On June 25, 1876, along the banks of the Little Bighorn River, General George Armstrong Custer and his men met a devastating end. The battle that unfolded that day became one of the most notorious defeats in American military history. Yet for decades, the story has been shaped by myth and legend. The firsthand accounts of soldiers who survived reveal a far more brutal and confusing reality, one marked by overwhelming odds, desperate thirst, and agonizing uncertainty about the fate of their commander.
The campaign had begun days earlier. On June 22, the regiment departed the Rosebud at noon and marched roughly twelve miles before making camp for the night. The following morning, they resumed their advance, following a trail well into the evening before setting camp again. On June 24, six Crow scouts who had been sent ahead by Custer returned with news that they had found fresh pony tracks, indicating a large Indian village nearby.
Custer gathered his officers, though the details of their discussion remained unknown to the enlisted men. The scouts were sent forward once more. Around four in the afternoon, the regiment reached an abandoned village site and made camp two miles below the forks of the Rosebud. The scouts were dispatched again, and by eleven that night, Custer ordered the camp packed.
The column marched up the right fork of the Rosebud through the darkness. By dawn, the scouts reported that they had spotted the village. The soldiers concealed themselves in a ravine near the headwaters of the creek, about three miles from the divide where the village had been sighted. Custer galloped forward with his orderlies to scout the area himself, but returned an hour later claiming he had seen nothing.
The half-breed guide and the scouts insisted the village lay ahead. They also warned that the column had been discovered and that war parties had already spotted the soldiers. Custer gave the order to prepare for battle. The regiment continued cautiously, advancing along a small creek for roughly six miles.
They came upon a single Indian lodge containing a dead man near the entrance to the Little Horn Valley. In the distance, clouds of dust rose about five miles away. Custer seemed convinced the Indians were retreating. He sent a message to Colonel Reno, ordering him to push the scouts toward the dust.
Reno led his men across the river at a natural ford and advanced onto the prairie. After about a mile, his troops dismounted to fight on foot while their horses were sent into the trees. Mounted Indians soon charged across the prairie, and Reno’s skirmishers returned fire. But as the enemy began maneuvering to cut off the troops from the ford, Reno ordered a retreat to the trees.
The Sioux pursued relentlessly, firing at close range and closing off any safe escape. Soldiers and horses fell together, and those left behind scrambled for their lives. One soldier, George Herendeen, recalled seeing around thirteen soldiers, some of them wounded, and convincing them to take cover in the trees. Though the wounded men were eager to escape, he advised them to stay and fight.
Experience had taught him the situation was not beyond hope. The small group remained in the bushes for hours, listening to the distant sound of gunfire, unaware that it was Custer’s command engaged against the Native forces. When the shooting eventually quieted, Herendeen urged the soldiers to move, though some chose to stay. A small group forded the river and rejoined Reno’s command on the bluffs, just as the Indians swarmed away from Custer’s fight.
Reno’s men fortified their position as darkness fell, using whatever they could find: saddles, packs, and the bodies of dead horses. At dawn, the Indians renewed their attack, charging multiple times and even throwing stones at the soldiers. Captain Benteen rallied his troops and launched an unexpected offensive that surprised the attacking warriors. His courage in standing firm in the line of fire saved many lives that day.
By mid-morning, the men began begging for water. They had gone without it for thirty-six hours in the scorching heat. Many were dehydrated, their tongues swollen, yet the battle raged on with no relief in sight. The men attempted to eat crackers and hardtack, but lacked enough saliva to moisten them.
Some resorted to chewing grass, which clung to their lips. None of them could spit or speak clearly. The wounded were said to be dying from dehydration, prompting several soldiers to volunteer for a dangerous mission to the river, knowing they might not return. The battle on the bluffs took place about seven hundred yards from the river, with a ravine running from the battlefield to the water’s edge.
To reach the ravine, the men had to sprint across an exposed area of roughly one hundred yards, all the while under fire from Indians positioned on the bluffs. Around fifty soldiers dashed across the open ground and made it into the ravine. When they reached the bottom, they found it guarded by Indians stationed in the timber across the river. Soldiers could approach the water to within about thirty feet while under cover, but stepping out onto the bank meant facing a barrage of fire.
Nevertheless, the soldiers faced the danger head on. Some dashed down to the river with camp kettles, filled them, and sought refuge in the bend of the ravine behind rocks. Canteens were filled and passed back up the hill, though before the men and wounded were fully supplied, one soldier was killed and six or seven others wounded. One man had the bone in his leg shattered by a bullet and required an amputation later.
By two in the afternoon, the Indians began to withdraw, although skirmishing continued until late in the day. By nightfall, the battlefield was clear of Indian forces. Finally, the men could bring water to the animals, many of which were on the brink of death, and allow them to graze. That evening, Reno repositioned his force to a stronger, higher location.
The men anticipated another attack the next day, but by morning no Indians were in sight. Around ten o’clock, word arrived that General Terry with a large force was approaching the valley, just six miles away. Soon, his troops were visible on the horizon. Mr.
Herendeen recounted his position during the fight. He had gone in with the scouts on the left side of Reno’s line, which included around sixty men, among them Crow and friendly Sioux scouts and the remainder white men. He witnessed a Ree scout raise his arm with a bloody knife before falling over, likely killed. Herendeen believed the two cavalry soldiers he had left in the timber were also killed, as they had not been seen since.
