Item:
ON10284

Original U.S. 7th Cavalry Regiment Indian Wars Chasseur Pattern Kepi - George Armstrong Custer Command

Item Description

Original Item: Only One Available. This wonderful totally genuine United States Army Staff Officer kepi used during the Indian Wars. This U.S. Army Model 1875 Chasseur Pattern Kepi features fabric of dark blue wool broadcloth. The crown stands 2.5" high at the front, 3.5" at the rear seam and the top is 5" in diameter. The body of the cap meets a band of wool seamed only at the back and stiffened with leather. The cap's interior is lined with black cotton. The leather sweatband is absent

The flat visor is original to the hat and composed of black patent leather. It is not edged in leather which indicates that this is an earlier production kepi, most likely from the 1870s - 1880s. The kepi has a brass crossed swords insignia pin with 7, a leather chinstrap and what appear to be genuine brass eagle buttons. Overall condition is very good, size is approximately a US 7.

The 7th Cavalry Regiment is the same regiment that was under the command of Brevet Major General (Lieutenant Colonel) George Armstrong Custer
and this kepi dates from approximately the same time as the Battle of Little Big Horn.


The 7th Cavalry Regiment was constituted in the Regular Army on 28 July 1866 at Fort Riley, Kansas and organized on 21 September 1866. Andrew J. Smith, a Veteran of the Mexican–American War, who had been a distinguished cavalry leader in the Army of the Tennessee during the Civil War, promoted to colonel, took command of the new regiment. Smith, however, commanded for only five months before Brevet Major General (Lieutenant Colonel) George Armstrong Custer assumed command on 26 February 1867. Custer graduated from the United States Military Academy in 1861 as the "class goat," served with the 2nd Cavalry Regiment, and later commanded the Michigan Brigade (Wolverines) from 1863–1865.

On November 26, 1868, Custer's Osage scouts located the trail of an Indian war party. Custer's troops followed this trail all day without a break until nightfall, when they rested briefly until there was sufficient moonlight to continue. They followed the trail to Chief Black Kettle's village, where Custer divided his force into four parts, moving each into position so that at first daylight they could simultaneously converge on the village.

The Osage, enemies to the Cheyenne, were at war with most of the Plains tribes. The Osage scouts led Custer toward the village, hearing sounds and smelling smoke from the camp long before the soldiers. The Osage did not participate in the initial attack, fearing that the soldiers would mistake them for Cheyenne and shoot them. Instead, they waited behind the color-bearer of the 7th Cavalry on the north side of the river until the village was taken. The Osage rode into the village, where they took scalps and helped the soldiers round up fleeing Cheyenne women and children.

Black Kettle and his wife, Medicine Woman, were shot in the back and killed while fleeing on a pony. Following the capture of Black Kettle's village, Custer was in a precarious position. As the fighting began to subside, he saw large groups of mounted Indians gathering on nearby hilltops and learned that Black Kettle's village was only one of many Indian encampments along the river, where thousands of Indians had gathered. Fearing an attack, he ordered some of his men to take defensive positions while the others seized the Indians' property and horses. They destroyed what they did not want or could not carry, including about 675 ponies and horses. They spared 200 horses to carry prisoners.

Near nightfall, fearing the outlying Indians would find and attack his supply train, Custer began marching his forces toward the other encampments. The surrounding Indians retreated, at which point Custer turned around and returned to his supply train. This engagement would soon be known as the Battle of Washita River.

Yellowstone Expedition

From 20 June – 23 September 1873, Custer led ten companies of the 7th Cavalry in the Yellowstone Expedition of 1873, during which, they fought several engagements with the Lakota Sioux Indians. The first of which was the Battle of Honsinger Bluff, on 4 August 1873. Near present-day Miles City, Montana, the 7th Cavalry's horses were grazing when a raiding party led by Chief Rain-in-the-Face approached upon them. Custer ordered the men to saddle up and began pursuit of the band alongside LT Calhoun and his aide, LT William W. Cooke. The Indians retreated into a wooded area, where a hidden force of 100–300 rode out to counterattack. Custer and his men retreated, covered by C Company (led by CPT Thomas Custer, George's younger brother), and dismounted his troops, forming a semicircular perimeter along a former channel of the Yellowstone in a wooded area. The bank of the dry channel served as a natural parapet. The Indian forces laid siege to the cavalry troops, but with little effect. About an hour into the battle, a force of nearly 50 warriors attempted to flank the cavalry's perimeter by traveling down along the river. They were hidden by the high bank, however a scout accompanying them was spotted and drew fire. The group, thinking they had been discovered, retreated.

The flanking tactic having failed, the Indians set fire to the grass hoping to use the smoke as a screen to approach the cavalry perimeter. However, 7th Cavalry Troopers likewise used the smoke as a screen to move closer to the Indian forces and the tactic did not favor either side. The remaining 7th Cavalry elements, under 2LT Charles Braden, charged the Indian positions. Simultaneously, Custer ordered his men to break out of the woods and charge, effectively scattering the Indians and forcing them to withdraw.

