Little Bighorn National Battlefield Monument

The ride from Hardin along the back roads to the town of Crow Agency and into the battlefield monument is cycling paradise. Good pavement, few cars, a sunny day, even a couple of roller coaster hills make this  route too good to pass up. The monument itself is worth the trip. The Monument road travels approximately four and a half miles north to south following the route of the battle which started south of the Indian encampment on the Bighorn River in the flat lands beneath the hills and rolling bluffs to the east. On the morning of Sunday June 25, 1876 Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer sent part of his 7th Calvary to attack the Indian encampment below. The small force of 7th Calvary soldiers, led by Major Reno, quickly realized that they had ridden into a hornet's nest as a large group of warriors rode out in defense of the village. Forced to begin a hasty retreat in an effort to rejoin the larger force still up on top of the hills above the small group was effectively cut off and forced to hold their ground alone.

Meanwhile, Custer continued to ride to the north along the ridge increasingly harried by a force much, much larger than they had anticipated though his own scouts had given him early notice of the size of the Indian encampment. The sites where Calvary soldiers fell along the route of the rolling battle are identified with white marble markers (Indian deaths are identified with red markers). One marker here, three to five there, until you reach Last Stand Hill where Custer and those still with him met their end. After shooting their own horses to serve as breastworks, Custer and his men fought on until they ran out of ammunition and the Indians charged up the hill to finish them off. As I walk by the white markers I try to envision what that day must have been like for soldier and

Indian warrior alike. The Indians were surprised by the arrogance of the white soldiers willingness to attack such a large Indian encampment but apparently there had been some foretelling of the epic battle to come around the Indian dance fires in the nights preceding the battle. For a lowly Calvary soldier what had turned out as just another hot dusty tramp across the prairie was quickly evolving into chaos as, from the scattering of markers indicates, it was every man for himself as each tried to fend off, for as long as they had bullets remaining, an overwhelming enemy force intent on their utter destruction. I can hardly imagine what thoughts must have gone though their heads as they fired their last shots and heard the click of an empty chamber realizing they were moments away from death. 

Along with the individual markers there is atop Last Stand Hill a Memorial to those

who gave their last full measure of their devotion that fateful day. There is also, hauntingly, a smaller Memorial marking a horse cemetery. Being Calvary the soldiers obviously started out on horseback, but perhaps not as consciously realized, is the fact that while more than 200 soldiers lost their lives so too did their mounts, often shot by the soldiers themselves in a last futile effort to block the fusillade of Indian bullets and arrows coming their way. Fittingly the monuments a quiet place, with the constant prairie wind whipping through the grass covered hills. If you close your eyes you can almost picture  that time long ago when two sides, each believing they were in the right, faced off in one of the last major clashes between two ways of life unable to coexist with each other.

Interestingly, the Memorial to the 7th Calvary soldiers is very much what you might expect - a tall obelisk reaching towards the blue prairie sky engraved with the names of the soldiers who died that day. The Indian Memorial fifty yards or so from the top of the hill takes a completely different approach with more of an emphasis on learning from what happened that June day.