The letter was written four days before the end. On June 21st, 1876, at the meeting of the Rosebud and Yellowstone rivers, a correspondent for the New York Herald named Mr. Kellogg put his observations to paper, describing the campaign as it prepared to move against Sitting Bull’s band.

Within days, Kellogg would be dead, along with Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer and every man of the five companies that rode with him into the valley of the Little Bighorn. But on the day he wrote, none of that was known. The mood was confident, the plans were laid, and the only question seemed to be whether the Indians would stand and fight or slip away.

Kellogg had been with General Alfred Terry’s command since early June, and his report opened with the quiet routine of a campaign still gathering itself. Since his previous dispatch on June 12th, the only significant developments had been the establishment of a supply post at the mouth of the Powder River and the conversion of the steamboat Far West into a floating base capable of carrying thirty days of rations and fodder. The steamer had then been moved to the mouth of the Tongue River with the headquarters command aboard, while Custer traveled overland from the Powder to the Tongue, a march of roughly forty miles through the Yellowstone River Valley.

Nothing of importance occurred during that ride, except for one display that Kellogg found worth recording. Custer, riding with the column, brought down an antelope at four hundred yards and came close to hitting several sage hens. It was the kind of marksmanship that defined his reputation, and Kellogg noted it without comment, as if it were simply another fact of the march.

The country north of the Powder River was severe. For twelve to fifteen miles the ground was tough going, the soil poor, the vegetation reduced to sage brush and cactus. On the 15th, the column came across a deserted Indian campsite, probably less than a year old.

The settlement stretched for over two miles and likely contained between twelve hundred and fifteen hundred lodges. Game was scarce, and no buffalo were seen at all.

Kellogg took the time to describe the Yellowstone itself, and his words carried the eye of a man who understood he was seeing something vast and new. The river ran fast, its current spinning into whirlpools that made a noise like a soft wind moving through high grass. The water had the color of yellowish clay, was invigoratingly cold, and tasted agreeable.

In Kellogg’s judgment, the Yellowstone exceeded the Missouri above their junction both in volume and in its suitability for steamboat travel. The Tongue River, by contrast, ran dark red, moved rapidly, and was less pleasant to drink.

On June 19th, Custer, with six cavalry companies, effectively forded the Tongue River about three miles from its mouth and advanced to within nine miles of Major Marcus Reno’s camp. Reno had just returned from a scouting mission with six companies of the Seventh Cavalry. But something had gone wrong, and Kellogg, writing as a reporter, was careful to note that the cause was unclear to him.

What was clear was that Reno had not merely strayed from General Terry’s direct orders—he had ignored them.

The orders in question were dated June 10th, 1876, and issued from the field headquarters of the Dakota Department. Reno had been directed to conduct a complete reconnaissance of the Powder River as far as the junction of the Little Powder. He was then to ford Pumpkin Creek and the Tongue River, advance down the Tongue to its meeting with the Yellowstone, and wait there for the rest of the Seventh Cavalry and its supplies.

His command was furnished with twelve days of rations and an equal supply of forage. The guide Mitch Boyer and eight Indian scouts assigned by Custer were to report to Reno for service, and Acting Assistant Surgeon H. R.

Porter was attached to the force by Terry’s own directive.

Reno did none of it as ordered. Instead of following the route laid out for him, he moved south from the junction of the Powder to the Rosebud River, where he found a recent and threatening trail. That single decision unraveled the entire plan.

Terry’s original scheme had been careful and deliberate. Reno was to reunite with the main column in the Tongue River Valley, where Custer would prepare his regiment for a scout up the Tongue, across to the Rosebud, and back down toward Terry. At the same time, Terry would travel by steamer to the mouth of the Rosebud, join with General John Gibbon’s command, and march up that valley until he encountered Custer coming the other way.

The Indians would be caught between the two forces.

Reno’s disobedience destroyed that design. By following the trail he found on the Rosebud, he allowed the main Indian force—Kellogg estimated it at about fifteen hundred—to escape capture. The campaign had to be reorganized on the spot.

A new plan was now in motion. On June 22nd, Custer would take twelve companies of cavalry and scout up the Rosebud Valley, following the trail Reno had found, with the expectation of fighting the Indians, who were then hunting buffalo and traveling unhurriedly. Terry would proceed by steamer to the mouth of the Big Horn River, scouting Pumpkin Creek along the way, while Gibbon’s forces marched up the Big Horn Valley to block the Indians if they tried to flee in that direction.

Confidence ran high. Kellogg wrote that it was thought, with solid justification, that this group of men he called Sitting Bull’s band would be seized and handled appropriately.

The march from the Tongue to the Rosebud was brutal. The column crossed arduous land marked by sharp drops and profound gorges. The heat was oppressive, leaving the men gasping and perspiring heavily, but the cavalry kept its speed, with the steamer climbing the Yellowstone alongside them.

Kellogg watched Custer ride at the head of the column, his light buckskin clothing visible from behind, followed immediately by the leading elements as they climbed the towering ridges above the twisting chasms below.

