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John William Dear was born in 1845 into a close-knit farming family in Northern Virginia. After the Civil War, when he fought as a Confederate soldier with Mosby's Rangers, he went West. For fifteen years, until his premature death, Dear lived a tumultuous life in the West as one of the last fur traders on the Upper Missouri and as the longest serving, government-appointed Indian Trader to Red Cloud's Sioux. But misfortune struck time and again: he was stripped of his lucrative tradership by a corrupt Commissioner of Indian Affairs and a former Governor of Nebraska and he lost his trading business when the President changed the border between Dakota Territory and Nebraska to prevent JW from trading with his Indian clientele. His is an authentic Wild West story, true and tragic.In the summer of 1871 JW met Red Cloud, the powerful leader of the Oglala who at that time was probably the most respected Indian chief in America. For the next twelve years the two men lived alongside each other on the vast Northern Plains. This was one of the most turbulent, violent, and controversial periods in the history of the American West. The end of the Civil War saw tens of thousands of emigrants brave the 2,000-mile journey across Indian territory in search of a better life in California and Oregon. It saw the coming of the trans-continental railroad across Indian land; the wanton slaughter of millions of buffalo the Indians depended upon for survival; the end of the fur trade; the emergence of cattle barons and open range ranching; the discovery of gold in the Black Hills of Dakota; the Great Sioux War of 1876; Custer's last stand at the Battle of Little Bighorn; and the forcing of the Lakota onto reservations.This book is about two men caught up in these momentous events—Red Cloud, whose life has been well researched, and JW Dear, whose story has never been told. It is a story about the opening-up of the West and the process of nation building, driven by great vision, sacrifice, and human endeavor. But it is also a story of mismanagement, avarice, corruption, bigotry, extreme violence, and injustice. It is a very personal story of how Red Cloud and JW became caught up in these life-changing events, which bound the two men together as they fought for their survival. The book covers twenty-five tumultuous years of American history that includes the Civil War, the abolition of slavery, the opening up of the West, and the forcing of the Lakota onto reservations.

In'Boots and Saddles,'Elizabeth Bacon Custer offers a vivid and personal account of life on the American frontier during the tumultuous years of the Indian Wars. Through a collection of letters and anecdotes, Custer captures the duality of military life—its camaraderie and hardships—while employing a richly descriptive narrative style that immerses readers in the challenges faced by the soldiers and their families. Her work not only provides a compelling glimpse into the personal experiences of military life but also serves as a critical reflection on the broader historical context of westward expansion and the conflicts that defined it. As the wife of General George Armstrong Custer, Elizabeth Bacon Custer was intimately acquainted with the realities of military service, which informs her authentic voice throughout the memoir. Her experiences not only placed her amidst the remnant cultural tensions of a changing America but also instilled in her a desire to portray the heroism and humanity of those involved. Her position as a woman in a male-dominated society adds a fascinating layer to her perspective and critique of contemporary gender roles.'Boots and Saddles'is a must-read for those intrigued by American history, military narratives, and women's contributions to documenting the past. Custer's reflective and sometimes poignant prose invites readers to consider the personal stories interwoven within significant historical events, making it an essential addition to the library of anyone seeking a deeper understanding of this pivotal era.

In War-Path and Bivouac, published in 1890, John Finerty (1846–1908) recalled the summer he spent following George Crook's infamous campaign against the Sioux in 1876. Historians have long surmised that Finerty's correspondence covering the campaign for the Chicago Times reappeared in its entirety in Finerty's celebrated book. But that turns out not to be the case, as readers will discover in this remarkable volume. In print at last, this collection of Finerty's letters and telegrams to his hometown newspaper, written from the field during Crook's campaign, conveys the full extent of the reporter's experience and observations during this time of great excitement and upheaval in the West. An introduction and annotations by Paul L. Hedren, a lifelong historian of the period, provide ample biographical and historical background for Finerty's account. Four times under fire, giving as well as he got, Finerty reported on the action with the immediacy of an unfolding wartime story. To his riveting dispatches on the Rosebud and Slim Buttes battles, this collection adds accounts of the lesser-known Sibley scout and the tortures of the campaign trail, penned by a keen-eyed newsman who rode at the front through virtually all of the action. Here, too, is an intimate look at the Black Hills gold rush and at principal towns like Deadwood and Custer City, captured in the earliest moments of their colorful history. Hedren's introduction places Finerty not only on the scene in Wyoming, Montana, and Dakota during the Indian campaign, but also in the context of battlefield journalism at a critical time in its evolution. Publication of this volume confirms John Finerty's outsize role in that historical moment.

