# George Armstrong Custer



## Liberty Ship (Jan 26, 2006)

I was just perusing Custer's "My Life on the Plains" and concluded that had he survived to this day, "yellowhair" would probably be posting here with us on AAAC. From the book:

*****
Ordinarily, I must confess to having sufficient regard for the customs and courtesies of life to endeavor to appear in society suitably and appropriately dressed. But when the alarm of "Indians" was given, and in such a startling manner as to show they were almost in our midst, the question was not "What shall I wear?" but "What shall I do?" It has become so common-in fact, almost a law-to describe the costumes worn upon memorable occasions, that I may be pardoned if I indulge in a description which I will endeavor to make as brief as the costume itself. A modern Jenkins, if desiring to tell the truth, would probably express himself as follows. "General Custer on this occasion appeared in a beautiful crimson robe (red flannel robe de nuit), very becoming to his complexion. His hair was worn au naturel, and permitted to fall carelessly over his shoulders. In his hand he carried gracefully a handsome Spencer rifle. It is unnecessary to add that he became the observed of all observers."

https://www.kancoll.org/books/custerg/cgchap06.htm


----------



## agnash (Jul 24, 2006)

*Flag from the Little Big Horn*

When I was an undergraduate studying history, I had access to the university archives. There on the wall, amongst all of the other relics collected by the Jesuits over the years, was the US flag carried by Custer's cavalry at the Little Big Horn. I thought it was a real shame that it was locked away and only seen by perhaps twenty people pre year. It still is locked up, but the university has made great strides in getting many other things on public display.


----------



## Acct2000 (Sep 24, 2005)

I wonder if Custer's appetite for attention and glory contributed to his disastrous military decision.


----------



## jackmccullough (May 10, 2006)

I don't know if this is true, but I recall that Jean Shepard used to talk about how Custer was promoted to general by mistake. According to Shep, while most people in that position would check on whether it was for real, Custer's first move was to order the flashiest, most spectacular uniform he could get his hands on, with gold epaulets, neon braiding, the works.


----------



## KenR (Jun 22, 2005)

jackmccullough said:


> I don't know if this is true, but I recall that Jean Shepard used to talk about how Custer was promoted to general by mistake. According to Shep, while most people in that position would check on whether it was for real, Custer's first move was to order the flashiest, most spectacular uniform he could get his hands on, with gold epaulets, neon braiding, the works.


Interesting. In a recent edition of _The Gettysburg Magazine, _Captian Custer was promoted to Brigadier General _"because of bravery in battle and a staff officer courting attention through loyalty to such senior officers as Major Generals George B. McClellan and Alfred Pleasanton". _He was promoted in June 1863 along with Elon Farnsworth and Wesley Merritt, two other "boy generals". According to all that I read of him in the Civil War, he was an good brigadier.


----------



## 16412 (Apr 1, 2005)

Seems like I read his uniform was his own design along with those under him.

He may have had a lot of chrisma but not somebody I want to follow to the end.


----------



## Kav (Jun 19, 2005)

Little has been written sartorially about that other great american patriot Crazy Horse. He went into battle nude save warpaint. HOKA HEY!


----------



## Beresford (Mar 30, 2006)

He probably should have paid more attention to his scouts than to his clothes.

ic12337:


----------



## Liberty Ship (Jan 26, 2006)

Patton paid similar attention to his dress as Custer did. 

In an interesting historical aside, prior to the Little Big Horn, Custer was in Washington testifying before congress about corruption in the Bureau of Indian Affairs. He stuck to his guns in spite of pressure from President Grant, accusing a close associate of Grant of corruption, specifically of cheating the Indians. Grant got so mad at Custer that he relieved Custer of command of the 7th Calvary and confined him in Washington. During this time, Grant himself ordered the deployment of the 7th against the Indians without its commander, Custer. Custer never changed his story but was sent back to command the 7th after other officers pressured the president. I believe that, having been out of the loop, he was still playing catch up in the field at the time of the Little Big Horn.

