Being A Celebrity Doesn't Make You Any Better A Re-enactor

The expectation at the time was that the natives would torture any captives since the bodies of previous captives were usually found naked and mutilated, hence the troopers would be eager to go as ‘painlessly’ as possible. But they didn’t notice that the bodies of those killed before capture were also stripped and mutilated – a tradition reserved for the dead: native Americans usually killed any captives immediately (to the point that there might even be a fight for the honour to do it; the sounds of intermittent gunfire heard by the surviving soldiers after they knew Custer and his men were defeated were the coup de grâce being dealt out prior to scalping) unless they were children (who were adopted) or young women (who were ‘adopted’ and eventually married into the tribe), stripped them and then mutilated the body so that it would not be happy in the ‘happy hunting ground’. The myth of torture has been perpetuated by most western’s – at least until they stopped being so one sided.

Apparently Custer’s ear drums were pierced so that he could hear better in the afterlife, because he hadn’t been listening to the natives when he’d been alive…

I think the documentary that I saw was part of a series called ‘Battlefield Detectives’.

I don’t remember any mention of Cavalry Troopers committing suicide but I seem to remember some analysis of the wounds, multiple wounds in many cases, found on the skeletons that had been exhumed. Given that the Native Americans would be unlikely to take any prisoners, and the expectation that any wounded Trooper may have had about his likely treatment, I can understand why there may have been multiple suicides amongst the Troopers.

Thinking about it, I’m not sure why there would have been skeletons of the Troopers to examine unless they had been exhumed specially for forensic examination.

No, Hampy. (See below)

is it asking too much for the film producers to, at least, get the history right and not deviate into flights-of-fantasy just because they believe it is more entertaining?

It won’t sell seats that way; usually make do is much cheaper and keeps the accountants happy. And anyway, history can be…influenced by a film:

While visiting Bletchley Park I have clearly overheard visitors telling each other that the anels explaining the first capture of Enigma machines are incorrect, because BP displays say it was RN personnel who captured it first, but the visitors ‘know‘ it was first captured by USN because they ‘remember seeing it “on TV” somewhere…‘ And I’ve heard that sort of comment from both Brits and Americans looking at the display

First captured by the RN, yes, but it was actually on sale – for both commercial and military use – from 1923 onwards, and the Poles had broken the encryption as early as 1932.

Yes I did realise that, having seen both movies 🙂

Both movies?

At the battlefield the locations of where men fell are marked (the bodies are buried elsewhere, even then the Army sent remains home to be buried.

Well, it was only officers bodies that were sent home (or more likely Fort Leavenworth) at the time – unless you were part of the Custer clan (two of his brothers, one a civilian, a civilian nephew and a brother-in-law died with him) or your family was prepared to take the body away without utilising military resources. The bodies were initially buried where they fell (1879) and later (1881) reburied in the on site cemetery – stakes were left in the ground to denote where the bodies had been and these were later replaced with the current markers (1890). More recently (1999 onwards) markers have been placed to indicate where native American warriors fell.

BTW – fascinating fact that most of the world believes Custer and all the men of the 7th Cavalry were massacred at Little Big Horn; just the men who rode with him died, another battalion followed behind, scouting further along the valley from where they had come whilst a company escorted the supply wagons but both arrived too late to assist him, whilst his 2ic’s battalion was meant to ride into the camp to rout the natives but either encountered a lot of resistance and retreated or (if you believe Custer’s wife) the coward in charge left Custer to die by not trying to push through the middle of the attacking warriors to help him. Either way the cavalry had initially been split into three distinct battalions and only one battalion – Custer’s – was completely wiped out (except for one native scout and one horse – Comanche – although other horses could have been taken by the victorious warriors). That is not to say that those two surviving battalions had it easy – they joined up and (with the wagon train and its escort) were apparently under siege for another day before relief arrived, but then what do you expect when you try to ambush a camp where (unbeknown to them) a mass pow-wow of various tribes was being held?
Incidentally, did this documentary mention that a large number of those who died alongside Custer apparently took their own lives rather than be captured? This information was known about – the native Americans never kept it secret – but it took 100 years before a history book came out and made it ‘official’, and even then that information had been essentially suppressed (apparently at the request of the government) for over 40 years due to the unpopular idea that US Cavalrymen would commit suicide in action.

