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a37f5e7b816facd9daa34d5cc9a27dac | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kazakhstan-oil-opec-idUSKCN1BP1ZL | Kazakhstan to remain part of global oil pact: president | Kazakhstan to remain part of global oil pact: president
By Reuters Staff1 Min Read
FILE PHOTO: Kazakhstan President Nursultan Nazarbayev attends a signing ceremony at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China August 31, 2015. REUTERS/Lintao Zhang/Pool/File photo
ASTANA (Reuters) - Kazakhstan, Central Asia’s largest oil exporter, will support future efforts to prop up the price of crude, President Nursultan Nazarbayev said on Thursday.
“The price of $52-55 (per barrel of Brent) satisfies everyone,” he told reporters. “If this position keeps working, we will maintain our solidarity in order to support the price.”
Some of the countries that joined a global pact of OPEC and non-OPEC producers to reduce output have suggested expanding it beyond December 2017 when the deal is set to expire.
On a visit to Kazakhstan last week, Venezuelan oil minister Eulogio Del Pino said global oil inventories remained too high.
Kazakhstan, however, has struggled to comply with the pact so far, as output at its giant Kashagan oil field has surged since its launch last November.
The Astana government has indicated it may have to seek a revision of the country’s quota if the global pact is extended.
Reporting by Raushan Nurshayeva; Writing by Olzhas Auyezov; Editing by Vladimir Soldatkin and Mark PotterOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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148e3019800e783a11e7a515e1724ea1 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kazakhstan-politics-verdict-idUSKBN13N1IB | Kazakhstan jails nine Islamists, two activists over attack, unrest | Kazakhstan jails nine Islamists, two activists over attack, unrest
By Reuters Staff3 Min Read
ALMATY (Reuters) - Kazakh courts sentenced nine Islamic State supporters and two leading political activists to prison terms in separate trials on Monday after their convictions over the two biggest shocks to veteran President Nursultan Nazarbayev’s rule.
Slideshow ( 4 images )
While unrelated, street unrest in April and May and a deadly Islamist attack in June dealt twin blows to stability in the oil-producing Central Asian state run since 1989 by Nazarbayev, who has brooked no dissent but remained broadly popular thanks to rising general wealth until a recent currency devaluation.
Political activists Maks Bokayev and Talgat Ayanov were sentenced to five years in prison each on Monday. They led a public protest in the city of Atyrau in April that triggered street rallies elsewhere and forced Nazarbayev to shelve a planned land reform in what amounted to a rare climbdown.
Prosecutors said the nine men sentenced to terms of 20 years to life for murder and terrorism were Islamic State sympathizers who in June attacked a National Guard facility in the deadliest episode of Islamist violence in Kazakhstan’s history.
Thousands of nationals from Central Asian nations are known to be fighting alongside Islamic State militants in Syria and Iraq, and authorities have long warned they could return and carry out attacks on home soil. Kazakhstan is mainly Muslim, but a vast majority of Kazakhs are non-observant.
Bokayev and Ayanov were convicted of “inciting social and ethnic hatred”, spreading deliberately false information at public events and failing to secure advance approval for their protest from the authorities, the court said. They both denied wrongdoing and plan to appeal against the verdict.
The wave of protests initially focused on government plans to ease restrictions on land ownership by foreigners and auction off large tracts of farmland.
But the rallies evolved into broader anti-government unrest, driven in part by an abrupt depreciation of the tenge currency after it lost nearly half its value against the dollar.
In August, Nazarbayev deferred land reform for five years.
Unlike the generally peaceful protests launched by the Atyrau activists, the Aktobe attack, blamed on followers of Salafism, an ultra-conservative school of Islam, stunned the ex-Soviet republic of 18 million with its unprecedented violence.
On June 5, 27 men attacked two stores selling firearms and then stormed the National Guard site and killed seven people. Security forces killed 18 of the attackers during the shootout and the subsequent manhunt.
In July, a lone gunman with Islamist links killed at least three policemen and two civilians in Kazakhstan’s financial capital Almaty, senior security officials said. He was captured and has since been sentenced to death.
Reporting by Olzhas Auyezov; editing by Mark HeinrichOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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ee666e94d244f2978dcfd9a5c51edb5a | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kazakhstan-president/kazakhstans-leader-nazarbayev-resigns-after-three-decades-in-power-idUSKCN1R01N1 | Kazakhstan's leader Nazarbayev resigns after three decades in power | Kazakhstan's leader Nazarbayev resigns after three decades in power
By Olzhas Auyezov6 Min Read
ALMATY (Reuters) - Kazakhstan’s President Nursultan Nazarbayev unexpectedly resigned on Tuesday after three decades in power, in what appeared to be the first step in a choreographed political transition that will see him retain considerable sway.
Known as “Papa” to many Kazakhs, the 78-year-old former steel worker and Communist party apparatchik has ruled the vast oil and gas-rich Central Asian nation since 1989, when it was still part of the Soviet Union.
Bestowed by parliament with the official title of “The Leader of the Nation”, he was the last Soviet-era leader still in office and oversaw extensive market reforms while remaining widely popular in his country of 18 million people.
“I have taken a decision, which was not easy for me, to resign as president,” Nazarbayev said in a nationwide TV address, flanked by his country’s blue and yellow flags, before signing a decree terminating his powers from March 20.
“As the founder of the independent Kazakh state I see my task now in facilitating the rise of a new generation of leaders who will continue the reforms that are underway in the country.”
But Nazarbayev, a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, said he would retain key security council and party leader positions and hand over the presidency to a loyal ally for the rest of his term, which ends in April 2020.
Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, speaker of the upper house of parliament, will take over as Kazakhstan’s acting president for the remainder of his term in line with the constitution, Nazarbayev said.
Related CoverageSenior Russian lawmaker says Kazakh leader's resignation is unexpected: agencies
Nazarbayev has no apparent long-term successor. His decision hit the price of Kazakh bonds, while the London-listed shares of Kazakhstan’s biggest bank, Halyk Bank, tumbled 5 percent. The news also appeared to weigh on the Russian rouble. Moscow is Kazakhstan’s main trade partner.
The Kremlin said Nazarbayev and Putin had spoken by phone on Tuesday, but gave no details of their conversation.
SMOOTHER TRANSITION?
“(Nazarbayev) will continue to some extent to oversee things, so it is not like he has cut the cord totally - he still has his fingers in the pie,” said Theodor Kirschner of Capitulum Asset Management in Berlin.
“That a 78-year-old won’t be sticking around forever shouldn’t be such a surprise to anyone, and this move makes the transition smoother. This doesn’t really give us a headache.”
Nazarbayev, who helped attract tens of billions of dollars from foreign energy companies and more than tripled Kazakh oil output, said he would continue to chair the Security Council and remain leader of the Nur Otan party which dominates parliament.
Slideshow ( 5 images )
The new acting president, 65-year-old Tokayev, is a Moscow-educated career diplomat fluent in Kazakh, Russian, English and Chinese who has previously served as Kazakhstan’s foreign minister and prime minister.
While praising Tokayev as “a man who can be trusted to lead Kazakhstan”, Nazarbayev - who has three daughters - stopped short of endorsing him as his preferred heir.
“We expect Tokayev to be an interim figure,” said Camilla Hagelund, an analyst at consulting firm Verisk Maplecroft. “The real question is, who will be Kazakhstan’s third president.”
Slideshow ( 5 images )
Kazakhstan is scheduled to hold both presidential and parliamentary elections next year.
Nazarbayev’s eldest daughter, Dariga, the most politically ambitious of his children, is a senator and once led a political party of her own. Another close relative, his nephew Samat Abish, is the No.2 official on the National Security Committee.
The head of state security, 53-year-old Karim Masimov, is also a close Nazarbayev confidant. He has served twice as prime minister and also worked as the president’s chief of staff.
But regardless of who eventually leads Kazakhstan, the transition may slow reforms, including in the key energy sector, according to GlobalData analyst Will Scargill.
“Although Nazarbayev will retain some key roles, his decision to resign will doubtless slow policy-making as political dynamics are restructured,” Scargill said.
Uncertainty could also hurt investor appetite for Kazakhstan’s biggest state-owned companies, which the government planned to list as part of a privatization campaign.
BALANCING ACT
Nazarbayev steered his nation, which is five times the size of France in area, to independence from Moscow in 1991. He has since managed to maintain close ties with Russia, the West, and China, Kazakhstan’s giant eastern neighbor.
Nazarbayev won 97.7 percent of the vote in the last presidential election in 2015. International observers have long judged elections in Kazakhstan to be neither free nor fair.
Nazarbayev tolerated no dissent or opposition and was criticized by rights groups who accused him of locking up his critics and muzzling the media, allegations he denied.
His government recently pushed through a number of popular policies - including raising public-sector salaries and forcing utilities to cut or freeze tariffs - stoking speculation that he was preparing for a re-election bid.
Members of Nazarbayev’s family have stakes in some of Kazakhstan’s most lucrative assets, including Halyk Bank and firms in sectors ranging from telecoms to fuel trading.
Additional reporting by Karin Strohecker in London; Writing by Olzhas Auyezov/Andrew Osborn; Editing by Gareth JonesOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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b5c618ff934252c285fda80221a58d74 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kazakhstan-swf/kazakhtelecom-may-be-first-key-state-company-to-list-abroad-in-2018-idUSKBN1CL1DF | Kazakhtelecom may be first key state company to list abroad in 2018 | Kazakhtelecom may be first key state company to list abroad in 2018
By Elzio Barreto3 Min Read
HONG KONG (Reuters) - Kazakhstan’s largest telecom operator may be the first of three big state-run companies to list abroad in 2018, an executive at the Kazakh sovereign wealth fund said on Monday, as the country looks to attract billions of dollars in its privatization drive.
Samruk Kazyna, the $67 billion sovereign wealth fund, pitched eight of the largest companies in its portfolio to Chinese investors and investment banks in a Hong Kong forum.
The fund is gauging demand from fund managers and other institutional investors for potential listings from flag carrier Air Astana [IPO-AIRA.HK], uranium miner Kazatomprom [KZTPR.UL] and Kazakhtelecom.
Five smaller companies, including national postal services operator Kazpost and power generator Samruk Energy, are likely to sell stakes to strategic buyers.
The size of the stakes to be sold varies, ranging from 26 percent for Kazakhtelecom - in which Samruk Kazyna now owns 51 percent - to 100 percent for some other state-run companies up for sale.
“It’s not decided yet who will go first, because the preparation procedures, like due diligence, have just started in Air Astana and Kazatomprom,” Dauren Tasmagambetov, the head of asset restructuring and privatization at Samruk Kazyna, said in an interview.
“For Kazakhtelecom, we know the situation better. At this point we see they’re more ready than others.”
No decision has been made where the companies will list, Tasmagambetov said, but Air Astana has mentioned Hong Kong, London or Singapore as possible.
The fund saw “a lot of interest” from potential investors at the forum, he added, as well from investment banks looking to arrange some of the deals.
Samruk Kazyna also brought national maritime shipping company Kazmortransflot, the United Chemical Company and national mining firm Tau-Ken Samruk to look for investments from Chinese firms.
Samruk Kazyna tapped China International Capital Corp, China’s oldest investment bank, to organize the Hong Kong event, looking to secure funding from large state-owned enterprises. China is pouring billions into its Belt and Road initiative around Asia.
“Considering the geographical position of Kazakhstan, we definitely see that the goals of our privatization program fully coincide with the goals of the Belt and Road program,” Tasmagambetov said. “Therefore we’re ready to offer a number of assets which could be potentially of interest to Chinese investors.”
Reporting by Elzio Barreto, editing by Larry KingOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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00dd84955b39964f9baab3771509bdc5 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kazakhstan-usa-chapman-lawsuit-idINKCN24P1EM?edition-redirect=in | Kazakhstan sues NY financier over $500 million-plus arbitration dispute | Kazakhstan sues NY financier over $500 million-plus arbitration dispute
By Reuters Staff3 Min Read
ALMATY (Reuters) - Kazakhstan is suing a New York financier, alleging he conspired with a Moldovan businessman to fraudulently secure an arbitration award of over $500 million against the oil-rich nation, according to documents filed with a New York court.
The Nur-Sultan government aims to hold emerging markets investor Daniel Chapman and his companies liable for all damages it has suffered as a result of lawsuits filed against it by Moldovan tycoon Anatolie Stati, his son and their companies, who are seeking to foreclose on a stake in a giant Kazakh oilfield.
Stati has won an arbitration award against Kazakhstan and has filed enforcement lawsuits in Britain, the European Union and the United States, briefly freezing $22 billion in assets owned by Kazakhstan’s rainy-day National Fund.
Although that freeze has been lifted, over $6 billion in other Kazakh sovereign fund assets remain frozen, mostly in the Netherlands, due to lawsuits by Stati and partners who accuse Kazakhstan of illegally nationalising their energy business.
Kazakhstan has in turn accused Stati of defrauding both the former Soviet republic and the Swedish arbitrators who ruled in his favour, charges he and his companies deny.
Further upping the stakes, in a lawsuit filed in the Supreme Court of the State of New York, the Nur-Sultan government accused Chapman and his companies of “conspiring with, and aiding and abetting, a fraudulent scheme” led by Stati.
Kazakhstan is seeking a jury trial and pursuing relief permitted by law, including compensatory and punitive damages.
“This includes any damages arising from the legal proceedings initiated by or involving the Statis in which the fraudulent scheme was perpetuated,” Justice Minister Marat Beketayev said in a statement.
A spokeswoman for Chapman and Argentem Creek Partners, a company where he serves as chief executive and which is also targeted in the lawsuit, said he and the company had no comment on the matter. A spokesman for Stati also had no comment.
The Stati camp said this month they would press ahead with legal proceedings, expected to conclude next year, to foreclose Kazakh sovereign fund Samruk-Kazyna’s stake in the giant Kashagan oilfield, after a Dutch court of appeal ruled in favour of recognising the arbitral award.
Reporting by Olzhas Auyezov; Editing by Mark PotterOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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125257a77d646a583302cc03075966de | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kazakhstan-usa-idUSL2561778020070525 | U.S. criticizes Kazakhstan over media shutdown | U.S. criticizes Kazakhstan over media shutdown
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
ALMATY (Reuters) - The United States criticized Kazakhstan on Friday for closing two media outlets controlled by the son-in-law of President Nursultan Nazarbayev and urged the Central Asian state to respect freedom of speech.
Kazakh officials on Thursday shut down the KTK TV channel and the Karavan newspaper for three months. Both are controlled by Rakhat Aliyev, a powerful political figure who is said to have fallen out with Nazarbayev.
The U.S. embassy said in a statement it was “disappointed with the decision”.
“We call on the government of Kazakhstan to honor its commitment to democratic reform and freedom of speech,” the embassy said. “We consider the right to communicate freely ideas and opinions as fundamental to democracy,” it said.
“We believe the public has the right to hear diverse points of view even if those views are different from those of the government or if they may be considered offensive by some.”
The statement came days after the Kazakh opposition criticized the United States for taking too soft a stance on what they see as the authoritarian rule of Nazarbayev.
Kazakh law enforcement agencies are investigating Aliyev on suspicion of his involvement in abducting two executives at Nurbank, a mid-size bank he controls.
Aliyev, currently Kazakhstan’s ambassador to Vienna, has not been available for comment since the criminal charges were made public on Wednesday.
Information Minister Yermukhamet Yertysbayev, who oversees the media sector, defended the authorities.
“The general prosecutor’s office carried out its duties strictly in accordance with the law,” he told Channel 31 television.
Speaking about the press generally he added: “There is more than enough freedom in our country.”
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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390af93cd3f839d8999a749d38e2b2eb | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kc-southern-results/kansas-city-southern-first-quarter-profit-beats-expectations-idUSKCN1RT1FU | Kansas City Southern first-quarter profit beats expectations | Kansas City Southern first-quarter profit beats expectations
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
FILE PHOTO: A wagon of a freight train of the Kansas City Southern (KCS) Railway Company is pictured in Toluca, Mexico October 1, 2018. REUTERS/Edgard Garrido
(Reuters) - U.S. railroad operator Kansas City Southern on Wednesday reported a first-quarter profit that topped Wall Street’s estimate, boosted by an increase in refined fuel and grain shipments to Mexico.
Shares in the company, which gets one-third of its revenue from Mexico, jumped 2.6 percent to $121 in early trading. First-quarter net income available to common stockholders fell 29 percent to $102.7 million, or $1.02 per share, versus a year earlier.
Excluding items, KSU earned $1.54 per share, beating the average analyst estimate by 10 cents per share, according to IBES data from Refinitiv.
Revenue increased 6 percent to $675 million during the quarter. Car loads fell 1 percent, largely due to protests by teachers, who blocked tracks for four weeks starting on Jan. 14 and disrupted shipments between Toluca, near Mexico City, and the Pacific Ocean port of Lazaro Cardenas.
Executives previously said that the labor uprisings would reduce profits by 5 cents per share in the first quarter.
KSU has hired management consultant Sameh Fahmy, a former Canadian National Railway Co executive who worked beside industry turnaround expert Hunter Harrison, to implement so-called Precision Scheduled Railroading measures aimed at reducing costs and improving train reliability.
Reporting by Lisa Baertlein in Los Angeles and Ankit Ajmera in Bengaluru; Editing by Shinjini Ganguli and Nick ZieminskiOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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afe0d8db1df362053a30ff8597497d70 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kc-southern-results/kansas-city-southern-profit-soars-trade-worry-eases-shares-climb-idUSKCN1MT2DL | Kansas City Southern profit soars, trade worry eases; shares climb | Kansas City Southern profit soars, trade worry eases; shares climb
By Lisa Baertlein, Rachit Vats3 Min Read
(Reuters) - Railroad operator Kansas City Southern's KSU.N quarterly profit jumped 34 percent, even after network congestion crimped operations in Mexico, where it has extensive services.
Shares climbed 4 percent to $106.76 in midday trading, partly due to easing anxiety around U.S. trade skirmishes and Mexico’s leadership transition.
Kansas City Southern Chief Executive Officer Patrick Ottensmeyer called the reworked United States, Mexico and Canada trade deal a positive, although steel and aluminum tariffs “need to be worked through.”
Renegotiation of the former North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) “left the treaty largely intact and this removes a major risk that was hanging over the stock,” CFRA Research analyst Jim Corridore said in a client note.
Comments from Mexico’s President-elect Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who takes office on Dec. 1, have further reduced uncertainty.
“Most of the signals that we’ve gotten are positive and encouraging that we will not see any major shift in either foreign relations or economic policy on Mexico,” Ottensmeyer said on a conference call with analysts.
The company dominates cross-border rail trade between the United States and Mexico, drawing about 30 percent of its revenue from such shipments. Cross-border carloads were up 20 percent from a year earlier, straining operations and sending rail car dwell times up in its Monterrey and Sanchez terminals.
Overall volumes increased 4 percent during the latest quarter, when congestion in northern Mexico sent costs around $7 million higher.
The railroad, which plans to take ownership of 50 locomotives next year, lowered its full-year volume growth forecast on the heels of its third-quarter results. It now expects full-year volume growth in the low single-digit percentages instead of mid-single digits. It cited delays in the start of crude oil movement and its own struggles to meet robust demand.
Despite challenges in the quarter, the company’s operating ratio, which measures operating costs as a percentage of revenue, improved to 62 percent from 64.4 percent a year earlier. A lower operating ratio means more efficiency and higher profitability.
Net income available to shareholders rose to $173.5 million, or $1.70 per share, in the quarter ended Sept. 30, from $129.2 million, or $1.23 per share, a year earlier.
On an adjusted basis, the company earned $1.57 per share, in line with analysts’ estimate, according to data from Refinitiv.
Revenue rose 6.5 percent to $699 million, boosted by southbound volumes of refined petroleum products related to Mexican Energy Reform.
Reporting by Lisa Baertlein in Los Angeles and Rachit Vats in Bengaluru; Editing by Maju Samuel; Editing by David GregorioOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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1e10c1979488e4ce7618e277614c99ee | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kc-southern-results/kansas-city-southern-takes-aim-at-rail-efficiency-shares-jump-idUSKCN1PC1LO | Kansas City Southern takes aim at rail efficiency, shares jump | Kansas City Southern takes aim at rail efficiency, shares jump
By Lisa Baertlein2 Min Read
FILE PHOTO: A logo of the Kansas City Southern (KCS) Railway Company is pictured in Toluca, Mexico October 1, 2018. REUTERS/Edgard Garrido
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Regional railroad operator Kansas City Southern KSU.N on Friday said it is revamping operations after 2018 financial and operational results fell short of company targets, sending shares up almost 5 percent in early trading.
“We did not meet the expectation of our customers (and) our shareowners, particularly in the areas of customer service and growth,” Chief Executive Patrick Ottensmeyer said on a conference call.
Like many of it peers, the company is implementing efficiency measures known as Precision Scheduled Railroading aimed at keeping trains running on time. It bolstered that effort by retaining management consultant Sameh Fahmy, a former Canadian National Railway Co CNR.TO executive who worked beside industry turnaround expert Hunter Harrison.
Kansas City Southern, which derives one-third of its revenue from Mexico, reported an adjusted fourth-quarter operating ratio of 64.3 percent, 30 basis points higher than prior year.
Operating ratio measures operating costs as a percentage of revenue. A lower operating ratio means more efficiency and higher profitability.
The company said it aims to reduce its operating ratio to 60 percent to 61 percent by 2021.
Fourth-quarter net income was $161.8 million, or $1.59 per share. Excluding items, it earned $1.56 per share. Analysts, on average, expected a profit of $1.53 per share, according to Refinitiv IBES data.
Revenue rose to $694 million from $660.4 million, boosted by petroleum and crude oil shipments.
Shares in Kansas City Southern were up 4.9 percent at $109.29 in morning trading.
Reporting by Lisa Baertlein in Los Angeles; editing by Jonathan OatisOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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81c453298e414e006ffd7be273598084 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kddi-daiwa-idUKKBN1FS02K?edition-redirect=uk | Japan's KDDI, Daiwa Sec tie up in smartphone asset management | Japan's KDDI, Daiwa Sec tie up in smartphone asset management
By Reuters Staff1 Min Read
TOKYO (Reuters) - Japanese telecoms operator KDDI Corp and Daiwa Securities Group Inc said on Thursday they have joined hands to offer asset management services, including using smartphones to target younger investors.
Their joint venture, established on Jan. 4, is 66.6 percent owned by KDDI and 33.4 percent by Daiwa, they said in a joint statement.
Reporting by Chang-Ran Kim; Editing by Stephen CoatesOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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3c72d576402bd6c41ada559650cc580e | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kellogg-ceo-idUSTRE6B529L20101206 | Kellogg CEO to retire with COO to succeed him | Kellogg CEO to retire with COO to succeed him
By Martinne Geller, Helen Chernikoff3 Min Read
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Kellogg Co K.N named Chief Operating Officer John Bryant its new chief executive officer on Monday, replacing David Mackay, who became eligible for retirement in July.
Mackay told the board he planned to retire, effective January 1, 2011, to spend more time with his family, according to company spokeswoman Kris Charles.
“We can’t help being surprised by the news today,” Stifel Nicolaus analyst Christopher Growe wrote in a note to clients, although he also said speculation about Mackay’s retirement preceded the announcement.
The board of the world’s largest cereal maker elected Bryant to become CEO on January 2, in accordance with its succession plan.
Bryant was actively involved in setting plans for 2011, so will probably not make any radical adjustments to the business, Growe said.
Mackay, 55, will work on the transition through March 31, the company said.
Morningstar analyst Erin Swanson said the departure may have been prompted by Kellogg’s recent struggles in the North American cereal business, where it has suffered from a lack of new products, industry discounting and the recall of 28 million boxes of cereals such as Apple Jacks and Corn Pops after complaints of a waxy smell and flavor in some boxes.
“Despite the fact that they’re the leader in the domestic ready-to-eat cereal business, they’ve been challenged by the intense competitive pressures,” Swanson said. “However what has really concerned us is management’s seeming inability to get its hands around these issues.”
She forecast that, under Bryant, Kellogg will put more emphasis on new products, but that “these investments will (not) yield measurable improvements overnight.”
Kellogg's third-quarter North American cereal sales fell 6 percent, while rival General Mills Inc GIS.N, which makes Cheerios, reported a 4 percent net sales increase for cereals in its most recent quarter.
Mackay is chairman of the Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation, a CEO-led coalition that has pledged to reduce the number of calories in the American diet.
Bryant, 45, will receive a base salary of $1 million, according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
The company also confirmed its outlook for 2010 and 2011. For 2010, it expects sales to dip about 1 percent, operating profit flat and earnings-per-share growing 4 percent to 5 percent. For 2011 it expects low single-digit net sales growth, operating profit flat to down 2 percent and low single-digit earnings-per-share growth.
Kellogg’s shares were down 7 cents, or 0.14 percent in midday trading on the New York Stock Exchange.
Reporting by Helen Chernikoff and Martinne Geller; editing by Lisa Von Ahn and Maureen BavdekOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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c6da4f36982f786768dff95cf5207fb5 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kellogg-restructuring-idUSKCN1TJ1KG | Kellogg to cut jobs, take $35 million pretax hit on North America unit revamp | Kellogg to cut jobs, take $35 million pretax hit on North America unit revamp
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
FILE PHOTO: The company logo and ticker symbol for The Kellogg Company, is displayed on a screen on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York, U.S., March 22, 2019. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File Photo
(Reuters) - Kellogg Co said on Tuesday it would cut about 150 jobs and take a $35 million hit to trim its North American operations following the sale of Keebler biscuits and a handful of other brands for $1.3 billion in April.
The announcement, small in scale for a company that employs around 34,000 globally, is a month after similar steps in Europe aimed at streamlining Kellogg’s operations and focusing on core businesses.
Kellogg, like other packaged food companies, has struggled with surging expenses owing to higher transportation and raw material costs, while consumers have shifted to trendier more health-focused upstart brands.
The company’s shares lost around 10% of their value last year and are down by more than a third from peaks hit in mid-2016.
“This transaction will result in a smaller, more focused (North American) portfolio with fewer brands... requiring a simpler, more agile and rightsized organization,” said Kris Bahner, senior vice president for Global Corporate Affairs.
The Battle Creek, Michigan-based company reported net sales of $13.55 billion in its last fiscal year with adjusted operating profit of $1.88 billion.
The pretax charges include about $20 million of expenses related to employee severance and termination benefits, the company said in a regulatory filing here.
It said it expected the restructuring moves in Europe and North America to be completed by end of 2020.
Reporting by Uday Sampath and Nivedita Balu in Bengaluru; Editing by Shinjini GanguliOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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2b36490d8a3afafbfd28322addb1bf8c | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kellogg-salmonella-idUSTRE50E0BP20090115 | Kellogg takes peanut butter snacks off shelves | Kellogg takes peanut butter snacks off shelves
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Kellogg Co said on Wednesday it was removing its Austin and Keebler branded peanut butter snacks from store shelves and put a hold on their shipments due to the current Salmonella food poisoning outbreak.
But the company said its own investigation has not indicated any concerns over its products, nor has Kellogg received any consumer illness complaints.
U.S. health authorities have reported that since September, the salmonella food poisoning outbreak has sickened at least 410 people in 43 states.
Kellogg said it is taking precautionary measures including putting a hold on any inventory in its control, removing products from retail store shelves, and encouraging customers and consumers to hold and not eat these products until regulatory officials complete their probe.
The products are Toasted Peanut Butter Sandwich Crackers, Peanut Butter and Jelly Sandwich Crackers, Cheese and Peanut Butter Sandwich Crackers, and Peanut Butter-Chocolate Sandwich Crackers.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration and other regulatory agencies have indicated that Peanut Corporation of America (PCA) is the focus of their investigation concerning a recent Salmonella outbreak thought to be caused by tainted peanut butter. PCA is one of several peanut paste suppliers used in its Austin and Keebler branded peanut butter sandwich crackers, Kellogg said.
PCA, on Tuesday,voluntarily recalled peanut butter produced in its Blakely, Georgia, processing facility because it could be contaminated with Salmonella.
U.S. Department of Agriculture, FDA and state health officials have been trying to trace the source of the outbreak.
Reporting by Steve James, Maggie Fox; Editing by Leslie GevirtzOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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f73995b87d5148dbecb97537fde40bbe | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kellogg-venezuela/maduro-seizes-kellogg-plant-after-it-leaves-venezuela-due-to-crisis-idUSKCN1IG2BS | Maduro seizes Kellogg plant after it leaves Venezuela due to crisis | Maduro seizes Kellogg plant after it leaves Venezuela due to crisis
By Corina Pons, Alexandra Ulmer3 Min Read
CARACAS (Reuters) - U.S.-based cereal maker Kellogg Co K.N on Tuesday pulled out of Venezuela due to the country's deep economic crisis, and an angry President Nicolas Maduro said its units would be taken over and given to workers.
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Kellogg confirmed later on Tuesday that its manufacturing plant had been seized by the leftist government, the latest company to jump ship amid Venezuela’s tough business climate.
“I’ve decided to hand the company over to the workers so that they can continue producing for the people,” Maduro said at a campaign rally ahead of Sunday’s presidential election.
“We’ve begun judicial proceedings against the business leaders of Kellogg’s because their exit is unconstitutional,” Maduro added to cheers from red-shirted supporters.
Maduro blames Venezuela’s crisis on an “economic war” he says is waged by Washington, greedy businessmen and coup-mongers.
Kellogg announced its retreat earlier on Tuesday, making it the latest multinational to exit the oil-rich country, which is heaving under hyperinflation and strict price controls.
“The current economic and social deterioration in the country has now prompted the company to discontinue operations,” Kellogg said in a statement, noting that it had already written off the value of its Venezuela holdings.
The company’s local operations had around 400 workers, according to local media.
Kellogg did not specify the difficulties it was facing in Venezuela, but companies have typically been struggling to find raw materials due to product shortages and currency controls that crimp imports. Maduro’s government also stops companies from raising prices to keep up with hyperinflation, sometimes forcing companies to sell below the cost of production.
Other multinational companies that have given up on the OPEC country, abandoning assets or selling them cheap, include Clorox CLX.N, Kimberly-Clark KMB.N, General Mills GIS.N, General Motors GM.N and Harvest Natural Resources.
Socialist Maduro has taken over the factories of some companies that have left the country. In 2014, authorities took over two plants belonging to U.S. cleaning products maker Clorox Co after its departure.
“This reminds me of the Clorox case,” opposition lawmaker Jose Guerra tweeted about Kellogg. “Operations halted due to lack of raw materials, the government took it over, and now it’s paralyzed.... So that means Corn Flakes are over.”
Kellogg warned against sales of its products or brands in Venezuela.
“Kellogg is not responsible for the unauthorized use of the commercial names and brands that are the property of the company and will exercise legal actions available as necessary,” the company said, adding it would like to return to Venezuela in the future.
Writing by Alexandra Ulmer and Girish Gupta; Editing by Leslie Adler and Phil BerlowitzOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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c26e0e0d860f63e1ed02e946dd36790e | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kendrascott-m-a-berkshirepartners-idUSKBN14A2GQ | Berkshire Partners to buy stake in Kendra Scott | Berkshire Partners to buy stake in Kendra Scott
By Lauren Hirsch2 Min Read
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Private equity firm Berkshire Partners LLC said on Wednesday it would acquire a significant minority stake in Kendra Scott Design Inc, in a deal that sources said values the Austin, Texas-based jewelry company at more than $1 billion.
The deal will keep Kendra Scott’s eponymous founder as the majority owner of the business which she started in 2002 with just $500, designing jewelry out of her spare bedroom. Norwest Venture Partners will continue as a minority investor.
The sources asked not to be named because financial details of the investment were not announced.
Reuters reported in November that the company was working with investment bank Jefferies LLC on a sale process.
Kendra Scott sells jewelry that includes necklaces, earrings, rings and charms, which are distinguished by their custom shapes and natural stones. Customers can also customize the large, colorful jewelry at its “Color Bars” in retail stores and online, where they can chose a stone, metal and shape to their liking.
Scott’s jewelry, much of which is priced under $100, has been worn by celebrities such as Sofia Vergara and Mindy Kaling, and has been featured on the runway by designer Oscar de la Renta.
The brand also recently moved into selling home goods such as frames.
Kendra Scott, which opened its first retail doors in Austin in 2010, now has stores across the United States, including in Alabama, Arizona, Florida, Maryland and Pennsylvania. It sells its jewelry and accessories at retail outlets that include Nordstrom Inc JWN.N and Bloomingdale's M.N.
The company has built up a strong social media platform, an increasingly important benchmark for consumer companies. It has roughly 472,000 followers on Instagram.
Jefferies LLC served as financial adviser to Kendra Scott, and Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP and Kastner, Huggins, Reddien & Gravelle LLP served as legal counsel to the company. Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP served as legal counsel to Berkshire Partners.
Reporting by Lauren Hirsch in New York; Editing by Jonathan OatisOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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282b1d3f2348ad18289f1c0c2a0355bf | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kentucky-healthcare-idINKCN0UQ07920160112?edition-redirect=in | Kentucky governor to dismantle state's health insurance exchange: newspaper | Kentucky governor to dismantle state's health insurance exchange: newspaper
By Reuters Staff1 Min Read
Matt Bevin (R-KY) speaks to a gathering at FreePAC Kentucky in Louisville, Kentucky, April 5, 2014. REUTERS/John Sommers II
(Reuters) - Kentucky Governor Matt Bevin has notified U.S. authorities that he plans to dismantle the state’s health insurance exchange created under the Obama Administration’s Affordable Care Act, the Courier-Journal reported on Monday.
Bevin’s office was not immediately available for comment.
Bevin, a Republican, has said his goal is to complete the transition of the state’s system, known as “kynect,” by the end of 2016 to the federal system, the Louisville newspaper said.
Bevin had pledged to dismantle the health exchange authorized by executive order of his predecessor, Democrat Steve Beshear. Bevin’s letter said he wants the transition to the federal site to occur “as soon as is practicable,” the newspaper said.
Reporting by Jon Herskovitz; Editing by Leslie AdlerOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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52896f759e0fecfed14678ba97481465 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kentucky-lgbt-idUSKCN0XA2J5 | Kentucky governor OKs removing clerks' names from marriage licenses | Kentucky governor OKs removing clerks' names from marriage licenses
By Steve Bittenbender3 Min Read
Matt Bevin talks with his campaign supporters at his campaign headquarters in Louisville, Kentucky, May 19, 2014. REUTERS/John Sommers II
LOUISVILLE (Reuters) - Kentucky’s governor on Wednesday signed into law a bill that removes county clerks’ names from the state marriage license forms at the center of a controversy involving an official jailed last year for refusing to issue licenses to gay couples.
Senate Bill 216, signed by Republican Governor Matt Bevin, also creates a single form that either heterosexual or same-sex couples can use. Applicants can choose between being called bride, groom or spouse.
“We now have a single form that accommodates all concerns. Everyone benefits from this common sense legislation,” Bevin said in an emailed statement. “There is no additional cost or work required by our county clerks. They are now able to fully follow the law without being forced to compromise their religious liberty.”
Last summer, Kentucky drew international attention and demonstrations after Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis refused to issue licenses to gay couples following the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to legalize same-sex marriage.
In the days after the ruling, Davis cited her Apostolic Christian beliefs defining marriage as a union exclusively reserved for heterosexual couples for her stand. Even though county clerks do not perform marriage ceremonies in Kentucky, she argued that her name on the document equaled her approval.
Four couples sued Davis in federal court for her refusal to do her job, and a judge ruled her in contempt of court and jailed her for five days. After being released, Davis would not let her name appear on such licenses, requiring her deputies to use the title notary public on the form.
While the plaintiffs raised concerns about such changes, state officials said the licenses would be deemed valid.
Bevin, who won election last year thanks to many of Davis’ supporters, campaigned on making changes to the form and issued an executive order just weeks after being inaugurated last December. The bill, whose final version was passed unanimously in both chambers, codified Bevin’s order.
After the senate vote on April 1, Michael Aldridge, executive director for the American Civil Liberties Union of Kentucky, welcomed a move that created a uniform license for everyone. The ACLU chapter represents the couples suing Davis in court.
Reporting by Steve Bittenbender, Editing by Ben Klayman and Alan CrosbyOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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20d73d6e1848fbfe30562cc705c5525f | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kentucky-marriage-idUSKBN17Y29Y | Same-sex couple can seek damages from Kentucky clerk: U.S. appeals court | Same-sex couple can seek damages from Kentucky clerk: U.S. appeals court
By Jonathan Stempel3 Min Read
(Reuters) - A federal appeals court on Tuesday revived a damages lawsuit against Kim Davis, the Kentucky county clerk who in 2015 refused to grant marriage licenses to same-sex couples because it conflicted with her Christian beliefs.
Rowan County clerk Kim Davis is shown in this booking photo provided by the Carter County Detention Center in Grayson, Kentucky September 3, 2015. REUTERS/Carter County Detention Center/Handout via Reuters
The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati said a lower court judge erred in finding that damages claims by David Ermold and David Moore became moot, after a new state law last July excused clerks like Davis, from Rowan County, from having to sign marriage license forms.
While the couple eventually did get a license, a three-judge appeals court panel said they could sue over Davis’ initial refusal to grant one, after the U.S. Supreme Court in June 2015 said the Constitution guaranteed a right to same-sex marriage.
“The district court’s characterization of this case as simply contesting the ‘no marriage licenses’ policy is inaccurate because Ermold and Moore did not seek an injunction-they sought only damages,” Circuit Judge Karen Nelson Moore wrote. “The record does not support an argument that (their) damages claims are insubstantial or otherwise foreclosed.”
Ermold’s and Moore’s case was sent back to U.S. District Judge David Bunning in Covington, Kentucky.
“The ruling keeps the case alive for a little while but it is not a victory for the plaintiffs,” Mat Staver, founder of Liberty Counsel, a Christian advocacy group representing Davis, said in a statement. “We are confident we will prevail.”
Michael Gartland, a lawyer for Ermold and Moore, called the decision a “no-brainer,” saying damages claims based on past harm often survive mootness challenges. His clients are seeking compensatory and punitive damages.
“Do I think it’s a million dollar case? Probably not,” Gartland said in an interview. “The next step will be to go to discovery and go to trial, where I am confident we will obtain a judgment against Davis.”
The refusal of Davis to issue licenses made her a national symbol for opposition to Obergefell v Hodges, the Supreme Court decision that legalized same-sex marriage nationwide.
The case is Ermold et al v. Davis, 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, No. 16-6412.
Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by Lisa ShumakerOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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93003847f63c0acf24aca73f232653f4 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kentucky-marriage/gay-man-to-run-against-kentucky-clerk-who-denied-him-marriage-license-idUSKBN1E031G?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=Social | Gay man to run against Kentucky clerk who denied him marriage license | Gay man to run against Kentucky clerk who denied him marriage license
By Suzannah Gonzales3 Min Read
(Reuters) - A gay man who was denied a marriage license in Kentucky two years ago by a county clerk who refused to issue licenses for same-sex marriages will run to unseat her next year, he said on Wednesday.
David Ermold, of Morehead, Kentucky, announced his candidacy as a Democrat against Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis, who drew worldwide attention when she refused to grant the licenses to same-sex couples, citing Apostolic Christian beliefs.
Ermold and his partner were one of the four couples who sued Davis.
“We need to restore the integrity of that office,” Ermold said in a phone interview with Reuters after his campaign announcement on Facebook. “I wasn’t treated fairly myself.”
Davis intends to seek re-election as a Republican in 2018. She said in an email on Wednesday that she helped Ermold with his candidacy paperwork.
“I shook his hand and told him ‘Congratulations and may the best candidate win,’” Davis said.
Davis spent five days in jail in September 2015 after refusing a court order to issue marriage licenses following the Supreme Court’s decision legalizing same-sex marriage.
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Her case in 2015 drew hundreds of protesters and supporters to her office in Morehead, in rural eastern Kentucky. While she was in jail, then-Republican presidential candidates Mike Huckabee and Ted Cruz visited her.
Less than a month after she was released from jail, Davis, who won election to the office in 2014 as a Democrat, switched her affiliation to the Republican Party.
After her case, Kentucky lawmakers removed all county clerks’ names from the state marriage license form.
Ermold and David Moore obtained a license and were wed on Sept. 26, 2015, Ermold said. The couple had a wedding ceremony the following month.
“We need someone who is going to stay focused on our community instead of focusing on the interests or agendas of outside organizations and politicians,” Ermold said.
In October 2017, Davis and a Liberty Counsel representative traveled to Romania, where those opposing same-sex marriage sought a referendum on the issue, to meet with religious and political leaders.
Reporting by Suzannah Gonzales; Editing by Jonathan Oatis and Matthew LewisOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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0b52ae1dfdfa5367aa7f48d32873820e | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kentucky-shooting/kentucky-supermarket-shooting-investigated-as-hate-crime-idUSKCN1N02W2 | Kentucky supermarket shooting investigated as hate crime | Kentucky supermarket shooting investigated as hate crime
By Reuters Staff3 Min Read
(Reuters) - The shooting of a black man and woman at a Kentucky supermarket was being investigated as a possible hate crime, a federal prosecutor said on Friday.
Gregory Bush, 51, a white man, has been charged with shooting Maurice Stallard, 69, in front of his grandson as they shopped in a Kroger Inc grocery store in Jeffersontown, some 15 miles (24 km) from downtown Louisville. According to an arrest citation, he then went to the parking lot and shot Vickie Jones, 67.
Bush has been charged with murder and 10 counts of first-degree wanton endangerment.
“Federal investigators are supporting local law enforcement and examining this matter from the perspective of federal criminal law, which includes potential civil rights violations such as hate crimes,” U.S. Attorney Russell Coleman said in a statement on Friday.
An armed bystander with a carry permit for a concealed weapon exchanged gunfire with Bush in the parking lot before the suspect fled in his car. He was apprehended shortly afterwards, police said.
Ed Harrell told the Louisville Courier Journal that he pulled out his pistol as Bush approached him in the parking lot and Bush told him not to shoot as “whites don’t kill whites.”
It was not immediately clear if Bush had legal representation.
If investigators suspect the killings were racially motivated, Bush could also be charged for a hate crime.
Both Stallard and Jones were shot from behind multiple times, Jeffersontown Police Chief Sam Rogers told reporters on Thursday.
Rogers said Bush suffered from mental illness and court records showed he had a history of violence and at least one instance when he used a racial slur.
About 15 minutes before walking into the Kroger supermarket Bush tried to get into a predominantly black Baptist church, police said, citing surveillance video.
First Baptist Church administrator Billy Williams told local CBS affiliate WLKY there were eight to 10 people in the church at the time.
In 2015, self-described white supremacist Dylann Roof, then 21, shot and killed nine black people in a church in Charleston, South Carolina.
Reporting by Andrew Hay in New MexicoOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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2dc5bbc10c61e8ce975429ad5094c66d | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-alibaba-idUSKBN1A51XD | Alibaba's revenue to jump 45-48 percent this year: executive chairman | Alibaba's revenue to jump 45-48 percent this year: executive chairman
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
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NAIROBI (Reuters) - China’s Alibaba expects its revenue to expand by 45 to 48 percent in its fiscal year from April as more small businesses join its online community in search of sales, Executive Chairman Jack Ma said on Thursday.
Alibaba had revenue of $22.99 billion in its year to the end of March.
“Our revenue this year, we will still have 45-48 percent growth, the money comes from solving problems for others,” Ma told hundreds of senior executives who filled a large ballroom in a five-star hotel to listen to him on his first visit to Africa.
Ma, who founded the Hangzhou-based e-commerce firm, said he would consider investing in Kenya after meeting young entrepreneurs and being impressed by the East African nation’s broadband infrastructure.
“I was surprised by the speed of the Internet,” he told the executives. He told a separate gathering at the University of Nairobi that the speed was faster than in some developed nations.
He said he would consider the investment opportunities he had seen in the country, and make a firm announcement at a later date, adding that the dozens of Chinese entrepreneurs who accompanied him had also been stirred by locals’ drive to build businesses.
“They say it is very difficult to find another Jack Ma in China but today we found a lot of Jack Mas in Africa,” he said.
Reporting by Duncan Miriri; editing by Susan ThomasOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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4463e004c4dc6ffddeb51a7b173dedf9 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-alphabet/alphabet-to-deploy-balloon-internet-in-kenya-with-telkom-in-2019-idUSKBN1K90SV | Alphabet to deploy balloon Internet in Kenya with Telkom in 2019 | Alphabet to deploy balloon Internet in Kenya with Telkom in 2019
By Duncan Miriri2 Min Read
NAIROBI (Reuters) - Alphabet Inc’s Loon said on Thursday it would deploy its system of balloons to beam high-speed Internet access with Telkom Kenya from next year to cover rural and suburban populations, marking its first commercial deal in Africa.
Known as Project Loon, the technology was developed by Alphabet’s X, the company’s innovation lab. It has since become Loon, a subsidiary of Alphabet, which is the parent company of Google.
The technology was used by U.S. telecom operators to provide connectivity to more than 250,000 people in Puerto Rico after a hurricane last year. Kenya hopes the technology can help achieve full Internet coverage of its population.
“Loon’s mission is to connect people everywhere by inventing and integrating audacious technologies,” said Alastair Westgarth, the chief executive of Loon.
Telkom Kenya is the third biggest operator in the country behind market leader Safaricom and Bharti Airtel’s Kenyan unit.
“We will work very hard with Loon, to deliver the first commercial mobile service, as quickly as possible, using Loon’s balloon-powered Internet in Africa,” said Aldo Mareuse, the chief executive of Telkom.
The terms of the deal were not disclosed.