Custer made a fatal tactical error at the Little Big Horn. It happens. But he really wasn't the genocidal racist that our educational systems seen to need for him to be to simplify things to the point that no child is left behind.


----------



## Flashy (Mar 15, 2006)

KenR said:


> According to all that I read of him in the Civil War, he was an good brigadier.


Except for that whole hanging Confederate prisoners thing....


----------



## jpeirpont (Mar 16, 2004)

Flashy said:


> Except for that whole hanging Confederate prisoners thing....


He did that? Never knew, I have a new found respect for him.


----------



## Kav (Jun 19, 2005)

Yes Jpierpont, go out and buy a poster and light a candle. Custer, a complicated person with good and bad points as a individual, military officer and would be politician felt no moral calling to extend emancipation to native peoples. Instead he violated treaties and his own word and was involved in more than one action that today would be equated with Me Lai. He was warned by the indians not to betray his word and did so. This is why after the battle the only mutilations to his body were the amputation of his right index finger ( so he couldn't direct any troops in the afterlife) and a bone awl punched into his ear (so he would listen better in the afterlife.)I would point out escaped ***** slaves found sanctuary in any number of tribes throughout our history. When your done being black all day, try a few minutes before bed to just be an objective human being.


----------



## 16412 (Apr 1, 2005)

jpeirpont said:


> He did that? Never knew, I have a new found respect for him.


Not sure which Confederate prisoners he hung, but some certianly deserved worse.

One time I was invited to a bar by a black tailor (I don't go into bars) and his friends (him and they were all from the deep South) would not even look at me or talk to me and were accusing him of even being around me. They all had light grey hair back then, about 25 years ago. For what some people had done to them, which happened to be whites, must have been terrible to cause that kind of anger.


----------



## Liberty Ship (Jan 26, 2006)

WA said:


> Not sure which Confederate prisoners he hung, but some certianly deserved worse.
> 
> One time I was invited to a bar by a black tailor (I don't go into bars) and his friends (him and they were all from the deep South) would not even look at me or talk to me and were accusing him of even being around me. They all had light grey hair back then, about 25 years ago. For what some people had done to them, which happened to be whites, must have been terrible to cause that kind of anger.


Well, actually, when I started this thread, I feared it might end up in a "cowboys vs. Indians" thing, which was not my intention. I never thought it would end up a North vs. South thing, though!

It is unlikely that the wronged gentlemen to whom you refer were abused by Confederates. They were probably abused by White southern Democrats. The Civil War and the role slavery play in it is the most misunderstood aspect of American history. There is an anti-Confederacy prejudice afoot that eclipses all the other prejudices we hear about on a daily basis.

Another interesting thing to be aware of is that the Cherokee Nations fought with the Southern states. It would seem that they had more of an ax to grind with the Federal Government than with Georgia, Texas, etc. And, I might add that slavery in the territory called the United States existed for some 250 years under the British, and 92 years under the Federal Government of the United States, but only 4 years under the Confederate flag. If memory serves, the Federal government didn't officially end slavery until 3 years after the Civil War.


----------



## Kav (Jun 19, 2005)

Returning somewhat to the thread, The Gene Autrey Museum in Los Angeles displays a brace of english pistols owned by Custer, who is believed to have carried yet another brace into the 'battle.' It's an interesting, if somewhat strange museum, actual artifacts with such provenance mixed with the cinema fantasy that has carried forward the american mythos of our knight errants, and errors into popular culture today. I was at the battlefield, visiting an epic archaeologic study that clarified much of that horrific day. It is one of the spookiest places I've ever been to. You keep thinking the wind in the tall grass is somebody coming up on you just as a hawk screams overhead. The Lakota, and who is, and is not a Lakota still a nasty infight between fullbloods , part bloods, old AIM members and Ward Churchillites; have, in part declared themselves independant since so many treaties were broken and are seeking recognition form the United Nations and no less than Hugo Chavez. It's a sad place, beautifull yet filled with despair and the broken reverberations of a long silent buglecall. That Custer was conscious of his image and clothing is a given. And, if the words of the one survivor ( yes there was one, a indian scout) can be trusted, he gave two commmands " at em boys! We have them surrounded! " and possibly " Don't take any prisoners!" Words I heard at the post Christmas shopping mall sales. I stayed, hunkered down in my Toyota like Benteen while my family sallied forth.


