The Mystery of E Troop: Custer's Gray Horse Company at the Little Bighorn [Paperback]

Gregory Michno (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 368 pages
• Publisher: Mountain Press Publishing Company; Later Printing edition (February 3, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0878423044
• ISBN-13: 978-0878423040
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #326,625 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

72 of 76 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Only book to focus on Company E at the LBH, May 14, 1999

By 

J. R. Bidwell - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Mystery of E Troop: Custer's Gray Horse Company at the Little Bighorn (Paperback)

Michno is one of the best writers on the battle of the Little Bighorn, and every student of that battle should read his books. But as I said in my review of "Lakota Noon," he mixes good ideas with bad ideas. I only give this book three stars because its main thesis - that the 28 soldiers thought to have been killed in Deep Ravine were really killed in Cemetery Ravine - is self-evidently wrong. What he does is he recapitulates all the accounts that have bearing on the problem, then decides whether they say CR or DR was the ravine in question. As you can imagine, he decides mostly in favor of Cemetery Ravine. Among the latter he incredibly places Sgt. Knipe as one of the guys who support Cemetery Ravine for the scene of the slaughter, even though Knipe was the man who walked with Walter Camp, pointed to Deep Ravine, and said that is the place where all the men were. Other men said the same. Michno often engages in sophistry, as in his analysis of Flying By's account. Flying By said that at the end of the battle soldiers broke from Custer Hill but only 4 made it to the "gully toward river," obviously Deep Ravine - ergo, the other 40 soldiers (which Flying By doesn't mention) must have died "along the banks of Cemetery Ravine"! What he doesn't say is that there were two exoduses (supported by Indian accounts) toward and into Deep Ravine. One of mostly Company E men (said to be about 40), before Custer Hill had fallen, and another, smaller group (said to be about 15), by Custer Hill survivors after that hill had fallen. Other Indians say that the second group was trying to join the first group in the ravine. Michno conflates the two exoduses to force Flying By's DR account into a support for CR. What then did happen to the 28 men in Deep Ravine, who definitely do not appear to be there any longer? I suggest that they were carried out by the burial details. Some will say that the burial details say that they did not move any of the bodies, but the burial details on the Reno battlefield also said the same, even though archaeological work has proven that Sgt. O'Hara, and possibly Pvts. Drinan and Meyer, who were killed in the valley fight and bluff, were later moved and buried on Reno Hill. The survivors' accounts make no mention of these battlefield transfers. I suggest that the same thing happened in Deep Ravine, and I think there would be a good reason for taking the trouble. In William O. Taylor's memoir he recalls an officer riding among the bodies on Calhoun Hill looking for the body of Lt. Sturgis, the son of the 7th's colonel. He was even feeling the hands of the corpses to see if they were soft and possibly the colonel's son. The desperation in this action is obvious. So I think that after it was realized that most of Sturgis's company was in Deep Ravine, all the bodies were carried out onto the ridge for closer inspection to try to identify Sturgis. It was a failure, but I think it would explain how markers #7-28 are in a rough line. #7-19 may have been laid out from the lower reaches of DR, while 20-28 from the upper.

47 of 49 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars For the non-expert this can be a little overwhelming, September 19, 1999

By 

LaLoren - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Mystery of E Troop: Custer's Gray Horse Company at the Little Bighorn (Paperback)

This book is well researched and well written. However, if you have just a passing interest in the Battle of the Little Bighorn, or have just begun your reading on the subject, this is not for you. In an effort to solve the mystery of 28 troopers who apparently died in Deep Ravine, but whose bodies are said to have never been found, Michno provides innumerable eye-witness accounts both white and Indian. In the beginning I tried to follow all of them, especially since I had just been to the battlefield, but I soon found it far too cumbersome. Mr. Michno has put alot of work into this, and he deserves recognition for it, however I would recommend this book only for people who already have a very detailed knowlege of the subject. END

16 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An important contribution to study of the Little Big Horn, February 3, 1997

By A Customer

This review is from: The Mystery of E Troop: Custer's Gray Horse Company at the Little Bighorn (Paperback)

Michno has performed a meticulous analysis of all available evidence about the fate of one company of the Seventh Cavalry during the Battle of the Little Bighorn. Many students of this famous Indian fight have contended that these soldiers had been killed in the bottom of a narrow ravine on the Custer battlefield, their remains now either buried by erosion or washed away. Michno presents a convincing case that this view is erroneous due to mis- interpretation of the evidence and makes a persuasive arguement that these graves are in fact well-marked on another part of the battlefield. Michno has made an important contribution to the tactical understanding of this most famous of the Indian Wars battles.