February 5, 2025 • 51 mins
On April 20, 1876, George Custer was at the 1876 Centennial Exhibit when he received a call from the future…
In this episode, Custer will share what inspired him to join the military in hopes of finding a life of adventure. He’ll explain why did didn’t get kicked out of WestPoint despite receiving more than 700 demerits. And he’ll share his role at Gettysburg that might have been a turning point in the civil war.
Listen to the Calling History Podcast on Spotify, Apple, or your favorite provider.
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Steve Alexander is a distinguished actor, author, and living historian renowned for his portrayal of George Armstrong Custer. His deep commitment to authenticity has earned him recognition as the "Foremost Custer Living Historian" by the United States Congress and the Senates of Michigan and Ohio. Alexander has appeared in over forty docudramas and films, such as the History Channel's "Custer's Last Man" and A&E's award-winning "George Armstrong Custer: America's Golden Cavalier."
He is the author of the quintessential 2010 biography "G. A. Custer to the Little Big Horn" and its successor, "Believe in the Bold: Custer and the Gettysburg Campaign." Steve and his wife Sandy reside in the restored Bacon-Custer home in Monroe, Michigan. To learn more or contact Steve go to georgecuster.com.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:28):
I'm Tony Dean and today we'llbe calling history to speak with
General George Armstrong Custer.
He'll be answering our call on April20, 1876, just a few months before
he makes his famous last standat the Battle of Little Bighorn.
You've heard the story.
Custer and his boys look off in thedistance and they see Sitting Bull
(00:49):
and Crazy Horse with a coalition ofNative Americans, thousands of them.
General Custer looks at his men.
Totaling at about 25 percent of theopposing force and says boys we can
take him and of course he was wrong.
Well, my wife and I were in Montana yearsago and we visited that battlefield It
was quite a sight to walk to the top ofthat hill as you pass all the gravestones
(01:13):
Marking the spots where the bodies werefound But there were two things that
surprised me looking back at that day
Well, the first thing is, is that wealmost stepped on a rattlesnake, and I
didn't know that Montana had rattlesnakes.
But the second thing is howlittle I knew about George Custer,
even after visiting that site.
Yes, this was a man who made a poorchoice, and possibly a victim of hubris.
(01:35):
But long before that, he was He isa fierce warrior that earned the
rank of general by the age of 23.
And considering how many times he haddefied the odds by beating a much larger
force, Why would he have thought hewasn't going to win this battle as well?
After all, he had this mysteriousforce called Custer's Luck on his side.
(01:56):
This man fought RobertE. Lee's army and won.
He was shot off his horse so manytimes and lived it became a joke.
He fought at Gettysburg.
He was the one that received thetruce flag from the Confederate army
during the Civil War and was evenin the room where Lee surrendered
to Grant at Appomattox Courthouse.
(02:16):
After the signing, he wasgiven the surrender table.
He was more than one failed battle.
He was a powerful leader, a masterof the media, a rock star in his
time, and a man that got results.
Ladies and gentlemen, fellow historylovers, and Julius Caesar aficionados
everywhere, I give you George Custer!
(02:38):
Hello, is that you, General Custer?
I hear, I hear a voice.
Can you hear me?
Yes, I can.
General Custer.
Sir, my name is Tony Dean.
I'm actually talking to you fromthe future in the 21st century.
I understand that you're at theCentennial Exhibit in Philadelphia,
where Mr. Alexander Graham Bellis introducing his telephone to
(03:02):
the public for the first time.
And I spoke with Mr. Bell earlier,and he gave me permission to
contact you on his device.
And sir, I was hoping that I could askyou some questions today about your life.
But before I do, I understandthis is a strange introduction.
Could I answer any questionsthat you might have first?
It's hard to hear there's a such a crowdin the background, but I've, I've been
(03:24):
told that we can use the room that Watsonattends and it'll be, it'll be more quiet.
Can you hear, can you hear allthe noise in the background?
There's a lot of people here.
So, so if you'll give me a second, I'll,I'll pause and move into that room and
that'll be much, much quieter, more,more comfortable for conversation.
(03:45):
Yes, that would be great.
Thank you very much and justtell me when you're in that room.
Okay.
I'm I'm here.
Can you hear me?
Yes.
. So what tell what is thisevent that you're at?
Well, it's the Centennial Exhibit.
Everybody in the country's here.
I mean, we've got the largest exhibitof agricultural, scientific machinery.
(04:07):
You know, the Coralis, thelargest machine ever built by man.
I'm in the building the main building.
It's the, it's the largestbuilding in the country.
And there's people who have broughtexhibits from all over the world.
I dare say there's probably ahundred thousand people out there
that are trying to push and shove toget to every exhibit that features
(04:29):
anywhere from art to science.
Well, what are you doing there?
I mean, are you an art and science guy?
I thought you were a military guy.
Oh, absolutely.
I'm, I'm always interested in, ineverything, but the only reason
I'm back here is I've just comeaway from the Hester Clymer
committee that's investigatingSecretary of War William Belknap.
(04:50):
That's the president's secretary who isbeing impeached and I was giving testimony
and they've given me the day off.
So, Vinnie Ream, the sculpturistyou, you probably know, she's
the one that did the, the Lincolnsculpture that's in the Capitol.
Well, she's she's with me, and, andI'm escorting her through the exhibit,
so this has been a wonderful day.
(05:12):
Very tiring, but there's aboutseven buildings, and we've gotten
through about half of them.
And, of course, then when I gotto see my old friend Alex, he,
he asked me to stay for a bit.
He'd talked to you previously,and He was wanting me to talk
to you on this new contraption.
Do you, do you realize it'slike, it's like a telegraph,
(05:32):
but sound goes across the wires.
I, I had no idea such a, suchan instrument existed and
it's going to revolutionizecommunication in this country.
Believe me, it does revolutionizecommunication for sure.
By the way, did you just say Alex?
Do you refer to AlexanderGrembell as Alex?
(05:53):
Are you, are you close?
Oh, well, I call him Mr. Bell,usually Professor or something.
But, you know, we're,we're, we're friends.
We're pretty good friends.
We've spent a lot of time together.
I, I knew of this concept coming afew years ago when I visited him in
Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, and , hewas telling me about this, but by
God, I did not have the slightestidea that such a thing would work.
(06:16):
And the fact that I'm talkingto you and you keep referring to
coming from the future I thinkthe future is here right now.
We're in the future.
I think, I think that you'llfind later on that you're just
in the early stages of this.
You're not going to believe someof the , stuff that happens next
. I'm wondering you were talking about these impeachment trials.
Tell me a little bit about that.
(06:37):
What happened during that?
Did you get in some trouble
? Well, the the, the post traders have been built out of some of their annuities
because the post traderships are beingsold as franchise through Secretary of War
Belknap, and also the President's brother,Orville, has been somewhat involved
in the corruption on the frontier.
(06:58):
You know, the Army has got a unthinkabletask were to police the planes and the
way that the Congress has cut our budget.
We're, we're only 24, 000troops on the frontier.
That's infantry and cavalry troops topolice over 250 million square miles.
(07:19):
So it amounts to that one soldier has tosurround 10 Indians and those Indians have
been been, for the most part, peacefulin the last few years, since the State
Planes Campaign that I led in 69, wherewe were able to pacify the Southern
Plains, we hadn't had any trouble,until some of these Indians have been
(07:42):
built out of their promise annuities.
You know, the flower and the beefthat was supposed to be sent to the
reservations has been illegally soldto prospectors who are entering into
the black hills to mine for gold.
And because of that, the Indianshave had to leave the reservations
to follow the Buffalo herd.
And that's put up.
(08:03):
A strain on the military as wellas the settlers who are out west
as they've had a tendency to theirlivestock and horses and so forth.
And so we're getting pressured to putmore physical force into the military and
we just don't have the funds right now.
Congress keeps cuttingthe budget since the war.
(08:25):
We're skeleton crews on the prairie.
We don't have the men to keep the peace,and it's a, it's an overwhelming job.
I'm partly here to meet with themilitary staff, General Sherman
and Sheridan, and talk about theupcoming campaign this summer.
If all goes well, I should be returningto Fort Abraham Lincoln, Dakota
(08:49):
Territory, to plan the campaign.
The upcoming spring campaign,which will, in order to bring the
Indians back to the reservations.
So, I kind of get the impressionthat you're responsible for
enforcing what what I guess someAmericans might call encroaching
on, I guess, land that we want.
(09:10):
But, it also seems like that youwere saying that we're not following
through on our end with the Indians.
Is that your impression?
Well, often, as in all governmentthe right hand never knows
what the left hand is doing.
And, at one time, the IndianBureau was under them.
And then it was turned overto the Interior Department.
(09:31):
But as much as I'm an advocatefor allowing the Indians to have
a free roaming life, they arenot in a situation right now to
make demands on the government.
And the demands that they've madeon the government has crippled
the system that They're trying toperpetrate out there in the West.
(09:52):
We've just come off from a, a greatdepression in the last few years with the
failure of the Northern Pacific railroad.
I had a hand in doing the protectingof the surveyors up there, my old
classmate from West Point, , TomRosser had been the chief surveyor
of the Northern Pacific Railroad.
