The Fights on the Little Horn

50 Years of Research into Custer's Last Stand

Gordon Harper

• Publisher: Casemate
• Year: 2014
• ISBN:
  9781612002156
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: North American History
• Index: History

Winner of the John Carroll Award and the G.Joseph Sills Jr. Book Award. A deeply researched work on the infamous 1876 battle, filled with new discoveries. This remarkable book synthesizes a lifetime of in-depth research into one of America's most storied disasters, the defeat of Custer's 7th Cavalry at the hands of the Sioux and Cheyenne, as well as the complete annihilation of that part of the cavalry led by Custer himself. The author, Gordon Harper, spent countless hours on the battlefield itself, as well as researching every iota of evidence of the fight from both sides, white and Indian. He was thus able to recreate every step of the battle as authoritatively as anyone could, dispelling myths and falsehoods along the way. When he passed away in 2009, he left nearly two million words of original research and writing, and in this book, his work has been condensed for the general public to observe his key findings and the crux of his narrative on the exact course of the battle. One of his first observations is that the fight took place along the Little Horn River—its junction with the Big Horn was several miles away—so the term for the battle, "Little Big Horn" has always been a misnomer. He precisely traces the mysterious activities of Benteen's battalion on that fateful day, and why it couldn't come to Custer's reinforcement. He describes Reno's desperate fight in unprecedented depth, as well as how that unnerved officer benefited from the unexpected heroism of many of his men. Indian accounts, ever-present throughout this book, come to the fore especially during Custer's part of the fight, because no white soldier survived it. However, analysis of the forensic evidence—like tracking cartridges and bullets discovered on the battlefield, plus the locations of bodies—assist in drawing an accurate scenario of how the final scene unfolded. It may indeed be clearer now than it was to the doomed 7th Cavalrymen at the time, who, through the dust and smoke and Indians seeming to rise by hundreds from the ground, only gradually realized the extent of the disaster. Of additional interest is the narrative of the battlefield after the fight, when successive burial teams had to be dispatched for the gruesome task because prior ones invariably did a poor job. Though the author is no longer with us, his daughter Tori Harper, along with historians Gordon Richard and Monte Akers, have done yeoman's work in preserving his valuable research for the public. "Having read and studied several previous books on the Custer Battle, I was hoping that something new would emerge and I was not disappointed... certainly a book that one cannot put down." —Norman Franks, author of Ton-Up Lancs and Under the Guns of the Red Baron

CHAPTER 1

THE APPROACH TO THE LITTLE HORN: BENTEEN’S MARCH

“Half a league, half a league, half a league onward”
—ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON

CUSTER’S ORDERS TO BENTEEN

Battalion assignments having been made just past the divide, Custer and Reno moved down Ash Creek while Benteen bore off to the left, following his verbal orders. Although it has become fashionable in some circles to theorize that Benteen’s task was to enter the Little Horn valley and to sweep north, there is no doubt as to what was intended, except perhaps in Benteen’s own musings.

Later, at the Reno Court of Inquiry in 1879, Benteen would say: “My orders were to proceed out into a line of bluffs about 4 or 5 miles away, to pitch into anything I came across, and to send back word to General Custer at once if I came across anything.” He stated that these orders were amplified by both the chief trumpeter and the sergeant-major of the regiment to require him to go on to the next line of bluffs and the next, and then “to go on to the valley—and if there was nothing in the valley, to go on to the next valley.”

He testified that these orders constituted nothing more than:

valley hunting ad infinitum . . . scarcely knew what I had to do . . . I was sent off to hunt up some Indians. . . . I could have gone on in as straight a line as the country would admit, all the way to Fort Benton . . . I might have gone on 20 miles in a straight line without finding a valley . . . those were exact orders. No interpretation at all . . . I understood it as a rather senseless order If I had gone on to the second valley, I would have been 25 miles away. I don’t know where I would have been.¹

Benteen responded to questions about his returning to the main trail by stating that “it was scarcely a compliance” with his orders, and “I must say I did” consider it a violation of his instructions. The truth of the matter is considerably different.

When Custer launched his regiment against the village discovered by his scouts at the Crow’s nest, he had only an approximate fix on its location. The scouts had located it around the mouth of Ash Creek, but there was the distinct possibility that it or other villages lay upriver or downriver. Those scouts included six Crow Indians and their interpreter Michel “Mitch” Boyer. Boyer was born in 1839 of a French father and Lakota mother and lived with the Crows. He had been mentored by Jim Bridger, and Boyer was considered second only as a guide and scout to that famous mountain man. Mitch Boyer and his Crows knew the area intimately, so from them and the surprisingly good maps which he had, Custer also knew that there were several tributaries flowing into Ash Creek from the west/southwest, i.e. from his left, and that the Sioux used these smaller creeks for campsites, and their valleys as roadways to the Little Horn. His orders to Benteen were designed to ensure that these smaller valleys and the larger valley of the Little Horn were seen in order to determine whether, in fact, Indian camps were located there.

