Day 6: Gillette, WY to Bozeman, MT
At the risk of drawing in contemporary politics, i visited the Little Big Horn National Memorial. This is the site of the battle of Little Big Horn between the US 7th Cavalry, partially led by the infamous LTC George Custer and a unified group of Native American Tribes.
I will leave it to you to learn or relearn the history of the battle itself and will only comment here on the ground itself and the feeling that it left with me.
It would seem easy to imagine that the ground of Little Big Horn is every bit as alien to the men, from Europe or the east coast of the US, of the 7th Cavalry as the ground of Vietnam or Iraq were to the recent and current US military. Or perhaps as alien as the armies of Japan in Manchuria or of Germany in central Russia. The trip would have been long. 5 days for me. But on horseback? A month? Two? A year? Easily.
For the plains Indians it would have been home. In fact, their tribes were encamped, families and all, on the north side of the Little Big Horn River. They had rejected reservation life and were content on living their nomadic lifestyle, at whatever cost. (Nomadic is not the right word for me, actually, I need to think about that).
In any case, you can learn the history.
At this site there is a US national cemetary which of course has the remains of the US soldiers killed there, but also US servicemen from the Indian Wars all the way through to Vietnam. The cemetary was closed to new burials in 1978.
On these plains, on this hilltop, even with the freeway close by, there is an eery quietness. The multitude of grasses and plants bend in the brisk winds. You can smell the grasses like spice. The view miles around bely the closeness of the mortal combat of the past.
There are tombstones that mark the locations of the death of US servicemen. Although many, later, they were buried under a single headstone.
And recently, rightfully, the resting places of fallen Indian warriors are noted. Few it should be noted, perhaps due to the circumstantial folly of Custer and the resolution of the Indian tribes.
But this was a place for me to imagine, the best i could, about the battle that unfolded. Its difficult.
There are several memorials, of course, to the fallen US servicemen and to the Native Americans that fought and died there. I feel that the place itself indicates the intractable struggle between the two sides. Its a place for picnic, not a memorial.
The US memorials are worn and weathered. The memorials to the Native Americans are newer, fresh. Newer in fact really. Its sad it took so long.
I am torn. The inevitability of the American Colonization of western North America is as inevitable as its alternative colonization from Russia or China or from inside.
I am torn. And not for the reasons that some of you may think. (I will have to think about that).
