Oh do come along Stilly (post 10 Apr 06 - 05:07 PM ) , make your mind up.

25th to 26th June - middle of the summer

The vast stores required to support such a vast number was located in their Winter camps - Was there a cold snap or something that June that drove all those Indians into their winter camps?

Easy for 20,000 to come together - take a look at the territory, think what it was like, try to imagine it 130 years ago - easy!! - bullshit.

Ask Melani what credance is put on the figure of 20,000 (Source Benteen). The source that Melani directs me to, the Author of "Lakota Noon", Greg Michno arrived at 3,000 all together, about 1,000 of whom would be warriors - Not that too far away from Wikipedia's estimate of between 950 and 1,200 warriors in fact.

One thing is for certain when it comes to over simplification, you certainly demonstrate that you do not have the foggiest notion what it would take to supply 20,000 people on the move. Under the circumstances the Lakota, Northern Cheyenne and Arapaho found themselves in, in the summer of 1876, it would have been hard enough with a fraction of that number. Your trouble would appear to be applying present day conceptions to yesteryears problems without acknowledging the limitations and constraints that would apply.

If you wish to believe that there were 20,000 Indians camped on the Little Big Horn then that is up to you. Logic and commonsense go against it and the only person who came up with that figure was Benteen - who, to the American public at the time was the man who let Custer down, the man who let Custer die. Now under those sort of circumstances he's not going to make light of the numbers of Indians opposing him - is he?