For the first time, this ground-breaking book tells the forgotten story of the true genesis of the June 25, 1876 disaster along the Little Bighorn,'Custer's Last Stand.'The failure of the southern column to continue to advance north after the battle of the Rosebud set the stage for the annihilation of George Armstrong Custer and his five companies of the 7th Cavalry at the Little Bighorn. For nearly 150 years, almost everything possible already has been written about the fascinating story of'Custer's Last Stand'except the analysis and new views that have been emphasized in this most revealing book: the true causes and culprits of the bloody fiasco at the Little Bighorn on June 25, 1876 that shocked the American nation like no other post-Civil War event. Phillip Thomas Tucker, Ph.D., the author of nearly 30 books and including award winners, has contributed many fresh and new views about'Custer's Last Stand,'revealing what has long been most often left out of the historical record. Where possible, Tucker has relied on primary source material, including period newspapers, to enlighten readers about the most forgotten and overlooked causes of Lieutenant George Armstrong Custer's and his command's annihilation in the bloody showdown along the Little Bighorn. These new explanations and fresh interpretations about how and why the battle of the Little Bighorn,perhaps the most controversial battle in American history, ultimately played out so disastrously like a Greek tragedy. Therefore, the author has exposed those individuals, America's leading military and civilian officials, who were most responsible for the greatest military disaster in the post-Civil War period. Dr. Tucker has presented the unvarnished truths about what really happened and exactly why by revealing the Machiavellian currents and dark threads of a needless war that had been artificially manufactured against the Sioux by America's top leaders, including the president, to gain their territory, especially the Black Hills. Tucker has presented the most forgotten story (literally the story inside the story) of the 1876 Sioux Campaign and'Custer's Last Stand.'In this way, he has provided us with a new understanding of exactly why Custer died on a lonely hilltop beside his most faithful followers, revealing the most overlooked truths that have been long ignored. Even more, this ground-breaking book has demonstrated how Custer became the convenient scapegoat for the monumental disaster, while the true culprits in contrast successfully maintained their reputations and paths to career advancement. With considerable insight and a long-demonstrated penchant for myth-busting,Tucker has demolished the myth which stubbornly persists to this day that Custer was the foolish glory hunter, who deserved sole blame for the fiasco along the Little Bighorn. This book has overturned some of the oldest misconceptions and falsehoods to present a fresh look of George Armstrong Custer and one of the most controversial campaigns and battles in American history. For the first time and despite all of the voluminous amount of literature about Custer and the famous last stand, this book brings the reader of today much closer to a more accurate and truer understanding of how and why Custer and his five companies of the 7th Cavalry were wiped out to the last man on a hot summer afternoon in the Montana Territory.

The Great Sioux War of 1876–77 began at daybreak on March 17, 1876, when Colonel Joseph J. Reynolds and six cavalry companies struck a village of Northern Cheyennes—Sioux allies—thereby propelling the Northern Plains tribes into war. The ensuing last stand of the Sioux against Anglo-American settlement of their homeland spanned some eighteen months, playing out across more than twenty battle and skirmish sites and costing hundreds of lives on both sides and many millions of dollars. And it all began at Powder River.Powder River: Disastrous Opening of the Great Sioux War recounts the wintertime Big Horn Expedition and its singular great battle, along with the stories of the Northern Cheyennes and their elusive leader Old Bear. Historian Paul Hedren tracks both sides of the conflict through a rich array of primary source material, including the transcripts of Reynolds's court-martial and Indian recollections. The disarray and incompetence of the war's beginnings—officers who failed to take proper positions, disregard of orders to save provisions, failure to cooperate, and abandonment of the dead and a wounded soldier—in many ways anticipated the catastrophe that later occurred at the Little Big Horn. Forty photographs, many previously unpublished, and five new maps detail the action from start to ignominious conclusion. Hedren's comprehensive account takes Powder River out of the shadow of the Little Big Horn and reveals how much this critical battle tells us about the army's policy and performance in the West, and about the debacle soon to follow.

