Joe Medicine Crow became a war chief. He set a standard for aspiring warriors and was his son's inspiration. His maternal step-grandfather, White Man Runs Him, was a scout for US General George Armstrong Custer and an eyewitness to the Battle of the Little Bighorn in 1876. Joe Medicine Crow's cousin is Pauline Small, the first woman elected to office in the Crow Tribe of Indians. When he was young, Medicine Crow heard direct oral testimony about the Battle of the Little Bighorn in 1876 from his step-grandfather, White Man Runs Him, who had been a scout for General George Armstrong Custer. Beginning
Goes Ahead Sioux and Cheyenne who were expected to be on either Rosebud Creek or in the Little Bighorn valley. The six Crow scouts were sent with Custer because they were familiar with the Rosebud and Little Big Horn drainage. On June 24, 1876 the Crow scouts were ranging ahead, and they sent back word to Custer that the trail of the Sioux/Cheyenne encampment had moved from the Rosebud valley toward the valley of the Little Bighorn. At first light on June 25, 1876, the morning of the battle, the Crow scouts were at a high point (later known as the Crows