EPISODE 17 The War for the Black Hills (Part 2): The Long Defeat

“…And together through ages of the world we have fought the long defeat.” J.R.R. Tolkien

“I shall have glory by this losing day.” William Shakespeare

“Oyate kin ninpi kta ca lecamu yelo” (“I do this so that the people may live.”) Lakota song

“My mind was occupied mostly by such thoughts as are regularly uppermost in the minds of young men. I was eighteen years old, and I liked girls.” Wooden Leg

To the Lakota people, the Black Hills of South Dakota were—and still are—‘the heart of everything that is.’ To the United States, they were a goldmine, and Manifest Destiny’s next target. It was for the Black Hills that the Lakota went to war against the United States for the last time.

In this episode:

-When he is not attacking camps full of women and children, Custer is a sensitive guy who cries at the theater

-How Grant, Sheridan, and Co. engineered their own version of the Gulf of Tonkin incident

-Frodo, the destiny of Middle Earth and Sitting Bull

-Custer decides to challenge Grant over corruption

-Lost in presidential dreams, Custer probably never realized he was being set up

-An American army that wasn’t really American

-A soldier’s scalp in an abandoned village

-The Battle Where the Girl Saved Her Brother

-Cross-dressing Crow warriors

-Custer: “Why are you doing all this?”

Half Yellow Face: “Because you and I are going home today—by a trail that is strange to both of us.”   

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