Standing with Custer

They were cut to pieces by Sioux and Cheyenne Indians in a battle that has assumed legendary proportions.

What is less well known is the part played in those events by Sgt Maj William Hunter Sharrow, Custer's most senior NCO - and the son of a village baker from Sheriff Hutton.

The tiny North Yorkshire village is better known for its links with Richard III than Custer's Last Stand. But, insists Peter Russell of the Custer Association of Great Britain, it was there that, on March 2 1845, William Sharrow was born.

The story of how the son of a Yorkshire village baker came to die fighting with Custer's troops in one of the most famous battles in American history is extraordinary. And it is told in an article which Peter, who lives in Kent, has written for this month's issue of The Crow's Nest, the Custer Association's journal.

William Sharrow's father, Peter writes, was also called William, and was variously described as a baker, confectioner and yeoman.

The future sergeant major was the son of his second wife, Elizabeth Hunter, and was baptised "William Hunter (Sharrow)" in the parish church on March 29 1845.

No house or street name is shown on his birth certificate, but it seems likely, Peter writes, that the family lived in Finkle Street, close to the inn known in the seventeenth century as the Pack Horse and now the Highwayman.

The young William Sharrow received an "elementary education at one of the two schools in the village", but apart from that, says Peter, little is known about his childhood.

It is not known, either, how or why he decided to emigrate to the United States. But by March 21 1865 - just three weeks before the US Civil War came to an end with the surrender at Appomattox Courthouse - he was living in New York City. Records show that on that day he enlisted in the US 2nd Cavalry.

The brown-haired, blue-eyed 20 year old gave his previous employment as "a clerk who was born in York, England."

Most of William's time with the 2nd Cavalry was spent in Nebraska. He was discharged at the end of three years service with the rank of corporal - and may then, Peter suggests, have found time to cross the Atlantic to visit his elderly parents in Sherriff Hutton.

By August 12 1869, however, he was back in the US, having enlisted in the 7th Cavalry at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. Less than three years later, aged 27, he was suddenly promoted directly from private to sergeant major.

With the Civil War long over, white settlers were penetrating further and further west.

In late 1875, Sioux and Cheyenne Indians defiantly left their reservations, outraged about the continued incursions by white settlers into their sacred lands in the Black Hills.

They gathered in Montana under Sitting Bull's command, determined to fight for their lands. Custer's 7th Cavalry was with one of three columns dispatched to deal with the Indian uprising. It was wild, bleak terrain.

On June 25, Custer spotted a Sioux village about 15 miles away along the Rosebud River. Ignoring orders to wait, he decided to attack. At about noon that day, at the divide between the Rosebud and the Little Bighorn rivers, he divided his forces into three. One troop, under Capt Frederick Benteen, he sent to prevent the Indians' escape through the upper valley of the Little Bighorn. A force under Maj Marcus Reno was detailed to cross the river and charge the Indian village in a co-ordinated attack with the remaining troops under his command.

He hoped to strike the Indian camp simultaneously from the north and south - but had not counted on the maze of bluffs and ravines he would have to contend with to get there.

Reno's squadron of 175 men attacked from the north, but encountered fierce resistance and withdrew.

Custer and his 210 men, presumably delayed by the terrain, arrived later, and were immediately attacked by a force of Cheyenne and Hunkpapa Sioux. Meanwhile, another force of mainly Oglala Sioux under Crazy Horse moved downstream then doubled back, enveloping Custer and his men in a pincer movement.

As arrows and bullets rained down on them, Custer ordered his men to shoot their horses and stack the carcasses to form a wall. But the bodies provided little protection - within an hour, Custer and his men had been wiped out.

And what of Sgt Maj Sharrow?

He was with Custer and the main column of men as they prepared to leave the divide between the Little Bighorn and the Rosebud for their southern attack on the Sioux village. A Lieutenant Luther Hare had ridden ahead of the column with some Crow scouts. "He had received orders from Custer to keep a look out and report back should he discover any Indians," Peter writes.

When Custer didn't hear anything from the forward party, he sent his faithful NCO, Sgt Maj Sharrow, to make contact. It is the last we hear of him alive. "This meeting with Hare, which took place around 1.45pm, is the last verifiable information we have about Sharrow until his body was discovered two days later," Peter writes.

According to General Charles Woodruff, William Sharrow's remains were found lying near another, unidentified soldier at the northern end of the battlefield.

Peter takes up the story: "There are two headstones just north of Custer Hill.... which may be for Sharrow and another trooper," he writes. "According to the Cheyenne brave, Wooden Leg: 'A soldier on a horse suddenly appeared in view from behind the warriors who were coming from the eastward along the ridge.

He was riding away to the eastward, as fast as he could make his horse go. It seemed that he must have hidden somewhere back there until the Indians had passed him. A band of the Indians, all Sioux, I believe, got after him. I lost sight of them when they went beyond the curve of the hilltop. I suppose, though, they caught him and killed him.' Was Wooden Leg referring to Sharrow?

"As regimental sergeant major and a member of Custer's headquarters staff, William Sharrow would have played a key role throughout the whole campaign.

"Judging from the spot where his body is reputed to have been found it seems that he remained close to his leader to the very end and surely justified the faith that Custer had clearly placed in him. Richard III's motto was 'Loyaulte me lie' (Loyalty binds me) and I like to think that Sgt Maj William Sharrow adopted these noble words for himself during those final desperate moments, that hot June Sunday afternoon on Last Stand Hill."

- If you have any information about William Sharrow's family, the Evening Press would love to hear from you. Write to Yesterday Once More, The Evening Press, 76-86 Walmgate, York YO1 9YN.

Updated: 10:53 Monday, April 28, 2003