James Butler Hickok: Another Legendary “Long Hair” And His Custer Connection

Rather than mark the birth date of another Little Bighorn player, today’s post marks the anniversary of a legend’s death. In reality, he was not at or even near the Little Bighorn when its namesake battle was fought. He did, however, have connections to the Custers. His death followed just over a month later.

George Armstrong Custer was known among Indians variously as “Yellow Hair,” “Long Hair” and other descriptors. Never mind the fact he’d cut his hair short before his last campaign.

Custer’s Sioux and Cheyenne adversaries, for the most part, did not even realize they were fighting against him until his last battle was done. It’s questionable whether they even recognized his body in the battle’s aftermath. But that’s a topic for another time.

“Wild Bill” Hickok

James Butler Hickok, better known as “Wild Bill,” is another legend of that time also known for his long hair. On August 2, 1876 he was murdered, shot from behind. He had more connection to Custer than just dying the same year. (That year was generally eventful, as chronicled in Chris Wimmer’s book The Summer of 1876.)

Wild Bill’s Background

First, some background. Born in Illinois in 1837, Hickok was raised an abolitionist. He helped in running part of an underground railroad until his father was killed for his beliefs in 1852. Hickok helped support his family by hunting wolves for bounty and driving freight wagons.

At age 18, thinking he had killed a man in a fight, Hickok went west to Kansas. While freighting to Santa Fe he tangled with a bear he had shot. He finally killed it with his bowie knife, but he was badly mauled in the fracas.

Early Exploits

While recuperating, Hickok shot and killed three men in a dispute. All armed, they pressed claims too aggressively against the stage company employing him. Thus began his reputation as a gunfighter.

Gunfights, Law Enforcement and Civil War Years

Hickok served briefly as constable of Monticello, Kansas, and accounts of his exploits soon were exploited and embellished by writers. He also found himself in “Bleeding Kansas” as an abolitionist. When America’s Civil War began Hickok enlisted in the Union Army at Fort Leavenworth.

Some of Hickok’s personal gun battles came at the start of and directly after the nation’s Civil War. Written embellishments came as well. Hickok had spent most of the war fighting against the South, however. He is better known as a Union scout, spy and sharpshooter than as a soldier.

Post-Civil War Career

After killing a man in July 1865 in a developing shoot-out, Hickok was found not guilty by a jury. He soon served as Deputy U.S. Marshal at Fort Hays, Kansas. He then served as a guide as General William T. Sherman made an official “visit” across Kansas and Nebraska.

In 1867 Hickok became a scout for General Hancock’s expedition against marauding Indians across Kansas and Oklahoma. That is where he first met Custer, who commanded the expedition in 1868 and 1869.

The Custer Connection

Custer found Hickok knowledgeable and tried to learn from him. Hickok continued as a scout through the winter of 1868-69 for both the 5^th and 7^th U.S. Cavalries. It can be said he was not present at the ill-vetted and ill-advised Washita attack.

Hickok suffered a leg wound in a Cheyenne attack while carrying dispatches to Fort Lyon, Kansas early in 1869. After healing he returned to law enforcement, serving as U.S. Marshal at Hays City, Kansas. That may not have ended his connection with the Custers, however.

Hickok was known as a tough and capable two-fisted marshal who was equally adept with fists and revolvers. George Custer was known as a tee-totaler since his sister’s temperance lecture while George was still a cadet at West Point. He was reputed to have little tolerance for drinking, or at least drunkenness, amongst his troops at the remote posts he commanded.

Tom Custer, however, was known as a rowdy drinker, often to excess. In one of his sprees he was said to have shot out lights and windows throughout Hays City and ridden his horse into a crowded saloon. Apparently this was not his first offense.

Historian Thom Hatch chronicled the incident, stating Hickok dragged Tom Custer off his horse and in before a justice of the peace, who fined him. Hatch says, “Tom was incensed with Hickok over the arrest and vowed revenge.”

Hatch goes on to state the younger Custer, on New Year’s Eve, returned to Hays City with three other soldiers and waited in the saloon. When Hickok strolled in unawares they cornered him, disarmed him and prepared to exact revenge physically.

A sympathetic barkeep tossed Hickok a shotgun or handgun, however, and soon Custer’s three comrades lay wounded but alive on the floor. Tom “lit out” for Fort Hays like a kid brother running to tell his big brother.

Lt. Colonel George Custer had left for Fort Leavenworth, however, to pass the holiday there. Tom then went to General Phil Sheridan. With military authority, Sheridan ordered Hickok’s arrest. Word reached Hickok before the soldiers did, however. As Hatch wrote, “Hickok thought it prudent to vanish for the time being and hopped a freight train headed for Ellsworth and Abilene until cooler heads prevailed.”

Written Descriptions

Apparently they did. Both George and Libby Custer wrote glowing descriptions of Hickok in their respective memoirs. In Following the Guidon Libbie wrote effusively describing Hickok’s frontier garb, his physique, his manner of walking or swinging down from a horse, and his general conduct. She concluded, “. . . his courteous manner gave one a feeling of confidence in his word and his undaunted courage.”

Libbie’s effusiveness has led some to speculate that she and Hickok had had an affair. That speculation reflects more on those who spread it than on Mrs. Custer, it appears. She suffered similar rumors regarding Captain Thomas Weir – who by protocol was her military escort in her husband’s absence on campaigns – and later regarding General Edward Godfrey. Such rumor mongering smacks more of childish whispering and gossip than of credible history.

In fact, Mrs. Custer was hardly the only writer to describe Hickok’s physique and appearance in glowing terms. George Ward Nichols seemed as awed by Hickok’s physical construction as by the buckskin clothes he wore or the Navy Colts in his belt.

Even George Custer, in My Life On The Plains, described Hickok effusively. He wrote, “Whether on foot or horseback he was one of the most perfect types of physical manhood I ever saw.” Like others describing Hickok, Custer could not help noting the plainsman’s broad shoulders and chest.

Custer paid Hickok perhaps the finest compliment, concluding, “His deportment . . . was entirely free from bluster or bravado. He seldom spoke of himself unless requested to do so. His conversation, strange to say, never bordered on the vulgar or blasphemous. His influence among the frontiersmen was unbounded, his word was law . . .”

Show Business

Hickok spent time acting, including in his old friend Bill Cody’s Wild West Show. Eventually, though, he was drawn back to the frontier. However, as Custer’s final campaign began, Hickok married Agnes Lake, a widowed circus owner and performer. The marriage was short-lived, but only because Hickok was too.

Before settling down, Hickok migrated to the gold-rush town of Deadwood. Ironically, it lay in the Black Hills, to which Custer’s 1874 expedition had drawn much attention. While Hickok’s good friend “Buffalo Bill” Cody sought his fabled “first scalp for Custer,” Hickok’s failing eyes had driven him to tamer pursuits – or so he thought.

Hickok’s Last Hand

Seeking his fortune at the gambling tables rather than the mines, Hickok experienced ups, then downs. Most know that, in taking a seat at a poker table, he uncharacteristically accepted one at which his back was not against a wall. Jack McCall, whom Hickok had “cleaned out” in a game the night before, shot Hickok from behind. Thus died a long-haired legend connected to Custer. Through Custer, even Hickok had loose connections to the Little Bighorn.