Little Bighorn

           I’ll say two other things. If the 7th had had decent carbines, thay might have sickened the Sioux and been able to hole up on the hill, as Reno did. And that was Custer’s fault, too. He should have tested those pieces before he went near the Powder Country—tested ’em until they were red-hot, and he’d have seen them jam. T’other thing—Reno deserved the clean bill he got from the court-martial. I didn’t know him, much, but Napoleon himself couldn’t have done any better. If Custer had done half as well, there’d be a few old troopers still telling stretchers about how they survived the struggle up Greasy Grass hill.

Flashman and the Redskins, p.332, Pan Books edition, 1983.

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