This Date in History: 150 Years Ago Today May 17, 1876 The Dakota Column and Destiny: The Seventh Cavalry Sets Forth

On May 17, 1876 no one knew events would lead to the Little Bighorn. Custer’s cavalry column set forth full of confidence.

Custer’s Absence

After congressional testimony, political detainments and delays, Lt. Colonel George Armstrong Custer did not manage to return to his post until May 10, 1876. Along with his immediate superior, General Alfred H. Terry, Custer arrived at Bismarck, Dakota Territory. With Terry and his staff, Custer arrived by train from St. Paul, Minnesota.

Final Preparations, More Weather Delays

It was May 14^th when Custer hired the black interpreter Isaiah Dorman. Some sources indicate Custer did Dorman a favor. He commandeered Dorman from the condescending Captain Frederick Benteen at nearby Fort Rice. It ended poorly.

Historian Edgar Stewart notes that Dorman had lived amongst the Sioux and was close with Sitting Bull. Stewart says Dorman asked to accompany the expedition because he wanted to visit the favored Sioux lands around the Powder, Tongue, Rosebud and Bighorn Rivers. Other scouts and interpreters were also hired at this time.

Regardless, a week of preparation occurred after Custer’s return to Fort Abraham Lincoln. After winter delays due to snow depths, heavy rains had turned the prairie’s clay-like soil to “gumbo.” This sticky mud made Prairies all but impassable for the expedition’s huge train of supply wagons, artillery and cattle.

Coordinating Columns

The column finally set forth on May 17, 1876. The two columns with which they were to coordinate and “cooperate” strategically had been in action now for more than two months. General George H. Crook’s Wyoming column had suffered setbacks and regressed. In another month it would again do so.

Colonel John Gibbon’s Montana Column actually carried out its orders since setting out on March 17^th, two months earlier. It had dutifully patrolled the north bank of the Yellowstone River. It was hoped the column would keep non-treaty tribes from fleeing northward until the other two columns could converge and entrap the tribes.

The Delays: Cause and Effect

Custer’s delays had been largely political. Previous posts here have detailed Custer’s testimony before Congress. First, he was called to witness before the House committee investigating the “Trader Post Scandal” under Secretary of War William Belknap. Wishing to head back and prepare his regiment for its planned campaign, Custer was then asked to appear before the Senate’s committee too.

Custer had wired the army’s headquarters when a contractor provided Fort Abraham Lincoln with grain in sacks marked for the Indian agencies. Believing the grain had been stolen from the Indian Department, Custer refused to accept it. After notifying headquarters he was ordered to accept the grain. He was also summoned by Congress; he stated he believed the order had come from Belknap.

Custer likely did not mention President Grant’s brother Orvil, who was also involved in the graft. It was enough that Belknap was a personal friend of Grant and had served on his staff during the recent Civil War. He had already resigned in hopes of avoiding impeachment, but the damage was done – for Belknap and Custer.

When Custer called at the White House before leaving for his post, Grant refused to see him. So Custer left but was detained at Chicago upon Grant’s order. General Terry interceded for Custer, writing to Grant that “Custer’s services would be very valuable with his regiment.” Terry had no Indian war experience. General Sheridan also interceded, reluctantly, as did Major General William T. Sherman.

Custer was allowed to accompany his 7th Cavalry Regiment. General Sherman’s dispatch of May 8^th makes it appear Custer was no longer prohibited from leading it. General Terry did, however, disobey Sherman’s directive to prohibit Custer from taking any newspaper men along. (See Mark Kellogg, March 31,2026.)

All these delays did more than set the campaign back. They allowed time for increasing numbers of tribal members to leave their reservations and join Sitting Bull’s huge gathering of Sioux and Cheyenne tribes. As that gathering grew in numbers, so did its fighting strength. The confident Custer would underestimate it.

Reinforcing the Regiment

As the 7^th Cavalry set forth on May 17^th, 1876, it had bolstered its numbers too. Private William O. Taylor would later write that troops G, H and K had been recalled from duty in the south. The regiment’s entire twelve troops marched out. They had been joined as well by two companies of 7^th Infantry and one company of 6^th Infantry, making a total of more than 800 enlisted men and nearly 40 officers.

The entourage was huge.

Parade-like Departure

Custer loved pageantry, and his column’s start from Fort Lincoln was typical. It is doubtful the officers or men were in parade uniforms, as they were in fact starting out on a remote campaign. It is known, though, that the regimental band was playing. General Terry ordered a full mounted march into the fort from the regiment’s nearby encampment (where incoming troops had “tented.”)

Various sources record that the Ree (Arikara) scouts led off, organized according to their warrior societies. Their families were said to have beat drums and sung “melancholy war songs.” Steward describes this as a “wailing, mournful dirge that was customary when Indians went to war.”

Many sources quote Elizabeth Custer, who described the parade in her well known Boots and Saddles. She described the fort’s children as beating on pots or pans and hoisting flags made of handkerchiefs tied to sticks to emulate soldiers. She then describes passing “laundress row,” where many enlisted men’s wives shed tears as if knowing many would not return.

General Terry, possibly at Custer’s behest, had ordered the march across the parade ground in order to reassure the wives. At one point he also ordered a brief halt so the married men could dismount and bid those wives ‘good-by.’ Naturally, the band had played the regimental favorite, “Garryowen,” probably many times over. However, Mrs. Custer wrote that when it broke into “The Girl I Left Behind Me” many of those wives broke down in tears.

An Ominous Phenomenon

The day was described as raw and cold, with a heavy fog over the river. Such is not uncommon on the plains in May, but a very rare phenomenon seemed ominous. Mrs. Custer wrote, “As the sun broke through the mist a mirage appeared, which took up about half of the line of cavalry, and thenceforth for a little distance it marched, equally plain to the sight on the earth and in the sky.” Or, as Stewart quotes, “. . . the moving column was mirrored in the radiant mist.”

Many of us put no stock in coincidences. This phenomenon, however coincides interestingly to Sitting Bull’s coming sun dance vision. Less than a month later, after self-deprivation in that dance, Sitting Bull would see soldiers falling upside down into the tribes’ huge, combined village. If the cavalry was truly mirrored as it left Fort Abraham Lincoln, its reflected image would have been upside down.

Regardless, the Seventh Cavalry’s fate is somewhat well known. Roughly half the regiment would survive in June of 1876. Custer and the five companies with him, as we know, would not. On May 17, 1876, 150 years ago today, they began their march toward destiny on the Little Bighorn.