It was great times for us to spend upthere, but we ran into some problems with
(10:16):
the Lakota people and their fighting andresisting the the progress of the railroad
has impacted our government to the extentthat people are looking for ways and means
of corralling the Indians so Progress canreturn to the great American opportunity.
The West is the greatAmerican opportunity.
(10:37):
And with each passing year, we seethe possibility of agricultural
purposes alone on the frontierwith a diminishing of the bison.
And we've seen a great, in the last20 years, a of the bison herds.
There could be introduction tobeef cattle on the prairies.
(10:57):
The grasslands could support a wholeagricultural livestock disposition for
the United States and feed the country.
And so we can't have anything that'sgoing to impede progress on the frontier.
You don't sound like a general.
You sound like a businessmanor a politician right now.
(11:18):
Well, I have a first hand knowledge ofthe plight of the American Indian, and
although I admire them, I realize thattheir prowess is always exhibited by
their capture of livestock even nonIndian women , and then the military
is sent in to Enforce the law and it's,it's a fine edged blade that we have to
(11:43):
use to keep the peace on the frontierand it's it's a difficult thing, but
I can also see from the idea of peoplein the East who are looking to the
West for new opportunities and that's aconflict that when we run into a culture
so different from our own that there'sgoing to be differences of opinion.
(12:04):
Yeah.
Do you feel like when it comes tothese laws in relation to westward
expansion and just the Indian presencein either their lands or the lands
that we want, do you feel like we'rekind of making these laws up as we go?
Don't we always?
Are you okay with that?
Well, you know, I, I'm pretty much anold file in that I, I believe in the old
(12:26):
ways and, and I, I sort of harken backto how things were and I don't really
like change that much, but I did seethe progress of when I first came to
the frontier and it took days and daysto cross areas that now locomotives
can, can cross in a matter of hours.
(12:47):
And so it's, it's shrinking our nation.
That was one time a largeexpanse, and it was something that
people back east just imagined.
Now, they're becoming touristsand coming out to the frontier,
and everyone's wanting to grow.
They want all of the necessities thatthey're used to having back east brought
(13:10):
to the fringes of civilization in thedesert, American desert that they called
it, but I've always felt that Eachtime we've progressed, we've taken a
little bit away from what life was likebefore the coming of the white man.
So, do you have good relationships withIndian tribes or individual leaders?
(13:35):
Indians that you've throughout yourcareer ended up having to fight
with because you were instructedto by the United States government?
For the most part, I, I feel that I doand one of the things, That has been
floated to me as the idea of becominghead of the Indian Bureau because I
have first hand knowledge of most ofthe tribes that I have had any with have
(14:01):
been to the point that they respect me.
And they know that when I tellthem something, it's the truth.
The Indian is such that you don'tlie to him, you tell him the truth.
And part of the reason that I wasbrought to Washington is because of that
veracity, that I was willing to testify.
(14:23):
Before the Congressional Committeeabout the corruption that's
taking place in the West and, andgive them my personal opinion.
And it's been suggested that I might havemore knowledge than the average officer
who has been assigned to the West becauseof my time my tenure on the planes.
(14:45):
So you mentioned corruption and you weretalking about Ulysses S. Grant's brother.
And you're saying he's part of thecorruption that you're testifying against?
Well, I can't, I can't presentsolid evidence, but what has
been remarked to me, I've heard.
word hearsay evidence that I presentedthat he has been in collusion with
(15:11):
the secretary of war and differentmembers of the administration in the
selling of these and post tradershipsand even the post traderships that
are in the military reservations.
Those have been sold as a franchiseand the cost of 4, 000 a year,
(15:31):
which is substantially higher thanwhat the profit margin would allow
for anyone having that franchise.
So, that extra money is being broughtin by the selling on the black market
of those supplies that were necessarilycommitted to the American Indian.
So, I want to get clear on this,because I'm not 100 percent
(15:53):
sure, when you're saying posttraderships, and you're talking about
franchises, can you clarify this?
I think what you're saying is, isthat there's money suppo there's flour
and supplies that are supposed to goto the Indian tribes, and Orville,
and The secretary of war, which Ithink he said, his name is Belknap.
They're not giving that to theIndians that it's supposed to go to.
(16:15):
They're taking it from that andthen selling it on the black market.
Well, I can't say that they'redirectly doing that, but they're
sending it to the post traders.
That's an individual store that'son the reservation and those
annuities that are being sent.
When I'm talking like flour and,and beef and all trade, goods,
(16:37):
blankets and and what have you.
Those are being sent necessarily tothe reservation and because of the
cost of the franchise in order to stayin business, a post trader is forced
to sell that on the black market topeople who Annuities weren't meant for.
(17:00):
What I'm saying is like a prospectorwould buy flour and the Indians
wouldn't receive the full amount.
So they'd have to sell that in order topay for their franchise and stay valid.
Otherwise they'd be replacedby some other corrupt.
Post trader.
(17:20):
So It filters back to Washington
because Washington is setting it up towhere the only way to do it successfully
is to do it using the black market.
Well, these post traders could sell itto anybody they wanted to if they had
family members, but they need the money.
In order to pay off the politicians backEast, they have to grease the palms of
(17:45):
the politicians in order to stay current.
You've spent quite a bit of timeinvolved in different wars and different
campaigns, but long before you weremonitoring the the movement of the
Indians, or you were fighting in the civilwar you didn't start your life as No,
(18:06):
in fact, my mother wanted me to go intothe Methodist ministry, because , on
my birth, and because it was a very badblizzard that was happening in New Rumley,
Harrison County, Ohio, where I was born,the doctor couldn't get to our, our home.
And so the midwife, Ann Lyle, andthe minister, George Armstrong,
(18:31):
attended to my mother who gavebirth to me on the kitchen table.
And so she had admired theMethodist minister to the point
that she had hoped that I wouldgo into the Methodist ministry.
She had a great deal of respectand hoped that I would pursue that.
As a small boy I grew up withmy father who was a blacksmith.
(18:54):
justice of the peace andWas around horses a lot.
And so I think I gravitated moretowards the cavalry and hearing
of those stories about Mexican warand the great Military leaders.
I cut my teeth on books such as JamesFenimore Cooper's last of the Mohicans
(19:15):
and Charles levers Charles O'Malley inthe light And so it was those books that
inspired me to think of adventure, and Icould only hope that after I left the farm
that I could go into a military career.
And fortunately for me, the fellow whohad been appointed from our district
(19:37):
washed out, didn't pass pre examsat West Point, and I was appointed
by my congressman, John A. Bingham.
And I entered West Point in 1857 andwould have probably spent five years
there if the war hadn't broke out.
And I ended my years at the Academy early.
(20:00):
We had two classes.
We had the May of 61 class.
And then my class graduated in June of 61.
But I read that you, beforeyou went into West Point, I
read that you were a teacher.
Is that true?
Oh, yes.
Yes.
In fact, my method of madness was toget my teaching degree because I needed
to bone up on my math and, and studiesso that I could pass the pre exams.
(20:26):
You know, it's a very hard curriculumto even get into West Point.
You know, first you have toget appointed by a congressman.
And out of all of the appointees theysift out the ones that don't pass.
Pre exam, and then you have that demeritsystem that occurs at any given semester.
(20:47):
A hundred demerits would getyou expelled from the academy.
So a large class dwindlesdown by the fifth year.
You're pretty much down to onlymaybe sixty to eighty students out
of the original, oh, maybe a hundredand thirty that were expelled.
Oh, so once you get, once you'vebeen appointed, it doesn't
(21:10):
necessarily mean you're goingto be there for several years.
It means that if you don't keepyour nose clean, that that you
could get kicked out very easily.
They just take the best of the best.
Well, I, I came very near I had quite afew demerits while I was there, and so
I spent 66 consecutive Saturdays walkingguard duty in order to shave off some
(21:30):
of the skins, the demerits that I earnedwhile I was there, and it was not an
easy task to, to get through a semesterbecause you're getting demerits for
hair out of uniform wrinkled uniform,lights on after hours, Any number of
Delinquencies could easily get youexpelled, so you're, you're constantly
(21:55):
on guard that you're also studying.
There are so many different quizzesthat are thrown at us, tests that we
were given unexpectedly, and so itwas always to be on top of your game.
Do you have any idea how manydimers you ended up with?
700 into 23.
(22:15):
Okay, now, now I'm super confused.
Well,
I would have had more than that,but I was able to shave them off
from disciplinary guard duty.
So I got, I got quite a few of them off.
I had demerits for swinging my armsin formation hair out of uniform
because my hair was too long.
(22:35):
So I shaved my head bald and thenI got undemerit for hair really out
of uniform until my hair grew back.
I wore a wig and then when I didgrow my hair back, I lathered it
down with cinnamon oil and I, Ipicked up the nickname of cinnamon
while I was there at the academy.
Okay.
Wait a minute.
Now you have a history of, as faras when commanding your regiments
(22:58):
of , demanding discipline andreally taking a ragtag group and
turning them into hardcore fighters.
And yet, it doesn't appear thatyou followed the rules at all when
you were going through West Point.
Is that, is that correct?
Well, I'm a young guy.
I was, I was young.
I mean, I was young.
I was 17 when I entered the academy, butI, I certainly grew up while I was there.
(23:20):
And by the time that the war brokeout, it didn't take a few battles
that everyone grew up very quickly.
