Matrix Games Forums

Garry Owen ! ya little horsey puke !

Was looking about and found the song on a guitar, with some good pics about just how to play it. Damn, gonna have to learn you how to play the Field Artillery Song.

http://custer.over-blog.com/article-10855872.html
Ciao, Bro. John

Are you telling us not to divide the KB when the enemy is nearby?

ORIGINAL: ChickenOfTheSea
Are you telling us not to divide the KB when the enemy is nearby?

Hello ChickenOfTheSea,

I so love it when someone gets it and turns it back. Sweet, Bro, really sweet.

So kinda on topic; Yeah, economy of force says ya don't disperse your assets in a concentric attack without perfect communication (and dare I say it, perfect intelligence).

And totally OT; Ya really think Reno and/or Benteen would'a done much more than add to the body count?

ORIGINAL: JWE

ORIGINAL: ChickenOfTheSea
Are you telling us not to divide the KB when the enemy is nearby?

Hello ChickenOfTheSea,

I so love it when someone gets it and turns it back. Sweet, Bro, really sweet.

So kinda on topic; Yeah, economy of force says ya don't disperse your assets in a concentric attack without perfect communication (and dare I say it, perfect intelligence).

And totally OT; Ya really think Reno and/or Benteen would'a done much more than add to the body count?

You might like the The Reno Court of Inquiry by W. A. Graham and published by Stackpole books. Some hairy testimony.

Walking the battlefield is good too. One massive WTF-were-they-thinking moment after another and skeery as heck even compared to the big uglies like Antietam and Gettysburg.

Walking the battlefield is prime. Can't understand squat unless you see and walk the ground.

Saw a program a long time ago (on the disingenuious History Channel) where some people walked the battlefield and collected cartridges from various locations. They could determine (from the cartridge markings), who stood where, and where they moved to. You can actually (superposing a topo of the battlefield) construct the constriction of the perimeter to its final circumference. Was seriously impressed.

Little Big Horn was determinable just because of these little things, and because so few (relatively) people were involved. Even though Gorgeous George was a Colonel, he acted like a Captain (and so too Reno and Benteen), so if you do a Staff Walk at LBH, it's a tactical Troop action, and if you dial in Reno & Benteen, it's a tactical Squadron action, where Georgie (the Sqdn Cmmdr) had his head up his a.. and his subordinates could care less.

All this is fun, but has no real bearing on operational or strategic issues. LBH was tactical, there may have been some operational constraints in the orders, but the battle was tactical, pure and simple. Let's look at Antietam. The troops, on both sides, were kept "in hand", and were used as "units". Command and control was the primary factor, and understanding the minds of the opposing Generals was key. This wasn't a bunch of troopers tactically hitting on 1,000 Sioux, this was a collection of regiments, brigades, and divisions performing their part in a chess game.

The really hard part to either developing a game or developing a scenario, is keeping all this crap in mind.

ORIGINAL: JWE

Walking the battlefield is prime. Can't understand squat unless you see and walk the ground.

Saw a program a long time ago (on the disingenuious History Channel) where some people walked the battlefield and collected cartridges from various locations. They could determine (from the cartridge markings), who stood where, and where they moved to. You can actually (superposing a topo of the battlefield) construct the constriction of the perimeter to its final circumference. Was seriously impressed.

Little Big Horn was determinable just because of these little things, and because so few (relatively) people were involved. Even though Gorgeous George was a Colonel, he acted like a Captain (and so too Reno and Benteen), so if you do a Staff Walk at LBH, it's a tactical Troop action, and if you dial in Reno & Benteen, it's a tactical Squadron action, where Georgie (the Sqdn Cmmdr) had his head up his a.. and his subordinates could care less.

All this is fun, but has no real bearing on operational or strategic issues. LBH was tactical, there may have been some operational constraints in the orders, but the battle was tactical, pure and simple. Let's look at Antietam. The troops, on both sides, were kept "in hand", and were used as "units". Command and control was the primary factor, and understanding the minds of the opposing Generals was key. This wasn't a bunch of troopers tactically hitting on 1,000 Sioux, this was a collection of regiments, brigades, and divisions performing their part in a chess game.

The really hard part to either developing a game or developing a scenario, is keeping all this crap in mind.

Well, mainly I was thinking about the big empty plains versus the "friendly confines" east of the 100th meridian. It's been a while since I read Forty Miles a Day or Frontier Regulars, but if I remember correctly, Custer and his gang must have been pretty darned surprised to see that many hostile Indians acting that way given the way the Indian wars west of the Mississippi had generally worked out. By the time of Antietam what was coming must have been well known to the individual troops, even if they hadn't yet seen the elephant. And the opponents might have had a higher opinion of each other's ability than the 7th had for the Sioux.