The Loon service uses balloons, which are powered by an on-board solar panel, to provide fourth generation (4G) coverage to areas with lower population densities.
They float at 60,000 feet above the sea level, well above air traffic, wildlife, and weather events, Loon said.
With more than 45 million people, Kenya’s major cities and towns are covered by operator networks, but vast swathes of rural Kenya are not covered.
A Microsoft-backed Kenyan start-up has been using under-utilized television frequencies to connect some of those rural communities.
Reporting by Duncan Miriri; Editing by Gopakumar WarrierOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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09a608406d9de117fe8f846e52306a3c | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-attack-court-idUSKBN26S1K6 | Kenya court convicts two for helping deadly jihadist attack on shopping mall | Kenya court convicts two for helping deadly jihadist attack on shopping mall
By Humphrey Malalo, George Obulutsa4 Min Read
NAIROBI (Reuters) - A Kenyan court convicted two men on Wednesday for helping al Qaeda-linked gunmen storm Nairobi’s Westgate shopping mall and kill at least 67 people in a 2013 assault that proved Somali militants could strike at the heart of the capital.
The attack on the upscale mall - a favourite with the country’s growing middle class and foreign workers - came two years after the East African nation sent troops into Somalia following a series of kidnappings and raids on Kenyan soil.
A third defendant, also charged under a national terrorism prevention act, was acquitted in the trial, the only prosecution Kenya mounted over the assault by Somali al Shabaab militants.
Four gunmen died during the attack in one of the most secure areas of the Kenyan capital, and it has never been proven that there were any others who escaped.
The three defendants - all ethnic Somalis, two of whom are Kenyan citizens - were accused of assisting the attackers.
“The prosecution has proved its case against the accused on charges of conspiracy of committing a terrorism act and supporting a terrorist group,” Chief Magistrate Francis Andayi said as he read the verdict.
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HARROWING TESTIMONY
During his judgment, Andayi referred to harrowing testimony from witnesses: bodies slumped behind the wheels of cars whose windscreens were shattered with bullets, their engines still running, a man attending a children’s cookery event who was shot several times before he crawled under a car and passed out.
Andayi said the prosecution’s case hinged on evidence of phone communication in the months before the attack between the accused and the gunmen.
The two convicted men will be sentenced on Oct. 22. Andayi was one of four different magistrates who presided over the case over seven years; there was no jury.
The authorities’ disastrous response to the Westgate attack deeply damaged Kenya’s reputation.
Soldiers and police fired at each other during a chaotic four days and footage emerged of soldiers looting the complex amid bodies sprawled on the bloodstained floor.
The trial provided little comfort for the loved ones of victims because it shed very little light on what happened during the bloody standoff.
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Years later, questions such as whether the attackers’ forensic remains were ever correctly identified remain unanswered. No one from the security forces has ever been held responsible for the pillaging of the mall.
QUESTIONS LINGER
“For as long as the authorities remain reluctant or unwilling to investigate the conduct of the security forces, questions will persist as to whether justice has indeed been served in this case regardless of how the judges decide,” Otsieno Namwaya of Human Rights Watch said.
Al Shabaab has continued to mount major attacks in Kenya, including a 2015 assault on Garissa University that left 166 people dead and a 2019 attack on a Nairobi hotel and office complex that killed 21 people. The 2019 attack was the first led by a Kenyan gunman who was not an ethnic Somali, a result of al Shabaab’s intensive efforts to recruit more foreigners.
East Africa has long been plagued by Islamist militancy. Twin attacks by al Qaeda on the U.S. embassies in Tanzania and Kenya in 1998 killed 224 people. Some of those responsible later found refuge with al Shabaab in Somalia.
Reporting by Humphrey Malalo and George Obulutsa; Writing by Maggie Fick; Editing by Katharine Houreld and Mark HeinrichOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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8b735f58526a35525a68b071d299fc99 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-attack-idUSKBN19Q1VK | Somali militants kill three police in raid on Kenyan border town | Somali militants kill three police in raid on Kenyan border town
By Joseph Akwiri3 Min Read
MOMBASA, Kenya (Reuters) - Somali al Shabaab militants killed three police officers on Wednesday during a raid on a northeastern Kenyan town that sparked a day-long gunbattle, a senior police official said.
It was the latest in a spate of attacks on Kenyan security services since Nairobi sent troops into Somalia in 2011 to join a African Union force charged with neutralizing militant and other armed groups and bolstering its U.N.-backed government.
Al Shabaab gunmen attacked the police station in the town of Pandanguo in the coastal district of Lamu around 6 a.m. (0300 GMT), forcing villagers to flee, according to residents. The area is near Kenya’s long, porous border with Somalia.
The militants also raided a dispensary for drugs and houses for food items, clothes and other valuables, witnesses said. Smoke could be seen rising from the village later in the day.
By 6 p.m., three policemen had been killed and a gunbattle was continuing, police said.
“The attackers used RPGs (rocket-propelled grenades),” George Kinoti, Kenya’s national police spokesman, said in a text message. “Reinforcements sent to engage the enemy have killed several terrorists.”
In July 2014, more than 60 militants attacked the same village, torched houses and stole drugs at the same dispensary.
Al Shabaab’s military operations spokesman, Sheikh Abdiasis Abu Musab, confirmed Wednesday’s attack to Reuters by phone.
“We burned the police station and captured cars. Now, today, there are sporadic exchanges of gunfire between us and the police in the outskirts of the town but we still control the town,” he said.
The raid follows a series of attacks in Kenya claimed by Somali militants that have killed at least 28 people in the last six weeks. Most have taken place near the Somali border.
The al Qaeda-linked al Shabaab militia is fighting to overthrow Somalia’s weak, U.N.-backed government and impose strict Islamic law in the Horn of Africa state.
They ramped up attacks in neighboring Kenya after Kenyan troops entered Somalia to join the AU peacekeeping force there.
In a separate incident in Somalia, an air strike killed 10 al Shabaab militants near the southern port city of Kismayo, the Mogadishu government said. It was not immediately clear who carried out the air strike.
Somalia’s government does not have aircraft but mentioned “international partners” in its press statement. Ethiopia, Kenya and the United States have all conducted air raids on Somali territory.
Additional reporting by Humphrey Malalo; writing by Katharine Houreld; editing by Mark HeinrichOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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a5895825c99338453898d0e5059cb88d | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-attack/kenya-foils-terror-attack-planned-by-somali-militants-idUSKBN1930NK | Kenya foils terror attack planned by Somali militants | Kenya foils terror attack planned by Somali militants
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
NAIROBI (Reuters) - Kenya has seized six men suspected of planning an attack sponsored by the al Shabaab militant group from neighboring Somalia, the head of Kenyan police said late on Sunday.
In recent weeks, the East African nation has lost 20 officers in various attacks, mostly on deserted roads in the vast northern region bordering Somalia, in which the militants used Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs).
Joseph Boinnet, the inspector general of the police, said in a statement that two of the suspects were Kenyans and the others were Somali nationals. Police also seized assembled explosives, four suicide vests and bomb-making materials such as TNT.
“The six had been dispatched from Burhanche in Somalia by their commanders to launch attacks in Kenya,” Boinnet said.
Kenyan security forces worked with their counterparts in Somalia to foil the attack and to capture the suspects. The captured men were being interrogated to establish the extent of the entire network, Boinnet said.
Kenya has faced a constant security challenge from across the border ever since it sent its troops into Somalia in late 2011, to help defeat the al Shabaab militants and restore order.
Reporting by Humprey Malalo; Writing by Duncan Miriri; Editing by Gareth JonesOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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8e3f13f6e823a25b9f34aeb5efc0a1c9 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-attacks-idUSKCN11H0AC | Robed women petrol-bomb police station in Kenya's Mombasa | Robed women petrol-bomb police station in Kenya's Mombasa
By Joseph Akwiri3 Min Read
MOMBASA, Kenya (Reuters) - Three robed women tricked their way into a Mombasa police station where they stabbed one officer and set fire to the building with a petrol bomb before being shot dead, an officer and a witness said on Sunday.
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Police also recovered an unexploded suicide vest from one of the attackers, spokesman George Kinoti said in a statement.
The city of Mombasa, with a large Muslim population on the coast of Kenya, has been targeted by Islamist militants in recent years although the frequency of attacks has subsided.
Under the pretext of reporting a stolen phone, the women walked into the police station on Saturday morning, a knife and petrol bomb concealed in their traditional Buibui robes.
“While being questioned by officers, one drew a knife and the other threw a petrol bomb at the police officers,” Patterson Maelo, Mombasa County Police Commander, told reporters.
“The station caught fire. Police shot the three and killed them. Two officers are in hospital with wounds. Presumably it is a terror attack.”
Two bullet-proof jackets and an unused petrol bomb were recovered from the dead suspects, Coast regional commander Nelson Marwa told reporters.
Two separate police sources who asked not to be named said a woman who had housed the suspects the night before the attack had been arrested.
Kinoti said police arrested three other people at the house of one of the attackers, saying they were her accomplices.
Salma Mohamed, a witness who was at the station to see a relative in custody, said one attacker had jumped onto a counter and stabbed an officer in the thigh before being shot.
Police did not say which group the suspects were linked to but Mohamed said the women pledged allegiance to al Shabaab.
“They shouted saying they were al Shabaab and recited the Arabic slogan ‘Allahu Akbar’ even as police fired bullets at them. They did not run. They shouted until bullets felled them down,” she told reporters.
Somalia’s al Qaeda-linked al Shabaab has claimed responsibility for attacks in Mombasa and other parts of Kenya, saying this was retaliation for Kenya sending troops to Somalia.
Al Shabaab was behind an attack on Nairobi’s Westgate shopping mall that killed 67 people and a raid on Garissa university in the northeast that killed 148. The militants also launched attacks in 2014 that killed more than 100 in Lamu County region.
Reporting by Joseph Akwiri; Additional reporting by Humphrey Malalo in Nairobi; Writing by George Obulutsa; Editing by Ruth PitchfordOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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991bfbd1bfa428fd68c08ac13e4b1142 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-backstreet-abortions-idUSTRE79O4XV20111025 | Kenya backstreet abortions kill thousands each year | Kenya backstreet abortions kill thousands each year
By Katy Migiro, TrustLaw6 Min Read
NAIROBI (TrustLaw) - “I was bleeding like hell. I knew that I was going to die,” Emily said, recalling how she sat naked on a plastic basin, hemorrhaging blood for two weeks after paying $10 for an abortion in Nairobi’s Mathare slum.
“It is the most painful thing I have ever experienced in my life. Even giving birth is not as painful as doing abortion.”
One reason the world’s population is soaring - to 7 billion, by U.N. calculations, on October 31 - is because many poor women have little control over their bodies or their fertility.
One place where that is most apparent is in Kenya, where high rates of sexual violence, limited access to family planning and poverty mean 43 per cent of pregnancies are unwanted.
The majority of these women and girls have no choice but to give birth because abortion in most cases is technically illegal, although enforcement of laws around abortion are ambiguous, leading to one standard for the rich and another for the poor and uneducated.
As a result, at least 2,600 Kenyan women die in public hospitals each year after having botched backstreet abortions. Many more die at home without seeking medical care. And another 21,000 are admitted for treatment of abortion-related complications.
When Emily, 28, found out she was pregnant in 2009, her boyfriend denied it was his child and left her. She was jobless and already had a seven-year-old daughter, Ashley, to care for. Emily’s friends advised her to terminate the pregnancy.
“I have seen what my girls have gone through with abortion. I was very afraid,” she said, adding how she found a 20-year-old friend dead alongside a note explaining how she had drunk a bottle of bleach hoping to cause a miscarriage.
After two months debating what to do, Emily borrowed $10 from friends - the equivalent of two months’ rent - and sought treatment from a well-known local abortionist.
The elderly woman inserted a plastic tube into Emily’s vagina and told her to sit for several hours on a bucket until she heard a pop.
“I felt something hot from my stomach coming out. She gave me some medicine and I went home,” Emily said, sitting in a friend’s one-room corrugated iron shack off a muddy alley.
After a week of bleeding, Emily’s friends brought her more medicine from the abortionist but it didn’t help. Eventually, they carried her to a nearby clinic where she was given an injection that stopped the hemorrhaging.
Her ex-boyfriend beat her when he found out about the abortion.
“He told me that I am a murderer, that I killed his baby,” Emily said.
WOMEN DIE IN POLICE CUSTODY
Kenya is a deeply religious Christian country and the church is vocal in its condemnation of abortion.
The implementation of the law, which prohibits abortion except in cases where the mother’s life is in danger, is ambiguous, however.
The penal code says women who abort illegally can be jailed for seven years. But wealthier and more educated women take advantage of “medical guidelines,” which allow terminations in the interests of a woman’s physical or mental health but require the signatures of multiple doctors.
“In Kenya, we don’t know whether to procure an abortion is legal or illegal. We are just in between,” said one doctor who performs abortions.
Public hospitals rarely provide the service, but it is easily available in private practices, such as the prestigious Nairobi Hospital where women pay around $1,000 for a termination.
International charity Marie Stopes performs abortions in clinics for $25 to $60, which is still unaffordable for the majority of Kenyans.
“If we were to charge a lower price, we would be overwhelmed,” said a doctor working for Marie Stopes.
NEEDLES AND STICKS
Women and teenage girls who are poor often have no option but to turn to quacks in backstreet hovels.
“They use bicycle spokes, knitting needles ... putting sticks, pens through the cervix,” said Dr. Joseph Karanja, an obstetrician-gynecologist who works at Kenyatta National Hospital in Nairobi.
Other painful, often lethal, methods include drinking detergent or overdosing on malaria pills.
The hospital’s acute gynecology ward receives five women each day seeking post-abortion care. It has 30 beds, sometimes shared between up to 70 women.
Women often delay seeking treatment until they are very sick due to fear, lack of money or emotional turmoil.
“They come at the point of death,” said Karanja, who estimates one or two women die from post-abortion complications at the hospital each month.
“They stay at home scared because they are afraid they will be arrested. So the uterus goes rotting inside. They get a very bad kind of infection called septic shock, where there is tissue damage, kidney damage, and then they finally die.”
Unsafe abortions account for 35 percent of maternal deaths in Kenya, versus the global average of 13 percent.
“We are losing many people through the botched and backstreet abortions,” said the Marie Stopes doctor.
“If we legalize it, we shall find that the number of deaths will go down or maybe there won’t be any deaths at all.”
For Karanja, the problem is the divide between Kenya’s rich and poor.
“The high and mighty don’t have a problem. In those ivory tower hospitals, these services are available as a routine,” he said.
“These services should be provided in all public health facilities because that is where ordinary people go.”
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22439a4f8aaaac8ecebbe2db70129e6b | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-bharti-airtel-idUSKBN1HH0UR | Telkom Kenya and Airtel seek merger to take on Safaricom: sources | Telkom Kenya and Airtel seek merger to take on Safaricom: sources
By Duncan Miriri3 Min Read
NAIROBI (Reuters) - Telkom Kenya plans to merge operations with Indian-owned Bharti Airtel's BRTI.NS local unit as a first step to acquiring all of Airtel's assets, sources said on Tuesday, creating a stronger challenger to market leader Safaricom.
The two operators have a combined 23 percent of Kenya's 41 million mobile subscribers, but have long struggled to compete with Safaricom SCOM.NR, which has a 71.9 percent market share.
The disparity is even wider in revenue terms, with Safaricom, which is 35 percent held by South Africa's Vodacom VODJ.J, enjoying more than 90 percent in both voice and short messages categories.
Data from the Communications Authority (CA) regulator showed Safaricom also has close to 90 percent of the annual revenue from the Internet access business.
It also has a commanding lead in mobile phone money transfer with its M-Pesa service, which is regulated by the central bank.
A source at CA said the two firms have been engaging officials over the plan to share outlets and infrastructure like transmission assets, before Telkom acquires Airtel Kenya at an unspecified time.
“They are yet to make a formal application (to the telecoms regulator) disclosing all the details,” the source told Reuters.
BULKING UP
Wang’ombe Kariuki, the director general of the Competition Authority of Kenya did not comment on the deal, saying both firms were yet to lodge a merger application.
Telkom Kenya, which is controlled by Africa-focused, London-based Helios Investment declined to comment. Airtel Kenya also said it would not comment.
Industry executives said that if a deal to acquire all of Airtel Kenya’s assets goes through, it would help both firms make significant savings and acquire the scale to compete effectively with Safaricom.
“This is a cold, calculated business strategy,” said a telecoms executive who did not wish to be named.
Bharti Airtel has been examining a flotation of a minority stake in its African operations but has said it remains committed to the continent.
Sources said the combined entity could however create concerns because it will enjoy a large slice of prime spectrum.
A merger of Telkom and Airtel will result in a new company with 77 megahertz of spectrum, compared with just 47 for Safaricom.
They said that will create a new challenge for the sector regulator, which had commissioned consultants Analysys Mason to review competition in the industry.
That study caused controversy after a leaked draft showed it recommended the breaking up of Safaricom to boost competition, forcing the government to pledge no operator would be broken up.
Executives said a joint venture between Telkom and Airtel could render the report useless.
“The competition study they had done becomes toilet paper,” said the industry official who did not wish to be named.
Editing by Keith WeirOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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b6ae95c46cc179a99dc1006cccade5be | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-bonds-green-idUSKBN1721OI | Kenya sets sights on green bonds after mobile phone issue | Kenya sets sights on green bonds after mobile phone issue
By George Obulutsa3 Min Read
NAIROBI (Reuters) - Kenya aims to issue its first ‘green’ bond this year, the initiative’s backers said on Friday, bolstering the nation’s reputation for financial innovation after the government launched the world’s first mobile phone bond earlier this month.
The proceeds from so-called green bonds help finance projects in the renewable energy, energy-efficiency, green transport and wastewater treatment sectors.
France and Poland both issued green bonds in the last four months, becoming the first nations to venture into territory previously dominated by development banks and companies.
“I believe we will have the first green bond issued this year,” said Lamin Manjang, chairman of the Kenya Bankers Association (KBA), which is spearheading the green finance initiative.
He did not say who would issue the bond or its potential size. Kenya’s first green bond is likely to be issued privately.
Plans for a green sovereign issue by Kenya will follow after the first issue under the KBA initiative, Central Bank Governor Patrick Njoroge told Reuters earlier this month.
On Friday during the launch of the green bond program, he repeated his support.
“This definitely has legs. This will see the light of day,” he said.
Nigeria has unveiled plans to launch a local currency green bond in April.
The green bond issue will bolster Kenya’s reputation as a financial innovator after the government launched M-Akiba, the world’s first bond sold exclusively over mobile phones, last week.
The mobile phone bond aims to tap a pool of small investors, offering them a bond for as little as 3,000 shillings. The initial offering is 150 million shillings ($1.46 million).
Finance Minister Henry Rotich said the offer had already hit more than half of its target within a week. Nearly 68,400 mobile phone users have invested 79 million shillings.
Habil Olaka, chief executive officer of Kenya Bankers Association, said the green bond would build on M-Akiba’s success.
“We are seeing the success of M-Akiba, (and) us leveraging on it,” he said.
Editing by Katharine Houreld and Toby DavisOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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7510be8a97b460580200dc67f4ba7501 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-cholera-idUSKBN1A61HU | WHO sees high risk from Kenya cholera outbreak | WHO sees high risk from Kenya cholera outbreak
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
GENEVA (Reuters) - An outbreak of cholera in Kenya poses a high risk to the region and a moderate threat globally, the World Health Organization said on Friday, after delegates at two international conferences were hit.
The spread of the disease has surged since April, affecting the capital Nairobi, a major hub for conferences in Africa, and the large refugee camps of Dadaab and Kakuma.
The disease, which is spread by ingesting fecal matter, hit 146 at a conference in Nairobi on June 22, and a further 136 people at the China Trade Fair on July 10-12, one of whom died.
In total, the disease, which causes acute watery diarrhea and can kill within hours if not treated, registered 1,216 suspected cases and 14 deaths between the start of the year and July 17.
“The risk of the current outbreak is assessed as high at national and regional levels and moderate at global level,” WHO said in a disease outbreak news item.
Cholera is reported in Kenya every year but large cyclical epidemics normally come every five to seven years, it said.
Kenya holds elections for the presidency, the legislature and local seats on Aug. 8.
Reporting by Tom Miles; Editing by Alison WilliamsOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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54ba52ae230c9c881184ef96e887a32b | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-conservation-idUKKCN24G0TD?edition-redirect=uk | Wild animals losing freedom to roam as city encroaches on Nairobi park | Wild animals losing freedom to roam as city encroaches on Nairobi park
By Katharine Houreld3 Min Read
NAIROBI (Reuters) - Rhinos, lions, buffalo and leopards range against the background of a city skyline in the Nairobi National Park, Africa’s only game reserve within a capital city.
The park has been fenced in on three sides as the city mushroomed around it.
Outside its unfenced southern boundary, the banks of the Mochiriri River are a favoured refuge for breeding lions. Animals often pass through to make their way to larger parks beyond.
But the Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) has proposed a 10-year plan to fence land along the southern boundary to reduce conflict between people and animals.
The idea has many conservationists up in arms and a court hearing on the plan is scheduled on Wednesday.
“This is the lifeline of this park,” said Reinhard Nyandire, a conservationist working with the Friends of Nairobi National Park, gesturing to the open pastures behind him.
“When they fence the park, you cut them (the animals) off,” he said.
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The volunteer group is dedicated to helping KWS keep the lands around the park open.
The KWS director general and spokesmen did not respond to requests to discuss the plan.
Commercial buildings are encroaching on the park’s land and in 2018, a six-km railway bridge was built through it. Sewage from nearby settlements empties into the river, KWS reports say.
Animals often leave the park during the rainy season when the grass is too long to see predators and return during the dry season when the grass inside is more lush. The park also links up to migration corridors leading to larger parks.
The plan proposes fencing in land on the southern boundary if the owners are willing, or if they do not agree, to fence the park itself.
A 2016 KWS report said fencing was the “least suitable option” to reduce animal-human conflict. Shrinking ranges would cause conflict among rhinos and lions, other species could not migrate, and inbreeding would be a problem.
Slideshow ( 8 images )
It is not the only option. The plan itself said conservation initiatives such as installing free motion-sensor lights to deter lions have already reduced human-animal conflict.
Nkamunu Patita, co-ordinator for the Naretunoi conservancy which borders the park, said many landowners do not want any fencing.
When Reuters visited Naretunoi, herds of zebras were resting there with fluffy babies, unsteady young giraffe grazed alongside their mothers, and ostrich and wildebeest roamed alongside Maasai cows.
Freedom to move across wide swathes of land benefits both wildlife and Maasai herders, she said.
“Their way of life is compatible with conservation,” she said. “That’s why you see zebras and cows grazing together.”
Editing by Angus MacSwanOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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f5ba044c61010753efd53e2ba7c33caf | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-corruption/kenyan-court-grants-bail-to-nairobi-governor-charged-with-corruption-idUSKBN1YF17T?edition-redirect=in | Kenyan court grants bail to Nairobi governor charged with corruption | Kenyan court grants bail to Nairobi governor charged with corruption
By Humphrey Malalo3 Min Read
NAIROBI (Reuters) - A Kenyan court granted bail on Wednesday to the Nairobi County governor charged with multi-million dollar corruption in one of the most high profile cases in the government’s anti-graft push.
Nairobi's Governor Mike Sonko leaves the court room after a hearing, after he was arrested on corruption-related charges, at the Milimani Law Courts in Nairobi, Kenya December 11, 2019. REUTERS/Baz Ratner
The move was opposed by the prosecution, which argued Governor Mike Mbuvi Sonko was likely to interfere with witnesses and obstruct the investigation.
Sonko, an elected official from President Uhuru Kenyatta’s Jubilee party known for his flamboyant lifestyle, was arrested on Friday.
He has denied charges of conspiracy to commit corruption, conflict of interest, failure to comply with procurement laws, unlawful acquisition of public property and laundering.
Corruption is a huge drag on the economy and investor confidence in East Africa’s business hub.
Since taking office in 2013, Kenyatta has repeatedly pledged to tackle graft and over the past year the country’s top prosecutor has charged dozens of officials, including the then sitting finance minister.
The president has not commented on Sonko’s case.
Magistrate Douglas Ogoti said the bail ruling took into account the presumption of innocence. He said Sonko would be freed after posting a bond of 30 million shillings ($296,000) with one surety of a similar amount and a cash bail of 15 million shillings.
Sonko, a former senator, was elected in 2017 after years of news splashes about his flashy fashion sense including chunky gold jewelry and eye-catching hairstyles.
The prosecution had also opposed the governor’s release on bail because they said he had previously escaped from custody following conviction in two criminal cases in the late 1990s.
Sonko’s team did not respond to that.
Ogoti also ordered the governor not to incite supporters once free nor to post on social media about the case.
Police set up barriers on streets around the court before the hearing in anticipation of possible trouble. In November, police used teargas to disperse supporters when he was called into the anti-corruption office for questioning.
Sonko was recently photographed using a gold-plated iPad and matching iPhone and has appeared in rap videos gyrating in gold-colored trainers while insulting political opponents.
He invited a storm of criticism this month after he shared photos online of his dining room, featuring a gold-plated lion statue and a gold-tinted dining table and chairs.
He has recruited hundreds of people into his “Sonko Rescue Team” who sweep out streets or appear at fires wearing “Sonko”- branded red boiler suits in Nairobi’s poorest neighborhoods.
But despite taking a recent award for encouraging volunteering, Sonko’s watch has seen little improvement in public services. Public schools and clinics are crumbling, roads are potholed and hundreds of thousands of people live in slums without access to services.
Reporting by Humphrey Malalo; Additional reporting by Omar Mohammed and Maggie Fick; Writing by George Obulutsa; Editing by Maggie Fick and Andrew CawthorneOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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4db81cfad42509297aacd0cd99e57fd3 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-court-ruto-idUSKCN0X21WC | International Criminal Court throws out charges against Kenyan deputy president | International Criminal Court throws out charges against Kenyan deputy president
By Thomas Escritt3 Min Read
AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - Judges at the International Criminal Court on Tuesday threw out post-election violence charges against Kenyan Deputy President William Ruto, giving him a major boost as he prepares to make another run for office in elections next year.
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In a complex ruling on Tuesday, ICC judges declared that there was no case for Ruto and his co-accused, broadcaster Joshua Sang, to answer.
The two were accused of fomenting murderous inter-ethnic violence in Kenya after the 2007 elections in the country, leading to some 1,200 deaths. A similar case against Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta collapsed last year.
“This decision brings to a close what has been a nightmare for my nation,” Kenyatta said in a speech welcoming the decision. “Our country is fully back on focus to enhance our efforts towards nation building, promoting peace and security.”
Judges halted the trial before Ruto’s defense lawyers opened their case, ruling that prosecutors had failed to marshal enough incriminating evidence, but the three judges were divided on whether to acquit, continue the case or declare a mistrial.
The decision was a blow to prosecutors at the court who have seen their highest-profile cases evaporate under heavy political pressure from Kenya and its African Union allies. They had accused the court of unfairly targeting Africans.
Set up in 2002, the ICC has struggled to enforce its will in countries that are reluctant to cooperate with it. Powerful indictees like Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir and guerrilla leader Joseph Kony remain at large.
Related CoverageKenyan President Kenyatta says innocence of Ruto, Sang vindicated after ICC mistrial
But the absence of an acquittal in the Ruto and Sang cases means the ICC is free to bring fresh charges in future. The judges said on Tuesday that their task had been made impossible by political interference and efforts in Kenya to threaten prosecution witnesses into silence.
Kenya’s Citizen Television showed crowds cheering in Ruto’s electoral heartland of Eldoret in reaction to the ruling, which followed a similar withdrawal of charges against Kenyatta.
The three judges in the case were deeply divided over how to proceed, with presiding judge Chile Eboe-Usuji writing in a separate opinion that a mistrial had taken place.
“Declaration of mistrial and allowing the case to start afresh in the future is better than rewarding the interference and political meddling with a verdict of acquittal,” he said.
Another judge, Robert Fremr, wrote that Ruto should have been acquitted, while the third, Olga Herrera Carbuccia, wrote that the trial should have proceeded until the reaching of a verdict.
Additional reporting by George Obulutsa in Nairobi; Editing by Mark HeinrichOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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267c82d339b18216945faf61bfe35b47 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-crash/three-americans-among-five-killed-in-kenya-plane-crash-source-idUSKCN1Q22BG | Three Americans among five killed in Kenya plane crash: source | Three Americans among five killed in Kenya plane crash: source
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
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NAIROBI (Reuters) - A light plane crashed in Kenya’s Great Rift Valley region on Wednesday, killing five people including three Americans, a police source said.
Witnesses saw the plane clip a tree as it attempted an emergency landing and crashed in a field in Kericho county west of the capital Nairobi. The Kenyan pilot and another passenger, of unknown nationality, also died, the police source said.
“The plane clipped the tree and the rear wheels came off,” said farm worker Joseph Ng’ethe. “It then careened and crashed into another tree in front and into the ground.”
The Kenya Civil Aviation Authority (KCAA) said it received a distress signal from the plane, with registration 5YBSE, which was flying from the Maasai Mara wildlife reserve to the northern county of Turkana when it crashed.
“This prompted our Search and Rescue team to initiate an emergency mission,” KCAA said, adding that it had started investigations.
The American fatalities were a man and two women, the source said.
Witnesses said the plane was making odd sounds as it approached the field. The pilot gestured at farm workers on the ground below to move away before the rear hit a tree, they said.
Last year, eight passengers and two pilots were killed when a single turboprop Cessna Caravan plane operated by local firm FlySax on a domestic flight to Nairobi crashed into a mountain.
Reporting by Humphrey Malalo and Duncan Miriri; Editing by Andrew CawthorneOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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b60b498cc366deda262b718e485e3119 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-credit-uber-idUSKCN0ZG1RW | Uber driver data in Kenya helps bridge credit gap | Uber driver data in Kenya helps bridge credit gap
By Neha Wadekar5 Min Read
NAIROBI (Reuters) - Sidian Bank has approved its first car loans to experienced Uber [UBER.UL] drivers in Kenya, using a model the ride hailing service hopes can be rolled out across countries in Africa where a lack of customer data limits lending.
A customer uses her cell-phone to access the Sidian Bank mobile-app inside the banking hall at the Sidian Bank headquarters on the outskirts of Kenya's capital Nairobi, June 29, 2016. REUTERS/Thomas Mukoya
Getting loans is one of the main hurdles facing small businesses and individuals across the continent as relatively few people have bank accounts or a credit score to go with them so lenders can assess risk.
Under the Sidian Bank scheme, Uber’s app for booking cars and registering customer satisfaction provides the data the lender needs to decide whether to offer Uber drivers relatively cheap loans to buy their own cars.
To secure a loan from Sidian, a driver must have accumulated a minimum of 500 trips with Uber and have an average passenger rating score of at least 4.6 points out of a top mark of 5, a way of ensuring the best-performing drivers get the loans.
“It’s really a data-driven approach to credit risk analysis, dispensing with the traditional banking method and relying instead on the data that Uber has collected,” Sidian Bank Chief Executive Officer Titus Karanja said.
For Uber drivers in Kenya’s capital Nairobi such as Michael Muturi, it means he now has the chance to buy a car that would normally be out of reach, as most of his earnings typically go to the owner of the car he uses.
“I felt like I won a jackpot,” said Muturi, who received an Uber message this month telling him his profile was good enough to apply. “With my own car I will be able to afford a good house, take my kids to a good school and save for the future.”
Sidian is offering up to 100 percent financing for a car, with a maximum loan of 1.5 million shillings. Since launching the service at the end of May it has already approved 10 three-year loans with a 10.5 percent interest rate, well below the average 18 percent rates most Kenyans face.
A lack of credit history in the country, where the first credit rating bureau opened in 2010, is one of the reasons just 4.4 percent of the 45 million population have a personal bank loan, according to the central bank.
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“It’s hard to tap into the credit market in Kenya,” said Melekot Abate, an associate in the Nairobi office of development advisory firm CrossBoundary.
“Most individuals have very little credit history or assets to seize so banks are unwilling to take the risk,” he said.
INSPIRING COMPETITION
As in other markets, Uber drivers have faced opposition and sometimes hostility from other taxi drivers. In March, Kenya charged six men with attempted murder and malicious damage to property over an attack an Uber driver. But Uber continues to expand in a country where many are wary of taking rides with drivers they don’t know and trust. Uber has also inspired rivals.
Mobile phone company Safaricom, which is 40-percent owned by Britain’s Vodafone, said this month it was teaming up with a local software firm to launch a ride-hailing service to take on Uber.
Sidian Bank, which is part of Kenya’s biggest listed investment vehicle Centum Investment, has allocated 10 billion shillings to the car loan program and Uber hopes it can be adopted elsewhere. “It makes sense for all of these countries that we’re going into in Africa to implement similar programs,” Nate Anderson, acting general manager for Uber in Kenya, told Reuters.
“Hopefully it’s going to be a much shorter time frame before it’s live in places like Tanzania, like Uganda and like Ghana.”
A similar credit scheme has been rolled out using Uber data in South Africa, the continent’s most industrialized economy.
But Kenya’s less developed financial market is more typical of the rest of the continent and should provide a better indication of how the credit program could be repeated.
About 38 percent of Kenyans have accounts with commercial banks compared with 77 percent in South Africa, according to FSD Kenya, a development program funded by Britain that works to expand access to financial services.
Kenyans have already pioneered new financial technology. Safaricom’s M-Pesa mobile money transfer service has mushroomed, inspiring rival services in Kenya as well as similar initiatives in other African markets and beyond.
“People are very quick to adopt technologies here, and really embrace things that can create efficiencies and help improve people’s lives,” Uber’s Anderson said.
Additional reporting by Duncan Miriri; editing by Edmund Blair and David ClarkeOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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a6d794d3411140920a231cc98cd1c9fd | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-drought-insurance-idUSKCN1SJ0EW?edition-redirect=in | Voice of resilience: Kenyan radio builds herders' trust in drought insurance | Voice of resilience: Kenyan radio builds herders' trust in drought insurance
By Kagondu Njagi6 Min Read
ISIOLO, Kenya (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - It only lasts about two and half minutes, but the brief message Asma Mohamed broadcasts on her daily radio show has become essential listening for more than half a million herders in northern Kenya.
For the past five years, station manager Mohamed has been using her show on non-profit community radio channel Baliti FM to discuss everything from good governance and livestock breeding to children’s rights and challenging gender roles.
But she gets the biggest response from her listeners in Isiolo County when she talks about insuring their animals.
As a warming climate spurs more extreme weather, herders in Kenya’s arid and semi-arid northern parts can lose up to 10 percent of their livestock when drought hits, according to the Pastoralist Capacity Development Programme, a local non-profit.
Pastoralists think of their animals as their “banks”, Mohamed said. But figures from the state-run Kenya Livestock Insurance Programme (KLIP) show that, out of an estimated 6 million Kenyans who depend on animals for their income, only a fraction have any kind of insurance for their herds.
So Mohamed and her crew decided to devote a few minutes a day to explaining how livestock insurance works, and how it can help herders get through the worst effects of drought.
“To own livestock is not only a cultural thing, but (also) a status symbol among pastoralists,” she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
“Drought is a threat to their livelihoods. But when they have insurance, they can use the money to keep their herds alive.”
FAST PAYOUT
Mohamed focuses on index-based livestock insurance, an innovative model being offered to Kenyan herders through KLIP.
It uses satellite imagery to measure how rangeland vegetation has been affected by drought.
Once an area gets dry enough to meet the threshold for a payout - usually based on how little pasture there is compared with seasonal records - pastoralists are compensated with cash they can use to buy food, water or medicine for their herds.
Index-based insurance is triggered earlier than traditional policies, which pay out only when an animal dies, and is designed to help farmers get through severe drought without losing livestock.
Since KLIP launched a pilot in two northern counties in 2015, around 18,000 pastoralist households have been insured through local agencies partially subsidized by the government.
Fatuma Guyo, 36, sells camel milk from a stall in Isiolo and has insured her animals ever since she first heard about the service on Baliti FM three years ago.
She did not want to give details of her policy, but said the payouts she received had eased the constant search for food for her animals.
“My family’s bonds have been strengthened because there is less traveling to far lands to look for pasture,” she said.
The payouts had also reduced their reliance on food relief, she added. “Life has been easier for us.”
Rahab Kariuki, managing director at Agriculture and Climate Risk Enterprise (ACRE), a company that connects farmers with insurers, said Guyo’s story was typical, with many families needing less food aid after signing up to livestock insurance.
They can also diversify their diet by buying nutritious food like greens and fruit, no longer relying only on the grains and flour supplied by aid agencies, she added.
HARD TO REACH
Bashir Mohamed, CEO of the development arm of Takaful Insurance of Africa (TIA), a provider working with KLIP, said his company had seen a dramatic rise in the number of pastoralists taking up insurance over the past few years.
And he credits Baliti FM with helping spread the word.
When TIA first launched its own index-based livestock insurance a decade ago, the company had an average of just one customer for every square kilometer in northern Kenya, he said.
Then Baliti FM started addressing the issue on air, and now TIA has 20 times as many customers.
Since 2013, more than 155,000 animals have been covered under TIA’s insurance scheme, according to company data.
In that time, it has paid out more than 60 million Kenyan shillings (about $600,000).
But in a country where livestock contributes more than 40 percent of agricultural GDP, according to the government, the TIA official sees a long way to go before all Kenya’s herds are covered.
Rough terrain, lack of internet and weak phone services make it difficult for insurance agents to reach and stay in touch with potential customers in rural areas, he said.
“Our agents often go out to look for pastoralists grazing their herds in the bush. There are no proper roads and communication network signals are very poor,” he explained.
Another challenge is the general mistrust of insurance companies among rural communities, he added.
When insurance agents approach potential customers, the farmers “cannot understand why they should peg their herds to something they cannot see or touch”, and want to know what the agents are getting out of it, he said.
SUSPICION
At Baliti FM, the station regularly gets calls from farmers worried about whether insurance is a safe way to spend their money, broadcaster Asma Mohamed said.
Easing their suspicions was a key reason why she decided to give the issue special attention on air.
As a member of the Borana tribe, who live in northern Kenya and southern Ethiopia, she has seen firsthand how destructive drought can be.
“When there is drought and the people lose their livestock, there is a feeling of doom within the community,” she said.
She feels a responsibility to grow the station’s reach beyond Isiolo and neighboring counties, so she can help more farmers across the region find ways to save their livelihoods.
“I would like to see us reaching all the marginalized people in northern Kenya,” she said. “With the proper communication network, this can be achieved.”
Reporting by Kagondu Njagi; editing by Jumana Farouky and Megan Rowling. Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, climate change, resilience, women's rights, trafficking and property rights. Visit news.trust.org/climateOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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18e36706a3d3afdd03479d1529728d5d | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-education-idUSKBN19E1EH | Kenya gives girls free sanitary pads to boost school attendance | Kenya gives girls free sanitary pads to boost school attendance
By Daniel Wesangula, Thomson Reuters Foundation2 Min Read
NAIROBI (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Kenya has promised free sanitary pads to all schoolgirls to encourage them to go to school during their periods, rather than stay at home with rags or tissues stuffed in their underwear.
Every schoolgirl is Kenya is entitled to “free, sufficient and quality sanitary towels” and a safe place to dispose of them, according to the law introduced this week.
“We are treating the access to sanitary pads as a basic human right,” government spokesman Eric Kiraithe told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
“We are improving the sanitation and healthcare of our schoolgirls, which will boost their class attendance.”
Menstruation is still taboo in many countries around the world, where it’s often considered embarrassing or shameful.
One in 10 African girls miss school during their periods, the U.N. children’s agency UNICEF estimates, which means they fall behind in their studies and often drop out of school.
“This will give girls confidence to attend class on any day of the month, consequently improving their academic performance,” said Albanous Gituru, director of Shining Hope for Communities, a girls’ school in Nairobi’s Kibera slum.
Girls can miss up to 15 days of school each term because they cannot afford sanitary products, he said.
In neighboring Uganda, researchers from Oxford University found absenteeism from school was 17 percent higher among girls who had no access to sanitary towels or information about puberty.
When 10 percent more girls go to school, a country’s GDP increases by an average of 3 percent. Each additional year of secondary schooling leads to a 15-25 percent increase in a girl’s potential income, say gender equality campaigners.
The policy will cost Kenya 500 million shillings ($4.8 million) a year, Kiraithe said, expanding on a 2011 program giving pads to girls from poor families.
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9e5a3ed61b34812ac5cd361089a8bb17 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-election-debate-idUSKBN1A3162?il=0 | Kenyan vice president candidate debates himself after rivals' no-show | Kenyan vice president candidate debates himself after rivals' no-show
By Reuters Staff3 Min Read
NAIROBI (Reuters) - Kenyans hoping to watch a televised debate between vice-presidential candidates in next month’s election were left disappointed on Monday when only one of six meant to be on stage was left fielding questions alone for an hour.
Surrounded by five empty podiums, Eliud Muthiora Kariara, a former banker turned running mate to independent presidential candidate Japhet Kavinga Kaluyu, answered questions posed by two moderators and the audience.
Why the other candidates were not present was unclear although some had already voiced objections to the debate format. Broadcasters had planned to have six minor candidates, including Kariara, take the stage first, with the front-runners from the two biggest parties facing off separately later.
A letter signed by the six and released on Sunday had said they intended to show up as long as all eight vice-presidential candidates would be debating simultaneously.
“We made it clear that we shall take part at 8pm Debates that was to bring all candidates together,” Ekuru Aukot, presidential candidate for Third Way Alliance, said on Twitter to explain why his running mate did not take part.
He also rejected reports in local media that some candidates had arrived late and not been allowed in.
“This is documented. We arrived in time,” he said.
Kenya’s current deputy president, William Ruto, said on Twitter that he had not been given details of the event.
“I am surprised no one has engaged me on the debate. Courtesy demands that date, time, rules of engagement would have been made available,” Ruto tweeted on Sunday.
But Debate Media Limited, the alliance of broadcasters that organized the debate, said in a statement that all the campaigns had been informed. It noted that one minor candidate had even lodged a court case insisting he should share the podium with the two larger parties.
“The suggestion that the campaigns did not know about these debates is therefore at best dishonest,” the statement said.
Kenya will also choose legislators and local representatives in the Aug. 8 polls, which will see incumbent President Uhuru Kenyatta challenged by veteran opposition leader Raila Odinga, the head of the National Super Alliance (NASA).
Odinga also ran in 2007, when a disputed presidential poll sparked violence that killed 1,200 people, and in a peaceful election in 2013.
Both major parties have published manifestos, although Kenyan voters have often split along ethnic lines in previous elections.
According to polling firm IPSOS, the ruling party and NASA are likely to take about 90 percent of the vote, while none of the six independent presidential candidates is polling above 1 percent.
Vice-presidential candidate Kariara used his unexpected place in the spotlight on Monday to call for leadership “to take Kenya to the next level”.
“There has been so much talk. What Kenya needs is action,” he said.
Reporting by George Obulutsa; Editing by Katharine Houreld and Catherine EvansOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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4242f7c61d51a8fd2470e326fa62044d | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-election-idUSKBN1A41AY | Kenyan leaders steer clear of hate speech before vote, but monitors wary | Kenyan leaders steer clear of hate speech before vote, but monitors wary
By Katharine Houreld, Rajiv Golla5 Min Read
NAIROBI (Reuters) - Kenyan politicians are steering clear of inflammatory rhetoric at large public rallies before next month’s vote, but there are fears that hate speech is still spreading online and at smaller meetings out of sight of authorities, monitors said.
FILE PHOTO: A supporter of Kenyan opposition National Super Alliance (NASA) coalition wears a poster decipting Kenya's President Uhuru Kenyatta at a rally endorsing Raila Odinga as the presidential candidate for the 2017 general elections at the Uhuru Park grounds, in Nairobi, Kenya, April 27, 2017. REUTERS/Thomas Mukoya/File Photo
This year’s campaigning stands in sharp contrast to Kenya’s disputed 2007 election, when some candidates were accused of using speeches and broadcasts to fuel ethnic clashes that killed more than 1,200 people.
The change is a welcome development, says the government’s own hate speech monitor, and partly the result of a handful of lawsuits against lawmakers and others charged with incitement and other offences. The cases are still grinding their way through the courts.
But the public reserve doesn’t mean Kenyan politics has rid itself of its reliance on ethnic loyalties, with some politicians seeking to exploit tribal rivalries or promising patronage in return for votes.
“I think politicians are trying to be smart,” Hassan Mohamed, secretary of the government-run monitor, the National Cohesion and Integration Commission (NCIC), told Reuters.
“It is their foot soldiers who are doing this (hate speech). They are being paid by politicians.”
The commission was set up in the aftermath of the 2007 violence in East Africa’s economic powerhouse.
The next vote in 2013 was largely peaceful as senior leaders faced charges at the International Criminal Court of inciting violence in 2007, though those cases later collapsed.
“YOU WILL FACE THE LAW”
Slideshow ( 2 images )
This time round the Commission and other bodies have been trying to keep a lid on any return of inflammatory rhetoric.
Police in each of Kenya’s 47 counties are supposed to attend all rallies with body-cameras and digital recorders, under new regulations.
A student was charged in the western town of Eldoret over a Facebook post on Monday, days after another student was charged in the capital over a WhatsApp text.
So far in this year’s campaign, the body has brought charges against both a lawmaker from the opposition, and an independent candidate, alongside students, bloggers and Facebook users. All deny the charges.
Last year, the arrest of another eight particular prominent lawmakers was a turning point, said the NCIC’s Hassan Mohamed.
“It sent some signals to people that no matter how powerful you are, you will face the law,” he said.
