In this lavishly illustrated volume, Larry McMurtry,
the greatest chronicler of the American West, tackles
for the first time one of the paramount figures of
Western and American history. On June 25, 1876, General
George Armstrong Custer and his 7th Cavalry attacked a
large Lakota Cheyenne village on the Little Bighorn
River in Montana Territory. He lost not only the battle
but his life--and the lives of his entire cavalry.
"Custer's Last Stand" was a spectacular defeat that
shocked the country and grew quickly into a legend that
has reverberated in our national consciousness to this
day. Pulitzer Prize winner Larry McMurtry has long been
fascinated by the "Boy General" and his rightful place
in history. In "Custer, "he delivers an expansive,
agile, and clear-eyed reassessment of the iconic
general's life and legacy--how the legend was born, the
ways in which it evolved, what it has meant--told
against the broad sweep of the American narrative. We
see Custer in all his contradictions and complexity as
the perpetually restless man with a difficult marriage,
a hunger for glory, and an unwavering confidence in his
abilities. McMurtry explores how the numerous
controversies that grew out of the Little Bighorn
combined with a perfect storm of technological
developments--the railroad, the camera, and the
telegraph--to fan the flames of his legend. He shows how
Custer's wife, Libbie, worked for decades after his
death to portray Major Marcus Reno as the cause of the
disaster of the Little Bighorn, and how Buffalo Bill
Cody, who ended his Wild West Show with a valiant
reenactment of Custer's Last Stand, played a pivotal
role in spreading Custer's notoriety. While "Custer "is
first and foremost an enthralling story filled with
larger-than-life characters--Ulysses S. Grant, William
Tecumseh Sherman, William J. Fetterman, Sitting Bull,
Crazy Horse, Red Cloud--McMurtry also argues that Little
Bighorn should be seen as a monumental event in our
nation's history. Like all great battles, its true
meaning can be found in its impact on our politics and
policy, and the epic defeat clearly signaled the end of
the Indian Wars--and brought to a close the great
narrative of western expansion. In "Custer, "Larry
McMurtry delivers a magisterial portrait of a
complicated, misunderstood man that not only irrevocably
changes our long-standing conversation about Custer, but
once again redefines our understanding of the American
West. |
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