The Last Days of George Armstrong Custer (48 page)

Biographical information about the Custer family can be found on the pages of every Custer biography, as well as throughout these notes.

The best book utilizing information from the archaeological digs, a true classic of the battle—although not for beginners—remains
Archaeology, History, and Custer's Last Battle,
by Richard Allan Fox. Dr. Fox combines his extensive knowledge of the battle with his expertise in archaeology to present a fascinating, albeit speculative, glimpse into the unfolding of events on June 25, 1876. See also:
Archaeological Insights into the Custer Battle: A Preliminary Assessment,
by Fox and Scott;
Archaeological Perspectives on the Battle of the Little Bighorn,
by Conner, Fox, Harmon, and Scott;
They Died with Custer: Soldiers' Bones from the Battle of the Little Big Horn,
by Conner, Scott, and Wiley; and Scott's
Uncovering History: Archaeological Investigations at the Little Bighorn.

There are plenty of sources for the Reno inquiry. Some of the better ones are: Utley's
Reno Court of Inquiry: The Chicago Times Account
;
The Reno Court of Inquiry: Abstract of the Official Record of Inquiry,
by Graham; and
The Reno Court of Inquiry,
edited by Nichols. Three other helpful sources are Utley's
Custer and the Great Controversy, The Story of the Little Big Horn,
by Graham, and “The Reno Court Martial,”
Bismarck Tribune,
March 21, 1877.

Reno's side of the story can be found in his “Custer Massacre,” in
Americana Magazine
. A literary duel between Reno and Custer's friend Tom Rosser, as well as plenty of other material, can be found in
The Custer Myth,
edited by Graham.

DeRudio's statement is in Hardorff's
On the Little Bighorn with Walter,
241.

The letter from Lieutenant Lee to Libbie, which is in the collection at the Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument, has been reprinted in
General Custer's Libbie,
by Frost.

The complete story of Benteen and Theodore Goldin can be found in Carroll's
Benteen-Goldin Letters on Custer and His Last Battle
. See also
The Court Martial of Frederick W. Benteen, Major, 9th Cavalry, or Did General Crook Railroad Benteen?,
edited by Carroll.

The list of the men who were awarded Medals of Honor for their action on the hilltop includes:

Company A: Private Neil Bancroft, Private David W. Harris, and Sergeant Stanislas Roy

Company B: Private Thomas J. Callan, Sergeant Benjamin C. Criswell, Private Charles Cunningham, Sergeant Rufus D. Hutchinson, Sergeant Thomas Murray, and Private James Pym

Company C: Sergeant Richard P. Hanley and Private Peter Thompson

Company D: Private Abram B. Brant, blacksmith Frederick Deetline, Private William M. Harris, Private Henry Holden, Private George D. Scott, Private Thomas W. Stivers, Private Frank Tolan, and Private Charles H. Welch

Company G: Private Theodore W. Goldin

Company H: Sergeant George Geiger, blacksmith Henry W. B. Mechlin, Private Otto Voit, and Private Charles Windolph

For the best stories about these heroic men, see: “Account of Edward Pickard,”
Oregon Journal;
“Custer Battle Water Party,” by Brininstool;
Army and Navy Journal
(July 15, 1876);
Winners of the West
(June 24, 1926); “A Survivor's Story of the Custer Massacre on the American Frontier,” by Adams; and
Indian Fights and Fighters,
by Brady.

 

Bibliography

A listing here does not necessarily mean an endorsement of any kind for the credibility of the work; rather, these are publications cited as sources as well as associated material that have assisted in gathering facts and forming observations and opinions. I apologize if I have omitted any material that a writer or a historian has worked so hard to research and publish—which I am sure I unintentionally have—but the bibliography of George Armstrong Custer and the Little Bighorn is perhaps the most voluminous in American history and can at times seem almost unmanageable.

