Battle of the little Bighorn: Custer's death at the hands of Sitting Bull's Sioux in 1876 made him a martyr to many Americans. (American History).

Massacred!" cried the headline in the Bismarck Tribune in 1876. "General Custer and [his] men massacred. No officer or man of five companies left to tell the tale."

The news was grim. On June 25, 1876, George Armstrong Custer--commanding officer of the Seventh Cavalry Regiment--and his men had charged into a Sioux and Cheyenne village in the Montana Territory. Custer and his entire band of 210 soldiers were killed.

The news shocked Americans. How could Indians have beaten the mighty U.S. Army and one of its most celebrated heroes? And what did the defeat mean for the young country and its hopes for westward expansion?

A Glash of Wills

The Battle of the Little Bighorn, also known as Custer's Last Stand, was one of the most decisive struggles of the Indian Wars on the Great Plains.

By 1876, America's centennial (100-year anniversary), the U.S. had already broken several treaties recognizing Indian land and rights. Despite bloody conflicts, caravans of white settlers, in wagons pulled by horses and oxen, had continued to move farther west, into Indian Territory.

Most settlers built farms on the land. Others hunted, competing with Indians for buffalo hides and slaughtering the once plentiful herds. Indians and the Army alike committed atrocities (brutal or cruel acts).

The Second Treaty of Fort Laramie, signed in 1868, had promised peace with the Sioux. In exchange, they were guaranteed the western part of present-day South Dakota as a reservation and the use of vast hunting grounds that extended west to the Bighorn Mountains.

A Fragile Peace

Peace did not last long. Living conditions on the reservation were horrible. And, when gold was discovered in the Black Hills of South Dakota, white miners rushed to the area to stake claims. In late 1875, many Sioux left their reservation in protest.

The U.S. government started to negotiate for control of the Black Hills. Meanwhile, it ordered every Indian back onto the reservation by January 31, 1876. Those who didn't obey would be considered "hostile."

Sitting Bull, a Hunkpapa Sioux medicine man, had refused to sign the treaty. He also expressed contempt for the chiefs who did sign, and for the gifts and meager provisions they received from the U.S. government as bribery.

Led by Sitting Bull, a large group of Sioux and Cheyenne resisted the move back to the reservation. Instead, they braced for war with the Army "bluecoats."

The Battle Is Set

In the summer of 1876, the U.S. Army planned a three-pronged attack against the resisting Indians camped in the Montana Territory. General George Crook, Colonel John Gib bon, and General's Alfred Terry would each approach the "hostiles" from a different direction and surround them. At the front of Terry's forces rode a dashing officer, George Custer.

Once the youngest general in th Union Army, Custer was famous for his fearlessness in the Civil War. But his courage had a dark side. Custer was a vain, arrogant (boastful) man. In battle, he gambled recklessly with his men's lives. And he was capable of great cruelty.

In 1868, Custer had attacked a peaceful Cheyenne village and slaughtered most of its inhabitants. He later claimed to have killed 103 warriors, but most of the dead were women, children, and old men.

Custer's Last Stand

On June 25, after a long, hard ride, the Seventh Cavalry reached the southern end of the Sioux encampment near the Little Bighorn River (see map). Custer decided on a risky maneuver (movement of troops). Without knowing how many braves he faced, he divided his soldiers-- about 650 men--into three groups.

Custer refused to listen to his scouts' warnings about the size of the Indian encampment, or wait for support from General Terry's troops. He also didn't know that General Crook had already been beaten back by braves led by the Oglala Sioux warrior Crazy Horse.

In fact, Custer relied on nothing but his own sense of destiny. According to one witness, he stood on the ridge above the Indian camp, which spread for miles below, and said to his commanders, "Hurrah, boys, we've got them."

But Custer had miscalculated. There were at least 2,000 warriors in the Indian camp--probably the largest Indian army ever assembled.

Major Marcus Reno led the first charge across the river into one end of the camp. The soldiers were immediately driven back, raking heavy casualties (losses). The group of Indians chasing Reno then shifted course and attacked Custer's unit of 210 soldiers.

Custer panicked and divided his troops into two groups, one led by Colonel George W. Yates. Meanwhile, Crazy Horse's warriors charged in from another direction. Custer's men were now surrounded. The braves pounded the trapped bluecoats with bullets and arrows.

The terrified soldiers fired wildly, sometimes hitting each other. They also shot their horses in an effort to set up barricades. Two Moons, a Cheyenne chief, later said, "We circled around them, swirling like water 'round a stone."

In less than an hour, the battle was over. "It took about as long as it rakes for a hungry man to eat his dinner," Two Moons observed. Custer and all of his men were dead.

A Bitter Victory

The Indians won the battle, but in the end they would lose the war. Furious at the Army's humiliating defeat, U.S. officials stopped negotiating with the Indians and simply rook away most of the land promised to them. Army troops hunted down the Sioux and forced them onto an ever-shrinking reservation. After surrendering, Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse both were murdered.

Although modern scholars are not so kind to Custer, his reckless bravery and untimely (before the expected time) death have made him a subject of fascination to Americans. Today, the site of his famous last stand is a national park.

It is because of Custer's failure that we remember him at all. Says Neil C. Mangan, superintendent of the Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument: "In defeat, Custer found a fame and legend that no victory would ever have given him."

Your Turn

WORD MATCH

1. centennial A. movement

2. attocities B. losses

3. maneuver C. before the

4. Casualties D. 100-year anniversary

5. untimely E. brutal or cruel acts

THINK ABOUT IT

Was Custer a martyr for U.S. expansion or a villain of history?

GENERAL GEORGE CUSTER www.ibiscom.com/custer.htm

American History word match

1. D

2. E

3. A

4. B

5. C