And the responsibility of command putsa whole different complexion on things.
You know, I was 23 years old whenI became a Brigadier General, and
I had 1, 500 men's lives that I wasresponsible for guiding them into
(23:44):
battle and hoping that I could bringthem out without too many casualties.
But it's inevitable in asituation of war that men die.
Your command and, and men across thelines from us and many of those men
that I was shooting at were men thatI'd shared blankets with at West Point.
(24:04):
It was a very difficult thing.
When you talk about being responsiblefor men's lives in battle, when I, what
I hear in your voice is a man who feelsthat connection between his soldiers.
Like it sounds like youcan really feel that.
And yet my understanding is, is that youwent into some of these very difficult
(24:25):
battles where the odds were against you.
They had way more soldiers than you didand you were winning these battles, but
you were losing huge amounts of soldiers.
And so I guess I'm wondering,first of all, is that true?
And second of all, howyou think about that?
Well, the cavalry is alwaysaudacious, and we have to do
(24:46):
the main, thrust of the army.
And I took as many chances as any of mymen who were following me into battle.
I didn't say, go in and get them.
I said, come on, men, follow me.
And through the course of the war,I had 11 horses shot from under me.
So I was putting myself in thesame difficulties that I expected
(25:11):
my men to put themselves in.
You don't win a battle by saying,go get them guys and stand back
and hide behind trees while themen are butchered and process of
going up against outnumbered forces.
when I asked you how you felt about themen, I feel like you're talking more
about yourself and that you're sayingthat your method is to lead from the front
(25:36):
and just to go all in with the assumptionthat if they see their leader going
all in, that they're going to follow.
I would certainly hope they would,but I, I do have a concern for
casualties that I take in battle.
Any good officer is going to havea concern for his men, the welfare
of his men, and you just don't.
(25:57):
unceremoniously leadthem into a slaughter.
We used tactics that we learned atWest Point from von Clausewitz and
Jaumeni, the arts of war, and I usedthose plans on the battlefield and
In anything that I did throughout mymilitary career, I used the knowledge
(26:18):
that I gained from my time at West Point.
Was this a natural strength thatyou had for strategy, or were
these just all strategies thatyou learned from West Point?
Well, I learned at West Point, butthen when you take and apply them in
the real world, You have to be ableto use your mind to look at things,
(26:40):
look at the terrain understand thelikelihood that this could work
and audaciousness of the cavalry.
When an enemy sees men mounted on horsescoming down on them, it creates a great
deal of consternation and quite possiblythey'll buckle And a mad skedaddle to
(27:04):
the rear makes it victorious on our partbeing the cavalry arm of the service.
But it's the infantry that holds the line.
They come in behind us, and we onlyhope that we have tactical commanders
study the same books that, that Idid, and could You know, follow that
same philosophy , of the art of war.
(27:27):
Who are some of the peoplethat you, fought with, that
you admired their abilities?
And maybe also who are some of thosethat were , totally inadequate and
should have never been leading men
? Well, there's a number of men that were appointed because of their political.
position in civilian society.
(27:49):
They became colonels and thenfield promotions to generals.
And they didn't always have theknowledge of the military mindset.
I was very fortunate.
The first year out of WestPoint that I was appointed to
the staffs of Philip Kearney.
I served with General McClellan.
(28:10):
I had opportunities to bewith General Pleasanton.
Eventually I was putunder General Sheridan.
And I was at the right place at the righttime, and fortunately for me, the men that
I served under were military masterminds.
And they were able to instillin me those proper things that I
(28:33):
used when I had my own commands.
And I tried to use an amalgamof all of their great traits
in my own military career.
I learned from each person.
Commander that I served under, and Iknow, I know that you probably didn't
know that at one point I was an aau.
(28:53):
I was one of the first air Corps thatwould go up in observation balloons
during the Peninsula campaign,and was able to see the Confederate
withdrawal from Yorktown, thusrelieving the consternation and concern
around Washington DC of invasion.
What's that word you said?
Aero nod.
(29:14):
Yes, I went up in an observation balloon.
The Army of the Potomac, which I servedwith, had seven observation balloons.
I mostly went up in a ballooncalled Intrepid, and I would be
a thousand feet above the earth.
Confederate positions,writing it down in a journal.
(29:34):
I had binoculars and compass,and was able to observe the
positions of their artillery,the cavalry, infantry positions.
And I suggested that we did early morningobservations to go up before light,.
(29:54):
before it gets too windy.
And so I could observe the campfireswhen they were making breakfast.
And from that position, I couldsee where each company was.
Was that a dangerous job?
Oh yes.
I recall my first ascension thatI went up with one of professor
(30:15):
Thaddeus Lowe's assistants.
He didn't go up with me, but he was headof the balloon core and his assistant.
Went up in this basket thatwas a little more than a, a
laundry basket in, in, in size.
And it seemed like it was a wickerbasket that had woven wicker that I,
(30:35):
being so skinny at the time, I thoughtI was going to fall between the cracks.
And to assure me he began jumpingup and down in the basket, which
caused me to have that instantlaxative feeling come into my stomach.
And it was One of those situationswhere I, I spent the better part of
the ascension just sitting in thebasket holding on for dear life.
(30:57):
But eventually I got used to it andwas more than thankful when I finally
got sent back to be under GeneralBarnard's staff as a forward observer.
And was back in the saddle asopposed to being tethered off by a
thousand foot rope above the ground.
Yeah, that sounds very dangerous.
Sounds like you'd be more, morecomfortable with your feet a
(31:18):
little closer to the ground.
So were there any other strange jobs thatyou did like this before, , you started,
, gaining notoriety in the military?
Well, I was on staff duty for thebetter part of the first two years,
and on staff duty, my word waswhatever the commander sent out.
(31:38):
So I was riding between the front lines.
And it was a dangerous situation becausenormally I had my orderly riding with
me, but the, just the two of us, oftenthe case going in between lines of
combat and posting orders to the, theforward commanders, as well as check
(32:02):
and vedettes and, and picket duty tomake sure that our lines were secure.
And it was on one occasion when I wasout checking vedettes, that's mounted
pickets, that I got word that I wasto return to headquarters, and General
Pleasanton had taken over the CavalryCorps, and so he had this idea of
(32:28):
promoting the younger men in the ranks tohigher positions, and so Elon Farnsworth,
Wesley Merritt, and myself We're promotedto the grade of Brigadier General.
We're, we're all in ourtwenties at the time.
And so we became known as the BoyGenerals and that was quite an occasion
to be given command of a brigade simplybecause the brigade that I had acquired.
(32:55):
Was actually made up of volunteercavalry regiments, all from
the same state, of Michigan.
And I had previously applied for acolonelcy and one of the new formed
up regiments, the seventh Michigan.
And I was given a command of the first,fifth, sixth, and seventh Michigan
(33:16):
regiments, all men from the same state.
And just a few days beforethe battle of Gettysburg.
, were you 23 or 25 when youwere promoted to general,
? I was 23 when I got my brigadier general, and then by the age of 25, I'd received
my second star, which was major general.
I'm still the youngest major generalin the history of our country.
(33:38):
Why would they take achance on someone so young?
Are there not older, wiser men thatwould have been more qualified for this?
They may have been older and wiserand maybe the wiseness was to their
disadvantage because they didn'tseem to use that progress in battle.
And so they wanted somebodythat was willing to perform.
(34:00):
And so we were promoted bymerit, , what we showed in battle.
And that was what they needed at the time.
Up until probably Brandy Stationthe cavalry, the Union cavalry
anyways, was inadequately used.
They were assigned to baggage trains,courier duty very, very ineffective.
(34:25):
And so, right after the Battle ofBrandy Station the cavalry was kind
of given the lead to go into battlesand, and work effectively, and then
the infantry would come up and securethe position after we gained the land.
What was the battle of Brandy station?
It was probably the largest gatheringof mounted forces on the North American
(34:50):
continent took place in early June of 63.
And Jeb Stewart.
who was the flower of the confederacy,had successfully proven that he
could ride around the army ofthe Potomac and not be touched.
And so the attempt was tomove the war into the north.
(35:16):
General Robert E. Lee wantedto make it an offensive war.
And so his idea was to sweepin through Pennsylvania.
And, and drop into Washington, capturethe the Capitol, and force the Union to
capitulate or to recognize the South,the Confederacy, as a equal entity.
(35:39):
And so in his attempt, they pushed upthrough the valley of where Brandy Station
was located in that part of Virginia.
And we had our cavalryforces into position.
And as each accumulatedit became an all out war.
And during that battle, a coupleof the officers went down, their
(36:03):
horses went down, and I rode to thefront and rallied the troops and was
able to turn what might've been aUnion defeat into a Union victory.
You've mentioned somepretty big names there.
One of them being Robert E. Lee.
And as you are, , fighting thesedifferent battles in the Civil War, , I
know there was at least, at least onetime or a couple times where you were
(36:27):
directly engaging Robert E. Lee, butcan you tell me a little bit about him,
what fighting him was like, what kind ofperson he was, what you know about him?
I can't tell you a lot about himbecause I haven't really studied the
man, but I would tell you that theSouth had a number of, Officers that
inspired the men and in any givenbattle, if you have someone who creates
(36:53):
an inspiration, you can turn the intovictory simply because the men will rally
on a certain individual and Robert E.
