Custer

The Controversial Life of
George Armstrong Custer

By Jeffry D. Wert
Simon & Schuster, $27.50

ISBN 0684810433


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Review by Roger Bishop

In 1865, almost everyone agreed that George Armstrong Custer was, in the words of a former Union soldier, "the best Cavalry officer in the Army." He was brave, a superb battlefield tactician, relentless in battle. "He never asked his men to go where he would not lead them," according to a fellow veteran, and perhaps that was the major reason for his success. He was energized by the quest for honor and glory. As General Philip Sheridan noted, "If there was any poetry or romance in war, he would develop it." The youngest brigadier general in U.S. history, Custer was a complex man -- ambitious, flamboyant, reckless, but also admired, a genuine Civil War hero.

Custer is remembered today primarily for the Battle of Little Big Horn in July 1876, when his heavily outnumbered Indian fighters took a "last stand" against the Sioux. Who was this mythic figure who in both life and death aroused fierce loyalty and praise as well as controversy and condemnation? Why was the was hero unable or unwilling to adjust to military service of a different kind in a period when the nation was changing in many ways?

Historian Jeffry D. Wert uses recent scholarship and archival research to give us a fresh examination of Custer's life in his insightful Custer: The Controversial Life of George Armstrong Custer, the first full-scale study in over 30 years. Wert, author of highly praised biographies of Civil War figures James Longstreet and James Mosby, covers the full range of his subject's life. We learn of his close ties to his family and his courtship of and marriage to Elizabeth (Libbie) Bacon. Their love story is a dominant theme. Wert's handling of Custer's Civil War leadership is outstanding. We learn exactly what Custer did to earn the praise of his troops. The author relates instances of Custer's kindnesses to captured Confederate officers who had been his classmates at West Point. This behavior contrasts with his insensitivity to his own men in the postwar period. We see the failures and frustrations of government policy in the postwar period that led to his death.

One of the most revealing documents Wert refers to is a letter Custer wrote to a cousin during the war. "You ask me if I will not be glad when the last battle is fought . . . so far as my country is concerned I, of course, must wish for peace, and will be glad when the war is ended, but if I answer for myself alone, I must say that I shall regret to see the war end . . . I would be willing, yes glad, to see a battle every day during my life . . . " And as his wife Libbie wrote, "I believe that if ever God sends men into the world for a special purpose Armstrong was born to be a soldier." Yet Custer was last in his class at West Point and had more demerits than any of his classmates. But he told his wife that he loved West Point better than any other place on earth and wished to be buried there.

This carefully researched, readable biography helps us to understand General Custer within the context of his era. It deserves a wide readership.

Roger Bishop is Contributing Editor to this publication.

©1996, ProMotion, inc.

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