This monograph discusses the role of operational art in the Sioux War of 1876, the U.S. Army's largest campaign between the Civil War and the Spanish-American War. This campaign, often overlooked in the historical study of operational art, demonstrates the successful application of operational art in a non-traditional campaign: the U.S. Army's defeat of the Northern Sioux Indians and their allies. This campaign also demonstrates how operational art can lead to operational victory, despite repeated tactical failures.The monograph first defines operational art, based on emerging U.S. Army doctrine, and then reviews its role in three campaigns that served as models for the Army's operations in the Sioux War of 1876: Grant's 1864-1865 campaign to defeat the Confederacy, the Southern Plains War of 1868-1869, and the Red River War of 1874-1875. The plans and execution of the Sioux War of 1876 are then reviewed and analyzed utilizing the definition of operational art and modem concepts for operational planning. The causes of failure in the 1876 campaign are then analyzed, based on Cohen and Gooch's methodology for analysis of military failure, followed by explanation of the campaign's ultimate success.The monograph concludes that the Frontier Army's success in this campaign demonstrates successful application of operational art, despite many errors in planning and execution committed by General Sheridan and his subordinates. Additional lessons from this campaign include the danger of blindly applying previously successful models for operations, the preeminent role of the operational commander, and the validity of operational art in campaigns against unconventional foes.

This thesis will analyze Major General George Crook's performance during the Sioux War of 1876-77 and attempt to answer whether or not Crook successfully fought the Native Americans by effectively implementing the concept of counterinsurgency compound warfare. Counterinsurgency Compound Warfare is the simultaneous use of a regular or conventional force and an irregular, indigenous force in unison against a common enemy. A highly skilled conventional force fighting an insurgency will often face significant cultural, ethnic, linguistic and physical challenges. An irregular, indigenous force can meet many of these challenges by working in concert with the conventional force. Major General George Crook sought to utilize Indian allies outside their traditional roles as scouts and utilized his forces in mutually supporting roles within each force's means and capabilities. The efficacy of an indigenous, irregular force is not only military in nature but, when used appropriately and honestly, this force serves as a vehicle of influence with native populations. The mutually supporting nature of this relationship enhances the strengths of both forces while limiting their inherent weaknesses. This thesis will attempt to explain how Crook was successful when he faced ethnic divisions, interagency rivalry and political hindrances while displaying adaptability as a leader and the ability to continue to learn while fighting a difficult counterinsurgency war.

On a September day in 1877, hundreds of Sioux and soldiers at Camp Robinson crowded around a fatally injured Lakota leader. A young doctor forced his way through the crowd, only to see the victim fading before him. It was the famed Crazy Horse. From intense moments like this to encounters with such legendary western figures as Calamity Jane and Red Cloud, Valentine Trant O'Connell McGillycuddy's life (1849–1939) encapsulated key events in American history that changed the lives of Native people forever. In Valentine T. McGillycuddy: Army Surgeon, Agent to the Sioux, the first biography of the man in seventy years, award-winning author Candy Moulton explores McGillycuddy's fascinating experiences on the northern plains as topographer, cartographer, physician, and Indian agent.Drawing on family papers, interviews, government documents, and a host of other sources, Moulton presents a colorful character—a thin, blue-eyed, cultured physician who could outdrink trail-hardened soldiers. In fresh, vivid prose, she traces McGillycuddy's work mapping out the U.S.-Canadian border; treating the wounded from the battles of the Rosebud, the Little Bighorn, and Slim Buttes; tending to Crazy Horse during his final hours; and serving as agent to the Sioux at Pine Ridge, where he clashed with Chief Red Cloud over the government's assimilation policies. Along the way, Moulton weaves in the perspective of McGillycuddy's devoted first wife, Fanny, who followed her husband west and wrote of the realities of camp life.McGillycuddy's doctoring of Crazy Horse marked only one point of his interaction with American Indians. But those relationships were also just one aspect of his life in the West, which extended well into the twentieth century. Enhanced by more than 20 photographs, this long-overdue biography offers general readers and historians an engaging adventure story as well as insight into a period of tumultuous change.