Lee was venerated by the South to thedegree that he was almost godlike and
the men protected him and admired himand would probably have done anything
(37:16):
ran into the mouth of cannons, whichthey pretty much did at the Battle of
Gettysburg when Pickett came acrossthat open field towards Cemetery Ridge.
They wouldn't have done that forother commanders, but he was able
to inspire them, and so was Pickettand Longstreet and other officers
of the South that they admired andvenerated and held up in high esteem.
(37:42):
When you talk about Gettysburg tellme a little bit about that battle.
Well, I think it was a battle that wasfought by accident because the South,
by that year, had been suffering greatlybecause we were being effective with
the Anaconda campaign, strangling.
(38:02):
the ports of the South, so they couldn'tget goods in from the European countries.
And so they were at a lossfor clothing and shoes.
And somehow or another, they'dheard General Heath, Confederate
officer, heard that there wereshoes in a town of Gettysburg.
So they went in with a strategythat they were going to steal
(38:24):
shoes for the men who needed shoes.
And there were out.
A small scouting detachment of cavalrythat saw that buildup and sent back word.
And so numerous commands camein, corps, cavalry corps, General
Reynolds came in, and it built up.
(38:46):
The good thing of it was, it wasin a location where there was
the adequate water that wouldbe needed for the livestock, the
men, and to cool the weaponry.
So, that was ideal ground forthe battles to take place, but
it wasn't strategically planned.
It was in Robert E. Lee's movement tosweep into Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and
(39:09):
then to drop down into Washington, andit was just a stop over on their route.
And the decision that was made ofRobert E. Lee to move back south was
a result of the Union victory beingable to hold the line at Gettysburg.
(39:30):
That was kind of the turningpoint because it became the high
water mark of the Confederacy.
During the first two days ofthe battle probes were made.
and the right and left flank ofthe Union Army atop Cemetery Ridge.
And when they were unable toturn those flanks, they felt that
the weakness was in the middle.
(39:51):
And so Pickett's charge commencedacross an open field to attack
what they thought was the weakestpoint of the Union command.
But at the same time, they had instructedJ. E. B. Stuart to swing in behind with
Black Horse Cavalry and attack the rear.
(40:11):
and right flank of the Union Army, whichwould have caused mass disintegration
of the command on Cemetery Ridge.
Fortunately for me, I was in a movementheading towards Devil's Den when I
got word that General McMurdy Craigand his Pennsylvania boys needed
(40:32):
me to move my command, the MichiganCavalry Brigade, and put us between
and the right flank and we werefortunate that we had the new firearm.
The seven shot repeating rifle, Spencerrepeating rifle, which effectively gave
(40:53):
us more firepower than the Confederateshad, and we were able to thwart Stuart's
attempt to turn that flank, and at theend of the day, he retired from the field,
and we were able to hold that position andsave the Union forces atop Cemetery Ridge.
If you had not been in that battle then,if you had not been in that position,
(41:16):
the uh, Confederates have won Gettysburg.
It's possible.
There was thoughts that if wehad lost that major conflict that
we would have had to come to somesort of compromise at the time.
My
former commander general GeorgeMcClellan he was talking of running
(41:38):
for the presidency and he did run in64 his was to have peace at any cost.
And we had already committeda lot of men to that conflict.
Their lives had been lost.
And it was, it was such that,We needed to make a point and
(42:00):
push the war to the south.
And once we were able to dothat, then the last year of
the war rolled up pretty fast.
started pressing the issue.
Yes.
They were in bad need of suppliesand by attrition they had lost a
lot of men and manpower throughthose last few years of the war.
(42:24):
I want to go back fora minute to West Point.
So, here you are going to school atWest Point, and they are preparing
this, this class of generals andleaders that are going to go out and
fight on both sides of this battle.
How did it, what did it looklike when the war started?
did you see a bunch of people , leaveWest Point and then immediately go
(42:47):
fight for one side or the other?
And did more people go south than north?
What, what did that look like?
My class alone had, by attrition,gotten down to about 68 cadets.
And we had heard rumors to theeffect that they were offering
commissions in the Southern Army.
(43:08):
And many of my classmates,roommates even, were Southern born.
And they were just waiting until theygot a letter offering them a commission.
And so many of them dropped out.
And The remaining class was 34,and I ended up at the bottom of
the class because of my grades anddemerits, and became known as the
(43:32):
immortal I guess they since now callthem goats of the class, but still.
We were offered commissions assecond lieutenants in the Union
Army, and it was the only place thatyou would be, by act of Congress,
considered an officer and a gentleman.
(43:53):
And so I was given a secondlieutenant commission in
Company G, 2nd U. S. Cavalry.
But the majority of the studentswho left ended up in positions
of power in the Confederate Army.
Most of them jumped to thegrade of captain to colonel
in a short period of time.
(44:15):
It was meteoric that I would becomea brigadier general as quickly as I
did, but that was due to the fact thatI had the right mentors putting me
in the right place at the right timethrough my first few years of the war.
, as the war is starting, Wasthere like heavy recruiting from
both the North and the South?
(44:35):
Were they both tryingto keep those people?
They were.
What did that look like?
Well, I can't say that I was thereon site because most of the time
I was at the academy and then waspretty much signed to Washington and
then joined my unit in the field.
But there was a overall surge ofpatriotism, both for the North and
South and the South felt that they werefighting to preserve a way of life.
(45:01):
And they, they were fightingfor their independence.
We were fighting to contain the Union sothat the country wouldn't be broken up,
split up into two separate countries.
And that was our purpose long before theissue of slavery became first and formal.
And the, the fight forthe, to save the Union and,
(45:27):
Do you have opinions on slavery?
Well, I never was one to bepro slavery at all, whatsoever.
And even though I spent a great dealof time with my southern students, that
was not an issue that was talked about.
It was mostly about rights, about astrong federal government as opposed
(45:50):
to state individual governments.
And most of the students that I spokewith felt that each state should
have their own form of government.
And unfortunately, For the United Statesto have been successful at that time.
We, we, we need a strong federalgovernment to hold us together,
much like what we experiencedduring the revolutionary war, when
(46:14):
there were individual colonies,we were united and strengthened by
the fact that we stayed together.
So, what was the Civil War about?
Was the Civil War about slaverythen, or was it about states rights?
It
became, it became the issue.
Yes, it became the issue because mostnorthern people weren't apprised of
(46:37):
how ingrained slavery was in the South,but as time went on And we penetrated
the South and some of the plantations.
We saw how prevalent it was, but at thetime the South was agricultural based, and
so they needed people to work the fields.
And the indication that there werea larger degree of black indentured
(47:03):
slaves became more apparent.
That most people in theNorth had no knowledge of.
We were more of a industrialmanufacturing, and people worked and
were paid, and the South being poorand based mostly on cotton and sugar
(47:23):
cane and rice, they needed peopleto work the fields, and they didn't
get the prices for their goods.
It was dependent on theweather, and you could have a
bad year, and so they weren't.
In a position to pay high wages isthe industrial part of the country.
(47:45):
And so we, we already hadthe advantage on the South.
But we didn't have the wartactics that the South had.
They had most of the generals that knewhow to fight that had been, , raised
on horseback and were attuned to theland , where people in the North
(48:05):
were more concerned about paying theirbills and, and going to work and not,
you know, Apprised of the terrain andstuff that would be needed in battle.
So, like, men who came from stores andfactories were put in charge of troops.
Because they wereinfluential in government.
(48:27):
And they had no knowledge of war.
So, they were ineffective.
You gotta put people in that knowwhat they're doing, especially when
you've got men's lives at, at risk.
That doesn't make any sense, taking aguy that, , he's got a lot of money or
has got lot of pull in, in politics.
I mean, he's just not goingto charge into the bullets.
Well, all of these questions you're askingme, particularly about the Civil War
(48:52):
and the Indian Wars, they're all basedon opinions that I've formed, and not
necessarily the absolute facts, becauseI look at things that maybe the man next
to me might not see in the same light.
Light.
And I would tell you that when I wasat West Point, we were being taught
(49:14):
the European tactics that had beenemployed during the Napoleonic Wars.
And that suddenly changed whenthe different inventions that
came out that were more killingmachines used during the Civil War.
And it.
Made obsolete those Napoleonic tactics.
(49:37):
What, what are some of those inventions?
Well, the rifling of the muskets they weresmooth bore in the beginning of the war.
Then they rifled themto become more accurate.
And we were still firing acrosslines that had been drawn during
the revolutionary war that were the.
tactics at the time that allowedthat a large amount of lead would
(50:01):
be shot out like a shotgun and youwould hope that you'd hit something.
Well, then it became more accurate andeach wound inflicted by the rifled 58
caliber Springfield devastated the enemy.
The person that got hit because chancesare it shattered the bone and they'd
(50:22):
have to lose a limb in the process.
If they weren't killed outright,then it would take two men that would
have to remove them from the field.
So you could effectively removethree people from a line a skirmish
line and that person probablywouldn't return to the front because
of the wounds that they suffered.
(50:43):
If they didn't die outright during theprocedure to remove their arm or leg, they
would probably just return to civilianlife and try to make do as best they can.
Jeez, what a way to think.
