"Life in Custer's Cavalry" is an interesting narrative of an interesting and less-examined period of the Custer era, through the insightful letters and diary entries of Albert and Jennie Barnitz. Barnitz was an officer with the 2nd Ohio Cavalry during the Civil War, and participated in many combat actions in that time. After the war, like many ex-soldiers, he was lured back to uniform and managed to use his exemplary combat record to obtain a commission with the 7th Cavalry Regiment, commanded by G. A. Custer.
As Utley himself states in the preface, academic historians might find fault with his presentation, as this is not the typical "historical editing" project, but a more fluid narrative. In short, it's a lot more fun to read. The basic coverage is of Barnitz's joining of the regiment in 1867 until his near-fatal wounding during the attack on Black Kettle's village in the action known as the Battle of the Washita.
The greatest appeal of this study is the inside look into the daily lives of the officers, troops and other mundane and less-than-mundane activities of the regiment. Too many other works, scholarly and not-so-scholarly, really do ignore these important glimpses into the real past of actual once-living humans.
While the writings of the Barnitz' are appealing in their own right, one of the very best features of this book are Utley's short biographical sketchs of many of the main "players" of the time period. It is here that I met some of them for the first time (so to speak), such as Edward S. Godfrey, whose name I'd always connected with his later modification of the cavalry saddle. Another is the wildly interesting Miles Keogh, an Irish soldier-of-fortune and owner of the famous Comanche.
Anyone with an interest in post-civil war cavalry life should include this book as a must-have in their library.