Marcus Reno: The Officer Who Survived Little Bighorn

Near this spot lay the farm of Major Marcus Reno, one of American military history's most controversial figures. On June twenty-fifth, eighteen seventy-six, Reno commanded a battalion of the Seventh United States Cavalry at the Battle of Little Bighorn. While Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer and the troops he led were annihilated by Lakota and Cheyenne warriors, Reno and most of his command survived by pulling back and holding a defensive position on nearby bluffs.

For decades, debate raged over whether Reno acted wisely or showed cowardice. He was court-martialed in eighteen seventy-nine on unrelated charges and dismissed from service. But his earlier service in the Civil War, including fighting at Antietam and commanding Pennsylvania volunteer cavalry, was distinguished. A board of inquiry in nineteen sixty-seven cleared his military record, and his remains were reinterred at Little Bighorn with full honors.