Newspapers and Journals

Army and Navy Journal

Billings Gazette

Bismarck Tribune

Chicago Daily News

Chicago Daily Tribune

Chicago Evening Journal

Chicago Tribune

Cincinnati Commercial

Cincinnati Enquirer

Detroit Free Press

Grand Rapids Daily Eagle

Harper's Weekly

Helena Herald

Inter-Ocean

Minneapolis Tribune

Monroe Commercial

Monroe Democrat

Monroe
[MI]
Evening News

National Tribune

New York Herald

New York Sun

New York Times

New-York Tribune

New York World

Placerville
[CA]
Pony Express Courier

St. Louis Democrat

St. Paul Pioneer Press

Sioux City Journal

Toledo Blade

Walla Walla Bulletin

Washington Post

Washington Star

Winners of the West

Government Reports and Publications

Annual Report to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs,
1875.

Campbell, Marius, et al.
Guidebook of the Western United States; Part A: The Northern Pacific Route.
Bulletin 611. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1916.

Kappler, Charles J., comp.
Indian Affairs: Laws and Treaties
. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1904–41.

44th Cong., 1st sess., Sen. Exec. Doc. No. 52.

44th Cong., 1st sess., House Exec. Doc. No. 184.

Records of the U.S. Army, Box 16, Division of the Missouri, Special File, RG 393.

Register of Delinquencies, 1856–61, United States Military Academy Archives, West Point, New York.

Regulations for the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, New York
. New York: John F. Trow, Printer, 1857.

Report of the Expedition to the Black Hills Under Command of Brevet Major General G. A. Custer,
43rd Cong., 2nd sess., Sen. Exec. Doc. 32.

Report of the Secretary of War Communicating, in Compliance with a Resolution of the Senate of February 4, 1867: Copy of Evidence Taken at Denver and Fort Lyon, Colorado by a Military Commission Ordered to Inquire in the Sand Creek Massacre, November 1864.

Report of the Secretary of War, 1876.

“Report on Management of the War Department, Rep. Heister Clymer, Chairman of Committee.”
House Reports
no. 79, 44th Cong., 1st sess., serial no. 1715 (1876).

Report on the Mineral Wealth, Climate and Rainfall and Natural Resources of the Black Hills of South Dakota,
44th Cong., 1st sess., Exec. Doc. No. 51.

Report on the Yellowstone Expedition of 1873
. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1874.

Special Orders, no. 21, U.S. Military Academy Archives.

War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Records.
130 vols. Washington, D.C., 1880–1901.

Collections

Benteen, Frederick W., Collection. University of Georgia Library.

Bonner, Robert. Papers. New York Public Library.

Brininstool, Earl Alonzo, Collection. Center for American History, University of Texas, Austin.

Camp, Walter M., Papers. Denver Public Library.

Camp, Walter M., Papers. Harold B. Lee Library, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT.

Camp, Walter M., Papers. Lilly Library, Indiana University, Bloomington.

Campbell, Walter Stanley, Collection. Western History Collection, University of Oklahoma, Norman.

Cartwright, R. G., Collection. Phoebe Apperson Hearst Library, Lead, SD.

Custer, Brice C. W. Private Collection.

Custer File and Scrapbooks. Montana Room, Billings Public Library, Billings, MT.

Custer, Elizabeth, Collection. Detroit Public Library.

Custer, Elizabeth B., Collection. Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument, Crow Agency. MT.

Custer, George Armstrong, Collection. Monroe County Library System, Monroe, MI.

Frost, Lawrence A., Collection. Monroe County Historical Museum, Monroe, MI.

Ghent, William J., Papers. Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.

Godfrey, Edward S., Papers. U.S. Army Military History Institute, Carlisle, PA.

Grinnell, George Bird, Papers. Braun Research Library, Institute for the Study of the American West, Autry National Center, Los Angeles, CA.

Hagner, Francis R., Collection. New York Public Library.

Hein, Louis, Collection. Special Collections Division, Georgetown University Library, Washington, D.C.

Kellogg Collection. North Dakota State Historical Society.

Kuhlman, Charles, Collection. Harold B. Lee Library, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT.

McCracken Research Library, Buffalo Bill Historical Center, Cody, WY.

Merington, Marguerite, Papers. New York Public Library.

National Archives, Washington, D.C.

Order of the Indian Wars Papers. U.S. Military History Institute, Carlisle, PA.

Oshkosh, Wisconsin, Public Museum.

