information, or stating why the public must be content with a simple reference thereto.

While I am on the subject of the affidavit, I call the student’s attention to a possible suggestion in Colonel Godfrey’s second communication below.

It is twenty-eight years since the Battle of the Little Big Horn. If the alleged affiant is now alive, what reason can exist to prevent him coming out and acknowledging his affidavit? If he is dead, why should secrecy about it longer exist? Why does not General Miles break his silence? The whole matter turns on the production of this affidavit, with satisfactory evidence as to the character of the affiant.

The other position taken in General Miles’ letter above, which of course is a summary of his views as set forth in his book, is discussed later on by General Woodruff.

II.

I now refer the student to the following letter in answer to one from me asking information and calling General Hughes’ attention to President Andrews’ book, which has just been reissued in a new and amplified edition:

Your letter of the 13th was duly received. I had not heard of Dr. E. Benjamin Andrews’ book prior to receipt of your letter, but have looked it up since.

After a careful examination of what he says about the Sioux campaign of 1876, I cannot find any good and sufficient reason for changing aught that was stated in the article published in the Journal of the Military Service Institution, in January, 1896. I do find, however, that something could be added to the statement of the case in reply to new matter which he has injected into it in his book. These items are three in number, to wit:

1st. General Miles does not agree with the views therein expressed.

2d. New evidence in the form of an affidavit made by some individual, name not given.

3rd. The writer of the book dissents from my view of the case.

We will take these items up severally:

First: “General Miles is strongly of the opinion that Custer was not guilty of disobeying any orders.”

It is not a new experience to learn that the views of General Miles and myself are at variance. Indeed, it seems that they are seldom in accord. But, in this instance, my views are supported by the late General P. H. Sheridan, who states as follows:

“General Terry, now pretty well informed of the locality of the Indians, directed Lieutenant-Colonel George A. Custer to move with the Seventh Cavalry up the Rosebud, until he struck the trail discovered by Major Reno, with instructions that he should not follow it directly to the Little Big Horn, but that he should send scouts over it and keep his main force farther south.”^[118]

General Gibbon, in a letter to General Terry, written after having reached his post, Fort Shaw, Montana, and bearing date November 5th, 1876, writes as follows, speaking of the “Conference”:

“We both impressed upon him (Custer) that he should keep constantly feeling to his left, and even should the trail turn toward the Little Big Horn that he should continue his march southward along the headwaters of the Tongue, and strike west toward the Little Big Horn. So strong was the impression upon my mind and great my fear that Custer’s zeal would carry him forward too rapidly, that the last thing I said to him when bidding him good-by, after his regiment had filed past you when starting on the march, was, ‘Now, Custer, don’t be greedy, but wait for us.’ Poor fellow! Knowing what we do now, and what an effect a fresh Indian trail seemed to have on him, perhaps we were expecting too much to anticipate a forbearance on his part which would have rendered coÖperation between the two columns practicable.”

The foregoing clearly shows that no doubt existed in the minds of the Division Commanders and the third party present at the conference as to what the instructions required and that those instructions were not complied with.

Second: Dr. Andrews states that there was a listener at the last conversation between Terry and Custer at the mouth of the Rosebud, just before Custer began his fatal ride, and that his affidavit sets up that:

“Terry said: ‘Use your own judgment and do what you think best if you strike the trail and, whatever you do, Custer, hold on to your wounded.’”

It is quite evident that this is the same affidavit which General Miles refers to in his book. My attention was called to that reference in the winter of 1896, and in behalf of the family and friends of General Terry I asked to see the affidavit, saying that I might wish to make a copy of it. My request was refused by General Miles, with the further information that it had been in his possession for nineteen years, which carried the date back to a time when Colonel Miles was commanding a post in General Terry’s Department. The value of the document could have been very readily determined at that time by General Terry himself, and I am thankful to say its worthlessness is still capable of proof.

The quotations given by Dr. Andrews would alone be sufficient to condemn the paper with any one familiar with General Terry and the situation.

It will be noticed that he is represented as saying, “If you strike the trail.” Terry was sending, with Custer, Reno and six troops of cavalry, who had followed the trail for many weary miles only three days before, and there was no “if” in the case.

The other quotation is equally incredible. General Terry had an enviable reputation throughout the army for his exceptional courtesy on all occasions and under all circumstances, to all those serving in his command. To have made the remarks quoted, “Whatever you do, hold on to your wounded,” would have been tantamount to saying to one of his Lieutenant-Colonels, to whom he was confiding the finest command in his department, that he considered it necessary to caution him on the elementary principle of the position assigned him. To an officer of General Custer’s experience and gallantry such a caution would have been far from agreeable, and such action would have been entirely foreign to the life-long conduct of General Terry.

But, fortunately, we are not dependent upon deductive evidence in this instance. There are still living a good many people who were witnesses of that “march past” and parting of Generals Terry and Custer. By personal observation I positively know that any one, General Gibbon excepted, who makes affidavit to the effect that, at the said parting at the Rosebud, there was a conversation between Terry and Custer to which he was the only listener, is guilty of perjury.

When the notice came that the command was ready to take up its march I was sitting with Terry and Gibbon. General Terry invited General Gibbon to go with him and see it. They walked off a few yards from the bank of the stream and stood together when Custer joined them. The three remained together until the command had filed past and the final good-by was said. Custer mounted his horse and rode off, and Terry and Gibbon came back to where I had remained. The last remark made to Custer was by Gibbon. If any change was made at that time in Custer’s orders it was perforce known to Gibbon, who was alongside of Terry, and the only one who was with him and Custer. Now let us see what Gibbon said in a letter written to General Terry twenty-seven years ago, when he could not foresee for what purpose his words would be quoted:

“Except so far as to draw profit from past experience it is, perhaps, useless to speculate as to what would have been the result had your plan been carried out. But I cannot help reflecting that, in that case, my column, supposing the Indian camp to have remained where it was when Custer struck it, would have been the first to reach it; that with our infantry and Gatling guns we should have been able to take care of ourselves, even though numbering only two-thirds of Custer’s force.”

The only person actually in the presence of Terry and Custer at that final parting, happened to be the third member of the conference, who knew the “plan,” and on the fifth of the November following he writes as above, of what would have been the result had “your plan” (Terry’s conference plan) been carried out.

It so happened that I went over this whole subject with General Gibbon personally only a short time before his death. He certainly knew nothing of any change in the “conference plan” at that time. Any historian who makes use of the affidavit General Miles had some years ago, would do well to look carefully into the facts.

Third: Andrews states: “He (Hughes) adduced many interesting considerations, but seemed to the writer not at all to justify his views.”

I am, by no means, sure that this dissent would have disturbed me if I had depended on my own judgment alone in submitting the article^[119] for publication, but it so happened that I did not do so. The tragedy discussed being of an exceedingly grave character, and both the responsible heads having passed away, rendered it unusually important that every possible precaution should be taken against mistakes. For this reason, after the “many interesting considerations” were prepared for publication, I submitted the article to different competent military men with the simple question, “Is it conclusive?”

The final review was made by General Henry L. Abbott, U. S. Army, who enjoys a world-wide reputation for military ability and scholarly attainments. The gentlemen who revised the article were unanimously of the opinion that the statement was absolutely conclusive, and with the support of such men I have felt little anxiety about the criticisms that have been made.

Thereafter I wrote again to General Hughes about some matters repeated to me in conversation by General Carrington, who told me that Custer actually got down on his knees to Terry and begged him, for the sake of Custer’s honor and fame as a soldier, to get the orders detaining him at Fort Lincoln revoked, so that he might be spared the disgrace of seeing his regiment march to the front leaving him behind. Carrington’s recollection was that the scene took place in Terry’s bedroom.

Here is General Hughes’ letter on that point:

Yours of the 27th at hand. Carrington is all right except as to location—the incident occurred in General Terry’s office in St. Paul, corner Fourth and Wabashaw Streets. It drew from Terry a request to the President to permit Custer to go with him, the answer being through Sherman, “If Terry wishes Custer let him take him along.” Just after notifying Custer of the reply and telling him he would take him along, Custer met Ludlow on the street and made the “swing clear” remark which is spoken of in Andrews’ history and is referred to in my article in the journal. I shall have to apply for a copy of the Secretary of War’s report for 1876, which has the reports of Sheridan, Crook, Terry, Gibbon, Reno, etc., pages 439–487.^[120]

III.

Meanwhile I had communicated with Colonel Godfrey, who had already furnished me with much data in addition to that contained in his valuable and interesting paper, calling particular attention to some of the statements made by General Hughes in his article in the Journal of the Military Service Institution. From Colonel Godfrey I received the following paper:

Memoranda for Rev. C. T. Brady

A semi-official account entitled “Record of Engagements with Hostile Indians in the Division of the Missouri, from 1868 to 1882,” was published by the Division of the Missouri. This paper is now being reprinted in the United States Cavalry Journal, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. The part relating to the Little Big Horn, is in the October, 1903, number. This account reads:

“About two o’clock in the morning of July 25th, the column halted for about three hours, made coffee, and then resumed the march, crossed the divide, and by eight o’clock were in the valley of one of the branches of the Little Big Horn.”

