28INDIAN LIFEWILD WEST JUNE 2019NATIONAL^
ARCHIVESo white man or Indian ever fought as bravely as Custer and
his men,” said the veteran of the June 25–26, 1876, Battle of the
Little Bighorn to a reporter before an 1881 gathering of Indian
chiefs and rapt American officers at Fort Yates, Dakota Territory.
“If Reno and his warriors had fought as Custer and his warriors fought, the battle
might have been against us.”
The veteran in question was neither a soldier nor a Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer
partisan seeking to spare widow Libbie Custer’s feelings. He was Low Dog, an Oglala
Lakota war chief who five years earlier had fought Colonel Custer and his bluecoats
on that Montana Territory battlefield. Furthermore, Low Dog had played an important
role in the shocking (at least to the U.S. Army and the American people) defeat of the
controversial 7th U.S. Cavalry officer, though he never claimed to have personally
killed Custer and was certain no one knew who had.THE RESOLUTE OGLALA INSISTED THE
BRASH COLONEL HAD PUT UP ONE TOUGH FIGHT
ON THE LITTLE BIGHORN BY JOHN KOSTERLOW DOG GAVE
CUSTER HIGH MARKS
“
N
Low Dog was in his late 20s in 1876.
After the battle he was among the hold-
outs who withdrew north to Canada and
remained there with Hunkpapa leader
Sitting Bull until 1881, when hunger and
desperation forced their hand. That spring
Low Dog and his followers re-crossed the
border bound for Dakota Territory. Met
and escorted by 7th Cavalry troopers, they
surrendered on March 11 to Major David
H. Brotherton, the commander of Fort
Buford, at the confluence of the Missouri
and Yellowstone rivers. In late May the
Army transported them down the Missouri
by steamboat to Fort Yates, headquarters of
the Standing Rock Indian Agency. Weeks
later Sitting Bull and band followed suit,
surrendering at Fort Buford on July 19.
On July 30, days before Sitting Bull’s sched-
uled arrival at Fort Yates, Low Dog was
among other leading chiefs interviewed
by an enterprising reporter from Kansas’
Leavenworth Times. Through an interpreter,
and before more famous chiefs gave more
colorful accounts, Low Dog shared the bare
facts of the Little Bighorn fight.
“I was asleep in my lodge at the time
[of the soldiers’ attack],” he said at the out-
set of an interview augmented by sign lan-
guage. “The sun was about noon [pointing
with his finger]. I heard the alarm...[but] I
did not think it possible that any white men
would attack us, so strong as we were....
I lost no time in getting ready. When I
got my gun and came out of my lodge the
attack had begun at the part of the camp
where Sitting Bull and his Uncapappas [sic]
were.” Low Dog was referencing the initial
attack on the right flank of the Indian village
by three companies of the 7th Cavalry and
a contingent of Arikara and Crow scouts
under Major Marcus Reno. The Lakotas
held their ground, determined to give their
women and children time to get clear.
Low Dog gave a thorough account of the
subsequent two-day battle:By this time the herders were driving in
the horses, and as I was nearly at the far-
ther end of the camp, I ordered my men
to catch their horses and mount. But there
was much confusion. The women and
children were trying to catch their horses
and get out of the way, and my men were
hurrying to go and help those who were
fighting. When the fighters saw that theFive years after taking
part in the Battle of the
Little Bighorn, Low Dog
said Lt. Col. George
Custer and men “stood
their ground bravely.”