Oral health of Seventh Cavalry troopers: dentitions from the Custer National Cemetery

To document the oral health of mid-nineteenth century frontiersmen, the dentitions of eight Seventh Cavalry troopers from the Little Bighorn Battlefield were examined for indications of disease. These observations are supplemented with historic records and compared with the oral health of other soldiers from the Indian Wars. The Seventh Cavalry troopers, despite their young ages, had a variety of oral problems, including abscesses, caries, periodontitis, attrition, antemortem tooth loss, and indications of tobacco use. One of the specimens had gold and tin foil fillings. Combining historic records and a dental approach to the archaeological specimens provides complementary insights which are unavailable otherwise from either of the individual fields.