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By the Numbers: Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument

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Top: This NPS photo shows a James Kenneth "J.K" Ralston painting depicting Custer's Last Stand in a romanticized fashion. Bottom: Little Bighorn Battlefield photo by Rob Mutch, October 2004.

The battle popularly known as "Custer's Last Stand," and now also recognized as the last stand of the Plains Indians (who called it the Battle of the Greasy Grass), was fought in southeastern Montana on June 25-26, 1876. Here are some highlight statistics for Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument and the battle it commemorates.

320,959

Recreational visits in 2010.  This tally reflects a slight increase over the previous year, but is far short of the 425,995 recorded in the peak year of 2002. Visitation is strongly seasonal, with two-thirds occurring  in June-July-August.

149,000

Objects in the park's museum and archival collections, which have been temporarily relocated to the National Park Service’s Western Archeological and Conservation Center in Tucson, Arizona, for preservation and conservation.

900-2,000?

Estimated number of warriors, including the renowned war chiefs Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse, among the roughly 7,000 Lakota (Sioux), Northern Cheyenne, and Arapahos (small contingent) encamped along the Little Bighorn River in June 1876. This immense encampment, possibly the largest-ever gathering of Plains Indians, stretched for several miles along the river valley and had a pony herd of some 15,000 animals.

765

The park's acreage, all federal. Actually, the park's two widely separated units -- the Custer Battlefield and the Reno-Benteen Battlefield -- preserve only a small fraction of the sprawling area encompassing the 1876 Indian encampment and the ground on which fighting, movements of the combatants, and other battle-related activities occurred. The great majority of this land is located on the Crow Indian Reservation.  The several miles-long stretch of Battlefield Road connecting the park's two units is on an Indian-granted right of way easement.

About 647

Total size of the U.S. Army Seventh Cavalry, including attached personnel, under the command of Lieutenant Colonel (brevet Major General) George Armstrong Custer as of June 22, 1876. This count included 31 officers, 566 enlisted personnel (+/- a few), a dozen or so mule packers and quartermaster employees, and 35 Indian scouts (six Crows, the rest mostly Arikaras).  Custer's command was organized into twelve  companies, one of which was assigned to guard the pack train.

268

Soldiers and attached personnel of the Seventh Cavalry killed in the Battle of the Little Bighorn. The Seventh Cavalry lost 16 officers, 242 troopers, and 10 scouts. Included among the dead were Custer, all of the personnel in the five-company battalion under his immediate command, and 18 men who fought in the southern part of the battlefield (valley and hilltop engagements in the Reno-Benteen Battlefield).

The body counts made on and near Last Stand Hill are unreliable and conflicting. The first was 197, the second was 214, and neither is considered indisputable.  

About 100?

Indians killed in the Little Bighorn fight.  Historical accounts are ambiguous and conflicting, with estimates ranging from as few as 36 to more than 130.  Since Plains Indians customarily minimized their battle losses, usually scattering when hard pressed, it was unusual to have such a large number of warriors killed in a single battle.

Less than 60 minutes
 
Duration of the engagement at Last Stand Hill in which Custer and the remainder of his  battalion were wiped out. Some Indian witnesses insisted that this final stage of the fighting in Custer's area of the battlefield lasted no more than half an hour.

55

Seventh Cavalry troops wounded at the Battle of the Little Bighorn.  These were men in the battalions commanded by Major Reno and Captain Benteen.  Engaged in fierce fighting about three miles to the south of Last Stand Hill, an area now lying mostly within the park's Reno-Benteen Battlefield unit, these troops were immobilized in a defensive perimeter and rendered no help to Custer's doomed detachment.

After burial details finished their grim work, wounded soldiers were transported to the Yellowstone River, placed aboard the riverboat Far West, and evacuated some 700 miles to the post hospital at Fort Abraham Lincoln on the Missouri River near Mandan, North Dakota.  When the Far West arrived in Bismarck during the night of July 5, the news of Custer's defeat was quickly telegraphed to the public at large, stunning a nation engaged in its Centennial celebration.   

24

Medals of Honor awarded for bravery above and beyond the call of duty during the Little Bighorn fight. Fifteen were awarded to troopers of the Reno-Benteen force who volunteered to fetch river water for the thirsty defenders of Reno Hill. Four sharpshooters who provided covering fire also received medals. (Ironically, a 16th water carrier, the only trooper wounded during the successful foray, was not awarded a medal even though his leg was amputated.)

20

Years since "Custer" was deleted from the park's official name. Much to the disgust of Plains Indians who fought to save their families and way of life, "Custer's Last Stand" became a cultural icon portraying the 7th Cavalry troopers as heroes and the Indians as bloodthirsty savages. The battlefield property, which was transferred from the War Department to the National Park Service in 1940, was redesignated Custer Battlefield National Monument in 1946.  It wasn't until December 10, 1991, that the park was finally renamed Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument via legislation that also called for an Indian Memorial to be built near Last Stand Hill.
 
17 minutes

Duration of the orientation video show at the park's visitor center, which is located in the Custer Battlefield unit not far from Last Stand Hill. 

