General Custer Family Album
Longtime Ohio Neighbors and Unusually 
Close Friends of One Branch of our Family

Graves of two infant brothers of General George and Thomas Ward Custer, at the English Lutheran Cemetery in New Rumley, Harrison County, OH. In this small rural cemetery also rest many of our cousins, including pioneers John and Maria (Kohl) Minard and their children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Minerd.com Archives.

Birthplace and early home of General George and Thomas Custer in New Rumley. Henderson's Art Gallery of Scio, OH published this postcard circa 1907. Minerd.com Archives

Above: Custer State Memorial at New Rumley, Harrison County, OH, on the actual site of the birthplace of the Custer brothers. Minerd.com Archives

Statue of the General in New Rumley, OH, dedicated in 1932. Minerd.com Archives

Front view of the farmhouse where the General's parents and Tom resided near Tontogany during the Civil War years, depicting members of the Williams family, owners at the time the image was made later in the 1800s. Minerd.com Archives

~ Tom Custer's Civil War Battles ~

Battle of Chickamauga -- Sept. 19-20, 1863.Minerd.com Archives

Battle of Missionary Ridge, Tennessee -- Nov. 25, 1863.Minerd.com Archives

Battle of Kennesaw Mountain, Georgia -- June 27, 1864.Minerd.com Archives

General Custer saluting Confederate General Ramseur following the Woodstock Races battle on Oct. 9, 1864. From Whittaker's A Life of Major Gen'l George A. Custer, drawn by Alfred Rudolph Waud. Minerd.com Archives

Gen. Custer's Cavalry Division display Confederate colors captured by Tom and others at the Battle of Sailor's Creek, April 6, 1865. From Sabre and Bayonet, compiled by Theo. F. Rodenbough (New York: G.W. Dillingham Co., 1897). Minerd.com Archives

General Custer presenting captured Confederate flags at the War Department in Washington, DC. Sketched by A.R. Waud. Harper's Weekly, Nov. 12, 1864. Minerd.com Archives

General Custer receiving the first flag of truce -- "a towel on a pole" -- sent by General Lee after the Battle of Appomattox. From Whittaker's A Life of Major Gen'l George A. Custer, drawn by A.R. Waud. Minerd.com Archives

Thomas Ward Custer remained in the service of the United States Army after the end of the Civil War. He joined the staff of his brother George in the 7th Cavalry regiment. Their first assignment was to occupy postwar Texas in May 1865. Two years later, they were on the Great Plains, ordered to protect builders of the Kansas Pacific, Union Pacific and Central Pacific Railroads. In 1873, their mission to was protect the construction of the Northern Pacific Railroad as well as gold mining operations in the Black Hills of South Dakota, a territory which Native Americans considered sacred hunting ground.Minerd.com Archives

After General Custer and his 7th Cavalry failed to catch Cheyenne warriors near Pawnee Fork, Kansas, his superior officer Maj. Gen. Winfield Scott Hancock ordered the hostiles' village to be burned, north of Fort Dodge, April 19, 1867. From Harper's Weekly, June 8, 1867, and sketched by Theodore R. Davis. Minerd.com Archives

Left, Chief Satanti of the Kiowa tribe, and right, Little Raven, of the Arapahoes, whose warriors attacked postal stations, stagecoach facilities, wagon trains and railroad laborers in Kansas in May 1867, while Custer and the 7th Cavalry cooled their heels at Fort Hays, Kansas, waiting for the exhausted horses to regain strength. Satanti's earnest desire for peace earned him an army uniform. Sketch by Theodore R. Davis, from Harper's Weekly, June 8, 1867. Minerd.com Archives

Cavalrymen drilling at Fort Wallace in the summer of 1867. From a photograph by Maj. A.R. Calhoun and Dr. Bell, surveyors for the Union Pacific Railroad, as published in Harper's Weekly, July 27, 1867. Minerd.com Archives

A three-hour attack on a re-supplied wagon train returning from Fort Wallace in June 1867. From Whittaker's A Life of Major Gen'l George A. Custer.Minerd.com Archives

Troopers with Company G of the 7th Cavalry under attack by Cheyenne warriors in what Harper's Weekly called a "desperate battle" on the Smoky Hill route through Kansas near Fort Wallace. Led by Chief Roman Nose on June 26, 1867, the Indians "ran off the Overland Stage Company's stock [and] then advanced toward the fort." From a photograph by Calhoun and Bell, Union Pacific Railroad surveyors, as published July 27, 1867. Minerd.com Archives

Remains of Sgt. Frederick Williams, killed in the June 26, 1867 battle near Fort Wallace, Kansas. "The body was fearfully mutilated," reported Harper's Weekly (July 27, 1867). "His scalp was taken, two balls pierced his brain, and his right brow was cut open with a hatchet. His nose was severed and his throat gashed. The body was opened and the heart laid bare. The legs were cut to the bone, and the arms hacked with knives. We give an engraving of the body from a photograph." Minerd.com Archives

Pawnee Killer and his Oglala braves, who fought against General Custer's 7th Cavalry along the Republican River, halfway between Colorado's Fort Sedgwick and Fort Wallace in northwest Kansas, in June 1867. From Harper's Weekly, Aug. 17, 1867, sketched by T. R. Davis. Minerd.com Archives

Led by Pawnee Killer, hostile Sioux warriors attack on June 24, 1867, which the 7th Cavalry held off after an hour of the Indians' circling movements and shooting. Sketch by T.R. Davis, Harper's Weekly, Aug. 17, 1867. Minerd.com Archives

