On June 25, 1876, the Battle of the Little Bighorn ended in the complete destruction of five companies of the U. S. 7th Cavalry under the command of George Armstrong Custer. The aftermath, however, was as grim and historically telling as the battle itself.
Among the Cheyenne and Lakota warriors present was White Wolf, who later recounted how young men searched the bodies of fallen soldiers and found square, green paper currency in their pockets. Unfamiliar with this form of money, children repurposed the bills as saddle blankets for their toy mud horses. Silver coins found on the dead were crafted into buckles by Cheyenne artisans. Other warriors, including Wooden Leg, Little Hawk, and Bobtail Horse, reported finding bottles of whiskey among the fallen troopers.
These items gave a detailed, human account of what the soldiers carried into their final fight, and what the victors found among them. Two days after the battle, on June 27, cavalry troops arrived to survey the devastating scene. Lieutenant Edward S. Godfrey described the haunting sight of marble-white soldier bodies lying alongside the brown remains of horses and ponies, scattered across the battlefield near Custer Hill.
He noted the dry, reddish-brown grass and the pale earth, a contrast that created a chilling image of death he said he would remember for the rest of his life. Captain Tom Custer was found near the summit of the hill, just north of the general, lying face down. His features were so distorted he was unrecognizable. His body carried numerous arrow wounds, including injuries to his back and head, where an arrowhead was bent and deeply embedded.
His skull had been fractured, and nearly all of his hair had been scalped, leaving only a small patch at the nape of his neck. General Custer’s body, in stark contrast, was found largely undisturbed. He lay on his back with his hands placed on his abdomen, a position familiar to those who had marched with him, as he was often seen napping in that manner. He had suffered two fatal wounds, one to the front of his left temple and another near his heart.
Boston Custer, the youngest of the Custer brothers, was found about two hundred yards from Custer Hill. His body was entirely stripped except for his white cotton socks, which had their labels removed. Across the battlefield, many bodies still wore remnants of bloody undershirts, trousers, or socks, but in every case, the names had been cut away. The sight of naked, mutilated corpses marked by fatal injuries created a scene of deep distress for the burial parties.
With only half a dozen spades and shovels, a few axes, and a couple of picks available, soldiers used knives and tin cups to cover the dead with a thin layer of soil. The fallen were left in the wilderness, hundreds of miles from civilization and far from their families. Trumpeter Giuseppe Martini recalled seeing a pile of deceased soldiers in a deep ravine between Custer’s position and the river. Among them was a first sergeant whose body was adorned with torn pieces of approximately $500 in paper currency, which had been entrusted to him for safekeeping by the men he commanded.
Martini also observed that part of Adjutant Cook’s sideburns had been scalped, with the skin still attached. Seventh Cavalry scout George Herendeen reported that four soldiers’ heads were found in the Sioux camp, severed from their bodies, which could not be located on the battlefield or within the village. Lieutenant Charles Roe of the Second Cavalry observed that a white man’s head was found in the Indian village, tied to a lariat, and had been dragged through the area until it separated from the body. Survivor Jacob Adams recounted that soldiers were lassoed from their horses and drawn into the center of the village, where they were tied to trees and burned alive.
These horrific events were witnessed by fellow soldiers from Benteen’s division, who were unable to intervene. John Ryan later noted that bones and pieces of blue uniforms were found at the sites where men had been secured to trees and stakes. Of the five guidons carried by Custer’s troops during their final stand, only one was recovered shortly after the battle. It had been hidden beneath the body of Corporal John Foley, who had tried to escape on horseback.
As he was chased by warriors, Foley took his own life before he could be captured. The retrieved flag later became known as the Culbertson Guidon, named in tribute to Sergeant Ferdinand Culbertson, a member of the burial party that discovered it.