was a West Point graduate who attained brevet promotions to brigadier general and major general in the regular army on March 13, 1865 and major general of volunteers April 15, 1865 during the American Civil War. Custer, in the 1870’s, was dispatched to the west to fight in the Indian Wars. His disastrous defeat at the Battle of the Little Bighorn in 1876 resulted in his death along with his entire detachment.