Indian Memorial Proves Slow in Coming to Little Bighorn Battlefield

LITTLE BIGHORN BATTLEFIELD NATIONAL MONUMENT, Mont.--Clifford Long Sioux comes to this spot on the rolling prairie of eastern Montana each year. It is how he honors his ancestor Buffalo Hump, and the other Cheyenne warriors who died defending their way of life against Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer and the 7th Cavalry.

But there is no memorial here to Long Sioux’s people, only a monument to Custer and his men, a granite monolith atop a flowing, grassy rise.

“A memorial should have been up many, many years ago to honor the ones we lost,” says Long Sioux, a Northern Cheyenne tribal member.

Nearly 125 years after the battle memorialized as “Custer’s Last Stand,” there is little at the battlefield to acknowledge the American Indians who fought.

For the Sioux, Cheyenne and Arapahoe, the battle was their last major victory in a long and eventually unsuccessful fight to save their land from seizure by whites. Even the Crow, allies of Custer, and Arikara, who had scouts who died fighting on Custer’s side, believe recognition is lacking.

When Congress ordered Custer’s name removed from the battlefield in 1991, it also authorized an Indian memorial. But lawmakers never provided any money. Without federal aid, construction on the $2.5-million project is unlikely to begin until at least 2005.

“It’s a slap in the face to those of us who are descendants . . . and Native America as a whole, because it appears we may not be regarded equally to other citizens of the United States, still, in 2001,” said Linda Pease, whose great-grandfather was a Crow scout for Custer.

The proposed memorial includes bronze outlines of three warriors, representing the victorious Sioux, Cheyenne and Arapahoe. It features a sunken circle and a “spirit gate,” meant to welcome the cavalry dead and act as a counterpoint to the soldiers’ monument, about 100 yards to the south.

But even the proposed memorial has proved controversial.

Some Indians complain that the monument, designed by whites, doesn’t fully tell their stories. Many so-called “Custer buffs” believe it’s poor taste to locate the Indian memorial so close to the cavalry monument.

Indians say they want their children to have a fuller understanding of what happened June 25-26, 1876, on the rolling plains southeast of Billings, and to be proud. It’s not about political correctness, they say, but fairness, honesty and equality.

Custer, seemingly underestimating the size of the Indian force, ordered the attack on the Indians camped in the river valley. Custer and more than 260 of his men were wiped out.

“I remember going [to the battlefield] as a kid, and the heroic . . . Custer was glorified,” Pease said. “I remember going away thinking, ‘That doesn’t seem right, but maybe we’re not as good as other people.’

“It formed a real negative perception of myself as a Native American,” she added. “And it does that generation after generation, as well as giving credence to white supremacy.”

The battlefield’s superintendent, Neil Mangum, is working hard to get the Indian memorial built. Faced with paltry private donations, he nearly doubled the site’s entrance fee in February--from $6 to $10 a car--to meet the 2005 construction goal.

“It’s a fact that we do not present a balanced perspective to the public. There is more than one story to tell here,” Mangum acknowledged.

Visitors to the battlefield’s museum and interpretive center do get a more balanced history of the battle. But anyone visiting just the battlefield gets a skewed view.

“They put up a memorial for Custer, and they say that we’re a part of the same United States and a part of this society,” said Bob Kelly, a Crow tribal member. “Why don’t they recognize the valiant effort of the Indians?”

In 1988, members of the American Indian Movement put an iron plaque at the base of Custer’s granite obelisk. The plaque read, in part: “In honor of our Indian patriots who fought and defeated the U.S. Cavalry in order to save our women and children from mass-murder.”

It was eventually removed.

In 1999, two granite markers were erected to indicate where two Cheyenne warriors were wounded and died. But Indians say that is not enough.

Chauncey Whitwright III, a Sioux from Wolf Point, Mont., quit work on a memorial advisory committee over what he perceived as government foot-dragging. He threatened last year to tear down the Custer monument if the Indian memorial wasn’t built by the 125th anniversary of the battle, this June 25. He has since recanted the threat but remains angry.

“It is time for this country to grow up, buck up and acknowledge its sins,” Whitwright said.

Former Rep. Pat Williams (D-Mont.), who co-sponsored the bill that included the battlefield name change, said a memorial is in the national interest and the government should pay for it.

An estimated $40,000 to $50,000 has been raised from tribes and through donations at the battlefield, Mangum said. The National Park Foundation, the fund-raising arm of the park service, has received small donations, but “we’re not close to the $2.5 million,” said Jen Larson, director of public relations.

Indian leaders and Mangum want Congress to contribute, even as disagreement over the memorial itself continues.

Pease, the Crow representative on the committee that chose the design, objected to it initially because the Arikara and Crow were omitted.

She gave in when the Park Service assured her that parts of the memorial could be redesigned or that the scouts’ stories could be “included heavily” in the interpretive portion.

To others, the memorial is not only about honoring their fallen heroes but about taking some shine off Custer, who is still considered a hero by some battlefield visitors.

“It was always ‘those savages that killed Custer,’ ” said John Pretty on Top, a former cultural director for the Crow tribe. “Custer came to annihilate the Indians, and the Indians were fighting for freedom.”

William Wells, who publishes a battlefield newsletter and is president of a Custer historical group, said he supports an Indian memorial.

But he believes the desire to “belittle” Custer, rather than honor the Indian dead, was a motivating factor in building one and changing the battlefield name.

He also believes there are better places for a memorial to the Indians, including in the river valley where the Indian village was located.

Legislation, however, says the Indian memorial is to be built near the cavalry monument.

“It’s quite a site, and its stark loneliness is the thing that impresses almost everyone,” Wells said of the existing obelisk. “And I think that almost any other monument or structure or anything else in that area takes away from that.”

Custer remains a big part of the local economy. Posters and cards bearing Custer’s likeness are sold alongside Indian jewelry at gift shops carrying the names of Custer or the battlefield.

Recently a man walked into Maureen Secrest’s gift shop down the hill from the battlefield, seeking a bumper sticker he’d seen that read, “Custer had it coming.”

Her shop doesn’t carry it. The closest she had read: “Custer died for your sins.”

“Custer does get a bad rap,” said Secrest, who takes no sides on the Indian memorial issue. “The soldiers were just out there doing the job they set out to do.”

Long Sioux, who said his great-great-grandfather Buffalo Hump died in the battle, said his ancestors gave their lives for a more noble cause that should be recognized.

“All I’m doing is trying to help recognize the fallen warriors and what they stood for, to do the honorable thing for them, honor them and recognize them for giving ultimate sacrifice,” he said.

*

Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument: https://www.nps.gov/libi/index.htm

*

Indian memorial design: https://www.nps.gov/libi/design.htm