The eight accused include lawmaker Moses Kuria, from incumbent President Uhuru Kenyatta’s ruling Jubilee party - who was charged over a speech posted on YouTube - and Junet Mohamed from the opposition, led by Raila Odinga - indicted over speech reported on local media.
Both lawmakers deny the charges and both are seeking re-election on Aug. 8.
In the last elections, Odinga’s key support came from parts of the coast and the west of the country, home the Luo, the Luhya and other groups, whereas the ruling party had more support among the Kikuyu and part of the Kalenjin, the ethnic groups of the president and vice president.
“THE MEDIA CAN NOT WATCH DAY AND NIGHT”
Arrests are easy but convictions are hard. The law requires anyone submitting electronic recordings to testify to their authenticity but many citizens are afraid, say campaigners.
The courts move at a glacial pace. The case against the eight lawmakers has ground on for a year. A case against a senator from the coastal city of Mombasa has lasted 18 months.
Other punishments are possible. The electoral body has fined two governorship candidates $10,000 each after supporters clashed, and two aspiring parliamentary candidates for violence. No one has been disqualified.
ELOG, a coalition of civil society groups monitoring the elections, said the NCIC had not yet responded to any of the 28 incidents of hate speech that it had reported from the national and local media.
Monitoring rallies and media also missed threats made by private citizens, said Leo Mutisya, project leader for ELOG’s hate-speech monitoring program.
No recordings were made of meetings that reportedly took place at night-time before clashes between communities in remote parts of Laikipia, Baringo and other counties earlier this year, he told Reuters.
“Hate speech has really gone down in public but we don’t know what is going on in private,” he added. “The media cannot watch day and night.”
Editing by Andrew HeavensOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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ad3234157a7c5fa05b69a0e6464a9f44 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-election-idUSKBN1AS0D1?il=0 | At least eleven dead as post-election unrest erupts in Kenya | At least eleven dead as post-election unrest erupts in Kenya
By Katharine Houreld, Maggie Fick6 Min Read
NAIROBI/KISUMU, Kenya (Reuters) - Kenyan police have killed at least 11 people in a crackdown on protests as anger at the re-election of President Uhuru Kenyatta erupted in the western city of Kisumu and slums surrounding the capital, officials and witnesses said on Saturday.
However, the NASA opposition coalition, led by four-time presidential hopeful Raila Odinga, put the death toll at more than 100, including 10 children, but did not provide evidence. Odinga has rejected the poll and its result as “massive” fraud.
The eruption of violence has revived memories of a decade ago, when Odinga, now 72, lost an election in controversial circumstances that sparked a wave of political and ethnic unrest in which 1,200 people were killed and 600,000 displaced.
Kofi Annan, the former U.N. head who mediated during that crisis, on Saturday issued a statement warning Kenya’s leaders to “be careful with their rhetoric and actions in this tense atmosphere”.
Reuters was able to confirm 11 deaths, including one girl, in the space of 24 hours. The Kenya National Commission on Human Rights said 24 people had been shot dead by police since Tuesday, election day.
Top Odinga lieutenant Johnson Muthama said police had been packing corpses into body bags and dumping them, remarks likely to exacerbate the tensions that followed Friday night’s official announcement that Kenyatta had won, with 54.3 percent of votes.
Mwenda Njeka, a spokesman for the Interior Ministry, said the opposition claims were “hogwash”.
Acting Interior Minister Fred Matiang’i had earlier said trouble was localized and blamed it on “criminal elements” rather than legitimate political protest. He also denied accusations of police brutality.
“Let us be honest - there are no demonstrations happening,” he told reporters.
Related CoverageEx-U.N. chief Annan warns Kenyan leaders on rhetoric, actionsKenya opposition accuses police of killing 100
“Individuals or gangs that are looting shops, that want to endanger lives, that are breaking into people’s businesses – those are not demonstrators. They are criminals and we expect police to deal with criminals how criminals should be dealt with.”
“STATE TERROR”
However, James Orengo, another top NASA official, said the killings were part of a carefully laid plan by 55-year-old Kenyatta’s Jubilee party and the security forces to rig the poll, crush dissent and then hide the evidence.
“This violence, this state terror is being executed following very meticulous preparation,” he said.
He and Muthama urged Odinga supporters to stay calm and out of harm’s way but, ominously, said there would be no backing down. “We will not be cowed. We will not relent,” Muthama said.
As with previous votes in 2007 and 2013, this year’s elections have exposed the underlying ethnic tensions in the nation of 45 million people, the economic engine of East Africa and the region’s main trading hub.
In particular, Odinga’s Luo tribe, who hail from the west, hoped an Odinga presidency would break the Kikuyu and Kalenjin dominance of central government since independence in 1963. Kenyatta, the son of Kenya’s first president, is a Kikuyu.
Most of the trouble has been in the western city of Kisumu, an Odinga stronghold, and the large, ethnically mixed slums on the outskirts of Nairobi.
Slideshow ( 10 images )
The bodies of nine young men shot dead in the capital’s run-down Mathare neighborhood were brought to the city morgue, a security official said. A young girl was also killed by a stray bullet in Mathare, according to a witness.
A government official said one man had been killed in Kisumu county. A Reuters reporter in the city heard tear gas grenades and gunshots overnight and on Saturday morning.
In addition to the deaths, officials at Kisumu’s main hospital said they had treated 26 people since Friday night, including four with gunshot wounds and others who had been beaten by police.
Medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres said it had treated 54 patients, including seven for gunshot wounds.
Slideshow ( 10 images )
“THIS IS JUST A WARM-UP”
One man, 28-year-old Moses Oduor, was inside his home in Kisumu’s impoverished district of Obunga when police conducting house-to-house raids dragged him out of his bedroom and set about him with clubs.
“He was not out fighting them. He was rescued by my sister who lives next to him,” said his brother, Charles Ochieng. “She came outside screaming at the police, asking why they are beating people.”
In Nairobi, armed police and water cannons moved through the rubble-strewn streets of Kibera, another pro-Odinga slum.
At one point they fired volleys of tear gas and live rounds to force a convoy of pick-up trucks containing senior NASA officials to retreat, a Reuters witness said.
Fleeing Odinga loyalists vowed to vent their rage at the seat of Kenyatta’s administration in central Nairobi.
“This is just a warm-up. Tomorrow we will go to State House and they can kill us there,” shouted Felix Oduor, 18, as he ran from clouds of tear gas along Kibera’s railway line. “They can’t kill us all,” those around him shouted in response.
Annan reiterated calls for Odinga to lodge any complaint in court but the opposition has said it does not trust the system.
Even before the official result was declared, NASA had rejected the poll’s outcome, saying the election commission’s systems had been hacked, the count was irregular, and foreign observers who endorsed the poll and the count were biased.
NASA provided no evidence but singled out former U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and former South African president Thabo Mbeki - who both led teams of observers - for criticism.
Kenya’s ELOG domestic observation group, which had 8,300 agents on the ground, published a parallel vote tally on Saturday that conformed with the official results.
Additional reporting by Humphrey Mulalo, David Lewis and Linda Muriki; Writing by Ed Cropley and David Lewis; Editing by Kevin Liffey and Andrew BoltonOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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77300beed9c1f56d8071de2286aba9cc | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-electricity/power-from-kenyas-planned-lamu-plant-could-cost-10-times-more-than-estimated-study-idUSKCN1TC1MP | Power from Kenya's planned Lamu plant could cost 10 times more than estimated: study | Power from Kenya's planned Lamu plant could cost 10 times more than estimated: study
By George Obulutsa3 Min Read
NAIROBI (Reuters) - Electricity from a coal-fired power plant due to be built in Kenya by a Kenyan-Chinese consortium will cost consumers up to 10 times more than planned, a U.S. thinktank says, raising further doubts about the long-delayed project.
Slideshow ( 4 images )
Construction of the plant on the Kenyan mainland opposite the tourist island of Lamu was scheduled to begin in 2015 but has been repeatedly halted, due in part to opposition by environmentalists.
Amu Power, a consortium comprising Kenya’s Gulf Energy and Centum Investment and a group of Chinese companies, is due to build the plant after winning the government contract.
The plant’s backers say it would help tackle Kenya’s frequent blackouts by increasing generation capacity by nearly a third and generating power that would cost about half what consumers currently pay.
But opponents say those costs are much higher than projected.
Amu Power says electricity from the plant will cost 7.2 U.S. cents per KWh. But that is “highly optimistic,” the U.S.-based Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis said in an independent study, which is the most extensive so far on the plant’s cost.
It said the 1000-MW coal-fired plant’s 25-year power purchasing agreement would cost consumers more than $9 billion, even if it does not generate any power.
“The true costs of Lamu’s electricity during the years 2024 through 2037 could average as high as US 22 to US 75 cents per KWh — three to 10 times the company’s 2014 projection,” the study noted. “We believe Kenya should cancel the project.”
The study said the plant’s backers had underpriced coal imports and rising operational and maintenance costs.
Joseph Njoroge, principal secretary at the Ministry of Energy, said the plant was competitive but did not address specific concerns.
“One condition of any competitively acquired project is to sustain the bid specifications to the end,” he said in a text message to Reuters. “The plant will be put up with (the) aim of producing electricity based on sound economic projections.”
Francis Njogu, chief executive officer of Amu Power, did not respond to requests for comment.
Kenya’s Energy Regulatory Commission, which sets tariffs, also did not respond to a request for comment.
The plant’s location on the mainland in the coastal Lamu County region is about 14 km from Lamu island, a famous ancient Swahili settlement and UNESCO World heritage site and a top tourist destination.
Environmentalists say the plant will pollute the air, destroying mangroves and breeding grounds for five endangered species of marine turtles, fish and other marine life.
In 2018, a Kenyan court suspended the project for a second time, sending the dispute back to an environmental tribunal. It is expected to issue a decision later this month on whether the project can go ahead.
Editing by Katharine Houreld and Susan FentonOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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e83c122db6e526ef20d841f072cd8022 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-energy-cooking-trfn-idUSKBN1XF2D4 | Kenya vows to cut emissions as dirty stoves and fuels kill 21,500 a year | Kenya vows to cut emissions as dirty stoves and fuels kill 21,500 a year
By Nita Bhalla3 Min Read
NAIROBI (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - More than 21,500 Kenyans die each year from cooking with traditional fuels like charcoal and firewood, new government data showed on Tuesday, as authorities pledged to meet a global goal of universal access to clean cooking energy by 2030.
The health risks were greatest in rural areas, where 90% of households use wood stoves, compared to 70% nationwide, Kenya’s first household survey on energy usage in cooking by the energy ministry and the Clean Cooking Association of Kenya found.
It also found that 80% of households relied solely on either charcoal or firewood as their primary cooking fuel, with 68 billion shillings ($660 million) of charcoal consumed each year.
Kenya’s energy minister Charles Keter said the situation was “grave” and called for more focus on providing clean energy options, such as gas and electricity, to the poor.
“This data underlines the great exposure to harmful pollutants which account for about over 21,560 deaths annually,” he said, launching the survey at a conference on clean cooking.
The World Health Organization (WHO) says 3 billion people globally cook with solid fuels such as charcoal and coal on open fires or traditional stoves, producing high levels of carbon monoxide, which kills about four million people a year.
Countries have committed to ensure universal access to clean, modern energy for cooking by the year 2030 as part of 17 global development goals, but low levels of investment in the clean cooking sector are hindering progress.
The widespread use of dirty fuels also contributes to climate change and deforestation, according to energy experts.
Government officials said Kenya has committed to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 30% - where clean cooking will account for about 14% - under the Paris agreement on climate change, and it hopes to meet this target by 2028.
Rohit Khanna from the World Bank’s Energy Sector Management Assistance Program said it was an “orphan” and “invisible” sector as those most affected were poor women and children.
“It is not acceptable as a matter of human dignity, of public health, of environmental damage, of gender equality and of economic harm, that access to clean cooking remains a failing target,” said Khanna.
“Half of the four million people who die every year are children under the age of five ... Yet, if current trends continue, 2.2 billion people will still not have access to modern energy cooking services by 2030.”
The number of Kenyans killed by dirty stoves and fuels is double that of Uganda, which has a similar sized population, according to the Clean Cooking Alliance, which is promoting reform.
Reporting by Nita Bhalla @nitabhalla, Editing by Katy Migiro. Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, women's and LGBT+ rights, human trafficking, property rights and climate change. Visit news.trust.orgOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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c62666ad7e435097db9cf266bce88cc2 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-environment-water-nature-featur/kenyan-villagers-nurture-local-springs-as-founts-of-clean-water-idUSKBN2830U3?edition-redirect=uk | Kenyan villagers nurture local springs as founts of clean water | Kenyan villagers nurture local springs as founts of clean water
By Wesley Langat6 Min Read
BOMET, Kenya (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Monica Kirui, 30, a mother of five from Kipsegon, remembers queueing for hours as she waited to fetch water from the local springs, the only source of fresh drinking water in her village in the southern part of Kenya’s Rift Valley.
One of the few springs in the area that has water year round, Kipsegon attracts people from all over. In the past, some would wait overnight to get their water, often contaminated by so many people dipping containers into the springs, Kirui said.
But that has not been a problem since April, when a concrete barrier was built around the springs to help keep the water clean and guide it through pipes ending in four taps, allowing villagers to collect their water quickly and safely.
“I’m happy because I no longer worry about how I will get water, nor spend the whole day looking for water. I have time to concentrate on my other house chores,” Kirui said.
Across Bomet County, springs like Kipsegon are being protected and rehabilitated under a government project that aims to increase access to drinking water sources and boost biodiversity, said Fredrick Ruto, the county’s assistant director for water and irrigation.
In some cases, people have been trekking up to 5 km (3 miles) to get water from rivers, he noted.
“The main objective of our programme is to ensure everyone gets safe, clean drinking water for both domestic and livestock use,” he added.
Launched in 2018, in partnership with local “Water Resources Users Associations” (WRUA) and the USAID-funded Sustainable Water Partnership, the Spring Protection Programme is part of the Kenyan government’s nationwide watershed conservation plan.
It involves erecting walls or fencing to prevent people from contaminating the springs, marking the exact points where water flows out of aquifers and building supply systems to help villagers tap into the resource more easily.
So far, the initiative has made improvements to more than 60 out of at least 100 mapped springs - each providing drinking water for up to 1,500 people - and has built about 130 ponds to catch rainwater in dry areas, according to Ruto.
The programme has proven so successful that the local government has more than doubled its funding this financial year to 11 million Kenyan shillings ($100,600), he noted.
“For the springs that we have (improved), we have witnessed an increase of water,” he said, without providing figures.
WATER SHORTAGES
Bomet is one of four counties that make up Kenya’s share of the Mara River basin, where Ruto said there had been persistent shortages of fresh drinking water for the past two decades.
The majority of the county’s population of about 876,000, especially in southern areas, struggle to find water in dry seasons, which can last up to three months at a time, he noted.
According to the 2019 U.N. World Water Development Report, less than a quarter of the population of sub-Saharan Africa has access to safe drinking water.
John Hawuory, an independent geologist, said droughts fuelled by climate change together with human activity, particularly agriculture, had interrupted the natural processes that generate river flow and allow groundwater to recharge.
“These disturbance factors - such as soil erosion, farming and the use of fertilisers - reduce water flows, (as well as) water levels in reservoirs fed by seasonal rivers and inland groundwater levels in the entire region,” he said.
BOOSTING BIODIVERSITY
Besides providing communities with fresh water, springs and wetlands are hotspots of biodiversity, hosting about 30% of the species in the Mara River basin, said Taita Terer, head of the Centre for Biodiversity at the National Museums of Kenya.
“Springs form rivers and these rivers are the hallmark of wildlife survival in the Mara-Serengeti (region). So, if springs are unprotected, reduced or there is no water in these rivers, we will not have animals in the Mara in the next generation.”
Terer said deforestation is a major cause of biodiversity and spring loss in the region, because trees are key in hydrological cycles.
When rain falls, the holes made by tree roots help the rainwater sink into the soil, refilling the aquifers that feed springs and wells. In treeless areas, most of the water runs off instead, the water table is not replenished and sources run dry.
Trees also help cool the local environment and minimise the amount of water that evaporates from springs and aquifers in dry periods.
As part of Bomet’s programme, villagers are being encouraged to plant indigenous trees around riparian areas, said Paul Rono, chairman of the Nyongores WRUA, a community-based group mandated by the government to manage local water resources.
To help with the effort, his group is providing villagers with indigenous seedlings purchased by the government.
COMMUNITY PROTECTORS
To stop farmers and others encroaching on the land being conserved under the programme, all reforested areas are mapped and fenced off, Rono explained.
Initially, villagers were resistant to the move, concerned about being cut off from areas that carry historical and cultural significance as sources of herbal medicines, he said.
But after learning about the importance of protecting the springs, they came around.
Now each spring is assigned a committee of 15 community members tasked with managing and maintaining it, he said.
Maize and cattle farmer Joseph Kirui is one of them. He oversees repairs to the fences around the Kipsegon springs, does routine checks every several days for pipe damage or blockages, and stops anyone he catches trying to harvest the trees.
He thinks the county government should consider paying villagers to motivate them to look after the springs far into the future.
But, for now, they are happy to do the work for free.
“The improved and productive springs have given the community a sense of ownership,” Kirui said.
“The more water community members take from the springs, the more they voluntarily become the springs’ caretakers.”
($1 = 109.3500 Kenyan shillings)
Reporting by Wesley Langat; Editing by Jumana Farouky. Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers the lives of people around the world who struggle to live freely. Visit news.trust.org/climateOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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2393b870dd8f3e70842402ea8ec26f5d | https://www.historynet.com/americas-greatest-work-architecture.htm | America’s Greatest Work of Architecture | America’s Greatest Work of Architecture
Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fallingwater turns 75 this year. A house of genius and mystery, it may be admired as America’s best 500 years from now.
December sun filled the sky in 1934 as department-store mogul Edgar Kaufmann left Pittsburgh with the legendary architect Frank Lloyd Wright. They drove on winding back roads into the deep woods of southwestern Pennsylvania as a light rain, then a soft snow fell. After a few hours, Wright’s eyes lit up when an arc of color rippled before him. “Surely something will come out of this journey,” he said. “After all the elements through which we have traveled, the end is crowned with a rainbow.”
The two men had met a month prior when Kaufmann and his wife, Liliane, visited Wright’s rural Wisconsin studio, Taliesin. At 49, Kaufmann was already a supporter of important architecture in Pittsburgh. Wright was 67. “He was thought of as being washed-up as an architect,” says Lynda Waggoner, vice president of the Western Pennsylvania Conservancy.
It had been three decades since Wright gained recognition for his Prairie homes, a style of domestic architecture featuring open floor plans and expansive views of the outdoors. Since then he had made headlines for scandals involving women and money and was so cash poor that he’d launched an apprentice program at Taliesin to help make ends meet. That program lured Kaufmann’s 24-year-old son Edgar jr., whose enthusiasm for Wright’s designs piqued his parents’ interest.
Ultimately, Wright built an utterly unique country home that propelled him to the cover of Time, a special exhibition at New York’s Museum of Modern Art and on to commissions for hundreds more homes and other buildings, including the spiraling Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York. Dubbed Fallingwater, the Kaufmanns’ house in the woods not only restarted Wright’s career—it established his place as America’s greatest architect.
Fallingwater’s reputation is even more monumental 75 years after construction began on the house. Every year, more than 150,000 people make a pilgrimage to the remote site to see what the American Institute of Architects calls “the best all-time work of American architecture.” In the late 1990s, some 10,000 individuals and 20 foundations from 50 states contributed to a $4.5 million restoration project spearheaded by the Western Pennsylvania Conservancy to keep Fallingwater from collapsing. “I would say,” posits David De Long, University of Pennsylvania emeritus professor of architecture, “it is the great American house, and one of the greatest works in all of art history.”
Kaufmann’s wishes were more moderate. He just wanted a nice weekend house where his family could gaze out at a waterfall and swimming hole they treasured. Wright defied those wishes. Fallingwater’s beauty does not come from its proverbial views. The falls, in fact, aren’t even visible from the house. Instead, drawing inspiration from what he described as “the music of the stream,” Wright incorporated the sound of the falls into his design in such a way that it is difficult to discern where the landscape ends and the house begins. “There are billions of waterfalls and streams in this world, and this is one where someone said, aha, and has turned a waterfall into something else, into an artistic experience,” says Harvard University professor of architecture history Neil Levine, author of The Architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright. Fallingwater “takes what is normal, what is natural, what some people would say is Godgiven, and makes it a work of man, a work of imagination, and in this case, a work of genius.”
The laurel- and oak-filled valley where Fallingwater was built lies 60 miles southeast of Pittsburgh. In 1916, Edgar Kaufmann Sr. opened a summer “club” in this wilderness to offer his employees a respite from the hot metropolis, and five years later he built his family a modest weekend cabin on the property. Known as “The Hangover,” the house was purposefully rustic, without electricity or plumbing, and situated on a cliff above Bear Run, where the family bathed and fished. At night they slept in screened porches. By 1934, the Kaufmanns had acquired 1,600 acres around Bear Run and hankered for a more civilized private getaway to use year-round.
During the December visit, Wright and Kaufmann walked the woods and watched the sun’s orientation. Wright inspected the sandstone bluffs, saw water rush over the stony streambed and ogled the rhododendron leaves. Kaufmann took care to point out the rocky spot at the edge of the stream where his family liked to picnic and swim. They assumed a head-on view of the falls made this the perfect spot to build their new house.
Wright “was amazed at the beauty and forceful contours,” Kaufmann later recalled, and began to muse about a house suspended by cable over the stream, facing the falls. Kaufmann promised to send Wright a topographical map. For the next eight months, mostly in correspondence, Kaufmann responded to Wright’s queries about the family’s style of living at Bear Run. Each time Kaufmann asked a question—Where would the house be placed?—there was only silence from Wright.
The map was sent. Money was wired. Spring of 1935 came and went. The men chatted regularly about a planetarium for Pittsburgh. Wright visited Bear Run again. Exasperated that no sketches had come and that Wright kept evading the placement question, Kaufmann finally sent word that he would be in Milwaukee at summer’s end and wanted to see his house plans. This time, Wright assented. “Wright typically waited to put pencil to paper when he had the idea in mind,” says De Long. “He had this extraordinary ability to visualize.”
Once in Milwaukee, Kaufmann telephoned to announce that he was en route to Taliesin. At last Wright gathered with his assistants at the drawing board and laid out a design just in time for Kaufmann’s lunchtime appearance. Kaufmann devoured the plans. But not until two weeks later did he fully began to fathom Wright’s ambitious vision for a house conceived to “the music of the stream,” rather than an arresting view of the falls.
“September 15: Floor plans and colored elevations of Fallingwater arrived,” Kaufmann recounted in a 1938 essay. “The next few nights were sleepless. Finally I began to understand the plan partially. The Master’s conception—the colored elevations fascinated me. At least I thought I understood.”
The structure was immense, but it did not resemble a house. It looked more like hinged dominoes. “On September 16, I could not work,” Kaufmann remembered. “I thought of nothing but the house.”
Wright’s signatures—a flat, low-slung roof and sweeping terraces—were there. Yet the way windows, stone walls and concrete slabs interlocked and cantilevered out from the hillside, it was almost as if the levels and balconies of the home were cascading down the slope. A symbolic waterfall.
But where were those falls?
Wright had ignored Kaufmann’s suggested site. The house was above and slightly upstream from the falls. But exactly where was difficult to picture. “September 21: The Master arrived,” Kaufmann recounted. “Went over the plan thoroughly. Allowed me to drink in his conception and the meaning. My first lesson in organic architecture. It was plain and I did not understand—it required the Master to open my eyes.”
Wright was steadfast to his original vision: a house hung over the water and based on sounds. The building was anchored to a huge boulder protruding from the stream’s midsection. “I think you can hear the waterfall when you look at the design,” Wright later wrote.
There was no view at all. The falls were invisible from inside the house. Yet the stream’s music would be eternal. Fallingwater, Wright explained, would become “an extension of the cliff beside a mountain stream, making living space over and above the stream upon several terraces upon which a man who loved the place sincerely, one who liked to listen to the waterfall, might well live.” It was indeed a house about sounds, not sights.
Wright had come of age among Unitarians in the Wisconsin countryside during the era of American industrialization following the Civil War. His family was taken with Ralph Waldo Emerson and other transcendentalist opponents of the machine age. Architecture, Wright felt, should establish a sense of continuity with the environment. “Wright wanted to make us more natural citizens,” says John Reynolds, an architecture professor at Miami University in Ohio. “He believed we could become more democratic and responsible by having these direct encounters with nature.”
At Fallingwater, Wright used a cantilever to overhang nature. Like a diving board, the main section of the house consists of a solid slab affixed horizontally at one end to a vertical support. Wright had used cantilevers in domestic architecture but never to this degree: Fallingwater’s entire foundation was cantilevered, with concrete bolsters rising up from the stone at the stream’s edge to support the main floor. Subsequent levels were cantilevered from stone walls, and sweeping terraces shored with concrete borders, resembling trays. The structure allowed for Wright’s open floor plan. It also pushed parts of the building up to 20 feet over the stream.
“It was an extraordinary moment when the full force of Wright’s concept became apparent,” wrote Edgar Kaufmann jr. in 1986. “Whatever the previous expectations and whatever the problems suggested by the plans, here was an amazing augmentation of our regular refreshment in nature, and a magnetic image. The prospects were exhilarating.”
So were the challenges of building the house. Kaufmann hired engineers to inspect the unconventional plans. Anchor a home to a boulder? Their response was resolute: foolish. “There was a wonderful cartoon drawn by some engineers,” says Waggoner. “They showed life boats hanging off of Fallingwater. They thought it would never stand.” But construction had begun. Wright, indignant about Kaufmann’s fact-checking, insisted the design was safe.
Nonetheless, in laying the first-floor slab, Kaufmann’s contractor made a last-minute decision to double the weight of the reinforcing steel rods. Wright became livid when word reached him. Too heavy a slab could cause sagging. “My dear E.J.,” the architect wrote. “If you are paying to have the concrete engineering done down there, there is no use whatever in our doing it here….I don’t know what kind of architect you are familiar with but it apparantly [sic] isn’t the kind I think I am. You seem not to know how to treat a decent one…if I haven’t your confidence—to hell with the whole thing.”
Kaufmann went back at Wright. “I don’t know what kind of clients you are familiar with but apparently they are not the kind I think I am….I have put so much confidence and enthusiasm behind this whole project in my limited way, to help the fulfillment of your efforts that if I do not have your confidence in the matter—to hell with the whole thing.”
Wright was renowned for controlling every aspect of his designs, even down to the furniture, the dishes and the carpets. But he needed Kaufmann; this was the only commission he had at the time. The men convened under an oak tree at Bear Run to settle the matter. Less than a year later, in the spring of 1937, Fallingwater was finished.
Arrive at Fallingwater and you will come upon a symphony that has begun before the curtain goes up. It’s a melody of water on rock—a trickle…a thrum…a whooooosh—that reaches you before the house comes into view. Heading down the curving drive that eventually leads to the melody’s source, the eye yearns to make sense of the geometry of Fallingwater through the openings in the forest. At last the curtain rises, and a 5,000-square-foot, straight-edged mass of stone and concrete soars from above a 20-foot waterfall. First impressions are well summed up by Waggoner: “anchored to the earth” yet simultaneously “about to take flight.”
Fallingwater is constructed with five materials: sandstone for floors and walls; ochre-tinted concrete for terraces; North Carolina walnut veneer for cabinetry and furniture; glass framed in steel for window walls. The stone is left raw on interior walls, but the stone floor is waxed and polished to resemble the river surface below. The palette is neutral—natural—with bursts of color from textiles for bedding and seating. Waggoner says Kaufmann jr. thought colors from pillows should act “like birds in the woods.”
Wright made no show of the home’s entrance. “It’s almost like you’re a spelunker in a cave,” says Reynolds of the narrow door shrouded in darkness between two stone walls. Within just a few steps, however, one is pulled into an expansive interior space bathed in sunlight. Throughout the home, Wright repeats this tension. Cramped, narrow passageways with low ceilings open onto expansive rooms. The arrival at a dark spot propels one toward a light and airy space that beckons from beyond. “Wright had this wonderful understanding of the importance of a threshold,” says Waggoner.
Inspired by the horizontal striation of Bear Run’s sandstone bluffs, Wright reproduced that dramatic layering throughout the home. For the stone formations themselves, he insisted on using unskilled laborers, ignoring the smooth edging of traditional masonry. The emphasis on the horizontal repeats itself in the smooth, uninterrupted walls of the framed terraces and the overhanging roofs, the orientation of the wood grain on wardrobes and cabinets, the built-in seating that spans the entire length of a living room wall.
But like the tensions between light and dark, compression and expansion, Wright countered the horizontal planes with thrilling verticals. On the exterior, terraces are dramatically set off by the rising columns of sandstone, particularly the massive chimney, and by a towering, four-story box of windows. Its steel-framed panes open outward, laterally, to obliterate the corner and unleash a horizontal view into the trees. Even within the house’s smaller features—stone ledges on the fireplaces, shelves on a wooden desk, steps into the concrete pool—cantilevered components unfurl like cascades. An unusual concrete canopy perfectly mirrors the deep, gradual staircase from the main home to the guesthouse, as if the stairway were rippling down the slope like the stream.
More linkages with nature are found throughout the house. Beams are curved to let trees grow through the trellis. A planted window box is situated under glass in the interior. A moss garden extends from the exterior of a sandstone bluff to an interior hallway. Where does the landscape end and the house begin? It doesn’t, says De Long. “Wright never wanted to dissolve the sense of an edge, a boundary. He simply wanted to make it permeable.” At the center of the home, the boulder on which the house was so controversially anchored protrudes through the floor to form seating in front of the fireplace.
“Wright always called himself a pantheist,” says Waggoner. “If he was asked, ‘What’s your religion?’ he’d say nature with a capital ‘N.’ ” Fallingwater’s main-level living room, with its music, dining, study and sitting areas all communing without the interference of vertical beams, may be the best rendering of that theology. All of nature’s elements enter: earth through the all-important boulder, fire at the hearth, and water and air through the unusual “hatch,” a 17-step staircase down to the stream, enclosed by a glass skylight and swinging doors.
Although the family had insisted on access to water, Kaufmann found the hatch confusing, expensive and unsuitable. The water there was too shallow for swimming. But Wright was insistent. The hatch was “absolutely necessary,” he wrote. “We got down into the glen to associate directly with the stream and planned the house for that association. Hence the steps from living room to stream.” Kaufmann’s son stepped in to smooth things. “I felt that Wright wanted to keep the main room in touch with the movement and energy of the run, and I pleaded for trust in Wright’s intuition,” Edgar jr. recounted later. “Wright himself considered the steps not so much a proposal as a decision.”
The hatch is the only place in the living room where a visitor can see the water. It brings the outdoors in—cool air, moisture, the music of the stream. “It’s in a way the most remarkable feature,” says Levine. “You sense the water underfoot, and you hear it. You smell it. All those things. But you don’t see it.” Wright even shaped the concrete wall around the hatch as a semicircle. “It becomes a resonating chamber,” says Levine. “He wanted to increase the sound.”
Symbolically the hatch plays an even bigger role in the house’s orientation, 30 degrees east of south. “If you trace the line from the entrance into the house to the far corner of the living room toward the terrace that overshoots the falls, that diagonal aligns perfectly with the path of the stream below,” says Levine. “If you then take a line from the fireplace to the hatch, that line crosses the other diagonal at 90 degrees, and it aligns with the ledge that creates the falls. Typically you mark a site with a cross. In this case, the cross is locked in, aligned with those two very important aspects of the site: the sound and the movement of the water.”
The sound of the falls is constant throughout a visit. The sun sets, the seasons change—but the falls never quiet. As Levine puts it, “This finally is what gives the building its magic, its uniqueness, and its lasting significance.”
Liliane and Edgar Kaufmann liked to entertain. They used the home on weekends from 1938 to 1955, hosting friends, members of their family and the architecturally curious in the guesthouse, finished in 1939. Yet Liliane took to the place gradually, calling her residence an “education” and a “constructive lesson of deletion.” Kaufmann said it was a “retreat” he couldn’t imagine living without. Of the dozen potential projects he and Wright eventually collaborated on, none but Fallingwater and his department store office were finished. But the men remained lifelong friends until Kaufmann’s death in 1955, only hours after a visit from “the Master.”
Originally published in the October 2011 issue of American History. To subscribe, click here.
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182ea3d996b411c1dc43852a4f458100 | https://www.historynet.com/americas-medal-honor-heroes.htm | America’s Medal of Honor Heroes | America’s Medal of Honor Heroes
From the Civil War to Afghanistan, the United States’ highest valor award has recognized feats of courage and sacrifice.
On October 25, 2007, in the Korengal Valley, Afghanistan, a patrol from 2d Battalion, 503d Infantry Regiment, 173d Airborne Brigade Combat Team, was returning to Combat Outpost Vimoto when it ran into a Taliban ambush. In the intense battle that ensued, Sergeant Joshua Brennan, walking point, was hit multiple times. During the firefight, two Taliban began to drag Brennan away from the kill zone. Specialist Salvatore Giunta, one of the fire team leaders, seeing that the enemy intended to capture his comrade, exposed himself to withering enemy fire and sprinted after the Taliban, killing one and wounding the other, after which he provided medical aid to Sergeant Brennan and dragged him back to safety. For this courageous and selfless act under intense enemy fire, Specialist Giunta was nominated for the Medal of Honor.
On November 16, 2010, Salvatore Giunta, then staff sergeant, received the Medal of Honor from President Barack Obama in a White House ceremony. Giunta became the first living person to receive the nation’s highest decoration for valor for actions that have occurred since the Vietnam War.
BORN IN BATTLE
When the president placed the medal on its distinctive blue ribbon around Staff Sergeant Giunta’s neck, the young Soldier became a member of one of the most exclusive fraternities in the world. More than 40 million men and women have served in the armed forces of the United States since the beginning of the Civil War, but fewer than 3,500 men and one woman have been awarded the Medal of Honor.
The Medal of Honor is the nation’s highest award for military valor and it can be awarded to Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines and Coast Guardsmen. It is presented by the president of the United States in the name of Congress and thus is often mistakenly referred to as the Congressional Medal of Honor. It is awarded for “conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of life above and beyond the call of duty.” Given the inherently dangerous nature of its criteria, the Medal of Honor is often awarded posthumously.
The Medal of Honor did not exist until the Civil War. However, the idea of recognizing individual acts of bravery dates back to the Revolutionary War. The Badge of Military Merit was established by General George Washington, commander in chief of the Continental Army, on August 7, 1782. The award, which consisted of a purple cloth heart, was designed to recognize “any singularly meritorious action,” and records indicate that only three persons received it.
The Badge of Military Merit fell into disuse after the Revolutionary War, although it would be revived in 1932 as the Purple Heart, which would be awarded to those who had been wounded in World War I and in subsequent conflicts. In the interim, there were several efforts to devise a way to recognize individual valor on the battlefield. In 1847, after the outbreak of the Mexican-American War, a “certificate of merit” was established for those who distinguished themselves during battle, but it was discontinued after the war.
Early in the Civil War, the idea of a medal for bravery on the battlefield was proposed to General Winfield Scott, then Union general in chief, but he rejected the idea because he thought medals smacked of European affectation. However, a similar proposal was presented to Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles, who endorsed the idea of creating a medal for valorous service for enlisted men in the Navy and Marine Corps. Senator James W. Grimes of Iowa introduced a bill in Congress, which President Abraham Lincoln signed in December 1861.
The next year, a “medal of honor” was created for the Army, largely due to the efforts of Edward D. Townsend, assistant adjutant general, and Massachusetts Senator Henry Wilson. The bill creating the Army Medal of Honor was signed into law in July 1862. The medal was to be awarded “to such noncommissioned officers and privates as shall most distinguish themselves by their gallantry in action, and other soldier like qualities.”
Although the medal was proposed only for the Civil War, Congress made it permanent in 1863, extending provisions to include officers as well as enlisted men, and making the provisions retroactive to the beginning of the Civil War. The Medal of Honor has remained the highest and most prestigious award that can be presented to members of the U.S. armed forces.
CIVIL WAR
The first act of valor that would be recognized with the Medal of Honor occurred on February 13, 1861, a year before the medal was proposed. Bernard J.D. Irwin, an Army assistant surgeon, led a group of 14 men into Apache Pass, Ariz., to rescue 60 Soldiers surrounded by a band of Indians. However, Irwin would not actually receive the medal until 1894, over 30 years later.
Army Private Francis Edwin Brownell was involved in the first action to merit the Medal of Honor during the Civil War. On May 24, 1861, he killed the murderer of Colonel Elmer E. Ellsworth, colonel of the 11th New York Regiment, in Alexandria, Va. However, Brownell would not receive the medal until 1877.
John Williams, captain of USS Pawnee, was the first to receive the Navy Medal of Honor, for his bravery in leaving no man behind in a desperate June 1861 battle off Mathias Point, Va. However, Williams would not receive the medal until April 1863.
On March 25, 1863, Secretary of War Edwin Stanton made the first-ever presentation of the Medal of Honor, presenting one each to six of the surviving members of the famous Andrews’ Raiders. The first to receive the medal was Private Jacob Parrott.
In April 1862, Parrott had been part of the force of 23 military and civilian volunteers led by civilian James J. Andrews that struck deep into Confederate territory at Marietta, Ga. There, Andrews’ Raiders captured an entire train pulled by the locomotive General in an effort to disrupt the lines of transportation between Atlanta, Ga., and Chattanooga, Tenn. The Raiders were pursued by locomotive and eventually captured, after which seven of them, including Andrews, were hanged as spies. Four of those hanged also received the Medal of Honor; they were the first to receive the medal posthumously. In all, 19 of the 24 Andrews’ Raiders were awarded the Medal of Honor, but not Andrews – as a civilian, he was deemed ineligible for the award.
The first Marine to receive the Medal of Honor was John Freeman Mackie, who, while serving on the Union ironclad Galena during the attack on Fort Darling at Drewry’s Bluff, Va., “fearlessly maintained his musket fire against the rifle pits on shore, and when ordered to fill vacancies caused by men wounded and killed in action, manned his weapon with skill and courage.”
During the Civil War, a total of 1,522 Medals of Honor were awarded to Army and Navy personnel, including 17 to enlisted Marines. One of the Civil War recipients was Dr. Mary Edwards Walker, a civilian surgeon with the Union Army. Walker is the only woman to receive the Medal of Honor and one of only eight civilians to receive it.
Second Lieutenant Thomas Custer, brother of George Armstrong Custer, became the first to receive two Medals of Honor for two separate actions during the Civil War. Tom Custer later died with his brother at the Battle of Little Bighorn. Only 13 other people have received two distinct Medals of Honor for two separate actions (five others received both the Army and Navy medals for the same action).
During this early period, there were no detailed criteria or time limits for presentation of the award. Therefore, many Medals of Honor went to individuals who did nothing particularly heroic. For example, President Lincoln authorized the award of the medal to 864 members of 27th Maine Volunteer Infantry Regiment simply for re-enlisting.
POST-CIVIL WAR
Over time, the requirements became stricter and fewer Medals of Honor were awarded. In 1897, Congress passed legislation to insure that the medal could be awarded only for “gallantry and intrepidity.” Furthermore, nomination for the award had to be made by someone other than the individual being nominated. Additionally, one or more eyewitnesses had to testify under oath about the deed, and the recommendation had to be submitted within one year of the act for which the medal would be awarded.
In September 1905, President Theodore Roosevelt issued an executive order outlining the basic policy for the actual presentation of the Medal of Honor. This order directed that award of the medal “will always be made with formal and impressive ceremonial occasions” and that the recipient will, when practicable, be ordered to Washington, D.C., where the presentation will be made by the president, as commander in chief, or by such representative as the president may designate. If it proved impractical for the recipient to come to Washington, as it eventually would during World Wars I and II, the service chief of staff would designate the time and place for the award ceremony. President Roosevelt presented the first Medal of Honor at the White House to one of his old Rough Rider comrades, U.S. Army Assistant Surgeon James Robb Church, on January 10, 1906, setting the precedent for the White House Medal of Honor ceremonies that continues to this day.
During the period between the Civil War and World War I, U.S. forces fought in a number of conflicts, including the Indian Wars, 1871 Korean Campaign, Spanish-American War, Philippine Insurrection, Boxer Rebellion, and several campaigns in Mexico and Central America. A total of 769 Medals of Honor were awarded during these years. Within this period, two Marines joined the select group who received two Medals of Honor for two separate actions. Major General Smedley D. Butler received his medals for Veracruz (1914) and Haiti (1915), and Sergeant Major Daniel Daly received his for Peking (1900) and Haiti (1915).
In 1916, intending to redress perceived earlier abuses in awarding the medal, the War Department established a Medal of Honor review board. It consisted of five retired general officers headed by Medal of Honor recipient General Nelson A. Miles. The board was charged to consider all 2,625 medals presented by the Army up to that time. It released its findings in 1917, striking the names of 911 Medal of Honor recipients, most from the Civil War, whom the board considered undeserving of the medal. The deleted names included all several hundred men in the 27th Maine who received the medals for re-enlisting; 29 members of President Lincoln’s funeral guard; and six civilians, whose courage was not questioned but who were deemed ineligible for the medal as civilians. Among these were five scouts, including Buffalo Bill Cody, who had served in the Indian Campaigns, and Civil War surgeon Mary Edwards Walker. The medals of Dr. Walker, Cody, and the other scouts were later restored in 1977.
WORLD WAR I THROUGH WORLD WAR II
During World War I, 124 Medals of Honor were awarded (95 Army, 21 Navy, and eight Marine Corps), 33 of them posthumously. Famous Medal of Honor recipients from World War I were Sergeant Alvin York, Army Air Corps ace Eddie Rickenbacker, and Lieutenant Colonel William J. “Wild Bill” Donovan (later head of the World War II Office of Strategic Services and “Father of the Central Intelligence Agency”).
In 1921-23, the president signed congressional legislation awarding the Medal of Honor to the Unknown Soldiers of the United States, Britain, France, Italy, Belgium, and Romania. Later, the Medal of Honor was awarded to the American Unknown Soldiers of World War II (1948), Korean War (1957), and Vietnam War (1984).
During 1920-40, Medal of Honor awards continued to be rare, but regulations then still permitted awarding the medal for peacetime bravery and distinguished acts not involving combat. Commander Richard E. Byrd and Warrant Officer Floyd Bennett each received the Medal of Honor for their 1926 flight over the North Pole. Charles Lindbergh was awarded the medal for his famous 1927 trans-Atlantic solo flight from New York to Paris in the Spirit of St. Louis. Four Sailors were awarded the Medal of Honor for risking their lives to save the crew of the sunken American submarine USS Squalus in May 1939. (The Navy had long awarded the medal for non-combat actions. From 1901-11, 48 Navy Medals of Honor were given for actions involving boiler explosions on board ships, shipboard fires and lifesaving.)
With the outbreak of World War II, the award of the Medal of Honor once again focused on recognizing valor above and beyond the call of duty in combat against an armed enemy. The award of the medal remained rare. Even though 16 million Americans served in World War II, fewer than 500 Medals of Honor were awarded (more than half of them posthumously). Among the most famous World War II recipients were Army infantryman Audie Murphy, Marine fighter ace Joe Foss, and Marine John Basilone, whose story was featured in the HBO miniseries The Pacific.
Only one member of the U.S. Coast Guard (under the Department of the Navy in wartime) has ever received the Medal of Honor. Coast Guardsman Douglas Munro was awarded the medal posthumously for his actions at Point Cruz during the Battle of Guadalcanal in September 1942.
KOREA AND VIETNAM
In June 1950, the North Korean People’s Army crossed the 38th parallel and invaded South Korea. During the Korean War’s three bloody years of fighting that followed, 133 Medals of Honor, including 42 to Marines, were awarded for heroism (95 of them posthumously). Included among the U.S. Army heroes who received the medal during the Korean War were Captain Lewis L. Millett, Corporal Mitchell Red Cloud and Corporal Rodolfo P. Hernandez.
In 1947, President Harry S. Truman had created the United States Air Force as a separate branch of the armed forces. However, during the Korean War, members of the Air Force who were awarded the Medal of Honor received the Army medal. In 1956, three years after the war’s end, Congress passed legislation establishing the Air Force Medal of Honor, distinct from the Army and Navy medals (Marines continued to receive the Navy medal).
In 1963, Congress again tightened regulations governing the award of the Medal of Honor. The heroic act leading to the nomination for the medal had to occur while the potential recipient was engaged in action against an enemy of the United States, engaged in military operations involving conflict with an opposing force, or serving with friendly forces in armed conflict against an opposing armed force in which the United States was not a belligerent party.
The first Medal of Honor awarded during the Vietnam War went to Army Special Forces Captain Roger H.C. Donlon for his actions at Nam Dong in July 1964. During the Vietnam War, nearly 250 Medals of Honor were awarded (about half of them posthumously). Donlon was joined on the list of Vietnam War recipients by Marine Major Jay R. Vargas, Air Force Sergeant John Levitow, Admiral James Stockdale, and Bob Kerrey, a Navy SEAL who became governor of Nebraska and U.S. senator.
During the Vietnam War period, there was one exception to the enemy action rule. Commander William McGonagle received the Medal of Honor for his actions while in command of USS Liberty when it was mistakenly attacked by the Israel Defense Forces in the Eastern Mediterranean on June 8, 1967, during the Six Day War.
