Among the soldiers killed: Tom Custer, the first person to receive two Medals of Honor (in his case, for Civil War actions).

The main fight, Cheyenne leader Two Moon opined, lasted about long enough for a hungry man to eat a meal. Other Lakota, Cheyenne, and Arapaho (five of them) veterans compared it to the time it took to smoke a pipe.

Among other problems: Custer's failure to fully take into account the report of his Crow and Arikara scouts that the village in that valley was the biggest they'd ever seen. Cooking fires obscured it that morning, eyes were bleary from the forced march, but that pony herd grazing along the hillsides - "like worms," they reported, perhaps 50,000 animals.

News of the battle reached Philadelphia on July 6, somewhat dampening self-congratulatory national centennial celebrations.