NFL Quiz: Name the Top 5 rushers of all time? Answer below.
George Armstrong Custer
I know what you”re thinking…I already know about this guy.
Well, my own curiosity was pricked by a recent U.S. News
article by Andrew Curry which raises the subject of Custer”s
“Last Stand,” and the issue of whether or not it was so heroic.
Recently, a professor of anthropology who had analyzed the
battlefield after a wildfire laid it bare, came up with the
conclusion that Custer”s men panicked more than anything else
in the battle. “There was no last stand in the gallant, heroic
sense,” said the professor.
According to this theory, the Indians had an incentive to play up
the bravery of Custer”s men during their later treaty negotiations.
Simply put, they didn”t want to offend the white man”s sense of
pride at this humiliating defeat. But later on, the U.S. News
piece says, Indian accounts of the Battle of the Little Big Horn
told of Custer”s men running like “a stampede of buffalo,”
“shouting like drunken men, firing into the ground, into the air,
wildly in every way.”
So folks, I happen to have some terrific sources nearby and I
figured, what the heck, let”s retell the story here and see if I can
add anything to the discussion. Pull up a chair…and take sides.
Custer was born in 1839 and gained early fame by becoming the
youngest Union general in the Civil War. On June 29, 1863, he
was promoted to brigadier-general, just days before the Battle of
Gettysburg. It was here that he made his debut as a ranking
cavalry officer in one of the rare actions of the war that featured
an old-fashioned clash of mounted men (against Jeb Stuart).
By the end of the war, Custer was General Sheridan”s right-hand
man as the Union pushed the Confederate forces to their day of
reckoning at Appomattox. Actually, Sheridan and Custer sought
to bully the Confederate General Gordon (one of your editor”s
favorites…a classic southern gentleman) into surrendering the
Army of Northern Virginia but Gordon stood his ground, waiting
for negotiations between Grant and Lee. [Custer is in the famous
painting of the surrender at Appomattox Court House].
Custer is also known for an incident late in 1864. Back then, the
Confederate great, Colonel John Singleton Mosby, was the
Union”s public enemy #1 and General Grant had ordered that any
of Mosby”s men who were captured were to be executed. Custer
followed through on the orders, putting 6 to death, including a
17-year-old boy who was shot before his mother…the mother”s
efforts to save her son notwithstanding.
Historian Paul Johnson describes Custer thusly. “He was a brave
but insensitive, arrogant, and often stupid man, and whenever his
military record is examined in detail, he emerges badly.”
Johnson adds, “The best thing about him was his taste in
painting; especially his admiration for Albert Bierstadt. In fact,
shortly before Custer was killed, he lunched in Bierstadt”s New
York studio.”
After the war, Custer was posted to the frontier (as were many of
the Union generals). But in 1867 he was court-martialed and
suspended for a year for a grab bag of charges, including
ordering deserters shot, failing to bury soldiers killed in battle,
and leaving his post and traveling 250 miles to spend a night
with his wife. [Very sweet…an Al Gore kind of thing.]
Custer returned in 1868 and was placed in command of the
Seventh Cavalry. He was already well-known to the Plains
Indians, having slaughtered 103 in Black Kettle”s Cheyenne
village back in 1867 (only 11 of whom were warriors). The
Indians called him “Long Hair,” or “Hard Backsides,” the latter
because he could chase Indians forever without leaving his
saddle.
The Treaty of 1868 is a key to the whole Custer story. At the
time, the Black Hills region (roughly covering the territory from
present day western South Dakota through parts of Wyoming and
Montana) was the center of the world for the Indians. “It was the
place of gods and holy mountains, where warriors went to speak
with the Great Spirit and await visions.” [Dee Brown]
In 1868, the “Great Father,” the Indian term given to whomever
was U.S. president, considered the land generally worthless and
handed it over to the Indians, forever, by treaty.
Specifically, the treaty read: “No white person or persons shall
be permitted to settle upon or occupy any portion of the territory,
or without the consent of the Indians to pass through the same.”
The great Sioux chief, Sitting Bull, said, “We want no white men
here. The Black Hills belong to me. If the whites try to take
them, I will fight.”
And, of course, by 1872, the white man was all over the territory.
Gold had been discovered in the hills. The Indians observed how
the yellow metal drove white men crazy. By 1874, there was
such a clamor for the product from the gold-hungry public that
the Army was ordered to make a reconnaissance into the Black
Hills. The U.S. government didn”t bother to obtain permission
even though the treaty of 1868 prohibited entry without the
Indians approval. Leading the troops was General George
Armstrong Custer.
Sioux Baptiste Good proclaimed, “The white man is in the Black
Hills just like maggots…The chief of all thieves (Custer) made a
road into the Black Hills last summer, and I want the Great
Father to pay the damages for what Custer has done.”
The U.S. sought to renegotiate the treaty. Crazy Horse replied,
“One does not sell the earth upon which the people walk.”
President Grant recognized the Indian”s anger and announced his
determination “to prevent all invasion of this country by
intruders so long as by law and treaty it is secured to the
Indians.”
But Custer said the hills were filled with gold “from the grass
roots down.” The white men formed like locusts. Sioux Chief
Red Cloud, who had been instrumental in the treaty of 1868, was
sure that the Great Father would keep his promise to send
soldiers to drive the miners out. But Red Cloud was losing sight
of the fact that younger warriors were still hunting near the hills
(the rest stayed on reservations largely outside the area). Conflict
seemed inevitable.
In the spring of 1875, General Crook had taken his own survey
of the Black Hills and found 1,000 miners there. He ordered
them to leave but made no effort to enforce it. Grant finally sent
a commission to “treat with the Sioux Indians for the
relinquishment of the Black Hills.”
But bands of primarily Sioux warriors, hunting on the range
according to their treaty rights, continued to harass the miners.
The army decided they had to move against them.
On May 17, 1876, Custer led the 7th Cavalry out of Fort
Abraham Lincoln. With him were some 750 men in search of
the Indian encampments, primarily Sitting Bull”s village.
On Wednesday, Little Big Horn.
Sources: “Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee,” Dee Brown; “A
History of the American People,” Paul Johnson; “The Lance and
the Shield,” Robert Utley; “A Great Civil War,” Russell
Weigley.
Top 3 songs for the week of 8/28/71: #1 “How Can You Mend
A Broken Heart” (The Bee Gees) #2 “Take Me Home, Country
Roads” (John Denver) #3 “Signs” (Five Man Electrical Band)
NFL Quiz Answer: Top 5 rushers – Walter Payton, 16726 yds;
Barry Sanders, 15269; Emmitt Smith, 13963; Eric Dickerson,
13259; Tony Dorsett, 12739.Jim Brown, 12312; Marcus Allen,
12243; Franco Harris, 12120. Among active rushers, Ricky
Watters is already at 9083.
Next Bar Chat, Wednesday…Custer gets his.