SETTING THE RECORD STRAIGHT
Since the 1980s, a number of Medals of Honor have been belatedly awarded to correct past administrative errors, oversights, or to consider previous recommendations as a result of new evidence. On July 19, 1980, President Jimmy Carter presented the Medal of Honor to Matt Urban 36 years after Urban had performed numerous acts of valor during the fighting in France and Belgium in World War II. On February 24, 1981, President Ronald Reagan presented the Medal of Honor to Army Sergeant Roy Benavidez for his valor during the Vietnam War. On April 24, 1991, President George H.W. Bush presented the Medal of Honor to the family of World War I hero Corporal Freddie Stowers for his extraordinary and inspirational valor during the 1918 Meuse Argonne Campaign. Stowers was an African-American who was mortally wounded while attempting to destroy a machine gun that had pinned down his unit. The paperwork recommending him for the award had been lost for over 70 years.
In 1993, a special study was commissioned to investigate racial discrimination in the awarding of medals in World War II; no African-Americans had received the Medal of Honor for action during the war. The study concluded with a recommendation that several African-American Distinguished Service Cross recipients be upgraded to the Medal of Honor. On January 13, 1997, President Bill Clinton presented the Medal of Honor to seven African-Americans. Six were posthumous awards; only former 1st Lieutenant Vernon Baker was present to receive the award for action in Italy in 1945.
A similar study was conducted in 1998 to examine the records of Asian-Americans who had served in World War II. On June 21, 2000, President Clinton presented the Medal of Honor to 22 Asian-Americans for their World War II courage, including U.S. Senator Daniel Inouye and 19 Japanese-Americans who had served in the famous 442d Regimental Combat Team in the European Theater of Operations.
Periodically, other additions have been made to the Medal of Honor Roll of Heroes to correct past oversights. On January 21, 2001, President Clinton presented the Medal of Honor posthumously to Theodore Roosevelt for his bravery in the Spanish-American War. Roosevelt thus became one of two sets of father-son Medal of Honor recipients; his son, Brigadier General Theodore Roosevelt Jr., had received the medal for his June 6, 1944, actions on D-Day. The other father-son recipients were Arthur MacArthur, for his 1863 heroism during the Civil War, and his son, Douglas MacArthur, for leading the defense of the Philippines early in World War II.
President Clinton also presented Medals of Honor to James Day for heroism in World War II, Robert Ingram and Alfred Rascon for actions in Vietnam, and Andrew Jackson Smith posthumously for gallantry in the Civil War.
President George W. Bush presented Medals of Honor to Ed Freeman, Bruce Crandall, Jon Swanson, and Humbert Versace
(the last two posthumously) for Vietnam, to Ed Salomon for World War II, and to Woodrow Keeble (the first full-blooded Sioux to receive the Medal of Honor) and Tibor Rubin for the Korean War. Rubin was a Jewish veteran and Holocaust survivor who some believed was originally overlooked for the medal due to anti-Semitism.
On May 2, 2011, President Barack Obama presented posthumous Medals of Honor to the families of Army Privates 1st Class Henry Svehla and Anthony T. Kaho’ohanohano. Both awards were for valorous acts performed by the men as riflemen in the Korean War.
POST-VIETNAM WAR
The award of the Medal of Honor has been exceedingly rare for conflicts since the end of the Vietnam War. There were no awards of the medal during Grenada, Panama, Lebanon or Desert Storm. Two Medals of Honor were awarded for action in Mogadishu, Somalia, in 1993: Master Sergeant Gary Gordon and Sergeant 1st Class Randy Shughart received the medal posthumously for their actions during the fighting recounted in the book and movie Blackhawk Down.
At present, only four Medals of Honor have been awarded for valor in the Iraq War, all posthumously: Marine Jason Dunham, Army Private Ross McGinnis, Navy SEAL Michael Monsoor and Army Sergeant Paul Smith. Similarly, only seven Medals of Honor have been awarded in the Afghanistan War, three posthumously (Army Sergeants Robert Miller and Jared Monti and Navy SEAL Michael Murphy). After Staff Sergeant Giunta became the first living recipient presented the Medal of Honor for action since the Vietnam War, he has been joined by Army Staff Sergeants Leroy A. Petry and Clinton Romesha and Marine Sergeant Dakota Meyer. Petry and Meyer received their Medals of Honor from President Obama during White House ceremonies in 2011, while Romesha received his in 2013.
The Medal of Honor is the ultimate symbol of courage and valor under fire and is awarded to only the bravest of the brave; as such, the medal and its recipients are rightfully objects of awe and veneration. It is such an extraordinary honor that President Harry S. Truman, himself a Soldier in World War I, reportedly said, “I’d rather wear that medal than be president of the United States.”
The Medal of Honor is the epitome of valor and selfless service, and many who received the medal made the supreme sacrifice – giving their lives – in that service. The recipients of the Medal of Honor are officers and enlisted men from all branches of the service. They come from all walks of life and from many different ethnic backgrounds and cultures. They come from all over the country, and even some foreign lands. They come from every armed service and have seen action in America’s wars from the Civil War to Afghanistan. Despite all these differences, the recipients of the Medal of Honor all share one thing in common. At some point in their lives, they selflessly performed extraordinarily courageous acts in the face of almost insurmountable odds – deeds that were clearly “above and beyond the call of duty.”
More often than not, those who survived to receive their Medals of Honor accepted them in honor of their comrades who fought and sometimes died in the defense of their nation. Perhaps Canadian-born Vietnam hero and Medal of Honor recipient Peter Lemon summed this up best when he told a group of young students, “Whenever you see the medal, you see millions of people out there who have given their service and sacrificed for your freedom.” In that sense, the Medal of Honor is not only a tribute to those who received it, but it is also a testament to the dedication and duty to all who have served the nation.
James H. Willbanks, PhD, is an “ACG” advisory board member, the General of the Army George C. Marshall Chair of Military History, and Director of the Department of Military History at the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, Fort Leavenworth, Kan. He is the author of several books on the Vietnam War, including “Abandoning Vietnam,” “The Battle of An Loc” and “The Tet Offensive: A Concise History.” He is also the editor of “America’s Heroes: Medal of Honor Recipients From the Civil War to Afghanistan.”
Originally published in the May 2013 issue of Armchair General.
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08f0260e7731debf16aeef670857673d | https://www.historynet.com/americas-spanish-savior-bernardo-de-galvez.htm | America’s Spanish Savior: Bernardo de Gálvez | America’s Spanish Savior: Bernardo de Gálvez
After entering the American Revolutionary War on the colonies’ side in 1779, Spain drew off British forces to the south, then crushed them, first in Louisiana and Alabama, and finally with a combined naval and land assault at the Battle of Pensacola in 1781. (Nicolas Ponce/Library of Congress)
THROUGH THE SWELTERING HEAT of Louisiana in the autumn of 1779 marched one of the most diverse military forces ever assembled in North America to challenge the British Army’s stranglehold in the southern theater of the American Revolutionary War. Led by a young rising star of the Spanish military, Col. Bernardo de Gálvez, the force included recruits from Mexico, free blacks, experienced Spanish soldiers in the Louisiana Regiment, volunteers from the American colonies and from Louisiana’s German and Acadian communities, and American Indians.
The march was one of the first campaigns ignited by the Spanish declaration of war against Britain in June 1779, opening a second front in the region the British had hoped to quickly secure and turn against the rebellious colonists in the North. The Spanish, who had been secretly aiding the North American rebels with critical military supplies and financing since 1776 [see “Bankrolling the Battle of Yorktown,” Spring 2007], now openly challenged the British in the global power struggle between the Bourbon monarchs and King George III, finally taking their longstanding enmity into action against British forces in North America.
The Spanish circumvented the British navy’s Eastern Seaboard blockade, using the Mississippi River to supply the colonial rebels. It was up to Gálvez to keep that line open
Over the next two years, Gálvez would lead thousands of Spanish soldiers and scores of ships against the British in what would prove to be the last combat theater of the Revolution. Enduring hurricanes, disease, and difficult, swampy terrain, he and his soldiers forced the British to divert scarce resources and played a little-known but crucial role in pressuring Great Britain to negotiate for peace after seven grueling years of war.
Upon hearing that Spain had declared war on Britain, Gen. George Washington, who was struggling to hold the rebellion together during the early summer of 1781, declared: “United with the arms of France, we have every thing to hope over the arms of our common enemy, the English.” That hope was soon realized when a French army and navy helped American troops trap Lord Charles Cornwallis at Yorktown—and Bernardo de Gálvez rousted the British from their strongholds in Louisiana and Florida.
DESPITE BRITAIN’S ECONOMIC POWER and the colossal army and navy it massed against the beleaguered rebels, the war had dragged on for years. By 1779, murmurs of discontent and discord had grown louder within the colonies, particularly among the merchants and loyalists of the South. Southern loyalists traveled to London that year to urge the British ministers to deploy troops in their home colonies, insisting that they would be welcome and could rally the population to the king. The British, who blithely overestimated loyalist sympathies throughout the war, agreed. In October 1779, the British sent 3,500 troops from Rhode Island to the south, and in May 1780, Lt. Gen. Henry Clinton and 8,700 British troops sailed from New York to capture Charleston. (Clinton’s first attempt to capture Charleston, in 1776, had failed.) They hoped this would lead to the collapse of the rebellion in that region, leaving the northern colonies pitted against Britain and their former brethren to the south, while giving the British secure seaports from which to harass the French in the Caribbean.
By the spring of 1780, it appeared the British strategy would succeed. With British reinforcements from Georgia and the former Spanish territory of Florida, Clinton and his combined force of 17,200 men marched against Charleston. After a brutal six-week siege featuring continual artillery bombardment, the city surrendered on May 12. The 5,500 colonial troops in the garrison, almost half of them from the dwindling and discouraged Continental Army, were taken prisoner. The surrender by Maj. Gen. Benjamin Lincoln was the biggest American loss of the Revolutionary War.
Even as the British targeted the South, the Spanish were gathering for a powerful counterstroke. Spain would enforce its declaration of war with a military campaign led by the governor of Louisiana, Bernardo de Gálvez, the 33-year-old nephew of Spain’s respected minister of the Indies, José de Gálvez, and the son of one of King Carlos III’s trusted military advisers, Matías de Gálvez y Gallardo.
Unlike the hereditary titleholders typical of the 18th century, Gálvez was born to a family of self-made men from a humble adobe home in a small town near Málaga, in southern coastal Spain. Able, educated administrators and lawyers, the elders of the family ensured that Bernardo was well prepared for a military career. His first combat experience was against the Apaches in Texas, where he was wounded. He then studied military science and served with the Regiment of Cantabria in France, and was wounded again in Spain’s difficult campaign against the Moors in Algiers in 1775.
Gálvez’s first assignment in America came on New Year’s Day in 1777, when King Carlos appointed him acting governor of the Spanish city of New Orleans. (France had ceded Louisiana to Spain in 1762.) Among his biggest tasks: managing a smuggling operation authorized by the king to supply the Continental Army. Spain backed the colonists because it feared Great Britain was becoming far too powerful; the British still occupied Gibraltar on the Spanish coast and since 1764 had held the former Spanish territories in Florida, exchanged after the British captured Havana in the French and Indian War. The rebellion in North America gave Spain a strategic opportunity to protect its interests, regain its territory, and disrupt British global power.
Yet the Spanish, who had suffered terrible losses fighting the British in the Seven Years’ War, did not want to antagonize their adversary until they were fully prepared for any backlash, so their support of the colonists was at first covert. Beginning in 1776, they secretly supplied the Americans with gunpowder, weapons, and uniforms. Because the British navy blockaded the colonial Eastern Seaboard, the Spanish used the Mississippi River as an important supply line for the rebels.
Spain’s long-term strategic plan was to seize the strongholds of Mobile and Pensacola, driving the British from the south. But Gálvez first had to secure Louisiana by taking Forts Panmure and Bute. (Baker Vail)It was up to Gálvez to keep that line open—not an easy task, since New Orleans was rife with British spies. But Gálvez was resourceful. Often working through brokers, he artfully arranged purchases of materiel, always carefully concealing the king’s involvement in the operation. Gálvez also created a valuable partnership with Oliver Pollock, a wealthy Irish-American patriot who risked his personal fortune to aid the Revolution. Together, the two managed to slip many critical shipments past the British watchdogs and into the hands of the colonists.
By April 1779, with its military forces finally ready for battle, the court in Madrid sent an ultimatum to the British. Among other stipulations, the Spanish demanded that the United States of America be recognized as independent. Unsurprisingly, the British rejected these terms and declared war. Spain responded with its own declaration June 21.
The official notice of the war reached Havana on July 17, 1779, and the captain general there immediately sent word to Gálvez. Realizing this would also certainly mean an attack on New Orleans, Gálvez increased his military preparations.
By this time, he was bound to his adopted hometown by far more than military duty. In December 1777, he had married a widowed French-American citizen of the city, María Feliciana de Saint-Maxent Estrehan. By popular account, this marriage to a woman known for her beauty and charm was also a departure from 18th-century norms, a marriage for love.
A skilled speaker, Gálvez—whom the king now formally appointed as governor of New Orleans—assembled the city’s citizens and called on them to defend Louisiana. In a dramatic oration, his voice rang out, “[A]lthough I am disposed to shed the last drop of my blood for Louisiana and for my king…I do not know whether you will help me in resisting the ambitious designs of the English. What do you say?…Shall I swear to defend Louisiana?” The audience applauded thunderously.
The campaign against the British was coordinated through Havana, the strategic center for Spanish military power in the Caribbean. After their disastrous defeat during the British invasion of 1762, in the Seven Years’ War, the Cuban military forces had been rebuilt under the leadership of Capt. Gen. Ambrosio Funes de Villalpando, Count of Ricla. Ricla had put in place the radical policy of training and arming Cubans, which King Carlos accepted. Pragmatically acknowledging there were not enough whites to fill the ranks of a strong military, Ricla also created two battalions of biracial and free blacks, confidently predicting that they would become the best volunteers on the island. Two decades later, as the Spanish prepared to invade British territory, the army and diverse militias of Cuba were well established.
The long-term Spanish strategy was to seize the well-fortified British enclaves of Mobile and Pensacola, which lay east of New Orleans on the Gulf Coast. Gálvez began preparing for a long campaign. Arranging for provisions in July 1779, he dispatched an emissary to the provincial governor of Texas, where Spanish vaqueros—cowboys—managed great herds around Béxar, present-day San Antonio. The next month, they herded 2,000 Texas longhorns to Louisiana to supply Gálvez’s troops—the inaugural long-range Texas cattle drive.
By August, Gálvez had assembled a force of remarkable diversity for the 18th century. The initial troop of more than 600 men comprised 170 veteran soldiers, 330 recruits from Mexico and the Canary Islands, 60 militiamen and local citizens, 80 free blacks, and 7 American volunteers, including Oliver Pollock. Gálvez recruited another 600 men among Louisiana’s German and Acadian immigrants, and 160 Indians. The babel of languages can only be imagined: West African, German, Acadian French, probably Choctaw or Chickasaw, and the Castilian of the Mexicans, Cubans, and peninsular Spaniards, with the Irish lilt of the bilingual Pollock. The troops marched more than 100 miles through the dense forests and swamps northwest of New Orleans to a recently constructed six-cannon British fort on the eastern shore of Mississippi, a few miles south of Baton Rouge. Gálvez preceded them and continued to muster volunteers. Though almost a third of the men became ill from the swarming mosquitoes and fever-inducing swampland, by all accounts their leader managed to instill esprit de corps in them.
The troops reached Fort Bute on September 6. Most of the British garrison had retreated to Baton Rouge upon learning of Gálvez’s advance, and the fort’s 27 soldiers were taken after a brief skirmish. That modest success provided a much-needed boost, encouraging the inexperienced volunteers and bonding the troops.
After resting his men, Gálvez marched on Baton Rouge. But Gálvez was a sympathetic commander. He knew his troops were green and had families at home, and he feared a direct assault on the city, which was surrounded by an 18-foot moat, would cost too many lives. Instead, he opened the battle with bombardment. Using a diversionary detachment to draw British fire as twilight fell, Gálvez’s men surreptitiously installed cannons he had hauled upriver on flatbeds in a garden on the opposite side of the fort. In the morning, the dismayed British realized their mistake, but it was too late. Gálvez’s troops launched an artillery barrage from their secure vantage point and wrecked the fort. The British could not bring their own guns to bear on the garden. By midday, the British officers proposed a truce, the terms of which included the surrender of both Baton Rouge and Fort Panmure, at Natchez, Mississippi, though the Spanish could not immediately claim the second prize.
THE MILITIA AND CIVILIANS GATHERED at Fort Panmure were in a quandary. The commanding British officer at Pensacola, Maj. Gen. John Campbell, had countermanded the terms of the surrender at Baton Rouge. Campbell himself had a force of more than 1,000 men, including loyalist troops from Pennsylvania and Maryland. He urged the inhabitants at Fort Panmure to join against the Spanish, who were rapidly approaching despite the September heat.
But Pollock’s pen proved mightier than Campbell. Certain that Natchez residents favored the Americans and Spanish, he sent a letter to them with news of Spain’s declaration of war, urging them to give up the fort. The fort quickly surrendered and the Spanish campaign’s initial sweep up the Mississippi was complete. As Gálvez later wrote, “It had so fortunate a result that with the loss of only one man and of two wounded, we have taken all the English settlements which they had on this river,” three forts, 13 cannons, 550 British and German regulars, and another 500 militiamen.
Gálvez’s success was a pleasant surprise to a weary General Washington, and it stunned the British. Campbell initially believed the reports of these losses were a ploy to lure the British out of the strong fortifications of Pensacola. The British in San Augustín panicked at the threat of a Spanish attack and—importantly for the Continental Army—requested more troops from General Clinton. The fort commander wrote in December 1779, “Should we receive a similar visit from the Havanna [sic], I shall do what ought to be done; but I have not the gift to perform miracles.”
The Continental Army and Congress turned their focus to the southern theater in 1780, amid several blows to the morale of the Revolution. Maj. Gen. Benedict Arnold had defected after trying to turn West Point over to the British, and in May, two Connecticut regiments threatened to return home, protesting lack of pay and short rations. The officers defused the upheaval, but it was a troubling presage to the serious mutinies that soon convulsed other regiments of the army.
The bad news continued with General Clinton’s siege of Charleston, also in May 1780. Clinton returned to New York later that summer but General Cornwallis inflicted a devastating defeat on the colonists near Camden, South Carolina. The American commander, Maj. Gen. Horatio Gates, victor at Saratoga, fled the field in disgrace. George Washington sent his ablest commander, Maj. Gen. Nathanael Greene, to lead the Southern Department of the Army and ordered Lt. Col. Henry Lee’s and Baron von Steuben’s forces south. Greene traveled to his new command post through the states of Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia, stopping to request troops and supplies from political leaders, with little success.
Meanwhile the Spanish continued to gather troops, supplies, and naval reinforcements from Cuba and Spain for their assault on more impressive fortifications and larger British garrisons at Mobile and Pensacola. Gálvez sallied to take on Fort Charlotte in Mobile on January 10, 1780. Many of his men now were from the Havana garrisons, joining the artillery, fixed infantry, and militia of Louisiana. Twenty-six North Americans joined Gálvez, bringing his total force to 1,427. Spanish and Cuban troops sailed from Havana, and Gálvez’s men embarked from New Orleans. Their journey through the Gulf to Mobile Bay was plagued by shipwrecks and storms; few supplies survived, and on February 10 the soldiers disembarked, some from ships stranded on sandbars.
The story later circulated that Gálvez had thoughts of abandoning his mission. But he persevered, salvaging artillery from one of the ships to establish a battery at the entrance of Mobile Bay. Catching his spirit, the men constructed ladders from the wreckage of their ships to scale the walls of the fort.
As the troops boarded the remaining ships to continue up the bay, a small vessel arrived with the welcome news that reinforcements were under way from Havana. By February 20, the billowing sails of five warships were sighted. They carried the Regiment of Navarra, 500 veteran Spanish infantrymen, and the combined forces assembled for the assault on Mobile.
Once the Spanish reached Fort Charlotte, a Spanish officer acquainted with the British commander of the fort, Capt. Elias Durnford, was sent to negotiate. The adversaries exchanged a series of gifts and double-edged pleasantries that were traditional in 18th-century warfare. Durnford sent wine, chicken, fresh bread, and mutton; Gálvez responded with Spanish and Bordeaux wines, tea biscuits, corn cakes, and—most persuasively—Cuban cigars. The swap ended with Durnford declaring that honor required him to resist.
While Durnford waited for relief from Pensacola, Gálvez and his men resumed the arduous work of building a battery to bombard the fort. By March 4, several of their 18-pound cannons were situated. During the ensuing week, the men completed the earthworks and trenches and began the siege in earnest.
On March 11, scouts reported two English camps in the region with an estimated force of 400 to 600 men, the relief mission from Campbell. They were too little, too late. The next day, the Spanish batteries of 18- and 24-pound cannons began firing. The intense and sustained barrage of artillery filled the skies with smoke, and cannonballs smashed the parapets and embrasures of Fort Charlotte. By late afternoon, Durnford ordered a white flag raised. The British surrendered on March 14, 1780.
GÁLVEZ WANTED TO MOVE QUICKLY against Pensacola, using Mobile as a base, but his superiors in Havana postponed the complex campaign against the most formidable British bastion on the Gulf Coast. The British continued to reinforce Pensacola and, again to the relief of the Continental Army, diverted some of their forces from Savannah. The Spanish Army of Operations, sailing from Spain, planned to support the Pensacola campaign with a formidable six regiments of more than 7,600 soldiers and 100 artillerymen from Spain. But when Adm. George Rodney brought an impressive fleet with men and supplies to shore up Britain’s stronghold at Gibraltar that spring, the Spanish fleet was forced to remain in port, where disease devastated the fleet’s sailors and soldiers. Once Rodney left, the main convoy did not reach Havana until August 3, three months after leaving Spain.
Hundreds died at sea, and hundreds more were hospitalized and died in the West Indies. By the time Gálvez was ready to launch his first campaign against Pensacola in October, only 594 of his men were fit enough to join the expedition. The Spanish commanders planning the Pensacola campaign knew that most of the troops would now have to come from Cuba, Louisiana, and other Spanish holdings in the Americas. Gálvez reached Havana to lobby for more troops on August 2, just as the decimated Spanish Army of Operations arrived. The junta there agreed to provide 4,000 men, including reinforcements from Mexico and as many troops as could be spared from Puerto Rico and Santo Domingo.
Preparations for an attack on Pensacola were finalized for mid-October 1780. But this was hurricane season, and a naval lieutenant, José Solano y Bote, protested the timing after calculating that one of the Gulf’s terrible storms was approaching. Gálvez prevailed, however, and the powerful fleet of 11 warships and 51 transport ships set sail on October 16.
Two days later, the fury of a hurricane ripped into the fleet, scattering ships and troops throughout the Caribbean, the southeastern Mexican coastline along Campeche, and the Mississippi River. When the commanders were finally able to account for 3,829 of the men in January 1781, 862 of them were in Havana, 1,771 in Campeche, 831 in New Orleans, and 365 in Mobile. Despite these discouraging setbacks, Gálvez pressed on with the final siege against the British.
In the dawn light of February 28, 1781, a squadron of 36 warships and transport ships under the command of Capt. José Calvo de Irizábal sailed in a second campaign to take Pensacola. Gálvez joined the fleet on his private brig, the Galveztown. On March 4, they reached Santa Rosa, a 40-mile-long barrier island that provided a harrowingly narrow passage into the bay leading to Pensacola. The large fleet also faced a British shore battery overlooking the inlet at Barrancas Colorados, opposite the western shore of the island.
Gálvez planned to land some troops and cannons on Santa Rosa and wait for reinforcements from Louisiana and Mobile. The troops debarked on March 9, safely shielded from the cannons of the shore battery and several patrolling British frigates. Campbell, fearing the worst, managed to slip a brig out to Jamaica in a desperate bid for reinforcements.
The convoy attempted to enter the bay on March 11, and the leading 64-cannon San Ramón touched bottom in the shallow water. The naval officers, fearing both the shallow draft and the shore battery, countermanded Gálvez, refusing to take the fleet through the gap. Calvo moved his warships out to the deeper water.
Gálvez and Calvo began an acrimonious dispute. For six days, anchored at sea in their respective ships, they remained at a standoff. Gálvez feared that the campaign would be lost. The turbulent weather of the Gulf could once again scatter the ships, and he worried that the British might send a rescue fleet from Jamaica. He decided on a dramatic course of action. After sending one man to sound the entrance of the bay, he risked his Galveztown and three other Louisiana vessels he commanded with a run through the gap. The Galveztown cleared the channel, avoiding British cannons by hugging the shoreline. When they saw it was safe to follow, the Spanish frigates entered the bay under the command of Capt. Miguel de Alderete. Calvo returned to Havana on the San Ramón.
ON MARCH 24, THE SPANISH ARMY and militias at Santa Rosa joined the forces arriving from Mobile. During the first weeks of April, they reconnoitered Pensacola’s fortifications. There were two redoubts, Crescent and Sombrero, protecting Fort George, earthen works topped by a palisade, built at Campbell’s direction the previous year. The troops established encampments and began preparations for what became a two-month siege, the longest of the Revolution. Hundreds of engineers and workers brought supplies and armaments to the battlefield. The men dug trenches, bunkers, and redoubts. Then they extended a tunnel toward the British redoubts, large enough to move mortars and cannons while shielding the troops from the fire of British cannons, grapeshot, grenades, and howitzers.
A month after arriving, Gálvez was wounded by gunfire while viewing the British fortifications, and he transferred battlefield command to his friend Col. José de Ezpeleta. On April 19, a large fleet was sighted heading toward the bay. Rumors swept through the ranks that British reinforcements had arrived.
To his relief, Gálvez soon learned that these ships were the combined Spanish and French fleet from Havana headed by Solano, the navy lieutenant who had warned of the hurricane during the first Pensacola expedition. The Spanish fleet carried a crew of 1,700 as well as 1,600 soldiers, raising the total Spanish force to nearly 8,000 men. Solano decided to remain to assist Gálvez after the troops disembarked, and the two men worked closely together.
By April 30, the Spanish had moved six 24-pounders through the tunnel to a small hill within range of the British redoubt, and opened fire. Trenching continued and a larger battery was installed on Pine Hill, a more advantageous position, but the British sallied, captured the position, and spiked the Spanish cannons. The Gulf continued its tempestuous storms, and on May 5 and 6, another hurricane struck the Spanish ships. The Spanish commander was forced to withdraw, fearing that the fierce sea would wreck his wooden ships on the shore. The army was on its own to continue the siege. The trenches flooded and with morale in the balance, Gálvez granted a ration of brandy to his troops.
On May 8, a howitzer blast, aimed from information given by an American loyalist deserter, hit the magazine at the Crescent redoubt. Black smoke billowed into the sky as the gunpowder supply exploded, killing 57 British troops and devastating the fortifications. Ezpeleta, commanding the light infantry, led a charge into the redoubt and then took it, quickly positioning howitzers and cannons to open fire on Fort George.
At this point, most American loyalists and their Creek Indian allies deserted, leaving Campbell only 600 soldiers. The British returned fire from Fort George, but were overwhelmed by the Spanish bombardment. Realizing that their final line of fortification could not sustain the barrage, the British hoisted the white flag from Fort George at 3 in the afternoon on that same day. On May 10, 1781, the formal surrender was complete. The Spanish lost 74 men, with 198 wounded.
That victory clinched the Spanish rout of the British from their southern strongholds. Gálvez and his men were welcomed as heroes when they arrived in Havana on May 30. The king promoted him to lieutenant general and Solano to squadron chief, with the title Marquez de Socorro. Gálvez was also named governor of Florida (in addition to Louisiana), his annual salary was increased to 10,000 pesos, and he was made viscount of Gálveztown and count of Gálvez.
The royal commendation also stated that in recognition of Gálvez singly forcing the entrance to Mobile Bay, he could place on his coat of arms the words, “Yo solo,” or “I alone.”
Returning to Spain, Gálvez was among those who drafted the Treaty of Paris that formally ended the Revolutionary War in 1783—and gave East and West Florida to Spain. His contributions to the American victory also were recognized in the newly forged United States; both Galveston, Texas, and St. Bernard Parish in Louisiana are named in his honor.
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35a7e75e49c145617e82361f30d68434 | https://www.historynet.com/americas-worst-wildfire-the-big-burn-of-1910.htm | America’s Worst Wildfire: The Big Burn of 1910 | America’s Worst Wildfire: The Big Burn of 1910
The fire swept through some 2.7 million acres of federal woodlands, including this stand of white pines in Idaho’s Couer d’Alene National Forest. (U.S. Forest Service)
Shopkeepers, miners and housewives in Wallace, Idaho, had been complaining about the smoke for most of the summer of 1910. It had rained little since spring, and the tinder-dry forest on the surrounding slopes had spawned numerous small blazes. The smoke, at times verging on a fog, enveloped town. The fledgling U.S. Forest Service was struggling to keep up with the fires. In mid-August ranger Ed Pulaski, one of the service’s few experienced men, ventured out with a crew to fight fires near the west fork of Placer Creek, about 5 miles south of town, while fellow ranger Henry Kottkey and his men battled a blaze on Loop Creek.
“The fire’s blowing up,” Kottkey soon reported to supervisors. “I’m worried.”
He was also concerned about wife Bertha, who had entered Providence Hospital in Wallace to give birth to the couple’s third child. Others were growing anxious, too. In Taft, Mont., which the Chicago Tribune had recently labeled “the wickedest city in America,” and in other rough settlements in the northern Rocky Mountains—Saltese in Montana, and Mullan, Avery and Grand Forks in Idaho—saloonkeepers, railroad workers and prostitutes kept an eye on the burning hills.
On Little Beaver Creek, north of Thompson Falls, Mont., 3-year-old Lily Cunningham had watched in fascination as glowing plumes of orange smoke drifted across the night sky. She could tell her mother was frightened, as she’d been crying. But Lily found the orange clouds beautiful.
‘The country has been wiped clean,’ one survivor recalled of the stark landscape left in the fire’s wake
Other residents of the northern Rockies, especially those with memories of earlier fires, began plotting their escape and planning what they might take with them on horseback, in wagons or on the train. Some buried sewing machines, tools and trunks filled with personal possessions and family keepsakes for later retrieval.
Within days winds swept down from the low hills of the Palouse region of southeastern Washington, fanning the flames and merging the thousands of small fires into a single massive blaze. Dubbed the “Big Burn” or “Big Blowup,” the resulting firestorm remains the largest wildfire known to have hit the United States and, as one historian wrote, “possibly the biggest ever in North American history.” It scorched some 3 million acres of virgin forest, mainly in northern Idaho and western Montana, and killed dozens of people, mostly firefighters.
“The country has been wiped clean,” one survivor recalled of the stark landscape left in the fire’s wake.
The first report of fire in the northern Rockies that season had come in on April 29, earlier than usual, from the newly declared Blackfeet National Forest of northwestern Montana. As spring yielded to an unusually dry, hot summer, reports flooded in of hundreds of small blazes, many sparked by lightning, others by cinders thrown off by steam locomotives or through the careless actions of miners and even inexperienced forest rangers. A strong lightning storm over the Bitterroots on the night of July 26 exacerbated the situation by igniting a flurry of fires that stretched the Forest Service lines and began to get out of hand.
“For every fire we put out,” one service member told a Missoula, Mont., newspaper, “a new one is reported.”
As the blaze intensified, increasingly desperate local officials brought in trainloads of firefighters from every walk of life. (Museum of North Idaho)
By early August an estimated 3,000 fires were burning across Idaho, Montana and Washington, including the Bean Creek fire, the Lakeview and Loop Creek fires, the Mineral County fires, the Placer Creek fire, the Trout Creek fire and countless others with no name. The Forest Service was battling them earnestly but was short of supplies and staff. Pressed for manpower, it had resorted to recruiting immigrants fresh off the train and prisoners from area jails.
In desperation the Forest Service appealed for federal aid to President William Howard Taft, who on August 7 authorized the dispatch of Army troops to help with firefighting efforts. Twenty-five hundred soldiers eventually joined the fire lines. Most were buffalo soldiers of the 25th U.S. Infantry from Fort George Wright, north of Spokane. Unfortunately, like the newly recruited immigrants, the corralled jail inmates and the Forest Service neophytes, these black soldiers had little or no experience fighting forest fires.
Regardless, they did what they could, even trying to induce rain. Beginning in mid-August, on direction from their officers, the buffalo soldiers spent 60 straight hours firing cannons and dynamite charges into the sky. Their efforts were prompted by the timeworn observation that rain often followed major military battles involving cannon fire.
This time the tactic failed—no rain came.
In Wallace and Taft, Saltese and Avery, concerns mounted.
The Big Burn left one-third of the town of Wallace, Idaho, in ashes. (Library of Congress)
The region’s longtime miners and shopkeepers were no strangers to fire. Wallace, founded in 1884 when namesake Colonel William R. Wallace built a cabin on the promising townsite, had grown as fortune seekers came after gold and silver ore in the surrounding hills. By 1890 it was thriving. That July, however, a residential fire fueled by strong winds devastated the business district, destroying 19 saloons and hotels, three livery stables, a bank, a theater, the newspaper office, doctors’ and lawyers’ offices, stores and shops.
Now wildfire threatened.
Burning embers had drifted down into town and set afire a couple of canvas awnings. Though alert townspeople had quickly put out those blazes, on August 19 local insurance companies, noting with alarm the rapidly encroaching flames, stopped issuing fire insurance policies.
As the glowing orange clouds that had so fascinated 3-year-old Lily Cunningham approached the family home on Little Beaver Creek, her parents released livestock, secured belongings from the cabin, piled whatever fit into their root cellar and fled to a neighbor’s house. Put to bed with the neighbor’s small children, Lily watched through the window as the adults and older children carved out a fire line and doused any embers landing in the farmyard.
On August 20 the winds came. “[That] Saturday afternoon,” historian Tim Egan wrote in his 2009 book The Big Burn, “atmospheric conditions gave birth to a Palouser that lifted the red dirt of the hills and slammed into the forests—not as a gust or an episodic blow, but as a battering ram of forced air.”
When the wind hit the downslopes, it accelerated, flattening out the flames and incinerating everything in its path. Hydrocarbons in the resinous sap of the predominant Western white pines boiled out of the trees, releasing highly flammable gas that spread across hundreds of square miles and detonated spontaneously as it heated.
“In a matter of hours,” the Forest Service noted, “fires became firestorms, and trees by the millions became exploding candles. Millions more trees—sucked from the ground, roots and all—became flying blowtorches. It was dark by 4 in the afternoon, save for wind-powered fireballs that rolled from ridgetop to ridgetop at 70 miles an hour. They leaped canyons a half-mile wide in one fluid motion. Entire mountainsides ignited in an instant.”
Answering an appeal from the Forest Service, the government dispatched U.S. Army troops to fight the blaze from field camps like this one. (Museum of North Idaho)
By noon on August 21 roiling clouds of smoke had blacked out the sky as far south as Denver and as far north as the town of Saskatoon in Saskatchewan, Canada. People claimed to have seen night-flying bats at midday. Smoke from the fire, the Forest Service reported, “turned the sun an eerie copper color in Boston. Soot fell on the ice in Greenland.” As the fire grew, people in upstate New York, some 2,000 miles east of Wallace, could smell smoke on the wind, and ships in the Pacific Ocean to the west had trouble navigating by the stars due to the smoke obscuring the night sky.
The windblown firestorm persisted a full 48 hours. “For pure physical force,” Egan says, “we haven’t seen anything like it since.” Ranger Edward G. Stahl recalled flames hundreds of feet high, “swooping to earth in great darting curves, truly a veritable red demon from hell.”
Ranger Edward G. Stahl recalled flames hundreds of feet high, ‘swooping to earth in great darting curves, truly a veritable red demon from hell’
In Wallace fear reached a fever pitch. Authorities ordered trains to evacuate the town’s women and children. On August 19 Bertha Kottkey had given birth to a son, naming him after his father. As the fires threatened town, Bertha and Henry Jr. joined other patients and staff from Providence Hospital evacuating by eastbound train. They just made it. Immediately after the caboose crossed a trestle on the outskirts of town, the charred structure collapsed. Arriving safely in St. Regis. Mont., the patients and staff transferred to a train bound for Montana’s capital, Helena, where they caught still another to Missoula. They had no way of knowing it at the time, but Providence Hospital would be one of the few buildings in the fire-stricken east end of Wallace to survive.
Meanwhile, back in town men had been ordered to the fire lines, and authorities had released prisoners from the city jail to help. (Only two, an accused murderer and a bank robber, were kept in handcuffs.) Ashes fell like snow. That evening a large ember came down amid buckets of press grease and solvent-soaked rags beside the Wallace Times building. The resulting blaze ignited the newspaper office, then spread quickly to an adjoining mill, a boardinghouse, two hotels and the railroad depot.
As the fire spread, an elderly man named John Boyd, whose son happened to be a Wallace fire captain, finally headed for the depot to board one of the waiting trains. Suddenly remembering his beloved pet parrot, he turned back toward home to retrieve the bird. Searchers later found their bodies side by side in the street. Master and bird had died of smoke inhalation.
Beyond the city limits a vast swath of the northern Rockies was ablaze.
Buffalo soldiers of the 25th U.S. Infantry out of Fort George Wright, north of Spokane, Wash., answered the call. (Museum of North Idaho)
One Mullan resident likened it to being “inside a deep bowl which is completely lined with seething flames.” Railroad bridges burned and collapsed. Wherever possible, trains took refuge in tunnels. Grand Forks, a canvas-and-wood town on the Idaho-Washington border, simply disappeared when the firestorm swept through. “The whole horizon to the west was aflame,” one ranger reported.
Amid the blazing hills the understaffed Forest Service did what it could with its ragtag force of rangers, hasty recruits and buffalo soldiers. As the fires spun out of control, Henry Kottkey and crew abandoned the line on Loop Creek and hurriedly sought shelter in the cooler air of a large railroad culvert. To the east ranger Ed Pulaski led his 45-man crew and its two horses into a mineshaft. There the men shrouded the tunnel entrance with blankets, soaked them with standing water from the shaft and finally dropped to the floor where the air was breathable.
The buffalo soldiers kept fighting. In Wallace and other places they worked through the night hauling water buckets and setting backfires. “Not a man in the lot knew what a yellow streak was,” one Avery resident recalled. “They never complained. They were never afraid.”
Forest ranger Ed Pulaski, his 45-man crew and two horses sheltered in this muddy mineshaft. Five hours later all but five men and the horses emerged, injured but alive. (U.S. Forest Service)
Pulaski and crew finally emerged after five hours face down in the mud of the mineshaft, the fire having burned past them. But five men and the two horses lay dead, and the others were in varying states of distress. Pulaski himself was in dire shape. Burned on his hands, head and face, he was blind in one eye and afraid he might lose the other. Though the soles of their shoes were burned through, the crew headed down the smoldering mountainside. Leading the way, Pulaski tried his best to follow a familiar path now obscured amid the charred remnants of the forest. The ragged group finally stumbled across a group of women searching the burned-out woods on Placer Creek for survivors. The rescuers greeted the men with coffee and whiskey.
They had made it. Kottkey and crew had also survived, and the exhausted buffalo soldiers soon returned to their post north of Spokane.
By the evening of August 21 the winds that had fueled the firestorm had moved east, and storm clouds began rolling in from Washington. Then it rained, a steady drenching rain, a gully washer that smothered the fires, leaving a moonscape of damp ash and ghostly snags.
(Molly Quinn/The Spokesman-Review, Spokane, Wash.)
At its height the Big Burn had covered an area the size of Connecticut. It razed more than 3 million acres of virgin forest through Idaho, Montana, Washington, Oregon and British Columbia, including 2.6 million acres of national forest and 521,184 acres of private land. Timber losses approached a billion dollars. The fire killed at least 87 people, 78 of whom were firefighters. (Fifty-four of the latter are interred at the St. Maries 1910 Fire Memorial, marked by a 6-foot granite slab at the cemetery in that Idaho town.) An exact count of civilian casualties could not be established due to scanty records kept at the time. Furthermore, those fleeing the fire had scattered throughout the wilderness. Some were entirely consumed by the flames, including those in the vanished settlements of Grand Forks and Taft. A third of Wallace, the entire east end of town, lay in ashes. A magazine described the region as a “graveyard, random clumps of fried and half-burned trunks, a forest no more.”
With the passing of the welcome rains the roads opened, the trains began running again and evacuees trickled back in to dig up their buried sewing machines and family keepsakes.
Seated at center in this 1930s family portrait are forest ranger Henry Kottkey, who rode out the fire in a railroad culvert, and wife Bertha, who gave birth to son Henry Jr. (standing at center) on Aug. 19, 1910. (The Spokesman-Review, Spokane, Wash.)
After a lengthy recovery Pulaski returned to work for the Forest Service. In 1931, just shy of his 65th birthday, he died from complications of his injuries at home in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho. While Kottkey and his men had emerged unscathed from the culvert in which they’d sheltered, Henry and Bertha’s home in Falcon, south of Wallace, had been destroyed. The couple and their three children moved to Florida. Eventually, as the bad memories faded, they moved back and raised five more children. Son Henry Jr. later joined the Forest Service.
Three-year-old Lily Cunningham and family had survived their ordeal, as had all but one of the family cows her parents had released before the fire. Their only remaining belongings were the clothes on their back and a cherished rocking chair, family photos and other items they’d stored in the root cellar. Yet the family stayed in the region and rebuilt. Lily lived long enough to be recognized as the last known survivor of the Big Burn.
In the aftermath of the fire the Forest Service gained in stature and received the increased funding and manpower it needed to implement a new fire suppression policy, one that held every blaze was to be extinguished wherever and whenever it occurred at whatever cost. In the decades that followed the hard-line policy seemingly bore fruit, as rangers were quick to spot, attack and extinguish most wildfires. There were no more Big Burns, no more destroyed towns.
But the policy had an unintended consequence. “Over time,” Idaho forest ecologist Ryan Haugo explains, “the exclusion of fire from forested landscapes resulted in accumulating and dried-out fuels; denser, less diverse forests; and a recipe for catastrophic blazes once more. Add in a changing climate—with longer, hotter, drier summers—and it’s clear that the ‘fight at all costs’ approach to wildfire couldn’t be sustained.”
It had in fact left tracts of forestland vulnerable to bigger and more damaging fires, a fact forest ecologists didn’t recognize until the 1970s and the Forest Service itself didn’t fully accept until the 1990s. Ultimately backing away from the decades-old fire suppression strategy spawned by the Big Burn, Forest Service Chief Jack Ward Thomas declared its rangers would battle certain fires, while allowing others to burn.
“Fire is neither good nor bad,” Thomas said. “It just is.” WW
Wild West contributor and onetime newspaperman Chuck Lyons is a freelance writer based in Rochester, N.Y. For further reading he suggests The Big Burn: Teddy Roosevelt and the Fire That Saved America, by Timothy Egan; The Big Burn: The Northwest’s Great Forest Fire of 1910, by Don Miller and Stan Cohen; and Year of the Fires, by Stephen J. Pyne.
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d654d92ab68c9a2f12943ef7e6db42e5 | https://www.historynet.com/an-american-traitors-homecoming.htm | An American Traitor’s Homecoming | An American Traitor’s Homecoming
British Brigadier Benedict Arnold’s last ‘homecoming’ only served to secure his place in the history books as America’s most despised traitor.
A fleet of warships and troop transports glided quietly across the waters of Long Island Sound toward the Connecticut coastline. The commander of the soldiers aboard the transports knew this country well. He had been born and raised in the town of Norwich, a dozen miles inland from the harbor before him. As a ship’s captain and a merchant trader, he had often sailed these waters. It was September 6, 1781, and Brigadier Benedict Arnold of the British army was coming home.
Up to this point, six years of Revolutionary War had left the Connecticut town of New London physically unscathed. Although battles had been waged around Newport, R.I., 40 miles to the east, and at New York City, 100 miles to the west, thus far British operations in the region had been limited to blockading and occasional raids by small landing parties. That was about to change.
By the late summer of 1781, the British presence in the Northern colonies was limited to New York City and its immediate environs. Their principal commander in the South, Lt. Gen. Charles, Lord Cornwallis, had moved northward into Virginia after a long, fruitless campaign in the Carolinas. As Cornwallis’ force settled in Yorktown, General George Washington’s Continental Army and his French allies were reportedly turning their backs on New York and marching to strike at the vulnerable Cornwallis. Rather than reinforce his threatened forces there, however, Lt. Gen. Sir Henry Clinton, the British commander in chief based in New York, decided to take action in the local theater, perhaps partly in the hope that a diversion would draw American attention away from Virginia.
New London was an attractive choice for a quick operation. Its fine harbor, at the mouth of the broad Thames River, had sheltered numerous privateers that preyed upon hundreds of British merchant ships. Only a month before, the merchantman Hannah, loaded with a cargo valued at 80,000 pounds sterling, had been captured and carried into New London. The town’s warehouses were packed with goods that could supply Washington’s forces in the coming winter.
New London’s harbor was protected by Fort Trumbull, a waterfront battery on a small peninsula to the south, and by Fort Griswold, a much stronger work atop steep Groton Heights, directly across the Thames from the town. In addition, a small earthwork, derisively known as “Fort Folly” or “Fort Nonsense,” guarded the land approaches to New London from the south and west. Lieutenant Colonel William Ledyard, a member of a prominent local family, commanded the coastal defenses. Except for about 50 Connecticut state soldiers divided between the garrisons at Forts Trumbull and Griswold, Ledyard would have to rely upon local militia. Although the rolls carried 2,000 names, far fewer men could actually be mustered during an emergency.