This is misleading and not altogether true. We halted about two A.M., till eight A.M., then marched till ten A.M., halted, and it was not until nearly noon that we crossed the divide. We were in a narrow valley. The march is correctly described in my article. The inference is that Custer was so very eager that he crossed the divide into the valley of the Little Big Horn and put himself where he could be discovered. General Hughes’ article is a special plea to clear General Terry from the odium that he and his family seemed to think was heaped upon him for failure to push forward with the information they had on June 25th and 26th, and that General Custer’s family and friends were supposed to hold him (Terry) responsible for the disaster in a measure. I do not remember a charge of disobedience as having been made at any time during this campaign; nor, on the other hand, do I recall that much was said that Terry and Gibbon did not do as they thought best on June 25th and 26th.

The marching distance from the Yellowstone, where Gibbon’s command was crossed, to the Little Big Horn, was about forty-six miles. East of the Big Horn, the country over which Gibbon’s forces marched, was rough—bad lands. The Second Cavalry on its march June 25th, saw the “big smoke” (from the fire in the bottom at the time of Reno’s attack) and at once sent word to General Gibbon (and Terry) that they thought a fight was going on, or something to that effect. I don’t know when they saw this “big smoke,” but my recollection is that it corresponded or tallied very well with the time of Reno’s attack. The Second Cavalry got to the Little Big Horn, four or five miles above the mouth, about nine-thirty, June 26th. They were then distant from the battlefield about eight or ten miles—an infantry officer says six miles. They arrived in the vicinity of our position about eleven A.M., June 27th, nearly two days after the “signs,” the “big smoke” of the fight, had been communicated.

That the country between the Yellowstone and the Little Big Horn was rough; that the 25th of June was hot; that the water was scarce, we all know; but we thought it strange that, after they learned from the Crow scouts—say at ten-thirty, June 26th, on the Little Big Horn—that a disaster had occurred, it took them so long to get a move. Yet none of us blamed them for being cautious at that time.

General Terry was not an Indian fighter and would never have made a success of getting Indians on the plains. The idea is preposterous^[121] that a force can march through the open country (a great big country like we had) pass by the Indians fifty or sixty miles south, then turn round and find them in the same place, and crush them between that force and another from the opposite direction. They don’t linger that way. Our march from eleven P.M., June 24th, was in a close country and not exposed—was in a close valley, a branch of the Rosebud. The Indians who discovered us and sent word to the village would have discovered our trail and consequently informed them of our movements.

General Custer did not intend to attack until June 26th, the date Terry was to be at the Little Big Horn.^[122] Herandeen was the scout that was to take the information through to Terry, but developments made it necessary, in General Custer’s opinion, if we were to strike the Indians at all, that we should do it at once. Even then he expected only a running fight. Their stand and concentration were unexpected, because the chance of “surprise” was gone, and he probably did not send Herandeen, as was intended, to communicate with Terry for the reason that he did not think he could get through.

Now, suppose the Indians had been located on the headwaters of the Rosebud or Tongue, or Powder, and not on the Little Big Horn, and we had bumped up behind them on the north, should Custer have backed away, sent a scout through to Terry, made a detour so as to get to the south side? Terry’s instructions had fairly located the Indians, but it was a mere guess.^[123] On the 17th they had fought Crook to a retreat, then they concentrated upon the Little Big Horn.

In my opinion, if our attack had been delayed even a few hours we would not have found the Indians all in the village. When we got to the divide their pony herds were still out grazing; when the attack was made all herds had been driven into the village; they did not have time to strike their tepees and steal away. I don’t believe they had a long warning of our advance. The Indian runners had the same, or a greater, distance to get back than we had to advance. It was their evident purpose to drop out of sight of our scouts who were in position for observation before daylight, and did not see them returning down the valley on the trail. Therefore, they must have made a wide detour.

Again, when they discovered us we were probably in bivouac and, at all events, an ordinary day’s march distant from the village. The time of warning, I think, could be safely conjectured as the time of arrival of the few warriors that came out to meet the advance and attack Reno. All those warriors that had their ponies handy, I believe, were assembled at once to come out and meet the troops. The rapid advance didn’t give the Indians a chance to collect their belongings and mature any plans to escape; otherwise I believe the expected “scattering” would have taken place. And in just so much was the attack a “surprise.”

That General Custer deliberately disobeyed Terry’s orders I do not believe. Custer was intensely in earnest and fully determined to find the Indians and, when found, to attack them, even if it took him back to the agencies. Suppose Custer had asked Terry “If I find these Indians shall I attack, or wait for you?” Undoubtedly Terry would have replied “Attack!” He was too good a soldier not to appreciate opportunity, but he was not enough of a cavalryman or Indian fighter to appreciate the flash-like opportunities for hitting the Indians on the broad prairies.

Custer was what in these modern days is styled a “strenuous” man. Terry was not. He was the personification of gentleness and deliberateness. And besides, Terry’s instructions gave the necessary latitude. He told Custer what he thought should be done but, after all, left it to Custer’s judgment and discretion when so nearly in contact with the enemy.^[124] If Custer had passed on south and the Indians had escaped, or had gone forth and attacked him, as they had Crook, and defeated him, would these instructions have shielded him? Not much. He would have been damned as cordially for the failure of the expedition as he is now, by those same men, for courting disaster. I have no doubt in my mind, that if Custer had passed south even one more day, the Indians would have attacked us as they had General Crook, and upon almost the same ground, just one week before.^[125]

Terry says, in his instructions, “He will indicate to you his own views of what your action should be, and he desires that you should conform to them unless you should see sufficient reason for departing from them.”^[126] Custer was an experienced war soldier, a thorough cavalryman, and an experienced Indian campaigner. So why not give him the benefit of “sufficient reason”? Were Terry’s instructions “definite and explicit”? Terry himself says in his order that “definite instructions” were “impossible.”

There was not an officer or soldier of the Seventh Cavalry but that expected a fight when we were preparing to leave the mouth of the Rosebud. Where the fight would take place we knew not, but I venture to say that never was there a thought that the Indians would take a position and wait there for us to go through a lot of manoeuvers. Reno’s scout had not brought any definite information. I find my notes (June 20th) say that it was generally thought the trail, when they left it, was about three weeks old and the indications showed perhaps three hundred and fifty lodges. I don’t think General Terry had any later information than Reno’s scout on which to guess the location of the Indians on the Little Big Horn. General Custer’s statement that he would follow the trail until he found the Indians, even if it took us to the agencies on the Missouri or in Nebraska, does not indicate that he expected them to wait in position on the Little Big Horn or elsewhere. This statement was made after it had been decided that we should go over the trail, June 21st, but probably before the general instructions had been made out.

As it turned out I think Custer did make a mistake in going in with a divided force, not that the division of itself would have been fatal, but because Reno failed to hold a leg even if he couldn’t skin.

If Custer had followed Reno the latter, in my opinion, would never have dared to halt, or even hesitate, in his attack. If Reno had even held to the bottom, the overwhelming forces would have been divided. There was nothing in Reno’s past career that would indicate confidence should not be placed in his courage. Custer could not have anticipated a faint-hearted attack or that Reno would get stampeded.

I believe that Reno was dismayed when he saw the showing in front of him, and when he failed to see the “support” promised, I think he lost his nerve, and then when his Ree scouts stampeded and he found his force being surrounded in the bottom, I believe he abandoned himself to his fears, then stampeded to the hills and lost his reason, throwing away his ivory handled pistols. If Reno had held to the bottom, Custer’s left flank (Keogh and Calhoun) would not have been so quickly overwhelmed (for the Indians leaving Reno made that envelopment), and it is reasonable to suppose Custer would have had a better show to withdraw and rejoin other forces.

If Custer had followed up Reno he would have taken matters in his own hands, held and concentrated his men in such manner as to control the situation until Benteen and the packs came up. The Indians, as a rule, will not stand punishment unless cornered. I went over the ground in the bottom where Reno was when he concluded to go to the hills, and I believe he could have held the position. I talked the matter over with General Gibbon and he practically agreed with me. I know many others think otherwise, including some who were in that part of the fight.

