The wife and I ppent a few hours at the site this week. 2nd visit to the site.
I am not much of a horseman but would be interesting to ride the site. They must have had some darn tough horses back then. Reno's retreat uphill from the river timber did not look easy if at high speed. Custer's troops were seperated a long distance from the rest. If Custer and all knew where Reno and Benteen were located, the order to bring up packs was not expected to be a quick proposition. Something must have gotten screwed up beyond Reno's problems.
Odd thing is the area where the battle occurred was only under Lakota and Tsisitas control for 30-40 or so years prior and maybe not complete control then.
Need to do some more studying.
On the approach to the battle horses were going down from exhaustion. That factor and green troopers going up against desperate battle hardened Indians that were able to use the terrain to their advantage was a huge issue. It's pretty obvious that panic set in and the defense disintegrated. That is if there ever was truly an organized defensive position.
I've been to the battlefield several times and studied as many opinions and facts as I could find.
I believe Custer's main blunder was when he dismissed Capt. Benteen's advice to keep the whole outfit together. The Springfield rifles and disciplined fire from the troopers on the flat side (west) of the river would have had an excellent chance of repelling any Indian counter attacks. This is where Reno attacked with only 3 companies and he was apparently somewhat timid. In this alternate scenario the Indians may or may not have gotten away but they certainly would have had to abandon their tepees and anything else they couldn't carry off.
As it was 7 out of the original 12 companies survived in a very imperfect defensive position under the command of Capt. Benteen.