Although Custer had Varnum and some of the scouts going ahead over much of this same ground, he obviously wanted a larger force in the vicinity, in case it should be needed quickly. Whatever written notes or orders that existed were lost to posterity—unlike the famous later order from Custer to Benteen—but sufficient witnesses to the verbal orders left a record, including Benteen himself, that there is no need to guess what they indeed were.

Lieutenant Frank Gibson, Benteen’s own lieutenant, wrote his wife on July 4, 1876 that: “Benteen’s battalion . . . was sent to the left about five miles to see if the Indians were trying to escape up the valley of the Little Big Horn, after which we were to hurry and rejoin the command as quickly as possible...”²

Edward Godfrey, who commanded K Company of Benteen’s battalion, wrote in his 1892 Century Magazine article: “Benteen’s battalion was ordered to the left and front, to a line of high bluffs about three or four miles distant. Benteen was ordered if he saw anything to send word to Custer, but to pitch into anything he came across; if when he arrived at the high bluffs he could not see any enemy, he should continue his march . . . until he could see the Little Big Horn valley . . . ”³ Godfrey told Walter Camp that “Cooke came up after passing the divide, and gave Benteen his orders to make scout to the left. . . . Reason for sending Benteen off to left was that Custer expected to find Indians scattered along the river, and did not know whether he would find them down stream or up stream from the point he would strike the river.”⁴

Lieutenant Winfield Edgerly was second in command of D Company of Benteen’s battalion. He also left a record. In a letter to his wife dated July 4, 1876, he wrote: “We were in Benteen’s battalion, and our orders were to go over to the left and charge the Indians as soon as we saw them, and keep an officer with about six men in advance . . . to report anything they might see.”⁵ Edgerly was also interviewed by Walter Camp, and Camp’s notes say that Edgerly told him: “Custer’s idea was that they would scatter and run in all directions, hence he sent Benteen to southwest.”

Benteen himself seemed to understand his orders quite clearly prior to his testimony quoted above. In a letter of July 2, 1876 to his wife, he wrote: “I was ordered with 3 Co.’s . . . to go to the left for the purpose of hunting for the valley of the river—Indian camp—or anything I could find.” And on July 4, 1876, also to his wife: “I was ordered . . . to go over the immense hills to the left, in search of the valley, which was supposed to be very near by.”⁶

In his official report dated July 4, 1876, Benteen had no difficulty in recounting his orders in detail:

The directions I received from Lieutenant-Colonel Custer were, to move with my command to the left, to send well-mounted officers with about six men who would ride rapidly to a line of bluffs about five miles to our left and front, with instructions to report at once to me if anything of Indians could be seen from that point. I was to follow the movement of this detachment as rapidly as possible . . . the other instructions, which were, that if in my judgment there was nothing to be seen of Indians, Valleys &c, in the direction I was going, to return with the battalion to the trail the command was following.⁷

Benteen said much the same in an interview published in the New York Herald on August 8, 1876, and repeated the basic contents of his official report, with a few extra details, in both of the narratives he wrote in the 1890s. It is only in his Reno Inquiry testimony that he mischaracterized his instructions; but it is exactly that testimony which has colored most histories of the Little Horn ever since.

Benteen’s battalion was to consist of three companies—Weir’s D and Godfrey’s K, in addition to his own H—and although many writers have tried to make something of significance out of Custer’s choice of the delegated companies, including one writer who went to great lengths to show that Custer had divided up the combat-experienced companies among the various battalions, and others who have tried to show that Custer kept his favorite company commanders with himself, the more prosaic truth is that these three were simply half of the left-wing organization of the regiment. Benteen had, in fact, commanded this wing during the march from Fort Lincoln up until the evening of June 22 when Custer had temporarily abolished the wing organizations. All of the other battalion assignments were similarly constructed. Custer did, however, make a minor adjustment in that he switched companies A and K (the previous alignment had been ADH and GMK). He made the same minor adjustment in the battalions of the right wing, switching L and C (the original alignment had been CIB and EFL). His reasons for these changes are not readily apparent.

According to Benteen, the troops were in column dismounted when he received his orders. He had his three companies move out on their left oblique mission, sending his own first lieutenant, Frank Gibson, ahead with an escort of about eight men. The number is variously given as six or ten or a dozen, or just “some,” but it makes sense that two sets of four would be selected for the duty. The time was approximately 12:15 p.m., and Benteen would not rejoin the main command for another four hours.

BENTEEN’S LEFT OBLIQUE AND RETURN TO ASH CREEK

Although his orders called for a rapid movement, Benteen moved along only at a fairly fast walk. To be sure, the nature of the terrain—though not nearly so forbidding as it has been made out to be—had an effect upon the pace. Not everyone, however, was slowed by the ground, for after the battalion had been marching for about fifteen minutes and had covered something less than a mile, Chief Trumpeter Henry Voss galloped up with additional instructions for Benteen.