I have doubts about the saving of Custer if Reno had advanced after the packs joined us, for I think the fight was practically over then. To have advanced before then might possibly have done something in favor of Custer, but probably not. I am of the opinion that part of the fight was settled quickly. Custer’s battalion had practically no shelter and no time to make any. While a good many horses were killed, I fear that most of those getting away carried their reserve ammunition, and it didn’t take long to get away with fifty rounds in a fight. With a different commander than Reno we might have created a diversion by advancing as soon as the ammunition packs came up, which was some little time before McDougall arrived with all the packs. Reno was apparently too busy waiting for further orders from Custer to take any initiative. Weir asked permission to take his troop to reconnoiter in the direction of the firing on Custer, and Reno would not give it. Weir started on his own hook, and Edgerly (Weir’s Lieutenant) supposing permission had been given for the troop, followed Weir with the troop. I think Reno subsequently tried to make it appear that this advance of Weir was by authority. I don’t think Reno was drunk, for I don’t believe there was enough whiskey in the command to make a “drunk.”^[127]

At the Reno Court of Inquiry I was asked if I thought Reno had done all he could as a commanding officer, and I replied “No.” That was about the effect of the question and answer. The testimony and proceedings were reported in full in the Chicago Times. The New York Herald had an able correspondent, Mr. Kelly, that joined our forces on the Yellowstone in July or August, and wrote, giving all the information he could gather from all sources that pervaded the command, that he could get at. There were a “whole lot” of correspondents in the field after the fight, but Mr. Kelly was considered one of the ablest. Being in the field till September 26th, we saw but few newspapers from the east.

On the receipt of this memoranda I sent Colonel Godfrey all the papers printed above, and asked him further to discuss these papers. They were returned to me with the following letter, accompanied by these additional notes:

I return to-day the letters sent to me by registered mail. I am very sorry to have kept them so long from you, but I have been suffering from a sprained knee which has laid me up, and have been otherwise under the weather.

I feel that I have not in my memoranda done justice to the subject. It is largely one of sentiment, and the best rule is to put yourself in his place and act under the lights then exposed to view. That Custer may have been actuated by other motives I do not doubt. The main question to me was whether he was justified from a military point, in a campaign against Indians, in his conduct of the march and battle.

If we could have foreseen as we now look back and see!

The statement of General Sheridan, quoted by Hughes, was made in his annual report for 1876, and of course from data furnished by General Terry. It is but natural that he should reflect more or less the views of Terry. He could have had only the newspaper and other unofficial accounts. Of course I recognize that “unofficial accounts” very often give more inside information than the official report.

A word as to that affidavit. I don’t know anything about it and am ready to take Hughes’ say-so as to what officers were present, but I suggest a possible solution: When Custer dismounted he had his orderly and generally his flags with him; naturally the orderly would be somewhat retired, and when Custer went to mount his horse, Terry may have gone aside to accompany him and spoken the caution to him in a subdued voice so that Gibbon would not have heard him, but the orderly might have heard.^[128]

In going over a lot of letters relating to the campaign, etc., I find one from General J. S. Brisbin (now dead), then Major, commanding Second Cavalry Battalion. It is dated January 1st, 1892, just two weeks before his death. In it he is very bitter against Custer. He says that Custer disobeyed:

“If not in letter, then in spirit, and I think and have ever thought, in letter as well as spirit. Terry intended, if he intended anything, that we should be in the battle with you. I was on the boat, steamer Far West, Captain Grant Marsh, the night of the 21st, when the conference took place between Gibbon, Custer and Terry, to which you refer, and I heard what passed. Terry had a map and Custer’s line of march up the Rosebud was blocked out on it by pins stuck in the table through the paper. Terry showed Custer his line of march and, being somewhat near-sighted as you know, Terry asked me to mark the line, and I did so with a blue pencil. Custer turned off that line of march from the Rosebud, just twenty miles short of the end of the pins and blue line.”

Just how much dependence can be placed on Brisbin’s statements I don’t know. He may have been present at this conference, but Hughes makes no mention of him; in fact, entirely ignores him and may have forgotten him. I will make another quotation from Brisbin:

“I read the order you print as being the one given by Terry to Custer for this march. If that is the order Custer got it is not the order copied in Terry’s books at Department Headquarters. You will remember that after Custer fell Terry appointed me chief of cavalry. I looked over all the papers affecting the march and battle of Little Big Horn and took a copy of the order sending you up the Rosebud. The order now lies before me and it says ‘you should proceed up the Rosebud until you ascertain definitely the direction in which the trail above spoken of leads (Terry had already referred to the trail Reno followed). Should it be found, as it appears almost certain that it should be found, to turn toward the Little Big Horn, he thinks (that is, the Department Commander thinks) that you should still proceed southward, perhaps as far as the headwaters of the Tongue River, and then (‘then’ underscored in order) turn toward Little Big Horn, feeling constantly, however, to your left, so as to preclude the possibility of the escape of the Indians to the south or southeast by passing around your left flank. It is desired that you conform as nearly as possible to those instructions and that you do not depart from them unless you shall see absolute necessity for doing so.’”

That part of the quotation from “It is desired” to “necessity for doing so,” is omitted in the order as printed in the report of General Terry. Not having seen the original order I cannot vouch for either being the true copy, but the omission looks peculiar to say the least, if omission there was.^[129]

I do not know that I can add very much to what I have already sent to you on the question of disobedience. Here is a commander who has had experience in war, civilized and Indian, sent in command of his regiment against an unnumbered foe, located we know not where (although well conjectured in the instructions, as it turned out); given instructions to preclude their escape; to coÖperate with another column separated from fifty to one hundred miles, having infantry and artillery, marching over a rough, untried country. Now if that commander thought that to go on farther south before he had located the foe (when he was on the trail) was to leave an opening and an almost certainty of their escape, if they wanted to do so, is it reasonable to expect him to leave the trail and go on “in the air”? The commander who gives him his instructions cannot be communicated with. Is this isolated commander not allowed to act on his own responsibility, if he thinks he cannot preclude the escape by leaving the very trail that will locate the enemy?

Hughes in his article, and the official reports, make it appear that we were at or near the “Crow’s Nest” at daylight and crossed the divide at eight A.M. The scouts were at the “Crow’s Nest,” but at eight A.M. we took up the march to near the divide and “Crow’s Nest,” arriving at ten o’clock, A.M.; that is, we were in the Rosebud Valley, one mile from the divide. We did not cross the divide till nearly noon. Hughes seems to pooh-pooh the idea that we were not to attack till the morning of the 26th. We had Custer’s own statement as to that. He said so himself when he called the officers together on the night of June 24th and again reiterated the statement before crossing the divide.

During the second or third day (23rd or 24th) up the Rosebud, several times we thought we (I mean some of us) saw smoke in the direction of the Tullock, and finally we spoke of it to the General (Custer) at one of the halts. He said it could not be, that he had scouts over on that side and they most certainly would have seen any such “signs” and report to him, and he reiterated that there were scouts out looking toward Tullock’s Valley. After this assurance we made it a point to watch this “smoke business” and we discovered the illusion was due to fleecy clouds on the horizon and the mirage, or heated air, rising from the hills on that side. The air was full of dust from our marching columns, which helped the illusion.

With reference to my slip that “about eighteen hundred had gone from one agency alone.” I took that from my diary, as I had been informed by some one who got the information from Department Headquarters. I had never seen the despatch and put down the item as it came to me. It was a matter of common report in the camp.

Another point occurs to me: “For Custer to be in coÖperating distance on the only line of retreat if the Indians should run away.” (Hughes’ magazine article, page 36.) Hughes intimates that there was only one line of retreat, presumably up the valley of the Little Big Horn. The Indians certainly could have retreated over their traveled route, or could have cut across the headwaters of the Tullock for the Yellowstone had Custer gone south. Hughes seems to forget that an almost impassably rough country—the Wolf Mountains—would lie between Custer and those lines of retreat. Yet he would insist that it was good generalship to leave these routes open to close up one other. The Indians were in light marching order and could travel faster than Gibbon over the Tullock Divide, and there would have been a long-distance, “tail-end” pursuit for Custer when he descended the Little Big Horn (by following the “plan”) and found the enemy had escaped over the very trail he had left behind him, or had struck for the Yellowstone, passing Gibbon’s left.

It has been the criticism almost ever since Indian fighting began that commanders were too prone to follow some strategic theory and fail to bring the Indians to battle—give them a chance to escape. It was Custer’s practice to take the trail and follow it, locate the enemy and then strike home by a surprise attack. Custer knew the ridicule and contempt heaped on commanders who had failed to strike when near the enemy; or who had given the enemy opportunity to escape when nearly in contact with them. Whatever may be the academic discussions as to his disobedience, I hold that he was justified by sound military judgment in making his line of march on the trail.^[130]

IV.

General Hughes and Colonel Godfrey may be considered fairly enough as representatives of the opposing views on the question. I thought it would be well to have the papers discussed by an officer who might be considered as taking an impartial view of the matter. I therefore sent them to Brigadier-General Charles A. Woodruff, U. S. A. (retired), and his review of the whole question is as follows:

I have read with a great deal of pleasure, your three articles on “War with the Sioux,” and I have taken the liberty of making various marginal notes and corrections on the manuscript. I have also read the letters from General Miles, Professor Andrews, General Hughes, and Colonel Godfrey.

