Courting Elizabeth

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None Wounded, None Missing, All Dead: The Story of Elizabeth Bacon Custer.

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A full moon hovered over South Monroe Street, and beams of light from the gigantic orb filtered through a cluster of clouds. Twenty-one-year-old George Armstrong Custer stumbled through the scene, helped along by a friend who steadied his walk and kept him from falling. Both men were dressed in the uniform of the 5th Cavalry, and both had been drinking. In fact, George was drunk. It was late, and apart from the two inebriated soldiers, the street was deserted.

It was the fall of 1861, and numerous leaves had dropped off the massive trees lining the thoroughfare, drifting across the path the men followed. George was making his way to his sister Ann Reed’s home, where he had been staying while recovering from a slight illness contracted after the Battle of Bull Run. George had carried dispatches to the Union troops holding their position against the Confederate Army lined along Bull Run Creek near a railroad center called Manassas Junction in Virginia. The battle had ended when the Union Army was ordered to fall back toward Washington, and the accompanying downpour of rain had left George suffering with chills and fever. He was sent back to Monroe to recuperate, and as George’s condition improved, he started venturing out to local taverns where his friends gathered.

Arm in arm with his school chum, an intoxicated George and his buddy staggered down the roadway, singing at the top of their lungs. The commotion woke his sister, who raced to the front window of her house, followed closely by her husband and children, to see who was disturbing the quiet, respectable neighborhood.

George was unaware that Judge Bacon, Elizabeth Bacon’s father had witnessed the scene. He also had no idea that Elizabeth herself had been gazing out of her upstairs bedroom window at the same moment. She wasn’t surprised at the sight, having seen other young men who’d had too much to drink. She considered his actions standard fare, and the following morning, barely remembered the spectacle George had made of himself the night before.

To learn more about Elizabeth Bacon Custer and how she lived to glorify her husband’s memory read None Wounded, None Missing, All Dead.