By the way, at the time of LBH the official regimental colors of the US Artillery were ....wait for it....YELLOW! As they had been for quite some time.

So why would a cavalry unit carry an artillery flag at LBH?

Custer played fast and loose with personal flags and there were no regulations governing those, but the US Army then, and now, runs like a machine for much of what it does and when the regs from the Civil War called for US Cavalry flags to be blue, then they were STILL blue until changed in the mid-1880s. Thousands of surplus flags made during the Civil War, in particular troop guidons, were still in use through the 1880s. I have copies in my files as to how many of these remained in government depots after the Civil War and there were thousands. The blue regimental flags were made by the depots and were not lettered until they were to be assigned to a particular unit, so if any cavalry regiment lost or wore out their regimental standard then a replacement was easy to get.

So if by some amazingly remote chance the 7th US Cavalry were carrying a yellow flag at LBH then some idiot at a depot sent them an artillery flag, which would have been much larger by the way.

Greg Biggs