CUSTER, GEORGE ARMSTRONG. 1839-1876.


Autograph Note Signed ("G.A. Custer"), 1 p, 4to (torn), Fort Lincoln, April 7, [probably 1875], in pencil on blue-ruled machine-laid paper, to Major [John] Carland in Bismarck, chasing warrants to be issued for Dennison and Moran, previously removed from an album, folds, trimmed.CUSTER ORDERS THE ARREST OF PRIVATE CITIZENS. In the spring of 1875, Fort Lincoln had been suffering a rash of grain thefts, the grain being sold on to Bismarck merchants for private sale. Custer doggedly tracked the thefts, and in a remarkable transgression of authority, issued orders for arrests to be made, even as he was under orders not to make arrests outside of the military reservation. Elizabeth Custer in Boots and Saddles, describes Custer's taking a company of cavalry and several wagons into Bismarck directly to the storefront where the grain was stored, transferring the stolen grain directly into the wagons, after which "the troops marched out of the town as quietly as they had entered." In rounding up the accomplices, he sent a similar note to Carland on March 31 (see Sotheby's, New York, November 1, 1993, lot 43, written on the same paper stock); this note followed, doggedly pursuing the arrest of two additional thieves. Famously, the accused thieves were imprisoned with Rain-in-the-Face, and soon all escaped, with Rain-in-the-Face retreating to the Powder River to rejoin Sitting Bull, heading inexorably to the Battle of Little Big Horn (Barnett, Touched by Fire, p 250).Major John Carland, a close friend of Custer, would discover Custer's body on the field of Little Big Horn just over one year later.