After proffering the usual “with the compliments of General Custer,” Voss instructed Benteen that should nothing be observed from the first ridge of hills about a quarter mile off, then Benteen should carry on to the next line of bluffs, the remainder of the orders remaining in effect. Voss then galloped away to rejoin the main command on Ash Creek. Custer, on the main trail, could see that this first divide did not appear to be promising in terms of viewing the Little Horn valley.

As Benteen started up again, Gibson crested the first ridgeline and saw that the small valley of the dry creek below was devoid of life. There is no record of how he did so, whether by signal or by courier, but Gibson did report that nothing of any consequence could be seen. Benteen’s instruction to keep on going was relayed to Gibson, again by unknown means—although it may simply have been shouted, since Gibson was not that far in front of Benteen. Gibson and his party dropped down over the ridgeline, through the narrow bottom and up the other side.

As this was transpiring, Benteen was overtaken by another messenger from Custer, this time in the person of Regimental Sergeant Major William Sharrow. Sharrow brought Custer’s compliments along with orders that if nothing could be seen from the second ridgeline, then Benteen was to keep on until he could see the valley of the Little Horn and whatever might be visible therein. The remainder of the orders as to rapidity, reporting and rejoining was repeated.⁸

It must be noted that nothing in Benteen’s orders, notwithstanding his later statements to the contrary, told him to “pitch into anything he came across.” This is evident for the following reasons: 1) his official report mentions nothing of the kind and he would not have omitted something so significant; 2) he was not provided with any medical services or supplies, not even an enlisted medical attendant; 3) Benteen would not have failed to capitalize on that failure, had it truly been an oversight or deliberate act on Custer’s part. He did not however, mention it at any time, even when he was telling the Reno inquiry that he would have been beyond Custer’s aid, had he in fact been forced to fight any major action.

The battalion kept on to the next ridgeline, with Gibson keeping to the high ground and Benteen staying on the lower ground as much as possible by edging to the right. The rate of travel was, on average, a fast walk, perhaps averaging as much as three and a half miles an hour. As Benteen topped the western ridge of the unnamed creek, the valley of which Gibson had crossed and examined some minutes earlier, he could see Gibson on a higher ridge ahead, signaling that there was nothing in the valley of the Little Horn.

Benteen would later say that he had never seen the valley, which was true since it was not viewable from the lower ridges at the nameless creek; but Gibson did see it, of that there can be no doubt. In a letter to Godfrey dated August 9, 1908, Gibson wrote:

I can state definitely that I did find and see it . . . I crossed one insignificant stream running through a narrow valley, which I knew was not the Little Big Horn valley, so I kept on to the high divide on the other side of it, and from the top of it I could see plainly up the Little Big Horn Valley for a long distance, with the aid of the glasses; but in the direction of the village, I could not see far on account of a sharp turn in it . . . I saw not a living thing on it, and I hurried back and reported to Benteen, who then altered his course so as to pick up the main trail.

Some writers have speculated that Gibson was mistaken, and that he was referencing the south fork of Reno Creek, and it is true that in later years, Gibson himself thought he might have been in error; however, it is impossible to confuse the two valleys and it would not have required the use of glasses to see down the rather narrow valley (as compared with the Little Horn valley) of the south fork.

In addition, Gibson stated in a narrative written sometime after 1880 that: “After a fatiguing march over the hills, we reached a point from which the valley of the Little Big Horn could be seen for a distance of ten miles in a southerly direction, but on the North, towards the village, the view was obstructed by very broken country and high hills. We found no Indians and retraced our steps as rapidly as possible.”⁹

Benteen, with his orderly and the Gibson party, descended back into the nameless creek bottom, and led his battalion along it to the valley of Ash Creek and the trail being followed by Custer and the remainder of the regiment. He did so in compliance with his original orders, not in disobedience of them; but he did not increase his rate of march to rejoin the command, nor did he dispatch a courier to Custer with the important intelligence he had gathered—this was a direct contravention of his orders, one which he consistently tried to hide or gloss over.

The squadron walked down the little creek bottom until it came out into the valley of Ash Creek at almost exactly 2:00 p.m. The pack train was in sight coming down the trail, about a half-mile away, according to every witness on the topic, and Benteen hurried onto the trail so as to put some space between the train and himself. It would not have looked good on the record should he have allowed the train to beat him down the trail. At this point in time, the Custer/Reno commands were only about three miles ahead of Benteen, and had passed the mouth of the little creek just twenty-five to thirty minutes before. Benteen had been off on his scout for slightly more than an hour and a half, and had covered almost exactly six miles. The time and distance involved in this scout has been the subject of some little controversy and speculation in the intervening years—mainly because of Benteen’s obfuscating testimony at the Reno court of inquiry. The contemporary record however, is quite clear, and the sighting of the pack train, which is mentioned by virtually every witness, establishes the truth beyond any doubt.

Gibson, to his wife July...