Crazy horse and custer
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Another bestselling and fantastic book from bestselling historian Stephen E. Ambrose, a dual biography of two great nineteenth century warriors, General Custer and Crazy Horse, and the Battle of Little Bighorn. On June 25, 1876, 611 men of the United States 7th Cavalry rode towards the banks of the Little Bighorn where three thousand Indians stood waiting for battle. The lives of two great war leaders would soon become forever linked: Crazy Horse, leader of the Sioux, and General George Armstrong Custer. This masterly dual biography tells the epic story of the lives of these two men: both were fighters of legendary daring, both became honoured leaders in their societies when still astonishingly young, and both died when close to the supreme political heights. Yet they - like the nations they represented - were as different as day and night. Custer had won his spurs in the American Civil War; his watchword was 'To promotion - or death!' and his restless ambition characterized a white nation in search of expansion and progress. Crazy Horse fought for a nomadic way of life fast yielding before the buffalo-hunters and the incursions of the white man. The Great Plains of North America provided the stage - and the prize. A great read by a great author!
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Excellent book
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The same as a few other readers of this book, I bought this primarly for the reason that it had been written by Ambrose.
Before I read the book I thought that it could get bogged down in the politics of the day and would probably become very difficult to read. However my first inpressions were totally wrong! Once I turned the first page I couldn't put it down and had read it in a couple of days. Not only is this book very easy to get through, it is also very detailed and informative. Two things that some authors find very difficult to achieve but as always Ambrose manages to pull it off.
This should definitely be the number one stop for readers who are interested in this subject but have never been able to find an in-road. I hope that you enjoy it as much as I did.
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Pleasantly Surprised
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Like the previous reviewer I picked this book in my local bookshop, looking for something different and somehow expecting to tire of it pretty soon.I was engrossed almost immediately and found the style of writing though factual, very interesting.
As I followed the parallel lives of Custer and Crazy Horse I experienced awe, anger and sadness as our European ancestors enforced their `civilised' ways upon the `savages'.
At this time the same actions were being forced upon Africa, the relevance being I recently read `The scramble for Africa' by Thomas Pakenham and would recommend you read this to compare the two.
The diaries of Custer and his wife's novels give this book a feeling of authenticity and destroy many myths.
I felt quite saddened as the tale came to an end but realised the native american way of life could not have survived till today in it's simplicity.
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An elegy for a lost way of life.
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Ambrose is a born story-teller, and the events of these two men’s lives provides excellent raw material. The notes at the book’s rear suggest a thoroughly academic approach – but Ambrose is at his best when speculating on the inner world of the twin “warriors” (as he calls them). The descriptions are powerful and evocative, the style that of a novel. His account is even-handed throughout, neither seeking to defend Custer nor sentimentalising native Americans. Custer himself comes across surprisingly sympathetically: though clearly vain and foolish in Ambrose’s estimation, the man described here is far more interesting, contradictory and generally appealing than I’d expected from revisionist films and books. Ambrose’s admiration is reserved for Crazy Horse, however, who is presented as a dignified and committed freedom fighter. In a way, the book is as much about the collision of a European mind-set with a traditional Native American way of life as it is about the fighting between these two specific leaders at the Battle of the Little Big Horn. Ambrose makes it clear that the Sioux Nation was eventually defeated by railways and venture capitalism, not the 7th Cavalry – and he reminds us that much of what we think of as “American” can be related back to military acts which uncomfortably resemble twentieth-century genocides and ethnic cleansings. As he states, anyone who lives on the Western coast of the US, or who has travelled across the continent by train, is directly benefiting from the actions of men like Custer. This edition is a reprint from the 1970s; thus, we have “red men” and “indians” rather than more politically correct terms. However, a reader would have to be prudish in the extreme to be put off by such terms when the book provides such a powerful and compelling elegy for a culture perfectly in step with its natural surroundings. A culture which was destroyed to make way for modern America
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Pretty Damn Good
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Like many people, I read to much and after a while I found myself with very few books that even interest me in the slightest. I picked up this book purely because Stephen Ambrose had written it, have loved Band Of Brothers. I was instantly hooked and read it completly in 3 days. Ambrose paints Custer and Crazy Horse in thier own unique lights showing where they came from (thier society) and thier ambitions vividly in such a way you feel you can understand where they come from (as much as you can). He also builds up to battle in such a way that suddenly everything else in yourlife ecomes secondary and all you are interested in is HOW IS THIS GONNA END!!!! Without giving anything away, this is a great book which made me laugh, angry and depressed (The ending made me depressed, which made the book feel even better). Recommended to anyone that likes to read. Two Thumbs up, 5 stars and a golden rosette.
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