Why is Maj. Marcus Reno of the 7th Cavalry such a controversial figure?
By: Marshall Trimble 08/25/2009
Q
Why is Maj. Marcus Reno of the 7th Cavalry such a controversial figure?
Ross Taylor
Nashville, Tennessee
A
I believe Maj. Marcus Reno was unfairly treated following the Custer Battle. Libby Custer blamed him for the Little Bighorn defeat, as did other Custer supporters; that faction believed he was a coward for not coming to Custer’s aid during the attack. Those folks kept making trouble for him.
In April 1877, the wife of another officer, a woman with an unsavory reputation, began hitting on Reno. When he rebuffed her, she charged him with making improper advances. A court martial found him guilty. The army tried to kick him out, but President Rutherford B. Hayes intervened; he reduced punishment to two years suspension without pay.
Some brother officers accused him of striking a junior officer, but those charges were dropped.
Then he was charged with being a “peeping tom” and drunk on duty at Fort Meade, Dakota Territory. The case was weak, but the army dismissed him on April 1, 1880—over the protests of Gens. Sherman and Terry. Reno tried, unsuccessfully, to clear his name before he died of cancer in 1889. His body was buried in an unmarked grave in Glenwood Cemetery, Washington D.C.
During the mid-1960s a relative requested the army re-open the case; the army determined the evidence did not support the charges. The army restored Reno to his rank and, in 1967, buried his body at the Custer Battlefield cemetery.
Comments (2)
Marshall,
Don't forget, Custer split up his troops into three groups preceding the battle weakening their ability to fight as one mass against the Indian warriors. He sent Capt. Benteen and his men south, Reno and his men head-on toward the village, and Custer took his group of soldiers in yet another direction - going north. More importantly, Reno maintained that Custer promised him full backup if he came under attack - well, backup never came. Similarly, Custer by one account (Custer's Indian Scouts told this story to a news reporter named "Curtis"), watched Reno and his men getting beaten up from a point of safety on a nearby ridge and did not go to Reno's aid.
Jim Becker, Colorado Springs, CO
Marshal, I think Reno's behavior at the Little Bighorn is what made him controversial. He badly bungled the attack on the Indian village. He put his battalion into a battle line way too early. As such, he ran up against obstacles he could not charge across and so elected to dismount his men and put them into a skirmish line. When he gave the order to dismount, he lost the offensive, was routed, and effectively doomed Custer. His subsequent dash from the valley and the abandonment of his men was disgraceful. He doesn't deserve all the blame for the debacle but his failure to use appropriate cavalry tactics and his poor leadership was a big factor in the defeat. Being "damned by faint praise" was much better treatment than he deserved in my opinion.
Post A Comment