Clinton’s choice to command the expeditionary force was equally compelling. Not only was Benedict Arnold familiar with New London from childhood, but his presence would draw American ire. In the first five years since he had learned of the outbreak of fighting at Lexington and Concord in April 1775, Arnold had gone from Connecticut militia leader to major general, suffering two leg wounds and distinguishing himself at Quebec, Valcour Island and Saratoga. In 1780 he was placed in charge of West Point, on the Hudson River. Intensely ambitious, disgruntled over delays in promotion and angered by charges that he had mishandled funds, Arnold had already begun secret negotiations with the British. He agreed to surrender West Point in exchange for a commission in the British army plus a large cash reward. Through mischance the plot was discovered before it could be carried out, but Arnold escaped to the English lines. As a British brigadier general, Arnold led a force to harass coastal Virginia during the winter and spring of 1781 before being recalled. He had been in New York for two months when Clinton agreed to his proposal to attack New London.
Arnold’s heterogeneous strike force typified the British army in America by that stage of the war. The regulars were represented by the veteran 38th, 40th and 54th regiments of foot. A detachment of Hessian light infantry—Jägers—four units of Loyalists, including the “American Legion” raised under Arnold’s personal direction, and a few artillery pieces completed his roster of more than 1,800 men.
As the British approached New London in the early morning of September 6, an unexpected shift in wind direction forced the ships to beat back and forth in a zigzag course. At dawn Fort Griswold’s garrison sighted two dozen transports and their warship escorts. Orderly Sergeant Rufus Avery summoned the fort’s commander, Captain William Latham, who immediately sent for Ledyard. The colonel was not altogether surprised—a spy had already warned of a British fleet anchored off the north shore of Long Island, 30 miles from New London.
Ledyard ordered two alarm guns fired to warn the countryside—and the local militia—of an enemy approach. Within seconds, however, a third cannon sounded, fired from one of the British ships at the river mouth. Ledyard realized that spies had betrayed his alarm system, for three shots identified a friendly vessel. The American commander dispatched couriers to muster the militia regardless of the confusion in signals.
While the British fleet still labored against the wind to enter the harbor, Ledyard crossed the Thames to confer with civilian officials in New London. Recognizing that Fort Griswold offered his only realistic defense, Ledyard arranged for gunpowder from the town’s storehouses to be carried across the river to that fort. Ledyard also sent a courier with news of the impending attack to Governor Jonathan Trumbull’s home in Lebanon. Once warned of their danger, ship captains roused their crews and tried to escape upriver, but they had to contend with the same unfavorable wind that was delaying the British.
Having sent his pregnant wife away from the town, Ledyard crossed back to Fort Griswold. There, he found a disappointing number of militiamen, partly due to the confusion arising from the British signaling ruse but also because there had been numerous false alarms in the past. Ledyard called his officers to a council of war. Amos Stanton, a veteran Continental Army captain, urged that troops be sent to the shore to oppose the expected landing, and then to harass and delay any British advance while more militia arrived. Ledyard, however, probably mindful of the lack of discipline in the militia, decided to make his stand in Fort Griswold itself.
Arnold finally managed to anchor several hours behind schedule and divided his force into two parts. Arnold himself would lead a force of some 800 men, including the 38th Foot, three Loyalist battalions and a Jäger detachment, with one cannon. They were to land on a sandy beach near the western edge of the river’s mouth, then march three miles north on high ground to approach Fort Trumbull and New London from the west. The remainder of the British force, including the 40th and 54th Foot, the 3rd Battalion of New Jersey Volunteers, the rest of the Jägers and two guns, was to land east of the harbor entrance. Commanded by Lt. Col. Edmund Eyre of the 54th, this detachment would attack Fort Griswold, which Loyalist informants had reported was still under construction.
Arnold’s western column didn’t finish coming ashore by small boats until 10 a.m. About 40 American civilians and militiamen had gathered to oppose the landing, with the pointed encouragement of family and friends. John Hempstead’s wife shouted after him “not to let me hear that you are Shot in the Back.” The Americans, however, were quickly driven off by covering fire from British warships. Lieutenant Hempstead later recalled that “ther Cannon…balls flew over Our heads like hale Stones.” Arnold’s troops started inland, driving small groups of militia before them. Arnold split off four companies of the 38th Foot and a detachment of Loyalists to march directly against Fort Trumbull. The Connecticut-born Loyalist commander, Captain Nathan Frink, was well qualified to guide them—his sister lived in New London. The fort was a riverside battery intended only for defense against ships sailing up the Thames. Its 23-man garrison, commanded by Captain Adam Shapley, fired one volley of grapeshot that killed or wounded five British, then spiked their cannons and fled to boats on the riverbank.
Although several of his men were captured or wounded, Shapley brought the rest across the Thames to Fort Griswold. Among them was another member of the Hempstead family, Sergeant Stephen Hempstead, who had previously served under his friend, Captain Nathan Hale, a former New London schoolteacher, and had accompanied Hale during his doomed spy mission. He later volunteered as a crewman on a fire ship in an unsuccessful attempt to burn a British ship-ofthe-line at New York. Badly wounded at the Battle of Harlem Heights in October 1776, he returned home to New London to recuperate. Not yet fit for active field service, he had enlisted in Connecticut state forces for garrison duty in the coastal defenses.
As he advanced north, Arnold realized that although wind and tide were still holding the American ships in the harbor, they might soon escape upriver. He sent a messenger to cross the Thames with orders for Eyre to hurry his attack against Fort Griswold so that its cannons could be turned against the American vessels.
While Fort Trumbull was being captured, Arnold led the rest of his force along the main road to New London. South of Fort Folly, 100 militiamen had gathered. Colonel Joseph Harris, commander of New London’s Independent Militia companies, rode past, and when the troops called upon him to take charge, Harris replied, “You must excuse me, gentlemen, as I have a violent sick-headache this morning, and can hardly sit on my horse,” and departed. The disorganized militia scattered.
As John Hempstead neared Fort Folly, a friend called to ask if he would care for some gin. “I told him yes & thanky two,” Hempstead later wrote. After taking a drink of “holland Jinn” with several other would-be defenders, Hempstead helped hide the remaining bottles of liquor from the British in a patch of high weeds. He was later happy to record “they never fownd the case of jinn.” After being fired upon by green-jacketed skirmishers, Hempstead ran to the fort, only to find it already abandoned. He fled, dodging more enemy bullets, and the British entered the fort unopposed, as an American onlooker shouted, “Wilkom God damyou to fort Non Sence.”
After brushing aside another small militia force on the high ground above the town, Arnold quickly occupied New London. Many of the inhabitants had fled to the countryside. Arnold found that the wind had shifted, and thus any American ships able to raise sail were already escaping. Inspecting the fortifications across the river with a field glass, he saw to his dismay that Fort Griswold looked far more formidable than his spies had claimed. He immediately dispatched a new order to Eyre to suspend any attack on the fort.
Perched at the top of a hill 120 feet above the river, Fort Griswold formed a rough trapezoid, about 70 by 90 yards. Bastions at the northwest and southwest corners and a projection in the eastern face could deliver flanking fire against any enemy trying to scale the stone-and-earth walls. A dry moat along the northern and eastern faces augmented the 12-foot-high walls. The southern and western walls were considered tall enough to make a moat there unnecessary. Partway down the steep slope to the river, an additional battery of heavy guns pointed out across the Thames. A small redoubt a few hundred yards east guarded against any approach from that direction.
The main gate, in the northern wall, was shielded by a ravelin outside the fort. The narrow sally port, a cramped, twisted tunnel through the high south wall, was its only other entrance. Further obstacles to approach were provided by abatis, bundles of sharpened branches outside the moat, and by sharpened stakes sticking out from the walls themselves.
Inside the fort, a barracks for the permanent garrison stood along the eastern edge of the small parade ground. A powder magazine was built into the southwestern bastion, where the fort’s flagpole stood. About half of the fort’s 22 cannons faced west toward the river, while the rest peered out through embrasures in the parapets. Firing steps had been built between the cannons for the musket-armed defenders.
Strong though Fort Griswold looked, its rotted timber cannon platforms were liable to collapse during firing. Although Ledyard had brought more gunpowder for the magazine that morning, few preweighed and bagged charges were available. Most of the powder would have to be measured out for each shot, slowing the reloading process and increasing the danger of accidental explosion from the loose powder.
Even with the arrival of Shapley’s force from across the river, Ledyard had only about 160 men at Fort Griswold. Most were local farmers, of whom at least a dozen shared Sergeant Rufus Avery’s surname, but two men of African descent and a Pequot Indian also carried arms. The most valuable of Ledyard’s reinforcements were crewmen from privateers unable to escape upriver, who at least had experience in firing cannons.
When Colonel Eyre’s force disembarked on the Groton side of the Thames, he decided to leave his cannons behind to follow at their own pace, accompanied by the battalion of New Jersey Volunteers. Eyre himself pressed ahead with the 40th and 54th Foot and the Jägers. Eyre sent Captain George Beckwith forward under a flag of truce to demand Fort Griswold’s surrender, warning that, under the rules of war, no quarter would be given if the garrison refused his offer. Beckwith was kept waiting while Ledyard, in accordance with 18th-century military protocol, communicated formally through an American officer of a rank equal to that of the British messenger. Rufus Avery recorded the colonel’s final answer: “[H]e should not give up the fort to them, let the consequence be what it might.”
Arnold’s order to suspend the attack had not yet made its way across the river, so Eyre launched an assault before the Loyalists and the artillery came up. Eyre would lead the elite British Light Infantry and Grenadier companies north past the fort, then turn and strike the north and east faces. The line companies, commanded by Major William Montgomery of the 40th, were to attack the south wall while the Jägers screened the approaches to the fort.
As the British formations maneuvered and captured the outlying redoubt, the Americans opened fire. One blast of double grapeshot from an 18-pounder cannon aimed by privateer captain Elias Halsey tore a wide hole in a British column—Avery later heard that about 20 men had been killed or wounded by that single shot.
When in position, both British columns tried to push their way past the obstacles and up the walls. Eyre was wounded and carried from the field. Some of the Americans later remembered repulsing three separate assault waves in half an hour before the British fell back. By chance, however, a musket ball cut through the halyard of Fort Griswold’s flagpole. Seeing its striped banner flutter to the ground, British soldiers thought the defenders were surrendering. They cheered, fired a volley into the air and rushed eagerly toward the fort. The Americans, raising their flag on a pikestaff, again opened fire.
Incensed at this seeming treachery, the British furiously pressed their renewed attack. The Grenadier and Light Infantry companies of the 40th Foot shifted left to the fort’s south face and scaled it without ladders by climbing on one another’s shoulders. Major Montgomery was one of the first to make his way up the wall before being mortally wounded by a pike reportedly wielded by Jordan Freeman, Colonel Ledyard’s black orderly. Finding the rate of musket fire too slow, some of the Americans resorted to tossing cannon balls down upon the British.
“I commanded an eighteen-pounder on the south side of the gate,” wrote Stephen Hempstead years later, “and while in the act of righting my gun, a ball passed through the embrasure, struck me a little above the right ear, grazing the skull, and cutting off the veins, which bled profusely. A handkerchief was tied around it, and I continued at my duty. Discovering, some little time after, that a British soldier had broken a picket at the bastion on my left, and was forcing himself through the hole, whilst the men stationed there were gazing at the battle which raged opposite to them, cried, ‘my brave fellows, the enemy are breaking in behind you,’ and raised my pike to dispatch the intruder, when a ball struck my left arm at the elbow, and my pike fell to the ground. Nevertheless, I grasped it with my right hand, and with the men, who turned and fought manfully, cleared the breach.”
Hempstead looked across to the southwest bastion to see a wave of British soldiers overrunning its defenders. When Fort Griswold had been constructed, a rough outcropping of rock was incorporated into the wall at one angle of the bastion. British attackers now scaled that outcropping like a ladder and pushed the Americans back. One soldier leapt down on to the fort’s parade field and tried to open the sally port, but he fell wounded. A comrade finally succeeded in unbarring the gate. Ledyard, certain that he couldn’t organize a counterattack to retake the walls, called for his men to cease fighting.
Chaos erupted. “When they had overpowered us and driven us from our stations at the breastwork of the fort,” Avery wrote, “[the] officers and men…quit their posts, and went on the open parade in the fort, where the enemy had every opportunity to massacre us, there was about six of the enemy to one of us. The enemy mounted the parapet seemingly all as one, swung their hats around once, and discharged their guns, and them they did not kill with ball they meant to kill with the bayonet.”
British soldiers crossed the parade field to unbar the main gate, admitting more Redcoats. What happened next would spark controversy. Sergeant Avery, seeking refuge in the barracks, saw Ledyard approach a British officer, raising and lowering his sword as a signal of surrender. Avery turned to enter the barracks, then looked again towards Ledyard, only to see the American commander lying dead on the ground.
Although no witness reported actually seeing what happened at the time, Americans were quick to believe a dramatic tale of Ledyard’s death. Only three days after the battle, one local leader wrote Governor Trumbull that “Colo. Ledyard…thot. proper to Surrender himself with the Garison prisoners, & presented his Sword to an officer who Recd. the Same & imediately Lunged it thro. the Brave Commandant when the Ruffans (no doubt by order) pierced him in many places with Bayonets.” Trumbull repeated the story in a letter to Washington a few days later.
A tradition grew up that a British officer, often identified as a Loyalist, had called out, “Who commands this fort?” Ledyard supposedly replied, “I did, but you do now,” at the same time handing over his sword, hilt first. The officer is then said to have plunged Ledyard’s own sword into his body. Many years after the battle, several survivors, undoubtedly influenced by decades of propaganda, claimed they had personally witnessed his perfidious murder. Whether he was indeed killed by a sword or a British bayonet, as some evidence suggests, Ledyard and many of his men were in fact cut down after the fort’s surrender. British soldiers were enraged at the loss of many comrades, and American Lieutenant Obadiah Perkins was told by one of his captors that “every Man ought to be put to the Sword, for (says he) this is a propur storm, and you fought us after your Colours were struck.” Adding to British rancor, Ensign Alexander Gray of the 40th Foot wrote, “After the troops carried the work the Enemy fired from their Barracks and wounded several men.”
Avery recalled:
They killed and wounded nearly every man in the fort as quick as they could, which was done in about one minute. I expected my time to come with the rest. One mad-looking fellow put his bayonet to my side, and swore, ‘bejasus, he would skipper me.’ I looked him very earnestly in the face and eyes, and asked for mercy and to spare my life. He attempted three times to put the bayonet in me, but I must say I believe God forbade him, for I was completely in his power, as well as others that was present with the enemy. The enemy at the same time massacred Lieut. Enoch Stanton within four or five feet of me. A platoon of about ten men marched up near where I stood….They discharged their guns into the magazine among the dead and wounded, and some well ones, and some they killed and wounded. That platoon fell back, and another came forward to discharge their guns….As they made ready to fire, [a British officer] came suddenly around the corner of the magazine, and very quickly raised his sword, exclaiming, ‘Stop firing! You’ll send us all to hell together!’ Their language was bad as well as their conduct…they very soon left off killing, and then went stripping and robbing the dead and wounded, and also those that were not wounded.
Several months after the battle, Captain Solomon Perkins remembered a moment of horror:
I with a number of others being on the Parade perceiving they gave no quarters we retired into a room in one of the barracks in hope of escaping their fury, but an officer of the British came to the door of the barracks & ordered us to lay down our arms. We accordingly laid down our arms, begged for quarters. He damned us & told us we ought all to be put to Death immediately, upon this another officer with some soldiers came to the door & asked the first officer why he did not put us to death, the other replied we had begged for quarters, he again replied he would be damned if [we] should have quarters or words to that amount, & immediately ordered his men to fire in upon us. They fired & some they wounded & we crowded up into the opposite corner of the barracks being shut up & could make no escape, they continued firing & killing, & we kept pressing against the partition of the barracks & burst out into the other room & as I was getting the door I received a whole charge into my neck the ball coming out at the opposite side, this brought me down & nearly deprived me of my senses after which they put a ball through my body, pierced me three times in the stomach with a bayonet….
Americans subsequently claimed that almost all of the defenders’ casualties—85 dead and 35 seriously wounded—came after Ledyard called for his men to lay down their arms. In those chaotic minutes, the fate of individuals was often a matter of chance. While Avery was spared, Stephen Hempstead received a third wound, this time a bayonet thrust into his hip. Some survivors owed their lives to the intervention of British officers. Several escaped by leaping down from the ramparts and running for their lives. A few, pretending to be dead, hid among the piled bodies of their comrades.
British officers struggled to restore order. The American prisoners, most of them wounded, were gathered on the parade field. Those able to walk were escorted aboard British vessels. Several, too badly injured to be transported to New York, were placed in a wagon to be brought down to a house on the riverbank. The heavily laden vehicle broke loose as it was being rolled down the steep slope and crashed into an apple tree at the hill’s base. Although this was clearly an accident, American propagandists claimed that British soldiers had deliberately rolled the cart down the hill, even firing on it as it sped out of control.
While some British soldiers spiked the guns and knocked off their trunnions, others hastily buried their dead, including Major Montgomery, outside the fort. The slain Americans were left where they fell. The British had suffered 47 dead and 133 wounded, almost a quarter of the assault force. Many of the wounded, both British and American, would die in the coming weeks.
Once Fort Griswold was cleared and the British had marched back toward the mouth of the Thames with their wounded, a Captain Lemoine of the Royal Artillery poured a powder train into the magazine and then set fire to the barracks. A party of American militia watched the British depart, then hurried into the fort. They scattered the powder train, keeping the magazine from exploding, and managed to extinguish the barracks fire. Then the local families came to find and take home the bodies of husbands, sons, fathers and brothers.
On the western bank of the Thames, Arnold’s men, guided by Loyalists, set fire to about a dozen ships in the river and searched the waterfront. Public buildings and storehouses filled with the fruits of privateering voyages were burned. Americans claimed that the British soldiers deliberately set fire to private houses at Arnold’s direct order. Arnold later reported that the widespread destruction was accidental, writing: “An immense quantity of European and West India Goods were found in the stores…the whole of which was burnt with the stores, which proved to contain a large Quantity of Powder unknown to us. The explosion of the Powder and change of wind soon after the stores were fired communicated the flames to that part of the Town, which was, notwithstanding every effort to prevent it, unfortunately destroyed.”
By that time, John Hempstead had come upon a group of 500 Americans on a hill to the north of the town and asked, “why the Devel dont yoo Go down & meet the Enemy?” Picket Lattimer, captain of one of the independent companies of New London militia, replied “that he would not Resk his life to Save other mens property.” Ironically, unknown to Lattimer, his own house was among the first to be burned.
Although British soldiers were detailed to protect the houses of invalids, tales of rampant pillaging and the levying of unofficial ransoms to spare individual dwellings were common. Ignored, however, were reports of looting by Americans taking advantage of the disorder. Fifteen-year-old Jonathan Brooks sat by his house while watching for the British to enter the town. He later wrote: “The silence was soon broken by the entrance of five or six shabby looking fellows into the street on the full run….They passed me without notice, so intent were they probably on the prospect before them, for they shouted as they passed, ‘by G-d, we’ll have fine plunder by-and-by.’ Very soon I heard a great noise, and I…saw the door of a storehouse open, which contained the goods of the prize ship Hannah….The goods were flying out of the store, and I should think thirty or forty persons were loading themselves with plunder and scampering off.” In all, 143 buildings, including 65 houses, were burned in New London, with more than 20 others across the river in Groton.
Before Arnold left, a former Norwich neighbor, Abigail Dolebear—now the wife of privateer captain Elisha Hinman—reportedly tried to shoot the turncoat. Depending on the version, she either balked at shooting him in the back, shot his hat off or simply missed.
Arnold marched his men away in the late afternoon. Brooks, who had left New London as the British approached, now rode back to a scene of desolation:
I entered the north end of the town, passed into Main Street about twenty rods, when the heat and smoke of the burning buildings was such that I could not urge the mare on. I, however, retreated back about twenty rods, put on the whip, and she went through. I had just cleared the burning district at that point, when there was a store, containing a large quantity of gunpowder, blew up, which filled the air with smoke and fragments, which fell around me in every direction….I saw a heavy fire raging on the parade, which was the Court House, Jail, Episcopal Church, &c. I, of course, could not pass that way, and, indeed, the smoke was so dense—there being but little wind—no object whatever could be discovered….Thus you may understand that I passed through the principal streets of New London on the afternoon of the 6th of September, 1781, and never saw a single living creature, except one singed cat, that ran across the street when the store blew.
The British fleet sailed for New York the next morning. Although a great quantity of military stores had been destroyed and many American militiamen and civilians had been killed or captured, those results did not balance the severe casualties suffered at Fort Griswold. General Clinton published a general order that, while expressing “the greatest satisfaction from the ardor of the troops,” also stated that he could “not but lament with the deepest concern the heavy loss in officers and men.” Moreover, any hope Clinton had of the New London raid’s diverting Washington’s attention from Virginia was soon dashed. Cornwallis’ surrender at Yorktown would come only six weeks after Arnold’s raid.
The burning of New London and the massacre of Fort Griswold’s defenders exacerbated American hatred of Benedict Arnold, who soon sailed to England. The favor he acquired in royal circles was soon lost when the Tory government fell and was replaced by the antiwar Whigs. He spent the remainder of his life in futile attempts to secure wealth and acceptance. He died on June 14, 1801, at age 60, in debt and widely scorned. In a final twist of fate, the bones of perhaps America’s finest Revolutionary War battlefield commander and certainly its most despised renegade today lie in an unmarked coffin, lost beneath a parish church on the bank of England’s Thames River, 3,000 miles from its American namesake and the site of his last infamous act.
Engineer Bruce A. Trinque writes from Amston, Conn. For further reading, he recommends: Narrative of Jonathan Rathbun: With accurate accounts of the capture of Groton Fort, the massacre that followed, and the sacking and burning of New London…the command of the traitor Benedict Arnold, by Jonathan Rathbun; and Traitor: The Case of Benedict Arnold, by Jean Fritz.
Originally published in the April 2006 issue of Military History. To subscribe, click here.
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ba713ae26d7c958749be43fe4d0d5fe4 | https://www.historynet.com/ancient-history-walls-of-constantinople.htm | Ancient History: Walls of Constantinople | Ancient History: Walls of Constantinople
The art of fortification has existed ever since man first came to realize the value of natural obstacles to his common defense, and evolved as he sought to invoke his own methods to fully exploit that advantage. The building of barriers rapidly evolved from the simple mud parapets and mountaintop abodes of the Neolithic Age to the construction of linear and point stone obstacles of the Bronze Age, best represented by the Hittite capital of Hattusas. The Greco-Roman world was the proving ground for medieval fortifications. When Emperor Constantine I moved the capital of the Roman empire from Rome to the sleepy port town of Byzantium in AD 324, the opportunity to make full use of the state of the art in the construction of fortifications was at hand. The results of what followed shaped the course of world history.
Located on a horn-shaped peninsula astride the Bosphorus and the Sea of Marmara, the renamed imperial capital of Constantinople dominated the narrow waterway that divides Europe from Asia. The complexities of that geography provided both advantages and challenges to the site’s defense. A steep and rugged shoreline and the Sea of Marmara’s swift currents protected the southern coast. To the north the Golden Horn, an inlet that bordered the peninsula, was a natural anchorage and harbor. The ancient Lycus River ran diagonally northwest to southeast across the peninsula, forming a narrow valley that sectioned the city into two distinct areas-a chain of six hills running along the Golden Horn to the north, and a single, larger hill to the south. A coherent urban defense had to address those considerations. For the most part, the many leaders and builders of the city succeeded in mastering the terrain. The ruins that still enclose what is now the Turkish capital of Istanbul are the remnants of centuries of evolution. Awe inspiring even in decay, they are a testament to the glory of Greco-Roman military art.
The despair of its enemies, the walls of Constantinople were the most famous of the medieval world, singular not only in scale, but in their construction and design, which integrated man-made defenses with natural obstacles. Their principal composition was mortared rubble, faced with blocks of fitted limestone and reinforced by courses of layered red brick. To enhance the integrity of the overall network, the towers and walls were built independently of one another. The entire city was enclosed in a defensive circuit of 14 miles of walls, reinforced by more than 400 towers and bastions, and several strong points and fortresses. The strongest construction faced west, against an approach by land. There, along a four-mile stretch of rolling land, stand the legendary Theodosian Walls, their depths blending together, the merlons overlapping like teeth in the mouth of an Olympian shark. There an enemy had to attack a linear obstacle of four belts, each ascending above the other, with a depth of some 200 feet.
The main line of defense was the Inner Wall, 40 feet in height and 15 feet thick, with a battlemented parapet five feet high that was accessed by stone ramps. Along its course at 175-foot intervals run 96 massive towers, each once capable of mounting the heaviest military engines of the day. A second, Outer Wall, approximately 30 feet high, is joined to this main wall by an elevated 60-foot terrace. The Outer Wall is also equipped with 96 bastions, each offset from the towers of the Inner Wall to avoid masking their fires. Subterranean passages run from many of those points back toward the city-avenues that presumably provided the defending troops with secure movement to and from a threatened area. From the Outer Wall extended another 60-foot terrace, ending in a 6-foot high parapet. This bordered a great moat, some 60 feet wide and 15 to 30 feet deep, supplied by an aqueduct system. To compensate for the rolling terrain, the moat was sectioned by a number of dams, which enabled it to retain an even distribution of water along its length. The five public gates that traversed the moat by way of drawbridges were set narrowly into the walls and were flanked by towers and bastions. Any assault made on the outer gates would be attacking into the strength of the defense. The belts were constructed at a tiered elevation, starting at 30 feet for the Inner Wall and descending to the moat. This, and the distance between strong points, ensured that an attacker, once within the network, was in range from all immediate points in the defense. The Land Walls were anchored at both extremities by two great fortresses. Along the Sea of Marmara, the Castle of the Seven Towers secured the southern approach, while in the north, along the Golden Horn, the salient that was the quarter of the Blachernae Palace, residence of the later Byzantine emperors, was gradually transformed into one massive fortress. To those two fortified points were adjoined the Sea Walls, similar in construction to the Outer Wall, of which little remains today.
The Golden Horn posed a certain challenge for the Byzantine engineers, since the five miles of sea walls in that area were comparatively weak and the calm waters there could provide a safe anchorage to an enemy fleet. Emperor Leo III provided the tactical solution in the form of the famous barrier chain. Made of giant wooden links that were joined by immense nails and heavy iron shackles, the chain could be deployed in an emergency by means of a ship hauling it across the Golden Horn from the Kentenarion Tower in the south to the Castle of Galata on the north bank. Securely anchored on both ends, with its length guarded by Byzantine warships at anchor in the harbor, the great chain was a formidable obstacle and a vital element of the city’s defenses.
While the Land Walls glorify the name of Theodosius I (408-450), the reigning Roman emperor at the time their construction began, it is to one of history’s dim figures, Anthemius, to whom they owe their genesis. Anthemius, as prefect of the East, was the head of state for six years during the minority of Theodosius and it was he who conceived and carried out a massive and defining expansion of the city defenses. His vision would provide a durable framework for a citadel that the new capital would need to become to weather the challenges that lay ahead. The cornerstone of those new fortifications was a massive land wall, represented by the Inner Wall, built in 413. The Theodosian system was completed in 447 with the addition of an outer wall and moat-a response to a near calamity, when a devastating earthquake seriously damaged the walls and toppled 57 towers at the very moment that Attila and his Hunnic armies were bearing down on Constantinople. Over the centuries many emperors improved the city fortifications. Their names can be seen to this day engraved on the stone-roughly 30 of them covering more than a millennium, clearly illustrating the importance of these defenses to the empire. While Attila drew away from Constantinople to pursue easier prey, later invaders were not so easily discouraged. Persians, Avars, Sacracens, Bulgarians, Russians and others tried to take the citadel in their turn. Far from serving as a deterrent, Constantinople’s formidable reputation seemed to attract enemies. As the capital of a mighty empire, and at the crossroads of two continents, Constantinople represented to the early medieval world what Rome and Athens had meant to classical times. The ‘Queen of Cities,’ she was a magnet for pilgrim, trader, and conqueror alike. None were wanting. The citadel turned back besieging armies 17 times in the course of a millennium. With each succeeding onslaught, Constantinople became ever more the final stronghold of Greek civilization. Behind her bulwark in the east, Christian Europe also took shelter.
Undoubtedly, Constantinople’s finest hour came when it turned back a series of determined Arab attacks during the initial period of Islamic expansion. In 632, the Muslim armies burst forth from the desert confines of the Hejaz and into the Levant. Benefiting from a power vacuum in the region, the Arabs made stunning advances. Both the Byzantine and Sassanid Persian empires, nearly prostrate from 25 years of mutual warfare (fighting that cost the Greeks alone some 200,000 men, an enormous drain of manpower in that age) were unable to hold back the tide. In a little more than a decade the Byzantines were driven from Syria, Palestine, Mesopotamia, and Egypt. The Persians fared worse. Arab armies invaded the Persian highlands and destroyed the Sassanid kingdom. By 661, the standard of the Prophet Mohammed reached from Tripoli to India.
On two occasions, from 674 to 677, and again in 717-18, Arab armies besieged Constantinople by land and sea. Superior military organization, the leadership of Leo III (the Isaurian) and the timely intervention of one of history’s most decisive weapons, a medieval form of napalm dubbed ‘Greek fire,’ enabled the Byzantines to weather the storm. The cost to both sides was high. Byzantium lost most of her territory south of the Taurus Mountains and much of the remainder of the empire lay devastated. The Arabs lost untold thousands of men through futile attacks against Constantinople’s defenses, as well as a series of disastrous defeats on land and sea. Many more perished of disease and cold in dire encampments before the Land Walls. Of the 200,000 Muslims who laid siege to Constantinople in 717, only 30,000 crossed back into Syria the following year.
The impact of Constantinople’s successful defense at that time cannot be overstated. Not only did it save the Byzantine Empire from the same fate as Sassanid Persia, but spared a fractured and chaotic Europe from Muslim invasion for another eight centuries. One can only wonder of the consequences for Europe and Christendom had Muslims armies marched unchecked into Thrace in the late 7th or early 8th centuries. What is certain is that the Muslim tide, broken at it shortest approach, was channeled to Europe via another, much longer axis-North Africa. Crossing the Strait of Gibraltar, a Muslim army of 50,000 traversed Spain, crossed the Pyrenees and penetrated into the French heartland before finally being overcome by Charles Martel at Tours in 732. With its expansion stemmed, the Muslim world turned its energies to internal disputes that splintered the caliphate, providing medieval Europe a much-needed period of growth and consolidation. In the end, the same spirit of ingenuity that created Constantinople’s fortifications would prove their undoing. The weaknesses of the defenses must have been obvious, since a series of attackers, beginning with the Avars, had tried to exploit them. Interestingly, the salient problems lay along the strongest point-the Land Walls. At a point just south of the Blachernae quarter, a section called the Mesoteichion, the walls dip sharply into the Lycus Valley, exposing that area to enfilading fire from higher ground on the enemy side. Apparently, the trace of the walls owed itself more to the need to accommodate a growing population than a regard for the natural lines of terrain. Another problem, far more perplexing, was the region of the Blachernae Palace, a neglected salient in the original Land Walls. The fortifications there, while often improved, were never equal to those elsewhere in that area. Finally, the construction of the Sea Walls as a single-wall circuit reflected a reliance on natural obstacles and a navy. As long as the Byzantine fleet commanded the narrows of the Hellespont and the Bosphorus, an attack from that quarter was not to be feared. That situation changed dramatically, however, after 1071, the year that the Seljuks of Rum inflicted a decisive defeat upon the Greeks at Manzikert. As the empire passed into decline, the Byzantine emperors could no longer maintain an effective navy, and gradually had to rely on the protection of friendly maritime powers. As the Byzantine navy withered, Constantinople lay exposed to an assault from the sea.
The challenge was not long in coming. The first Crusades were a marriage of convenience for a Christendom divided between the rival Eastern (Orthodox) and Western (Catholic) churches. During the Fourth Crusade that enmity erupted into open warfare when the Latins sought to exploit one of Byzantium’s many dynastic squabbles. While en route to Palestine, the leaders of the crusade, cash-strapped and never opposed to a little profiteering, took up an offer by Alexius, the son of the deposed and imprisoned Emperor Isaac II, to restore their throne. In exchange for overthrowing the usurper, Alexius promised 200,000 marks, generous trade concessions and troops for the coming campaign. The deal was struck and on July 17, 1203, the Crusaders attacked Constantinople by land and sea. That night, the usurper Alexius III, fled and the next day Isaac was crowned with his son as co-emperor Alexius IV. Their restoration would be short lived. In January 1204, resentful Byzantine nobles toppled the puppet rulers and brought Alexius III’s son-in-law, Alexius Ducas Mourtzouphlos, to the throne as Alexius V. With no hope of securing Byzantine cooperation for the campaign to the Holy Land from the defiant new emperor and seeing little chance of success without it, the Crusaders determined once more to take Constantinople. The Latins, with a decisive naval advantage thanks to the financial support and powerful fleet put at their disposal by Venice, decided to make a major effort at the Sea Walls. To provide an assault platform, they erected siege towers on their ships from which long spars were rigged as a kind of suspended bridge. As a ship approached the wall or tower to be attacked, the bridge was lowered and the knights would shimmy across. The task of leading such an assault must have been daunting. A knight, grasping for balance moving down a narrow platform high above a ship rolling at anchor, then lifting himself over the parapet, all while evading the arrows, cuts and thrusts of the defenders, was at the mercy of his circumstances. When their first attempt failed, the Latins launched a second assault with two ships tied together. That provided a more stable platform and the possibility of assaulting a tower at two points. A witness, Robert de Clari, described how the attackers gained a foothold: ‘The Venetian who entered first in the tower was on one of these suspended bridges with two knights, and from there, with the aid of his hands and feet, he was able to penetrate the level where the bridge provided access. There he was cut down; it was there that Andr d’Urboise penetrated in the same way when the ship, tossed by the current, touched the tower a second time.’
Once the Crusaders had made the critical penetration of the defenses, another witness, Henri de Villehardouin, described how they exploited their success: ‘When the knights see this, who are in the transports, they land, raise their ladders against the wall, and scale to the top of the wall by main force, and so take four of the towers. And all begin to leap out of the ships and transports and galleys, helter-skelter, each as best he can; and they break in some three of the gates and enter in; and they draw the horses out of the transports; and the knights mount and ride straight to the quarters of the Emperor Mourtzouphlos.’
Most historians point to the Latin conquest of Constantinople on April 13, 1204 as the practical end of the Byzantine Empire, which disintegrated into a number of feudal fiefdoms and kingdoms under the elected Latin Emperor Baldwin I until his defeat and capture by Tsar Kaloyan’s Bulgarian army near Adrianople on April 14, 1205, and his subsequent execution by his captors. Although the Greeks, who had established a rival kingdom across the Bosphorus in Nicea, returned to reclaim their capital in 1261, they would find it plundered and most of their territory lost forever. The Fourth Crusade, which never came near to the Holy Land, had shattered the citadel of Christendom in the east.
Although treachery and resourcefulness could overcome the strongest of medieval fortifications, it was the cannon that would render them obsolete. The Hundred Years’ War witnessed the emergence of this weapon as the decisive instrument of war on land. The Ottoman Turks, who emerged in the late 14th century as the next great challenge to Byzantium, were in the forefront of this early technology. In 1451, 19-year-old Mehmet II ascended the Turkish throne with a burning desire to succeed where his father, Murad II, had failed 29 years before-to capture Constantinople and make it the capital of his empire. By that time the Ottoman Empire had absorbed most of Byzantium’s territory and engulfed its capital as it expanded outward from Asia Minor into the Balkans. In his quest, Mehmet would not be limited to traditional methods of siegecraft, for the sultan’s armies had by that time acquired a large number of cannon. Combining that technology with superior energy and vision, Mehmet would go further than others in exploring tactical solutions to the formidable obstacle that Constantinople’s defenses still presented.
Reports circulating around the courts of Europe in the winter of 1452-53 spoke of unprecedented Turkish preparations for an assault upon the city. In fact, the Turkish army that appeared before Constantinople on April 6, 1453, was singular in only one respect. With 80,000 soldiers-including 15,000 of the Sultan’s elite Janissary corps-Serbian miners, various siege engines, and a fleet of some 300 to 400 ships, it was a formidable force, though hardly anything the city had not seen many times before. It was artillery, however, that made this a potent threat, especially a new generation of massive siege artillery developed by a Hungarian cannon founder named Urban.
Abandoning the meager pay and resources of the Byzantines, Urban found an eager sponsor in Mehmet, who set him to work casting large-caliber cannon to breach the city walls. The Hungarian went about his work with equal enthusiasm, promising the sultan that ‘the stone discharged from my cannon would reduce to dust not only those walls, but even the walls of Babylon.’ The resultant cannon was titanic, requiring 60 oxen and 200 soldiers to haul it across Thrace from the foundry at Adrianople. Twenty-seven feet long, 2 l/2 feet in bore, the great weapon could hurl a 1,200-pound ball over a mile. When it was tested, a Turkish chronicler wrote that a warning was sent out to the Ottoman camp so that pregnant women would not abort at the shock. Its explosions, he said, ‘made the city walls shake, and the ground inside.’ The cannon’s size, however, was also its liability. Crewed by 500, it took 2 hours to load and could only fire eight rounds per day. Fortunately for the Turks, Mehmet had many more practical and more proven pieces-2 large cannons and 18 batteries of 130 smaller caliber weapons.
Against traditional siege engines and complemented by adequate land and sea forces, the walls of Constantinople had proven impregnable for centuries, but times had changed. Destitute and depopulated, the city had never recovered from its sack by the Latins in 1204. In spite of Emperor Constantine XI’s efforts to rally volunteers, few answered the call. To make matters worse, the defenders’ resolve was undermined by deep divisions caused by the emperor’s decision to reunify the Orthodox with the Catholic Church in a desperate attempt to give the Pope incentive to aid him against the Turks. The empire was at the end of its resources, its defenses left primarily to Italian mercenaries. Greeks commanded only two of the nine sectors of the defense. Gunpowder was in short supply and the walls had fallen into disrepair; the overseers had embezzled the funds for their maintenance. The fleet, long the critical arm of the Empire, now consisted of just three Venetian galleasses and 20 galleys.
The 4,973 Greek soldiers and volunteers, and the 2,000 foreigners who had come to assist them, had to defend 14 miles of fortifications. With 500 men detailed to defend the Sea Walls, that would have left only one man every four feet at the Outer Land Walls alone. With many of the garrison manning the engines, towers, bastions and other points, the distribution of soldiers along the walls was undoubtedly much thinner. The demands on each man grew precipitously as the battle progressed and as casualties, sickness, and desertion reduced their numbers, and substantial breaches appeared in the walls. That such a scant force managed to defend one of the largest cities of the medieval world for seven weeks was a remarkable testament to both the fortifications and the men who defended them.
For weeks Turkish guns relentlessly battered the Land Walls, in the words of witness Nicol Barbaro, ‘firing their cannon again and again, with so many other guns and arrows without number…that the air seemed to split apart.’ The high masonry walls made an easy target for long-range enemy guns, and at the same time could not long withstand the recoil of the Byzantine cannons mounted upon them. Although Urban’s monster cannon exploded on its fourth round, killing its builder and many of the crew, the Turks discovered a more effective technique for employing their artillery. Following the advice of a Hungarian envoy, Turkish gunners concentrated their fire against points on the wall in a triangular pattern-two shots, one each to the base of the a 30-foot section, then a toppling shot to the top center. In that way, the Turks gradually breached sections of the Outer Walls, exposing the Inner Wall, which too began to crumble. The defenders fought off Turkish attempts to assault the inner defenses by day, and crept forward each night to fill in the widening holes with rubble and palisades.
If the ultimate outcome of the siege of Constantinople was ever in doubt, Mehmet’s solving the problem of the barrier chain made it inevitable. Unable to force a passage through the chain and past the Christian warships, the sultan resolved to bypass it by hauling his ships overland, behind Galata and into the Golden Horn. To his engineers, who had hauled Urban’s cannon across Thrace, that posed little problem. Using greased windlasses and buffalo teams, the first ships made the trip on the night of April 22. The next morning the defenders awoke to find a squadron of Turkish vessels in the Horn and themselves with another five miles of sea walls to defend. Before the Greeks and their allies could effectively counter this new threat, Mehmet had the Horn sealed to the west, in front of his ships, by building a floating bridge of giant oil casks and planks. The Christian ships were now bottled up in the Horn between two arms of the Moslem fleet. The final blow came on May 29, 1453. The Turks attacked three hours before dawn, concentrating their effort on the Mesoteichion and the western half of the Sea Walls along the Horn. After seven weeks of heroic resistance, the defenders had reached the limits of endurance. In any case, their numbers were no longer sufficient to defend the Land Walls, sections of which were reduced to rubble. A large breach was opened in the walls in the Lycus Valley and the Turks pressed the attack. Barbaro described the final moments: ‘One hour before daybreak the Sultan had his great cannon fired, and the shot landed in the repairs which we had made and knocked them down to the ground. Nothing could be seen for the smoke made by the cannon, and the Turks, under the cover of the smoke, and about 300 of them got inside the barbicans.’ While the defenders beat back that attack, the next succeeded in penetrating the Inner Wall. As Turkish soldiers appeared in the garrison’s rear, the defense swiftly collapsed. Word spread that the defenses had been breached and panic ensued. Those who did not take flight were overwhelmed at their posts. Constantine went to a hero’s death, struck down in the final melee near the great breach. A few managed to escape aboard the Christian ships; most of the rest, including 90 percent of the populace, were sold into slavery. After nearly 1,000 years, the Eastern Roman Empire ceased to exist.
Constantinople was reborn as Istanbul, and as the capital of the Ottoman Empire, its fortunes were reversed. Many of its splendors, old and new, still beckon, though the broken, overgrown remnants of its ancient defenses attract little interest. It is pertinent today, as historians look upon the tragic history of the Balkans, to recognize the consequences for the West and the implications for the world had it not been for Constantinople’s role as the citadel at the gate of Europe, which for critical centuries held the East at bay through the long night of the Dark Ages.
This article was written by U.S. Army Lt. Col. Comer Plummer III, a Middle East Foreign Area officer with degrees in history and international relations, writes from Springfield, Va. For further reading, he highly recommends Byron Tsangadas’ The Fortifications and Defense of Constantinople, noting: ‘For a scholarly examination of the defenses of the city, it is unsurpassed. It also contains an excellent account of the defense of Constantinople in the Seventh and Eight Centuries.’
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073909b98efceb9be3d5807f2fde7b7d | https://www.historynet.com/andrew-carnegie-a-fool-for-peace.htm | Andrew Carnegie—A Fool for Peace | Andrew Carnegie—A Fool for Peace
Author and historian David Nasaw, who specializes in early 20th-century American social and cultural history, is a professor of history at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. His books Andrew Carnegie (2006) and The Patriarch: The Remarkable Life and Turbulent Times of Joseph P. Kennedy (2012) were nominated for the Pulitzer Prize.
How did a tough businessman like Andrew Carnegie become a pacifist? He read a lot of philosopher Herbert Spencer, which convinced him that through evolution progress was inevitable. Carnegie had lived through the Civil War as a civilian. He recognized that in war there are no winners, only losers. He saw war as backward, barbaric, outmoded. There had to be a better way to settle disputes between nations—which, for Carnegie, was arbitration. Carnegie pledged himself to hasten war’s extinction.
Davidi Nasaw
What inclined him to this point of view? He was as committed to ending war as he had been to making a profit. He often said that he worked harder after his retirement from the steel business than he had as an industrialist. I don’t think Carnegie’s anti-war sentiments had much to do with his Scottish Calvinist upbringing. And I don’t think it fair to say he was just a tycoon who embraced an admirable cause.
Who else influenced Carnegie, and what were some of his pacifist ideas? Until Carnegie, the international peace movement was the province of Quakers and international lawyers. Carnegie brought pacifism into the mainstream through articles, speeches, pamphlets, and conferences he sponsored at, among other venues, Carnegie Hall. The major impetus for a revitalized peace movement may have been the Spanish-American War, notably the American invasion and occupation of the Philippines. For people like Carnegie, Mark Twain, William James, and others, the United States was abandoning its principles and donning the mantle of European imperialism in occupying the Philippines with troops who engaged in torture and deprived a people of their independence.
What was Carnegie’s relationship with Presidents Theodore Roosevelt and William Howard Taft? Theodore Roosevelt held Carnegie in contempt. He abhorred Carnegie’s self-righteousness, his unquestioned belief that war was inhumane and wrong. Roosevelt refrained from publicly criticizing Carnegie because he needed the industrialist. Republican businessmen assailed TR as a radical for his trust-busting. The principal industrialist who stood by him was Carnegie, who was admired for his philanthropy. So TR played a double game: in public he feigned friendship and praised Carnegie but in private ridiculed him and opposed his ideas for international arbitration and a world court.
Roosevelt played Carnegie? Yes. After he left the White House, Roosevelt wanted to hunt in Africa. To pay for that expedition, he accepted Carnegie’s donations. In exchange, Carnegie asked TR to broker a peace between the cousins who ruled Germany and Great Britain—Kaiser Wilhelm and King Edward VII. TR agreed, then sabotaged the initiative when he told the kaiser he stood firm in his judgment that war was sometimes necessary, and that no leader should embrace pacifism. When Edward VII died, the peace plan was scuttled for lack of a partner to work with Wilhelm.
