More than half of members of the U.S 7th Cavalry survived the Battle of the Little Bighorn, but for some, the fight did not end when they left that battlefield in June, 1876. Instead of the modern diagnosis of PTSD, terms like nostalgia, melancholia, and congestion of the brain were used to indicate the lasting scars of mental trauma.
Here we will look at some of the officers whose lives were never the same after Custer’s Last Stand.
The companion videos on the enlisted men survivors of the 7th, as well as the Lakota and Cheyenne warrior survivors, are coming soon!
…
LINKS:
Did Civil War Soldiers Have PTSD? | Smithsonian (smithsonianmag.com)
Suicide, alcoholism, and psychiatric illness among union forces during the U.S. Civil War – ScienceDirect
History of PTSD in Veterans: Civil War
National Center for PTSD (va.gov)
A Historical Examination of Military Records of US Army Suicide, 1819 to 2017, Depressive Disorders, JAMA Network Open, JAMA Network
St.-Elizabeths-Hospital-A-History.pdf (dcpreservation.org)
(thelancet.com)
Drunk And Disorderly: The Origins And Consequences Of Alcoholism At Old Fort Hays (fhsu.edu)
Dying to Get Home: PTSD in the Civil War – Warfare History Network
Opiate Addiction in the Civil War’s Aftermath, Virginia Museum of History & Culture
Death by Nostalgia, 1688 | TS Digest | The Scientist
BOOKS & ARTICLES:
Haunted by History: Tragedy Followed the Bighorn Survivors. The Billings Gazette, Lorna Thackeray. June 21, 2009
Military Register of Custer’s Last Command, by Roger Williams
Participants at the Battle of the Little Bighorn, by Frederick Wagner
The Custer Casualties I & II, by Richard Hardorff
Camp Talk: The Very Private Letters of Frederick Benteen, by John M. Carroll
The Custer Myth, by Colonel W.A. Graham
Music credit (final slide) Undertow by Low Light, license held by ArtList and used with permission (like all the music used in this video).
…
If you too have a passion for the 7th Cavalry, please consider joining:
Little Bighorn Associates
www.thelbha.com
Custer Battlefield Historical & Museum Association
Custer Association of Great Britain
www.english-westerners-society.org.uk
**PLEASE DONT FORGET TO SUBSCRIBE, LIKE, & STAY TUNED FOR NEW EPISODES!**
I love hearing suggestions of what you’d like to see next!
For more about my current work-in-progress or my published books (The Confusion of Languages and You Know When the Men Are Gone, both with Putnam/Penguin), please see my author website:
www.siobhanfallon.com
Or follow me on Instagram and Facebook:
siobhanfallonwriter
THANK YOU!