I mean, here, we got these superawesome guns, we shoot one guy, which
means they need two guys to carry himaway, and that's how we win the battle.
(51:03):
I don't know if I would havebeen that great of a general.
In the next episode, we are going to talka little bit more about Custer's luck.
We're going to talk about howhe received the surrender table
after Lee surrendered to Grant.
And we're going to talk about theBattle of Washita, where Custer was
accused of massacring more than ahundred Native Americans and much more.
(51:24):
I'm glad you're enjoying this podcast.
If you haven't yet subscribed now,and we'll see you at the next episode
of the calling history podcastwith part two of George Custer.
I'm Tony Dean and today we'llbe calling history to speak with
General George Armstrong Custer.
He'll be answering our call on April20, 1876, just a few months before
he makes his famous last standat the Battle of Little Bighorn.
You've heard the story.
Custer and his boys look off in thedistance and they see Sitting Bull
(00:49):
and Crazy Horse with a coalition ofNative Americans, thousands of them.
General Custer looks at his men.
Totaling at about 25 percent of theopposing force and says boys we can
take him and of course he was wrong.
Well, my wife and I were in Montana yearsago and we visited that battlefield It
was quite a sight to walk to the top ofthat hill as you pass all the gravestones
(01:13):
Marking the spots where the bodies werefound But there were two things that
surprised me looking back at that day
Well, the first thing is, is that wealmost stepped on a rattlesnake, and I
didn't know that Montana had rattlesnakes.
But the second thing is howlittle I knew about George Custer,
even after visiting that site.
Yes, this was a man who made a poorchoice, and possibly a victim of hubris.
(01:35):
But long before that, he was He isa fierce warrior that earned the
rank of general by the age of 23.
And considering how many times he haddefied the odds by beating a much larger
force, Why would he have thought hewasn't going to win this battle as well?
After all, he had this mysteriousforce called Custer's Luck on his side.
(01:56):
This man fought RobertE. Lee's army and won.
He was shot off his horse so manytimes and lived it became a joke.
He fought at Gettysburg.
He was the one that received thetruce flag from the Confederate army
during the Civil War and was evenin the room where Lee surrendered
to Grant at Appomattox Courthouse.
(02:16):
After the signing, he wasgiven the surrender table.
He was more than one failed battle.
He was a powerful leader, a masterof the media, a rock star in his
time, and a man that got results.
Ladies and gentlemen, fellow historylovers, and Julius Caesar aficionados
everywhere, I give you George Custer!
(02:38):
Hello, is that you, General Custer?
I hear, I hear a voice.
Can you hear me?
Yes, I can.
General Custer.
Sir, my name is Tony Dean.
I'm actually talking to you fromthe future in the 21st century.
I understand that you're at theCentennial Exhibit in Philadelphia,
where Mr. Alexander Graham Bellis introducing his telephone to
(03:02):
the public for the first time.
And I spoke with Mr. Bell earlier,and he gave me permission to
contact you on his device.
And sir, I was hoping that I could askyou some questions today about your life.
But before I do, I understandthis is a strange introduction.
Could I answer any questionsthat you might have first?
It's hard to hear there's a such a crowdin the background, but I've, I've been
(03:24):
told that we can use the room that Watsonattends and it'll be, it'll be more quiet.
Can you hear, can you hear allthe noise in the background?
There's a lot of people here.
So, so if you'll give me a second, I'll,I'll pause and move into that room and
that'll be much, much quieter, more,more comfortable for conversation.
(03:45):
Yes, that would be great.
Thank you very much and justtell me when you're in that room.
Okay.
I'm I'm here.
Can you hear me?
Yes.
. So what tell what is thisevent that you're at?
Well, it's the Centennial Exhibit.
Everybody in the country's here.
I mean, we've got the largest exhibitof agricultural, scientific machinery.
(04:07):
You know, the Coralis, thelargest machine ever built by man.
I'm in the building the main building.
It's the, it's the largestbuilding in the country.
And there's people who have broughtexhibits from all over the world.
I dare say there's probably ahundred thousand people out there
that are trying to push and shove toget to every exhibit that features
(04:29):
anywhere from art to science.
Well, what are you doing there?
I mean, are you an art and science guy?
I thought you were a military guy.
Oh, absolutely.
I'm, I'm always interested in, ineverything, but the only reason
I'm back here is I've just comeaway from the Hester Clymer
committee that's investigatingSecretary of War William Belknap.
(04:50):
That's the president's secretary who isbeing impeached and I was giving testimony
and they've given me the day off.
So, Vinnie Ream, the sculpturistyou, you probably know, she's
the one that did the, the Lincolnsculpture that's in the Capitol.
Well, she's she's with me, and, andI'm escorting her through the exhibit,
so this has been a wonderful day.
(05:12):
Very tiring, but there's aboutseven buildings, and we've gotten
through about half of them.
And, of course, then when I gotto see my old friend Alex, he,
he asked me to stay for a bit.
He'd talked to you previously,and He was wanting me to talk
to you on this new contraption.
Do you, do you realize it'slike, it's like a telegraph,
(05:32):
but sound goes across the wires.
I, I had no idea such a, suchan instrument existed and
it's going to revolutionizecommunication in this country.
Believe me, it does revolutionizecommunication for sure.
By the way, did you just say Alex?
Do you refer to AlexanderGrembell as Alex?
(05:53):
Are you, are you close?
Oh, well, I call him Mr. Bell,usually Professor or something.
But, you know, we're,we're, we're friends.
We're pretty good friends.
We've spent a lot of time together.
I, I knew of this concept coming afew years ago when I visited him in
Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, and , hewas telling me about this, but by
God, I did not have the slightestidea that such a thing would work.
(06:16):
And the fact that I'm talkingto you and you keep referring to
coming from the future I thinkthe future is here right now.
We're in the future.
I think, I think that you'llfind later on that you're just
in the early stages of this.
You're not going to believe someof the , stuff that happens next
. I'm wondering you were talking about these impeachment trials.
Tell me a little bit about that.
(06:37):
What happened during that?
Did you get in some trouble
? Well, the the, the post traders have been built out of some of their annuities
because the post traderships are beingsold as franchise through Secretary of War
Belknap, and also the President's brother,Orville, has been somewhat involved
in the corruption on the frontier.
(06:58):
You know, the Army has got a unthinkabletask were to police the planes and the
way that the Congress has cut our budget.
We're, we're only 24, 000troops on the frontier.
That's infantry and cavalry troops topolice over 250 million square miles.
(07:19):
So it amounts to that one soldier has tosurround 10 Indians and those Indians have
been been, for the most part, peacefulin the last few years, since the State
Planes Campaign that I led in 69, wherewe were able to pacify the Southern
Plains, we hadn't had any trouble,until some of these Indians have been
(07:42):
built out of their promise annuities.
You know, the flower and the beefthat was supposed to be sent to the
reservations has been illegally soldto prospectors who are entering into
the black hills to mine for gold.
And because of that, the Indianshave had to leave the reservations
to follow the Buffalo herd.
And that's put up.
(08:03):
A strain on the military as wellas the settlers who are out west
as they've had a tendency to theirlivestock and horses and so forth.
And so we're getting pressured to putmore physical force into the military and
we just don't have the funds right now.
Congress keeps cuttingthe budget since the war.
(08:25):
We're skeleton crews on the prairie.
We don't have the men to keep the peace,and it's a, it's an overwhelming job.
I'm partly here to meet with themilitary staff, General Sherman
and Sheridan, and talk about theupcoming campaign this summer.
If all goes well, I should be returningto Fort Abraham Lincoln, Dakota
(08:49):
Territory, to plan the campaign.
The upcoming spring campaign,which will, in order to bring the
Indians back to the reservations.
So, I kind of get the impressionthat you're responsible for
enforcing what what I guess someAmericans might call encroaching
on, I guess, land that we want.
(09:10):
But, it also seems like that youwere saying that we're not following
through on our end with the Indians.
Is that your impression?
Well, often, as in all governmentthe right hand never knows
what the left hand is doing.
And, at one time, the IndianBureau was under them.
And then it was turned overto the Interior Department.
(09:31):
But as much as I'm an advocatefor allowing the Indians to have
a free roaming life, they arenot in a situation right now to
make demands on the government.
And the demands that they've madeon the government has crippled
the system that They're trying toperpetrate out there in the West.
(09:52):
We've just come off from a, a greatdepression in the last few years with the
failure of the Northern Pacific railroad.
I had a hand in doing the protectingof the surveyors up there, my old
classmate from West Point, , TomRosser had been the chief surveyor
of the Northern Pacific Railroad.
It was great times for us to spend upthere, but we ran into some problems with
(10:16):
the Lakota people and their fighting andresisting the the progress of the railroad
has impacted our government to the extentthat people are looking for ways and means
of corralling the Indians so Progress canreturn to the great American opportunity.
The West is the greatAmerican opportunity.
(10:37):
And with each passing year, we seethe possibility of agricultural
purposes alone on the frontierwith a diminishing of the bison.
And we've seen a great, in the last20 years, a of the bison herds.
There could be introduction tobeef cattle on the prairies.
(10:57):
The grasslands could support a wholeagricultural livestock disposition for
the United States and feed the country.
And so we can't have anything that'sgoing to impede progress on the frontier.