So I picked up my copy of Frontier Regulars, and Utley has this to say about Gen. Crook: "No Militarily sound explanation has been given for his division of command before the battle of March 17. THe additional force would surely have enabled him to hold the gain that Reynolds lost and, with the supply train present, to have remained on the scene. Likewise, his withdrawal to his train after the battle of June 17 left the Indians free to meet Custer without distraction. [ellipses] Privately, General Sherman believed Crook guilty of mismanagement on both occasions."

So, not only were Custer, Reno and Benteen dividing, Crook was dividing his force, and the whole operation was divided from the get-go between Crook, Terry, and Gibbon.

[>:]

Anyway.....

Since you mentioned games [;)] . . . maybe someday Age of Rifles will get an update. Matrix could use a 19th century game for grognards.

Jeez. Ya know this is the really cool part about doing this stuff. It's where folks like you make it thought provoking.

Ok, so Custer, Reno, and Benteen were blindly glory seeking, slovenly clueless, or actively vengeful (respectively). And Crook, Terry and Gibbon couldn't put a full deck of cards together between all of them. Hadn't heard they were the sharpest tools in the box back in the Big Time; expected a teensy bit better from Terry though, but what the hooka.

ORIGINAL: JWE

Jeez. Ya know this is the really cool part about doing this stuff. It's where folks like you make it thought provoking.

Ok, so Custer, Reno, and Benteen were blindly glory seeking, slovenly clueless, or actively vengeful (respectively). And Crook, Terry and Gibbon couldn't put a full deck of cards together between all of them. Hadn't heard they were the sharpest tools in the box back in the Big Time; expected a teensy bit better from Terry though, but what the hooka.

Or maybe they were applying what my Dad called the "school solution." A little rhyme he learned at Quantico in the summer of 1941 doing whatever the Corp called a field trip to nearby battlefields in those days.

Here lie the bones of Lt. Jones
A graduate of this institution
In the midst of the din
He died with a grin
He had followed the school solution

If you ain't CAV, you ain't $h!^

Robert E Lee said the G A Custer was the worst officer he ever fought against and also the luckiest!  Think he used it up all those times in the War Between The States.
 

ORIGINAL: Zemke_4

If you ain't CAV, you ain't $h!^

So, if you are Cav, you are Sh1t?

(USN)

ORIGINAL: Don Bowen
So, if you are Cav, you are Sh1t?

Pretty much, yeah. Why, what's your point?

. . . the cavalry tradition is to be dashing, and quick to act. Quick of thought? Not so much. George Armstrong Custer is our patron saint.
[8D]

ORIGINAL: Blackhorse

ORIGINAL: Don Bowen
So, if you are Cav, you are Sh1t?

Pretty much, yeah. Why, what's your point?

. . . the cavalry tradition is to be dashing, and quick to act. Quick of thought? Not so much. George Armstrong Custer is our patron saint.
[8D]

No actual negative feeling about the Cavalry - just a fascination with double negatives...

Hi John!

Read the posts up til 4/3. One should NEVER post after a glass or two but here goes anyway...(to my shame I'm sure)

Wow, if listening to Gary Owen doesn't stir your blood at an emotional and primordial level...I doubt your American ancestry!
It rings in my ears of so many motion pictures I grew up with...and pride of America's Irish Soldiers and general sense of purpose and destiny in the early Republic...it's just plain emotional.

As for the fateful day of Custer's Last Stand...well a lot has been written about it - hasn't there been?
Some proclaiming everlasting glory for the 7th Cavalry, some condemning Custer, some in between. I got interested in US Frontier History many decades ago, and went to the library in Fullerton CA to check out and read every book they had on the Winning of the West - in which LBH was always prominent.

The opinion of Custer that I came to was that he was certainly too ill-informed that day, and basing his plan of operation on past experience - he certainly had no idea of the actual strength of Sioux Indian forces facing him at the time.

I guess he will remain an enigma for generations to come, some people are devoted haters of George Custer because he lacked what counts most in modern society - humility, while others will damn him for lack of modern command qualities that we take for granted today - staff work and military intelligence/reconnaissance. But Custer learned through practical experience that decisive action counted for more than anything else (perhaps the wrong lesson).

But the one lesson in life that I HAVE learned is that it is impossible to really judge a man - unless you are in his shoes...and I mean - you must be capable of living in his time and place and experience to come to a meaningful judgment of a mans actions.

Given the above criteria, I still don't know what to think of Custer that day...although with hindsight - we all know he goofed - but he knows that better than any of us do.

I end by saying - No matter what - the Music still stirs the soul!

B