Here’s a story about what can go wrong when we hold beliefs about a group and attribute these beliefs to the members of the group.
The Battle of Little Bighorn, also called Custer's Last Stand, took place in Montana Territory on June 25-26, 1876, between the Lakota, Northern Cheyenne, and Arapaho tribes and the 7th Cavalry Regiment of the U.S. Army.1
George Armstrong Custer’s fame began as a daring major general of calvalry in the Civil War a decade earlier. Now commissioned as a lieutenant colonel, Custer had been chasing and fighting Indians in the western plains since 1866. He was part of a push to clear all Plains Indian tribes from the territory so the U.S. could take possession of the Black Hills.2
THEY USUALLY FLED
Usually the Indians fled from the soldiers, so it was unusual that at Little Bighorn Custer and his 800 troopers found an estimated 3,000 Indians in a valley near the Little Bighorn River, called together by Hunkpapa Lakota holy man Sitting Bull to discuss what to do about the whites.3
When Custer's scouts spotted the Indian encampment, he decided to attack immediately and divided his forces into three battalions. Custer rode his troops north, hidden to the east of the encampment by bluffs. When Major Marcus Reno’s battalion had to take cover after a failed charge, part of Custer's troops tried to ford the river but were driven off by Indian sharpshooters. The soldiers were pursued by hundreds of warriors onto a ridge. The U.S. troops were prevented from digging in by Chief Crazy Horse, whose fighters had outflanked them and were at the crest.4
Custer's men appear to have been deployed in a skirmish line. When the Indians charged through the line, according to Lakota accounts, many soldiers threw down their weapons and rode or ran towards the knoll where Custer, other officers, and about 40 men were making a stand. The warriors rode them down and then overwhelmed Custer and his companions.5
The Battle of the Little Bighorn was a stunning victory for the Native Americans. The 7th Cavalry, casualties numbered 268 dead, including Custer, and 55 wounded.6
WHY DID THE INDIANS WIN?
Why did the Indians win? Objectively, they had better weapons obtained from traders and were better sharpshooters. They held the high ground and had strength of numbers. And they were better hand-to-hand fighters than the U.S. troops.
But why did Custer not think defensively when he knew he was greatly outnumbered and did not have the advantage of better terrain? Why, even when it should have been clear that running would have saved lives, did Custer continue his attack?
IN HIS HEAD
Clearly, how Custer viewed the Indians opposing him led him astray. Custer stereotyped Indians as backward and unsophisticated. Stereotyping is the mental error of sharing in a widely held but over generalized and oversimplified belief about a particular category of person or thing, with the expectation that what we believe applies to every or nearly every person of the particular group. In the case of the Plains tribes, this stereotype did not apply.
Further, the potential of smart leadership by Sitting Bull and the other chiefs was likely discounted by Custer because of ultimate attribution error, that is, making an internal attribution to an entire group instead of the individuals within the group. Custer likely thought that it just was not possible for Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse to out-general him because they were Indians and Indians were not that intelligent, and, in any case, he had never encountered Indian leaders who could beat him.
He was wrong, fatally wrong.
NOTES
1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Little_Bighorn
2 https://www.history.com/topics/native-american-history/george-armstrong-custer
3 https://www.history.com/topics/native-american-history/battle-of-the-little-bighorn
4 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Armstrong_Custer
5 https://military.wikia.org/wiki/George_Armstrong_Custer
6 https://www.history.com/topics/native-american-history/battle-of-the-little-bighorn
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