Eyewitness reports on Custer's campaigns from 1874 through 1876 are told in Arikara Narrative of Custer's Campaign and the Battle of the Little Bighorn, the result of interviews with nine scouts. Arikaras scouted in advance of the U.S. Army for Custer and Reno, reporting enemy Indian movements and seeking to capture their horses. Their accounts of the Battle of the Little Bighorn reveal much about why Custer failed.

'Easily the most significant book yet published on the Battle of the Little Bighorn."--Paul L. Hedren, Western Historical Quarterly "[Gray] has applied rigorous analysis as no previous historian has done to these oft-analyzed events. His detailed time-motion study of the movements of the various participants frankly boggles the mind of this reviewer. No one will be able to write of this battle again without reckoning with Gray"--Thomas W. Dunlay, Journal of American History "Gray challenges many time~honored beliefs about the battle. Perhaps most significantly, he brings in as much as possible the testimony of the Indian witnesses, especially that of the young scout Curley, which generations of historians have dismissed for contradictions that Gray convincingly demonstrates were caused not by Curley but by the assumptions made by his questioners . . . The contrasts in [this] book. . . restate the basic components of what still attracts the imagination to the Little Bighorn."--Los Angeles Times Book Review "Gray's analysis, by and large, is impressively drawn; it is an immensely logical reconstruction that should stand the test of time. As a contribution to Custer and Indian wars literature, it is indeed masterful."--Jerome A. Greene, New Mexico Historical Review John S. Gray was a distinguished historian whose books included the acclaimed Centennial Campaign: The Sioux War of 1876. Custer's Last Campaign is the winner of the Western Writers of American Spur award and the Little Bighorn Associates John M. Carroll Literary Award.

Considered one of the most important source documents for the study of the Battle of the Little Bighorn, Custer's Last Stand, the Arikara Narrative is a fascinating account of this seminal event. No scholar of the Little Bighorn conflict omits this book from their bibliography. George Armstrong Custer rode to the Little Bighorn with forty Arikara scouts (among others). Of this group, nine survivors were interviewed in 1912. Their accounts of the battle were carefully translated and then published in 1920. From inside the book: "The purpose in publishing this material on the Indian campaign of 1876 is twofold. Merely as a matter of justice to the Arikara Indian scouts their version of the campaign in which they played an important part should have long ago been given to the public. Nearly every other conceivable angle of this memorable campaign has received attention and study. But during the past generation the Arikara scouts, true to their oath of fealty to the government as they understood it, have remained silent as to their own part in those eventful days. "The present narrative is designed to make public the real story of the Arikara Indian scouts who served with Terry and under the immediate command of Custer. In August, 1912, the nine survivors of some forty of these scouts met at the home of Bear's Belly on the Fort Berthold Reservation, at Armstrong, and there they related to Judge A. McG. Beede and to the secretary of the State Historical Society the various portions of the narrative that follow. Each of the scouts gave that special portion of the whole with which he was most familiar. The narrators were very scrupulous to confine themselves to just that portion of the common experience to which they were eye witnesses." CONTENTS Historical Introduction Narrative Of The Arikara Sitting Bear's Story Story of the First Enlistment The Narrative as continued by Soldier The Enlistment as told by Young Hawk The Second Enlistment Red Bear's Story Boy Chief's Story of His Enlistment Account of an Interview with Custer Red Star's Story of the March Story of how the Mail was brought Continuation of Red Star's Story Young Hawk's Story Red Star's Story continued Red Star's Story of Special Scout Work Narrative of Young Hawk Supplementary Story by Soldier Continuation by Red Star Boy Chief, and Strikes Two Red Star's Additional Interview Supplementary Story by Red Bear Later Story by Running Wolf Later Story of Little Sioux Later Story of Goes-Ahead Appendix Expedition To The Black Hills Gerard's Story Of The Custer Fight Biographies Soldier Strikes Two Young Hawk Red Star Red Bear One Feather Running Wolf Goes Ahead, Crow Scout James Coleman