Ricker, Eli, Collection. Nebraska State Historical Society, Lincoln.

Smith, Nettie Brown, Collection. Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley.

Terry Family Collection. Beinecke Library, Yale University, New Haven, CT.

Van de Water, Frederic, Papers. New York Public Library.

Wyoming State Archives, Cheyenne.

Periodicals

Adams, Jacob. “A Survivor's Story of the Custer Massacre on the American Frontier.”
Journal of American History
3 (1909).

Aiken, Will. “A New Story of Custer's Last Stand, by the Messenger Boy Who Survived.”
Montana Historical Society Contributions
4 (1923).

Aimore, Alan. “U.S. Military Academy Civil War Sources and Statistics.”
Military Collector and Historian
54, no. 3 (Fall 2002).

Alfield, Philip L. “Major Reno and His Family in Illinois.”
English Westerners' Brand Book,
July 1971.

Allison, E. H. “Surrender of Sitting Bull.”
South Dakota Historical Quarterly
6 (1912).

Ambrose, Stephen E. “Sidesaddle Soldier: Libbie Custer's Partnership in Glory.”
Timeline
7 (August–September 1990).

Anderson, Harry H. “Cheyennes at the Little Bighorn: A Study in Statistics.”
North Dakota History
27, no. 3 (Summer 1960).

——
—. “Indian Peace Talkers and the Conclusion of the Sioux War of 1876.”
Nebraska History,
December 1963.

Anderson, Ian. “Sitting Bull and the Mounties.”
Wild West,
February 1998.

Arnold, Steve. “Cooke's Scrawled Note: Last Word from a Doomed Command.”
Greasy Grass
14 (May 1998).

Athearn, Robert G. “War Paint Against Brass.”
Montana
6
,
no. 3 (July 1956).

Bailey, Edward C. “Echoes from Custer's Last Fight.”
Military Affairs
17, no. 4 (1953).

Baird, Andrew T. “Into the Valley Rode the Six Hundred: The 7th Cavalry and the Battle of the Little Bighorn.”
Vulcan Historical Review
4 (Spring 2000).

Barnard, Sandy. “Custer's Burial Revisited: West Point, 1877.”
6th Annual Symposium Custer Battlefield Historical & Museum Association,
1992.

Barnett, Louise. “Powder River.”
Greasy Grass
16 (May 2000).

Bates, Colonel Charles Francis. “The Red Men and the Black Hills.”
Outlook,
July 27, 1927.

Beardsley, J. L. “Could Custer Have Won?”
Outdoor Life
71, no. 3 (March 1933).

Beck, Paul. “Military Officers' Views of Indian Scouts.”
Military History of the West
23, no. 1 (Spring 1993).

Benham, D. J. “The Sioux Warrior's Revenge.”
Canadian Magazine
43 (September 1914).

Braatz, Timothy. “Clash of Cultures as Euphemism: Avoiding History at the Little Bighorn.”
American Indian Culture and Research Journal
28, no. 4 (2004).

Brackett, William S. “Custer's Last Battle on the Little Big Horn in Montana, June 25, 1876.”
Contributions to the Historical Society of Montana
4 (1903).

Braden, Charles. “An Incident of the Yellowstone Expedition of 1873.”
Journal of the United States Cavalry Association
15, no. 54 (October 1904).

——
—. “The Yellowstone Expedition of 1873.”
Journal of the United States Cavalry Association
16 (October 1905).

Bradley, James H. “Journal of the Sioux Campaign of 1876 Under the Command of General John Gibbon.”
Contributions to the Historical Society of Montana
4 (1903).

Brady, Cyrus T. “Captain Yates' Capture of Rain-in-the-Face.”
The Teepee Book
. Sheridan, WY: June 1916.

Bray, Kingsley M. “Teton Sioux Population History, 1655–1881.”
Nebraska History
75, no. 2 (Summer 1994).

Briggs, Harold E. “The Black Hills Gold Rush.”
North Dakota Historical Quarterly
5, no. 2 (January 1931).

Brigham, Eric. “Custer's Last Meeting with Secretary of War Belknap at Fort Abraham Lincoln.”
North Dakota History,
August 1952.