Jeff Barnes

By an enthusiast, but well-written. Custer is perhaps in a tie with Douglas MacArthur for the most controversial American “general” (in quotes there because Major General of Volunteers was a brevet rank; at his death Custer’s rank in the Regular Army was Lieutenant Colonel). Like MacArthur, Custer was adept at publicity, flamboyant, contemptuous of his enemies while grossly overrating his own ability (fatally, in Custer’s case), and hard on the men in his command while living in luxury himself (well, whatever luxury was available in the 1860s and 1870s). Unlike MacArthur, there’s no doubt about Custer’s personal bravery. And there’s no “MacArthur Association of Great Britain” like there is for Custer; I should get one of their T-shirts, which is kind of cool looking.


In this travel guidebook, author Jeff Barnes is only concerned with Custer’s activity after the Civil War, tracing his routes and billets from 1865 on. Barnes is not a Custer admirer, although fairly even-handed; he doesn’t gloss over Custer’s recurring disobedience to orders or his penchant for shooting or hanging deserters. The guidebook is chronological rather than organized by geographic area; since Custer’s areas of activity ranged from Louisiana to Montana you couldn’t do all the sites in a single tour unless you were willing to spend a lot of time on the road. The research seems exceptional; each chapter and the entire book have extensive bibliographies, often referencing fairly obscure Western military posts and sites. The flip side is that Custer was so busy trooping around the American West, there isn’t a lot of detail on each site mentioned.


I was amused to note that although Custer didn’t spend a lot of time in Colorado, when he was chaperoning Russian Grand Duke Alexei on a buffalo hunt in 1870 the party stayed at a hotel in Denver at the corner of 16th and Blake Street, across the street from the RTD Administration Building where I used to work. It’s now a bank, and the place where I got my mortgage refinanced. I had also assumed that Custer was buried at the Little Big Horn battle site; there’s a marker there showing where his body was found but it was removed and he’s buried at West Point.


Probably essential to the die-hard-with-your-boots-on Custer fan; for me I imagine it will be most useful for reference to the bibliography and for general history/geology/etc. trips in the West.… (mere)