This study of the “Battle of the Rosebud” shows parallels between the army of 1876 and our army today. It briefly investigates the linkage of National Policy, political objectives, National Military Strategy, and the operational level of war. The army of 1876, like the army of today, experienced drastic downsizing. It had problems adjusting doctrine to the type of fight they were experiencing, not unlike our experience in Vietnam. The study of the battle provides some lessons we have had to relearn in the recent past. It is a study of how a relatively small, unsophisticated culture fought and won against an adversary that was vastly superior in population, organization, technology and resources. As a secondary benefit, the study of this battle offers a look at the advantages, disadvantages and compromises that must be considered in combined warfare. For these reasons, this study holds powerful lessons for soldiers serving in our armed forces today. The struggles with doctrine, training the force, force structure, combined warfare, and leadership challenges are just some of the parallels that can be drawn between Crook's Big Horn and Yellowstone Expedition and our modern units.

During the first half of 1876 the Army conducted three expeditions against the Sioux and Cheyenne Indians. The results of these three expeditions were: the first expedition destroying a small village, the second expedition being defeated in a meeting engagement, and the third expedition suffering the annihilation of five companies. The results lead to questioning the Army's focus on attacking and destroying villages as the primary target of their expeditions. If the Army had a complete understanding of the Sioux they would have realized that the “hub of all power” or center of gravity of the Sioux was the horse, which every major aspect of Sioux life was augmented and dependent upon. The first three expeditions of the Sioux Campaign of 1876 demonstrate that: senior Army commanders planned their campaigns, expeditions, and organizations around their knowledge of Sioux mobility, the primary source of power for the Sioux warrior was mobility gained from the horse, Army forces could not bring their advantage in firepower to bear on Sioux warriors. Army commanders understood the mobility of the Sioux village and their warriors, but they failed to take the next step—challenging the old assumption that attacking villages and using a strategy of exhaustion was the correct way to subdue the Sioux. Instead, Army forces should have concentrated their attacks on center of gravity of the Sioux—the horse.

The resistance of great Native American warriors to the U.S. government in the war against the Plains Indians is a well-known chapter in the story of the American West. In the aftermath of the great resistance, as the Indian nations recovered from war, many figures loomed heroic, yet their stories are mostly unknown. This long-overdue biography of Dewey Beard (ca. 1862–1955), a Lakota who witnessed the Battle of Little Bighorn and survived the Wounded Knee Massacre, chronicles a remarkable life that can be traced through major historical events from the late nineteenth into the mid-twentieth century. Beard was not only a witness to two major events involving the Lakota; he also traveled with William “Buffalo Bill” Cody's Wild West show, worked as a Hollywood Indian, and witnessed the grand transformation of the Black Hills into a tourism mecca. Beard spent most of his later life fighting to reclaim his homeland and acting as an advocate for his family and his people. With a keen eye for detail and a true storyteller's talent, Philip Burnham presents the man behind the legend of Dewey Beard and shows how the life of the last survivor of Little Bighorn provides a glimpse into the survival of indigenous America.

Sergeant Charles Windolph was the last white survivor of the Battle of the Little Big Horn when he described it nearly seventy years later. A six-year veteran of the Seventh Cavalry, Windolph fought in Benteen's troop on that fatal Sunday and recalls in vivid detail the battle that wiped out Custer's command. Equally vivid is the evidence marshaled by Frazier and Robert Hunt on events leading up to the battle and on the investigation that followed.

In June of 1876, the U.S. government's plan to pressure the Lakota and Cheyenne people onto reservations came to a dramatic and violent end with a battle that would become enshrined in American memory. In the eyes of many Americans at the time, the Battle of Little Bighorn represented a symbolic struggle between the civilized and the savage. Known as the Battle of the Greasy Grass to the Lakota, the Battle of Little Bighorn to the people who suppressed them, and as Custer's Last Stand in the annals of popular culture, the event continues to captivate students of American history. In The Battle of Little Bighorn, Debra Buchholtz narrates the history of the battle and critically examines the legacy it has left. Through government documents, newspaper articles, and eyewitness accounts, Buchholtz situates the material and symbolic impact of the battle at the time. Using popular film and cultural references, she investigates the ways in which the wake of the event continues to shape the way students understand indigenous peoples, the Wild West, and the history of America.

