COMANCHE

The Battle Of The Little Bighorn was fought in June 1876 in Montana terrritory, between the U.S. 7th. cavalry regiment (700 men) led (rashly) by lieutenant colonel George Armstrong Custer, and a mixed force of native American warriors (Sioux, Cheyenne, Arapaho) inspired by Sitting Bull and led into battle most notably by Crazy Horse (both of these great chiefs were later murdered whilst in the custody of the U.S. government). Despite popular assumptions, the regiment, by dint no doubt of superior firepower, was not completely wiped out. That fate did befall Custer’s detachment, who died along with his two brothers and other relations. Total deaths on the white Americans’ side was 268 dead; the number of ‘indians’ killed is still a subject of conjecture – certainly many thousands had gathered at that time in desperation, and in defiance of a government order that they must all return to their reservations or be removed by force, or face the consequences (which was total war as we might euphemistically describe it today). Of the ill-fated detachment however, there was one survivor, found two days after the battle where he had hobbled into a ravine to die, of numerous wounds including seven bullet wounds: this subsequently feted survivor was named Comanche, a veteran of previous battles in which he was also wounded. Comanche had been the mount of the seventh’s Captain Keogh; only 15 hands high he was called Comanche after being wounded with an arrow in his hindquarters in a campaign against that tribe. As the only survivor of Custer’s detachment it was ordered that he be nursed back to health and thereafter he was honoured as a true military hero: he never worked again and was never ridden, but appeared in parades “saddled, bridled and draped in mourning.” He died of colic aged 29 in 1891. American country singer Johnny Horton recorded a song about Comanche in 1960…

But what’s all this got to do with Black Hearts And Blue Devils and England in 1888? I hear you ask. Well, they had newspapers in England, and Custer’s Last Stand was big news, as was the follow up about old Comanche. And in Black Hearts And Blue Devils there is a little pony named after the heroic survivor of 1876. He lives at the Hailstone pub and plays a role in our story. Not too far-fetched. Sitting Bull himself toured both the U.S. and Europe with Buffalo Bill in his Wild West show (another character, one Stephen Vyle, was saving to see one of those shows). This connection suggested itself to me because my wife recalls how her grandmother as a child was told by an old relative that she remembered the battle happening, reading about it in the papers. So there you have it.

Attached is an image of Comanche (now stuffed) taken at the University Of Kansas Natural History Museum by Gorian Empathy.

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