17 stops

Organization of the Park Tour, a self-guided driving tour on the park's Battlefield Road.  Understandably, Last Stand Hill is the Park Tour's star attraction.

1 hour

Duration of  an Apsaalooke tour (aka native guide tour).  Scheduled five times daily from June through Labor Day, these Native American-guided bus tours of the battlefield are offered with the support of Little Bighorn College and the Apsaalooke (Crow Indian) Nation.

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Comments

Amen, Rick.  We may not be able to change history, but we should all be working hard not to repeat our past errors instead of trying to Make America Hate Again.

 


I totally disagree - first the Indians didn't conquer anyone for the land - they migrated here from Europe - technically from Africa via Europe and Asia across the tundrra in Russia - across the Bering Sea (which was land at the time) and were the original settlers of North America.  We stole the land from them, often killing them with our diseases (Indians had no crowd communicable diseases until the white man arrived) and using the diseases as a pretext for forcing them to recognize our God instead of their own saying your pagan gods must be angry to impose these diseases on you so come worship ours -- it was absolutely horrific what we did to them and there is no excuse for our not making PROPER reparations to their descendants.  I wish I had time to actually write a paper on this matter and posting it here because I could give you dozens of practical, viable reasons where we were wrong and we owe this to them.  For the record I am not Native American despite some Creek blood in my bloodline but am VERY empathetic to their causes and our own role in how they live now.  We should be ashamed.


Deborah, the Indians consisted of many different tribes.  Their history prior to the "white mans" landing was one of wars and land acquisition from each other.  Such has been the history of the world.  


IN  MEMORIAM:   JOE  MEDICINE  CROW

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2016/04/04/joe-medici...
 
http://www.worldwisdom.com/public/authors/Joe-Medicine-Crow.aspx
 
 
https://www.amazon.com/Joseph-Medicine-Crow/e/B001K848SQ

 
 

Quotes on Joe Medicine Crow


"Dr. Joseph Medicine Crow, the last living Plains Indian war chief, is the author of seminal works in Native American history and culture. He is the last person alive to have received direct oral testimony from a participant in the Battle of the Little Bighorn: 

His grandfather was a scout for General George Armstrong Custer. A veteran of World War II, Medicine Crow accomplished during the war all of the four tasks required to become a 'war chief,' including stealing fifty Nazi SS horses from a German camp. Medicine Crow was the first member of his tribe to attend college, receiving his master's degree in anthropology in 1939, and continues to lecture at universities and notable institutions like the United Nations. His contributions to the preservation of the culture and history of the First Americans are matched only by his importance as a role model to young Native Americans across the country."

--The White House, Office of the Press Secretary, taken from a press release announcing the naming of Dr. Medicine Crow, along with 15 others, as recipients of the 2009 Presidential Medal of Freedom.

 


i just dont see why still to this day, people point fingers for people failing to succeed in the world. now a days, for the most part everyone has an equal chance to do well for themselves. I know theres circumstances where this is not true. but thats life and everyone gets treated unfairly at some point. if people stopped pointing fingers and started working hard, no matter where youre from or what colour your skin is, this world would be a whole lot better. "white man" gets blamed for an awful lot, and im not saying we didnt do some terrible things in the past, but we have also done a lot of good. and thats the same for every one in the world. soooo ya enjoy.


This is the standard white man's justification for genocide.  "Everybody else did it, so we will too." The white man wins.  Not really honorably, but through lies, deceit, bloodlust, and  broken promises. It's a simple explanation for simple minds that are deranged by cultural and genetic flaws.  Hopefully the peacful and just will eventually conquor those who think they rule because they are honest, hard-working people who had no unfair advantages, and lazy people want everything given to them are the problem.  Nice-sounding myth, but really dumb.


Please take time to learn of these people and their ways. If we had had done so when we first arrived in their country we might have understood the balance they lived with nature. These meek will have the earth back. They haven't died.  Only called up to wait for the rebirth. Read: Black Elk Speaks


I imagine you are a Hitler admirer. I can't think of any other leader that would agree with the suggestion "to inoculate the Indians [with smallpox] by means of blankets, as well as to try every other method, that can serve to extirpate this execrable race" (Sir Jeffrey Amherst) or offering fifty pounds for adult male scalps, twenty-five for adult female scalps, and twenty for scalps of boys and girls under age twelve (Goverment of Massachussets). Or if you want more modern quotes "A war of extermination will continue to be waged between the two races until the Indian race becomes extinct." (California Governor Peter H. Burnett, 1851), or with the order the killing of babies because "nits make lice" (Col. J. Chivington) or the proposal of giving buffalo hunters a medal representing on one side a dead buffalo and on the other a starving Indian (general W.T. Sheridan). Until we became humanitarians and forcibly removed little children from their mother's arms in order to "kill the Indian to save the man" (Captain Richard H. Pratt)

The truth is that we Americans tried to stay on the moral high ground and maintain that we were treating the Indians as sovreign nations, until we found it inconvenient and unilaterally abolished treaties.

 


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