6-9-89 Yesterday’s river journey was prologue; today we got to see and experience the Custer Battlefield. I should say, first off, that I’ve long been familiar with the events of the Greasy Grass. But yesterday, as we made our way to Lodge Grass, Montana, I read an entire article about the Battle of the Little Bighorn in a recent issue (December 1986) of National Geographic magazine. This article not only refreshed my memory of the events of June 1876, but it provided new information about Custer’s Last Stand—information generated by archaeological expeditions following a fire at the battlefield. So when we arrived at the visitor’s center under clear, blue skies this morning, I saw not only rolling hills on which lay scattered gravestones. I saw soldiers marching and Indians crawling through the grass, heard the sounds of bugles, war-whoops, and gunfire, and smelled leather and gunpowder. (I have a pretty good historical imagination and enjoy using it.) As we stood atop Custer Hill, David and I reconstructed Custer’s movements that fateful afternoon of 25 June 1876. Having paddled almost to Reno Creek yesterday, the battle [this is bad grammar] took on new significance to us. We pointed to where Custer divided his battalion, to where Reno forded the Little Bighorn River and attacked the Indian encampment, to where Reno and his men entrenched after being rebuffed, to where Benteen met him hours later, to where Custer marched along the bluffs, and to where the last stand occurred. What fun this was (to us, not Custer)! Dozens of tourists walked up the long path to do their own reconstructions of the battle.
Later, having thoroughly photographed the place, we walked through the visitor’s center and drove the van along the road to the Reno-Benteen battlefield. It’s a four-mile drive. On the way back, we took our time, pausing to read the markers and filling in the details of the battle. We tried to imagine what it was like to be with Reno and Benteen and realize that Custer needed help only a few miles away. They were trapped there by Indians. One brave officer, Thomas Weir, tried to get to Custer, but was forced to retreat under heavy fire. The place where he turned around is named, appropriately enough, Weir Point. I now have a better understanding of what happened during the Battle of the Little Bighorn. It looks as though Custer moved progressively to higher ground as he advanced along the river. He had a better chance on high ground, because, among other things, it helped him follow the Indian movements. Along the way, he dispatched companies to protect his flanks and give him time to make the hill. These soldiers died where they were dispatched, as you can see by the clusters of gravestones on both sides. Finally, having reached a prominent point, Custer must have ordered his remaining soldiers to dismount and kill their horses for breastworks. This—Custer Hill—is where the rest of the soldiers died. The spot is now marked by a huge monument that contains the names of all of Custer’s cavalrymen. There’s also a small, metal fence surrounding the last cluster of gravestones, including Custer’s. (Custer is buried in West Point, New York, at the United States Military Academy.) As we drove off, David confessed that I had “made him a Custer buff”, which, though he may not yet know it, is for life. He apparently enjoyed this stopover, as I did.
I don’t know who suggested it (I probably did), but we decided to head for Yellowstone National Park for at least one night and perhaps two. I did all of the day’s driving: 304.1 miles, giving me a total of 1180.2 miles, or forty-three percent of the aggregate. My gas mileage was only ten miles per gallon, which was disappointing. Rather than cut across Montana and turn south into Yellowstone, I backtracked part of the way to Sheridan and drove across northern Wyoming. What beautiful country! We passed through the Bighorn Mountains, which constitute the source of the Bighorn River. (The Little Bighorn flows into the Bighorn, which flows into the Yellowstone, which flows into the Missouri, which flows into the Mississippi, which empties into the Gulf of Mexico.) The road going up the mountains from the east is much less steep than that coming down on the west. I had to keep my foot on the brake almost continuously, or we would have careened over the side. David and Ellen smelled something burning—the brake pads, undoubtedly. While in the Bighorn Mountains, we had lunch at a rustic lodge. The waitress who served us is a student at the University of Wyoming, while another waiter wore a shirt that said “Minnesota”. These must be college students getting away from it all for the summer. I envy them. When I was an undergraduate, I worked in a sweatshop (Huron Metal Products in North Branch, Michigan) for peon wages.
As expected, it was cool in the Bighorns, so cool that there is still snow on the craggy peaks and in the meadows. David and I stopped several times to take photographs. Ellen, as usual, waited patiently inside. We even drove several miles off the main road to see the medicine wheel, an ancient astronomical site. The road was treacherous. It was gravel, there were no guardrails along the way, and it was wide enough for only one vehicle. Ellen was a nervous wreck, and rightly so. By the time we got to Cody, having passed through Lovell and Powell, it was late afternoon. We had lost most of our altitude and crossed the Powder River, which figured so prominently in the fur trade. We stopped at a rest area near the river, but decided not to jump the fence and go down to the river. (David wanted to know whether it was kayakable.) As for Cody, named for William “Buffalo Bill” Cody [1846-1917], I fell in love with the place immediately. We stopped at a grocery store for provisions, then pushed on through the mountain pass that constitutes the border of Yellowstone National Park. Cody is large enough to have urban amenities, such as shopping malls, theaters, and recreational sports leagues, but it sits at the foot of a tremendous mountain range and is rich in history. It’s a nature-lover’s dream. On the way out of town, we passed a facility that claims to be the world’s largest rodeo ground. So far, I count Buffalo and Cody (both in Wyoming) as my favorite towns. From Cody, we made our way along the Shoshone River. The wind was furious in the pass, so I had to drive slowly in order to keep the kayaks from being blown off the van.
Words cannot describe the beauty and majesty of Yellowstone, though of course I will try. We entered the park during a summer thunderstorm, so every now and then, in the distance, we would see lightning. The dark clouds gave the area a spooky, romantic aura, which is to my liking. The road itself winds along the Shoshone River, occasionally passing through a tunnel where the mountains come in too closely. A large dam creates a pristine lake several miles into the park. My reactions of awe and disbelief went on for at least two hours, during which time it got dark and I grew tired. (I’m still recovering from yesterday’s eight-hour kayak trip.) To my horror, the first campground that we reached had a “full” sign at the entrance. Undaunted, we pushed on to the next campground, which had vacancies. While negotiating the narrow road around the campsites (at David’s direction), I ran over an ornamental log and ripped the waste-water nozzle from the van. Damn! It’ll have to be replaced. Eventually we found a reasonably flat site and parked the van for the night. The ground was marshy and cold, and covered with the manure of some large, hoofed beast (bison? elk? deer?), but I threw the tent up anyway and ate a dinner of freeze-dried chicken and rice. These freeze-dried meals, to my surprise, are tasty and filling, especially when I break bread (usually three slices) into them. Tomorrow we’ll get a chance to see Yellowstone, not just drive through it. We may even put the kayaks into Yellowstone Lake, which is near our campsite.
