Editing Battle of the Little Bighorn (section)

===Custer's fight===
{{external media|float=right|headerimage=[[File:Chief Gall ca1880s.jpg|210px]] [[Gall (Native American leader)|Gall]]|video1=[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q2UzKRUgzJ0 C-SPAN Cities Tour – Billings: Battle of the Little Bighorn], 38:44, [[C-SPAN]]<ref name="cspan">{{cite web|title=Battle of Little Bighorn|publisher=[[C-SPAN]]|date=September 12, 2013|url=https://www.c-span.org/video/?315349-1/battle-little-bighorn|access-date=May 24, 2017|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170612134900/https://www.c-span.org/video/?315349-1%2Fbattle-little-bighorn|archive-date=June 12, 2017|df=mdy-all}}</ref> Park Ranger Steve Adelson describes the battle on-site}}

The precise details of Custer's fight and his movements before and during the battle are largely conjectural since none of the men who went forward with Custer's battalion (the five companies under his immediate command) survived the battle. Later accounts from surviving Indians are useful but are sometimes conflicting and unclear.

While the gunfire heard on the bluffs by Reno and Benteen's men during the afternoon of June 25 was probably from Custer's fight, the soldiers on Reno Hill were unaware of what had happened to Custer until General Terry's arrival two days later on June 27. They were reportedly stunned by the news. When the army examined the Custer battle site, soldiers could not determine fully what had transpired. Custer's force of roughly 210 men had been engaged by the Lakota and Northern Cheyenne about {{convert|3.5|mi|km}} to the north of Reno and Benteen's defensive position. Evidence of organized resistance included an apparent skirmish line on Calhoun Hill and apparent [[breastworks]] made of dead horses on Custer Hill.<ref name="michno1997" /> By the time troops came to recover the bodies, the Lakota and Cheyenne had already removed most of their own dead from the field. The troops found most of Custer's dead men stripped of their clothing, ritually mutilated, and in a state of decomposition, making identification of many impossible.<ref name="Brininstool, 60–62">Brininstool, 60–62.</ref> The soldiers identified the 7th Cavalry's dead as well as they could and hastily buried them where they had fallen.

Custer's body was found with two gunshot wounds, one to his left chest and the other to his left temple. Either wound would have been fatal, though he appeared to have bled from only the chest wound; some scholars believe his head wound may have been delivered postmortem. Some Lakota oral histories assert that Custer, having sustained a wound, committed suicide to avoid capture and subsequent torture. This would be inconsistent with his known right-handedness, but that does not rule out assisted suicide (other native accounts note several soldiers committing suicide near the end of the battle).<ref>{{multiref|Wooden Leg, [[Thomas B. Marquis]] (interpreter), ''A Warrior Who Fought Custer'', p. 246|Sun Bear, "A Cheyenne Old Man", in Marquis, ''The Cheyennes of Montana'', p. 86|Kate Big Head, [[Thomas B. Marquis]] (interpreter), ''She Watched Custer's Last Battle''}}</ref> Custer's body was found near the top of Custer Hill, which also came to be known as "Last Stand Hill". There the United States erected a tall memorial obelisk inscribed with the names of the 7th Cavalry's casualties.<ref name="Brininstool, 60–62" />

Several days after the battle, [[Curly (scout)|Curley]], Custer's Crow scout who had left Custer near Medicine Tail Coulee (a drainage which led to the river), recounted the battle, reporting that Custer had attacked the village after attempting to cross the river. He was driven back, retreating toward the hill where his body was found.<ref>Fox, pp. 10–13.</ref> As the scenario seemed compatible with Custer's aggressive style of warfare and with evidence found on the ground, it became the basis of many popular accounts of the battle.

According to [[Pretty Shield]], the wife of Goes-Ahead (another Crow scout for the 7th Cavalry), Custer was killed while crossing the river: "...{{nbsp}}and he died there, died in the water of the Little Bighorn, with Two-bodies, and the blue soldier carrying his flag".<ref name="linderman">Linderman, F. (1932) ''Pretty-shield: Medicine Woman of the Crows''. University of Nebraska Press. {{ISBN|0803280254}}. (Preface © 2003 by Alma Snell and Becky Matthews).</ref>{{rp|136}} In this account, Custer was allegedly killed by a Lakota called Big-nose.<ref name="linderman" />{{rp|141}} However, in Chief Gall's version of events, as recounted to Lt. [[Edward Settle Godfrey]], Custer did not attempt to ford the river and the nearest that he came to the river or village was his final position on the ridge.<ref name="godfrey">Godfrey, E. S. (1892) [http://ebooks.library.cornell.edu/c/cent/cent.1892.html ''Custer's Last Battle''] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110811113204/http://ebooks.library.cornell.edu/c/cent/cent.1892.html |date=August 11, 2011 }}. The Century Magazine, Vol. XLIII, No. 3, January. New York: The Century Company.</ref>{{rp|380}} Chief Gall's statements were corroborated by other Indians, notably the wife of Spotted Horn Bull.<ref name="godfrey" />{{rp|379}} Given that no bodies of men or horses were found anywhere near the ford, Godfrey himself concluded "that Custer did not go to the ford with any body of men".<ref name="godfrey" />{{rp|380}}

