Why was General Custers army beaten so badly at the Battle of Little Big Horn?
He was greatly outnumber. Initially, Custer had 208 officers and men under his command, with an additional 142 under Reno and just over a hundred under Benteen. The Indians fielded over 1800 warriors. As the troopers were cut down, moreover, the Indians stripped the dead of their firearms and ammunition, with the result that the return fire from the cavalry steadily decreased, while the fire from the Indians steadily increased. With Custer and the survivors shooting the remaining horses to use them as breastworks and making a final stand on the knoll at the north end of the ridge, the Indians closed in for the final attack and killed all in Custer’s command. As a result, the Battle of the Little Bighorn has come to be popularly known as “Custer’s Last Stand”. When the cavalry’s main column did arrive three days later, they found most of the soldiers’ corpses stripped, scalped, and mutilated. Custer’s body had two bullet holes, one in the left temple and one just above the heart.
