They Died With Custer: Soldiers Bones from the Battle of the Little Bighorn

by P. Willey, Douglas D. Scott, Melissa A. Connor

Book Overview

Dead men tell no tales, and the soldiers who rode and died with George Armstrong Custer at the Battle of the Little Bighorn have been silent statistics for more than a hundred years. By blending historical sources, archaeological evidence, and painstaking analysis of the skeletal remains, Douglas D. Scott, P. Willey, and Melissa A. Connor reconstruct biographies of many of the individual soldiers, identifying age, height, possible race, state of health,...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0806135077
• ISBN13: 9780806135076
• Release Date: September 2002
• Publisher: University of Oklahoma Press
• Length: 416 Pages
• Weight: 1.06 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 5.4" x 8.6"

Customer Reviews

A Very Thorough and Precise Study

Among all of the books I have on the archeaology of the Little Bighorn, my library would not be complete with out this one concerning the findings from those digs. It is well written. It is very technical and not the kind of book a causual reader would enjoy. It is , however, the kind of book a very serious student of the subject will enjoy. Although I was not present for any of the digs as a volunteer, I have kept up with them by purchasing many other books related. I have visted the battlefield several times of the years and even met a few of the poeple mentioned in the book. This all of course, makes it of special interest to me. I would highly reccomend this book to anyone with a very serious interest in the anthropology concerning the members of the 7th U.S. Cavalry who participated in the battle in 1876. There are some very important comparisons with other remains that were studied from several other areas of the Western expansion to arrive at a picture of what these men were really like. As the book concludes, this was not a period that was quite so romantic as many people have imagined. It was a very tough life in a harsh environment. For the advanced "Custer Buff" or historian, this is a must have book.

Digging into the Little Bighorn

This book should be a considered a companion book to the others written detailing the results of the numerous battlefield investigations following the 1984 brush fire, particularly "Archaeology, History, and Custer's Last Battle: The Little Big Horn Reexamined." While this book goes into detail about the individual soldiers and the remains found at numerous marker pairs across the field, the other title gives the new forensic based chronology of the battle. I was a park visitor in 1984, and two time subsequent to that date. It is amazing how the interpretation of the battle has changed since then. The new explanation answers many of the nagging questions that have fed the Custer Myth. Scott's book in particular explodes the myth of the noble fighting bunkmates or suicide pacts, that rose from the apparent grave stone pairs that dot the battlefield, and the apparent mis match between the number of markers and the number of soldiers that were killed. Exhumation of numerous such sites revealed in all cases only the partial remains of one individual. The fact that so many ramains were found at so many of the sites, and that markers intended for the Reno Field were placed on the Custer Field, calls into question the thoroughness of the reburial details subsequent to the battle. Remnants and nearly complete skeletal remains were found. Makes you wonder how many horse bones are under the marker on mis-named Last Stand Hill. Scott makes a valiant attempt to include attributed artifacts and remains previously found on the battlefield to expand his data population. A noble endeavor. Some of the biggest questions regarding the battle may never be known due to the construction of the park visitors center, parking lot and Veterans Cemetary. Scott's book adds new indespensible information to the updated unglorified story of the Little BigHorn. A must read for anyone interested in the Little Bighorn.

Its about the men this time....

I thought this was a well written, easy to read and utterly interesting book on the archeological research done around the Custer Battlefield (Little Big Horn Battlefield for the politically correct). The book centered around the common soldiers of the Seventh Cavalry instead of its more infamous commander. The study of human remains helped give a "slice of life" look at the regular cavalrymen of the Seventh Cavalry and how the battle went according to archeological finds of bullets, casing and where the men of Seventh fell during the battle. It was also interesting to read about how they tried to identified some of the remains they found. The book should be consider as a mandatory reading material for anyone interested in the battle of Little Bighorn.

Digging into Little Bighorn Battlefield

A well-written summary of more than a decade's analysis of battlefield archeology. Fascinating identification of several bodies from a few bones, especially those well-know persons who were found in sites other than where eyewittnesses placed them in written history. The book suffers, however, by a brief and weak synopsis that fails in its attempt to draw too-broad conclussions about the entire frontier population from a few soldiers' bones.

They died with Custer.

This was a superbly written volume outlining the archaeological reclaimation of the battlefield site of the Little Big Horn. A military archeologist (Scott), a forensic archeologist (Conner), and a forensics anthropologist (Willey) combined talents to preserve and identify the material evidence of the events that took place there after a wildfire stripped the scene of vegitation and exposed the site to erosive processes and human curiosity. The book details: 1) the history of the 7th Cavalry, including among other things, the age of the soldiers, their origin, and length of service, 2) the efforts to identify individual soldiers and the location of their fall in battle, 3) the effect of the rigorous life on the frontier on the health of the soldiers, 4) etc. I found particularly interesting the efforts to reconstruct the facial features of some of the skulls in an effort to identify the remains with specific people. This is a good text of archaeology at work.