You don't sound like a general.
You sound like a businessmanor a politician right now.
(11:18):
Well, I have a first hand knowledge ofthe plight of the American Indian, and
although I admire them, I realize thattheir prowess is always exhibited by
their capture of livestock even nonIndian women , and then the military
is sent in to Enforce the law and it's,it's a fine edged blade that we have to
(11:43):
use to keep the peace on the frontierand it's it's a difficult thing, but
I can also see from the idea of peoplein the East who are looking to the
West for new opportunities and that's aconflict that when we run into a culture
so different from our own that there'sgoing to be differences of opinion.
(12:04):
Yeah.
Do you feel like when it comes tothese laws in relation to westward
expansion and just the Indian presencein either their lands or the lands
that we want, do you feel like we'rekind of making these laws up as we go?
Don't we always?
Are you okay with that?
Well, you know, I, I'm pretty much anold file in that I, I believe in the old
(12:26):
ways and, and I, I sort of harken backto how things were and I don't really
like change that much, but I did seethe progress of when I first came to
the frontier and it took days and daysto cross areas that now locomotives
can, can cross in a matter of hours.
(12:47):
And so it's, it's shrinking our nation.
That was one time a largeexpanse, and it was something that
people back east just imagined.
Now, they're becoming touristsand coming out to the frontier,
and everyone's wanting to grow.
They want all of the necessities thatthey're used to having back east brought
(13:10):
to the fringes of civilization in thedesert, American desert that they called
it, but I've always felt that Eachtime we've progressed, we've taken a
little bit away from what life was likebefore the coming of the white man.
So, do you have good relationships withIndian tribes or individual leaders?
(13:35):
Indians that you've throughout yourcareer ended up having to fight
with because you were instructedto by the United States government?
For the most part, I, I feel that I doand one of the things, That has been
floated to me as the idea of becominghead of the Indian Bureau because I
have first hand knowledge of most ofthe tribes that I have had any with have
(14:01):
been to the point that they respect me.
And they know that when I tellthem something, it's the truth.
The Indian is such that you don'tlie to him, you tell him the truth.
And part of the reason that I wasbrought to Washington is because of that
veracity, that I was willing to testify.
(14:23):
Before the Congressional Committeeabout the corruption that's
taking place in the West and, andgive them my personal opinion.
And it's been suggested that I might havemore knowledge than the average officer
who has been assigned to the West becauseof my time my tenure on the planes.
(14:45):
So you mentioned corruption and you weretalking about Ulysses S. Grant's brother.
And you're saying he's part of thecorruption that you're testifying against?
Well, I can't, I can't presentsolid evidence, but what has
been remarked to me, I've heard.
word hearsay evidence that I presentedthat he has been in collusion with
(15:11):
the secretary of war and differentmembers of the administration in the
selling of these and post tradershipsand even the post traderships that
are in the military reservations.
Those have been sold as a franchiseand the cost of 4, 000 a year,
(15:31):
which is substantially higher thanwhat the profit margin would allow
for anyone having that franchise.
So, that extra money is being broughtin by the selling on the black market
of those supplies that were necessarilycommitted to the American Indian.
So, I want to get clear on this,because I'm not 100 percent
(15:53):
sure, when you're saying posttraderships, and you're talking about
franchises, can you clarify this?
I think what you're saying is, isthat there's money suppo there's flour
and supplies that are supposed to goto the Indian tribes, and Orville,
and The secretary of war, which Ithink he said, his name is Belknap.
They're not giving that to theIndians that it's supposed to go to.
(16:15):
They're taking it from that andthen selling it on the black market.
Well, I can't say that they'redirectly doing that, but they're
sending it to the post traders.
That's an individual store that'son the reservation and those
annuities that are being sent.
When I'm talking like flour and,and beef and all trade, goods,
(16:37):
blankets and and what have you.
Those are being sent necessarily tothe reservation and because of the
cost of the franchise in order to stayin business, a post trader is forced
to sell that on the black market topeople who Annuities weren't meant for.
(17:00):
What I'm saying is like a prospectorwould buy flour and the Indians
wouldn't receive the full amount.
So they'd have to sell that in order topay for their franchise and stay valid.
Otherwise they'd be replacedby some other corrupt.
Post trader.
(17:20):
So It filters back to Washington
because Washington is setting it up towhere the only way to do it successfully
is to do it using the black market.
Well, these post traders could sell itto anybody they wanted to if they had
family members, but they need the money.
In order to pay off the politicians backEast, they have to grease the palms of
(17:45):
the politicians in order to stay current.
You've spent quite a bit of timeinvolved in different wars and different
campaigns, but long before you weremonitoring the the movement of the
Indians, or you were fighting in the civilwar you didn't start your life as No,
(18:06):
in fact, my mother wanted me to go intothe Methodist ministry, because , on
my birth, and because it was a very badblizzard that was happening in New Rumley,
Harrison County, Ohio, where I was born,the doctor couldn't get to our, our home.
And so the midwife, Ann Lyle, andthe minister, George Armstrong,
(18:31):
attended to my mother who gavebirth to me on the kitchen table.
And so she had admired theMethodist minister to the point
that she had hoped that I wouldgo into the Methodist ministry.
She had a great deal of respectand hoped that I would pursue that.
As a small boy I grew up withmy father who was a blacksmith.
(18:54):
justice of the peace andWas around horses a lot.
And so I think I gravitated moretowards the cavalry and hearing
of those stories about Mexican warand the great Military leaders.
I cut my teeth on books such as JamesFenimore Cooper's last of the Mohicans
(19:15):
and Charles levers Charles O'Malley inthe light And so it was those books that
inspired me to think of adventure, and Icould only hope that after I left the farm
that I could go into a military career.
And fortunately for me, the fellow whohad been appointed from our district
(19:37):
washed out, didn't pass pre examsat West Point, and I was appointed
by my congressman, John A. Bingham.
And I entered West Point in 1857 andwould have probably spent five years
there if the war hadn't broke out.
And I ended my years at the Academy early.
(20:00):
We had two classes.
We had the May of 61 class.
And then my class graduated in June of 61.
But I read that you, beforeyou went into West Point, I
read that you were a teacher.
Is that true?
Oh, yes.
Yes.
In fact, my method of madness was toget my teaching degree because I needed
to bone up on my math and, and studiesso that I could pass the pre exams.
(20:26):
You know, it's a very hard curriculumto even get into West Point.
You know, first you have toget appointed by a congressman.
And out of all of the appointees theysift out the ones that don't pass.
Pre exam, and then you have that demeritsystem that occurs at any given semester.
(20:47):
A hundred demerits would getyou expelled from the academy.
So a large class dwindlesdown by the fifth year.
You're pretty much down to onlymaybe sixty to eighty students out
of the original, oh, maybe a hundredand thirty that were expelled.
Oh, so once you get, once you'vebeen appointed, it doesn't
(21:10):
necessarily mean you're goingto be there for several years.
It means that if you don't keepyour nose clean, that that you
could get kicked out very easily.
They just take the best of the best.
Well, I, I came very near I had quite afew demerits while I was there, and so
I spent 66 consecutive Saturdays walkingguard duty in order to shave off some
(21:30):
of the skins, the demerits that I earnedwhile I was there, and it was not an
easy task to, to get through a semesterbecause you're getting demerits for
hair out of uniform wrinkled uniform,lights on after hours, Any number of
Delinquencies could easily get youexpelled, so you're, you're constantly
(21:55):
on guard that you're also studying.
There are so many different quizzesthat are thrown at us, tests that we
were given unexpectedly, and so itwas always to be on top of your game.
Do you have any idea how manydimers you ended up with?
700 into 23.
(22:15):
Okay, now, now I'm super confused.
Well,
I would have had more than that,but I was able to shave them off
from disciplinary guard duty.
So I got, I got quite a few of them off.
I had demerits for swinging my armsin formation hair out of uniform
because my hair was too long.
(22:35):
So I shaved my head bald and thenI got undemerit for hair really out
of uniform until my hair grew back.
I wore a wig and then when I didgrow my hair back, I lathered it
down with cinnamon oil and I, Ipicked up the nickname of cinnamon
while I was there at the academy.
Okay.
Wait a minute.
Now you have a history of, as faras when commanding your regiments
(22:58):
of , demanding discipline andreally taking a ragtag group and
turning them into hardcore fighters.
And yet, it doesn't appear thatyou followed the rules at all when
you were going through West Point.
Is that, is that correct?
Well, I'm a young guy.
I was, I was young.
I mean, I was young.
I was 17 when I entered the academy, butI, I certainly grew up while I was there.
(23:20):
And by the time that the war brokeout, it didn't take a few battles
that everyone grew up very quickly.
And the responsibility of command putsa whole different complexion on things.
You know, I was 23 years old whenI became a Brigadier General, and
I had 1, 500 men's lives that I wasresponsible for guiding them into
(23:44):
battle and hoping that I could bringthem out without too many casualties.
But it's inevitable in asituation of war that men die.
Your command and, and men across thelines from us and many of those men
that I was shooting at were men thatI'd shared blankets with at West Point.
(24:04):
It was a very difficult thing.
When you talk about being responsiblefor men's lives in battle, when I, what
I hear in your voice is a man who feelsthat connection between his soldiers.
