I visited the battlefield in 1966 when I was 12. 90 yrs to the day. It was very hot .

Historian here! One of my favorite books of all times is Archaeology, History, and Custer's Last Battle (1993) by Richard Fox! It covers first use of metal detecting over the whole site of Little Big Horn. Had a fantastic result including establishing entire pattern of battle and finding of remains!

Always good to listen to Bob Reece! Looking forward to seeing Bob at Little Big Horn for the 151st!

A gruesome task. It was hot, the corpses were in terrible states of decomposition which was even worse due to the mutilations. I read that the Gettysburg dead were buried hastily, shallowly and temporarily so the battlefield would be presentable when Lincoln arrived to deliver his address. The description of “ (it) was like walking on mattresses” due to the bloating. I said the burials were temporary. I recoil at the thought of disinterring the bodies and the trauma that was surely part of the burial details collective psyches. And the bodies were riffled by curious ghouls. Did you know that when Lynyrd Skynyrd crashed in the swamp that there were dozens and dozens of souvenir seekers on site way before the first responders arrived? What a world.

Another great discussion involving LBH. Good work fellas!!!

Outstanding job Bob!

Nice! These podcasts are great!

Liked the video

MY GREAT GRANDFATHER HELPED BURY 20 SOME BODIES IN DEEP RAVENE. I WAS SHOWN IN THE MID-SIXTIES WHERE THEY WERE. 2 OF THE SOLDIERS WERE GOOD FRIENDS OF MY GREAT GRANDFATHERS AND ATLEAST 1 OFFICER IS BURIED THERE ALSO. IM SURE THE OFFICERS NAME IS IN ONE OF THE LETTERS I HAVE. MOST COULDNT BE IDENTIFIED UNLESS THEY HAD PART OF THEIR UNIFORM ON. HE SAID MOST OF THEIR HEADS HAD BEEN SMASHED WITH LARGE BOLDERS AND ARMS AND LEGS HAD BEEN CUT OFF AND THREW IN ALL DIRECTIONS. THE STENCH WAS HORRIBLE HE SAID AND MOVING THEM FOR BURIAL LEFT BIG TRAILS OF MAGGOTS AND FLIES. BEFORE I DIE I WOULD LIKE TO SHOW WHERE THEY ARE.

They were down in that ravine because they were running away in panic and shooting wildly into the air as the Indians cut them down from both sides of the ridges above..as per the Indian story tellers..

They didn’t collect the remains until a year later.

