Customer Reviews

Blood Song (Plainsmen)

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This book number 8 in the Plainsmen series tells of the BATTLE OF THE POWDER RIVER AND THE BEGINNING OF THE GREAT SIOUX WAR OF 1876. In this book as in all of the other Plainsmen stories Frontier Scout Seamus Donegan leads as a guide General George Crook and his 2nd. and 3rd. Cavalry and a band of scouts and interpreters into the bloody battle. All of Johnstones books are very wordy and can sometimes lose me as I can not always understand what he is trying to tell me. But that does not mean he is not a good writer, it just means I should maybe use the dictionary more often.

The hostilities between the Indians and the U.S. military begins here with the March 17 battle on the Powder River. The wheels for conflict between the red men and the army were set in motion on January 31, the government-imposed deadline for all Indians to report to their reservations or be declared hostile and thus subject to reprisals by the War Departement. Colonel Joseph J. Reynolds committed a series of major blunders during the fight by burning the village and allowing the Indians to recapture most of their ponies that the soldiers ran off when the fighting started. General George Crook was so enraged by Reynolds' incompetence in the field that he preferred charges against him immediately after the column returned to Fort Fetterman. This battle set the tone for the Sioux War of 1876 that the War Department had every confidence of winning but as events were to show, the Sioux and Cheyennes were more than worthy adversaries on the battlefield.

Good reading for history buffs. Well researched and put into to a storyline that saddles you up and takes you back to 1876 to the war against the Sioux and northern Cheyenne. Giddyup!

book was in good shape. very fast delivery. always happy with purchases with amazon. thank you