Warriors of the Sioux and Cheyenne tribes attack a wagon train, the type of hostility Gen. Custer and the 7th Cavalry were trying to prevent. Sketch by T.R. Davis, Harper's Weekly, Aug. 17, 1867. Minerd.com Archives

Custer's men fording the Platte River at North Platte, Nebraska, as sketched by T. R. Davis and published in Harper's Weekly, Aug. 3, 1867. Minerd.com Archives

Traveling in a prairie canyon, left, and the General's interview with Pawnee Killer of the Oglala tribe, where the hostile Indian asked for coffee and sugar after attacking the army earlier in the day. Printed in Harper's Weekly, Aug. 3, 1867. Minerd.com Archives

Sioux attempting to stampede the Seventh Cavalry's horses, in a sketch by T.R. Davis and as published in Harper's Weekly, Aug. 3, 1867. Note the sharpshooters on the plateau at right, on their stomachs, defending against the raid. Minerd.com Archives

Gen. Custer examines the arrow-ridden remains of Lieut. Lyman Kidder and 10 men of the 7th Cavalry, who had left Fort Sedgwick in Colorado to deliver a telegram from Maj. Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman, ordering Custer to change his search for hostile Indians and move closer to Fort Wallace in Kansas. Sketched by T.R. Davis and published in Harper's Weekly, Aug. 17, 1867. Minerd.com Archives

The Battle of Washita, otherwise known as the "Capture of Black Kettle's Camp" near what today is Cheyenne, OK. From the book Indian History for Young Folks by Frances S. Drake (New York, 1885). Tom was slightly wounded in this engagement. Minerd.com Archives

Custer's men shooting down "worthless" horses after the Washita battle, as drawn by Theodore R. Davis. Harper's Weekly, Jan. 16, 1869. Minerd.com Archives

"Custer's Attack." American Tobacco Co. New York Public Library

After the Washita victory against Black Kettle, Custer's scouts of the Osage and Kaw nations celebrated at night around a large fire, "encircled by officers and men who formed a ring comprising hundreds in number -- the front rows sitting down or kneeling," reported Harper's Weekly, Jan. 16, 1869. "The ceremonies were enlivened by music from the military bands. Inside the circle, by the Indian drummers, sat Generals Sheridan, Custer, Forsyth, and staff-officers. The Indians were highly painted, and adorned with shields, spears, war-bonnets, bows, whistles, and other 'toggery'." Sketch by Theodore R. Davis. Minerd.com Archives

Southern Cheyenne prisoners captured at the Battle of Washita as sketched by Theodore R. Davis. Harper's Weekly, Dec. 26, 1868. Minerd.com Archives

Despite Tom's wound in action at Washita, however slight, he is not named or pictured in the National Historic Site museum display or local plaques.Minerd.com Archives

The General (blue dot) and Tom (orange dot) at Custer's quarters at Fort Abraham Lincoln, North Dakota in November 1873, with Seventh Cavalry officers and family, including the General's wife Elizabeth, and their brother in law Capt. James C. Calhoun and his wife Margaret (Custer) Calhoun. Denver Public Library and the Library of Congress American Memory Project

Tom (orange dot) and his brothers the General (blue dot) and Boston (green) and brother in law James Calhoun (red) in July 1875 at an outing near the Little Hart River at Fort Abraham Lincoln, North Dakota. Denver Public Library and the Library of Congress American Memory Project

Another view of "Fort Abraham Lincoln North Dakota, where General Custer and his regiment were stationed before starting on their ill-fated expedition," from a photo by D.F. Barry, published in "The Massacre of General Custer and His Command," Wide World Magazine, 1901. Minerd.com Archives

The Custer camp along French Creek, where the Custer expedition first discovered gold in 1874, today a South Dakota state park. National Park Service

Site of the Pease Bottom battle, Aug. 11, 1873, where Tom commanded Co. A, seen here during a 2023 tour of the Little Big Horn Associates. The Custers were part of a military column accompanying Northern Pacific Railway surveyors working on the north side of the Yellowstone River. Minerd.com Archives

Custer's wagon train wending its way through Castle Creek Valley as it enters the Black Hills. Until the Custer expedition of 1874, the Black Hills was an unknown and mysterious land, sacred to the Cheyenne and Sioux. Custer entered the area from the west and for the first time, white men viewed the spectacular mountains which were holy ground to the Indians. South Dakota State Historical Society

Gen. Custer's expedition on the march into the Black Hills, from Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper, May 1, 1875.Minerd.com Archives

Left: Custer with a grizzly bear he brought down in the Black Hills, on Aug. 7, 1874, with help from his chief scout Bloody Knife, Private Noonan and Capt. William Ludlow, from a photograph by E.H. & T. Anthony & Co. Right: the Custer expedition in camp at Hidden-Wood Creek in the Black Hills. From Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper, May 1, 1875.Minerd.com Archives

Above: Left: Sitting Bull, leader of the Sioux nation which attacked the Seventh Cavalry and Custer at Little Big Horn. Right: "Chief Gall, who was in supreme command of the Indian Forces," from a photo by D.F. Barry, published in "The Massacre of General Custer and His Command," Wide World Magazine, 1901.Minerd.com Archives

Rain in the Face (Etomo Gozue), a Sioux warrior who held a personal grudge against Thomas Ward Custer and was rumored to have cut out Tom's heart. Left: image taken near Fort Keough, Montana, circa 1879, originally copyright L.A. Huffman. Right: another image of Rain in the Face, from a photo by D.F. Barry, published in "The Massacre of General Custer and His Command," Wide World Magazine, 1901.Minerd.com Archives