Lieutenant Colonel George A. Custer was widely known as a Civil War figure, author, and successful cavalry leader before his spectacular defeat at the Battle of the Little Bighorn in 1876 by Lakota and Northern Cheyenne Indians. His actions—and those of his troops—would have been of public interest even without their final, bloody outcome. A ready audience of readers was hungry for information about the engagement and about their fallen hero when Frances Fuller Victor's book appeared in spring 1877.Published even before the Great Sioux War had ended, Our Centennial Indian War and the Life of General Custer was the first contemporary and comprehensive account of the successive army operations in 1876 and early 1877. It was a major accomplishment. Victor drew information from a wide range of sources—including personal letters, war correspondents'dispatches, and government documents—to explain the lengthy, disjointed struggle between the army and the Lakota-Cheyenne coalition. She also offered one of the earliest biographical assessments of Custer, its most noted military participant.Compared to other period writings, Victor's narrative is smooth and dispassionate, devoid of conjecture and judgment. In addition, her account contains rare Indian perspectives on the Little Bighorn battle, including Lakota testimony that has not previously appeared elsewhere. Featuring an introduction by historian Jerome A. Greene, this edition of Our Centennial Indian War provides a remarkable window into contemporary thinking about an iconic event

'An engrossing and tautly written account of a critical chapter in American history.'--Los Angeles Times Nathaniel Philbrick, author of In the Hurricane's Eye, Pulitzer Prize finalist Mayflower, and Valiant Ambition, is a historian with a unique ability to bring history to life. The Last Stand is Philbrick's monumental reappraisal of the epochal clash at the Little Bighorn in 1876 that gave birth to the legend of Custer's Last Stand. Bringing a wealth of new information to his subject, as well as his characteristic literary flair, Philbrick details the collision between two American icons- George Armstrong Custer and Sitting Bull-that both parties wished to avoid, and brilliantly explains how the battle that ensued has been shaped and reshaped by national myth.

Winner of the Western Heritage Award for'Outstanding Western Novel'2005As the Cheyenne fought that June day in 1876, warrior Comes in Sight faced grave danger. His horse had been shot out from under him, and he was left stranded on the battlefield. Suddenly, a rider galloped through enemy fire, pulled Comes in Sight onto the back of her horse, and spirited him to safety. It was Buffalo Calf Road Woman—the warrior's own sister. While white men refer to this clash as the Battle of the Rosebud, the Cheyenne know it as the battle, “Where the Girl Saved Her Brother.” Days later, Buffalo Calf fought at the Battle of Little Bighorn—the only woman to do so. And now a controversy is brewing over her role in that battle: Did Buffalo Calf strike the fatal blow that killed Custer?In this award-winning novel, authors Rosemary Agonito and Joseph Agonito depict the life and times of this brave young woman and the devastating effects of white man's westward migration. Based on true events, this epic tale of love and war is an inspiring journey through one of history's most moving sagas.

First published in 2004. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

'I am an old man, and soon my spirit must leave this earth to join the spirit of my fathers. Therefore, I shall speak only the truth in telling what I know of the fight on the Little Bighorn River where General Custer was killed. Curly, who was with us, will tell you that I do not lie.'So spoke White Man Runs Him, a Crow Indian who with five other Crow warriors had served as a scout for Custer's Seventh Cavalry on June 25, 1876, the day of the battle known to generations of white Americans as'Custer's Last Stand.'They survived the battle, but Custer and more than 250 troopers did not. Thus their accounts and those of the Lakotas and Cheyennes who triumphed at Little Bighorn (or Greasy Grass, as it was known to the Lakotas) offer the only firsthand picture of what happened that fateful day. These stories—from leaders as renowned as Black Elk and Sitting Bull, warriors such as Wooden Leg, a Cheyenne woman, and Arikara and Crow scouts—at last bring one of the most unforgettable showdowns in American history to vivid, complex, multifaceted life.