Editing George Armstrong Custer (section)

==Personal life==
[[File:George Armstrong Custer and Elizabeth Bacon Custer - Brady-Handy.jpg|thumb|George and Libbie Custer, 1864]]
On February 9, 1864, Custer married [[Elizabeth Bacon Custer|Elizabeth Clift Bacon]] (1842–1933), whom he had first seen when he was 10 years old.<ref>Connell (1984), p. 113.</ref> He had been socially introduced to her in November 1862, when home in Monroe on leave. She was not initially impressed with him,<ref>{{Cite book|last=Barnett|first=Louise|title=Touched by Fire: The Life, Death, and Afterlife of George Armstrong Custer|year=1996|publisher=Henry Holt and Company, Inc.|location=New York|isbn=978-0-8050-3720-3|url=https://archive.org/details/touchedbyfirelif00barn}}, p. 22.</ref> and her father, Judge [[Daniel S. Bacon|Daniel Bacon]], disapproved of Custer as a match because he was the son of a blacksmith. It was not until well after Custer had been promoted to the rank of brigadier general that he gained the approval of Judge Bacon. He married Elizabeth Bacon 14 months after they formally met.<ref>Connell (1984), pp. 113–114.</ref>

In November 1868, following the [[Battle of Washita River]], Custer was alleged (by Captain [[Frederick Benteen]], chief of scouts Ben Clark, and Cheyenne oral tradition) to have unofficially married [[Mo-nah-se-tah]], daughter of the Cheyenne chief [[Little Rock (Cheyenne chief)|Little Rock]] in the winter or early spring of 1868–1869 (Little Rock was killed in the one-day action at Washita on November 27).<ref name="utley-107">Utley, Robert M. (2001). ''Cavalier in Buckskin: George Armstrong Custer and the Western Military Frontier,'' revised edition. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press. {{ISBN|0-8061-3387-2}}, p. 107.</ref> Mo-nah-se-tah gave birth to a child in January 1869, two months after the Washita battle. Cheyenne oral history tells that she also bore a second child fathered by Custer in late 1869. Some historians, however, believe that Custer had become sterile after contracting gonorrhea while at West Point and that the father was in actuality his brother Thomas.<ref>Wert (1996), pp. 287–288.</ref> Clarke's description in his memoirs included the statement, "Custer picked out a fine looking one and had her in his tent every night."<ref>''Montana: The Magazine of Western History'' (Montana Historical Society), vol. 67. no 3, Autumn 2017, p. 7.</ref>

In addition to "Autie", Custer acquired several nicknames. During the Civil War, after his promotion to become the youngest [[brigadier general]] in the Army aged 23, the press called him "The Boy General". During his years on the [[Great Plains]] in the American Indian Wars, his troopers referred to him with grudging admiration as "Iron Butt" and "Hard Ass" for his stamina in the saddle and strict discipline, as well as with the more derisive "Ringlets" for his long, curling blond hair, which he perfumed with cinnamon-scented hair oil.<ref>James Welch and Paul Stekler, ''Custer: The Battle of Little Bighorn and the Fate of the Plains Indians''. New York: W. W. Norton and Company, 1994. p. 60.</ref>

Throughout his travels, he gathered geological specimens, sending them to the University of Michigan. On September 10, 1873, he wrote Libbie, "the Indian battles hindered the collecting, while in that immediate region it was unsafe to go far from the command...."<ref>Elizabeth B. Custer, Boots and Saddles, or Life in Dakota With General Custer.(New York: Harper and Brothers, 1885), p. 285.</ref>

During his service in Kentucky, Custer bought thoroughbred horses. He took two on his last campaign, Vic (for Victory) and Dandy. During the march he changed horses every three hours.<ref>E. A. Brininstool, Troopers with Custer: Historic Incidents of the Battle of the Little Bighorn. (Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press, 1989), p. 63.</ref> He rode Vic into his last battle. Custer took his two staghounds Tuck and Bleuch with him during the last expedition. He left them with orderly Burkman when he rode into battle. Burkman joined the packtrain. He regretted not accompanying Custer but lived until 1925, when he took his own life.<ref>Nathaniel Philbrick, The Last Stand. (New York: Penguin Group, 2010), p, 152</ref>

===Appearance===
Custer was fastidious in his grooming. Early in their marriage, Libbie wrote, "He brushes his teeth after every meal. I always laugh at him for it, also for washing his hands so frequently."<ref>Marguerite Merington, ''The Custer Story: The Life and Intimate Letters of General George A. Custer and His Wife Elizabeth''. Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press, 1987. p. 109.</ref> He was 5'11" tall and wore a size 38 jacket and size 9C boots.<ref>Thomas O'Neill, Passing Into Legend: the Death of Custer. (Brooklyn, NY: Arrow and Trooper, 1991), pp. 14–15.</ref> At various times he weighed between 143 pounds (at the end of the 1869 Kansas campaign)<ref>Lawrence A. Frost, General Custer's Libbie. (Seattle: Superior Publishing Co., 1976), p. 187</ref> and a muscular 170 pounds. A splendid horseman, "Custer mounted was an inspiration."<ref>Custer's Indian Battles. (Bronxville, NY: Unknown, 1936), p. 29.</ref> He was quite fit, able to jump to a standing position from lying flat on his back. He was a "power sleeper", able to get by on short naps after falling asleep immediately on lying down.<ref>Custer's Indian Battles. (Bronxville, NY: Unknown, 1936), pp. 12, 34.</ref> He "had a habit of throwing himself prone on the grass for a few minutes' rest and resembled a human island, entirely surrounded by crowding, panting dogs".<ref>Katherine Gibson Fougera, With Custer's Cavalry. (Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press: 1986), p. 110.</ref>

The common media image of Custer's appearance at the Last Stand—buckskin coat and long, curly blonde hair—is wrong. Although he and several other officers wore buckskin coats on the expedition, they took them off and packed them away because it was so hot. According to Soldier, an Arikara scout, "Custer took off his buckskin coat and tied it behind his saddle."<ref>Kenneth Hammer, ''Custer in '76: Walter Camp's Notes on the Custer Fight''. (Norman, Oklahoma: University of Oklahoma Press, 1990), p. 188.</ref> Further, Custer—whose hair was thinning—joined a similarly balding Lieutenant Varnum and "had the clippers run over their heads" before leaving Fort Lincoln.<ref>T. M. Coughlin, ''Varnum: The Last of Custer's Lieutenants''. Bryan, TX: J. M. Carroll, 1980. p. 35.</ref>