This lavishly illustrated volume reassesses and celebrates the life
and legacy of the West's most legendary figure, George Armstrong Custer,
from "one of America's great storytellers" (The Wall Street
Journal).
On June 25, 1876, General George Armstrong Custer and his 7th Cavalry
attacked a large Lakota Cheyenne village on the Little Bighorn River in
Montana Territory. He lost not only the battle but his life--and the
lives of his entire cavalry. "Custer's Last Stand" was a spectacular
defeat that shocked the country and grew quickly into a legend that has
reverberated in our national consciousness to this day.
In this lavishly illustrated volume, Larry McMurtry, the greatest
chronicler of the American West, tackles for the first time the "Boy
General" and his rightful place in history. Custer is an expansive,
agile, and clear-eyed reassessment of the iconic general's life and
legacy--how the legend was born, the ways in which it evolved, what it
has meant--told against the broad sweep of the American narrative. It is
a magisterial portrait of a complicated, misunderstood man that not only
irrevocably changes our long-standing conversation about Custer, but
once again redefines our understanding of the American West.
