Part 35: South Skirmish Line, Upper Segment

okay we are on the upper segment of the South skirmish line Last Stand Hill can be seen up on the ridge you can see the obelisk up there on the horizon and right in front of us we have a warrior marker this is for black white man or black glossy Jew he is a miniconjou warrior and was mortally wounded in this area while fighting against Custer soldiers that were up on Last Stand Hill he was taken back to the village and he died either at that night or the next day as I stated in the last segment there was a bugle call early in the Last Stand Hill episode and for some unknown reason to the Warriors about 30 to 40 men left the hill and came down into this area and based on the kill sites the people that were identified in this area down here by the survivors of the Reno and Benteen battalions it is clear that the men that were killed down here were mainly from Company E so Company E was sent down here for a reason the reason was pretty simple the situation up on the hill was bleak Custer was on the defensive they had shot their horses and were using them as cover they were just trying to hold out and they were waiting for Benteen and the recalled units which never came and Custer was wondering what the heck was going on so the whole reason for the company maneuver down here was to open up a corridor were a couple soldiers that still had horses so they could ride off to the south and find Benteen find help find Reno and do whatever they could because this was a bad situation here so Company E who was without its commander 1st lieutenant Algernon Emory Smith he was found up on Last Stand Hill which would suggest that he was killed early in the Last Stand Hill episode so he was not able to lead his company off the hill the command of Company E fell to the executive officer 2nd lieutenant James garland Sturgis who was the son of the actual 7th cavalry commander Colonel Samuel Sturgis who was on detached duty in st. Louis so Sturgis led Company E down here to open up a corridor for the riders and they came down in this area and swept the Indians away but just like the Company C back in the Calvin and Cooley earlier the Indians while they were initially surprised and pushed back they immediately regrouped and attacked again and company aid disintegrated company was supposed to come back to the hill I believe once they had opened up the corridor so you would have a hundred soldiers back on the hill unfortunately come the II did not return to the hill after the Indian counter-attack many soldiers simply fled south into the deep ravine sector perhaps to find some cover or to escape or just to hide so we're going to work our way down the south skirmish line now and look at some of the people that died here here are two markers the first two on the south skirmish line as you can see last and Hill is right there this is a pair of markers and of course one is spurious this pair is for a private Weston Harrington of Company L he was found at this spot and identified by people that knew him so not only did company a personnel move down here but others did as well remember I told you that at some point we know 42 men were killed on the hill but at the same time you have other soldiers that left the hill on their own volition you have sergeant major William Henry share o of the headquarter staff he fled off to the north and was killed there other soldiers fled south along battle Ridge and were killed on the western slope so Weston Harrington probably wasn't part of the initial charge from Company E off the hill he probably was one of those that was still alive on the hill later on in the episode and decided to flee because staying on the hill was not a good time at that point most people were dead or dying so we're coming down the south skirmish line and as you can see soldiers that came down here really got into a corridor you have Indians up on this Ridge here to my left and then to the right we have Cemetery Ridge this was the area that company II was holding during the cemetery ridge episode well now the ridge is covered with Indians and the Indians can easily shoot down on the soldiers they are just funneling them in here picking them off one by one as they go and as you can see we have some markers here here's one soldier dead and here's a pair of markers here probably one soldier again and we will continue to come on down here it's amazing that more people weren't killed with all the Indians on both sides of them here in this corridor here we have three more soldiers killed and here is a subject of controversy see this little ravine here that's Cemetery ravine and there are a lot of people that say that men actually fled Last Stand Hill and actually died in Cemetery ravine which I don't agree with since there is no way to get trapped in there and soldier testimony sure does not suggest anyone was found in Cemetery ravine it isn't deep at all survivors always call it a deep ravine or a deep gully but if you notice there is cemetery ravine but here's where all the markers are they are all along this Ridge they aren't going into Cemetery ravine at all so I tend to believe that it's deep ravine that they are going to and not cemetery ravine now here's the marker for second lieutenant James garland Sturges who was the executive officer of Company E now Sturgis was never identified but it is sure that he was killed somewhere in this sector it might not be at this point this is most likely a spurious marker but he definitely was killed in this area he was never identified but his shirt was found in the abandoned Indian village a couple days after the battle and the shirt was buttoned all the way up but it was all bloody and stuff too that leads me to believe and others to believe that most likely he was decapitated and that would make identification impossible also sturgis's bloody under clothes were found in the Indian village so that's just more proof that he was killed to other officers and custards Italian that weren't identified after the battle were first lieutenant porter of company i and second lieutenant Harrington of company see now lieutenant Porter's jacket was found in the abandoned Indian village and it had to bloody bullet holes in it so that pretty much has proved that he was killed lieutenant Harrington's watch was recovered in 1877 when Indians had surrendered to soldiers gave it up so that was pretty much proof that Harrington had been killed too we all know that the Indians did loot the day the Custer dead after the battle they pretty much took everything from the field including the weapons and clothing so obviously Harrington did not give up his watch it was obviously found on his body and was taken by the Indians as we continue down the south skirmish line we just have marker after marker and if we swing around here we have an interesting pair of markers here this is marker pair 33 34 and this is another positive identification of the kill site this pair is for the scalp Mitch Boyer archeological excavations done at this spot actually found facial bones as well as other bones and other equipment and artifacts the archaeologists were able to take the facial bones and superimpose them onto a photograph of Mitch Boyer and it was a perfect positive match also the teeth that were found at the site suggested that the individual was a pipe smoker which we all know Boyer was it also gave an age of about 45 to 55 years old and Boyer was in that age bracket lastly the bones themselves the racial characteristics revealed a racially admixed individual with both European and American Indian traits and there was only one individual in the Custer battalion that fit that description and that was Mitch Boyer also clothing found at the site showed that the individual was not wearing a soldier uniform but they were wearing a scout or civilian outfit mother-of-pearl buttons things of that nature so that would definitely be something that Boyer would wear and something that a soldier would wear meanwhile we turn around here you will see that we are moving down toward deep ravine deep ravine is right in front of us and to the right is an area called the flats you can see the trees in the background that is a Little Bighorn River and the valley of the Little Bighorn is beyond the river so at this point we're going to stop and move further down the trail before we start the next segment which will feature the lower segment of the South skirmish line as well as the fighting in deep ravine and the end of the battle

Channel: CusterApollo

Views: 138,306

Keywords: Custer, Little Bighorn

Id: onJbRjI3Foc

Length: 9min 27sec (567 seconds)

Published: Fri Dec 10 2010