As the column moved farther up the Yellowstone Valley, the country began to change. The vegetation grew more substantial, both grasses and trees increasing in scale. Charming small islands appeared in the river, thick with trees whose bright green leaves hid the branches reaching out over the fast yellowish water.

The riverbanks were steep, the channel consistent, and the gravel bottom held enough depth at normal low water to allow light-draft steamers to travel from the Missouri to the mouth of the Big Horn, a distance of nearly five hundred miles.

Kellogg described the river with an eye toward the future, telling the readers of the Herald about its size and its promise for commercial use in the years to come, when its valley would be settled. He compared the valleys of the East to the limits of a racetrack, while those of the far West stretched from thirty to five hundred miles long and from one to fifteen miles wide. The upper half of the Yellowstone Valley, he wrote, exceeded the rest in every respect: grass, timber, fertility of the soil, health, weather, game, fish, and all other qualities.

From the country, Kellogg turned to the men. He praised Brigadier General Alfred Terry as his model of a commanding general—broad-minded, wise, anticipating, calm in every situation, and possessed of uncommon administrative talents. Terry was friendly, polite, open, and honorable.

Kellogg believed his preparations had been of the best nature, and unless his juniors ruined them by their conduct, they must prove victorious. Terry had won the affections of everyone who knew him and was deeply esteemed by the whole command. His staff, Kellogg wrote, were all benevolent, courteous, and principled gentlemen, each performing his role wonderfully.

Then came the passage about the most unusual genius in the army. Kellogg’s words built a portrait of a man of powerful feelings, of generous friendships and intense hatreds, of a rapid and anxious disposition, fearless bravery, resolve, and persistence. A man with a lively mind and a strong body.

A courageous, loyal, and noble soldier with close friends and fierce opponents. The toughest rider, the most forceful driver, with the most tireless watchfulness, conquering apparent impossibilities, and with a desire to triumph in every task he attempted. A man resolved to act correctly as he perceived it in each instance.

One esteemed and adored by his men, who would follow him willingly into the mouth of hell.

Kellogg named him plainly: Lieutenant Colonel G. A. Custer.

And he insisted he was not overstating. The depiction was accurate to reality, drawn from both observation and involvement.

The officers of the Seventh Cavalry, Kellogg wrote, were as courageous and noble a group of men as ever drew a sword for their nation’s purpose. He said the same for the infantry—brave and loyal, each of them. Based on years of experience and knowledge of the army, he considered the current campaign under Terry’s leadership to be made up of the finest in the American service: the Seventh and Second Cavalry, and the Sixth, Seventeenth, Twentieth, and Seventh Infantry.

His knowledge of Gibbon’s command, the Seventh Infantry, was brief. They were tough frontiersmen, mainly Scotch and Irish, with some Americans in the ranks. Serious, quiet, yet valiant soldiers who could be relied on in any circumstance.

Gibbon himself was a brave, sensible, and cautious commander, known to have chased the Nez Perce Indians from the Judith Basin the previous summer with a force of only one hundred and fifty men, without losing a single soldier. Kellogg did not question his success now.

The best fighting men in the army, in Kellogg’s judgment, were General George Crook’s troops, mostly whites and Mexicans serving in Gibbon’s command, with some colored soldiers serving with Crook. And he trusted that with the army now chasing him, Terry would surely capture or eliminate Sitting Bull and his multitude. These soldiers, Kellogg wrote, would gladly starve to achieve their duty, ready to feed on horse or mule, face death rather than quit their chase.

The letter ended with a strange and prescient passage. Kellogg wrote that if he should die, as might happen, he requested that his friends and comrades remember him generously, considering the perils and hazards he encountered, which appeared unavoidable. He was honored to be a member of the army and wished to conduct himself properly.

If he lived, he would keep serving his country with the same enthusiasm and resolve. But if he should die, he asked that God bless and safeguard his family and friends.

He signed it simply: Mr. Kellogg.

Four days later, on June 25th, Custer divided his regiment at the Little Bighorn. He took five companies—about two hundred and ten men—and rode toward the village. Kellogg rode with him.

None of them came back.

The battle that followed has been analyzed ever since, and the letters from 1876 have been read and reread for what they reveal. They show a command that knew its own strengths and trusted its leaders, a plan that was sound on paper, and a subordinate’s disobedience that destroyed it before the first shot was fired. Reno’s decision to abandon his orders and follow the trail to the Rosebud scattered the careful design Terry had built.

It let the Indian force slip away from the intended trap, and it sent Custer into a pursuit that would carry him, and the men who followed him, straight into the largest gathering of Lakota, Cheyenne, and Arapaho fighters the plains had ever assembled.

Kellogg’s letter survives as a record of the days before the disaster, written by a man who saw the campaign coming together and believed in it completely. He praised the general, the regiment, and the cause. He described the country and the river and the march.

He wrote of Custer with admiration and of the men who would follow him anywhere. Then he went with them, and he died with them, and his words remained behind to show exactly how much confidence was riding into the valley that day.