General Miles, in his letter of November 20, 1903, dismisses the matter very curtly. He says “Custer did not disobey orders,” and he states as military dictum that, in sending General Custer seventy-five or one hundred miles away, Terry could not indicate what Custer should do, and that, practically, Custer was not under any obligations to execute Terry’s orders, even when he found conditions as Terry had expected and indicated.^[131]

The order states explicitly “Should it—the trail up the Rosebud—be found (as it appears almost certain it will be found) to turn toward the Little Big Horn, then you should still proceed southward.” Now, when he found that it turned toward the Little Big Horn, instead of going south or stopping where he was and scouting south or southwest and west and try to locate the village, or examining Tullock Creek, or sending scouts to Gibbon, he made that fatal night march with the deliberate intention of trying to locate and strike the village before Gibbon could possibly get up.

Gibbon says (page 473, Vol. I., Report of the Secretary of War for 1876), “The Department Commander (Terry) strongly impressed upon him (Custer) the propriety of not pressing his march too rapidly.” Whether Custer’s written instructions were based upon a “guess” of the actual condition, as Colonel Godfrey suggests, or had no “military merit,” as General Miles states, the facts remain: First: That they were based upon a “foresight” as good as the present “hindsight,” which is often not the case. Second: That Custer accepted them without demur. Third: No further information was gained to suggest a modification, or, to use the words of the letter: “unless you see sufficient reason for departing from them.” On the contrary, the supposed turn of the trail was found to be an actual fact.

Therefore, Custer did not obey his written instructions, in letter or spirit, and had no proper military justification for not doing so, unless General Terry afterwards told him, “Use your own judgment and do what you think best,” which, in my opinion, would have made the instructions advisory rather than positive orders. If these facts (I ignore the unproduced affidavit) do not constitute disobedience of orders, I do not see how it is possible for the charge of disobedience of orders to hold against any man, under any circumstances, when away from his superior.

Here is a trifling sidelight on the matter. On the night of June 23d, General Gibbon, in reply to an optimistic remark of mine, told me in effect, “I am satisfied that if Custer can prevent it we will not get into the fight.” The meaning I gathered was that Gibbon thought that Custer was so eager to retrieve the good opinion that he might have lost owing to his controversy over post traderships, that he would strike when and where he could.

While Terry, with Gibbon’s command, was camped at Tullock’s Creek, Saturday night and Sunday morning, June 24th and 25th, he was looking for a message from Custer very anxiously, so I was told at the time.

Colonel Godfrey speaks of the odium Terry’s family seemed to think was “heaped upon him for the failure to push forward on the information they had on June 25th and 26th.” Now let me say a few words with reference to that.

The smoke that is spoken of as having been seen by Terry’s command—and I saw it myself—was on the afternoon of June 25th. It was occasioned, I understood, by attempts to drive some of Reno’s stragglers out of the brush, and must have been somewhere from two to four o’clock in the afternoon. Now let me quote from a telegram of General Terry, dated June 27, and found on page 463, Vol. I., Report of the Secretary of War of 1876, to show that Gibbon’s command did not linger by the wayside:

“Starting soon after five o’clock in the morning of the 25th, the infantry made a march of twenty-two miles over the most difficult country which I have ever seen. In order that the scouts might be sent into the valley of the Little Big Horn, the cavalry, with the battery, was then pushed on thirteen or fourteen miles farther, reaching camp at midnight. The scouts were sent out at half-past four in the morning of the 26th. They soon discovered three Indians, who were at first supposed to be Sioux; but, when overtaken, they proved to be Crows, who had been with General Custer. They brought the first intelligence of the battle. Their story was not credited. It was supposed that some fighting, perhaps severe fighting, had taken place; but it was not believed that disaster could have overtaken so large a force as twelve companies of cavalry. The infantry, which had broken camp very early, soon came up, and the whole column entered and moved up the valley of the Little Big Horn.”

I want to say that the infantry broke camp about four o’clock on the morning of the 26th. It had rained that preceding night and the lash ropes of the packs were soaked with water and, as we moved, they stretched continuously and we were stopping constantly to replace the packs, and besides that, mind you, traveling in adobe mud was very trying. I continue the quotation as follows:

“During the afternoon efforts were made to send scouts through to what was supposed to be General Custer’s position, to obtain information of the condition of affairs; but those who were sent out were driven back by parties of Indians, who, in increasing numbers, were seen hovering in General Gibbon’s front. At twenty minutes before nine o’clock in the evening, the infantry had marched between twenty-nine and thirty miles. The men were very weary and daylight was fading. The column was therefore halted for the night, at a point about eleven miles in a straight line from the mouth of the stream. This morning the movement was resumed, and, after a march of nine miles, Major Reno’s intrenched position was reached.”

It was the general opinion from indications found next day just beyond where we halted for the night, that had we proceeded five hundred yards more, we would have been in the midst of a night attack from the Sioux Indians, who came to meet us as a means of guarding their fleeing village.

In reference to the number of Indians, the same telegram of General Terry’s says: “Major Reno and Captain Benteen, both of whom are officers of great experience, accustomed to seeing large masses of mounted men, estimate the number of Indians engaged at not less than twenty-four hundred. Other officers think that the number was greater than this. The village in the valley was about three miles in length and about a mile in width. Besides the lodges proper, a great number of temporary brushwood shelters were found in it, indicating that many men, besides its proper inhabitants, had gathered together there.”

I am under the impression now that we counted positions occupied by twelve hundred lodges.

I coincide with your view that had Reno proceeded in his attack, with the audacity that should characterize, and usually does characterize, a cavalry charge, there would have been a different story to tell; perhaps as many men would have been killed, but they would have been divided among at least eight, if not eleven, troops of cavalry rather than concentrated in five, which meant annihilation for those.

I have been told, or was told at the time, that it was thought that about sixty lodges were a few miles up the Little Big Horn above the main village, and that, in the early morning, when Custer’s proximity was discovered, that this small village, knowing that they were but a mouthful for Custer’s command, hurriedly packed up and dashed down the valley. It can readily be understood that sixty lodges, with the horses and paraphernalia, moving rapidly down the valley, might well create the impression that a very large force was in retreat.

Now, if the Indian village was in retreat, Custer’s division of his forces was not altogether bad. One command to hurry them up and continue the stampede, his main force to attack them in the right flank if they turned that way, which was most probable, Benteen’s to attack them if they turned to the left, which was possible but not as probable.

Unfortunately for Custer they were not fleeing. Colonel Godfrey rather dwells upon the fact that Custer had to attack these Indians or they would have gotten away from him. The fact is, as I have stated above, when he left the Rosebud he did not know where they were, had not located them, was not in visual contact even with them, and a glance at the map will show that, standing on the Rosebud, where the trail left it to go over to the Little Big Horn, Custer was in the best possible position for intercepting these Indians on three of their four lines of retreat. For having passed into the Little Big Horn Valley, there were only four practicable routes of flight for the Indians, north, toward Gibbon, or east, northeast, or southeast. From the point where he left the Rosebud, Custer was in a position to strike either one of the three last lines of flight, whereas, if, after making the forced night march with his fatigued animals, he had struck the Little Big Horn, and a reconnaissance had shown that the village had left the Little Big Horn, going northeast, on the 24th of June, he would have been two days’ march behind them.

Had he sent a scout, on the night of the 24th, to Gibbon, whose exact whereabouts was almost known to him, that scout would have reached Terry or Gibbon, on Tullock’s Fork, a few miles from the Yellowstone, on the morning of Sunday, and by Sunday night Gibbon’s command would have been within less than ten miles of what is designated as Custer Peak, the hill on which Custer perished. Then, with Custer moving on the morning of the 26th, Gibbon’s infantry and Gatling guns could have forced those Sioux out of the village on to the open ground, extending from the Little Big Horn to the Big Horn, and Custer’s twelve troops of cavalry and Gibbon’s four, sixteen troops in all, between them would have made the biggest killing of Indians who needed killing ever made on the American continent since Cortez invaded Mexico. While this is a speculation, and an idle one, it is to my mind a rather interesting one.

I think myself that General Hughes makes out his case in reference to that affidavit that General Miles has so carefully treasured for so many years. It would be a very interesting historical document, but it would have been more satisfactory if it had been produced while Terry or General Gibbon or both were alive. I doubt very much whether Major Brisbin’s supposed copy of the order book at Terry’s headquarters was compared with the original after Brisbin had made it.

I regret to say that my paper upon this campaign was lost, and I have not even the notes from which it was written. I found one brief page, which I quote merely as indication of my reasons for believing that there were more than two thousand Indian warriors in the battle of June 25th: “Before May 10th of ’77 more than one thousand warriors came in and surrendered, not including the warriors killed in that battle or the half dozen other engagements, nor the individual warriors by the hundreds that sneaked back to the agencies and those who went to British America under Sitting Bull, numbering, it was understood, over two thousand warriors.”

I do not think you are too severe upon Major Reno. I conversed with most of the officers of that command at one time or another, while in the field, and nearly all were very pronounced in their severe criticism of Reno. The testimony at the Reno court of inquiry was less severe than the sentiments expressed within a few days, weeks, and months after the occurrence. That was perhaps natural. It is barely possible that some of it was due to the fact that Captain Weir, one of General Custer’s most pronounced friends and one of Major Reno’s most bitter critics, died before the court of inquiry met.

