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Webmaster's Note:
Historian and Friends member, Paul Hedren, talks with us about his new book
"Great Sioux War Orders of Battle", his process with research and writing of
history, and fascinating future projects. We wish to thank Mr. Hedren for also
providing his list of burial sites for the survivors of the Battle of Little
Bighorn,
"Where Are They Now".
May 2011
Bob Reece: Your
book, “Great Sioux War Orders of Battle” is a masterpiece in analysis of the
frontier army at its most challenging times. This could not have been an easy
book to research and write. What led you to your decision to tackle this subject
and write the book as you did?
Paul Hedren: Your praise is deeply appreciated. I think there were
actually several motives that drove this project. The whole thing started simply
enough with the drawing up of one, and then a dozen, and ultimately twenty-eight
orders of battle for this war. I had long been interested in such matter and
particularly had wanted a definitive directory of the officers, regiments, and
companies engaged, from first shot to last, and how they organized themselves,
episode by episode (or deployment by deployment as I came to label them). I was
curious, too, about the differences in the organizations and wondered whether
there were similarities or consequences more than the painfully obvious. It
occurred to me early on that I was assembling information that had mostly never
been seen and assessed before and that, in turn, opened an opportunity to
discuss and analyze the army more wholly. Your readers know well of my life-long
interest in the history and culture of the Old Army and Great Sioux War and I
saw a chance to address and correct some of the common perceptions and
misperceptions held about this army. Readers contend with my assessments and
conclusions in the essays that open and close the book, which I think are quite
well grounded. I truly believe that this was a sound army in 1876, not flawless
by any means, but much more competent and capable than some writers have
contended, especially lately.
B.R. That is a rich subject that requires an abundance of research. Your
due diligence is a great example of the correct way to examine a subject: 185
monthly regimental returns, primary reports, and diaries for example. How long
did it take you to research the book and how long to write it?
P.H. This project was a good challenge. As I explained in the
Introduction, this was a book sourced largely in the army’s myriad of monthly
returns. Most but not all of these documents are microfilmed and I pestered many
friends and institutions who I knew possessed some of the films and did what I
could by loan. Ancestry.com now has some of these primary sources on-line, too,
and that site was of great importance. Ultimately, I still needed to spend time
in the National Archives in Washington particularly examining infantry returns
on film, and department returns in their original paper format. The department
returns have never been microfilmed and are rarely used by researchers. I
consumed six or eight months researching the book, and another six or eight
months writing it. I had a marketable manuscript ready about two years ago and
then it was another year and a half in press.
B.R. Thank goodness for the internet and sites like Ancestry.com to help
save some travel. Our readers, who have aspirations to become historians, would
be interested in the processes you follow when writing such a book. How do you
even begin to tackle such a project?
P.H. With a topic or subject in mind I’ll spend weeks combing my own
library and research files pulling matter relevant to the project. I am
reasonably diligent in maintaining order in the working papers and files
gathered from previous projects and in fact have a calendar of papers for it
all. As most of your readers know, my research and writing interests are
relatively narrowly focused and papers and sources gathered for old projects
have proven themselves useful again and again. Once I have a fair sense of what
I have at hand, I’ll start working to augment those sources. Omaha has several
fine college libraries that I use frequently, and the University of Nebraska’s
Love Library with its several million volumes and the state historical society
library are merely blocks apart in Lincoln, fifty miles away. I also long ago
came to appreciate the remarkable library and archival collections at Fort
Laramie National Historic Site and invariably my projects draw from there, too;
this one did. And usually my projects require time in the National Archives
chasing source matter unavailable from any other repository.
As I gather sources I am continually making notes on what I’ve collected and how
I see it fitting into my story. Sometimes these working notes serve as the
outline I’ll use when writing. And all along I keep a list of sources that I
have somehow learned of but have not yet seen and through the course of the
project will work that list over, too, until I have examined it all. Gathering
and assessing sources is a never ending challenge. I hate the embarrassment of
learning of something that I ought to have seen and perhaps used, and I do know
that embarrassment.
B.R. Because of that extensive investigation, you make a strong case for
why this frontier army was ready and able to win the war. Why do you think that
has not been the mode of thinking in the past?
P.H. Quite honestly, I believe Custer, Reno, and the Battle of the Little
Bighorn have much to do with this pattern of thinking, especially in light of
the century and a quarter of introspection as writers have attempted to explain
the army’s greatest defeat in the West. Rightly or wrongly, dimensions like
leadership qualities, training, the adequacy of weapons, and strategy and
tactics become perfect foils in this continuous churn, and there always seems to
be enough superficial evidence in each aspect to build some manner of a case for
or against an individual, element, or institution. These qualities and the
larger story line, in turn, have lent themselves perfectly to commercial
treatments, whether movies like the ever popular “Little Big Man,” the next
History Channel exposé, or cycles of best selling books. It seems that to impugn
the Seventh Cavalry is to impugn the cavalry and ultimately impugn the Old Army.