all just jabber jawing and no one is going to be able to do anything else because of the passage of time since the ''BATTLE AT THE LITTLE BIG HORN'', over a 150 years ago in that hot Montana sun. after the battle ended, the women, children & the men & women elders came over to the battle field to make sure that all the troopers were dead. then the warriors along with the people I just mentions went over the battle field to carry out their traditional ways of making sure that all their dead enemy soldiers would not enter the spirit world to fight with them again, so they all set upon of mutilating, cutting up & chopping up all the bodies of the troopers into pieces,, and that was the reason that the warriors did all that mutilation of their enemies bodies, it was not savagery as  the whites called it, it was the Indians believe to do all that mutilation to their enemies... back to the battle field and the dead troopers. as I have said before, the troopers were then looked over to make sure that they were dead, & those that were wounded but alive were killed right there where they lay, that must've been the reason that CUSTER had 2 bullet wounds, one on his chest & the other on his temple, that shot to his temple cause the controversity weather CUSTER had indeed committed suicide or that that was a shot to his head to make sure that he was dead. after all that was done to make certain that all the troopers & CUSTER were dead, all the Indian warriors left the battle field and the immense encampment was then taken down & moved from where it had stood during their annual SUMMER CONFERENCE CELEBRATION'' of which CUSTER surprise attack had interrupted by attacking that huge encampment and the big fight with the soldiers had it's fateful beginning. after that fierce battle was fought and the plains Indians were victorious, the bodies & the partial remains of all the troopers and the remains of the dead horses lay in the hot Montana sun for at least 3 days & nights, on the first night, the odor of spilled blood attracted the local wild life like the wolfs, coyotes, & all the other kinds of wild life in that area where all the dead lay. then all that wild life sountered onto the field and started to devour the many body parts & bodies alike,,, including the dead horses, some animals carried away many of the body parts all over a wide area of that entire area, and also took some body parts to their dens to feed their young. so many animals converged on that battle field to eat all those body parts, bodies and the horses bodies also, so for 3 days & nights, so many animals ate their fill of all the dead bodies on that battlefield ! so after approximately 3 days after the battle & that all those bodies & body parts has laied out in the hot sun, the remainder of CUSTERS command arrived at the battlefield, which by this time had a horrendous stench from all the rotting bodies of the dead troopers & the dead horses ! so now the remaining troops of CUSTERS former command had the unenvied task of burying the dead,,, men & horses. gowever
the enormous stench of the rotting bodies of the troopers and the horses made the burial almost impossible to bury the dead. so the men assigned to dig the graves did the best to bury the dead as possible, so they dug very shallow graves & put some remains in that grave including what were thought of as CUSTERS remains & put a temporary marker with a name on it, because the remains were so distorted by the mutilation done by the warriors and also what the animals did to them as they ripped those bodies apart to eat them, the burying was very hurrydly done in order to finish the burials due to the tremendous foul stench from all the rotting bodies, it got so bad that the burial details were ''unceremoniously putting the horses remains along with troopers remains in the same grave'' !!!, when the burials were over,  the graves were left there untouched for a whole year. after an entire year of all those bodies & body parts lying in the hard Montana ground, for over a year, it was then decided that it was time to give all those troopers a decent burial with proper grave markers. when the people assigned to dig up the remains arrived, they all had a very difficult time digging up the corpses and identifying them correctly, so they set about digging, identifying & reburying those remains and putting names on markers, but how could they possibly been able to identify all those troopers by name & where they fell ?the remains of those troopers and horses had been scattered all over that wide area for at least 3 days and the so many remains had been taken away and off the battlefield to GOD knows where ? when the troopers bodies were first again reburied the burial detail had put some remains in a box and had marked with CUSTERS name on it, but they suddenly saw a tattoo with a corporals name on the arm, so then the burial detail grabbed some other remains and put them in the box marked CUSTER with the comment from the officer in charge that ''no one is going to find out for sure whose remains this are'' anyway. so the burial detail went on burying remains at different spots & putting markers with the names of the trooper that they knew had been in CUSTERS command and all because of the names on the rouster that was put out with the names of the troopers that had ridden out on that expedition with CUSTER, so after an entire year of being buried in the ground thru heavy rains, animals digging up and then scattering so many of the remains of troopers & horses all over a very wide area of the battlefield, how could it be possible to pin point who fell where, there were only bones & so many artifacts that had belonged to the troopers, most of the remains could not possible be identified correctly ! so all the markers with names on them are all wrong, because not one of the troopers could be correctly identified. and also there were accounts by warriors where many of the troopers just dropped their weapons and ran away just to be ridden down & killed and also the 28 bodies that were killed in that revine  & never buried. the ARMY did not do a thorough job of giving those troopers a decent burial, they just hurriedly buried the troopers & the horses as quickly as they could and forgot about them for a whole year, and brutal & disrespectful manner that so many troopers remains were unceremomiously buried in the same grave with the many remains of their horses, this is not to belittle how important &
how faithful the horses were to the troopers , but all this was impossible to give the troopers & CUSTER a military funeral with full military honors, due to the condition of all the troopers bodies,, including ''CUSTERS'' something else, in 1942 a crew of construction workers were digging for a pipe installation when they struck something odd in their path, upon checking ,they found bones in that area. they told their supervisor who then called a team of experts who dug all around that area & found a lot more bones of humans & horses ! they did dig more & did find so many more bones that appeared to be horses bones and finally secured the area with orders from the government to clear the area of any bones found there. it was probobly part of the area where many of the troopers & horses had also been buried 'AND' FORGOTTEN. what a way to fight & die in battle, be killed, buried in a desolate place ''AND BE FORGOTTEN''------>  I, AS A FORMER UNITED STATES MARINE, HAVE THE DEEPEST RESPECT FOR ANY SOLDIER FROM ANY COUNTRY THAT FIGHTS FOR WHAT HE BELIEVES IN AND DIES IN COMBAT BELIEVING IN HIS CAUSE-------  ''CROW MEDICINE WOLF'' --- U.S. MARINES

Can't u get to the point😮

THAT IS NOT THE MOST IMPORTANT QUESTION - THE MOST IMPORTANT QUESTION IS; "WHO BURIED THE SURVIVORS???!!!!