The Last Stand: Custer, Sitting Bull, and the Battle of the Little Big Horn

technique pioneered by Benjamin Church during King Philip’s War; see my Mayflower, pp. 311–44. Red Cloud’s defiant words appeared in the June 9, 1876, New York Herald, cited by James Olson in Red Cloud and the Sioux Problem, p. 218. John Bourke in On the Border said that Crook’s belief that the Lakota “would never stand punishment as the Apaches had done” was based on the fact that they had “accumulated much property in ponies and other things, and the loss would be felt most deeply,” p. 286.
    Grouard described the “Sioux war-cry” and the confrontation between the Lakota and Crows and Shoshone in DeBarthe, pp. 224–25. Anson Mills judged the Lakota “the best cavalry soldiers on earth” in My Story, p. 406. In his Autobiography, Crook claimed the Indians “outnumbered the soldiers three to one and were armed with the latest model repeating rifles,” p. 196. John Finerty in War-Path and Bivouac wrote that an incredible twenty-five thousand cartridges were expended during the battle, adding, “It often takes an immense amount of lead to send even one Indian to the happy hunting grounds,” p. 141. Mills described the Lakota and Cheyenne’s intimidating appearance in My Story, p. 406. Crook remembered how the war whoop “caused the hair to raise on end” in his Autobiography, p. 194. Bourke in On the Border details the column’s activities after the battle, p. 322. Libbie’s letter mentioning Crook’s battle is in Merington, p. 303. Bates in Custer’s Indian Battles quoted a bit of soldier’s doggerel describing Crook after the Battle of the Rosebud: “I’d braid my beard in two long tails / And idle all the day / In whittling sticks and wondering / What the New York papers say,” p. 30.
    Terry’s June 21, 1876, letter in which he describes his anger over Reno’s actions no longer exists; before its disappearance it was quoted in Hughes’s “Campaign Against the Sioux in 1876” and is reprinted in Willert’s edition of Terry’s letters, p. 47. Hughes in “Campaign Against the Sioux in 1876” approvingly quotes Terry’s personal motto: “Zeal without discretion only does harm,” p. 43. Custer’s criticisms of Reno appeared in the July 11, 1876, New York Herald . Terry’s movements on June 20, 1876, are outlined in his Field Diary, p. 23. Peter Thompson tells of how Custer “upbraided” Reno in his Account, p. 9; he also states that “Custer and some other of the officers were anxious to witness the opening of the Centennial Exposition,” p. 10.
    Mark Kellogg’s description of Terry strategizing aboard the Far West appeared in the July 1, 1876, New York Herald . John Bailey writes of Terry’s background in his biography of the general, Pacifying the Plains, p. 5. Roger Darling writes insightfully about Terry’s mind-set in A Sad and Terrible Blunder, commenting that “he was proud of his plan,” p. 60. According to S. L. A. Marshall in The Crimsoned Prairie, it was “not a very bright plan; the synchronization of such movement over great distance being next to impossible,” p. 113. Robert Hughes in “Campaign Against the Sioux in 1876” writes of the inadequacy of the available maps: “A copy of the map then extant . . . [shows] that the Rosebud was an unexplored and unmapped region,” p. 35; Hughes also states that Terry’s belief that the Lakota and Cheyenne were in the vicinity of the Little Bighorn was based on the Crow scouts’ reports of “many smokes” in that region, p. 36. In a Jan. 1, 1892, letter to Godfrey, Brisbin described the scene in the cabin of the Far West, in Brininstool, p. 276.
    In his biography of Custer, Jay Monaghan wrote of Custer’s neglect of orders at the Battle of Gettysburg: “[H]e had successfully evaded a superior’s order and by doing so become a gallant—perhaps a key—figure in winning the greatest battle of the war,” p. 149. Or as John Gray comments in Centennial Campaign, “When perceptive disobedience snatches victory from defeat, who complains?” p. 148. Even Terry’s biographer, John Bailey, questioned Terry’s decision not to accompany Custer: “Terry might be faulted because he did not go in command of the Seventh Cavalry himself. He had experienced problems with both Colonel Custer and Major Reno and he might have kept them in the harness by his presence,” in Pacifying the Plains, p. 156. Terry’s comments about wishing “to give [Custer] a chance to do something” are in Brisbin’s Jan. 1,