I do not think that Sturgis, Porter, etc., were captured and tortured. I found most of the lining of Porter’s coat in the camp, which showed that the bullet that struck him must have broken the back and passed in or out at the navel. My theory has been, with reference to those whose bodies could not be found, that most of them made a dash into the Bad Lands in the direction of the mouth of the Rosebud, where they had last seen General Gibbon’s command. It would have been easy for them to have perished from thirst in the condition they were in, and if they reached the Yellowstone and undertook to swim it, the chances were decidedly against their succeeding.

V.

So soon as this appendix as above was in type, I sent printed proofs of it to Generals Hughes, Woodruff, and Carrington, and to Colonel Godfrey for final revision and correction before the matter was plated. In returning the proof, General Carrington and Colonel Godfrey both add further communications, which I insert below.

I also sent the same proof to Mrs. Elizabeth B. Custer, widow of General Custer, and to Mrs. John H. Maugham, his sister, with an expression of my willingness—nay, my earnest desire—to print any comment they or either of them might wish to make upon the question under discussion.

At Mrs. Custer’s request I sent the appendix to Lieutenant-Colonel Jacob L. Greene, U. S. V., now president of the Connecticut Mutual Life Insurance Company, who was Custer’s adjutant-general during the war and his life-long friend thereafter. His able defense of his old commander is printed as the last of this interesting series of historic documents.

Desiring that Custer, through his friends, may have the final word, I print it without comment, save to say that I fully join Colonel Greene in his admiration for the many brilliant qualities and achievements of his old commander.

General Carrington’s Letter

I appreciate the favor of reading the proof-sheets of the appendix to your papers upon the Custer massacre. When it occurred I was greatly shocked by an event so similar in its horrors to that of the Phil Kearney massacre, in 1866. A previous interview with General Custer came to mind, and I attended the sessions of the court of inquiry at Chicago, taking with me, for reference, a map which I had carefully prepared of that country, with the assistance of James Bridger, my chief guide, and his associates.

The evidence indicated that when Custer reached the “Little Big Horn” (so known upon that map) and sent Benteen up stream, with orders that, “if he saw any Indians, to give them hell,” ordering Reno to follow the trail across the river and move down toward the Indian camps, while he moved down the right bank, detaching himself from the other commands, he practically cut the Indians off from retreat to the mountains, which was part of his special mission; but, in the flush of immediate battle, lost thought of the combined movement from the Big Horn, which had for its purpose the destruction of the entire Indian force by overwhelming and concentrated numbers.

Indeed, the court of inquiry did not so much discredit the conduct of Reno as reveal the fact that he faced a vastly superior force with no assurance that he could have immediate support from the other battalions, so vital in a sudden collision with desperate and hard-pressed enemies. The succeeding fight, on the defensive, protracted as it was, with no information of Custer’s position, or possible support from him, was a grave commentary upon the whole affair.

The interview with General Custer referred to was in 1876, when, upon leaving the lecture platform of the Historical Society in New York, he made the remark, on our way to his hotel, “It will take another Phil Kearney massacre to bring Congress up to a generous support of the army.” We spent several hours together, while he discussed his troubles with the authorities at Washington. He recalled the events of 1867, and felt that General Sherman had severely judged his operations on the Republican, but that the time was near when he might have an opportunity to vindicate himself, and that, “if he again had a chance he would accomplish it or die in the attempt.” He was practically on a leave of absence, and its extension was not his choice. Colonel Smith was sick, and he claimed the right to command his regiment, since it had been ordered to report as part of General Terry’s command.

The famous sutlership scandal was fully discussed, and here there has been confusion as to Custer’s position. He had nothing to do with the popular complaint that Belknap was farming out sutlerships for personal emolument. Neither is it technically correct that the Secretary of War could make original appointments of the kind complained of. Post commanders, with their councils of officers, had both the selection of their sutler, and fixed the prices of articles to be sold. The Secretary simply issued the appointment thus designated, unless for good reasons declined, thereby requiring another selection by the officers. In cases of troops in campaign, or detached, or on distant service, the commanding General confirmed the officer’s choice. Custer’s position was manly, legal, and just; but his assertion of this right, so far as made, offended Belknap, at the expense of officers whose rights were overruled by non-military influence.

Custer was not under charges that would militate against his assignment to the rightful command of his regiment when ordered into field service. I did not hesitate to urge him to press his claim, but could not entertain the idea that he would go to Bismarck, or otherwise to make his claim in person, except through Washington Headquarters.

If ever a man had an incentive to dare odds with his regiment, this fearless fighter and rider, whose spirit reached the verge of frenzy in battle, was the man for the occasion.

Through all the papers cited by you, there runs the same subtle suggestion that he who, as an independent commander of aggressive cavalry in the Civil War, was almost expected to take into the field a large discretion as to his actions (whereby he had formerly achieved success) when confronted by the enemy, within striking distance in the Little Big Horn Valley, lost all sense of danger and all thought of prescribed details of action in the confidence that, somehow, the old Seventh could not be whipped by any savage force whatsoever!

I have always regarded Terry’s general plan as well conceived, for Reno’s prior scouting had almost assured the inevitable course of the Indian trail westward, and events confirmed Terry’s judgment. General Hughes had served upon Terry’s staff during the Civil War with credit, as well as captain in the 18th Infantry on the frontier, and his assurances that General Terry fully explained to Custer the reasons why Washington authorities distrusted his discretion and was more precise in giving him this detached command, cannot be impeached by an asserted affidavit that whispered hints, unheard by officers by his side, allowed him to be his own master in a matter where a combined movement of three commands was the prime factor in complete success.

Neither is there any doubt whatever that Custer’s earnest plea, that he be trusted to fulfil the exact duties assigned to his command, secured not only the sympathy and confidence of Terry in his behalf, but that on that condition only did the Washington authorities authorize General Terry to vacate the order for his arrest because of going to his command without orders.

As already stated, Custer’s confidence in the Seventh Cavalry was well deserved. It, with him, was a veritable thunderbolt in action; but it was not omnipotent. That over-confidence which dissolved its unity at the supreme crisis was fatal. Even then, a realized success of which Custer had no doubt, would have minimized the rashness of his dash and have largely condoned his fault.

Colonel Godfrey’s Final Remarks

I have no desire to pose as the special champion of General Custer, and it is still further from my desire to pose as inimical to General Terry. My only purpose is to demonstrate the truth, not only for this discussion, but for history.

This subject surely has gotten to the stage of academic discussion. I am not willing to admit that the phrase “he desires that you should conform to them (his views) unless,” etc., conveys a direct, positive command which could not be more explicit. Nor do I admit that orders given by a commander, in which he uses the words “desires,” “wishes,” and equivalents, convey positive commands under all circumstances. In personal or social matters, such words convey the idea of what is wanted and what is expected; and in such matters the expressed wishes and desires are usually conveyed to personal friends, who loyally conform thereto, if not in letter, in spirit and in results. In such relations a commander does not want to use language that would appear dogmatic. I further admit that in personally giving orders a commander may accentuate the expression of his desires, wishes, etc., so as to leave no doubt about his intentions, and to convey positiveness thus expressed to his commands. When a commander gives written orders through official channels, the words “commands,” “orders,” and “directs,” or the use of the imperative, leave little ambiguity or doubt as to what is ordered or intended.

Developments subsequent to the campaign or battle leave little doubt that General Terry had about him men or influences that were suspicious, inimical, or hostile to General Custer. I sincerely believe General Terry was too high minded knowingly to allow himself to be influenced by any sinister motive.

That the “instructions” give rise to this discussion shows they were vague. Was this vagueness intentional? General Terry was a lawyer. He was a soldier. As lawyer and soldier his trained mind should have weighed the words embodied in these instructions. Now read them: “It is of course impossible^[132] to give you any definite instructions in regard to this movement, and were it not impossible to do so, the Department Commander places too much confidence in your zeal, energy, and ability to wish to impose upon you precise orders which might hamper your action when nearly in contact with the enemy,” and then goes on to indicate what he thinks should be done; or, in other words, indicates what he (Terry) himself would do if he found conditions as expressed. Custer evidently saw “sufficient reasons for departing from them” and did what a reasonable interpretation of the instructions contemplated, made his own plans.^[132] I interpret the phrase “when so nearly in contact with the enemy” to refer to the immediate time or place (June 21, mouth of Rosebud) of writing it.^[133]

As to the location of the Indians. Terry believed they were on the Little Big Horn;—we found them on that river about 15 miles above its forks with the Big Horn. Had the village been at the forks, the attack would have been delivered on the 25th of June, as the village would not have been located by Custer from the divide. It is possible the two columns might have joined in the attack. Now, suppose the village had been located 50 or 60 miles farther south, it would have still been within Terry’s guess, but it would have been a far cry to Gibbons’ column which, under the instructions, would have remained at the forks. It must be remembered that Custer would have had the Wolf Mountains (Rosebud Mountains on later maps) between him and the Little Big Horn had he ignored the trail and gone on southward up the Rosebud, as Custer’s critics would have us believe were the intentions of the instructions.

