Nathaniel Philbrick, is a leading authority on the history of Nantucket Island. His In the Heart of the Sea won the National Book Award. His latest book is Sea of Glory, about the epic U.S. Exploring Expedition of 1838–1842. His other books include Away off Shore: Nantucket Island and Its People, 1602-1890 (which Russell Baker called "indispensable") and Abram's Eyes: The Native American Legend of Nantucket Island ("a classic of historical truthtelling," according to Stuart Frank, director of the Kendall Whaling Museum). He has written an introduction to a new edition of Joseph Hart's Miriam Coffin, or The Whale Fisherman, a Nantucket novel (first published in 1834) that Melville relied upon for information about the ... |
The Last Stand
Custer, Sitting Bull, and the Battle of the Little Bighorn
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The bestselling author of Mayflower sheds new light on one of the iconic stories of the American West
Little Bighorn and Custer are names synonymous in the American imagination with unmatched bravery and spectacular defeat. Mythologized as Custer's Last Stand, the June 1876 battle has been equated with other famous last stands, from the Spartans' defeat at Thermopylae to Davy Crockett at the Alamo.
In his tightly structured narrative, Nathaniel Philbrick brilliantly sketches the two larger-than-life antagonists: Sitting Bull, whose charisma and political savvy earned him the position of leader of the Plains Indians, and George Armstrong Custer, one of the Union's greatest cavalry officers and a man with a reputation for fearless and often reckless courage. Philbrick reminds readers that the Battle of the Little Bighorn was also, even in victory, the last stand for the Sioux and Cheyenne Indian nations. Increasingly outraged by the government's Indian policies, the Plains tribes allied themselves and held their ground in southern Montana. Within a few years of Little Bighorn, however, all the major tribal leaders would be confined to Indian reservations.
Throughout, Philbrick beautifully evokes the history and geography of the Great Plains with his characteristic grace and sense of drama. The Last Stand is a mesmerizing account of the archetypal story of the American West, one that continues to haunt our collective imagination.
List of Maps
PREFACE
Custer’s Smile
CHAPTER 1
At the Flood
CHAPTER 2
The Dream
CHAPTER 3
Hard Ass
CHAPTER 4
The Dance
CHAPTER 5
The Scout
CHAPTER 6
The Blue Pencil Line
CHAPTER 7
The Approach
CHAPTER 8
The Crow’s Nest
CHAPTER 9
Into the Valley
CHAPTER 10
Reno’s Charge
CHAPTER 11
To the Hill
CHAPTER 12
Still Point
CHAPTER 13
The Forsaken
CHAPTER 14
Grazing Horses
CHAPTER 15
The Last Stand
CHAPTER 16
The River of Nightmares
EPILOGUE
Libbie’s House
APPENDIX A
The Seventeenth Cavalry on the Afternoon of June 25, 1876
APPENDIX B
Sitting Bull’s Village on June 25, 1876
Acknowledgments
Notes
Bibliography
Illustration Credits
Index
"Vivid and remarkably fresh...Philbrick has recast the Pilgrims for our age of searching and turmoil."
—The New York Times Book Review
"A signal achievement. Philbrick enlightens and even astounds."
—Salon.com
Praise for Sea of Glory, winner of the Theodore and Franklin D. Roosevelt Naval History Prize
"Brilliantly told...has to be among the best nonfiction books of this or any other year."
—Los Angeles Time Book Review
"A breathtaking account of one of history's greatest adventures."
—Entertainment Weekly
