General George Custer - Battle of Little Big Horn

BATTLE OF LITTLE BIG HORN BY W. DONALD HORN

General George Custer was greatly admired in the 19th century for his courage during battles, hard work in school, and leadership throughout his life. These qualities are very important and led him to be a great General in the army. George started his military career at the West Point academy, where George was well liked by all of his classmates. Many admired Custer because of his leadership in every thing he did wether it was sports or scholarly work. Soon after George graduated he joined the military while the civil war was in progress and fought on the Union side. When the war was finally over Custer was promoted to the lieutenant of the 7th Cavalry in which he held until his death. One of the most important victories he led was against the Chief Black Kettle and the Cheyenne Indians at the battle of the Washita.

In 1873 the new idea of Manifest Destiny was beginning to grow. During this time Americans believed that if any obstacles got in the way of this progress, including Indians, they were to be overcome to matter what the cost. Soon Custer and the 7th Cavalry were commanded into the Black Hills to find possible roads, but instead the found gold and now there was no stopping miners who entered the Black Hills in search of it, this made the Native Americans upset. Because of the gold in the area the Government told Custer to move all the Indians into a reservation. This is where the conflict began. Soon George and his troops tracked down the Native Americans and decided to strike. Custer was being defeated and he was waiting for more troops to arrive but, they never came. The author suggests that the reason the others never came was because they were waiting for more reinforcements.

The author of the book, W. Donald Horn, is trying to portray General Custer as a kind, brave hero, who was a normal human with flaws just like everyone. In which most aspects he was. In the author's opinion most people see General Custer as a man full of malice, he wants to prove them contrary. In the book there are many examples of how the author describes Custer as an admired man, and many of his colleagues suggested that also. Private W. H. Beebe, says "..how his command adored him; how willing we were to follow where he led; the confidence we had in his judgement, and he assurance that when he struck a blow on the enemy, it would be a victory." (Pg 6.) Many other military officers would say the same. In this case I believe that the author did a good job portraying how favored he was, due to the fact he used many of the opinions of Custer's military colleagues to prove this idea. But in this area the author doesn't include anything that would lead a person to think badly about Custer. So even if Custer wasn't the brave, kind, heroic man the author points out the reader would never know due to the authors bias towards the greatness