----------



## Flashy (Mar 15, 2006)

The incident I referred occurred on Sept 22, 1864. Custer ordered the execution, without trial, of six soldiers of the 43RD Batallion of Virginia Cavalry (Mosby's Rangers). Whatever your personal feelings on the Civil War, there are clearly defined rules protecting soliders, including partisans/guerrillas--a catagory which Mosby's command clearly falls into (unlike, say Quantrill's raiders outwest, or Al Qaeda today).


----------



## 16412 (Apr 1, 2005)

Kav said:


> The Gene Autrey Museum in Los Angeles


When I was in Los Angeles I wanted to go there (about 10 years ago) but I didn't want to fiddle around with the maps to figure out where it was, so I never went.

Did make it to Will Rogers Park.


----------



## jpeirpont (Mar 16, 2004)

Kav said:


> Yes Jpierpont, go out and buy a poster and light a candle. Custer, a complicated person with good and bad points as a individual, military officer and would be politician felt no moral calling to extend emancipation to native peoples. Instead he violated treaties and his own word and was involved in more than one action that today would be equated with Me Lai. He was warned by the indians not to betray his word and did so. This is why after the battle the only mutilations to his body were the amputation of his right index finger ( so he couldn't direct any troops in the afterlife) and a bone awl punched into his ear (so he would listen better in the afterlife.)I would point out escaped ***** slaves found sanctuary in any number of tribes throughout our history. When your done being black all day, try a few minutes before bed to just be an objective human being.


I was being slightly silly, though I do have a soft spot in my heart for anyone who has killed a confederate.
I am an objective Black human being all day every day.


----------



## Kav (Jun 19, 2005)

Forgive me for being an ' intolerate, tired old white guy' who has enough American Indian genetic material to cavalierly lump Custer and all the other war heros of the Indian Wars in kind.


----------



## 16412 (Apr 1, 2005)

Kav said:


> tired old white guy' who has enough American Indian genetic material to cavalierly lump Custer and all the other war heros of the Indian Wars in kind.


Isn't that being between a rock and a hard spot?



> jpeirpont


 Can't speak for all confederates, but you are right about some.


----------



## KenR (Jun 22, 2005)

WA said:


> Can't speak for all confederates, but you are right about some.


Yes, that is correct, SOME. Most Confederate soldiers were not slave holding gentry but lower and middle class folks who fought for states rights, or because their state seceded from the Union. I'm a Yankee through and through but I am not going to gloat over their deaths.


----------



## Murrah (Mar 28, 2005)

I wonder if this thread veered into a discussion of the wonderfulness of hanging blacks, the banning of members would commence asap....


----------



## Gurdon (Feb 7, 2005)

Murrah said:


> I wonder if this thread veered into a discussion of the wonderfulness of hanging blacks, the banning of members would commence asap....


Hanging, or otherwise executing, anyone isn't wonderful, whether it is lynching or war crime, or merely state-sanctioned killing.

Regards,
Gurdon


----------



## Kav (Jun 19, 2005)

WA, Whenever I find myself between a rock and a hard place I get out car keys, nail file, dental pick or even my fingernails and start chipping.


----------



## Phinn (Apr 18, 2006)

> I do have a soft spot in my heart for anyone who has killed a confederate.


My, how grotesquely inappropriate.


----------



## Acct2000 (Sep 24, 2005)

Phinn, Phinn, Phinn,

You know it is okay for politically correct people to slam politically incorrect people that way.

I will say that I thought slavery was an abomination, but it also ended almost 143 years ago. 

There are better ways to secure the cooperation needed to achieve better racial equality than enforcing selective political correctness.


----------



## jpeirpont (Mar 16, 2004)

forsbergacct2000 said:


> Phinn, Phinn, Phinn,
> 
> You know it is okay for politically correct people to slam politically incorrect people that way.
> 
> ...


What does any of this have to do with anything in the thread?


