Well, yeah, Custer had a simplified notion of how to fight a battle...arrive early (when they're still mostly asleep), take 'em totally by surprise, freak 'em out by having the band play "Garry Owen", and launch the irresistible charge!!!!! Hurrah!!!!

Only problem was...at LBH he arrived around midday, he did NOT succeed in taking them totally by surprise (although they were certainly surprised when Reno made his initial attack at the far end of the village, but they just got really mad about that), the marching band did not come along that time, and the irrestible charge never got across the river. ;-) Let's see...what else could have gone wrong? Oh yeah, and he was very badly outnumbered, and the Indians were very confident too, having whipped Crook's larger column at the Rosebud only a few days earlier. Hmmm. And then there was Crazy Horse, an even more capable practitioner of the irresistible charge technique...

Well, it was a bad day for Custer and an equally bad day for Walks Holding Tiny Balls, lemme tell ya.

Perhaps one day WAV will tour Montana and the Dakotas and write us some poetry about his observations of the Custer battlefield and other such historic locations in that area. If we're lucky, that is.