A visitor to the Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument is sleeping nearby in his van at night. He starts to hear horses, gunshots, and men, as if the battle once again occurred.
“Are you familiar with the Custer Battlefield in Montana? (Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument). Just to put things in perspective, I’m 65 years old now. This took place in the early 90s and I used to, I don’t do it so much anymore, I used to have a Dodge van and on vacation time I would always throw a futon in the back of it, a sleeping bag, my Coleman camping stuff and I’d hit the road for two or three weeks and go visit places. One trip I went back east, I’m from back east. I’m from Ohio. And I’ve been in Monterey now for the last 40 years. And I visited Civil War battlefields - Antietam, Gettysburg, Harpers Ferry and on one trip I went up to see Custer's Mountain up there in Montana, and where it is, it’s up there in the prairies and it’s surrounded by a lot of mountains. It is small. It’s on... the intersection of State 90 and US Route 212 which goes east and west. It’s a little east of Billings, Montana. And 212 starts at 90 and runs right behind Custer's Hill and goes to Spearfish, Sturgis, Deadwood, you know, that part of the country.
Anyway, so I’ve been on the road for 4 or 5 days already on this trip and I’m tired and I need to take a shower or jump in a river, someplace. I get to the park at 8:00 o’clock at night. It’s already closed so I’m not going to go in and see the monument that night. I was also really hungry. Now down where this was at is this little general store that has a cafe in it. So I pulled in the parking lot right there and they were getting ready to close. It was this guy and his wife and the guy was a retired park ranger who used to take out tours of the monument and he knew it really well. And his wife was Native American and she lived there with her whole family for generations. And you know after the battle the Native Americans just didn’t go away. They all still live around there and the following generations.
Anyway, so they make me something to eat. And I asked them if they happened to have a beer I could drink and they said no they said go up the road a couple miles to this little town called Crow Agency, buy a 12-pack, bring it back and we’ll help you drink it. So I did that. I went up there and got a 12-pack and I brought it back and for the next couple hours they told me the true story of Custer's battle and it was really riveting. Parts of the story you never heard of. It wasn’t like Errol Flynn dying on the hill like in the movies, it was a long, drawn-out battle, and it was multi-faceted. There were other parts of the battle. Other sections of the battle. Anyway, they were getting ready to close up. They had to go home. I asked them if I could camp out in their parking lot. They said no, I couldn't do that but there is a little access road off Route 212 about a mile down the road and it’s a dirt road and due to maintenance of the park, you can pull into that spot, and nobody will bother you. I said, 'That’s great.'
I went down the road. I found the spot, backed into it, and turned off the van. It was dark, starry and it was quiet and it was just out here in the prairies. It wasn’t eerie at all. It was just neat, right, and it was dark and it was starry. So I rolled back into my sleeping bag and I went to sleep and I was out like a light. So it must have been a couple hours later, I’m sleeping, I guess I'm sleeping. Maybe I’m dreaming. I’m hearing this noise; back of my mind – small, ethereal. I hear men shouting. I'm hearing horses. I'm hearing gunshots. I’m laying there thinking I gotta be dreaming this. You know how you’re in REM sleep, you can’t move, right? And it comes and it's going and it’s fading and it's coming back. And it's getting louder. Now I’m waking up and I’m hearing this. You know how you wake up to a bad dream and you go, 'Oh my god, that was a bad dream' and it goes away? This didn’t go away! It's getting louder. I’m hearing this. I’m looking at my hands. I’m awake. I’m hearing this. What is this?
I throw open the side doors of the van. I jump out and there’s nothing. There’s nothing. It’s dark. It’s starry and a little cool and it’s still going on... horses and gunshots and men. I’m hearing this. Then it just started fading away. And then it was gone. The whole episode probably lasted three minutes. The whole rest of the night, I crawled back in the van. I sat there wrapped in my sleeping bag completely spooked. The next day I went and visited the park and then I left but that night it was weird.”
Transcribed Source: Coast to Coast – October 31, 2018
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