----------



## jpeirpont (Mar 16, 2004)

Murrah said:


> I wonder if this thread veered into a discussion of the wonderfulness of hanging blacks, the banning of members would commence asap....


Didn't know confederates were a race.
You folk can whine all you like. A dead confederate is a good thing, so is a dead Nazi or participate in the old KKK. Nothing wrong with saying so. The men who killed any of them were doing gods work.


----------



## Acct2000 (Sep 24, 2005)

If you think I added nothing, you are welcome to think that. 

If you don't see this as a response to some previous posts, you are also welcome to think that.

I agree with a lot of your posts. There is one in here I don't agree with.

Life goes on.


----------



## Phinn (Apr 18, 2006)

The Nazis were a political party. The Confederates were a nationality. Saying that "a dead Confederate is a good thing" like saying that the only good German is a dead German.



> The men who killed any of them were doing gods work.


Please read my signature quote.


----------



## Kav (Jun 19, 2005)

'Race' is a morphological system based on at most 5 points in our 7000 odd DNA strand. The difference in melanin between a real dark ***** and a really washed out whitie, aka 'tired old white guy' as coined by the right revereand Al Sharpton is less than a good spit. We have ETHNICITIES based on shared cultures, religons and political assemblies. What JPIERPONT has is known as CROW JIM. Put that in your bowl of chittlin's and stir it. Say AMEN brotha Al, Say AMEN brotha Jessie and pass the collection, er shakedown plate.


----------



## Laxplayer (Apr 26, 2006)

jpeirpont said:


> Didn't know confederates were a race.
> You folk can whine all you like. A dead confederate is a good thing, so is a dead Nazi or participate in the old KKK. Nothing wrong with saying so. The men who killed any of them were doing gods work.


A dead Mumia Abu-Jamal would also be a good thing. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mumia_Abu-Jamal


----------



## Kav (Jun 19, 2005)

I'm off to Trader Joes. Pray for the black kids in white marching band uniforms pushing candy bars next to the Lyndon la Ruouche table. I'm not in the mood to have anyone get in my face.


----------



## jpeirpont (Mar 16, 2004)

Phinn said:


> The Nazis were a political party. The Confederates were a nationality. Saying that "a dead Confederate is a good thing" like saying that the only good German is a dead German.
> 
> Please read my signature quote.


Confederates were not a nationality. A dead confederate is not only a good thing it is a great thing.


----------



## jpeirpont (Mar 16, 2004)

Laxplayer said:


> A dead Mumia Abu-Jamal would also be a good thing. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mumia_Abu-Jamal


Nothing to do with anything either. Do you people sit around with a list of Blacks you'd like to see dead?
But I do support the Brother.


----------



## Laxplayer (Apr 26, 2006)

jpeirpont said:


> Nothing to do with anything either. Do you people sit around with a list of Blacks you'd like to see dead?
> But I do support the Brother.


Blacks? Nope, just cop-killers.


----------



## jpeirpont (Mar 16, 2004)

Laxplayer said:


> Blacks? Nope, just cop-killers.


What did it have to do with what we were talking about in this thread? And why not post a white guy who has killed a cop?


----------



## Acct2000 (Sep 24, 2005)

Geez

Do you keep a list of whites you want dead?

I do not speak for all white people, but I certainly have no such list.

To be fair, you do not speak for all black people and it is not fair to anyone to assume that you do.

Except for this issue, you usually make sense to me.

Sigh.


----------



## Laxplayer (Apr 26, 2006)

jpeirpont said:


> What did it have to do with what we were talking about in this thread? And why not post a white guy who has killed a cop?


It has about as much to do with this thread as you saying you had a soft spot in your heart for anyone who killed a Confederate. You obviously dislike the South, and just took a cheap shot at white southerners with your comment. I did the same to you because I figured (correctly) that you supported Mumia. I'm not from the South, nor do I have relatives there. I just thought your comment was dumb, and decided to post something that would piss you off. How's that for honesty?


----------



## Spence (Feb 28, 2006)

Having family in Sheridan, WY I remember driving by that site many times.

