Customer Reviews

Custer's Chief of Scouts: The Reminiscences of Charles A. Varnum

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Varnum's firsthand accounts are at once interesting and revealing. He tells his tale twice. First, he tells it as Reminiscences. Then we read much of it again as his Testimony at the Reno Court of Inquiry. In either telling, we see much that is now accepted by recent writers. I also sensed there was a great deal he was holding back that lend credence to the Carter allegations of the officers banding together for the honor of the regiment and in deference to Mrs. Custer. In testimony, he was often evasive.

For me the most revealing statement was toward the end, when Varnum states that Reno sent a messenger to Gen Terry on the 26th. On the morning after the Custer battle Reno is asking for help from Terry!

If Reno believed Custer was still alive, then wouldn't he have sent the request to Custer, his commanding officer, who they claimed to believe, must have to join up with Terry? This may have been the first crack in the cover up shell. Panzeri, LBH 1876, states that Edgerly admitted years later that they could see the bodies of Custer's men from Weir's Point.

Most informative book I have read about a soldier's life on the plains during the Indian wars.