(Had to do some background research into an Englishman who died in the battle…)

Correct. But from memory that was the original three-rotor version. Not the Kriegsmarine four-rotor responsible for ‘Triton/Shark’

Moggy

Ah, U-571 (link). I remember a mate and I going to visit another mate who was living and working on his own in a small town in the depths of winter, years ago. We went out and had a meal and a couple of beers and then, given the lack of other entertainment options, went and watched that film in a multiplex cinema about the size of a postage stamp. I think we were the only ones there, which was just as well – a genuinely laugh-out-loud awful film. Hilariously bad. If you think the description sounds bad – it’s even worse. :highly_amused:

Didn’t the Poles beat both the Yanks and Brits in obtaining the first Enigma?

Before (probably too late) this turns into another “Yank film that says they won the war…”

I’ll remind you that fighter pilots the world over are still laughing at Breaking the Sound Barrier….especially some guys at Edwards. 🙂

While visiting Bletchley Park I have clearly overheard visitors telling each other that the panels explaining the first capture of Enigma machines are incorrect, because BP displays say it was RN personnel who captured it first, but the visitors ‘know‘ it was first captured by USN because they ‘remember seeing it “on TV” somewhere…‘

Ah, U-571 (link). I remember a mate and I going to visit another mate who was living and working on his own in a small town in the depths of winter, years ago. We went out and had a meal and a couple of beers and then, given the lack of other entertainment options, went and watched that film in a multiplex cinema about the size of a postage stamp. I think we were the only ones there, which was just as well – a genuinely laugh-out-loud awful film. Hilariously bad. If you think the description sounds bad – it’s even worse. :highly_amused:

The amount of information that could be deduced was remarkable; in many cases managing to tie-up particular groups of spent cartridge cases with a particular weapon from the distinctive imprints made by the firing pin (for both US Cavalry and Native American weapons). In one classic case managing to prove that a particular US Cavalry weapon, reputed to have been taken as a trophy during the battle, was actually from the battle, and then returning to the battlefield with it, to the exact spot where it had been fired during the battle as identified by a group of spent cartridge cases that had been recovered over a hundred years later with a metal-detector (and the location accurately logged with GPS)!

At the battlefield the locations of where men fell are marked (the bodies are buried elsewhere, even then the Army sent remains home to be buried. Custer is buried at West Point) based on markers placed when remains were recovered….so I wonder how accurate some of them are since the site was not tended over the years. Small clusters of bodies were found quite a distance from the main group.

In the National Park Service museum on site there are weapons and artifacts from the battle…like a boot turned into a purse-like container by the Native Americans who stripped the bodies of clothes.
Dozens of book have been published, including a 3-volumne set of autopsy reports on all the soldiers. After studying aviation history for years I wasn’t surprised to see that the battle has its own set of anoraks and amateur historians.

I saw an extremely good documentary a while back about ‘Custer’s Last Stand’. It was a forensic investigation where an attempt was made to match the location and type of cartridge cases found on the battlefield to the locations where the US Cavalry dead were buried (in many cases where they fell).

The amount of information that could be deduced was remarkable; in many cases managing to tie-up particular groups of spent cartridge cases with a particular weapon from the distinctive imprints made by the firing pin (for both US Cavalry and Native American weapons). In one classic case managing to prove that a particular US Cavalry weapon, reputed to have been taken as a trophy during the battle, was actually from the battle, and then returning to the battlefield with it, to the exact spot where it had been fired during the battle as identified by a group of spent cartridge cases that had been recovered over a hundred years later with a metal-detector (and the location accurately logged with GPS)!

As has been suggested, the actual battle bore almost no resemblance to any film portrayal, but now that the truth is known (a truth that bears a startling similarity to the, often discounted, Native American version of events) wouldn’t it make a fascinating subject for a re-make?

Ludicrously impossible odds being the linking factor.
Moggy

Sadly, along with many battles since, where good men died.

BTW: I’ve visited both the Alamo and about 90 days ago, the Custer battlefield. Interesting places.
And as we mention whenever a film is discussed here, beware of taking film histories too literally. 🙂

Nor were there any tanks.

Yes I did realise that, having seen both movies 🙂

Ludicrously impossible odds being the linking factor.

Moggy

I didn’t think it was Private Ryan with tanks, it was more General Custer at The Alamo with tanks.
Moggy

You do realize that Custer was not at the Alamo….

Same basic results, different cast of characters, and 40 years apart.

OK, my personal opinion having seen it today.