General Woodruff would have him stop at the camp of June 24 and scout to locate the village, etc. Would that have complied with Woodruff’s interpretation of the instructions? And from that position he says: “Custer was in a position to strike either one of the three last lines of flight (east, northeast or southeast), whereas if, after making the forced^[134] night march with his fatigued animals, he had struck the Little Big Horn, and a reconnaissance had shown that the village had left the Little Big Horn going northeast, on June 24 he would have been two days’ march behind them.” That “forced” night march was about eight miles, and every mile made was in the direction to place us in the best position to intercept any flight to the northeast and east. Instead of being two days behind them, we would have met them almost “head on.”

Of what practical use to send scouts through to Gibbon June 24?

There was no fresh or new positive information to send to him; Terry had “guessed” it all.

Now let us repeat the marches made: June 22, twelve miles; June 23, thirty-three miles; June 24, twenty-eight miles; June 25, eight miles to the bivouac; and ten miles to the divide, and then say fifteen miles to the village. That is to say, ninety-one miles up to noon June 25, when it was decided to attack, and one hundred and six miles in all four days. That doesn’t indicate that we made forced marches.

Woodruff further states that “he made that fatal night march with the deliberate(?) intention of trying to locate and strike the village before Gibbon could possibly get up.” I say that statement is deliberately unfair, and contradicts the twice-told statement by Custer, that he did not intend to attack the village until the 26th, once before he knew the location of the village, the night of the 24th, and again when he called the officers together after the discovery at the divide.

Reno’s position in the bottom, in the old river bed, was sheltered from fire from the hills by heavy timber, and was nearly a mile from the hills. I have never before heard that he was fired upon from those hills; but he was fired upon from the woods on the opposite side of the river. General Gibbon and I both thought the hills were too far away to give any effective fire. It must be remembered that the river bottom was heavily timbered for some distance above and below this position. This timber subsequently was cut for the construction of Fort Custer.

Lieutenant-Colonel Greene’s Defense of Custer

I have read with great interest your discussion of the question of General Custer’s alleged disobedience of orders, both in the narrative of the Battle on the Little Big Horn and in the appendix to the volume, and upon which you have asked my comment.

For whatever bearing it may have upon the propriety of any comment of mine, let me say that General Custer was my intimate friend, and that his first act after receiving his appointment in the Civil War as a brigadier-general was to secure my appointment and detail to him as adjutant-general, which relation I held until his muster out of the volunteer service in 1866. I think no one knows better his quality as a soldier and as a man. I know his virtues and his defects, which were the defects of his virtues. He was a born soldier, and specifically a born cavalry man. The true end of warfare was to him not only a professional theory—it was an instinct. When he was set to destroy an enemy, he laid his hand on him as soon as possible, and never took it off. He knew the whole art of war. But its arts and its instruments and their correct professional handling were not in his eyes the end all of a soldier’s career, to be satisfied with a technical performance. They were the means and the tools in the terms of which and by the use of which his distinct military genius apprehended and solved its practical and fateful problems. When he grappled his task it was to do it, not to go correctly through the proper motions to their technical limit, and then hold himself excused.

He was remarkable for his keenness and accuracy in observation, for his swift divination of the military significance of every element of a situation, for his ability to make an instant and sound decision, and then, for the instant, exhaustless energy with which he everlastingly drove home his attack. And the swiftness and relentless power of his stroke were great elements in the correctness of his decisions as well as in the success of his operations. He was wise and safe in undertaking that in which a man slower in observation, insight and decision, and slower and less insistent in action, would have judged wrongly and failed.

I knew Custer as a soldier when he was a brigade and division commander under Pleasanton and Sheridan, the successive commanders of the Cavalry Corps of the Army of the Potomac. Those who knew the estimate in which those great commanders held him—the tasks they committed to his soldierly intelligence and comprehension, his fidelity and skill—need no reminder that in nothing of all their dependence upon and confidence in him did he ever fail in letter or spirit. I know how absolutely loyal he was under the conflicting conditions which sometimes confront every subordinate charged with grave responsibilities, and which test the sense of duty to the utmost. He was true as steel. He was depended upon for great things because he was dependable.

In temperament he was sanguine and ardent. He loved his friends; he was impatient of every form of inefficiency and of pretense; he did not highly esteem mere professionalism; he was impulsive and sometimes abrupt in manner, but kind of heart; he was sensitive only to unjust criticism; he despised intrigue, chicane and all meanness; he was independent in opinion and judgment, and frank in their expression; he was open in opposition, and fair to an enemy.

And it goes without saying that such a man had enemies—men who were envious of his abilities, his achievements and his fame; men whom he never sought to placate, and who sought envy’s balm in detraction and hatred; men who could not measure him or be fair to him, but men who in a pinch would have turned to him with unhesitating trust, whether in his ability or his soldierly faith.

Did this man, this soldier, whose service throughout the Civil War and a long career of frontier warfare was for eighteen years unequaled for efficiency and brilliancy within the range of its opportunities and responsibilities, who never failed his commanders, who never disobeyed an order, nor disappointed an expectation, nor deceived a friend—did this man, at the last, deny his whole life history, his whole mental and moral habit, his whole character, and wilfully disobey an understood order, or fail of its right execution according to his best judgment, within the limits of his ability under the conditions of the event; and, what is worse—and this is what his detractors charge—did he not only disobey, but did he from the inception of the enterprise plan to disobey—to deceive his commander who trusted him, in order that he might get the opportunity to disobey?

To any man who knew Custer, except those who for any reason hold a brief against him, not only is the charge of premeditated, deliberate disobedience absurd, but it is a foul outrage on one of the memories that will never fail of inspiration while an American army carries and defends an American flag.

In one of Mrs. Custer’s letters to me, narrating what took place during the days of preparation for the General’s departure, she wrote:

“A day before the expedition started, General Terry was in our house alone with Autie (the General’s pet name). A.’s thoughts were calm, deliberate, and solemn. He had been terribly hurt in Washington. General Terry had applied for him to command the expedition. He was returned to his regiment because General Terry had applied for him. I know that he (Custer) felt tenderly and affectionately toward him. On that day he hunted me out in the house and brought me into the living-room, not telling me why. He shut the door, and very seriously and impressively said: ‘General Terry, a man usually means what he says when he brings his wife to listen to his statements. I want to say that reports are circulating that I do not want to go out to the campaign under you.’ (I supposed that he meant, having been given the command before, he was unwilling to be a subordinate.) ‘But I want you to know that I do want to go and serve under you, not only that I value you as a soldier, but as a friend and a man.’ The exact words were the strongest kind of a declaration that he wished him to know he wanted to serve under him.”

That was Custer all over. And to any one who knew him—to any one who can form a reasonable conception of the kind of a man he must needs have been to have done for eighteen years what he had done and as he had done it, and won the place and fame he had won—that statement ends debate. Whatever of chagrin, disappointment, or irritation he may have felt before, however unadvisedly the sore-hearted, high-spirited man may have spoken with his lips when all was undetermined, and his part and responsibility had not been assigned, this true soldier, knowing the gossip of the camp, conscious possibly it was not wholly without cause, however exaggerated, but facing now his known duty and touched by the confidence of his superior as Custer never failed to be touched, could not part from his commander with a possible shadow resting between them. He knew the speech of men might have carried to Terry’s mind the suggestion of a doubt. And yet Terry had trusted him. He could not bear to part without letting General Terry know that he was right to trust him. That statement to Terry was a recognition of whatever folly of words he might before have committed in his grief and anger; it was an open purging of an upright soldier’s soul as an act honorably due alike to superior and subordinate; it was, under the circumstances, the instinctive response of a true man to the confidence of one who had committed to him a trust involving the honor and fame of both. Disobedience, whether basely premeditated, or with equal baseness undertaken upon after-deliberation, is inconceivable, unless one imputes to Custer a character void of every soldierly and manly quality. With such an one discussion would be useless.

Upon the discussion itself, which is presented in the narrative and in the appendix, I have little to say. In the opening paragraph of the appendix, you say: “I presume the problem ... will never be authoritatively settled, and that men will continue to differ upon these questions until the end of time.”