Like it sounds like youcan really feel that.
And yet my understanding is, is that youwent into some of these very difficult
(24:25):
battles where the odds were against you.
They had way more soldiers than you didand you were winning these battles, but
you were losing huge amounts of soldiers.
And so I guess I'm wondering,first of all, is that true?
And second of all, howyou think about that?
Well, the cavalry is alwaysaudacious, and we have to do
(24:46):
the main, thrust of the army.
And I took as many chances as any of mymen who were following me into battle.
I didn't say, go in and get them.
I said, come on, men, follow me.
And through the course of the war,I had 11 horses shot from under me.
So I was putting myself in thesame difficulties that I expected
(25:11):
my men to put themselves in.
You don't win a battle by saying,go get them guys and stand back
and hide behind trees while themen are butchered and process of
going up against outnumbered forces.
when I asked you how you felt about themen, I feel like you're talking more
about yourself and that you're sayingthat your method is to lead from the front
(25:36):
and just to go all in with the assumptionthat if they see their leader going
all in, that they're going to follow.
I would certainly hope they would,but I, I do have a concern for
casualties that I take in battle.
Any good officer is going to havea concern for his men, the welfare
of his men, and you just don't.
(25:57):
unceremoniously leadthem into a slaughter.
We used tactics that we learned atWest Point from von Clausewitz and
Jaumeni, the arts of war, and I usedthose plans on the battlefield and
In anything that I did throughout mymilitary career, I used the knowledge
(26:18):
that I gained from my time at West Point.
Was this a natural strength thatyou had for strategy, or were
these just all strategies thatyou learned from West Point?
Well, I learned at West Point, butthen when you take and apply them in
the real world, You have to be ableto use your mind to look at things,
(26:40):
look at the terrain understand thelikelihood that this could work
and audaciousness of the cavalry.
When an enemy sees men mounted on horsescoming down on them, it creates a great
deal of consternation and quite possiblythey'll buckle And a mad skedaddle to
(27:04):
the rear makes it victorious on our partbeing the cavalry arm of the service.
But it's the infantry that holds the line.
They come in behind us, and we onlyhope that we have tactical commanders
study the same books that, that Idid, and could You know, follow that
same philosophy , of the art of war.
(27:27):
Who are some of the peoplethat you, fought with, that
you admired their abilities?
And maybe also who are some of thosethat were , totally inadequate and
should have never been leading men
? Well, there's a number of men that were appointed because of their political.
position in civilian society.
(27:49):
They became colonels and thenfield promotions to generals.
And they didn't always have theknowledge of the military mindset.
I was very fortunate.
The first year out of WestPoint that I was appointed to
the staffs of Philip Kearney.
I served with General McClellan.
(28:10):
I had opportunities to bewith General Pleasanton.
Eventually I was putunder General Sheridan.
And I was at the right place at the righttime, and fortunately for me, the men that
I served under were military masterminds.
And they were able to instillin me those proper things that I
(28:33):
used when I had my own commands.
And I tried to use an amalgamof all of their great traits
in my own military career.
I learned from each person.
Commander that I served under, and Iknow, I know that you probably didn't
know that at one point I was an aau.
(28:53):
I was one of the first air Corps thatwould go up in observation balloons
during the Peninsula campaign,and was able to see the Confederate
withdrawal from Yorktown, thusrelieving the consternation and concern
around Washington DC of invasion.
What's that word you said?
Aero nod.
(29:14):
Yes, I went up in an observation balloon.
The Army of the Potomac, which I servedwith, had seven observation balloons.
I mostly went up in a ballooncalled Intrepid, and I would be
a thousand feet above the earth.
Confederate positions,writing it down in a journal.
(29:34):
I had binoculars and compass,and was able to observe the
positions of their artillery,the cavalry, infantry positions.
And I suggested that we did early morningobservations to go up before light,.
(29:54):
before it gets too windy.
And so I could observe the campfireswhen they were making breakfast.
And from that position, I couldsee where each company was.
Was that a dangerous job?
Oh yes.
I recall my first ascension thatI went up with one of professor
(30:15):
Thaddeus Lowe's assistants.
He didn't go up with me, but he was headof the balloon core and his assistant.
Went up in this basket thatwas a little more than a, a
laundry basket in, in, in size.
And it seemed like it was a wickerbasket that had woven wicker that I,
(30:35):
being so skinny at the time, I thoughtI was going to fall between the cracks.
And to assure me he began jumpingup and down in the basket, which
caused me to have that instantlaxative feeling come into my stomach.
And it was One of those situationswhere I, I spent the better part of
the ascension just sitting in thebasket holding on for dear life.
(30:57):
But eventually I got used to it andwas more than thankful when I finally
got sent back to be under GeneralBarnard's staff as a forward observer.
And was back in the saddle asopposed to being tethered off by a
thousand foot rope above the ground.
Yeah, that sounds very dangerous.
Sounds like you'd be more, morecomfortable with your feet a
(31:18):
little closer to the ground.
So were there any other strange jobs thatyou did like this before, , you started,
, gaining notoriety in the military?
Well, I was on staff duty for thebetter part of the first two years,
and on staff duty, my word waswhatever the commander sent out.
(31:38):
So I was riding between the front lines.
And it was a dangerous situation becausenormally I had my orderly riding with
me, but the, just the two of us, oftenthe case going in between lines of
combat and posting orders to the, theforward commanders, as well as check
(32:02):
and vedettes and, and picket duty tomake sure that our lines were secure.
And it was on one occasion when I wasout checking vedettes, that's mounted
pickets, that I got word that I wasto return to headquarters, and General
Pleasanton had taken over the CavalryCorps, and so he had this idea of
(32:28):
promoting the younger men in the ranks tohigher positions, and so Elon Farnsworth,
Wesley Merritt, and myself We're promotedto the grade of Brigadier General.
We're, we're all in ourtwenties at the time.
And so we became known as the BoyGenerals and that was quite an occasion
to be given command of a brigade simplybecause the brigade that I had acquired.
(32:55):
Was actually made up of volunteercavalry regiments, all from
the same state, of Michigan.
And I had previously applied for acolonelcy and one of the new formed
up regiments, the seventh Michigan.
And I was given a command of the first,fifth, sixth, and seventh Michigan
(33:16):
regiments, all men from the same state.
And just a few days beforethe battle of Gettysburg.
, were you 23 or 25 when youwere promoted to general,
? I was 23 when I got my brigadier general, and then by the age of 25, I'd received
my second star, which was major general.
I'm still the youngest major generalin the history of our country.
(33:38):
Why would they take achance on someone so young?
Are there not older, wiser men thatwould have been more qualified for this?
They may have been older and wiserand maybe the wiseness was to their
disadvantage because they didn'tseem to use that progress in battle.
And so they wanted somebodythat was willing to perform.
(34:00):
And so we were promoted bymerit, , what we showed in battle.
And that was what they needed at the time.
Up until probably Brandy Stationthe cavalry, the Union cavalry
anyways, was inadequately used.
They were assigned to baggage trains,courier duty very, very ineffective.
(34:25):
And so, right after the Battle ofBrandy Station the cavalry was kind
of given the lead to go into battlesand, and work effectively, and then
the infantry would come up and securethe position after we gained the land.
What was the battle of Brandy station?
It was probably the largest gatheringof mounted forces on the North American
(34:50):
continent took place in early June of 63.
And Jeb Stewart.
who was the flower of the confederacy,had successfully proven that he
could ride around the army ofthe Potomac and not be touched.
And so the attempt was tomove the war into the north.
(35:16):
General Robert E. Lee wantedto make it an offensive war.
And so his idea was to sweepin through Pennsylvania.
And, and drop into Washington, capturethe the Capitol, and force the Union to
capitulate or to recognize the South,the Confederacy, as a equal entity.
(35:39):
And so in his attempt, they pushed upthrough the valley of where Brandy Station
was located in that part of Virginia.
And we had our cavalryforces into position.
And as each accumulatedit became an all out war.
And during that battle, a coupleof the officers went down, their
(36:03):
horses went down, and I rode to thefront and rallied the troops and was
able to turn what might've been aUnion defeat into a Union victory.
You've mentioned somepretty big names there.
One of them being Robert E. Lee.
And as you are, , fighting thesedifferent battles in the Civil War, , I
know there was at least, at least onetime or a couple times where you were
(36:27):
directly engaging Robert E. Lee, butcan you tell me a little bit about him,
what fighting him was like, what kind ofperson he was, what you know about him?
I can't tell you a lot about himbecause I haven't really studied the
man, but I would tell you that theSouth had a number of, Officers that
inspired the men and in any givenbattle, if you have someone who creates
(36:53):
an inspiration, you can turn the intovictory simply because the men will rally
on a certain individual and Robert E.
Lee was venerated by the South to thedegree that he was almost godlike and
the men protected him and admired himand would probably have done anything
(37:16):
ran into the mouth of cannons, whichthey pretty much did at the Battle of
Gettysburg when Pickett came acrossthat open field towards Cemetery Ridge.
They wouldn't have done that forother commanders, but he was able
to inspire them, and so was Pickettand Longstreet and other officers
of the South that they admired andvenerated and held up in high esteem.
(37:42):
When you talk about Gettysburg tellme a little bit about that battle.
