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

what has come to be called the Lone Tepee, where they had enjoyed some of the meat and soup left for the dead warrior’s journey into the afterlife. When Gerard finally arrived at the Lone Tepee, the Arikara One Feather was fuming. “I scolded Gerard for not staying with us . . . to give us the orders,” he remembered.
    But Gerard, whom the Arikara called “Fast Bull,” had decided he had more important things to do than interpret. Instead of stopping to speak with his charges, he rode his big black horse to the top of a knoll overlooking the Lone Tepee. There he saw what the Crow scouts had been observing for some time now: billowing clouds of dust rolling up the Little Bighorn Valley in the northerly breeze. Gerard turned his horse sideways and waving his hat in his hand shouted out to Custer, “Here are your Indians, running like devils!”

    A s his actions at the last officer’s call indicated, Custer knew better than to trust the grandstanding Gerard. In this instance, however, the interpreter had found a way to make his commander finally pay attention. Waving his hat as if he were Buffalo Bill Cody, Gerard had played directly to Custer’s worst fears. Not only had the relatively small village at the Lone Tepee disbanded; the much larger encampment on the Little Bighorn was, at least according to Gerard, also on the run.
    Custer immediately began to rethink his strategy. If the village was rapidly disintegrating into fragments, its great size was no longer a concern. What mattered now was capturing as many of the fleeing Indians as possible. As it turned out, Benteen’s battalion to the left was well positioned to meet any Indians that might try to escape up the Little Bighorn to the southeast; Custer must now get himself and Reno down into the valley to the west and attack whatever Indians were left at the original encampment site, still hidden from view by an exasperating bluff. At the very least, they could drive the fleeing village down the valley toward the Montana Column to the north. According to the schedule outlined aboard the Far West, Terry and Gibbon should be arriving soon at the mouth of the Little Bighorn.
    By now, Reno’s battalion, which had been left behind during Custer’s final sprint to the Lone Tepee, was just arriving on the left side of the creek. Custer motioned to his second-in-command with his hat. Reno crossed the creek to receive his orders, delivered to him by Adjutant Cooke. Half a dozen people later claimed to have heard Custer’s orders, and as a consequence there are half a dozen versions of what the adjutant said. This is the gist: “Mr. Gerard reports the Indians are two and a half miles ahead and running. Move forward at as fast a gait as you think prudent and charge as soon as you find them, and we will support you with the whole outfit.” Except for telling Reno to take the Indian scouts along with him, that was it.
    The major turned to go with his three troops down the left bank of Sun Dance Creek. But there was a problem with the Arikara scouts. Instead of galloping ahead of Reno’s battalion, they remained clustered behind Custer and his staff. Custer turned to Gerard and told him to tell the scouts, “You have disobeyed me. Move to one side and let the soldiers pass you in the charge. If any man of you is not brave, I will take away his weapons and make a woman of him.” All of the Arikara knew what the real problem was. Gerard had been too busy pretending he was a member of Custer’s inner circle to explain to them what they were supposed to do. One of the scouts turned to the interpreter: “Tell him if he does the same to all his white soldiers, who are not so brave as we are, it will take him a long time indeed.” The scouts laughed and to assure the general of their bravery indicated in sign language that they were “hungry for battle.” Gerard later took credit for getting the Arikara back on track, but in actuality he was the cause of the problem in the first place.
    Just prior to the departure of Reno’s battalion, Lieutenant Varnum arrived from scouting the left side of the creek. Still desperate for information, Custer asked him what he’d seen.
    “I guess you could see about all I could see of the situation,” Varnum said.
    “I don’t know,” Custer replied. “What did you see?”
    “The whole valley in front is full of Indians.”
    Custer knew that Varnum was exhausted. Over the course of the last twenty-four hours his scouting