War-Path and Bivouac: The Big Horn and Yellowstone Expedition

xlviii, 375 pp. "It was the luck of the Irish that John F. Finerty, a  crack reporter on the Chicago Times, didn't get his way when he was assigned to cover the Big Horn and Yellowstone Expedition. Finerty wanted to go with General Custer and his men; he was ordered to go with General Crook's column instead--and thus lived to write this stirring and authentic account of army life in the field during the Sioux campaign of 1876. Objective, thorough, and accurate, War-Path and Bivouac crackles with wit as well as gunfire, is an excellent example of military reporting as well as an engrossing personal chronicle. Finerty also deals with the Custer and Dull Knife campaigns (in which he did not participate), and the Appendix includes Sheridan's account of the battle of the Little Bighorn and Crook's account of the battle of the Rosebud."