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April 15, 2004 Plains Folk: Washita
You probably know people, I sure do, whose reputations seem all out of proportion to their resumes. Such a person was George A. Custer. He was a civil war hero, sure enough, but his celebrated career as an Indian fighter with the 7th cavalry looks a little thin on paper. Custer performed abysmally as chief of cavalry for the Hancock expedition on the central plains in 1867. He saw a detachment of his men rubbed out, suffered wholesale desertions and was court-martialed. In 1868 he led the attack on Black Kettle’s Cheyenne village on the Washita River, in western present-day Oklahoma. He parleyed his checkered record and good looks into a national reputation by writing the serial, “Life on the Plains,” for “The Galaxy,” and then republishing the same sketches as “My Life on the Plains” (book discussed in a previous column). After that, in 1873, he had some inconclusive skirmishes with the Lakota in Montana, and after that, in 1876, well, you know. Given the hasty shock-attack mode of operation that bought Custer an arrow shirt at Greasy Grass, many historians are inclined to look back at his experience on the Washita and make connections. That experience is readily accessible to readers now in “Washita: The U.S. Army and the Southern Cheyennes, 1867-1869,” just published by the University of Oklahoma Press. The author is Jerome Greene, a research historian for the National Park Service. He’s done a number of authoritative books on military conflicts with the Sioux and Cheyenne. His writing is a little on the clinical side, reads a bit like a technical report, but that’s the sort of writing he’s supposed to do. A foray into florid prose in the introductory chapter produces lines like, “An anxious, freezing wind whipped across the stark, treeless plain, nudged the buffalo grass as it gusted over low, snow-specked hills and through silent arroyos.” Just overlook that, get into the body of the book, and if you like your history served factually, you’re in clover. In 1868 Major General Philip H. Sheridan sent Custer south to punish the Cheyenne, and maybe others, for killings and kidnappings committed in Kansas by the Dog Soldiers (an elite Cheyenne military society) and angry young men from various Cheyenne bands, including that of Black Kettle. This was the same band that had been victimized in the notorious massacre at Sand Creek, Colorado, in 1864. The assault on the sleeping village took place at first light of Nov. 27, 1868, with the military band playing until their instruments froze up. There were atrocities, although not near as many as at Sand Creek. Custer got himself in a hot spot, because having killed Black Kettle and routed his people; the command was beset by fighters who came from much larger villages up and down the river. The troopers methodically shot the captured horse herd and then extricated themselves by making a feint against the neighboring villages, then withdrawing. Custer, of course, had done no scouting in the vicinity and thus had no idea he was endangering his whole command when he attacked. As it turned out, his main losses consisted of one detachment of eighteen troopers headed by Major Joel Elliott. It seems that Elliott was foolhardy, chasing off and getting himself killed, but Custer withdrew from the scene without even determining what had become of the lost squadron. This and other matters are discussed in a nifty chapter headed “Controversies,” followed by a fascinating appendix describing monuments and sites in the battle area. Congress decided in 1996 to make it a national historic site. Visitors to the developing site surely will want to carry Greene’s book. It’s a ghostly place, and the book helps you give names to the ghosts. ### Source:
Tom Isern, (701) 799-2942, isern@plainsfolk.com
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