In other words, the charge of disobedience can never be proved. The proof does not exist. The evidence in the case forever lacks the principal witness whose one and only definite order was to take his regiment and go “in pursuit of the Indians whose trail was discovered by Major Reno a few days since.” They were the objective; they were to be located and their escape prevented. That was Custer’s task. All the details were left, and necessarily left, to his discretion. All else in the order of June 22d conveys merely the “views” of the commander to be followed “unless you should see sufficient reasons for departing from them.” The argument that Custer disobeyed this order seems to resolve itself into two main forms. One is trying to read into the order a precision and a peremptory character which are not there and which no ingenuity can put there, and to empty it of a discretion which is there and is absolute; the other is in assuming or asserting that Custer departed from General Terry’s views without “sufficient reasons.” And this line of argument rests in part upon the imputation to Custer of a motive and intent which was evil throughout, and in part upon what his critic, in the light of later knowledge and the vain regrets of hindsight, thinks he ought to have done, and all in utter ignorance of Custer’s own views of the conditions in which, when he met them, he was to find his own reasons for whatever he did or did not do. Under that order, it was Custer’s views of the conditions when they confronted him that were to govern his actions, whether they contravened General Terry’s views or not. If in the presence of the actual conditions, in the light of his great experience and knowledge in handling Indians, he deemed it wise to follow the trail, knowing it would reach them, and deeming that so to locate them would be the best way to prevent their escape, then he obeyed that order just as exactly as if, thinking otherwise, he had gone scouting southward where they were not, and neither Terry nor he expected them to be.

To charge disobedience is to say that he wilfully and with a wrong motive and intent did that which his own military judgment forbade; for it was his own military judgment, right or wrong, that was to govern his own actions under the terms of that order. The quality of his judgment does not touch the question of obedience. If he disobeyed that order, it was by going contrary to his own judgment. That was the only way he could disobey it. If men differ as to whether he did that, they will differ.

To sum up, I suggest this as a possible line of investigations by which the student may determine the question for himself:

First. Were Terry’s written orders definite and explicit?

Second. Were they intelligent orders capable of execution?

Third. Did these orders admit of more than one meaning?

Fourth. What are the various meanings, if more than one?

Fifth. Did Custer carry them out in any of their meanings?

Sixth. Did Custer depart from them?

Seventh. If so, how far?

Eighth. Such being the case, was he justified in so departing by the exigencies of the situation?

Ninth. Were the consequences of such a departure serious?

Tenth. Did Custer receive verbal orders from Terry at the last moment?

Eleventh. If so, when?

Twelfth. Did these verbal orders supersede the written orders?

In closing, I repeat that I should be glad to be convinced that I have erred in my conclusions; and that if any one can convince me that Custer did not disobey, or that in doing so he was justified in his disobedience, I shall make the fullest public amends for my expression of opinion that he did and that he was not.^[135] If this Appendix shall cause any light to be thrown on the affidavit so often referred to, it will serve an excellent purpose; for, I say again, I shall consider the establishment of that affidavit as settling the question.

The subject is now left with the student. Perhaps I cannot more fitly close the discussion than by this quotation from the confidential report of General Terry by General Sheridan, dated July 2, 1875:

“I do not tell you this to cast any reflection on Custer, for whatever errors he may have committed he has paid the penalty, and you cannot regret his loss more than I do; but I felt that our plan must have been successful had it been carried out, and I desire you to know the facts.”

After the publication of the Custer article censuring Reno, my attention was called to the following editorial, which appeared in the Northwestern Christian Advocate, of September 7, 1904:

Why General Custer Perished

General George A. Custer was and will always be regarded as one of the most brilliant officers of the United States Army. His career abounds in romantic interest; and his death, together with that of every officer and soldier fighting with him, was one of the most tragic and memorable incidents in Indian warfare. The story of Custer’s last fight with the Indians, which took place on the Little Big Horn River in the summer of 1876, is graphically described by Cyrus Townsend Brady. It is not our purpose to relate the story of the battle, but to call attention to the real cause of Major Reno’s conduct, which resulted in Custer’s defeat and death.

After describing the movements by which Custer distributed his force, and the task assigned to Major Reno, who displayed remarkable indecision and errors of judgment, which would have been inexcusable even in an inexperienced young officer, and caused Reno to retreat instead of vigorously attacking the Indians, Mr. Brady says:

“His [Reno’s] second position was admirable for defense. Sheltered by the trees, with his flanks and rear protected by the river, he could have held the place indefinitely. He had not, however, been detailed to defend or hold any position, but to make a swift, dashing attack; and after a few moments of the feeblest kind of advance, he found himself thrown upon the defensive. Such a result would break up the most promising plan. It certainly broke up Custer’s.

“It is a painful thing to accuse an army officer of misconduct, but I have taken the opinion of a number of army officers on the subject, and every one of them considers Reno culpable in a high degree. One, at least, has not hesitated to make known his opinion in the most public way. I am loath to believe that Major Reno was a coward; but he certainly lost his head, and when he lost his head he lost Custer. His indecision was pitiful. Although he had suffered practically no loss and had no reason to be alarmed, he was in a state of painful uncertainty as to what he should do next. The soldier—like the woman—who hesitates in an emergency which demands instant decision is lost....

“There had, as yet, been no panic, and under a different officer there would have been none; but it is on record that Reno gave an order for the men to mount and retreat to the bluffs. Before he could be obeyed he countermanded this order. Then the order was given again, but in such a way that nobody, save those immediately around him, heard it because of the din of the battle then raging in a sort of aimless way all along the line, and no attempt was made to obey it. It was then repeated for the third time. Finally, as those farthest away saw those nearest the flurried commander mounting and evidently preparing to leave, the orders were gradually communicated throughout the battalion and nearly the whole mass got ready to leave. Eventually they broke out of the timber in a disorderly column of fours, striving to return to the ford they had crossed when they had entered the valley.

“Reno calls this a charge, and he led it! He was so excited that, after firing his pistols at the Indians, who came valiantly after the fleeing soldiers, he threw them away. The pressure of the Indians upon the right of the men inclined them to the left, away from the ford. In fact, they were swept into a confused mass and driven toward the river. All semblance of organization was lost in the mad rush for safety. The troops had degenerated into a mob.”

Major Reno was not a coward, as many believe. His career in the army during the Civil War and his promotion for gallant and meritorious services at Kelley’s Ford, March 17, 1863, and at the battle of Cedar Creek, October 19, 1864, are evidence of his courage. What, then, was the explanation of his conduct at the Battle of the Little Big Horn? Dr. Brady does not give it. Perhaps he does not know. But Major Reno himself told the late Rev. Dr. Arthur Edwards, then editor of the Northwestern, that his strange actions were due to the fact that HE WAS DRUNK. Reno’s conduct in that battle lost him many of his military friends. To Arthur Edwards, who knew him well, and continued his faithful friend, Major Reno often unburdened his heart, and on one occasion in deep sorrow said that his strange actions were due to drink, and drink ultimately caused his downfall. His action at the Battle of the Little Big Horn was cited as one instance of the result of his use of intoxicating liquor. Liquor finally caused his expulsion from the army in disgrace. In 1880 he was found guilty, by a general court-martial, of conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman. While in an intoxicated condition he engaged in a brawl in a public billiard saloon, in which he assaulted another officer, destroying property and otherwise conducted himself disgracefully. For this offense the court sentenced him to be dismissed from the army.

It had occurred to me that probably the explanation of Reno’s conduct lay in the fact that he might have been intoxicated. I asked Colonel Godfrey if he thought so, and his reply has been noted above in Appendix A.

After reading the article in the Advocate, I wrote to the editor, Dr. David D. Thompson, asking for further evidence of the statement quoted. Here follows his letter:

Doctor Arthur Edwards, the former editor of the Northwestern Christian Advocate, was chaplain in the army during the Civil War. He was a soldier by instinct, and kept up his interest in military and naval affairs and his acquaintance with army and naval officers during all his life. In the army he won the confidence of his fellow-officers by his character and moral courage.

He was requested, by a number of officers, to wait upon General Hooker, then in command of the army, and express to him the great anxiety felt by the officers over his intemperate habits. Doctor Edwards waited upon General Hooker, and told him what the officers had requested him to say. He did it in so manly and delicate a way that General Hooker thanked him, and told him the army would not again have occasion to fear ill results because of his habits.

The story of this incident came to the knowledge of Mr. H. I. Cleveland, an editorial writer on the Chicago Herald, who published it several years ago over his own name in that paper. I had never before heard the story from Doctor Edwards, and when I saw Mr. Cleveland’s article I asked Doctor Edwards about it. He related the story to me, and, after doing so, told the story of Reno as I give it briefly in the Northwestern.

From all that I can learn of Reno, the feeling in the army against him was not due to his drinking habits, but to his conduct in his relations with others. Doctor Edwards told me that Reno told him that all of his trouble in his contact with his fellow-officers was due, primarily, to his drinking habits, which had undermined his moral character. Doctor Edwards knew Reno very well, and told me he believed that drinking was, as Reno himself stated, the cause of all his trouble. He had known him in the army during the Civil War, and spoke highly of his character as a soldier at that time.

P. S.—Doctor Edwards intended at some time to publish this story, but died in April, 1901, before doing so.

II.

As I have always been most willing and anxious to give the accused a hearing in every case, it gives me great pleasure to insert here a letter recently received from Mr. William E. Morris, an attorney, who is also an alderman of Greater New York. In this letter will be found a spirited defense of Major Reno, with interesting details of his fight. Although Mr. Morris dissents from many of my conclusions, and differs radically from the printed accounts of Colonel Godfrey and others, I am glad to place the other side before my readers. I only regret that this paper was received too late to be included in the body of the book.