Of course, reality is always much more complex and nuanced and therein lies the
joy of careful study and well sourced facts, and what emerges is sometimes
wonderfully revealing.
B.R. Well said. In your research, did you come across any documentation
that explained how much training the frontier soldier had in marksmanship? How
often did he get to fire his weapons in target practice?
P.H. Doug McChristian explored this issue thoroughly in his monograph,
Army of Marksman, which I regard as definitive on the subject. I found no
documentation that expands on this matter. The record is quite clear that the
soldiers of the 1870s were not the relatively skilled marksmen they became in
the 1880s, and especially in the 1890s. Certainly the loss at the Little Bighorn
had much to do with influencing what became an obsession with army marksmanship.
But this is not to suggest that the soldiers of the 1870s were entirely
unfamiliar with their weapons and the simple skill of aiming and shooting, or
that Sioux and Cheyenne warriors were any more skilled or unskilled with their
weapons. But for Little Bighorn, the war’s relatively modest casualty counts
suggest placing less importance on weapons and casualties and more on changing
numerical superiorities, leadership skills, basic tactical elements, and
perseverance to explain battles, campaigns, and the war’s outcome.
B.R. Mr. McChristian might gasp if he saw the current Amazon price of
$571.00 for a used copy of his
Army of Marksmen .
In all your work reviewing the official documents, why didn't you include in
your book the total number of soldiers, officers, and civilians within each
deployment?
P.H. I did consider attempting to compute the total number of individuals
involved in the deployments but found it an almost overwhelming challenge. Of
the troops alone, it would have taken a minute inspection of muster rolls for
every company in every reporting period, and that was an additional record group
I didn't particularly want to tangle with. Regimental returns carried summaries
but without the precise "who was actually present for duty" detail I would have
wanted. I figured that to do justice to such an enumeration, I would also have
had to examine the quartermaster rolls for civilian employees and that itself is
quite a challenge and where nothing is microfilmed and accessing such documents
at the National Archives is rather convoluted. There were civilians present in
virtually every deployment, from a handful to dozens to hundreds. In all, this
is a worthy challenge for another day, and without a doubt it should be
undertaken.
B.R. That is a book in itself and explains why it hasn’t been done
before. Your “Orders of Battle” is superb and filled with detailed analysis
about the 1876 war. For the researcher, its appendices really shine. There, we
find tables including each officer listing their background experiences, all the
medical officers and contract surgeons in the war, officers killed or wounded,
and a glossary of military terms. Appendix E is a beauty that lists the battles
and skirmishes of the war and the casualties from each separated for officers,
enlisted men, civilians, and Indians. Is there anything you wished to include in
this book that you couldn’t, either due to resources or time or theme? If none
of those were an issue, what would you have done differently?
P.H. Determining the precise numbers of individuals associated with each
deployment (your question above) might have made a meritorious addition, but I
chose not to devote time to it. I wanted a fold-out map with the book and the
Arthur Clark Company favored me with what I think is the finest map of the Great
Sioux War yet produced. Moreover, I think the Arthur Clark Company produces
inordinately handsome books of which this is merely their latest. I think you
see that I am quite satisfied.
B.R. You’re correct; the fold-out map is superb and adds value to the
book. No doubt, Arthur Clark publishing makes wonderful books. Your book is
ideal for Clark to be the publisher. Can you share with us any projects you have
planned that we can look forward to?
P.H. This fall the University of Oklahoma Press will published my next
book,
After Custer: Loss and Transformation in Sioux Country ,
which is a careful examination of the northern plains in the decade or two
following the Great Sioux War. I tell of the generals coming west in 1877, the
manner which the army was redeployed after the fighting ended, the advance of
the Northern Pacific Railroad to its completion in 1883, the killing of the
northern plains buffalo herd, the Beef Bonanza, and the fate of the
protagonists. It’s a powerful story and sometimes not very pretty but in the end
I think quite uplifting. This summer I’ll submit my latest manuscript, “Ho! For
the Black Hills: Captain Jack Crawford Reports the Black Hills Gold Rush and
Great Sioux War,” to the South Dakota State Historical Society Press. The book,
scheduled for release in mid-2012, presents the some forty letters Captain Jack
wrote to the Omaha Daily Bee chronicling the rush in 1875 and ‘76 and his
participation with Crook in 1876. I’ve added introductions, an essay on Jack’s
famous ride from Slim Buttes, and an afterword. Crawford is an almost unknown
original voice on the gold rush and battle at Slim Buttes. And this fall I will
commence in earnest a new account of the Reynolds fight at the Powder River and
the three courts-martial that followed in consequence. I’ve been collecting
Reynolds sources for years, have much that is new, and am eager to get into it.
B.R. That is an impressive line-up of material which I look forward to.
Regarding the Reynolds fight, I cannot think of anything published that focused
on the courts-martials that followed that fight. Thank you for talking with us
today and good luck on all of these future projects.
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