The Largest Indian Village He Had Ever Seen (Part 4 of 11)

His plan was to spring a surprise attack on the Indian village in the early morning.  A dawn attack would catch most of them sleeping.  They would awaken confused.  They would panic.  The warriors would run.  It had worked years earlier when the Seventh attacked a Cheyenne village on the Washita; he was confident it would work here.

The Seventh was miles and miles from the Little Bighorn when it made camp on the 24^th of June.  After a meal of hardtack and bacon, troopers turned in hoping for a full night’s rest.  They had been riding hard, and they and their horses were exhausted.  But they were awakened before midnight and ordered to break camp for an overnight march.  The moon was little more than a sliver in the sky, so it was terribly dark.  Some said afterward that the column stayed intact only by troopers following the subtle sounds of whoever rode ahead of them.

They paused at daybreak of the 25^th, a Sunday, the men allowed campfires for coffee with their hardtack and bacon.  Some distance ahead, Custer’s Arikara and Crow scouts had climbed a promontory now known as the Crow’s Nest to survey the horizon.  They immediately recognized that they had found what they were looking for, a big Indian village about ten miles distant.  They sent word to Custer.  He and his column arrived about midmorning.  The Arikaras advised Custer that the village was so immense and the teepees so thick that they appeared as a solid mass of white filling the Little Bighorn valley.  Scout Mitch Bouyer indicated it was the largest Indian village he had ever seen.

Custer now contemplated what to do.  If Custer stuck to his plan for an early morning attack, it would be best for the Seventh to remain in camp for the remainder of the day followed by an overnight march that would bring them to the camp just before sunrise, the perfect time to strike.  The darkness would also hide the dust cloud that the approaching column would certainly create.  But an incident earlier that morning had Custer concerned that they may have already been discovered.  A box of hardtack had fallen from a pack mule, and when a couple of troopers went back to retrieve it, they found a couple of Indians trying to pry it open.  One Indian was shot and killed, but the other fled.   If the Seventh delayed any further the Indian who fled would surely warn the others.  They could not risk discovery.  In retrospect, it was surprising that Custer had allowed the morning campfires.  The smoke had been visible from the Crow’s Nest; it may have been visible from the Little Bighorn.  It was possible that that, too, could have alerted the Indian village.  He decided to abandon his plan for an early morning attack and instead continue his march and attack the village that afternoon.  In so doing, he was also abandoning any possibility of a coordinated attack with Gibbon’s column.

The Arikara scouts began singing their death chant.