Last Summer Trip

My last summer trip was short one but one that I have been wanting to do for some time. I dropped Becky off at DFW, then drove about 4.5 hours northwest to Cheyenne, Oklahoma. The purpose of this trip was to see both the visitor center and the actual historic site of the Washita Battlefield National Historic Site.

Having grown up in Oklahoma, I have known about this place for a long time, and in spite of having spent a lot of time in western Oklahoma, I had never been to Cheyenne or the NHS. This is the place where Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer led about 700 soldiers of the 7^th cavalry in a surprise dawn attack on the village of Peace Chief Black Kettle, on the morning of November 27^th, 1868. This village was mostly occupied by old people, women, and children. The warriors were camped several miles downstream along the Washita River.

There was a surprising amount of Big Bluestem along the trail

The National Park Service signage and documentation says between 30 and 60 Cheyenne were killed, and 20 soldiers in the main attack. Major Elliott, Custer’s second-in-command, led a squad of the 7^th cavalry in pursuit Cheyenne warriors that attacked from downstream. Elliott and all 17 of his soldiers were killed by the Cheyenne warriors. After the attack, Custer reported to his commander, General Sheridan, that his soldiers had killed 103 Cheyenne warriors.

When I was young, I would often see bumper stickers (in Oklahoma) that said “Custer had it coming.” This was in reference to the battle of Little Bighorn, in Montana, in which Custer led 215 soldiers of the 7^th cavalry in an attack on about 3000 warriors of the Lakota, Sioux, Arapaho, and Cheyenne tribes. The result of this battle is well known as “Custer’s last stand.”