A few days later, on the morning of August 11, 1873, the 7th Cavalry was encamped along the north side of the Yellowstone River near present-day Custer, Montana. In the early morning hours the Battle of Pease Bottom began when warriors from the village of Sitting Bull started firing at Custer's camp from across the river. By dawn skirmishing had broken out in several locations. After shooting at least 3 warriors across the river, Private John Tuttle of Company E, 7th Cavalry was killed in the morning fighting, warriors then crossed the Yellowstone River above and below the camp of the 7th Cavalry and attacked Custer's troops. The 7th Cavalry successfully defended their rear, front and center from this attack, then counter-attacked with a charge, breaking the warrior positions and driving the warriors eight or more miles from the battlefield. At about the same time, Colonel Stanley's column appeared in the distance several miles away and hurried to support the engagement. During the battle Second Lieutenant Charles Braden of the 7th Cavalry was critically wounded, along with three other Privates of the same regiment. Braden's thigh was shattered by an Indian bullet and he remained on permanent sick leave until his retirement from the Army in 1878. He would posthumously be awarded the Distinguished Service Cross in 1925 for his actions during the battle.

The Black Hills and Yellowstone

Over the next several years, the 7th Cavalry Regiment was involved in several important missions in the American West; one of which was the Black Hills Expedition in 1874. The Troopers escorted prospectors into the Black Hills of South Dakota (considered sacred by many Indians, including the Sioux) to protect them as they searched for gold. In 1875, several 7th Cavalry Troops escorted a railroad survey team into the Yellowstone River Valley. This expedition brought them into constant contact with Native raiding parties.
The Battle of the Little Bighorn
General Philip H. Sheridan intervened, however, and had Custer returned to his command in early 1876 in order to join the upcoming campaign against the Dakota Sioux. Custer's 7th Cavalry Regiment would be under the command of General Alfred H. Terry, and departed Fort Abraham Lincoln on 17 May 1876. The plan for the 1876 Sioux Expedition involved three marching columns under the commands of Major General George Crook, Colonel Custer, and Major General John Gibbon. Crook's column was stopped by the Indians at the Battle of the Rosebud, leaving two columns remaining. The 7th marched on 22 June with 700 troopers and Native Scouts, and made contact with the Indians the next day, causing him to turn west towards the Little Bighorn River. On 24 June, Custer's Arikara and Osage scouts identified a party of Sioux shadowing their movements, but they fled when approached. That night, Custer gave his attack plans for the 25th of June 1876, precipitating the Battle of the Little Bighorn.

The precise details of Custer's fight are largely conjectural since none of the men who went forward with Custer's battalion (the five companies under his immediate command) survived the battle. Later accounts from surviving Indians are useful, but sometimes conflicting and unclear.

While the gunfire heard on the bluffs by Reno and Benteen's men was probably from Custer's fight, the soldiers on Reno Hill were unaware of what had happened to Custer until General Terry's arrival on June 27. They were reportedly stunned by the news. When the army examined the Custer battle site, soldiers could not determine fully what had transpired. Custer's force of roughly 210 men had been engaged by the Lakota and Northern Cheyenne about 3.5 miles (5.6 km) to the north of Reno and Benteen's defensive position. Evidence of organized resistance included an apparent skirmish line on Calhoun Hill and apparent breastworks made of dead horses on Custer Hill. The soldiers identified the 7th Cavalry's dead as best as possible and hastily buried them where they fell.

Custer was found with shots to the left chest and left temple. Either wound would have been fatal, though he appeared to have bled from only the chest wound, meaning his head wound may have been delivered postmortem. Some Lakota oral histories assert that Custer committed suicide to avoid capture and subsequent torture, though this is usually discounted since the wounds were inconsistent with his known right-handedness. (Other native accounts note several soldiers committing suicide near the end of the battle.)

Several days after the battle, Curley, Custer's Crow scout who had left Custer near Medicine Tail Coulee (a drainage which led to the river), recounted the battle, reporting that Custer had attacked the village after attempting to cross the river. He was driven back, retreating toward the hill where his body was found. As the scenario seemed compatible with Custer's aggressive style of warfare and with evidence found on the ground, it became the basis of many popular accounts of the battle.

According to Pretty Shield, the wife of Goes-Ahead (another Crow scout for the 7th Cavalry), Custer was killed while crossing the river: "... and he died there, died in the water of the Little Bighorn, with Two-bodies, and the blue soldier carrying his flag".:380

Cheyenne oral tradition credits Buffalo Calf Road Woman with striking the blow that knocked Custer off his horse before he died.

By the end of the day on 26 June 1876, the 7th Cavalry Regiment has been effectively destroyed as a fighting unit. Although MAJ Reno's and CPT Benteen's commands managed to make good their escape, 268 Cavalrymen and Indian scouts lay dead. Among the fallen was Custer's younger brother, Thomas Custer, in command of C Company. Other 7th Cavalry officers who were killed or wounded in action include;

    Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer, Regimental Commander
    1st Lt. William W. Cooke, Adjutant
    Assistant Surgeon George Edwin Lord
    Acting Assistant Surgeon James Madison DeWolf
    2nd Lt. Charles Varnum, Chief of Scouts (detached from A Company, wounded)
    2nd Lt. Benjamin Hodgson, Adjutant to Major Reno
    Capt. Thomas Custer, C Company Commander
    2nd Lt. Henry Moore Harrington, C Company
    1st Lt. Algernon Smith, E Company Commander
    2nd Lt. James G. Sturgis, E Company[37]
    Capt. George Yates, F Company Commander
    2nd Lt. William Reily, F Company
    1st Lt. Donald McIntosh, G Company Commander
    Capt. Myles Keogh I Company Commander
    1st Lt. James Porter, I Company
    1st Lt. James Calhoun, L Company Commander
    2nd Lt. John J. Crittenden, L Company

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