Flashman and the Redskins

infobox Book |
name = Flashman and the Redskins
orig title =
translator =


author = George MacDonald Fraser
cover_artist =
country = United Kingdom
language = English
series =
genre = Historical novel
publisher = HarperCollins
release_date = 1982
media_type = Print (Hardback & Paperback)
pages = 512 pp (paperback)
isbn = ISBN 0-00-721717-X
preceded_by = Flashman's Lady
followed_by = Flashman and the Dragon

"Flashman and the Redskins" is a 1982 novel by George MacDonald Fraser. It is the seventh of the Flashman novels.

Plot introduction

Presented within the frame of the supposedly discovered historical Flashman Papers, this book describes the bully Flashman from "Tom Brown's Schooldays". The papers are attributed to Flashman, who is not only the bully featured in Thomas Hughes' novel, but also a well known Victorian military hero. The book begins with an explanatory note detailing the discovery of these papers.

The book begins with Flashman fleeing with Susie Willinck (a New Orleans madam, aka "Miss Susie"), as described at the end of "Flash for Freedom!". They cross the US continent as Forty-niners, meeting several well-known personalities of the American West in 1849 and 1850. The story resumes in 1875, when he takes part in the Battle of the Little Bighorn in 1876. It also contains a number of notes by Fraser, in the guise of editor, giving additional historical information on the events described.

Plot summary

In his haste to leave New Orleans and the threat of imprisonment, Flashman agrees to shepherd Susie Willinck and her company of prostitutes to San Francisco, where she intends to set up shop and make a bundle from goldminers. As wagoncaptain, Flashman is nominally in charge of his and Susie's (now his wife) collection of women, supplies, and sex toys, and the other forty-niners and invalids looking for a better life, but he depends on the guidance of Richens Lacey Wootton to see them through. Unfortunately, Wootton becomes stricken with cholera. Flashman is left to get everyone to Bent's Fort in safety, which Comanches make difficult for him. Eventually, they reach Santa Fe, New Mexico, where Flashman absconds with two thousand dollars made from selling one of the prostitutes, Cleonie, to Navajos.

For safety in the wilderness, Flashman falls in with a group of travellers, but he discovers then to be scalp-hunters when they attack a band of Apaches. Flashman joins in but refuses to take any scalps or rape the captive women, which saves him when the scalp-hunters are killed by the rest of the tribe on their return. He ends up marrying Sonsee-Array, the daughter of chief, Mangas Coloradas, and becoming friends with Geronimo. Eventually, he escapes and is saved by Kit Carson on the Jornada del Muerto.

In 1875, Flashman returns to America with his wife, Elspeth. He meets George Armstrong Custer and Mrs. Arthur B. Candy, both of whom lead him into disaster. He travels to Bismarck, North Dakota, in order to meet with Mrs. Candy and pursue a carnal relationship, but is kidnapped by Sioux and kept captive at Greasy Grass. He escapes just in time to see the defeat and death of Custer and to be partly scalped himself. The book ends with Flashman discovering that he left more behind in America in 1850 than two jilted wives.

Characters

Fictional characters

*Harry Paget Flashman - The hero or anti-hero
*Elspeth - His loving and possibly unfaithful wife.
*Susie B. Willinck - A brothel owner and former prostitute.
*Cleonie/Mrs. Arthur B. Candy - One of Susie Willinck's prostitutes.

Historical characters

*Jim Bridger - Mountain man who confirms Flashman as suitable to be a wagon-captain
*Spotted Tail - A Brulé Lakota who Flashman initially meets in 1849, and then in 1875 at a wedding in Chicago. He may or may not have slept with Elspeth.
*John Joel Glanton - Scalphunter who Flashman falls in with. He describes Glanton (who he refers to as Gallantin) as "a burly fellow with feathers in his hat and two pistols belted over his frock-coat; when he turned I saw he had a forked beard and a great red birth-mark over half his face - a Sunday school-teacher, devil a doubt."
*Mangas Coloradas - Apache chief. Flashman is terrified by his physical appearance, and says, "He was a fine psychologist...an astute politician, and a bloody, cruel, treacherous barbarian who'd have been a disgrace to the Stone Age." However, even if Flashman did not like him, he definitely respected him.
*Geronimo - Future Apache chief and someone Flashman describes as "my closest Indian friend". They must have remained friends, because Flashman refers to seeing and talking to Geronimo in the early 1900s.
*Kit Carson - Frontiersman who saves Flashman after his escape from the Apaches
*Philip Sheridan
*William Tecumseh Sherman
*John Pope
*George Crook
*Crazy Horse - Sioux leader who Flashman meets twice only briefly, first as a child in the company of Spotted Tail, and later during his captivity at Greasy Grass. Flashman describes him as "young and wiry, lean-faced and lank-haired and without paint - but with those eyes he didn't need any."
*Ulysses S. Grant - President of the United States during the present novel, but Flashman evidently knows him from before. He says, "Grant was the same burly, surly bargee I remembered, more like a city storekeeper than the first-rate soldier he'd been and the disillusioned President he was."
*William B. Allison - Flashman accompanies him to Fort Robinson and translates in his negotiations with the Sioux for the Black Hills. Flashman calls him "a Senator of unusual stupidity and flatulence".
*Alfred Terry
*Red Cloud
*George Armstrong Custer - American soldier famous for his Last Stand at Greasy Grass. Flashman is acquainted with him from the American Civil War and clearly finds him annoying but also refers to him as a good soldier although too ambitious. He calls him "a reckless firebrand who absolutely enjoyed warfare, and would have been better suited to the Age of Chivalry, when he'd have broken the Holy Grail in his hurry to get at it."
*Elizabeth Bacon Custer
*Thomas Custer
*Boston Custer
*Marcus Reno
*Frederick Benteen
*Myles Keogh
*James Calhoun
*Henry Armstrong Reed
*John Gibbon
*George Yates
*Chief Gall
*Wild Bill Hickock
*Richens Lacey Wootton