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"This
is a good day to die!" shouted Low Dog. "Follow me!" Each man whipped
another man's pony so that no man would fall behind as they raced through
the buffalo grass across the prairie ravines toward their foes. Dismounting
to face the charge, the bluecoats tried to hold the reins of their terrified,
rearing horses, causing the soldiers to shoot poorly at Low Dog's men.
This bright, hot June day had held such promise for the buckskin-clad,
blond-haired boy wonder who, as a cavalry leader in the Union Army in
the U.S. Civil War, had advanced to brigadier general by age 23. Now
in 1876, a presidential election year, he was 37 and many believe he
was anxious to gain a victory in the Dakota Territory that might well
have catapulted him into the White House.
He led the Seventh Cavalry up the Little Bighorn River in what is now eastern Montana, searching for the encampment of the great Hunkpapa chief Sitting Bull. The general detached 125 men under Captain Benteen to search west of the river. He led the remainder over a rise, and in the haze of the searing summer sun, the village wavered into view.
Dividing his force a second time, leaving himself in command of 266 cavalry and Crow scouts, he ordered 175 men under Major Reno to attack from the south, while he and his troops moved up the ridge to attack the middle of the settlement. Eager for battle and glory, he uttered his last recorded words: "Custer's luck! The biggest Indian village on the continent!" Custer's luck turned out to be Custer's Last Stand at the Battle of the Little Bighorn.
What General George Armstrong Custer didn't know was that he could see only one third of Sitting Bull's "village." Instead of 2,500 Sioux, Cheyenne, Arapaho, Blackfeet and others as he might have guessed, there were some 9,000 to 12,000 Indians living at this location. Instead of facing several hundred fighting braves, he led his troops against 1,800 to 2,500 fully alerted, well-mounted and heavily armed warriors.
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