-spence


----------



## jpeirpont (Mar 16, 2004)

forsbergacct2000 said:


> Geez
> 
> Do you keep a list of whites you want dead?
> 
> ...


We were speaking of Custer and Confederates. You mention slavery was a long time ago, for what reason, I have no idea. Lax somehow finds a way to compare one fella with Nazi's, Confederates and the KKK, odd racial issues clearly on his part.


----------



## jpeirpont (Mar 16, 2004)

Laxplayer said:


> It has about as much to do with this thread as you saying you had a soft spot in your heart for anyone who killed a Confederate. You obviously dislike the South, and just took a cheap shot at white southerners with your comment. I did the same to you because I figured (correctly) that you supported Mumia. I'm not from the South, nor do I have relatives there. I just thought your comment was dumb, and decided to post something that would piss you off. How's that for honesty?


Someone else mention what happened to the Confederates, I responded. Thus your reply was childish. I actually love the South, and likely have more in common with them than you. Charleston & Greenville South Carolina along with Tuskegee, Alabama are all close to my heart I have land going back generations in the latter. Confederates were despicable and their supporters just as bad, any death of theirs should be celebrated. I do not beleive every white Southerner supported or supports them and their deeds. My posts had little to do with race, far less than you ASSumed.
Free Mumia!!


----------



## Laxplayer (Apr 26, 2006)

jpeirpont said:


> Someone else mention what happened to the Confederates, I responded. Thus your reply was childish. I actually love the South, and likely have more in common with them than you. Charleston & Greenville South Carolina along with Tuskegee, Alabama are all close to my heart I have land going back generations in the latter. Confederates were despicable and their supporters just as bad, any death of theirs should be celebrated. I do not beleive every white Southerner supported or supports them and their deeds. *My posts had little to do with race, far less than you ASSumed.*
> *Free Mumia!!*


Based upon your prior posts about the South and how you didn't want whites living in your neighborhood, I'd doubt this is true. My relatives didn't live here during the Civil War, so I really couldn't care less about the war. Again, I just posted to piss you off, just as you were trying to do to others.


----------



## jpeirpont (Mar 16, 2004)

Laxplayer said:


> Based upon your prior posts about the South and how you didn't want whites living in your neighborhood, I'd doubt this is true. My relatives didn't live here during the Civil War, so I really couldn't care less about the war. Again, I just posted to piss you off, just as you were trying to do to others.


Many aspects of the South are bad, so be it. I make negative comments about Black frequently, do I hate myself? No where have I said anything about disliking the South on a whole. Many people desire to live in segregated neighborhoods. Economically, religiously, culturally and racially, it doesn't mean they hate others. I'm not even sure how that translates into me hating the South, as I live in the North. You piss me off? Highly unlikely, I doubt many people get mad about comments on the net. But if it makes you feel better to imagine yanking the naps out my head in anger, go ahead.


----------



## Flashy (Mar 15, 2006)

The civil war ended 143 years ago. I'd say its a safe bet all confederates are dead



jpeirpont said:


> Didn't know confederates were a race.
> You folk can whine all you like. A dead confederate is a good thing, so is a dead Nazi or participate in the old KKK. Nothing wrong with saying so. The men who killed any of them were doing gods work.


----------



## Kav (Jun 19, 2005)

I give the readers the historical figure of Isaiah Dorman, an escaped slave who was befriended and given sanctuary by the Sioux nation @ 1850 , married a sioux woman and given the name Azinpi. Isaiah returned their kindness by joining Custer as his translator and became known to Lakota people as 'Custer's black white man.' At the battle of the Greasy Grass Isaiah was pinned under his wounded horse and shot by a female warrior. Before dying, He was singled out for the most horrific mutilation of all the 7th cavalry; his legs below the knees were riddled repeatedly by handgun fire @ 2" apart. His testicals were pinned to the earth with an iron picket pin, disembowled and blood drained into his personal coffeepot. His chest was shot with multiple arrows and finally, the greatest insult of all, male member shoved down his throat so he couldn't translate for Yellowhair in the afterlife. GOD! I love my useless degree ( according to my family.) Have a care who you hang with JPEIRPONT.