I didn’t think it was Private Ryan with tanks, it was more General Custer at The Alamo with tanks.

Poor script, little plot, fantasy action sequences. Three quarters of an hour in I was genuinely bored.

Pitt was OK. With skilful make up and hair he was just about credible.

Not for me I’m afraind.

Moggy

The trouble is that many of today’s cinema-goers forget they are watching something made purely for their “entertainment”, and tend to think they are watching dramatised documentaries that are (closely in their minds?) based on truth?

I also think subtlety has also been lost, so a shot of a ticking clock as per Dambusters would mean/imply nothing to most modern day audiences who seem to need to have the full gory details spelt out in front of them in slow-motion, HD, 3-D, close up, in short scene, and in multi-replay from as many angles as possible (and some that are probably impossible too), as many seem to lack the imagination to conjur up such images themselves… maybe its because fewer people read books, and have perhaps lost the art of imagination/visualisation of a scene. Why force people to imagine a scene when CGI and special effects can do it for them, so that it loks like the scenes they have witnessed ont heir computer game screen.

I haven’t watched ‘Saving Private Ryan’ in full, but I have seen the opening scenes a few times, and they do seem to portray the absolute and utter horror of the Normandy beaches well… the scope of those scenes is vast, and it is that fact that makes them stand out for me far more than if the opening scenes had focussed closely on the key players’ part in the landings.

While visiting Bletchley Park I have clearly overheard visitors telling each other that the anels explaining the first capture of Enigma machines are incorrect, because BP displays say it was RN personnel who captured it first, but the visitors ‘know‘ it was first captured by USN because they ‘remember seeing it “on TV” somewhere…‘ And I’ve heard that sort of comment from both Brits and Americans looking at the display :-O

I fear the boundaries between entertainment and documentary have become so blurred that for most non-enthusiasts they remember and believe a mish-mash of both… and that becomes their perception of “the truth”. As we lose direct contact with those who took part in WW2 battles etc, I suspect we will see the “truth” largely superseded by a populalry accepted ‘pseudo-truth’ based on half-remembered documentaries, dramatisations and outright fiction…

While that gradual move may upset historians and those with specialist knowldge and/or interest in a period or subject, for most people it will just be part of the accepted “norm”. After all, is our perceptions of, say, The Battle of Trafalgar, or of Hastings or Agincourt really correct, or have they too been subtely diluted over time, to become part-true, part-mythical, versions of what really happened?

Television can and sometimes does fulfill the role CD refers to. Film never will. Once upon a time of course it did, in the days when the visit to the cinema included the main feature and an accompanying short, often a high quality documentary. Short films were treasures of the 50s and 60s, but I fear are now a thing of the past.

For much of the population a couple of hours at the cinema is their primary source of information about important parts of our shared history

My observation is that for much of the today’s cinema-going population it is two and a bit hours of darkness which requires the intake of humungous quantities of calories in the form of popcorn, nachos or chocolate, enough fizzy drinks to rot all the teeth on the Titanic, and a chance to check their mobiles every five minutes.

Moggy

I is it asking too much for the film producers to, at least, get the history right and not deviate into flights-of-fantasy just because they believe it is more entertaining?

Short answer, CD – yes, it is. They are not interested – why should they be? As you said their task is to entertain, not to educate.

… action films cost huge sums of money these days and the art of subtlety is subsumed by the need to exploit the bold brash features required to sell the film big. Blood, guts, trauma, sentimentality and worst of all mawkishness, all fill the pot to draw in an unthinking audience.

I’d like to think that it is still possible to educate the audience at the same time as entertaining them; I suppose that would be my biggest gripe about many ‘war films’. For much of the population a couple of hours at the cinema is their primary source of information about important parts of our shared history; is it asking too much for the film producers to, at least, get the history right and not deviate into flights-of-fantasy just because they believe it is more entertaining?

The crash of the Airfix Lancasters and the Hornby ’00’ train getting washed off the track didn’t upset me too much either!

As for your reaction to the death of a loveable black Labrador…

…it only confirms what we already knew about you…..you big softie!!!

‘The Dambusters’ or ‘Angels 1-5’, even if re-made, will always be old fashioned war movies because they depict the ‘clean’ war in the air; planes crash, whole crews are wiped-out, but you don’t get to see any of it close-up.

I saw The Dambusters on release the first time round. I can recall that the deaths of the crews and civilians didn’t upset me in the least, but I was distraught when Nigger was run over.

Moggy