Cheyenne oral tradition credits [[Buffalo Calf Road Woman]] with striking the blow that knocked Custer off his horse before he died.<ref name="helenair.com">[http://www.helenair.com/news/state-and-regional/article_fcf44c96-cfb6-56f4-9c57-062e944350ce.html Martin J. Kidston, "Northern Cheyenne break vow of silence"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100628050508/http://helenair.com/news/state-and-regional/article_fcf44c96-cfb6-56f4-9c57-062e944350ce.html |date=June 28, 2010 }}, ''Helena Independent Record'', June 28, 2005. RetrievedOctober 23, 2009.</ref>

====Custer at Minneconjou Ford====
[[File:William W. Cooke's "Come quick" message to Frederick Benteen, Battle of the Little Bighorn, June 25, 1876.jpg|thumb|left|Lt. Adjutant William W. Cooke's message conveying Custer's orders to Frederick Benteen, June 25, 1876. Benteen's transcription is at upper right.]]
{{quote box|width=23em|''Hurrah boys, we've got them! We'll finish them up and then go home to our station''.|— Reported words of Lieutenant Colonel Custer at the battle's outset.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=E6t3ODKOQkkC&q=custer+%22We've+got+them.+We'll+finish+them+up+and+then+go+home+to+our+station%22&pg=PA86|title=I fought with Custer by Charles Windolph, Frazier Hunt, Robert Hunt|year=1987|access-date=2012-03-15|isbn= 978-0-8032-9720-3|last1=Windolph|first1=Charles|publisher=U of Nebraska Press}}</ref>}}

Having isolated Reno's force and driven them away from their encampment, the bulk of the native warriors were free to pursue Custer. The route taken by Custer to his "Last Stand" remains a subject of some debate. One possibility is that after ordering Reno to charge, Custer continued down Reno Creek to within about a half-mile (800 m) of the Little Bighorn, but then turned north and followed a ridge towards the bluffs, reaching them near the same spot to which Reno would soon retreat. A half mile farther, he reached the high ground and ridge, near the high point called Weir’s Hill (2500’ above Weir Peaks). From this high pinnacle where the bluff was tight to the river, he could see part of the big village in the valley on the other side. After passing over the high ridge (which connected Weir’s Hill to Sharpshooter’s Hill, sometimes referred to as “Martin’s Ridge”), Custer and his troops descended Cedar Coulee (RCOI figure 8) and into Medicine Tail Coulee. Some historians believe that part of Custer's force descended the coulee, going west to the river and attempting unsuccessfully to cross into the village. According to some accounts, a small contingent of Indian sharpshooters effectively opposed this crossing.

White Cow Bull claimed to have shot a leader wearing a buckskin jacket off his horse in the river. While no other Indian account supports this claim, if White Bull did shoot a buckskin-clad leader off his horse, some historians have argued that Custer may have been seriously wounded by him. Some Indian accounts claim that besides wounding one of the leaders of this advance, a soldier carrying a company [[Guidon (United States)|guidon]] was also hit.<ref>[http://www.astonisher.com/archives/museum/white_cow_bull_little_big_horn.html "White Cow Bull's Story of the Battle of the Little Bighorn #1"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080511210009/http://www.astonisher.com/archives/museum/white_cow_bull_little_big_horn.html|date=May 11, 2008}}.</ref> Troopers had to dismount to help the wounded men back onto their horses.<ref name="michno1997" />{{rp|117–19}} The fact that either of the non-mutilation wounds to Custer's body (a bullet wound below the heart and a shot to the left temple) would have been instantly fatal casts doubt on his being wounded and remounted.<ref>Wert, 1996, p. 355.</ref>

Reports of an attempted fording of the river at Medicine Tail Coulee might explain Custer's purpose for Reno's attack, that is, a coordinated "hammer-and-anvil" maneuver, with Reno's holding the Indians at bay at the southern end of the camp, while Custer drove them against Reno's line from the north. Other historians have noted that if Custer did attempt to cross the river near Medicine Tail Coulee, he may have believed it was the north end of the Indian camp, only to discover that it was the middle. Some Indian accounts, however, place the Northern Cheyenne encampment and the north end of the overall village to the left (and south) of the opposite side of the crossing.<ref name="michno1997" />{{rp|10–20}} The precise location of the north end of the village remains in dispute, however.