How about Taft? Taft was part of the Republican establishment that did not want to alienate Carnegie, a Republican and a donor. Taft admired Carnegie but had little need of him. He invited Carnegie to the White House and listened to him. And Taft worked to get the Senate to agree to treaties binding the United States to arbitrate its differences with selected European nations rather go to war. Those treaties never were ratified.
Carnegie refused to give up. He was a utopian, a visionary. He was not naïve, but he also knew that he’d succeeded at everything he had put his mind to; why not international diplomacy? He believed the world was moving away from the barbarism of war and toward greater civilization. It was not absurd to think that the 20th century
Andrew Carnegie envisioned the Palace of Peace at The Hague as a mecca for world leaders to resolve differences without bloodshed.
would be a century of peace through arbitration.
Should Carnegie have taken his case to the people? Carnegie was no populist. He believed, with Spencer, that the “fittest” should and would not only survive but would prosper and lead. And remember: he lived a century ago, when kings, queens, and emperors were alive and well in Europe. Carnegie reached out not to the masses, but to university students, because he believed they were the leaders of tomorrow. He was an adherent of the “great man” theory—that the Roosevelts, the Gladstones, the Carnegies, the emperors and kings, made history.
The Great War devastated him. He was broken by the war and more by national leaders’ enthusiasm and that of the young men following them into war. He hoped President Woodrow Wilson might broker a settlement—he urged Wilson to do so—but when this failed, he retreated into himself. We would say that he had a nervous breakdown. He stopped reading newspapers, ceased writing to dear friends in England, including Liberal Party statesman John Morley, to whom he had corresponded every Sunday for decades. He saw no visitors, stopped talking to his wife and daughter. Only when a truce was signed did he rouse himself, write President Wilson a congratulatory note, offer best wishes on Wilson’s plan for a League of Nations, and propose his Peace Palace at The Hague as a venue for a peace conference.
Was Carnegie’s $25 million-plus outlay for the cause money well spent? His palaces of peace, certainly at The Hague, are living monuments to his dream. So, too, the Carnegie Endowment for Peace. Have these institutions brought peace on earth? Of course not. But have they kept alive a dream; have they contributed to the promotion of peace? I think so.
What’s the lesson in Carnegie’s crusade? He was very much a “fool for peace.” His legacy is the notion that civilized people should not consider war inevitable but, rather, an aberration to be abolished. He was a “possibilist,” not a realist. We need more such men, men willing to dream of a better world and to do what they can to bridge the gap between the present and that better future they envision. Andrew Carnegie’s dreams of a world without war are as relevant today, perhaps more so, than they were a century ago.
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d24473bf74ab6c0a1be573e857afc258 | https://www.historynet.com/andrew-jackson-winner-and-loser-in-1824.htm | Andrew Jackson: Winner and Loser in 1824 | Andrew Jackson: Winner and Loser in 1824
Did a corrupt bargain between John Quincy Adams and Henry Clay steal the presidential election and overturn the will of the people?
It was a cold and snowy morning on February 9, 1825, as New York Congressman Stephen Van Rensselaer trudged through Washington, D.C., to the Capitol building, where he was about to play a pivotal role in the fate of his nation.
A “very wealthy and very pious” man hailing from a regal Dutch family with extensive land holdings, Van Rensselaer, who was known as the “Last Patroon,” was a member of the New York Federalist elite and had served as a major general of volunteers in the War of 1812. As he entered the Capitol, the elderly—and some believed increasingly senile—congressman found himself confronted by Henry Clay and Daniel Webster, two giants of the House who believed Van Rensselaer held the outcome of the 1824 presidential election in his hands.
The bitter and divisive election, which pit four of the nation’s most able statesmen—all members of the Democratic Republican Party—against one another, had failed to yield any one of them an electoral majority. Now the responsibility devolved to the House of Representatives, as mandated by the 12th Amendment, to choose one from among the top three electoral vote-getters: Andrew Jackson, John Quincy Adams and William Crawford. By all counts, none of the three had the requisite majority of state delegations to win.
Van Rensselaer had supported Crawford in the election and been strongly opposed to Adams, who had left the Federalist Party before the War of 1812. His New York delegation was split, just one vote short of giving Adams the majority, which would then hand him 13 out of 24 states and the presidency. Over the next few hours in the Capitol, Clay and Webster worked on the old man, arguing that Crawford could not win. It must be Adams or Jackson, and Adams was the only responsible choice. They used all the persuasion they could muster, playing on the veteran’s patriotism and warning against stalemate, dissolution and anarchy.
The meeting completely unnerved Van Rensselaer. As he took his seat in the House chamber, awaiting the ballot box to reach him, he felt as if the full weight of the Union rested upon his shoulders.
Monroe Leaves Office
The 1824 election signaled the end of the Era of Good Feelings, a nearly decade-long period of relative political harmony that saw the dissolution of the Federalist Party and the country firmly united behind the Democratic-Republican Party.
As the nation grew and the voting base expanded, more Americans wanted a say in how their leaders were selected. Reforms driven by war veterans, journalists, immigrants, laborers and frontier settlers cut into the influence of the old regime of well-born Eastern landowners and spelled doom for the Federalist Party, which opposed the expansion of suffrage in several states and tepidly supported America’s effort in the War of 1812. The party’s end came in 1816, when its presidential nominee, New Yorker Rufus King, was decisively defeated by Virginian James Monroe of the Democratic-Republican Party.
While Federalism vanished as a political movement, its principles endured and continued to influence national policy as Republican leaders began adopting several of the Federalists’ basic tenets. President James Madison had committed Jeffersonian heresy by backing the Second Bank of the United States and the tariff of 1816. Monroe, much to the dismay of hardline Democratic-Republicans, shifted the party to the center by signing bills for internal improvements and higher tariffs. The Panic of 1819—a financial crisis marked by bank failures, foreclosures and declines in manufacturing and agriculture—along with the controversy of Missouri’s 1820 admittance to the Union as a slave state, stirred national discontent. Openly hostile partisanship remained unusual, but in this atmosphere a controversial presidential election could prove to be a serious challenge to the durability of the republic.
Still, Monroe was reelected in 1820, winning every electoral vote but one. Monroe’s cabinet was extraordinary as the cream of America’s second generation of leaders occupied the highest positions: Secretary of State John Quincy Adams, Treasury Secretary William Crawford and Secretary of War John C. Calhoun. With different degrees of ambition, all three men had designs on the presidency.
John Quincy Adams followed his father’s lead into public life, serving as a senator from Massachusetts and then as a minister to several nations. He was on the 1814 diplomatic mission to Ghent, Belgium, to broker peace with Great Britain, and his foreign policy experience made him a logical choice as secretary of state. Adams influenced Monroe to declare opposition to further European colonization of the New World and negotiated the purchase of Florida from Spain in 1819, which helped soothe tensions over the fact that General Andrew Jackson had seized control of the peninsula the year before. Adams wished to be president. Nevertheless, he would not ask for the office or campaign for it.
John Caldwell Calhoun, born in 1782 in South Carolina, was the youngest and most handsome of the candidates in 1824. The Scots-Irish Calhoun was first elected to the state legislature in 1807, and then the House of Representatives in 1810. In the House, he was one of the most fervent supporters of the War of 1812. In 1817, at 35, he became Monroe’s secretary of war. Calhoun’s competence and charisma made him a rising star within the party, and he was almost universally admired by radicals, nationalists and even Federalists. Adams at first assumed Calhoun would support him for president, but soon politicians in South Carolina and Pennsylvania announced their support of a Calhoun candidacy.
The third candidate from within Monroe’s cabinet, William H. Crawford, was born in Virginia in 1772. His family moved to Georgia in 1783, where he was admitted to the bar in 1799. He served in the U.S. Senate from 1807 to 1813 and then as minister to France until 1815, when President James Madison appointed him secretary of the treasury.
Had he so chosen, Crawford might have become president in 1816 but he deferred to Monroe and retained his position as treasury secretary, probably expecting to become heir to the “Virginia Dynasty” at the end of Monroe’s presidency.
Crawford secured his support within the party by distributing patronage and coaxing Western banks with deposit money from public land sales. He soon realized Adams and Calhoun would be his presidential rivals, and fiercely opposed their policies. Adams suspected Crawford of attempting to undermine the negotiations with Spain for Florida. Also, contemplating a potential Jackson candidacy, Crawford was the most vocal member of the cabinet in favor of censuring the general after his seizure of Florida.
A formidable candidate, Crawford possessed personal magnetism that attracted some of the best people of the day. He had Thomas Jefferson’s private support, and a young senator from New York, Martin Van Buren, would manage his campaign. Outside Monroe’s cabinet, two more contenders emerged: Andrew Jackson and Henry Clay.
Jackson participated in the Tennessee Constitutional Convention and served his adopted state as a judge and in the militia, then as a congressman and senator. In the War of 1812, he was commissioned a major general of U.S. volunteers, crushing the pro-British Creek Indians in 1814 and usurping most of their land. He became a national hero in the Battle of New Orleans and again took center stage in 1818 when, acting on open-ended directives from Monroe and Calhoun, he invaded Spanish Florida, attacking hostile Seminoles, executing a couple of British agents and capturing the towns of Pensacola and St. Marks to effectively end Spanish control of the territory.
Jackson was condemned publicly by Crawford and Clay and privately by Calhoun over his Florida invasion. In Congress in 1819, four motions were put forward to censure Jackson. Although all four were rejected, Jackson came to view both Crawford and Clay as corrupt, power-grubbing villains.
“I hope the western people will appreciate his conduct accordingly,” Jackson said of Clay, adding, “You will see him skinned here and I hope you will roast him in the West.”
The criticisms of Jackson’s invasion of Florida did not diminish the gratitude and love his state and the nation felt for him. On July 20, 1822, the Tennessee legislature nominated Jackson for president and then in October 1823 it elected him to the U.S. Senate.
The final candidate in the race was the passionate and charming speaker of the House, Henry Clay, born in 1777 in Virginia. As a lad in Richmond he learned “the art of declamation” by watching orators such as Patrick Henry in action. At 20 he moved to Kentucky, where he quickly earned a reputation as a persuasive and highly skilled attorney. In 1811, after serving in the Kentucky legislature and then in the U.S. Senate, Clay won election to the House of Representatives and, almost immediately, was elected speaker. Clay used his position in 1812 to push the country toward war with Great Britain, and in 1814 he joined Adams on the diplomatic mission to Ghent to end the war. Clay expected a high-level appointment as his reward, but Monroe instead selected Adams to be his secretary of state. Returning to the House of Representatives, he was determined to use his power to build opposition to the administration.
Clay became “The Great Pacificator” in 1820, when he marshaled support for the Missouri Compromise, which brought slave state Missouri and free state Maine into the Union—and probably saved the nation from dissolution. He spent the next few years building support for his “American System,” a policy that was based on internal improvements, high tariffs and a national bank.
As for his 1824 presidential strategy, Clay realized he was not strong enough in the North to beat Adams or strong enough in the South to beat Crawford. But, he believed, he didn’t need to beat either man, he just needed to finish third. If, as appeared possible, no candidate earned a majority of the electors, the decision would move to the House, which would choose a winner from among the top three candidates—and Clay ruled the House. “If I get into the House I consider my election secure,” he stated in early 1824.
A Contest for the Presidency
In the late summer of 1823, Crawford suffered a stroke “which left him helpless, speechless, nearly blind, and scarcely conscious,” and dramatically altered the presidential contest. Secluded to rest and recover as much as possible, his allies tried to downplay his affliction and kept the campaign alive. In February 1824, Crawford’s supporters attempted to trump the other candidates by calling for a congressional Democratic-Republican Party caucus to nominate the presidential and vice-presidential candidates.
State legislatures, rival politicians and hostile newspapers criticized the scheduling of a caucus, arguing that too many people had too much at stake to permit an elite few to determine the next president. Of the 261 members of the House and Senate, only 66 attended the caucus. As expected, Crawford won the caucus’ presidential nomination with 64 votes. Albert Gallatin earned the vice-presidential nomination with 57 votes. Spectators in the galleries offered “faint applause and a few hisses.” Crawford received no boost from the nomination.
Meanwhile, Jackson was gaining support in Pennsylvania, the state Calhoun was counting on to serve as his anchor in the North. Momentum grew and the March 4 nominating convention in Harrisburg handed Jackson an overwhelming victory. At this point, Calhoun wisely bowed out of the race, allowing his name to be offered as a vice-presidential candidate.
Gallatin eventually was forced to withdraw his candidacy as a “great clamor” had arisen over the fact that he was Swissborn, and did not come to America until 1780.
While all of the presidential candidates were Democratic Republicans, clear policy differences existed. Crawford stood out as a small government free-trader. Jackson favored a “judicious” tariff, but opposed a national bank and most internal improvements. The other candidates were pro-tariff, pro-bank and pro-internal improvements. Ultimately, biography dominated the election: Adams, the dignified Northern statesman; Crawford, heir to the “Virginia Dynasty;” Clay, the Great Compromiser from the West; and Jackson, the war hero.
Although the nationwide electorate had expanded, its composition varied greatly by state. Still governed by its 1663 colonial charter, Rhode Island had the most restrictive voting requirement—ownership of land worth at least $134. Jackson’s Tennessee claimed the most liberal voting requirements. There a “free-holder” could vote as soon as he entered the state, men without land could vote after living in the state for six months and even free blacks could vote in that slave state.
How electoral votes were distributed also varied. Of the 24 states, only 12 chose their electors through an at-large, winner-take-all popular vote—the same method most frequently used today. Six states selected their electors via popular vote by district. Six states left the electoral decision solely to the discretion of the legislature, and two of those states, New York and Louisiana, proved key to the 1824 election results.
Even though Jackson was the Hero of New Orleans, Clay had strong support among Louisiana’s political elite. He was expected to carry the state, but when the legislature met in December, two of his supporters were absent. Then, as rumors spread that Clay had dropped out, some of his supporters cast votes for other candidates. Ultimately the state awarded three electoral votes to Jackson and two to Adams.
In New York, after much debate, compromise and bargaining, the legislature assigned 25 electors to Adams, seven to Clay and four to Crawford. But when the electors reported to cast their ballots, half of Clay’s were absent or had switched their vote to another candidate. The result was Adams 26, Crawford five, Clay four and Jackson one.
To win the general election, a candidate needed 131 electoral votes. The final electoral tally added up to a surprising result. Jackson not only won Tennessee, Alabama and Mississippi, as expected, but also all of the electoral votes of North Carolina, South Carolina, New Jersey, Indiana and Pennsylvania. He carried the majority of electors in Maryland, Illinois and Louisiana, as well as his one vote in New York, for a total of 99 electoral votes. Adams swept New England, dominated New York and carried minorities in Illinois, Maryland and Louisiana for 84 votes. Crawford won Georgia and Virginia, with additional votes in New York and Maryland totaling 41 electors. Clay finished fourth, winning Kentucky, Ohio and Missouri, in addition to his four New York votes, for a total of 37.
Calhoun easily won the vice presidency with 182 electoral votes, winning 14 states outright and majorities in three others. The country had elected a vice president, but not a president. It was now up to the House of Representatives.
What Happened to Henry Clay?
Clay, always an optimist, soothed his distress at his failure to win the presidency with the pride of becoming a president-maker. Supporters of other candidates, seeking Clay’s favor, boosted him with high praise. As Crawford’s illness clearly rendered him unable to serve, it came down to a choice between Jackson and Adams. Clay needed little time to decide.
Adams and Clay had had their differences, but they ultimately respected one another’s abilities. On the other hand, Clay harbored little affection for and no confidence in Jackson. He considered him a mere “military chieftain” whose accomplishment of “killing 2,500 Englishmen at New Orleans” did not qualify him for “the various difficult and complicated duties of the chief magistrate.” Clay saw Jackson as an American Napoleon or Caesar—a phony democrat who would use his military credentials to seize control and establish a tyranny.
On January 8, 1825, Clay confided to friends his decision. The next day, he met with Adams for three hours. No one knows what truly transpired, but Adams wrote it was “to satisfy [Clay] with regard to some principles of great public importance, but without any personal considerations for himself.”
On January 24, the Kentucky delegation announced it would support Adams, even though the state legislature had “instructed” its congressmen to vote for Jackson as Adams had not received a single popular vote in the state. While he had finished third behind Jackson in the popular vote in Ohio, another Clay state, its delegation also backed Adams. Sensing what was happening the Jackson forces struck back.
On January 25, a letter in Philadelphia’s Columbian Observer from an anonymous congressman gave “a brief account of such a BARGAIN as can only be equaled by the famous Burr conspiracy of 1801.” The letter writer claimed that Adams supporters had sent a message to Clay supporters offering an appointment to secretary of state in exchange for Clay’s support in the House vote. Allegedly, Clay’s friends then took this offer to Jackson’s men, seeking a counteroffer. “But none of the friends of Jackson would descend to such mean banter and sale.”
Incensed by the charges, Clay issued a statement in the National Intelligencer on February 1: “I pronounce the member, whoever he may be a base and infamous calumniator, a dastard, and liar; and if he dare unveil himself, and avow his name, I will hold him responsible, as I here admit myself to be, to all the laws which govern and regulate men of honor.”
Two days later, Pennsylvania Congressman George Kremer stepped forward, stating he was ready to prove the truth of the accusation. However, when called to appear before an investigative committee, Kremer refused and the probe was dropped. Clay, considering Kremer a dupe under the influence of Jackson’s men, decided not to call Kremer to the field of honor.
Meanwhile, Clay and Adams continued to garner support in the House. Congressman John Scott was the only member from Missouri, a state Clay had carried decisively. Missouri Sen. Thomas Benton was a cousin-in-law and supporter of Clay, but he preferred Jackson to Adams for president, and attempted to influence Scott to support him. Scott had apparently told Benton that he would not support Adams. However, on February 5, he wrote to Benton: “Notwithstanding the conversation we had on Thursday evening and on Friday, from which you might justly conclude that I would not vote for Mr. Adams, I am now inclined to think differently, and unless some other change in my mind takes place, I shall vote for him.”
Immediately, rumors spread that Scott sought patronage for his brother, a judge in Arkansas territory whose career was in jeopardy following a notorious duel. An outraged Benton answered him on February 8: “The vote you intend thus to give is not your own—it belongs to the people of the State of Missouri. They are against Mr. Adams….Tomorrow is the day for your self-immolation. If you have an enemy, he may go and feed his eyes upon the scene; your former friend will share the afflicting spectacle.” In spite of this stinging rebuke, Scott would still vote for Adams.
Other states fell into place for Adams. In Louisiana, Clay supporters regrouped, delivering that state to Adams. Illinois’ lone, lame-duck representative, Daniel Cook, gave his support to Adams in spite of heavy pressure from Jackson supporters and implied offers to become governor of Arkansas Territory. Daniel Webster helped in Maryland, assuring Federalists that Adams would not exclude them from his administration. Consequently, the delegations of three states in which Jackson had won a majority of electors would vote for Adams.
Was it a Conspiracy?
By the time the House prepared to vote on the morning of February 9, Adams could count on 12states—one shy of victory. The New York delegation was one vote short for Adams to win and the expectation was that it would remain so. Van Rensselaer, a strong Crawford supporter, had previously given his word of honor that he would not vote for Adams, but now he wasn’t sure.
As Van Rensselaer sat in the chamber awaiting the vote, Van Buren, Crawford’s campaign manager, hovered anxiously about his seat. Clay, striding down the aisle, paused when he reached the chair of Van Rensselaer, bent down and whispered in his ear, and then took his seat.
Van Buren would later recount in his autobiography that when the voting commenced, Van Rensselaer slumped forward and closed his eyes, praying for divine guidance. Opening his eyes, he spotted a discarded ballot laying on the floor. Taking this to be the guidance he had just prayed for, he picked up the ballot, read the name and placed it in the ballot box.
When the vote was complete, Webster and John Randolph counted the ballots. Most members and observers had expected a long and drawn out process involving several ballots, similar to the 1801 experience when it required 35 votes before Jefferson finally won. However, on the first ballot, with Van Rensselaer’s vote, the New York delegation went for Adams, giving him the 13 states needed. The election denouement was shocking to all. “The cards were stacked,” Randolph bitterly remarked.
With the announcement of Adams’ victory came a sudden “burst of applause from the galleries, followed by some hissing.” Horrified, Van Rensselaer stumbled to his feet, crying “Forgive me!” A young spectator replied contemptuously, “Ask your own conscience, General, not me.”
Adams, upon learning the news, said, “May the blessing of God rest upon the event of this day.” It wasn’t the popular confirmation he had so desired, but he would seize the opportunity nonetheless.
The evening after the vote, the Monroes hosted their final reception at the White House. Along with such luminaries as the Marquis de Lafayette, Samuel Morse and the British Earl of Derby Edward Stanley, Adams, Calhoun, Webster and Clay, were all in attendance. All eyes were riveted on Jackson when he arrived. When he offered his hand to Adams in congratulations, there was a collective sigh of relief. The defeated candidate had accepted the verdict.
The good will did not last long, however. The next week, President-elect Adams announced he wanted Clay to be his secretary of state, a baffling move considering the intense scrutiny both men were under. Congressman Kremer’s accusation of a backroom deal now seemed to carry weight.
On February 14, a bitter Jackson wrote to his friend, Major William B. Lewis: “So, you see, the Judas of the West has closed the contract and will receive the thirty pieces of silver. His end will be the same. Was there ever witnessed such a barefaced corruption in any country before?”
Perhaps the fact that it was so “barefaced” suggests it actually was not a corrupt bargain. Clay was a proven statesman of the highest caliber, and he and Adams shared many political views. His selection was understandable. But the circumstances were ripe for conspiracy theories.
Jackson had won the popular and electoral vote, yet another had ascended to the presidency. Something corrupt must have occurred, insisted his supporters.
The dark clouds of conspiracy never left the administration, and the disputed election severely weakened Adams, who was derisively called the “Clay President.” His “brave new proposals,” including a national bankruptcy law, a national university and a Department of the Interior, would all be defeated. A far-sighted effort on Clay’s part to nominate U.S. ministers plenipotentiary to participate in the Congress of Panama was delayed and debated at length, resulting in the ministers not reaching Panama until after the convention had adjourned.
With the disputed election, a new era of partisanship was born, causing the Democratic-Republican Party to disappear, replaced by two new political parties. The supporters of Adams and Clay would become the National Republicans, and the supporters of Jackson, Crawford and Calhoun—who as vice president was embarrassed to be associated with the Adams Administration— would become the Democrats.
Van Rensselaer continued in the House until 1829. He founded the Rensselaer School in 1824 in Troy, N.Y., and continued to contribute to New York society until he died in 1839.
Remarkably Jackson, who was quick to anger, quick to draw conclusions and unyielding in his beliefs, accepted his defeat and was determined to correct it through the electoral process. He resigned his Senate seat in October 1825 and was almost immediately again nominated for president by the Tennessee legislature. He and his supporters knew that the next election would leave no room for “corrupt bargains.”
With his bitter loss in the tainted 1824 election, Jackson had become a symbol of the popular will struggling against elitist power brokers and gave rise to a new era of democratic development and growing respect for the common man that would forever bear his name. By 1828, both he and the popular will could no longer be denied. And, in the end, Clay was wrong about Jackson, who turned out to be no Caesar or Napoleon, no “military chieftain,” but rather a true American democrat.
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3532c78a1f584203d66f7f563bce7613 | https://www.historynet.com/andrews-celebrates-u-s-air-force-70th.htm | Andrews Celebrates U.S. Air Force 70th | Andrews Celebrates U.S. Air Force 70th
After a year off due to budget restrictions, the Joint Base Andrews Air Show was held at Andrews Air Force Base outside Washington, D.C., on September 16-17, 2017. Spectators at the free airshow were treated to military aircraft displays, aerobatic routines, warbird flybys and a rousing performance by the U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds in celebration of the 70th anniversary of the Air Force’s establishment as a separate service on September 18, 1947. Most important, they got a chance to meet and interact with the airmen who defend the United States and its allies and fly relief missions around the globe. Here’s a snapshot of sights from this year’s show.
Old Lightning meets new: The Planes of Fame Air Museum’s Lockheed P-38J flies with a Lockheed F-35A Lightning II of the 61st Fighter Squadron at the Andrews Airshow. (U.S. Air Force)
The Commemorative Air Force’s replica Zeros never fail to impress with their “Tora, Tora, Tora!” mock Pearl Harbor attack. (U.S. Air Force)
The Boeing B-29 “Doc,” one of only two flying Superfortresses, makes a fly-by, reflecting Andrews’ runway on its polished aluminum fuselage. (Carl von Wodtke)
“Doc” parks on the tarmac at Andrews, awaiting its next flight. (Carl von Wodtke)
Two Thunderbird F-16s perform a reflection pass at Andrews Air Force Base. (U.S. Air Force)
Spectators watch and photograph the action on the flight line during the Andrews airshow. (U.S. Air Force)
The Geico Skytypers perform a break maneuver in their North American SNJ-2 Texans. (Carl von Wodtke)
Scott “Scooter” Yoak pilots his North American P-51D “Quick Silver” in formation with Jim Tobul’s Vought F4U-4 Corsair “Korean War Hero” during a Class of ’45 performance. (Carl von Wodtke)
After four decades of service, the Fairchild Republic A-10 “Warthog” is still helping to support ground troops with its lethal 30mm rotary cannon. (Carl von Wodtke)
The Delaware Aviation Museum’s North American B-25J Mitchell “Panchito” heads for the clouds over Andrews. (Carl von Wodtke)
A Lockheed Martin rep shows off the cockpit of the company’s new T-50A trainer to airshow attendees. (Carl von Wodtke)
Schoolchildren emerge from the gaping maw of an Air Mobility Command Lockheed C-5 Galaxy. (Carl von Wodtke)
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1286c2c7fbe92fdaf6996a24b27fdd18 | https://www.historynet.com/another-italian-misadventure-in-the-battle-of-britain.htm | Another Italian Misadventure in the Battle of Britain | Another Italian Misadventure in the Battle of Britain
When the Italian air force pitted biplanes against Hurricanes and Spitfires in the Battle of Britain, the outcome wasn’t pretty.
Sergeant Pietro Salvadori desperately tried to determine what was causing the engine of his Fiat C.R.42bis biplane fighter to overheat as he neared England’s south coast on November 11, 1940. The Italian airman soon realized he would have to shut it down and make an emergency landing. He glided toward a smooth stretch of beach near the lighthouse at Orfordness, hoping he could fix the engine, take off and return to his unit, the 95th Squadron, in Belgium. His landing was perfect, but after the Fiat’s wheels hit a soft spot in the sand, Salvadori found himself hanging by his seatbelt, with the plane’s nose buried in the sand and its tail pointing skyward. He gingerly eased himself over the hot engine cowling and onto the beach, where the British Home Guard took him prisoner. For Salvadori, World War II was over.
Languishing in a POW camp, he had plenty of time to ponder the march of events that had landed him in prison. On June 10, 1940, Italian dictator Benito Mussolini—believing that Germany had already won—baldly declared war on France and Great Britain. Mussolini expected a quick victory that would increase Fascist Italy’s prestige, help achieve his expansionist goals in North Africa and confirm his own domination of the Mediterranean. Just two days later RAF Bomber Command dispatched 36 Armstrong Whitworth Whitleys on a long-range mission to attack aircraft factories in Genoa and Turin. Because of bad weather, only 13 bombers reached their targets, but the unexpected raid raised considerable concern among the Italians, many of whom were unhappy about entering the war. On June 15, Vickers Wellingtons bombed aircraft factories in Genoa. The attacks on the Italian heartland enraged Mussolini, who was worried about their effect on civilian morale and his image as a leader.
Mussolini soon contacted Adolf Hitler and offered to send an expeditionary air corps to assist in the forthcoming attack on the British Isles. Although Hitler was at first hesitant, he soon saw the political and propaganda benefits of having his Axis ally engaged in the coming battle, and eventually accepted Mussolini’s offer.
Hermann Göring, the Luftwaffe commander in chief, and other members of the German high command were less than enthusiastic: They were certain the Italians’ outdated aircraft and lack of modern combat experience would hinder air operations. Members of the Italian Supreme Command in Rome, realizing they would have their hands full battling the British in both North and East Africa, were equally unenthusiastic. But Il Duce’s order must be obeyed.
Field Marshal Albert Kesselring, commander of Luftflotte 2, was notified in early August to prepare for the arrival of the Corpo Aereo Italiano (CAI). He complied, even though he considered the Italian involvement more of an annoyance than a worthwhile contribution to the campaign. Mussolini directed the commander of the Regia Aeronautica (Royal Air Force) to establish the CAI without delay. It would be equivalent to about three RAF wings, consisting of two bomber wings and one fighter wing. Air Marshal Rino Corso-Fougier, a veteran commander and pilot who nonetheless had little combat experience, would head up the expeditionary force.
Preparations for the deployment took longer than expected, but the Italians sent a small liaison staff, including several German-speaking men, to the headquarters of Luftflotte 2 to begin making arrangements for the CAI’s arrival. The Italian combat units were headed for four air bases in Belgium, and billeting, repair facilities and security for CAI men and planes there were assigned to the German National Labor Service, a semimilitary construction organization. Despite Mussolini’s impatience, the CAI was not officially organized until September 10, with training and equipping of the expeditionary force completed later that month.
Caproni Ca.133 transports brought in personnel, tools, spare parts and equipment to set up shop in Belgium. Since Italian bombs, ammunition and parts were not interchangeable with those of the Germans, they had to be shipped by train from Italy. The Germans provided fuel, tents, rations and other supplies.
Fiat B.R.20M bombers left Italy on September 25 for the flight over the Alps to Frankfurt am Main, and on to bases in Belgium. Bad weather and malfunctioning navigation instruments resulted in two damaged bombers and one destroyed during forced landings in Belgium. But the fighter units made it safely to their Belgian bases, with stops in Munich and Frankfurt. By October 22, the entire CAI was in Belgium and preparing for operations, making familiarization flights around the bases.
The CAI then began the complicated process of coordination with the Luftwaffe’s II Fliegerkorps, made more difficult because of language problems and differing procedures. The Italians also learned that winter weather in northern Europe was more severe than in most parts of Italy, which meant pilots urgently needed training in instrument and night flying.
The Germans were unimpressed with the Italian aircraft and aircrews. The C.R.42bis Falco (Falcon) biplane fighters were hopelessly inadequate for combat against the RAF’s Supermarine Spitfires and Hawker Hurricanes, which were armed with eight .303-inch Browning machine guns and had top speeds of 355 mph and 342 mph, respectively. Introduced in 1939, the C.R.42s were sturdy and extremely maneuverable, but their top speed was only 267 mph, with a range of 481 miles. Armament consisted of two synchronized 12.7mm Breda-SAFAT machine guns mounted above the cowling of the 840-hp Fiat radial engine.
The Fiat G.50 Freccia (Arrow) monoplane fighter first entered service in 1938. It was equipped with the same 840-hp Fiat engine and armament as the C.R.42bis, but had a top speed of 293 mph and range of 621 miles. Amazingly, only three of the CAI Freccias were equipped with radios, and all the Italian fighters lacked adequate instruments for navigation at night and in bad weather.
Italian air force Fiat B.R.20 Cigogna (Stork) bombers fly from their bases in Belgium on a mission to England during the Battle of Britain. (Ullstein Bild/Getty Images)
The twin-engine B.R.20 Cicogna (Stork) was one of the most advanced bombers of the mid-1930s, but by 1940 even the improved B.R.20M was becoming outdated. Fitted with 1,000-hp Fiat radials, the B.R.20M flown by the CAI had a top speed of 268 mph and a range of 1,243 miles. The Cicogna’s armament consisted of a flexible 12.7mm Breda-SAFAT machine gun in the nose, two 7.7mms in the dorsal turret and one 7.7mm in the ventral position, with two additional 12.7mm guns aimed manually from lateral blisters. It carried a 5,511-pound bombload. One problem that soon became obvious was the bomber’s lack of deicing equipment.
The Luftwaffe initially assigned CAI units the east coast of England, between the Thames River and Harwich, as their operating area. By late October, operational cooperation, weather reports and other arrangements between the two Axis allies had been worked out fairly well, and CAI headquarters reported its units were ready for action. There was great activity and excitement at the CAI bases on the night of October 24, when combat operations finally began with bombing raids on Felixstowe and Harwich by 12 B.R.20Ms of the 13th Bomber Wing and six from the 43rd Bomber Wing. One plane crashed shortly after takeoff, however, and only 10 B.R.20Ms located Harwich and dropped their bombs. Two Cicognas became lost during the return flight and crashed, and another was damaged during a forced landing.
The initial mission’s results were clearly less than impressive, especially since the Italians had encountered no British defensive action in the course of their night raid. Still, the newspapers back home made good propaganda out of this first Italian air raid on the British Isles.
For weeks the Germans had conducted strong daily raids against British targets, featuring dramatic air battles in the skies over southern England. German Field Marshal Erhard Milch, among the CAI’s detractors, reportedly stated that “Mussolini’s contingent was more of a liability than an asset.” Although night operations were less risky, they were obviously more difficult. After that first raid, German and Italian commanders decided on a change in strategy for the CAI: The Italians would mount a daytime mission.
On the afternoon of October 29, 15 B.R.20Ms from the 43rd Wing took off to bomb Ramsgate Harbor, escorted by 39 C.R.42bis and 34 G.50 fighters, plus a group of Luftwaffe Messerschmitt Me-109Es. Almost immediately engine trouble forced three of the bombers down. The remaining 12 reached the target at low altitude, flying in an unusual formation, wingtip to wingtip. Anti-aircraft gunners watched this approaching formation of unfamiliar aircraft with some confusion, but once they finally opened fire they damaged five bombers. Reports indicate the Italians dropped 75 bombs in haphazard fashion before they quickly departed. One damaged bomber made a forced landing at Chièvres, but the rest returned to base.
Members of the Corpo Aereo Italiano’s 18th Fighter Group, 56th Wing, assemble at Maldegem before a mission in November 1940. (Stato Maggiore Aeronautica)
Large formations of G.50 and C.R.42bis fighters made sweeps over several towns in southern England on November 1, but surprisingly encountered no opposition. After further training, the Italians carried out a night raid on Harwich and Ipswich, during which 13 B.R.20Ms of the 13th Wing dropped their bombs and returned to base with only one bomber damaged in the process. Inclement weather delayed operations until November 8, when 22 G.50s of the 20th Fighter Group made a sweep over coastal towns, including Folkestone and Margate, and as far inland as Canterbury. This time four Spitfires intercepted the Italians, and in the short dogfight that ensued, one Spitfire was damaged and had to make a forced landing. Five B.R.20Ms made a low-level raid on targets in the Ramsgate area on the night of November 10-11, returning without losses. Italian fighters also occasionally escorted German Junkers Ju-87B Stukas during attacks on British merchant shipping in the English Channel.
By then the Italian airmen had settled into a routine at the Belgian airfields. They generally enjoyed good relations with the Germans, especially with the labor service workers. But with the onset of winter weather, the aircrews, mechanics and support personnel—who mostly lived and worked in tents, and had to repair their aircraft in the open—were suffering in the frigid conditions. The Italians also complained about the German rations, obtaining fruit and vegetables from Belgian civilians whenever possible.
By early November, the main daylight battles were almost over, and the Luftwaffe was concentrating on night raids against British cities and industry. At a meeting attended by Air Marshal Corso-Fougier and officers of II Fliegerkorps, the decision was made to launch a major CAI raid on November 11. No one brought up the fact that it was the anniversary of the armistice ending World War I—and that Italy had been on the side of the victorious Allies in 1918.
November 11 dawned cloudy and cold, but according to plan 10 B.R.20M bombers took off at noon and attempted to rendezvous with a large group of fighter escorts. Bad weather soon set in, forcing 46 G.50s, as well as a squadron of German Me-109s, to return to their bases. But 42 C.R.42bis fighters managed to form up with the bombers and head out across the Channel and North Sea toward Harwich. At about 1330 hours, British radar picked up the Italians, and 30 Hurricanes of Nos. 17 and 257 squadrons scrambled to intercept. A flight of Hurricanes from No. 46 Squadron, which was already on patrol, was also directed to intercept the intruders. A massacre was in the making.
Royal Air Force Squadron Leader Robert Stanford Tuck poses with a group of 257 Squadron pilots under the nose of Tuck's Hawker Hurricane. They are displaying souvenirs of their action against Italian aircraft on November 11, 1940. (IWM CH1647)
When the leader of No. 257 Squadron spotted a “V” formation of enemy bombers at 12,000 feet, he called out “Tally ho” and initiated a starboard beam attack from above. Almost simultaneously, Hurricanes from 46 Squadron arrived and attacked the bombers from the port side. The No. 257 Squadron pilots roared in close to the formation and, despite defensive fire, quickly shot down four bombers.
Some of the Italians managed to bail out, but one crewman met a horrible end after he apparently pulled his ripcord too soon: His parachute snagged on one of the bomber’s rudders, dragging him down into the North Sea’s cold waters. A 46 Squadron pilot caught yet another B.R.20M heading for the coast. When the Hurricane made a second firing pass, one of the bomber’s engines burst into flames, sending plane and crew down to the sea. Pilots from 46 Squadron bagged one more bomber, which crashed in a forest near Ipswich, then joined a 257 Squadron pilot in an attack on a bomber that dived away with both engines smoking. Only a few bombs, probably 250 kg, were reported to have landed on and near the port at Harwich.
Meanwhile, Spitfires of 41 Squadron had intercepted the C.R.42 fighter escort. A wild dogfight ensued, eventually involving Hurricanes of 257 Squadron as well. The Fiats were no match for the RAF fighters, but the Italians, who were good pilots, tried to use the biplanes’ excellent maneuverability to their advantage. As the aircraft twisted and turned, one 257 Squadron pilot ran out of ammunition—then rammed the upper wing of a C.R.42 with his propeller, causing it to crash near a railway station. At least three Fiats crashed into the sea near Orfordness, and others were damaged during the melee. It was prior to this battle that Sergeant Salvadori had been forced down with engine trouble on the beach at Orfordness.
The RAF after-action report stated that the British sustained no losses in the battle, but at least two fighters had been damaged by fire from the C.R.42s and B.R.20Ms’ gunners. The RAF claimed a total of nine B.R.20Ms destroyed and one damaged, and five C.R.42s destroyed and seven damaged. When engineers at Farnborough examined a B.R.20M that had crash-landed near Woodbridge, they noted that its six crewmen were equipped with steel helmets and 6.5mm M91 Carcano carbines with bayonets.
The Italians, on the other hand, claimed they had destroyed nine RAF fighters. The reader can decide which version of the battle seems more credible.
As the scattered CAI aircraft beat a hasty retreat toward Belgium, four B.R.20Ms made forced landings at Antwerp-Deurne and on the sands at Dunkirk, near the section of beach still littered with wreckage from the British evacuation in May. Three more damaged bombers landed at German airfields. The C.R.42s fared even worse: Nineteen made forced landings at various airfields, either because they were low on fuel or had been damaged. But finding the well-camouflaged German fields was not easy. One hopelessly lost Italian crashed in a city square in Amsterdam. Another plane was destroyed during landing, with two more damaged in the same fashion.
The Italians’ morale was understandably low when they returned from their disastrous mission. Some had suffered frostbite in their open cockpits. The C.R.42bis pilots agreed that it had been a fatal mistake to replace one of the fighter’s 12.7mm machine guns with a 7.7mm to decrease weight and slightly increase range and maneuverability.
Adding to the gloom, the CAI men also learned that several Italian battleships had been sunk or badly damaged in southern Italy’s Taranto Harbor during a daring attack that day by Royal Navy Fairey Swordfish. What’s more, Italian forces were doing badly in battles with the British in Africa. And after Mussolini foolishly attacked Greece on October 28, that offensive bogged down in the face of heavy resistance in the snowy mountains along the Albanian border.
RAF personnel examine a Cicogna downed near Bromeswell during the CAI’s disastrous November 11 mission. (IWM CH1677)
As the weather improved on the afternoon of November 11, the CAI attempted to bomb Great Yarmouth with five Cant Z.1007bis bombers, escorted by 24 G.50s of the 20th Fighter Group. The raid had originally been intended as a feint before the main Italian bomber attack on Harwich. This time, at least, the Italians suffered no losses.
On the night of November 17-18, six B.R.20Ms from the 43rd Wing managed to bomb Harwich and return without losses. That was followed by a raid three nights later in which 12 B.R.20Ms of the 13th Wing bombed the English coast, losing one bomber to a night fighter.
Twenty-nine 18th Group C.R.42s made a sweep over southern England on November 23, accompanied by 24 G.50s of the 20th Group. A powerful force of Spitfires from No. 603 Squadron intercepted them and immediately downed two C.R.42s. In the ensuing dogfight, the Italians claimed five victories, but the British reported only one Spitfire Mk. II damaged and seven Italian fighters destroyed, along with two probables. Naturally, the Italian press did not report the CAI’s poor showing in its air battles with the RAF.
The Italians conducted a few desultory bomber raids and fighter sweeps along the English coast in November and December, but like earlier raids they accomplished little. On the night of December 22-23, six B.R.20Ms of the 43rd Wing made the CAI’s last bombing raid on England, attacking Harwich.
On January 3, 1941, all of the CAI’s surviving bombers and C.R.42bis fighters began taking off for Italy. They would subsequently be deployed to the Balkans and North Africa, where they were urgently needed at that point in the war. Some of the 20th Fighter Group pilots remained in Belgium with their G.50s until April 15, flying patrols along the coast in cooperation with the Luftwaffe.
Thus Mussolini’s vaunted air offensive against the British Isles came to an end. Several airmen would be awarded the Gold Medal for Military Valor. But the efforts of the courageous but poorly equipped and inadequately trained members of the Italian air expeditionary corps accomplished little, other than providing grist for Il Duce’s propaganda machine. As for the hapless Sergeant Salvadori, he survived the war and remained in the Italian air force after returning home. He died in a flying accident while piloting a Republic F-84G in April 1953. His C.R.42 has outlived him: Today it can be seen on display at the RAF Museum in Hendon.
Glen Sweeting is a U.S. Air Force veteran and former curator at the National Air and Space Museum. His books include Combat Flying Clothing, Combat Flying Equipment and Hitler’s Personal Pilot: The Life and Times of Hans Baur. Suggested reading: With Wings Like Eagles, by Michael Korda; The Most Dangerous Enemy, by Stephen Bungay; and The Narrow Margin, by Derek Wood and Derek Dempster.
This feature originally appeared in the May 2009 issue of Aviation History. To subscribe, click here!
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d06db11bf5f1bb85715787c8039c88c8 | https://www.historynet.com/antietams-deadly-harvest.htm | Antietam’s Deadly Harvest | Antietam’s Deadly Harvest
New revelations from a recently discovered map.
In this vivid drawing by Frank Schell, curious Sharpsburg civilians watch as Union soldiers excavate mass graves on the Roulette Farm and quickly fill them with corpses. (Atwater Kent Collections/Bridgeman Images) Nightfall on September 17, 1862 brought to a close the Battle of Antietam, ending America’s bloodiest single day. While this notorious title is not in doubt—it has remained so through wars, natural disasters, and even modern America’s horrific 2001 terrorist attacks—uncertainty still exists regarding the day’s exact death toll. A recently discovered map, however, is helping change that. Sunrise on September 18 brought many tasks to those who had survived Antietam’s firestorm. Generals George B. McClellan and Robert E. Lee faced deciding their two armies’ next steps. Officers of Federal and Confederate units large and small struggled to collect and re-form their commands for whatever those two commanders decided. Surgeons on both sides of Antietam Creek struggled to save lives of the wounded survivors, while the men in their care carried on a new fight to simply survive another day. Many of those in blue and gray who escaped unharmed returned to their mundane roles of guard duty, cooking, cleaning weapons, or similar routine tasks. Others, however, found themselves assigned the unpleasant task of burying the dead who littered the once-peaceful fields of Sharpsburg, Md. Despite having helped repulse Brig. Gen. Howell Cobb’s Brigade’s assault on the Sunken Road the day before, the 64th New York’s Ephraim Brown recorded that he and two comrades early on September 18 were “detailed to look for Our Dead. We took Ephraim Green…off under flag of truce & the Sharp Shooters whizzed 5 bullets at us…we then got Norman Foster[,] William Fuller & John Orr & carried them back down the slope to a house & barn & buried them under a big apple tree…taking a good pine board from the barn & marking E. Green inscription & putting it to his head.” Tough as they were to perform, these acts of kindness for fallen friends paled in comparison to their duty the following day. When Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia slipped away to reenter Virginia, dawn on September 19 revealed that only Confederate dead remained. Private Brown found that “today I was given detaile to burry the Dead Rebels…12 lengths of fence being counted off for my own station & in 10 rods we have piled & buried 264.”
Ever since Ephraim Brown recorded this number, tallying the Battle of Antietam’s bloody cost has held a morbid fascination for historians and the public alike. That such counts revealed Antietam as America’s deadliest day became clear within weeks of the battle itself, if not long since to those such as Private Brown who were charged with burying the dead. Even so, reaching an exact count of the lives lost in the short, sharp contest around Sharpsburg has remained elusive.
Explanations for this enduring uncertainty extend to the war itself. Neither army required reporting specific casualty types post-battle, and unit “returns” accounting for personnel—which enabled general casualty counts—were mainly meant to determine food and equipment needs rather than to gauge a fight’s cost or to notify families of the fallen. Lee’s hasty, late night retreat on September 18 prevented clerks and others in his army from compiling the records required to accurately create such counts for Confederate casualties.