Lieutenant McIntosh, whose horse was shot early in the fight, was killed while riding a soldier’s horse trying to make it back to the ford. Lieutenant Hodgson was shot and wounded after his horse fell into the river. Hodgson tried to pull himself up the opposite bank by grabbing a horse’s tail, but was shot by an Indian sharpshooter once he reached the top. Custer’s supply packs were with the rest of the command, and the Indians did not manage to capture any of them or the mules.
Most of Custer’s horses were killed during the battle, and Herendeen doubted the Indians captured more than one hundred animals. He suspected some men were captured alive and tortured. He believed the colored scout Isaiah Dorman was tortured, as he had small bullet wounds in his legs, suggesting they were inflicted while he was still alive. Another man had strips of skin cut from his body.
Many squaws and elderly Indians roamed the battlefield howling in madness. They carried stone mallets and smashed the skulls of both the dead and wounded, cutting some with knives and mutilating their bodies. The heads of four white soldiers were later found in the Sioux camp, but their bodies were missing. Herendeen estimated the Indian village housed around six thousand people, with at least three thousand being warriors.
The Indians had fought Reno first, then turned to engage Custer, and later returned to finish off Reno. The same group of Indians participated in all the attacks. Herendeen believed they were led by Sitting Bull along with eight or nine other chiefs. He identified five of the chiefs, each of whom carried a colored flag to rally their warriors, the flags being red, yellow, white, blue, and black.
Herendeen thought Crazy Horse and his band also took part in the battle and speculated that Indian casualties were equal to those of the whites. Custer’s men fought valiantly and killed many Indians, but none of Custer’s forces escaped. They were surrounded by at least twenty-five hundred warriors. Fear spread among the men due to Reno’s apparent cowardice, which influenced their actions.
Dan Neely, now living in guilt edge, Montana, had been dubbed crackerbox Dan for hiding behind a cracker box during the battle. Captain Miles Morland, known as appareo Mickey, spent the fight lying behind an appareo. Billy Blake pretended to be wounded for two days to avoid combat. These men, brave soldiers by nature, acted out of fear during the heat of battle.
In contrast, Herendeen worked tirelessly in the intense heat, dragging dead horses to form breastworks and firing at the Indians, all while wondering what had happened to Custer. On the morning of the 25th, as the soldiers worked, they noticed smoke and dust on a nearby ridge. Most of the Indians left Reno’s men to join the fight on the ridge. Some soldiers speculated that Custer was engaging the Indians, but when the smoke and dust cleared and the shots ceased, they feared the worst.
Despite hearing volleys of gunfire, which many now believe were Custer’s distress signals, the soldiers did not advance to aid him. They were left behind, thirsting for water and grappling with the heat. Dr. Porter, who worked relentlessly to care for the wounded, urged the men to retrieve water even though the river was guarded.
Several soldiers made the dangerous trek down the ravine, risking their lives to bring back water for the wounded. One man was shot while filling his pail, shattering his leg, and had to be dragged back up the hill. As the day wore on, a few soldiers managed to bring back just enough water to ease the suffering of the wounded, despite the men’s desperate thirst. On both the 25th and 26th, while the Indians below fired at the men, a sharpshooter perched on a nearby hill picked off soldiers one by one.
Armed with a buffalo gun, he was deadly accurate. Though they could not see him, every shot took out a man, horse, or mule. He proved to be more of a threat than the warriors below. Eventually, Captain Ryan managed to take him down with a long-range rifle.
After the battle, Herendeen ventured over to that hill and saw the sharpshooter lying there, his buffalo gun still in hand, behind the boulders he had set up for cover. As the day wore on and the smoke started to clear, most of the Indians pulled back, returning to their village to mourn their dead. They left just enough warriors to keep the soldiers trapped on the hill. By that point, none of the men had eaten since leaving camp with Custer earlier in the day.
They chewed on hardtack and raw bacon, but without water it was like swallowing hay. Most were utterly spent, with some men collapsing where they stood, too exhausted to care about what might come next. During the night, Herendeen had the task of standing watch outside Reno’s tent. He heard Reno inside drinking heavily from a keg.
At one point, Herendeen overheard him tell another officer, “I wonder where the majority of the American Army is now,” followed by a sneering laugh. Though Herendeen did not know who the remark was aimed at, he knew Reno was mocking Custer, and it angered him. As he continued his patrol, he passed the sleeping men scattered on the ground, and others, those who had not survived, lying motionless beside them. The night had grown eerily quiet.
Down in the valley where there had been gunfire, smoke, and chaos all day, it was now as silent as a graveyard. He could hear the distant beat of tom-toms and the mournful wails of Indians grieving their fallen. Every now and then he would stop, straining his ears and eyes, hoping to catch a sound or sight of Custer and his men creeping toward them in the dark. But nothing happened.
When morning broke, the air was still and heavy, tension hanging over the men like a cloud. The lack of food and water was taking its toll. Some men mumbled incoherently in their sleep, while others sat in silence, lost in thought. Herendeen’s mind drifted back to Custer and his horse, Dandy.
He remembered the moment the horse was shot and the overwhelming sadness he felt. That sorrow stayed with him, making it harder to shake the sense that they were doomed, that the worst was yet to come. The eerie calmness was unsettling, and they knew they had to be prepared for whatever was on the horizon. When the morning finally came, the battlefield was clear.
The Indians had gone, and soon General Terry’s force arrived, bringing the survivors of Reno’s command out of the trap that had held them for so long. The fate of Custer and his men, however, would not be fully known until the bodies were found on the ridge, surrounded by the evidence of a last, desperate stand.