The daily morning journal and courier., 1895-12-11

battle with Custer and escaped with his life was "Curley," the Crow Indian who acted as Clusters scout. Curley is now living on the Crow reservation. He does not talk much about the bat tie. It IS doubtful if he knows much. lie says that he was riding about 200 yards in advance of Custer, and as he came over the hill he smelled Indian, and knew that there were great many l Of them in the ravines and in the grass | on the hillside. He put spurs to his horse and dashed down the hill to the northwest into a ravine, riding right through the hosties who did not fire on him because they did not wish to | alarm Custer They allowed Curley to escape in order to meet Custer and his command on the west side of the hill, where they were waiting for him. Cur 1 ley thinks that Custer was surprised there, and lie and the sixty men whose
 bodies were found with his near the
 brow of the hill were killed there be- | fore they could arrange a plan of at | tack The scattered bands, according
 to this theory, were killed while on the ! with the theory of Scout Campbell or Captain Clifford of Troop K, Seventh Cavalry, who was with Captain Benteen | in charge of the pack train It is con- tradicted also by the empty shells found | by each body showing that Clusters men did fight, and used up all their ann unition before they were killed. And Curley confesses that he was "heap scared" when he rode to the hill, and never stopped to discover how many | Indians there were or what Custer did. He was no more with Custer than was
 the trumpeter who carried the order on and bring the packs, as there was
 a large village. Curley, by his own confession, must have deserted Custer before the trumpeter left the battalion with Cooks order.
 l Many efforts have been made to in- duce Old Gall, Crazy Horse, and Rain | in-the-Face to tell the story of their side of the battle, but without success. They have always feared punishment l for the murder of Custer, and they have 1 evaded all questions, or told stories that helped but little to solve the mystery. | Because i. has always been called a
 massacre the Indians who participated
 in the battle have had the greater fear of duplicating themselves, and have kept silent.
 Captain Clifford has told the story of Benteen's battalion and Major Reno's battle, but he says that the men with Reno did not know what had become of Custer and his battalion until General
 Terry come to their relief two days af-
 ter the battle, and brought the news of
 Clusters defeat and death. General
 Terry found the Custer field covered
 with the dead when he came up from
 the south to unite his forces with Gus
 ter's for a general attack. He found | the bodies as they are marked by the
 marble slabs, and the visitor to Gus
 ter's Hill to-day has as good an idea l of how Custer fought his last battle as
 has any one who has read all the re-
 ports. Major Reno requested a court
 of inquiry as to his conduct, and it ex-
 onerated him. The charges Of cow
 ardice and neglect of duty made at the
 time against Reno, and that of rash
 ness against the memory of Custer, have ceased to have any weight. Mill
 itary men have agreed that Reno had
 all he could attend to in his own fight