Of the three surgeons who accompanied Custer’s Seventh Cavalry on June 25, 1876, only the youngest, twenty-eight-year-old Henry Porter, survived that day’s ordeal, riding through a gauntlet of Indian attackers and up the steep bluffs to Major Marcus Reno’s hilltop position. But the story of Dr. Porter’s wartime exploits goes far beyond the battle itself. In this compelling narrative of military endurance and medical ingenuity, Joan Nabseth Stevenson opens a new window on the Battle of the Little Big Horn by re-creating the desperate struggle for survival during the fight and in its wake. As Stevenson recounts in gripping detail, Porter’s life-saving work on the battlefield began immediately, as he assumed the care of nearly sixty soldiers and two Indian scouts, attending to wounds and performing surgeries and amputations. He evacuated the critically wounded soldiers on mules and hand litters, embarking on a hazardous trek of fifteen miles that required two river crossings, the scaling of a steep cliff, and a treacherous descent into the safety of the steamboat Far West, waiting at the mouth of the Little Big Horn River. There began a harrowing 700-mile journey along the Yellowstone and Missouri Rivers to the post hospital at Fort Abraham Lincoln near Bismarck, Dakota Territory. With its new insights into the role and function of the army medical corps and the evolution of battlefield medicine, this unusual book will take its place both as a contribution to the history of the Great Sioux War and alongside such vivid historical novels as Son of the Morning Star and Little Big Man. It will also ensure that the selfless deeds of a lone “contract” surgeon—unrecognized to this day by the U.S. government—will never be forgotten.

“No one survived in Custer’s immediate command, but other soldiers fighting in the Battle of the Little Big Horn on June 25-26, 1876, were doomed to remember the nightmarish scene for decades after. Their true and terrible stories are included in Troopers with Custer. Some of the veterans who corresponded with E. A. Brininstool were still alive when his book first appeared in a shortened version in 1925. It has long been recognized as classic Custeriana. “More incisively than many later writers, Brininstool considers the causes of Custer’s defeat and questions the alleged cowardice of Major Marcus A. Reno. His exciting reenactment of the Battle of the Little Big Horn sets up the reader for a series of turns by its stars and supporting and bit players. Besides the boy general with the golden locks, they include Captain Frederick W. Benteen, the scouts Lieutenant Charles A. Varnum and “Lonesome Charley” Reynolds, the trumpeter John Martin, officers and troopers in the ranks who miraculously escaped death, the only surviving surgeon and the captain of the steamboat that carried the wounded away, the newspaperman who spread the news to the world, and many others.”-Print ed.

Describes the Battle of the Little Bighorn from the Native American point of view.

Son of the Morning Star is the nonfiction account of General Custer from the great American novelist Evan S. Connell. Custer's Last Stand is among the most enduring events in American history--more than one hundred years after the fact, books continue to be written and people continue to argue about even the most basic details surrounding the Little Bighorn. Evan S. Connell, whom Joyce Carol Oates has described as "one of our most interesting and intelligent American writers," wrote what continues to be the most reliable--and compulsively readable--account of the subject. Connell makes good use of his meticulous research and novelist's eye for the story and detail to re-create the heroism, foolishness, and savagery of this crucial chapter in the history of the West.

The battle that unfolded at the Little Big Horn River on June 25, 1876, marked a watershed in the history of the Plains Indians. While a stunning victory for the Sioux and Cheyenne peoples, it initiated a new and vigorous effort by the U.S. government to rid the west of marauding tribes and to realize the ideal of "Manifest Destiny." While thousands of books and articles have covered different aspects of the battle, few if any have analyzed the tactics and chronology to arrive at a satisfactory explanation of what befell George Armstrong Custer and the 209 men who died alongside him. This volume seeks to explain the circumstances culminating in the near-destruction of the 7th Cavalry Regiment by a close examination of timing, setting every event to a specific moment based on accounts of the battle's participants.

The Battle of the Little Big Horn was the decisive engagement of the Great Sioux War of 1876-1877. In its second edition this biographical dictionary of all known participants--the 7th Cavalry, civilians and Indians--provides a brief description of the battle, as well as information on the various tribes, their customs and methods of fighting. Seven appendices cover the units soldiers were assigned to, uniforms and equipment of the cavalry, controversial listings of scouts and the number of Indians in the encampments, the location of camps on the way to the Big Horn and more. Updated biographies are provided for many European soldiers, along with an additional 5,060 names of Indians who were or could have been in the battle.

The Real Custer takes a good hard look at the life and storied military career of George Armstrong Custer—from cutting his teeth at Bull Run in the Civil War, to his famous and untimely death at Little Bighorn in the Indian Wars. Author James Robbins demonstrates that Custer, having graduated last in his class at West Point, went on to prove himself again and again as an extremely skilled cavalry leader. Robbins argues that Custer's undoing was his bold and cocky attitude, which caused the Army's bloodiest defeat in the Indian Wars. Robbins also dives into Custer’s personal life, exploring his letters and other personal documents to reveal who he was as a person, underneath the military leader. The Real Custer is an exciting and valuable contribution to the legend and history of Custer that will delight Custer fans as well as readers new to the legend.