Although Union troops remained on the field for weeks and produced more complete counts, they too fall short. Post-battle confusion, the absence of wounded and missing men who remained away from their regiments for extended periods, leadership confusion caused by the need to replace officers wounded or killed in battle, and other organizational breakdowns large and small frustrated efforts to compile the records needed to generate accurate casualty figures. The report of Union Brig. Gen. Abner Doubleday, commanding the 1st Corps’ 1st Division, reflects these many complications. In late September 1862, he reported 862 killed, wounded, and missing, but later compilations of his unit’s returns changed the total to 812 casualties.
The inexact, inconsistent use of terms describing Antietam’s fallen by battle veterans and historians alike also frustrates compiling a definitive count. Although “casualties” usually captures the total number of men killed, wounded, and missing in a particular action, sometimes this term is used to include just killed and wounded and may even refer in some cases only to those killed. Even the seemingly concrete term “killed” can capture differing numbers, sometimes referring to those immediately killed in battle, but other times including those who died weeks, months, or even years later of wounds sustained in the action.
Historians have long used several “good enough” counts to quantify Antietam’s death toll. Explaining his use of one such compilation, historian Joseph L. Harsh noted, “based on correspondence, personal interviews, newspaper accounts, memoirs, and regimental histories, [these] figures are probably as close to the real numbers as later generations can hope to approach.”
The earliest aggregations of Antietam’s dead appeared in General McClellan’s September 29, 1862, report, which cites 2,010 Union killed and approximately 3,500 Confederate dead, the latter figure ascribed to assistant inspector general Major Nelson H. Davis, superintending McClellan’s burial effort. McClellan’s October 15, 1862, report created early complications by stating Confederate dead as 2,700—considerably lower than his earlier number—and the Union total as lower than the Confederates but without providing a figure. On the Southern side, Surgeon Lafayette Guild, Lee’s chief medical director, submitted a report sometime before the war’s close listing the Army of Northern Virginia’s dead for the entire Maryland Campaign as 1,567.
The Elliott Map locates more than 700 burials near Burnside Bridge alone, most of which belong to Federal troops. (Troiani, Don (b.1949)/Bridgeman Images)
Numbers given in the two earliest postwar counts of Antietam’s dead quickly became the standard for generations of historians. Publication of the Official Records in 1887 provided for the first time a widely available, reliable source for such numbers, listing 2,108 Union dead at Antietam and 1,567 Confederates killed in the entire Maryland Campaign. Access to the Official Records enabled backstopping these totals and efforts to generate more detailed figures, which editors of The Century Illustrated Monthly magazine used in 1887 to publish a highly detailed—though still incomplete—list of each unit’s dead in its four-volume Battles and Leaders of the Civil War, reporting 2,108 Union and 1,512 Confederate deaths at Antietam.
As the century ended, two additional sources for Antietam’s dead and casualty numbers appeared. In 1900, Thomas L. Livermore published the first volume devoted solely to compiling figures from the war, Numbers and Losses in the Civil War in America, which used the Official Records’ 2,108 Union dead and revived McClellan’s October 1862 figure of 2,700 Confederate killed. Although Livermore’s volume quickly became influential, Antietam veteran and historian Brig. Gen. Ezra A. Carman’s 1894 work on Antietam, The Maryland Campaign (three volumes)—repeating the 2,108 Union dead figure but offering his own total of 1,546 Confederate killed—gained more lasting influence despite not being published until the late 1990s.
Recent Antietam histories draw from one or more of these sources. James V. Murfin’s 1965 The Gleam of Bayonets used McClellan’s September 1862 report and Guild’s numbers, offering 2,010 Union and 1,567 Confederate dead. Stephen Sears’ 1983 Landscape Turned Red, perhaps the best-known modern account of the battle, repeats Carman’s 2,108 Union and 1,546 Confederate dead. John M. Priest’s 1989 Antietam: The Soldiers’ Battle cites the Official Records and Battles and Leaders’ figures and methods to generate 2,157 Union and 1,754 Confederate killed. Joseph Harsh’s 2000 Taken at the Flood, examining Southern actions at Antietam, uses Carman’s 1,546 Confederate dead figure.
Regardless of which source historians used, since 1862 it has been accepted that slightly more than 2,000 Union and 1,500 Confederate soldiers died on September 17, 1862—a total of 3,500 lives.
Last May, the discovery of a new map upended 158 years of scholarship by offering insights unavailable to all these historians and documentarians. This occurred when Adams County Historical Society researchers Timothy Smith and Andrew Dalton uncovered an 1864 map in the New York Public Library that depicts in detail the burials of those who fell on America’s bloodiest day. It was created by Simon Green Elliott (1828-1897), who before the war worked as a railroad engineer in California. Upon returning east, Elliott had famously also mapped the Gettysburg battlefield’s burials, a resource housed today in the Library of Congress.
Walking the ground around Sharpsburg, which remained a massive cemetery in 1864, Elliott chronicled the location, Union or Confederate affiliation, and what appears to be a fairly exact number of graves, as reflected in the exacting, differing number of each burial plot. Elliott rediscovered the mass resting place of several regiments, both Union and Confederate, using temporary markers that Union burial details left for later reburial teams. He recorded inscriptions of handhewn grave markers and headstones bearing names of a few of the fallen, created in Antietam’s immediate aftermath by brothers and friends, like those that Ephraim Brown described.
The burial sites of fallen horses are also recorded along with the locations of artillery batteries—the latter probably reflecting remaining evidence of their presence or locals’ accounts, because by 1864 these guns were long gone to other battlefields. By 1866, with the opening of the Antietam National Cemetery and other such grounds, most of the burials that Elliott depicted had been moved elsewhere. Despite some minor errors in recording names and unit designations, his record offers us today a glimpse of a moment in time that is no more.
Simon Elliott’s work instantly placed him in the top ranks of those recording counts of Antietam’s dead. Ironically, even with his own unique creation available, Elliott’s map sidebar text repeats McClellan’s report figures, listing 2,010 Union and 3,500 Confederate dead, totaling 5,500 slain. He had missed a golden opportunity.
This is because a simple, if time-consuming, count of the burials captured on Elliott’s map reveals a more accurate picture of the number killed on America’s bloodiest day than has previously been available. It shows 2,762 Union dead buried on the battlefield, while a similar count of Confederate burials reveals 3,281 dead. Combining the two figures offers a total of 6,043 deaths on September 17, 1862.
These figures captured on the Elliott Map reveal the cost of America’s bloodiest single day to be considerably higher than previously understood, both in the aggregate and by sectional divisions. On the Union side, it shows 654 more dead than reported by the Official Records, the most widely used figure by historians for depicting the Federal cost.
Elliott’s revelations about Antietam’s Confederate dead are even more significant and startling, bearing twice the long-accepted number. Showing 1,714 more Southern fallen than the Official Records’ and Guild’s total for the entire campaign, 1,735 more than Carman’s Antietam figure, and 531 more than Livermore’s battle count suggests just how great was the Confederacy’s loss of manpower in this greatest struggle of Lee’s Maryland Campaign. A further irony of the map is that of all numbers given for Antietam’s Confederate dead it is George McClellan—regularly criticized for playing loose with numbers—who provided the figure closest to Elliott’s, only 219 more than shown on the 1864 map.
Elliott’s map also allows more accurate, detailed counts of the deaths caused by several actions that comprise the Battle of Antietam, offering new insight into the course and implications of those actions and the battle as a whole. The early morning fighting on the Union right/Confederate left flanks north of Sharpsburg (Miller’s Cornfield, the East Woods, and the West Woods) together generated 1,539 Union dead and 2,331 Confederate killed. That these and several nearby similarly intertwined actions resulted in more than half of the battle’s killed—3,870 of its 6,043 total—shows just how significant to the battle’s outcome was this morning round of fighting.
The cost of fighting in and around the famous “Bloody Lane” is reflected, too, on Elliott’s map, suggesting the scope and impact of this action. The 413 Union burials graphically show just how costly was this action, disconnected from Federal tactical planning, which kept two full divisions from contributing to McClellan’s larger battle objectives. Similarly, the 677 Confederate dead in the nearby fields suggest the high price the South paid for defending this position and the number of men unavailable when Lee unsuccessfully sought to take the offense late on September 17. The Sunken Road fight was a deadly, costly sideshow, indeed.
An unburied Confederate soldier lies next to the grave of Lieutenant John Clark of the 7th Michigan Infantry. Clark’s grave is marked with a simple wood board on which his name is inscribed. The lieutenant’s family recovered his body, and he is buried in Monroe, Mich. (Library of Congress)
Losses depicted from the midday and late afternoon fighting south of Sharpsburg centered on the picturesque, famous “Burnside [Rohrbach] Bridge” are similarly revealing. The 715 Union burials there show how costly Maj. Gen. Ambrose Burnside’s uncertain efforts were to cross the bridge and attack the Confederate right flank, particularly when considered against the 258 Confederate lives spent in defending this spot. Further complicating capturing the full cost of this action is that a torn, missing portion on the right edge breaks the depiction of a line of Union graves, probably forever preventing their inclusion.
A Union soldier ponders the graves of some of the 19 men of the 51st New York Infantry killed during their regiment’s attack against Burnside Bridge, visible in the background. (Library of Congress)
Even the small number of burials along the Middle Bridge and Boonsboro Pike reveal Antietam’s ultimate course. Planned by McClellan to be the location of his main, final push into Lee’s center—weakened by his moving troops to defend his flanks—the burial of only 28 Union and five Confederate dead here reflects an attack that never materialized, of what might have been had Antietam’s fight unfolded differently.
In a larger sense, to understand just how great the human cost of America’s bloodiest day was, consider that as horrific as is the sight of this massive burying ground and the numbers depicted on Elliott’s map, it still fails to account for all the dead of that day. Including only those killed on September 17, 1862, or shortly thereafter who died and were buried on the fields immediately surrounding Sharpsburg; it does not capture the fates of those among the 17,779 wounded—some 9,075 Union and 8,724 Confederate, according to the Official Records—who later died of their Antietam injuries. Those who died of these wounds at various hospitals—ranging from temporary field aid stations surrounding Sharpsburg for dozens of miles to large, modern hospitals in Philadelphia, Washington, and elsewhere—were buried nearby and so are largely not reflected on Elliott’s map or in most counts of Antietam deaths.
A Union burial party poses on the Miller Farm on September 19, 1862, for photographer Alexander Gardner. One soldier dramatically points to the row of bodies that his crew is about to bury. (Library of Congress)
Private Henry Clark of the 88th Pennsylvania Infantry is just one of those almost certainly uncounted Antietam deaths. Wounded on September 17, probably during fighting in the East Woods, he survived in an Alexandria, Va., hospital until January 6, 1864. Clark’s cause of death was listed as “pleurisy”—inflammation of the lungs and chest—but he had never recovered from his Antietam wound, which likely caused this condition and his demise. Although Clark’s death was as surely caused by America’s bloodiest day as were those depicted on Elliott’s map, it remains unconnected to the battle by government records and so probably was not counted in any Antietam casualty figures.
The Elliott Map’s revelations also suggest that Antietam’s widely used 22,720-man casualty count should increase, too. Adding Elliott’s 6,043 recorded dead to the traditionally accepted 19,070 collective wounded and missing totals results in 25,113 Antietam casualties. Applying this same approach to the sectional totals similarly raises those figures to 13,062 Union and 12,051 Confederate casualties for September 17. As mind-numbing as these figures are, adding cases of overlooked casualties like Henry Clark shows that America’s bloodiest day was in truth more costly than we have long, if imperfectly, understood.
Even if such a true, full accounting of the number of Antietam’s dead remains impossible to compile, Simon Elliott’s priceless 1864 map nonetheless has given us a valuable new tool to better understand the devastating human cost demanded by America’s bloodiest day.
David A. Welker, a professional historian and military analyst for the federal government who writes from Centreville, Va., is the author of The Cornfield: Antietam’s Bloody Turning Point (Casemate Press, 2020).
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74205110a3db884259db9f78c3ccf342 | https://www.historynet.com/apocalypse-45-triumph-and-terror-in-never-before-seen-footage-of-the-pacific-war.htm | ‘Apocalypse ’45’: Triumph and Terror in Never-Before-Seen Footage of the Pacific War | ‘Apocalypse ’45’: Triumph and Terror in Never-Before-Seen Footage of the Pacific War
Ittsei Nakagawa, a survivor of the Hiroshima bombing, once recalled Frank Oppenheimer asking, “Do you know the story of Genie in the Bottle? Well, the Genie’s out of the bottle. There is no way that you can get that guy in a bottle.”
As director Erik Nelson’s latest documentary, aptly named “Apocalypse ’45,” unfolds to scenes of destruction, it becomes abundantly clear to the audience that even prior to the atomic bomb droppings, the genie had been let out some time ago.
Nelson (“A Gray State,” “Grizzly Man”) was the first to bring the concept of colorized and remastered archival footage to audiences with his June 2018 release of “The Cold Blue,” a film dedicated to the heroic actions of the “Mighty Eighth” Air Force over occupied Europe. Like Peter Jackson’s 2018 release of the World War I documentary, They Shall Not Grow Old, Nelson has proven to have a knack for turning the 20th century’s greatest conflicts into a relatable and heart-rendering experience.
“I was very conscious of creating a time machine in the film to remove as many barriers between the experience of the war in the 1940s and the present-day viewer,” Nelson said in an interview with HistoryNet.
“The way to do that is to have only the voices of the people who were there, who lived it, and only the footage that was shot at the time. Nothing else. No narrator, no graphics. Nothing that would interfere with a hardwired connection into the experience.”
The 1 hour, 44-minute documentary is just that—an unsanitized, unvarnished experience of the harrowing final year of the war in the Pacific. Pulling from thousands of archival reels that were shot in color, Nelson and his team ultimately culled that number down to 140 before laboriously restoring them to digital 4K resolution.
Calling it “haiku history,” the documentary’s script is paired down—intentionally. “What’s the absolute bare minimum you can possibly say to not break the spell?” Nelson posited.
Director Erik Nelson with Lt. Commander Charles Schlag in February 2020. Schlag has since passed away from Covid-19. (Courtesy of Erik Nelson)
Told through the voices of 24 veterans, including Medal of Honor recipient Hershel “Woody” Williams, “Apocalypse ’45” brings into focus the horrors of war and serves as a tribute to those living and those who paid the ultimate sacrifice.
The opening minutes of the film lay bare devastating visuals of a bombed-out Japan before giving way to scenes of jubilation among American troops, home after a brutal four years of fighting.
The documentary then makes its way chronologically—from Pearl Harbor to the bloody shores of Tarawa, prior to focusing in the “the last, most brutal year of this war as it actually was, in the raw words and rawer images from the time,” Nelson stated in a press release.
Across the volcanic sands of Iwo Jima, viewers see fragments of the 36-day slog that killed 6,821 Marines and wounded another 19,217.
“We were thinking about saving our asses. That’s true. Because boy, it scared us. It scared us tremendously,” Al Nelson, an Iwo Jima veteran, can be heard saying as Marines on screen trudge through the otherworldly landscape.
Of the 21,000 Japanese soldiers committed to defending the island, only 212 defenders—1 percent of the original garrison—were still alive to surrender on March 26, 1945.
Graves being dug after the Battle of Iwo Jima, spring 1945.
In the final land battle of the Pacific, the somber reels of Okinawa are punctuated by the reflective, tearful voice of Pharmacists First Mate Maurice Hubert, who made an astonishing five different landings in the Pacific campaign, including Iwo Jima and Okinawa.
“Got so that I didn’t know what my real name was. Everyone was ‘Doc, hey, Doc,’” Hubert says in the film, fighting back tears. “A lot of kids, a lot of casualties. I never like to remember any of those things. I always try to put it behind me. But I managed to survive. The good Lord was on my shoulder.”
It was to Nelson that Hubert revealed for the first time that Ernie Pyle, the famed war correspondent, had died in his arms.
“He didn’t know until later,” Nelson said. “When he told the story I thought, ‘Wow, this is amazing,’ and then, ‘Damn, there’s no possible way I can use this in the film.’ … But I’m very conscious of the fact that I shook hands with the man who cradled the dying Ernie Pyle in his arms.
“Ernie Pyle’s enduring contribution … was [that he] translated the experiences he lived through … to indelible, classic reporting. By interviewing Maurice Hubert, I felt like the torch was passed from Ernie Pyle directly to myself.”
In many ways, Nelson, too, is trying to carry and pass the torch of the history belonging to a generation whose numbers diminish by the day. The 75th anniversary of the war’s end is just another weighty reminder for Nelson of the importance of the task at hand.
“As the last men who fought in that war—the men who literally saved the world—leave us, I felt it was vital that their voices be heard one last time,” he said.
Survivors from the 5th Marine Division, who were in the first wave of the Iwo Jima invasion, at the National World War II Museum in October 2019.
Nelson’s attention to detail in sharing those voices—with the help of historians Ian Toll and Seth Peridon, whom Nelson says “knows World War II Pacific footage backwards and forwards”—is on full display in “Apocalypse ’45.”
“I was very conscious of this sort of responsibility to get it right to not do a disservice to them,” the director told HistoryNet. “Someone said to me, ‘Who’s going to notice?’ I said, ‘I’m going to notice. And trust me, vets are going to notice.’”
As a result, “Apocalypse ‘45” is as meticulous as it is powerful in the retelling of one of the bloodiest periods in world history.
“I hope that the quality of the filmmaking does their stories justice,” Nelson said.
“Apocalypse ‘45” can be viewed in select “virtual” theaters from August into September. It will have its televised premiere on the Discovery Channel at a date to be announced.
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c33d328b9963b464015b88f0d18893b8 | https://www.historynet.com/appomattox-apple-tree-yields-prize-for-winners-wife.htm | Appomattox Apple Tree Yields Prize for Winner’s Wife | Appomattox Apple Tree Yields Prize for Winner’s Wife
Exquisite jewelry carved in the shape of acorns presented to Julia Dent Grant
On April 9, 1865, during the final hours of the Appomattox Campaign, General Robert E. Lee sent Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant a message requesting a meeting to discuss the surrender of his army. Union staff officers Colonel Orville Babcock and Captain William M. Dunn located Lee resting under an apple tree northeast of the village of Appomattox Court House and told him Grant was willing to talk. Soldiers soon cut down the apple tree for souvenirs. A branch was saved for General Grant, and from it a splendid suite of jewelry was carved by Browne, Spaulding & Company of New York for Julia Dent Grant. The pieces, made in the Victorian Romantic Period style, were carved in the shape of acorns, a symbol of life and immortality. A hair comb, a brooch, and a pair of earrings with black enamel accents set in 18-karat gold rest in a purple velvet box engraved with the words: “Presented to Mrs. General U.S. Grant by Browne & Spaulding, 570 Broadway, N.Y. The wood used in this set was cut from the apple tree under which Gen’l Grant’s officers met Gen’l Lee on the morning of the surrender, April 9, 1865, Appomattox C.H., Va.” Julia Grant bequeathed the jewelry to “my dear Grandson, Ulysses S. Grant 3rd, Fred’s son, J.D.G., May 14, 1901.” The jewelry remained in the Grant family for generations. (Photo copyright 2019 Leslie Hindman Auctions)
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4638ce0289b1fb95cb1567c2201e209e | https://www.historynet.com/arch-and-teddy.htm | Arch and Teddy: First Flight By a U.S. President | Arch and Teddy: First Flight By a U.S. President
A bromance blossomed between Archibald Hoxsey and Theodore Roosevelt in 1910 when the early aviator took TR for a short flight—the first by a U.S. president.
As dawn broke on the last day of 1910, things were looking up for Arch Hoxsey. The early bird pilot had broken the world altitude record by soaring to 11,474 feet on December 26 and won more than $6,000 in prize money at an international air meet in Los Angeles. On New Year’s Day 1911 he was to ride on the first-ever aviation float in the Rose Bowl Parade. At their Pasadena home, Hoxsey’s mother fixed her son breakfast and kissed him goodbye. She had originally agreed to go aloft with him that day but at the last moment decided against it.
In breaking the altitude record Hoxsey noted that he had experienced “the most terrifying cold I ever felt.” On December 31 he would attempt to best his own record and then planned to head on to San Francisco for another international aviation meet starting January 3.
Hoxsey and officials examine his barograph after his record-setting flight to 11,474 feet on December 26, 1910. (Aviation History Collection/Alamy)
The 26-year-old aviator had pursued a flying career since he was 18, when he went to work as a mechanic for the Wright brothers. In 1910 he became a Wright team pilot. Aviation historian Arch Whitehouse referred to him as “one of the most personable airmen of his time—the dandy of the barnstorming circuits.”
Hoxsey had gained international prominence 12 weeks earlier on October 11 by convincing ex-President Theodore Roosevelt to fly with him at Kinloch Field outside St. Louis. In an impromptu meeting between Hoxsey and Roosevelt, the aviator said, “Colonel, I’d like to have you go up with me.” He mentioned to TR that they celebrated the same birthday, October 27. “After I told him [that] he smiled,” Hoxsey said. “As soon as I saw his smile, I knew I had him.” Roosevelt took off his frock coat and climbed into Hoxsey’s Wright Model AB.
They landed after a few passes over the airfield with some dips and climbs. Newspapers reported that Roosevelt, “smiling his most expansive smile,” vigorously shook Hoxsey’s hand. “It was great!” the president enthused. “It was the finest experience I ever had.” TR told the aviator that he “wished he could stay up with you for an hour” but his schedule prevented it.
After leaving Kinloch, Roosevelt went to Clayton, Mo., where he enthusiastically told an assembled crowd “of his trip in the airship.” This was followed by a stop at the St. Louis state fairgrounds, where he spoke to several thousand school children. “I know you children would cheerfully play hooky for a week to go up in an aeroplane,” said TR, “so you won’t blame me for being a little late.” Later that evening he insisted that Missouri Governor Herbert Hadley invite Hoxsey to the governor’s mansion for their dinner. There Roosevelt told Hoxsey: “That was the bulliest experience I ever had. I envy you, your professional conquest of space.”
Roosevelt had been involved with aeronautics from its very start. In 1902 famed Brazilian balloonist Alberto Santos-Dumont visited the White House to meet the president, who suggested he be taken aloft. Newspapers across the country generally condemned the idea. The Evening Journal in Wilmington, Del., for example, opined that TR’s “life and limbs…belong to the nation quite as much as to him individually” and that “It would be….an unnecessary jeopardy….for him to go sailing around the clouds.”
Roosevelt stayed on the ground during his presidency. He approved the assignment of Lieutenant Thomas Selfridge to participate in early aeronautical experiments with Alexander Graham Bell and Glenn Curtiss. During Roosevelt’s presidency, Selfridge became the first person and first military pilot to die in an airplane crash. In April 1910 TR witnessed his first flight demonstration in Paris.
When Hoxsey took off in his Wright biplane on December 31, 1910, it would be his last flight. He was up an hour and a half soaring over California’s 5,710-foot snowcapped Mt. Wilson. He had descended in spirals to within 800 feet of the landing strip when he seemed to drop out of the sky. “A sigh or gasp, not loud, but of tremendous volume, arose from the grandstand,” The Cairo Bulletin reported. Fellow Wright teammate Walter Brookins “uttered but one word, ‘God!’…and he fell into the roadway.” Curtiss team member Charles Willard “likewise collapsed.” Hoxsey’s body was impaled on parts of the wrecked Wright airplane.
Less than a week later, the remains of Hoxsey’s Wright airplane lie crumpled on Dominguez Field after his fatal crash. (Aviation History Collection/Alamy)
The following day Rose Bowl officials paraded the aviation float “draped and with a vacant seat” in his memory. The Wright brothers gave Mrs. Hoxsey a $10,000 annuity. Roosevelt, paying tribute to his friend, said, “I am more grieved than I can say over the tragedy….Hoxsey was a man unafraid….Such men as he are the ones who accomplish things in the sphere of science and of all activity.” Three months later TR stopped by Mrs. Hoxsey’s home in Pasadena during a campaign tour to personally express his condolences.
What actually happened to Arch Hoxsey? Most of his fellow aviators, including Curtiss and Wright team manager Roy Knabenshue, attributed Hoxsey’s crash to his hurried descent from high altitude, causing what they called “mountain sickness” or “ethereal asphyxia.” Early aviator Calbraith Rodgers described it as a sensation that “creeps irresistibly upon the senses of the aviator, lulling him into a dreamy unconsciousness.”
Today we know no such condition exists, and it seems likely Hoxsey was adversely affected by winds during his descent. An October 1928 Popular Aviation article reported: “After he was in the air the wind began to increase rapidly in violence….Evidently the wind whipped [Hoxsey’s plane] out of control when it entered the disturbed air near the ground.”
Roosevelt and Hoxsey had been friends a mere 12 weeks. TR would live to see his youngest son, Quentin, an acclaimed U.S. Army Air Service pilot, shot down and killed in action on the Western Front in July 1918. That September the Army named the eastern airfield at Mineola, N.Y., Roosevelt Field in Quentin’s honor. Teddy Roosevelt followed his son west in January 1919—he was 60.
This article originally appeared in the March 2020 issue of Aviation History. To subscribe, click here!
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f92f3d5b1a6d19d421ef5b31f3aac225 | https://www.historynet.com/arlington-funeral-held-for-bennie-g-adkins-medal-of-honor-recipient-who-died-from-covid-19.htm | Arlington Funeral Held for Bennie G. Adkins, Medal of Honor Recipient Who Died from COVID-19 | Arlington Funeral Held for Bennie G. Adkins, Medal of Honor Recipient Who Died from COVID-19
On Wednesday, Medal of Honor recipient Bennie G. Adkins was finally laid to rest with full military honors at Arlington National Cemetery.
After contracting COVID-19 in March of this year, Adkins died after a brief struggle with the virus. He was 86. Due to the ongoing pandemic, his funeral was delayed until this December. He is buried beside Mary Adkins, his wife of more than 50 years who passed last year.
On September 15, 2014 Adkins was awarded the nation’s highest military honor by President Barack Obama for his actions on March 9 to 12, 1966, at Camp “A Shau,” Republic of Vietnam. In the early hours of March 9th, the camp was overrun by a large force of North Vietnamese and Viet Cong.
According to his citation, “Sergeant First Class Adkins rushed through intense enemy fire and manned a mortar position continually adjusting fire for the camp, despite incurring wounds as the mortar pit received several direct hits from enemy mortars. Upon learning that several soldiers were wounded near the center of camp, he temporarily turned the mortar over to another soldier, ran through exploding mortar rounds, and dragged several comrades to safety.”
The soldiers were eventually ordered to evacuate the camp and did so by digging their way out of the rear bunker, all the while fighting off waves of attacking Viet Cong. During this time, “While carrying a wounded soldier to the extraction point,” reads Adkins’ citation, “he learned that the last helicopter had already departed. Sergeant First Class Adkins led the group while evading the enemy until they were rescued by helicopter on March 12, 1966.”
After 38 hours in battle and 48 hours of escape and evasion, it is estimated that Adkins killed 135-175 enemy soldiers, despite sustaining 18 different wounds to his body, according to the Army.
Originally joining the Army in 1956, Adkins completed three tours in Vietnam and went on to serve with the Special Forces for 13 years before retiring in 1978. He then went on to earn a bachelor’s degree from Troy State University, and two master’s degrees—one in education and one in marketing.
Once home, he continued to serve his community, teaching night classes for adults seeking high school equivalency degrees. In 2017 Adkins established The Bennie Adkins Foundation, which provides educational scholarships to Special Forces soldiers.
As for the delay in Adkins recognition, during the 2015 ceremony Obama explained: “Normally, the Medal of Honor must be awarded within a few years of the action. But sometimes even the most extraordinary stories can get lost in the fog of war or the passage of time. Yet, when new evidence comes to light, certain actions can be reconsidered for this honor, and it is entirely right and proper that we have done so.”
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4c485479dbcfbb6eac4fe7f7fc00b4a5 | https://www.historynet.com/arlingtons-enslaved-savior-selina-gray.htm | Arlington’s Enslaved Savior: Selina Gray | Arlington’s Enslaved Savior: Selina Gray
In October 1866, as the country was still in the early stages of recovering from the Civil War, a U.S. government party arrived on the doorstep of the Custis-Lee home at Arlington, the grand Greek revival mansion high on the hill overlooking Washington D.C. Robert E. Lee had left the home at the war’s outbreak, and the agents were tasked with taking possession of whatever items of value still remained in the house.
It was tough work. From May 1861 until the end of the war, the home had served as the headquarters of the Union Department of Northeastern Virginia. Federal troops had swarmed over the grounds cutting down the forests for firewood, gouging roads across the landscape and burying comrades in the gardens. The home had suffered as well. Occupiers had knocked out boards, creating holes through which they waved signal flags, and scribbled graffiti on its walls. Rufus Dawes of the famed Iron Brigade summed up Arlington House’s condition at the time: “The grand old southern homestead of Arlington, with its quaint and curious pictures on the wall, its spectacular apartments, broad halls and stately pillars in front, was an object of especial interest; but, abandoned by its owner, General Robert E. Lee…it was now a desolation. The military headquarters of McDowell’s division was in the Arlington House, which was open to the public and hundreds tramped at will through its apartments.”
The government agents worked their way through the house to the mansion’s loft, where according to an account of the visit in the Alexandria Gazette, “Many valuable heirlooms, including some of the family portraits, had been purloined….These boxes had been broken open and everything of real value taken away, and the letters and private papers of Gen. Lee scattered over the loft.” Elsewhere furniture, bureaus, gilt picture frames and other artifacts were “tumbled together, broken, bruised, and in a most vandalized condition.” Standing guard over these family effects was one Mrs. Gray, described as “the old and faithful household servant” by the newspaper reporter.
In 1866 Selina Gray was, by modern standards, hardly old; in fact, she was only 43. Yet her faithfulness in a time of war had certainly been well proven. Today the Gray family story is a key part of the history of Arlington House, and the continued existence of some of America’s most treasured artifacts can be attributed to this one remarkable woman. The recent discovery of a rare stereoscopic photograph of Selina Gray, dressed in period finery, is the latest chapter in her story.
In May 1861, with persistent rumors circulating in Virginia of Union troops building fortifications along the Arlington Heights, and the Potomac River growing ever more crowded with shipments fueling the nascent war effort, General Robert E. Lee’s wife, the former Mary Anna Custis, was preparing to leave the home she had made with her husband since 1857, the place where they had been married exactly 30 years earlier. Mary’s father was George Washington Parke Custis, the step-grandson and adopted son of George Washington, and the Lees were in possession of several cherished heirlooms from Mount Vernon.
The general, for his part, had long since decamped to Richmond to assume his duties with the Confederate Army. From there, he had written a letter to Mary urging her to take measures to protect herself and their most precious belongings. Among the troops coming from the capital city, he wrote, “it might be considered a smart thing to cross into Va & rob, plunder &c especially when it is known to be the residence of one of the Rebel leaders—I think therefore you had better prepare all things for removal that is the plate pictures &c. & be prepared at any moment….”
Mary did as she was advised. On a beautiful day in mid-May, she entrusted the keys to the house, and all the history it held, to Selina Gray. By the end of the month, the Union Army had indeed occupied Arlington.
When George Washington Parke Custis had begun construction on Arlington House not long after his adoptive father’s death in 1799, having a place to properly showcase what he called “the Washington treasury”— furniture, china, Revolutionary War tents and more—was paramount. Custis had also inherited some of Mount Vernon’s slaves, among them Selina Gray, a descendant from this first generation of Arlington slaves. Born into slavery at Arlington in December 1823, Selina was just slightly older than her future husband, Thornton Gray, a field hand and handyman at Arlington who was born in April 1824. The two were married around 1847, and legend has it that Mary Lee was so supportive of the union that she had an Episcopal minister perform the service in the same room where she and Robert had wed. (In Reading the Man, Elizabeth Brown Pryor’s portrait of Lee through his writings, the historian casts some doubt on the veracity of the wedding story, stating that “the slaves also had their idealized tales of warm bonds and powerful connections,” and that in such stories “truth melds into the wistful desire to believe in a harmonious connection between master and slave.”)
Thornton and Selina would have eight children—six girls and two boys—all born into slavery and listed in the Custis property rolls alongside livestock and farming equipment. Yet Selina and other slaves were undoubtedly treated better at Arlington than other slaves elsewhere. Among other things, the Custises and Lees offered education to their enslaved workers, including Selina. “They believed it was their Christian duty to teach them, not only so that they could read the Bible, but so that they could live successfully once they were freed,” says Jenny Anzelmo-Sarles, a National Park Service spokesperson. So it is perhaps not surprising, given their relationship, that Mary Lee entrusted Selina Gray with the keys to Arlington House when hostilities began. As General Lee expected, Union troops quickly occupied the estate. Although Gray reportedly did all she could to protect the “Washington treasury,” soldiers often made their way inside the house and ransacked the Lees’ belongings. Legend has it that Gray confronted looters on one occasion and demanded that they stop; her words likely had little effect. Finally Gray sent word to the commanding officer of the Department of Northeastern Virginia, Brig. Gen. Irvin McDowell, and told him Washington family heirlooms were at risk of being lost forever. With Gray’s guidance, McDowell arranged for several important artifacts—including a bookcase, knife boxes, dinner plates, a creamer and other china, and a side table among them—to go to the U.S. Patent Office for safekeeping. In many ways, Gray was unintentionally among the first historic preservationists.
Little is known about Selina Gray’s life after she became a free woman and left Arlington House. Sources say that Thornton and Selina bought some land not far from the Arlington estate, in the southern part of present-day Arlington County (called Alexandria County until 1920) and grew produce, which they sold at a stand in downtown D.C. Census records from 1880 and 1900 show Thornton listed as a farmer and Selina occupied with “keeping house.”
According to the NPS, Selina saw several of the Lees after the war when they came back to visit Arlington, including Robert’s brother, Sydney Smith Lee, and Mary Lee, one of the Lee daughters. When Mrs. Lee visited the house for the only time in 1873, she may have met with Selina there too. It is thought that Selina died in 1907, in her mid-80s, and that Thornton succumbed around that time as well, although where they are buried is a mystery.
A few years ago, two trunks left behind by Mary Lee, the eldest daughter, were discovered in the cellar of a bank in Alexandria. In one of those trunks was a letter written by Selina Gray to Mrs. Lee in 1872. “It was a cordial, even somewhat friendly letter telling things about Selina’s family and expressing warm wishes for Mrs. Lee,” Anzelmo-Sarles says. “She even told Mrs. Lee that she hoped that she’d get her home back one day.”
Mrs. Lee, of course, never did get her family home back, but her story, and that of her one-time slave Selina Gray, remain forever linked to Arlington House.
Where Is Selina Buried?
The final resting places of Selina and Thornton Gray are not known, but the story of their son, Harry Gray, offers some possible clues. Born a slave at Arlington, Harry was an intelligent, ambitious man who became a skilled mason and found work with the Department of the Interior. (According to family history, Harry helped to build the original masonry wall surrounding Arlington Cemetery, some of which can still be seen.) Harry did well enough to eventually purchase a 10-acre property near the former Arlington estate, where he built a stand-alone brick house modeled after the row houses of Washington, D.C. On his death in November 1913, his property was subdivided among his four children. Today his house still stands, and is listed in the National Register of Historic Places.
According to burial records, Harry Gray was interred in the graveyard of the Stevens Lodge of Odd Fellows, a fraternal organization founded in 1870 by 12 African-American men, some of them former Arlington slaves. Harry Gray had become a duespaying member in 1873. The lodge had a meeting hall and a two-acre graveyard on Columbia Pike, located between Arlington Cemetery and Gray’s house.
In 1964 a private developer made an arrangement with the lodge to reinter those buried there in another cemetery, to make way for new development along Columbia Pike (a Sheraton Hotel now stands on the site). Graves with markers would be moved to Coleman Cemetery in Alexandria, a church and fraternal burial ground not far from Mount Vernon. Three known graves that were moved along with their markers were those of Harry Gray and two of his sisters, Emma and Sarah. Also relocated, however, was a Gray family headstone marked for Thornton and “Salena,” one of several alternate spellings of Selina. The marker indicates it was “Erected by their daughter Sarah G. Wilson.” No dates are listed.
Does this mean Thornton and Selina are buried in Coleman Cemetery? No one knows for sure. Today Coleman Cemetery is in a state of disrepair, and burial records are incomplete. (Most of the records of the old Stevens Lodge were burned in a fire too.) It’s possible that their daughter simply placed the headstone in the Stevens Lodge graveyard as a memorial. Another possibility is that Thornton and Selina were buried in the cemetery at Freedman’s Village, which was created in 1863 and stood on the southern end of the former Arlington Estate for more than 30 years. But this theory is not backed by any evidence.
There’s one grace note to the mystery of Selina’s final resting place: Thornton H. Gray, lawyer son of Harry Gray and grandson of Thornton and Selina, fought with the U.S. Army in World War I and died in 1943. He is now buried in Section 8 of Arlington Cemetery, not far from the spot where his grandparents were born.
Originally published in the February 2015 issue of Civil War Times. To subscribe, click here.
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f0fadbfbf000a0394390021f1428a030 | https://www.historynet.com/armchair-historian-the-attempt-to-kill-hitler.htm | Armchair Historian – the Attempt to Kill Hitler | HistoryNet | Armchair Historian – the Attempt to Kill Hitler | HistoryNet
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942cbf8512228dcab19ba2732d8e53cb | https://www.historynet.com/arsenal-hh-43-huskie.htm | Arsenal – HH-43 Huskie | Arsenal – HH-43 Huskie
Click on image for expanded view. (Illustration: Greg Proche)
In March 1964, the U.S. Air Force deployed six Pacific Air Rescue Center HH-43B Huskies to Thailand’s Nakhon Phanom Royal Thai Air Force Base, forming the 33rd Air Rescue Squadron’s forward detachment. A year later, the 33rd launched its first Combat Search and Rescue (CSAR) mission of the Vietnam War. Responding to an F-105D shoot down, an HH-43F Huskie, supported by two USAF A-1E Skyraiders, flew 17 miles north of the DMZ to rescue Captain Robert V. Baird.
Initially designed for U.S. Navy at-sea rescues, the HH-43 had two intermeshed contra-rotating rotors to facilitate hover control and eliminate the need for a tail rotor. The first prototype flew in 1947 with a 690 shaft horsepower (shp) piston engine, but an experimental version with two gas-turbine engines was tested in 1954. The USAF ordered a later version of that prototype equipped with a single 860 shp gas turbine in 1958. The next year, the HH-43B became the first gas-turbine-powered helicopter to enter production.
The buildup in Vietnam caught the Air Force with few SAR squadrons and no SAR platforms designed for the missions required. The HH-43B lacked armor and armament because the Air Force had envisioned it only for the airborne fire-fighting and air base crash rescue role. The CH-21 was considered the better SAR platform because of its greater range, but its vulnerability to fire surfaced early in the French-Algerian War, forcing a rethinking of SAR mission requirements and platforms. The Vietnam deployment came before the Air Force could select a new helicopter, so the HH-43B was quickly modified for CSAR by adding titanium armor and designated HH-43F. Most HH-43Bs were brought up to “F” standard.
Trained for emergency response, a Huskie crew could be airborne in under a minute. Initially they were unarmed, but early experience led some crewmen to install a Browning automatic rifle or .30-cal. machine gun in a door sling. The crews also scrounged up additional cable for the hoist, since the helo’s standard cable was only 100 feet long, too short for dense canopy rescues.
Neither specifically designed nor particularly suitable for CSAR, the HH-43F flew more air rescues than any other aircraft in the war, though its limitations were problematic as North Vietnamese air defenses improved. As more purpose-built HH-3s arrived, the Huskies were relegated to their original role. The last HH-43 left Indochina on Sept. 20, 1975, making it the first USAF SAR helicopter to conduct a combat search-and-rescue mission and the last to leave the theater.
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2d84639315bea698f64dadb34c0ac8ec | https://www.historynet.com/arsenal-mig-21-hanois-aerial-equalizer.htm | Arsenal | MiG-21: Hanoi’s Aerial Equalizer | Arsenal | MiG-21: Hanoi’s Aerial Equalizer
The Mikoyan-Gurevich concept of a tailed delta wing interceptor with Mach 2 capability first flew in 1955, entered Soviet service in 1959 and remained in first-line service for more than 30 years—a record for progressive development, longevity and overall success paralleling the career of its frequent adversary, the much larger and more complex McDonnell F-4 Phantom II.
In addition to 10,645 MiG-21s manufactured from 1959 to 1985 in the Soviet Union, 657 were built under licensing agreements in India, 194 in Czechoslovakia and an undetermined number in China as the Chengdu J-7 from 1964 to 2013, making the plane the most produced Mach 2 aircraft in History.
More than 50 countries have used the MiG-21s—and many still do. Among the air arms that put MiG-21s to active use was North Vietnam’s
The subsonic MiG-17 had defended North Vietnam’s air space astonishingly well since 1964, but it was clearly at a disadvantage against faster opponents such as the F-105D Thunderchief, F-8 Crusader and F-4 Phantom. In April 1966 the Soviets shipped the first MiG-21F-13s (given the designation “Fishbed-C” by NATO) to North Vietnam. The planes entered service with the 921st Fighter Regiment. Although the 921st had been flying MiG-17s since February 1964, its pilots initially had trouble putting their Soviet training in Mach 2 flying, radar and air-to-air missile tactics to practical use in combat. Losses exceeded success to a discouraging degree.
By the end of 1967, however, the North Vietnamese had learned their hard lessons, and they adjusted their tactics to make the MiG-21 an effective element in a coordinated triad defense of fighters, surface-to-air missiles and anti-aircraft artillery. North Vietnamese forces also received a succession of upgraded models with improved performance and radar.
On Feb. 3, 1972, the 927th Fighter regiment was formed with MiG-21PFMs (Fished-F in NATO parlance), while the 921st re-equipped with the more advanced MiG-21MFs (Fished-J). Both units were heavily engaged in the climactic air battles of Operation Linebacker I and II that year, including claims on two B-52 bombers that the Americans still attribute to SAMs.
By the time the United States ceased direct involvement in Vietnam in January 1973, MiG-21 pilots were credited with a total of 134 American aircraft, including pilotless drones, and produced 13 aces, led by Nguyen Van Coc with seven planes and two drones. Only 64 American aircraft have been positively matched to the North Vietnamese MiG-21 claims. MiG-21MF
Wingspan: 23 ft.
Length: 47 Ft. 6 in.
Height: 13 ft.
Weight: Empty 11,400 lbs; Max. 17,086 lbs
Max. Speed: 1,352 mph
Power: One Turmansky R-13F2S-300 turbojet, 14,320 lbs
Armament: Four R-3S infrared-seeking missiles, one Gah-23L twin-barrel cannon
Range: 1,044 miles
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21ca92782be51eee3e7c1960126a3087 | https://www.historynet.com/arsenal-nvas-quick-change-machine-gun.htm | Arsenal | The NVA’s ‘Quick Change’ Machine Gun | Arsenal | The NVA’s ‘Quick Change’ Machine Gun
The Soviet-made PK general purpose machine gun—never as widely employed as the ubiquitous the Soviet-made AK-47 assault rifle and RPD light machine gun—began to replace the Soviets’ DP light machine gun in the North Vietnamese Army in late 1965. The gun’s open-bolt, gas-operated firing mechanism, which facilitated cooling and prevented “cooking off” during extended engagements, was based on the AK-47 design. The PK’s rear sight, however, differs from that of the assault rifle by having a slight adjustment forward of the hinge.
Cheap to manufacture, easy to maintain and extremely robust and reliable, the PK (short for “Pulemyot Kalashnikova,” or “Kalashnikov’s machine gun”) has little recoil or barrel climb when firing. The belt feed and ejection ports have spring-loaded dust covers so the openings are exposed only when required. The gun also features a “quick change” barrel with a carrying handle that enables gunners to swap barrels rapidly.
At 20 pounds with its bipod stabilizing legs, the PK is slightly lighter than the American M60 machine gun. However, its looser construction, done to reduce sensitive to debris, makes the NVA weapon less accurate. It can also used with a 17-pound tripod or mounted on vehicles and small riverine craft.
The PK’s ammunition comes in 25-round belts that can be linked together using the attached coiling wires to provide additional rounds. The ammo belt can also be drawn from a 100-round rectangular box attached under the gun, which feeds from the right and ejects the cartridges out the left.
The PK fired a more powerful cartridge than the AK-47 or RPD did. The North Vietnamese used it in situations where the infantry’s AK-47/RPD firepower needed reinforcement. For most combat missions, however, the combination of AK-47/RPD guns and rocket-propelled grenades was considered sufficient.
The PK was most often used to cover a unit’s withdrawal or teamed with RPGs and light mortars against enemy strongpoints or small unit concentrations. The PK saw widespread use in NVA’s final offensives in South Vietnam and its wars with Cambodia and China. It has remained in front-line service to this day.
First published in Vietnam Magazine’s December 2016 issue.
