George Armstrong Custer: Difference between revisions

Custer was fastidious in his grooming. Early in their marriage, Libbie wrote, "He brushes his teeth after every meal. I always laugh at him for it, also for washing his hands so frequently."<ref>Marguerite Merington, ''The Custer Story: The Life and Intimate Letters of General George A. Custer and His Wife Elizabeth''. Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press, 1987. p. 109.</ref> He was 5'11" tall and wore a size 38 jacket and size 9C boots.<ref>Thomas O'Neill, Passing Into Legend: the Death of Custer. (Brooklyn, NY: Arrow and Trooper, 1991), pp. 14–15.</ref> At various times he weighed between 143 pounds (at the end of the 1869 Kansas campaign)<ref>Lawrence A. Frost, General Custer's Libbie. (Seattle: Superior Publishing Co., 1976), p. 187</ref> and a muscular 170 pounds. A splendid horseman, "Custer mounted was an inspiration."<ref>Custer's Indian Battles. (Bronxville, NY: Unknown, 1936), p. 29.</ref> He was quite fit, able to jump to a standing position from lying flat on his back. He was a "power sleeper", able to get by on short naps after falling asleep immediately on lying down.<ref>Custer's Indian Battles. (Bronxville, NY: Unknown, 1936), pp. 12, 34.</ref> He "had a habit of throwing himself prone on the grass for a few minutes' rest and resembled a human island, entirely surrounded by crowding, panting dogs."<ref>Katherine Gibson Fougera, With Custer's Cavalry. (Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press: 1986), p. 110.</ref>

The common media image of Custer's appearance at the Last Stand—buckskin coat and long, curly blonde hair—is wrong. Although he and several other officers wore buckskin coats on the expedition, they took them off and packed them away because it was so hot. According to Soldier, an Arikara scout, "Custer took off his buckskin coat and tied it behind his saddle."<ref>Kenneth Hammer, ''Custer in '76: Walter Camp's Notes on the Custer Fight''. (Norman, Oklahoma: University of Oklahoma Press, 1990), p. 188.</ref> Further, Custer—whose hair was thinning—joined a similarly balding Lieutenant Varnum and "had the clippers run over their heads" before leaving Fort Lincoln.<ref>T. M. Coughlin, ''Varnum: The Last of Custer's Lieutenants''. Bryan, TX: J. M. Carroll, 1980. p. 35.</ref>