George Armstrong Custer and I had one thing in common. We both attended the United States Military Academy at West Point. He graduated. I didn't.
What few people realize is that General Custer went down with a huge fight in the hills above the Little Bighorn River. I have spent a fair amount of time hunting both on the river and up at the headwaters in the Big Horn Mountains. it is a magical place. Custer had a big family riding with him. His brothers, Thomas and Boston, his brother-in-law, James Calhoun, and his nephew, Autie Reed were all with him on the day they met their Maker. It wasn't reckless abandon that got the General killed. It was poor intelligence. There were supposed to be only 1,000 Natives camped in the river bottom, not 10,000.
The battle then took hours, not just a few minutes. Custer had it going until he ran out of ammunition. It still pains me to know how much so many Native Americans have given in defense of "their" country. And the government "took" so much from them in the first place.
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