Well, I think it was a battle that wasfought by accident because the South,
by that year, had been suffering greatlybecause we were being effective with
the Anaconda campaign, strangling.
(38:02):
the ports of the South, so they couldn'tget goods in from the European countries.
And so they were at a lossfor clothing and shoes.
And somehow or another, they'dheard General Heath, Confederate
officer, heard that there wereshoes in a town of Gettysburg.
So they went in with a strategythat they were going to steal
(38:24):
shoes for the men who needed shoes.
And there were out.
A small scouting detachment of cavalrythat saw that buildup and sent back word.
And so numerous commands camein, corps, cavalry corps, General
Reynolds came in, and it built up.
(38:46):
The good thing of it was, it wasin a location where there was
the adequate water that wouldbe needed for the livestock, the
men, and to cool the weaponry.
So, that was ideal ground forthe battles to take place, but
it wasn't strategically planned.
It was in Robert E. Lee's movement tosweep into Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and
(39:09):
then to drop down into Washington, andit was just a stop over on their route.
And the decision that was made ofRobert E. Lee to move back south was
a result of the Union victory beingable to hold the line at Gettysburg.
(39:30):
That was kind of the turningpoint because it became the high
water mark of the Confederacy.
During the first two days ofthe battle probes were made.
and the right and left flank ofthe Union Army atop Cemetery Ridge.
And when they were unable toturn those flanks, they felt that
the weakness was in the middle.
(39:51):
And so Pickett's charge commencedacross an open field to attack
what they thought was the weakestpoint of the Union command.
But at the same time, they had instructedJ. E. B. Stuart to swing in behind with
Black Horse Cavalry and attack the rear.
(40:11):
and right flank of the Union Army, whichwould have caused mass disintegration
of the command on Cemetery Ridge.
Fortunately for me, I was in a movementheading towards Devil's Den when I
got word that General McMurdy Craigand his Pennsylvania boys needed
(40:32):
me to move my command, the MichiganCavalry Brigade, and put us between
and the right flank and we werefortunate that we had the new firearm.
The seven shot repeating rifle, Spencerrepeating rifle, which effectively gave
(40:53):
us more firepower than the Confederateshad, and we were able to thwart Stuart's
attempt to turn that flank, and at theend of the day, he retired from the field,
and we were able to hold that position andsave the Union forces atop Cemetery Ridge.
If you had not been in that battle then,if you had not been in that position,
(41:16):
the uh, Confederates have won Gettysburg.
It's possible.
There was thoughts that if wehad lost that major conflict that
we would have had to come to somesort of compromise at the time.
My
former commander general GeorgeMcClellan he was talking of running
(41:38):
for the presidency and he did run in64 his was to have peace at any cost.
And we had already committeda lot of men to that conflict.
Their lives had been lost.
And it was, it was such that,We needed to make a point and
(42:00):
push the war to the south.
And once we were able to dothat, then the last year of
the war rolled up pretty fast.
started pressing the issue.
Yes.
They were in bad need of suppliesand by attrition they had lost a
lot of men and manpower throughthose last few years of the war.
(42:24):
I want to go back fora minute to West Point.
So, here you are going to school atWest Point, and they are preparing
this, this class of generals andleaders that are going to go out and
fight on both sides of this battle.
How did it, what did it looklike when the war started?
did you see a bunch of people , leaveWest Point and then immediately go
(42:47):
fight for one side or the other?
And did more people go south than north?
What, what did that look like?
My class alone had, by attrition,gotten down to about 68 cadets.
And we had heard rumors to theeffect that they were offering
commissions in the Southern Army.
(43:08):
And many of my classmates,roommates even, were Southern born.
And they were just waiting until theygot a letter offering them a commission.
And so many of them dropped out.
And The remaining class was 34,and I ended up at the bottom of
the class because of my grades anddemerits, and became known as the
(43:32):
immortal I guess they since now callthem goats of the class, but still.
We were offered commissions assecond lieutenants in the Union
Army, and it was the only place thatyou would be, by act of Congress,
considered an officer and a gentleman.
(43:53):
And so I was given a secondlieutenant commission in
Company G, 2nd U. S. Cavalry.
But the majority of the studentswho left ended up in positions
of power in the Confederate Army.
Most of them jumped to thegrade of captain to colonel
in a short period of time.
(44:15):
It was meteoric that I would becomea brigadier general as quickly as I
did, but that was due to the fact thatI had the right mentors putting me
in the right place at the right timethrough my first few years of the war.
, as the war is starting, Wasthere like heavy recruiting from
both the North and the South?
(44:35):
Were they both tryingto keep those people?
They were.
What did that look like?
Well, I can't say that I was thereon site because most of the time
I was at the academy and then waspretty much signed to Washington and
then joined my unit in the field.
But there was a overall surge ofpatriotism, both for the North and
South and the South felt that they werefighting to preserve a way of life.
(45:01):
And they, they were fightingfor their independence.
We were fighting to contain the Union sothat the country wouldn't be broken up,
split up into two separate countries.
And that was our purpose long before theissue of slavery became first and formal.
And the, the fight forthe, to save the Union and,
(45:27):
Do you have opinions on slavery?
Well, I never was one to bepro slavery at all, whatsoever.
And even though I spent a great dealof time with my southern students, that
was not an issue that was talked about.
It was mostly about rights, about astrong federal government as opposed
(45:50):
to state individual governments.
And most of the students that I spokewith felt that each state should
have their own form of government.
And unfortunately, For the United Statesto have been successful at that time.
We, we, we need a strong federalgovernment to hold us together,
much like what we experiencedduring the revolutionary war, when
(46:14):
there were individual colonies,we were united and strengthened by
the fact that we stayed together.
So, what was the Civil War about?
Was the Civil War about slaverythen, or was it about states rights?
It
became, it became the issue.
Yes, it became the issue because mostnorthern people weren't apprised of
(46:37):
how ingrained slavery was in the South,but as time went on And we penetrated
the South and some of the plantations.
We saw how prevalent it was, but at thetime the South was agricultural based, and
so they needed people to work the fields.
And the indication that there werea larger degree of black indentured
(47:03):
slaves became more apparent.
That most people in theNorth had no knowledge of.
We were more of a industrialmanufacturing, and people worked and
were paid, and the South being poorand based mostly on cotton and sugar
(47:23):
cane and rice, they needed peopleto work the fields, and they didn't
get the prices for their goods.
It was dependent on theweather, and you could have a
bad year, and so they weren't.
In a position to pay high wages isthe industrial part of the country.
(47:45):
And so we, we already hadthe advantage on the South.
But we didn't have the wartactics that the South had.
They had most of the generals that knewhow to fight that had been, , raised
on horseback and were attuned to theland , where people in the North
(48:05):
were more concerned about paying theirbills and, and going to work and not,
you know, Apprised of the terrain andstuff that would be needed in battle.
So, like, men who came from stores andfactories were put in charge of troops.
Because they wereinfluential in government.
(48:27):
And they had no knowledge of war.
So, they were ineffective.
You gotta put people in that knowwhat they're doing, especially when
you've got men's lives at, at risk.
That doesn't make any sense, taking aguy that, , he's got a lot of money or
has got lot of pull in, in politics.
I mean, he's just not goingto charge into the bullets.
Well, all of these questions you're askingme, particularly about the Civil War
(48:52):
and the Indian Wars, they're all basedon opinions that I've formed, and not
necessarily the absolute facts, becauseI look at things that maybe the man next
to me might not see in the same light.
Light.
And I would tell you that when I wasat West Point, we were being taught
(49:14):
the European tactics that had beenemployed during the Napoleonic Wars.
And that suddenly changed whenthe different inventions that
came out that were more killingmachines used during the Civil War.
And it.
Made obsolete those Napoleonic tactics.
(49:37):
What, what are some of those inventions?
Well, the rifling of the muskets they weresmooth bore in the beginning of the war.
Then they rifled themto become more accurate.
And we were still firing acrosslines that had been drawn during
the revolutionary war that were the.
tactics at the time that allowedthat a large amount of lead would
(50:01):
be shot out like a shotgun and youwould hope that you'd hit something.
Well, then it became more accurate andeach wound inflicted by the rifled 58
caliber Springfield devastated the enemy.
The person that got hit because chancesare it shattered the bone and they'd
(50:22):
have to lose a limb in the process.
If they weren't killed outright,then it would take two men that would
have to remove them from the field.
So you could effectively removethree people from a line a skirmish
line and that person probablywouldn't return to the front because
of the wounds that they suffered.
(50:43):
If they didn't die outright during theprocedure to remove their arm or leg, they
would probably just return to civilianlife and try to make do as best they can.
Jeez, what a way to think.
I mean, here, we got these superawesome guns, we shoot one guy, which
means they need two guys to carry himaway, and that's how we win the battle.
(51:03):
I don't know if I would havebeen that great of a general.
In the next episode, we are going to talka little bit more about Custer's luck.
We're going to talk about howhe received the surrender table
after Lee surrendered to Grant.
And we're going to talk about theBattle of Washita, where Custer was
accused of massacring more than ahundred Native Americans and much more.
(51:24):
I'm glad you're enjoying this podcast.
If you haven't yet subscribed now,and we'll see you at the next episode
of the calling history podcastwith part two of George Custer.
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Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.