George Custer was killed 150 years ago at the Battle of Little Bighorn. But he committed many atrocities before his death, including burning down the Shenandoah Valley in 1864. Col. John Mosby fought him there, and Custer hanged some of Mosby’s troops in my old hometown Front Royal, Virginia. This video is tied to my article at the Mises Institute page.
Custer unfortunately wasn’t alone. There were many honorable Union officers, but that terrible war produced numerous leaders who felt it was their job to destroy the South – soldiers and civilians alike. They put soldiers in Leavenworth now for dirty deeds that were overlooked as merely “unfortunate.” The victors write the history; Sherman got a statue in Central Park: and all the other Union war criminals got their pension.
Excellent points. I wrote about some of those war crimes in this WSJ piece in 2014 https://jimbovard.com/blog/2014/07/25/wall-st-journal-sheridans-1864-torching-shenandoah-valley/
Good article. Thanks!