----------



## jpeirpont (Mar 16, 2004)

Kav said:


> I give the readers the historical figure of Isaiah Dorman, an escaped slave who was befriended and given sanctuary by the Sioux nation @ 1850 , married a sioux woman and given the name Azinpi. Isaiah returned their kindness by joining Custer as his translator and became known to Lakota people as 'Custer's black white man.' At the battle of the Greasy Grass Isaiah was pinned under his wounded horse and shot by a female warrior. Before dying, He was singled out for the most horrific mutilation of all the 7th cavalry; his legs below the knees were riddled repeatedly by handgun fire @ 2" apart. His testicals were pinned to the earth with an iron picket pin, disembowled and blood drained into his personal coffeepot. His chest was shot with multiple arrows and finally, the greatest insult of all, male member shoved down his throat so he couldn't translate for Yellowhair in the afterlife. GOD! I love my useless degree ( according to my family.) Have a care who you hang with JPEIRPONT.


Savages, unfortunatly he wasn't a Buffalo.


----------



## Phinn (Apr 18, 2006)

> Confederates were not a nationality.


Of course it was a nationality. Claiming that their deaths were good is akin to saying that the death of any Mexican is good, or any New Yorker, or any Californian.

You didn't say "secessionist" (which would have included not only the Confederate secessionists, but also all of the Northern secessionists, such as the owners and workers of the many Northern pro-secession newspapers whose First Amendment rights Lincoln blatantly violated when he shut them down by force).

You didn't say "slave-owner" (which would have included all of the black slave-owners, not to mention the slave-owners in Union slave states like Maryland, which didn't abolish slavery until after the war started, or West Virginia, which was admitted as a slave state, despite the fact that it seceded from Virginia, even though secession itself was supposed to be illegal).

You said "Confederate" (which included all of the abolitionist Southerners who became Confederates in 1861, whose lives were destroyed by the Union army along with everyone else's as a result of Lincoln's orders to wage war against civilians like all the other war criminals in history who murdered civilians).

You said it. Own it, or retract it.


----------



## jpeirpont (Mar 16, 2004)

Phinn said:


> Of course it was a nationality. Claiming that their deaths were good is akin to saying that the death of any Mexican is good, or any New Yorker, or any Californian.
> 
> You didn't say "secessionist" (which would have included not only the Confederate secessionists, but also all of the Northern secessionists, such as the owners and workers of the many Northern pro-secession newspapers whose First Amendment rights Lincoln blatantly violated when he shut them down by force).
> 
> ...


Good points all, I suppose. I still disagree completely, but have lost the energy to chat about it. Plus I did make it my resolution to stay away from racial topics, failed early but I'll redeem myself by bowing out.


----------



## Kav (Jun 19, 2005)

Your vaunted buffalo soldiers took part in the genocide of another minority. I would point out the first use of the word 'Final Solution' was penned by General Sherman who reapplied his scorched earth policy against all southerners and lamented the fact that Indan agents prevented him from exterminating all indians, the favoured tactic being attacking winter villages to destroy, without prejudice all inhabitants. Mel Brooks got it wrong. He should have killed that wagonload of savage Shvartzers. Your a Bigot, and being black doesn't excuse you or render any special consideration thereof.


----------



## Liberty Ship (Jan 26, 2006)

jpeirpont said:


> Confederates were not a nationality. A dead confederate is not only a good thing it is a great thing.


Strikingly ignorant. Of course they were a nationality.

Also, I seem to recollect that about 12,000 free Black "Confederates" saw combat in defense of their home states during the Civil War; maybe 50 or 60,000 served. Something they don't mention in the government schools (the government schools trade in hatred; while preaching tolerance, they thrive on "black and white"). Sometimes, when wandering the back roads of the South, you will see a monument or a memorial to that effect...

I did a quick google and found this:

https://blackconfederates.com/index.html

There is more, of course.

Anyway, it looks like Custer was a man who paid attention to his appearance even under the stress of combat.


----------