[[File:Custer's route over Little Bighorn battlefield.jpg|thumb|upright=1.3|Custer's route over battlefield, as theorized by [[Edward S. Curtis|Curtis]]. (Credit: [[Northwestern University Library]] [http://digital.library.northwestern.edu/curtis/ ''Edward S. Curtis's The North American Indian,'' 2003]). ]]
[[File:Custer Battlefield 1908 (bottom).jpg|thumb|upright=1.3|1:5260 of Custer battlefield – surveyed 1891, detailing U.S. soldiers' body locations]]

In 1908, [[Edward S. Curtis|Edward Curtis]], the famed ethnologist and photographer of the Native American Indians, made a detailed personal study of the battle, interviewing many of those who had fought or taken part in it. First, he went over the ground covered by the troops with the three Crow scouts [[White Man Runs Him]], [[Goes Ahead]], and [[Hairy Moccasin]], and then again with [[Two Moons]] and a party of Cheyenne warriors. He also visited the Lakota country and interviewed Red Hawk, "whose recollection of the fight seemed to be particularly clear".<ref name="curtis" />{{rp|44}} Then, he went over the battlefield once more with the three Crow scouts, but also accompanied by General [[Charles Woodruff (general)|Charles Woodruff]] "as I particularly desired that the testimony of these men might be considered by an experienced army officer". Finally, Curtis visited the country of the [[Arikara people|Arikara]] and interviewed the scouts of that tribe who had been with Custer's command.<ref name="curtis" />{{rp|44}} Based on all the information he gathered, Curtis concluded that Custer had indeed ridden down the Medicine Tail Coulee and then towards the river where he probably planned to ford it. However, "the Indians had now discovered him and were gathered closely on the opposite side".<ref name="curtis" />{{rp|48}} They were soon joined by a large force of Sioux who (no longer engaging Reno) rushed down the valley. This was the beginning of their attack on Custer who was forced to turn and head for the hill where he would make his famous "last stand". Thus, wrote Curtis, "Custer made no attack, the whole movement being a retreat".<ref name="curtis" />{{rp|49}}

====Other views of Custer's actions at Minneconjou Ford====
{{More citations needed section|date=December 2013}}

Other historians claim, from testimony of Lt. Edward Settle Godfrey, that Custer never approached the river, but rather continued north across the coulee and up the other side, where he gradually came under attack. According to this theory, by the time Custer realized he was badly outnumbered, it was too late to retreat to the south where Reno and Benteen could have provided assistance. Two men from the 7th Cavalry, the young Crow scout ''Ashishishe'' (known in English as Curley) and the trooper [[Peter Thompson (soldier)|Peter Thompson]], claimed to have seen Custer engage the Indians. The accuracy of their recollections remains controversial; accounts by battle participants and assessments by historians almost universally discredit Thompson's claim.

Archaeological evidence and reassessment of Indian testimony have led to a new interpretation of the battle. In the 1920s, battlefield investigators discovered hundreds of [[.45-70]] shell cases along the ridge line known today as Nye-Cartwright Ridge, between South Medicine Tail Coulee and the next drainage at North Medicine Tail (also known as Deep Coulee). Some historians believe Custer divided his detachment into two (and possibly three) battalions, retaining personal command of one while presumably delegating Captain George W. Yates to command the second.

Evidence from the 1920s supports the theory that at least one of the companies made a feint attack southwest from Nye-Cartwright Ridge straight down the center of the "V" formed by the intersection at the crossing of Medicine Tail Coulee on the right and Calhoun Coulee on the left. The intent may have been to relieve pressure on Reno's detachment (according to the Crow scout Curley, possibly viewed by both Mitch Bouyer and Custer) by withdrawing the skirmish line into the timber near the Little Bighorn River. Had the U.S. troops come straight down Medicine Tail Coulee, their approach to the Minneconjou Crossing and the northern area of the village would have been masked by the high ridges running on the northwest side of the Little Bighorn River.

That they might have come southwest, from the center of Nye-Cartwright Ridge, seems to be supported by Northern Cheyenne accounts of seeing the approach of the distinctly white-colored horses of Company E, known as the Grey Horse Company. Its approach was seen by Indians at that end of the village. Behind them, a second company, further up on the heights, would have provided long-range cover fire. Warriors could have been drawn to the feint attack, forcing the battalion back towards the heights, up the north fork drainage, away from the troops providing cover fire above. The covering company would have moved towards a reunion, delivering heavy [[volley fire]] and leaving the trail of expended cartridges discovered 50 years later.