I have read your article entitled “War with the Sioux,” and as a survivor of Reno’s Battalion desire to enter an earnest protest against the many incorrect statements of alleged facts.

Col. Reno was cruelly libeled while he was alive, and took his medicine manfully, knowing that he had the respect of every officer and enlisted man who served under him on the 25th and 26th days of June, 1876.

The 7th Cavalry had no use for cowards, and had Reno showed the white feather, he would have been damned by every member of his command.

As a matter of fact, we revere his memory as that of a brave and gallant officer, who, through circumstances over which he had no control, was blamed by the public, who had no personal knowledge of the facts for the result of the Battle of the Little Horn.

It is quite evident to me that you have never interviewed a single member of Reno’s Battalion, to wit: Troops “A,” “G,” and “M,” for if you had you would not misstate the facts, as I assume that you intend to be fair, and would not intentionally mislead the public mind.^[136]

I was a member of Capt. Thomas H. French’s Troop “M,” 7th U. S. Cavalry, and I submit the following as a concise statement of the facts:

We lost sight of Custer, whose command was on our right, at least thirty minutes before we crossed the Little Horn River.

We saw a party of about one hundred Indians before we reached the river; we pursued them across the Little Horn and down the valley. As soon as we forded, Reno gave the command, “Left into line, gallop—forward, guide, center,” and away we went faster than I had ever ridden before. The Indians rode as fast as they could, and the battalion in line of battle after them. A body of at least two thousand came up the valley to meet the one hundred or more we were pursuing. They immediately made a flank movement to our left and a stand, opened a galling fire, causing some of our horses to become unmanageable. John R. Meyer’s horse carried him down the valley through the Indians, some of whom chased him two or three miles over the hills and back to ford. He escaped with a gun-shot wound in the neck. Rutten’s horse also ran away, but he succeeded in making a circle before reaching the Indians, and received only a gun-shot wound in the shoulder. We were then abreast the timber; to continue the charge down the valley meant (to the mind of every one) immediate destruction of the battalion, which consisted of about one hundred and twenty men (the old guard, of ten men from each troop, being with the packs).

Reno, very properly, gave the command “Battalion halt—prepare to fight on foot—dismount!” He directed French to send ten men from the right of his troop to skirmish the woods, before the “numbers four” proceeded there with the horses. We immediately deployed as skirmishers and opened fire. The odds were at least thirty to one, as our line with the fours out did not exceed seven officers and ninety men. We had, however, a few Indian scouts and civilians. We had entire confidence in our officers and in ourselves, and went to work smiling and as cool as if we were at target practice. In less time than it takes to relate it, the Indians were on three sides of us. We were ordered to lie down, and every man that I could see, except Reno and French, were fighting lying down. Reno walked along the line giving instructions to the men, while French was calling his men’s attention to his own marksmanship with an infantry long-tom that he carried.

While in this position, the man next on my right, Sergeant O’Hara, was killed. The smoke obscured the line, but bullets were taking effect all along it. We were perfectly cool, determined, and doing good execution and expected to hear Custer attack. We had been fighting lying down about fifteen minutes when one of our men came from the timber and reported that they were killing our horses in the rear. Every troop had, at this time, suffered loss and the enemy was closing in, despite our steady and deadly fire. Reno then made his only error; he gave the command, “Retreat to your horses, men!” French immediately corrected the mistake with the command, “Steady, men—fall back, slowly; face the enemy, and continue your fire.” “M” troop fell back slowly and in perfect order, held the Indians in check until “A” and “G” had mounted. Several of their horses had been shot, and their riders, consequently, very much disturbed.

“M” Troop left Sergeant O’Hara and Private Smith on the skirmish line. Isaiah, the colored interpreter of Fort Rice, Bloody Knife, the Chief of the Rees Scouts, and a civilian also remained. Lawrence was hit in the stomach when about to mount. I went to his relief, which caused me to be the last man to leave the timber, with the command, with the exception of Lieutenant Hare, who passed me in the bottom. Sergeant Charles White was wounded in the arm and his horse killed. He was left in the woods, as was also “Big Fritz,” a Norwegian, whose surname I do not remember, but whose horse was killed. “A” and “G” had men left in the timber also, and they all reached the command on the hill during the night with De Rudio, or about the same time.

I give more details in regard to “M” than the other troops, because of a personal acquaintance with each member. Corporal Scollen and Private Sommers fell in the charge from the timber to the ford. It was a charge and not a retreat, and it was led by Reno. Every man that I saw used his revolver at close range. I was at least twenty yards behind the rear of the command. The Indians closed in, so I was compelled to jump my horse off the bank, at least fifty yards below the ford, and while in the river had an excellent view of the struggle. It was hand to hand, and McIntosh was certainly there at the ford and sold his life as dearly as he possibly could. When I reached the cut in bank, I found Turley and Rye mounted and Lieutenant Hodgson wounded and dismounted. He was waist-deep in the water. He grasped my off stirrup strap with both hands. Rye let Turley go ahead through the cut, and he was killed as he reached the top; Rye followed without receiving a scratch. The lieutenant held onto my stirrup for two or three seconds, and was dragged out of the water. He was hit again, and let go as my horse plunged up the cut. Sergeant Criswell may have assisted him out of the water, but if he did he went back into it again. To say that any man could or did ride back down that cut is to suggest, to my mind, the impossible. Upon reaching the level above the cut I dismounted and led my horse as fast as possible up the bluff, and overtook Tinker, Bill Meyer and Gordon about half way up the bluff. We stopped a moment to rest. The bodies of the fallen soldiers were plainly visible. They marked the skirmish line and the line of the charge from the timber to the ford, and were in the river and at the top of the cut. At this instant a shower of lead sent Meyer and Gordon to the happy hunting-ground, and a fifty caliber passed through the left breast of your humble servant. Our horses were also hit. I continued up the hill alone and joined the command; was then assisted to the improvised hospital.

Reno at this time had lost, in killed, wounded, and left dismounted in the woods, over 30 per cent. of his battalion (there were over ten left in the woods). Lieutenant Hare was particularly conspicuous, and distinguished himself by his cool and determined manner when he ordered the men to fall in at the top of the hill, and whatever demoralization there was, was immediately dispelled by that courageous young Texan. Benteen, arriving about an hour later, came up as slow as though he were going to a funeral. By this statement I do not desire to reflect in any way upon him; he was simply in no hurry; and MÜller, of his troop, who occupied an adjoining cot to mine in the hospital at Fort Abraham Lincoln, told me that they walked all the way, and that they heard the heavy firing while they were watering their horses.

Benteen was, unquestionably, the bravest man I ever met. He held the Indians in absolute contempt, and was a walking target from the time he became engaged until the end of the fight at sundown on the 26th. He took absolute charge of one side of the hill, and you may rest assured that he did not bother Reno for permission of any kind. He was in supreme command of that side of the hill, and seemed to enjoy walking along the line where the bullets were the thickest. His troop, “H,” did not dig rifle-pits during the night of the 25th, as the other troops did, and in the morning their casualties were increased on that account. He ordered “M” out of their pits to reinforce his troop. There was some dissatisfaction at the order, as the men believed that the necessity was due solely to the neglect of “H,” in digging pits. They obeyed, however, and assisted Benteen in his famous charge.

It was rumored, subsequently, that French recommended his First Sergeant, John Ryan, a sharpshooter, and some other men for medals, and that Benteen refused to indorse the recommendation as to Ryan, because he failed immediately to order the men out of their pits at his end of the line at his (Benteen’s) order. It was claimed that French thereupon withdrew his list. Ryan was in charge of the ten men that Reno sent to skirmish the woods.

I was very much amused to learn, from your article, that Windolph received a medal. I remember him as the tailor of “H” troop, and have a distinct recollection of his coming into the field-hospital, bent almost double and asking for treatment for a wound which, his appearance would suggest, was a mortal one, but which the surgeon found, on removing his trousers, to be only a burn. The surgeon ordered him back to the line amid a shout of laughter from the wounded men. Mike Madden of “K” lost his leg, and Tanner of “M” his life, in the dash for the water for the wounded. I hope Madden received a medal.

In view of the conflict between the foregoing and the statements contained in your article, I ask you to investigate the matter further, with a view to correcting the false impression that your readers must have concerning Reno and his command. In conclusion, I ask you “how, in God’s name,” you could expect Reno, with one hundred and twenty men, to ride through upwards of three thousand armed Sioux, and then be of assistance to Custer or any one else? I say we were sent into that valley and caught in an ambush like rats in a trap. That if we had remained ten minutes longer, there would not have been one left to tell the tale. That the much abused Reno did charge out of the timber, and that we who survive owe our lives to that identical charge which he led. We, at least, give him credit for saving what he did of his command. I am, sir,