The Portland daily press., 1895-08-10


the story of their charge 1t was not
so with Custer The dashing General
leo 2oS men into battle, and 262 bodies
lay whitening on the field after the battle
was over. There were no wounded; no
missing. All were accounted for; all
We're there with their General, their
bodies within commanding distance of
his body, and all cold in death. The his
tory OF wars records no such battle as
this and that may be one reason why il
was called massacre But Custer was
the leader of an attack, pursuing the In
dams for days, and at last confident that
he had caught them. The War De-
partment and the Federal government
were behind him. He was not to allow
tho Indians to escape. He had located
their village in the valley of the Little
Big Horn, had made forced march in
the night to give battle before they could
discover his presence and make good
their escape, and when he realized that
the Indians had discovered his advance
he made the attack at once, for fear they
might retreat
Did they die at their posts? Lieutenant
Campbell at Fort Custer helped to bury
the dead, and he says that by the side or
each body was found a little pile OF
empty cartridge shells What more or
better evidence do we want? They died
lighting, and when you look at the align
ment of the marble slabs you will note
that they are in line of battle-the Gen
eral on the highest point, with his
brother, Colonel Tom Custer, just behind
him, Lieutenant Reilly on his left, and
Captain Yates on his right, both near
enough for them to touch elbows with
the general and his brother ill that death
struggle. Other officers were grouped
about the commander and the troopers
We're little farther down the hill In
front, stretched out in line of battle A
half dozen slabs stand out few rods in
advance of the main line like skirmish-
ers. 10 the right of the line are two
slabs bearing the names of Boston Custer
and Arthur Reed, the young brother and
nephew of the General, who accompanied
the expedition and died in the ranks of
the soldiers. The slab bearing the name
of Lieut.. w. W. Cook is in front of that
of Custer and a little to the left where a
line officer could lead his men. Two old
soldiers who accompanied me over this
field, and one of them a West Point
graduate, stood on the hill and looked
down upon the marble slabs glistening in
the afternoon sun, and then said that no
man could place battalion of soldiers in
a better or more precise line of battle ac-
c. riding to military science than were
these mute sentinels marking the places
where the 662 men of the Seventh Cav
airy died with Custer. Gould a higher
tribute be paid to the General, his officers
and his men, than this, that they died in
line OF battle, not man forgetting his
duty as soldier in death struggle?
Standing by the monument and facing
toward the west, from which direction
the on rushing tide of Indians came to
overwhelm Clusters little band of sixty
one, to the left quarter of a mile is an
other group of marble sentinels. They
seem to be marching around the side OF
another part of the hill and trying to
reach the center Of the battle which
ragged around the General. They are not
SO compact as. those around the cross
which marks where Custer fell They are
scattered out in a line just MS men might
be who were fighting against great odds
and trying to gain the top of the hill
where the fair-headed chief stood among
his soldiers. There is no use in speculat-
ing but it looks as though the men who
fell where these white slabs stand had
struggled to reach the hill and their COM
mander and that they had died fighting
toward their leader. That would have
been the impulse of soldiers trained to