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6667a71c2ebdebd8dcb099d1ebd9c8a8 | https://www.historynet.com/as-american-as-jim-crow.htm | The History of the Real Jim Crow | The History of the Real Jim Crow
The trickster whose name came to label racist language and culture has a startling past IN RECENT YEARS, the phrase “Jim Crow†has seen much use. Ire at a congressional rollback of federal Voting Rights Act protections, at state efforts to restrict access to polling places, and at police violence against unarmed African-Americans has caused official and unofficial voices to declare that Jim Crow is back—and never actually departed. Sheet music cover image of ‘Jump, Jim Crow’ by Rida Johnson Young and Sigmund Romberg, New York, New York, 1917 Were most Americans to guess, they might suppose incorrectly that the term came about when a fellow named Crow signed onto an obscure 19th-century lawsuit. Others might know that at one time “Jim Crow†was a common insult aimed at blacks; fewer, that Jim Crow was a figure well-known in rowdy, racialized stage shows that were among the foundations of American popular entertainment. But hardly anyone knows that the “Jim Crow†lately mentioned—President Barack Obama used the term in his January 10, 2017, farewell address—originated as a folkloric figure made a household word by a gifted white actor celebrated for his blackface performances in the mid-1800s. In the 1890s, when Southern states began to impose segregation, that practice was branded “Jim Crow.†How a stage character became a ubiquitous shorthand for legal subjugation by race is a story with a subversive genealogy that goes to the heart of the American identity. New Orleans shoemaker Homer Adolph Plessy boarded a passenger car of the East Louisiana Railroad on Tuesday, June 7, 1892. As Plessy knew, the coach was reserved for white customers. At the corner of Press and Royal Streets, police placed the 28-year-old African-American under arrest, an outcome the activist and accomplices had engineered as the opening gambit in a legal challenge. Plessy and company wanted to contest a Louisiana law requiring rail companies to seat blacks and whites in different cars. A descendant of Creoles who had fled Haiti decades earlier, Plessy described himself as “seven-eighths Caucasian and one-eighth African.†Plessy and many others of black and mixed-race descent living in cosmopolitan New Orleans were determined to challenge the Louisiana rail car law, enacted in 1890, an early ripple in a tide of restrictive legislation Southern states passed after Reconstruction that came to be known colloquially as “Jim Crow.†John Howard Ferguson, the judge assigned to Plessy’s arrest, ruled that “equal, but separate†accommodations on public transportation did not violate the shoemaker’s constitutional rights. Plessy appealed Ferguson’s ruling. His case rose through the courts, ending in 1896 with one of the U.S. Supreme Court’s most consequential decisions. Plessy v. Ferguson gave legal cover to Jim Crow laws. The purpose of Louisiana’s “Jim Crow car†law was “to separate the Negroes from the whites in public conveyances for the gratification and recognition of the sentiment of white superiority and white supremacy of right and power,†wrote Plessy’s attorney, Albion Tourgée, a Union Army veteran and radical. Begun on railroads, a herald of the industrialization disrupting the established social order, this racial ostracism soon “extended to churches and schools, to housing and jobs, to eating and drinking,†historian C. Vann Woodward wrote in his 1955 book, The Strange Career of Jim Crow. “Whether by law or by custom, that ostracism extended to virtually all forms of public transportation, to sports and recreations, to hospitals, orphanages, prisons and asylums, and ultimately to funeral homes, morgues, and cemeteries.†Jim Crow measures in effect constituted “an interlocking system of economic institutions, social practices and customs, political power, law, and ideology, all of which function both as means and ends in one group’s efforts to keep another (or others) in their place,†historian John Cell wrote. The performer who made Jim Crow Jim Crow was a Caucasian. Born in 1808, Thomas Dartmouth Rice, a furniture maker’s son, grew up in lower Manhattan near the East River docks. In his racially mixed working-class neighborhood, young Rice likely would have attended traveling shows that were staged in the saloons which in that era often doubled as theaters in New York and around the country. Since the mid-1700s, in Britain as well as in American colonies soon to become states, rambunctious productions often had featured white actors donning wigs and smearing burnt cork on their faces. These African-American characters often were comic. Separately, African-Americans, enslaved and free, told among themselves folktales in which animal characters tricked their way to spoils or victory, disrupting the balance of power—witty allegories on human existence. In these tales, roosters chased foxes, goats terrorized lions, Brer Rabbit taunted Wolf, and crows stood up to bullying bullfrogs. Blacks on islands across the Caribbean and along the Carolina coast sang a ditty, “Jump Jim Crow.†Little is known of Thomas Rice’s youth except that he preferred treading the boards to making cabinets. In 1827, the 19-year-old made his show business debut with a circus in Albany, New York. Tall and thin, an able mimic, songwriter, and comedian, the youth adopted the stage name T.D. Rice, working theatrical circuits in the Mississippi and Ohio valleys and around the Gulf Coast. Convention has it that the germ of the Jim Crow character took root after Rice observed a crippled black man dancing and singing somewhere in Ohio or Kentucky. Rice decided to imitate the fellow in blackface and, in that guise, call himself “Jim Crow.†William T. Lhamon, author of the 2003 book Jump Jim Crow, argues that no matter where exactly Rice may have happened onto his inspiration, “Jim Crow†by then had become a fixture in corners of American culture, especially among blacks. Around 1830, Rice appears to have fleshed out the character’s persona, as well as the song “Jump Jim Crow.†To go with his impudent air, “Jim Crow†sported ragged and patched clothing, suggesting the garb a runaway slave might wear, and adopted a signature crooked posture. Scholar Sean Murray suggests this pose was commenting on the risk of crippling injuries that workers in factories and other industrialized settings faced in the United States, where census takers in 1830 began counting “cripples†as a category. Rice unveiled his new character and verses he had written at the Bowery Theatre in New York City on November 12, 1832. Performing “Jump Jim Crow,†Rice boasted of trickster Jim’s misadventures, bewitching his audience. “Wheel about and turn about and do jus’ so,†Rice sang as he danced. “Every time I wheel about I jump Jim Crow.†Called back for encores, Rice transfixed crowds six nights running. Jim Crow embodied the strivings and frustrations of laborers of all races and circumstances who were wise to their oppressive masters. This was something new. Rice’s character, Lhamon argues, was the first to refer “to a very real cross-racial energy and recalcitrant alliance between blacks and lower-class whites.†Studying early American plays, theatrical productions, and song lyrics, Lhamon came upon Rice’s scripts and realized he had stumbled upon examples of some of the young republic’s earliest overtly working-class theater. Jim Crow penetratingly mocks the status quo, such as in “Jump Jim Crow,†when he makes fun of southerners’ vehemence in denouncing a tariff on imports—one of the South’s key antebellum gripes—and demanding nullification: De great Nullification, And fuss in de South, Is now before Congress, To be tried by word ob mouth. Dey hab had no blows yet, And I hope dey nebber will, For its berry cruel in bredren, One anoders blood to spill An if de blacks should get free, I guess dey’ll fee some bigger, An I shall consider it, A bold stroke for de nigger. I’m for freedom An for Union altogether, Aldough I’m a black man, De white is call’d my broder. In another song, Jim Crow boldly labels whites devils and threatens to repay insults with violence. What stuf it is in dem, To make de Debbil black I’ll prove dat he is white In de twinkling of a crack For you see loved brodder, As true as he has a tail, It is his berry wickedness What makes him turn pale. An I caution all white dandies, Not to come my way, For if dey insult me Dey’ll in de gutter lay By no means the first white performer to appear in blackface, Rice stood out because his material deeply engaged the mixed-race, working-class audiences made up of people, Lhamon observes, who Rice would have come to know in his travels in Appalachia, the Gulf Coast, and the South, where blacks and whites mingled in railyards, in shipyards, and on canals. Soon Rice was writing sketches starring Jim Crow; in none, Lhamon notes, does the character surrender his autonomy—and Jim Crow always outwits his white superiors. The rascally character, an American archetype, charmed onlookers of all ages. The audience at a performance Rice gave in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in the 1830s, may have included a young musical prodigy bound for success as a songwriter. Biographers of Stephen Foster, born in 1826, say he was 10 when he began performing his own version of “Jump Jim Crow.†Of Rice as Crow in 1836, a New York critic wrote, “in language he is obscure, ridiculous, yet cunning; in antics he is frisky—in grimace frightful, and in changing positions or shifting sides he is inexhaustible, endless, marvelous [sic], wonderful.†His act grew popular enough for him to take it across the Atlantic. Between 1836 and 1845, Rice performed in London, Dublin, and Paris. The song-and-dance man excited fans. “The most sober citizens began to wheel about, and turn about, and jump Jim Crow,†a critic wrote in the New York Tribune in 1855. “It seemed as though the entire population had been bitten by a tarantula; in the parlor, the kitchen, in the shop and the street, Jim Crow monopolized attention. It must have been a species of insanity, though of a gentle and pleasing kind.†Imitators trod Rice’s pioneering path, individually and in groups. In the 1840s, “minstrel shows†became the rage. Overacting in ludicrous “Negro dialect,†these troupes of white performers in blackface sang and danced in sketches that often revolved around life among an imaginary plantation’s slaves. All over the country but particularly in cities, where plantation culture was a novelty, minstrel shows persisted for decades. Having grown up and become a bookkeeper—a career path he was trying to escape—Stephen Foster broke into show business when the Christy Minstrels and kindred outfits hollered and hoofed his compositions “Camptown Races,†“De Ol’ Folks at Home,†and “Oh, Susanna!†Jim Crow entered the larger culture. An 1839 English novel, The History of Jim Crow, chronicles a young black man’s escape from bondage and his efforts to reunite with his family in Richmond, Virginia. Around 1850, a Glasgow, Scotland, publisher put out a children’s book, The Humourous Adventure of Jump Jim Crow. And early in her 1852 blockbuster Uncle Tom’s Cabin, abolitionist author Harriet Beecher Stowe has Mr. Shelby, a slave trader, tossing raisins at a young slave child he summons, addressing the youngster as “Jim Crow.†Those blander mainstream Jims, Lhamon argues, reflected not Rice’s subversive persona but condescending stereotypes. In 1840, Thomas Rice began to experience mystifying bouts of paralysis. However, the show had to go on, and Rice kept working, creating and landing new roles. He recast William Shakespeare’s Othello, a murderous drama of seduction and betrayal, as an irreverent musical with himself in the lead, a role he would recapitulate. Otello debuted in Philadelphia in 1844, returning to that stage three years later in tandem with the first stage production of Uncle Tom’s Cabin, which was enjoying a second life as a play. In 1854, a New York City run of Uncle Tom’s Cabin cast Rice, in counterpoint to his career-making brazen Jim Crow, as benevolent martyr Uncle Tom. That show featured Stephen Foster’s plaint, “Old Kentucky Home.†Scholars interpret this and similar material by minstrel show songwriters as an expression of the feeling of dislocation gripping Americans of all classes at the time. People were anxious about the effects of rapid industrialization and the threat posed by immigrants, especially from famine-ridden Ireland. According to this reading, plantation melodies distilled a comforting nostalgia for a vanishing, highly romanticized agrarian past. Now one of America’s leading songwriters, Foster had traveled south only once on a Mississippi riverboat and never lived in the region. Still, influenced deeply by Rice, he projected mixed messages in his songs, portraying black characters as cartoons yet also making them human. After his 1850 marriage to Jane McDowell, from a staunchly abolitionist family, Foster quit minstrelsy, dropping buffoonish caricature and instead treating black and white characters with equal sympathy, even giving some lyrics an abolitionist spin. Industrialization allowed some Americans to afford a parlor and a piano. Amateur musicians wanted simple, tuneful songs to play and sing, and by the mid-1850s Foster was turning out melodies aimed at young middle-class women playing pianos in genteel parlors, as opposed to raucous, tricky tunes suitable for being shouted out by dangerously hilarious actors in rough-and-tumble theaters, the way T.D. Rice had gotten his start. Foster’s brother claimed his sibling met Rice in 1845 and later sold the performer two songs. Rice’s descendants maintained that Rice declined Foster’s material as too stridently antislavery to perform universally, but did encourage his fan to keep writing. Rice died in 1860, at 53, and was buried in Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn, New York. His will stated that his occupation was to be recorded as “comedian.†Rice’s compellingly transgressive cross-racial persona, with its slyly veiled but unmistakable challenge to power, outlived him, not only in performances by inheritors but as the ironic label given to what became deadly subjugation with a global reach. From 1890 through the 1960s, Jim Crow kept a white knee on the necks of southern blacks. In 1948, white South Africans, inspired by that example, imposed their own system of segregation, apartheid. South Africa’s take on Jim Crow lasted until 1994. Rice’s tradition came to include immigrant show folk and artists who also exploited blackface—and the cultural wealth of the African-American experience. “Imitating perceived blackness is arguably the central metaphor for what it means to be American,†Lhamon wrote, “even to be a citizen of that wider Atlantic world that suffers still from having installed, defended, and opposed its peculiar history of slavery.†Generations of American performers devised variations on T.D. Rice’s provocative racial impersonation—to name a few, Irish-American minstrel impresario Dan Emmett; Lithuanian-born singer and actor Al Jolson, a rabbi’s son; and Brooklyn natives Ira and George Gershwin, songwriters whose immigrant parents were Russian Jews. In time, performers like Elvis Presley and Eminem would drop the mask and sing in their own white working-class skin, delivering entertainment percolating with interracial influence just as disruptive as Jim Crow more than a century earlier. This article was written by senior editor Sarah Richardson for the April 2018 issue of American History magazine. For more stories, subscribe here.
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f5c154f035e885ee3cbf05c7cdd28d76 | https://www.historynet.com/as-he-lived-for-others-so-did-he-die.htm | ‘As He Lived For Others, So Did He Die’: Beloved Union General Israel Richardson Cut Down at Antietam | ‘As He Lived For Others, So Did He Die’: Beloved Union General Israel Richardson Cut Down at Antietam
Israel Bush Richardson was born in Fairfax, Vt., in December 1815, the second of seven children born to Israel Putnam Richardson and Susanna Holmes Richardson. His father, one of Vermont’s more prominent lawyers, served as a state attorney. As a youngster, Israel loved hearing the stories of his famed ancestor, American Revolutionary War General Israel Putnam, and dreamed of achieving his own military fame one day. Those aspirations were realized in 1836, when he was admitted to the U.S. Military Academy.
Never a brilliant student, Richardson struggled with mathematics and relied on solid study habits and conduct to pull through. He graduated 38th in West Point’s Class of 1841—a class that would contribute 23 generals to the Civil War, including John F. Reynolds, Zealous Bates Tower, Nathaniel Lyon, and Richard and Robert Garnett.
Richardson was commissioned a brevet second lieutenant and fought in the Second Seminole War and then the Mexican War, where he earned the nickname “Fighting Dick” and won the esteem of Winfield Scott, commanding general of the United States Army. Postwar, Richardson was stationed on frontier posts throughout Texas and New Mexico.
In 1850, while in El Paso, Richardson married Rita Stephenson, daughter of a wealthy merchant. She died a year later in childbirth, however. Their son, Theodore Virginius Richardson, survived but would die six months later. Likely overcome with grief, loneliness, and frustration with Army bureaucracy, Richardson resigned his commission in 1855 and moved to Pontiac, Mich., to become a farmer.
When the Civil War opened in April 1861, he promptly offered his services. On May 25, shortly after Richardson married Frances (Fannie) Travor, he was given command of the 2nd Michigan Infantry.
Of the six generals who fell during the battle, Richardson survived longest—six weeks—but never left the Pry House. (Courtesy of Paul Russinoff)
Known for his humility and tough, no-nonsense method of leadership, Richardson quickly earned his troops’ respect. He was most comfortable mingling with his men and was generally seen around camp wearing “a jacket, an old straw hat, and trousers, [into] the side pockets of which his hands are generally thrust.” Richardson disliked pomp and circumstance, and he frowned upon superiors who were unable or unwilling to lead by example.
Richardson earned quick promotion: brigadier general after the First Battle of Bull Run in July 1861 (August 9 with rank to date from May 17); divisional commander on March 13, 1862 (just days before Fannie gave birth to Philip Augustus Richardson, whom Israel had to wait two months to see); and major general on July 4, 1862. Richardson stood out particularly in battles at Yorktown and Seven Pines, and during the Seven Days.
On September 14, 1862, Richardson’s 1st Division, in Maj. Gen. Edwin Sumner’s 2nd Corps, arrived in Western Maryland just as the fighting at South Mountain ended. He took a moment to pen a letter to Fannie: “Now is the time to end war if the North turns out…Now, my dear, take good care of yourself, give my love to all the family, also to little P. [Philip] kiss him many times.” The next night, his division camped in the vicinity of the Pry House, near Antietam Creek.
During the Battle of Antietam, Richardson personally led his division’s attack at the Sunken Road, managing to drive the Confederates from their position and nearly cutting their line in two. As he was giving orders, however, a spherical case-shot shell burst and one of its deadly lead balls struck the trunk of his body. In his diary, Colonel Edward E. Cross of the 5th New Hampshire, wrote that his commander had been struck in the “breast,” but Lieutenant Thomas Livermore, also of the 5th New Hampshire, claimed Richardson “received his mortal wound in his side.” Nevertheless, wounds to the trunk of the body were often mortal.
Though stunned, Richardson continued to walk around for several minutes before succumbing to the agony. He was carried from the field with the words, “Tell General McClellan I have been doing a Colonel’s work all day, and I’m now too badly hurt to do a General’s.” Tragically, it was James Longstreet, a good friend but now a foe, who ordered the cannon fire that caused Richardson’s injury and eventual death.
Richardson was evacuated to a field hospital, where he waited in extreme agony nearly four hours before receiving treatment. He was then taken to the Pry House and placed in an upstairs bedroom. Major General George McClellan sent Dr. Benjamin Douglas Howard, a member of his staff, and Army of the Potomac Medical Director Dr. Jonathan Letterman to examine Richardson. Both men feared shrapnel was lodged in his left lung and deemed the wound mortal.
But Dr. J.H. Taylor, the medical director of Richardson’s division and a close personal friend, examined Richardson and did not think the lung had been damaged. Taylor refused Letterman’s request to tell Richardson his fate, saying it would “kill Israel if he did.” The wound was excruciating and efforts by doctors to extract the embedded lead shrapnel ball proved futile. Pneumonia soon set in, although Richardson would recover and steadily improve under Taylor’s care.
Upon learning of her husband’s injury, Fannie traveled from Alexandria, Va., with one of her sisters-in-law to care for him. She would write, “Israel is slowly but steadily improving [but he] has grown very thin and very weak. He is very much depressed, not at all like himself, and inclined to look on the dark side, more than is good for him.”
On October 4, Abraham Lincoln visited Richardson at the Pry House. As related in Jack Mason’s Until Antietam: The Life and Letters of Major General Israel B. Richardson, U.S. Army, Captain Draper—a member of Richardson’s staff who was present—said the president told the general that if he recovered he would be named McClellan’s successor as Army of the Potomac commander.
By the end of October, Richardson’s wound became infected. Noted Taylor, “[H]is nervous system is much shocked. So much so that he makes no effort to rally, and has himself given up all hopes for recovery.” At 7:50 p.m. on November 3, 1862, Israel Richardson succumbed to his injuries and passed away.
On November 11, Richardson was laid to rest at Oak Hill Cemetery in Pontiac. As Taylor penned in his eulogy, “He looked at the world through his own unselfish nature, trusted to that integrity in others…As he lived for others, so did he die.”
This blog, adapted for print, first appeared on the National Museum of Civil War Medicine’s website, www.civilwarmed.org.
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7671f258a9ffedb4ff211c3c84271bcf | https://www.historynet.com/assault-at-petersburg.htm | Assault at Petersburg | Assault at Petersburg
Lieutenant Octavius Wiggins of Company E, 37th North Carolina, peered out across Arthur’s Swamp in the pre-dawn darkness of Sunday, April 2, 1865. He was searching for the masses of assaulting Federal soldiers that he and his fellow members of Brigadier General James Lane’s Brigade expected every morning to face along the lines south of Petersburg. Suddenly a few rifle shots from Rebel pickets broke the morning silence, followed by ‘one full, deep, mighty cheer,’ alerting Wiggins that this would be the morning.
The thin line of Confederate soldiers in the breastworks offered what resistance they could provide before they were overwhelmed. One of the Federal soldiers pointed the muzzle of his rifled musket at Wiggins and pulled the trigger. The blast blew powder into the lieutenant’s face, nearly destroying his eyes and knocking him senseless upon the ground.For nine long, weary months, a set of formidable field fortifications and an obstinate foe had kept the Army of the Potomac out of Petersburg, Va., the capture of which would have made the Confederate capital and industrial center of Richmond indefensible, hastening the end of the war. Southern soldiers fought valiantly during those nine months. Each time the Federal army sought to move westward in an attempt to cut the Rebel supply lines, portions of the Confederate army battled back. Yet the numerically superior Federals were able to continually lengthen their lines, stretching the Confederate defenders painfully thin.
In March 1865, General Robert E. Lee recognized that if other Federal forces in the Shenandoah Valley and North Carolina united with the Army of the Potomac, Richmond and Petersburg could not be held. The Confederate commander chose to strike first, and on March 25 attacked Fort Stedman, to the east of Petersburg. The assault met with early success, but the Confederates were later routed from their prize by Federal reinforcements. Lee’s only option was to retreat, and he waited for supplies and dry roads for his army.
On March 24, Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant, the overall Union commander, had issued orders for an offensive he believed would end the war. Infantry from the Army of the Potomac and cavalry from the Shenandoah Valley were to move west of Petersburg and destroy the South Side and Danville railroads. By 5 p.m. on March 28, the Federal cavalry was at Dinwiddie Court House, southwest of Petersburg, with the infantry moving in early the following morning. Lee pulled men from the front lines and his sole remaining reserves and sent them west to confront this force.
Portions of the two opposing forces clashed early in the afternoon around the Lewis farm, leaving the Federals in control of the field at the end of March 29. Meanwhile, the infantry that Lee had sent west arrived that evening and went into position at Five Forks.
Two different assaults followed on March 31. Four Confederate brigades attacked two Federal divisions on the White Oak Road, initially driving them back in confusion. By early afternoon, however, the Federal counterattack had pushed the Confederates back to their works.
The other Confederate attack was on the Federals at Dinwiddie Court House, and followed a similar pattern. The Rebels again made early gains, but these were erased as Federal reinforcements arrived overnight and forced the Confederates to fall back to Five Forks. A Union attack on Five Forks on April 1 pushed the Confederates out of their entrenchments and opened the way for a grand assault on the Confederate lines.
In the last weeks of March, the veterans of the 37th North Carolina had been one of the many Southern regiments juggled among the trenches south of Petersburg. On March 24, they, along with the other three regiments in Lane’s Brigade, had been placed in support of the attack on Fort Stedman. They were back in their old trenches the following day, and skirmished with the Federals that evening. Another skirmish followed on March 27, and on the 29th Brig. Gen. Samuel McGowan’s brigade, on the right of Lane’s Brigade, had been pulled out of the trenches and sent to help with the attack toward Dinwiddie Court House. The Tar Heels were forced to extend their position. Their division commander, Maj. Gen. Cadmus Wilcox, estimated that the distance between each soldier was 10 feet. The veteran soldiers hoped that the Federal generals would focus on the action at Dinwiddie and not on their lean lines.
On the 30th, anticipation gripped the Federal troops of the VI Corps across from Lane’s Confederates. They loaded their baggage wagons and harnessed their mules, while officers had their horses saddled, ready to step off toward the imposing Confederate lines at a moment’s notice. One brigade commander thought that the next day might ‘be a day of carnage & blood between the contending armies around Richmond.’ The Federal regiments were often up at 4 a.m., prepared to meet any possible dawn assault from the Confederates. Orders went out to the VI Corps to stage a dawn assault on April 1.’All the regimental commanders were ordered to report to Brigade headquarters where we were told that the 6th Corps must attack Petersburg,’ wrote Elisha Hunt Rhodes. ‘We must not fail….We must take the enemy’s work[s] no matter what it cost. We returned to our Regiments in a solemn frame of mind and made preparations.’
But weather conditions prevented the Union troops from detecting the withdrawal of McGowan’s Brigade, and by the early evening hours, the attack was called off. Later that night, word that the Confederates had indeed been on the move reached the VI Corps commander, Maj. Gen. Horatio G. Wright. He requested permission to proceed with the attack. Wright lacked sufficient time to get the troops into position before dawn, however, and the Federal soldiers returned to their rain-sodden camps.
All along the Confederate lines there was a sense of despair on April 1. One soldier wrote of ‘a feeling of unrest and apprehension, not only among the individuals, but even the animals….I have no recollection of having spent a more thoroughly disagreeable day.’
Despite the bad weather, Grant was invigorated by the success of the Federal attack at Five Forks on the 1st. He sent out new orders for a general assault against the Confederate entrenchments on April 2.
Wright’s VI Corps was again chosen to spearhead the attack. Members of the corps had detected a vulnerable point alongthe Confederate lines, and senior Union officers, including Wright and Maj. Gen. George G. Meade, examined the area several times. They observed that Arthur’s Swamp, a sluggish morass that extended from the Union lines to near the Boisseau home, was fed by a number of tributaries that caused breaks in the Confederate lines. One of the ravines was only 50 or 60 feet wide at the place where it intersected the Confederate lines, but it extended into a flat marsh nearer the Union picket lines.
Due to the nature of the woody, marshy ground, the Confederates had not built fortifications across the depression but had placed artillery on either side of it. Throughout the winter, McGowan’s infantry was posted along this section of the line. Lane’s Brigade of North Carolinians had replaced McGowan only days prior to the planned April 2 Federal assault.Orders went out to the VI Corps: ‘You will assault the enemy’s works in your front at 4 a.m. to-morrow morning.’ Major General George W. Getty’s division was assigned to lead the attack. His right was supported by the division of Brig. Gen. Frank Wheaton and his left by the division of Brig. Gen. Truman Seymour, both of which were positioned in echelon. The regiments in each brigade were stacked behind one another, providing a nar-row front but great depth.
Wright’s assaulting force consisted of some 14,000 soldiers. Officers were instructed to leave their horses behind, and the men in the leading ranks were to leave the priming caps off their muskets, relying on bayonets only. One brigade commander told his line officers: ‘We are going to have a hell of a fight at early daylight….I want you fellows to simply tell your first sergeant to have the men fall in ready to march…at 1 o’clock a.m. Now you can go to your quarters and if any of you have anything to say to your folks, wives or sweethearts make your story short and get what sleep you can for hell will be tapped in the morning.’
Federal artillery — some 150 guns — opened fire at 10 p.m. on the opposing entrenchments. One Confederate general recalled ‘an almost incessant cannonade, solid shot and shell whizzing through the air and bursting in every direction, at times equal in brilliancy to a vivid meteoric display.’ General Grant hoped the shelling would convince the Rebels to abandon their fortifications, and thus save lives. The Confederates returned the fire, however, making it seem to one Federal as if ‘the devils in hell were fighting in the air.’
Federal soldiers of the VI Corps began moving into position about the same time the long-range duel began. Artillery fire began to slacken by 1 a.m., as more Federals shifted into line behind their pickets and strained to conceal their movements from the Confederate sentinels.
Rebel pickets along the front lines opened fire, striking members of the assaulting force — who were not allowed to return fire, lest they expose their attack. Some of the Federals blamed their own pickets for bringing on the brisk firefight; they thought it was an attempt to mask the sounds of thousands of moving men. Others believed that the Confederates had detected the Federals moving into position and were attempting to provoke the main body into firing and giving away their location.
Brigadier General Lewis Grant’s brigade of Vermonters took the lead in the attack. They were positioned on the left of Getty’s division, with their left resting on the edge of the ravine. Grant had been wounded in the head during the skirmish between the pickets, and leadership of the brigade devolved to Colonel Amasa Tracy of the 2nd Vermont. Tracy commanded six regiments. To his right was the brigade of Colonel Thomas Hyde, composed of men from Maine, New York and Pennsylvania. Colonel James Warner’s brigade of Pennsylvanians was to the right of Hyde.
Farther to the right of Getty was Wheaton’s division, with brigades led by Colonels Oliver Edwards, William Pen-rose and Joseph Hamblin. Across Arthur’s Swamp, to the left of the Vermont Brigade, was Seymour’s division. The right of Colonel J. Warren Keifer’s brigade rested in the swamp, and to his left was the brigade of Colonel William Truex. Accompanying the infantry were three batteries of artillery, one for each division, along with a group of 20 volunteer artillerymen that hoped to turn captured Rebel guns on their former owners.
The Confederate task of guarding the area around Arthur’s Swamp fell to James Lane’s North Carolina Brigade. Lane positioned the 28th North Carolina on his right. The 37th North Carolina came next, to the left of the 28th, with the ravine of one of the tributaries of Arthur’s Swamp between the two forces. To the left of the 37th came the 18th North Carolina, and the 33rd North Carolina was on the brigade’s left. To the left of the 33rd was a brigade of Georgians under Brig. Gen. Edward L. Thomas, and to Lane’s right were two regiments of Brig. Gen. William MacRae’s Brigade: the 11th and 52nd North Carolina, under the command of Colonel Eric Erson.
Several artillery emplacements strengthened the Confederate line, but Lane’s four regiments probably numbered no more than 1,100 men. His fifth regiment, the 7th North Carolina, had recently been detached and sent to its home state.
The Federals waited in the darkness, miserable and solemn. Not only was the earth wet and the weather cold, but the early morning hours between when they went into position and when they were called to battle gave many hours to think of nothing but the unpleasant task at hand. All too often they had tried frontal attacks where the assaulting force gained nothing and suffered devastating losses.
Although the attack was slated to begin at 4 a.m., given the total darkness that pervaded the area the Federals had to cross, General Wright postponed the assault until 4:40 a.m. Wright thought that by then ‘it had become light enough for the men to see to step, though nothing was discernible beyond a few yards’ distance.’ A cannon in Fort Fisher, belonging to the 3rd Vermont Battery, broke the silence, and the Federal infantry stepped off.
Alert Confederate pickets produced a weak and scattering volley and attempted to make for the main Confederate lines. The Federals gave a cheer that, combined with the rifle fire from the pickets, warned the main Confederate line of their approach.
The 5th Vermont, leading the attack, advanced through the pickets, capturing many who were not quick enough to escape. The Vermonters were just about to reach the obstructions when, remembered a Yank, a ‘well-directed musketry fire from the front and artillery fire from the forts on either hand’ tore into their ranks, demoralizing the Federal soldiers and almost bringing an end to the assault.
One Union captain recalled that many of the men in the brigade ‘refused to advance further than the rebel picket line. I never had to strike men with my saber before to make them advance but that day I did [strike] a great many of them and in earnest too, as hard as I could with the flat of my sword….’ Thanks to the work of the officers, the stalled brigade regained its momentum and proceeded with its attack.
Federal soldiers soon encountered a line (possibly two) of abatis — trees that had been felled by the Confederates with their branches pointing toward the Union lines. The Rebels had sharpened the branches, presenting a formidable challenge for an attacking force to pass. During the assault, members of the Federal army detailed as ‘pioneers’ advanced with axes. As the attackers advanced and came upon the abatis, they called for their pioneers, who went to work chopping up and clearing the downed trees. One Yankee soldier recalled that while he was working,’seven of our Pioneer comrades were killed in that one place.’
Captain Charles G. Gould of the 5th Vermont was the first Federal inside the works. He had found a weak place in the abatis and led the way through the ditch and up the parapet into the Confederate lines, followed by several of his men. As soon as Gould gained the lines, a Confederate pointed his rifle at the captain and pulled the trigger. The gun misfired, but a second Rebel bayoneted Gould in the mouth, and the blade passed under his lip and emerged at the lower part of the jaw near his neck. Gould thrust his saber through that Tar Heel, killing him. Another Confederate slashed Gould on the head with a sword. Gould was grabbed, hands partially ripping off his overcoat. Before he could struggle free from his assailants, a second bayonet was thrust at the officer, entering his spine and penetrating nearly to the spinal cord.
The captain attempted to crawl back over the works, and one of his own men, Corporal Henry Recor of Company A, rescued him, although Recor was also wounded while dragging Gould into the ditch. Gould staggered toward the main Federal lines, seeking medical aid and reinforcements for his Vermonters. Captain Gould survived his wounds and was awarded the Medal of Honor for his actions.
More Federal soldiers poured into the fortifications and fought hand to hand with the Tar Heels. Close-quarters fighting took place when several members of the 37th Massachusetts of Edwards’ brigade spied the colors of the 37th North Carolina. Lieutenant William Waterman, Corporals Luther Tanner and Richard Welch, and Private Michael Kelly, all of Company E, rushed toward the Confederate color-bearer.
The ensuing melee left Lieutenant Waterman wounded in the wrist. Corporal Tanner was killed, as was Private Kelly, but not before he bayoneted a Tar Heel who was trying to kill the 37th Massachusetts’ regimental commander. Corporal Welch knocked down the color-bearer of the 37th North Carolina and seized the banner. Welch was also awarded the Medal of Honor for capturing that flag.
‘I was driven from the works,’ recorded the 37th North Carolina’s regimental com-mander, Major Jackson L. Bost. ‘[Our] line…was broken and the enemy were filling down in the rear of our works toward Petersburg. I had to fall back directly to the rear and formed a skirmish line as best I could to keep the enemy from advancing too fast in our rear.’ Major Bost lost approximately two-thirds of his regiment. Among the dead were three of his company commanders: Captains William T. Nicholson, Company E; John B. Petty, Company F; and Daniel L. Hudson, Company G. Sergeant Yates Lacy of the 5th Wisconsin recalled that he ‘did a little artistic bayonet work’ and that ‘the Johnny that he interviewed passed on to sweet subsequently.’
Other Confederates ‘threw down their guns and surrendered,’ said Elisha Hunt Rhodes. ‘They shouted `Don’t fire, Yanks!’ and I ordered them to go to the rear, which they did on the run.’ Union troops captured well over 100 veteran soldiers of the 37th North Carolina, including several who were wounded.
Rhodes’ men had advanced with their rifles uncapped. Now that they had gained the Confederate works, he ordered them to prime, and a volley was sent after the retreating Tar Heels.
Elsewhere along Lane’s line, his other regiments were collapsing. The attack of Keifer’s brigade, to the left of the Vermont brigade across Arthur’s Swamp, focused on the 28th North Carolina. Keifer had learned of ‘A narrow opening, just wide enough for a wagon to pass through,’ along the Confederate lines to the front of his brigade. He ordered the 6th Maryland, in the center of his brigade, to exploit this opening, holding their fire until they were within the works, when they would ‘open on the Confederates…taking them in the flank, and, if possible, drive them out and thus leave for our troops little resistance in gaining an entrance over the ramparts.’ After navigating through the Confederate pickets and abatis, the Marylanders did gain the Confederate works.
Major Edward Hale, Lane’s assistant adjutant general, on seeing his men coming over the earthworks ahead of the attack, ‘remarked to someone `Why, there are the skirmishers, drive in,’ & called out to know how near behind the enemy were. Just at the moment I observed a stand of colors in the work[s] & the person in command ordered his followers to fire.’ The 28th North Carolina was flanked on the right, and forced to fall back toward the Boydton Plank Road.
The 18th North Carolina, to the left of the 37th North Carolina, suffered the same fate. Federals from Penrose’s New Jersey brigade and Edwards’ mixed brigade of men from Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and Wisconsin struck the 18th North Carolina with overwhelming force.
Major Augustus Fay of the 40th New Jersey shot the color-bearer of the 18th. Another member of the 40th New Jersey, Private Frank Fesq, retrieved the flag and was later awarded the Medal of Honor for the deed. The 18th North Carolina fell back and attempted to establish a new line, but the troops were soon driven eastward toward Petersburg and the Confederates’ Fort Gregg. (Both the Federal and the Confederte armies had bastions called Fort Gregg at Petersburg.) The 33rd North Carolina was soon forced back toward the inner works as well. Once inside the Confederate works, the Federals began to spread out in all directions.
General Lane sent Lieutenant George Snow of the 33rd North Carolina back to division headquarters with word of the breakthrough. Wilcox gathered together remnants of Lane’s and Thomas’ brigades. The 600 men were ordered forward in a counterattack that allowed Lane and Thomas to recapture two cannons and reoccupy a portion of the lost breastworks. They established a new line perpendicular to the Confederate fortifications.
Surviving members of the 37th North Carolina, along with other soldiers and officers of Lane’s and Thomas’ brigades, retreated into Forts Gregg and Whitworth. There, they held the Federals at bay long enough for Lt. Gen. James Longstreet’s corps to stabilize the lines and allow the Confederates an orderly withdrawal during the evening hours.
Thirty minutes passed from the time the assault began before General Wright reported to Meade that his corps had ‘carried the works in front and to the left of the Jones house.’ Meade sent a congratulatory reply to Wright and shared the good tidings with Grant, who passed them on to Abraham Lincoln. Many of the Federals ‘were perfectly wild with delight at their success in this grand assault,’ wrote one division commander.
A fellow soldier, a sergeant in the 14th New Jersey, thought ‘the charge of Major-Gen. Wright’s veterans under cover of the darkness and mist, preceding the break of day, will forever live in history as one of the grandest and most sublime actions of the war.’ Even General Grant referred to the action among ‘the brightest day[s] in the history of the war.’ Robert E. Lee and his Army of Northern Virginia were forced to abandon Petersburg and Richmond on the night of April 2, and just a few days later surrendered at Appomattox Court House. Other Confederate armies were also forced to capitulate over the next few weeks, and the war, after four long years, ended.
What became of Lieutenant Octavius Wiggins? After he was knocked to the ground by the blast of the Federal rifle, he was captured and taken to the rear. He found fellow members of the 37th North Carolina behind the lines, and they commenced to pick the tiny grains of powder out of his face. Wiggins and the other Confederate prisoners were taken to City Point, Va., where they boarded a steamer for Washington, D.C. There, the officers were placed on a train bound for Johnson’s Island in Ohio. During the night, Wiggins, wearing clothes made from an old gray shawl, jumped out of a window of the car he was riding in and escaped.
He cut off his buttons from his coat and vest, ‘and substituting wooden pegs, he was in perfect disguise and passed as a laborer, working a day or so at one place, then moving further south,’ he remembered. Once he reached Baltimore, he took a steamer to Richmond, but was ‘too late to do any more fighting[,] for General Lee had surrendered.’
This article was written by Michael C. Hardy and originally appeared in the March 2005 issue of America’s Civil War. Tar Heel Michael Hardy is the author of The Thirty-seventh North Carolina Troops: Tar Heels in the Army of Northern Virginia. In addition to his book, for further reading he recommends A. Wilson Greene’s Breaking the Backbone of the Rebellion.
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3c0206dd481211221421c7a2a1376bea | https://www.historynet.com/attack-on-pearl-harbor-why-werent-we-warned.htm | Attack on Pearl Harbor: Why Weren’t We Warned | Attack on Pearl Harbor: Why Weren’t We Warned
More than 60 years later, Americans still wonder how Japan’s surprise attack on the Pacific Fleet could have succeeded. The joint congressional committee that investigated the attack in 1945 and 1946 put the question sharply: ‘Why with some of the finest intelligence available in our history, with the almost certain knowledge that war was at hand, with plans that contemplated the precise type of attack that was executed by Japan on the morning of December 7–Why was it possible for a Pearl Harbor to occur?’
The best intelligence came from breaking Japanese codes. Solving the secret messages of a hostile power is like putting a mirror behind the cards a player is holding, like eavesdropping on the huddles of a football team. It is nearly always the best form of intelligence. It is faster and more trustworthy than spies, who have to write up and transmit their reports and who are always suspected of setting up or falling for a deception. It sees farther into the future than aerial reconnaissance, which detects only what is present. It is broader in scope than the interrogations of prisoners, who know little more than what they have experienced. And it is usually cheaper and less obtrusive, hence more secret, than all of these. But it has a serious double-barreled failing: It cannot provide information that a nation has not put onto the airwaves, and its apparent omniscience and its immediacy seduce its recipients into thinking they are getting all the other nation’s secrets.
This is one of the lessons of Pearl Harbor. American code-breakers performed prodigies, giving remarkable insight into Japanese thinking. But that insight was not total, and so even the extraordinary U.S. cryptanalysis could not warn policymakers of Japan’s secret intentions.
The nations of the world learned the value of code-breaking during World War I. Radio–used extensively in that conflict for the first time–gave them their opportunity. Messages were easily intercepted, so armies and navies sheathed them in codes and ciphers. But linguists and mathematicians on both sides learned to crack them, and the information thereby obtained provided victory after victory to generals, admirals and political leaders. Cryptanalysis substantially helped France to block the supreme German offensive in 1918, Germany to defeat Russia, Britain to bring the United States into the war, the United States to convict a German spy. When hostilities ended, the powers refounded these agencies to retain in peace the benefits won in war.
The United States was one of these nations, and its main target was Japan. Before World War I, Japan had defeated China and then Russia to become mistress of the western Pacific. Now it was building a fleet to match that of the United States and, under a League of Nations mandate, had occupied islands that enabled it to menace the ocean routes to the Philippines. It was generally felt that Japan constituted the greatest danger to the United States.
The State and War departments jointly set up the Cipher Bureau in 1919 under the inspiring leadership of Herbert O. Yardley, a 30-year-old who had created and run a code-breaking unit for military intelligence in World War I. The Cipher Bureau scored the first great achievement of American code-breaking while working out of a narrow brownstone at 141 East 37th Street in Manhattan. Despite only a rudimentary knowledge of Japanese, Yardley and his associates cracked Japanese diplomatic codes. A bewhiskered missionary then turned the messages into English. Sent to the State Department, the translated messages informed American negotiators at the Washington naval disarmament conference of 1921-22 about Japan’s fallback position on capital ships. Armed with this knowledge, the negotiators pushed Japan to promise to build such ships in a U.S.Japan tonnage ratio not of 10-to-7, as Japan had wanted, but to 10-to-6–the equivalent of three fewer battleships.
Although the Navy was more concerned about Japan than was any other element of government, it had no code-breaking unit. Then, early in 1923, naval intelligence came upon a 1918 Japanese naval code book while rifling the steamer trunk of a Japanese naval officer visiting New York. This impelled the Navy to create a code-breaking agency–called, for security reasons, the Research Desk–within the Division of Naval Communications. Its first head was Laurance F. Safford, a lieutenant with a flair for mechanics and mathematics. He set up shop with four civilians in Room 1621 of the Main Navy Department, a temporary wooden building on Constitution Avenue near the Lincoln Memorial. One of the first things he did was to establish radio intercept stations in the Pacific, to furnish more material for code-breaking than was obtainable through haphazard monitoring by ships and the naval radio station in Shaghai.
In August Safford took one of his most important strides forward when he hired 32-year-old Agnes Meyer Driscoll as a cryptanalyst. A onetime mathematics teacher and former employee of the Code and Signal Section, under which the Research Desk came, she soon proved to be an outstanding code-breaker. Among her first assignments was to work on the photographed code from the rifled steamer trunk. The Research Desk had found that not only was the ‘plaintext,’ or the original message, encoded; its code groups themselves were enciphered. ‘Miss Aggie,’ as Driscoll was called, had to remove that encipherment. Incessantly turning the pages of the reproduced code book with the rubber tip of her eraser, she completed that job after two or three years of work. A husband-and-wife team of translators turned the Japanese into English. By then, in 1926, Safford had returned to sea. He was succeeded by Lieutenant Joseph J. Rochefort, one of the first American naval officers to have studied Japanese in Japan. He was a ‘mustang’–a former enlisted man who had earned a commission. This had made him tough and independent in a world dominated by Annapolis graduates; he neutralized his caustic speech with a conciliatory smile. Rochefort became one of the very few Americans with aptitude both in the Japanese language and in code-breaking.
A subordinate, who most likely helped to crack Japanese subsidiary code, remembered: ‘Hours went by without any of us saying a word, just sitting in front of piles of indexed sheets on which a mumbo jumbo of figures or letters was displayed in chaotic disorder….[We] gave ourselves to cryptography with the same ascetic devotion with which young men enter a monastery.’
The hardest part of breaking a code is the beginning. Rochefort explained it in colorful terms: ‘It first off involved what I call the staring process. You look at all of these messages that you have, you line them up in various ways, you write them one below the other, and you’d write them in various forms and you’d stare at them. Pretty soon you’d notice a pattern; you’d notice a definite pattern between these messages. This was the first clue….You notice a pattern that when you follow through, you say this means so-and-so; you’d run that through, and it doesn’t work out. Then you’d proceed on some other effort and eventually, if you’re lucky and the other fellow makes mistakes, which he invariably will, then you come up with a solution that will stand up under test, and this gives your first lead-in.’
Rochefort said he felt good while doing this work ‘because you have defied these people who have attempted to use a system they thought was secure, that is, it was unreadable. It was always somewhat of a pleasure to defeat them or challenge them.’ But the work took its toll. While engaged in the actual cryptanalysis, he said, he generally felt frustrated. The tension was so great that after work he had to lie down for two or three hours before he could eat anything; he developed ulcers anyway, and this, together with the fact that duty in communications intelligence hurt a man’s career, drove him to get out of the work when his tour at the Research Desk ended in 1927.
The translation of the photographed Code No. 1 originally had been put together in ten ‘volumes’ with metal-strip Acco office binders. When Safford returned from sea duty to the Research Desk in June 1929, he had the material retyped in four copies on huge 12-by-18-inch forms and bound in two volumes in red buckram McBee binders, far more convenient to use. This gave the code its more common name, the Red Code.
On December 1, 1930, the Japanese replaced it with a new code. But Driscoll by then had learned the ships, communications patterns, and frequently used phrases of the Japanese fleet, and she solved its transposition encipherment and then reconstructed the entire 85,000-group, two-part code. It was later called, from the color of its binding, the Blue Code. Her work was a remarkable feat of cryptanalysis, and for years it gave the U.S. Navy insight into Japanese forces and tactics.
Two events in 1929 led the army to expand its own code-breaking activities. In May, after giving the new secretary of state a little time to understand the realities of the job, Yardley passed him some solved messages. Henry L. Stimson was shocked at what he regarded as a dishonorable and counter-productive activity–‘Gentlemen do not read each other’s mail,’ he said later, maintaining that ‘the way to make men trustworthy is to trust them.’ He withdrew State Department support from the Cipher Bureau. In the meantime, the Army decided that Yardley was not doing what it needed most: training cryptanalysts for immediate use in case of war. These events doomed the unit, which was dissolved on October 31, 1929–two days after the great stock market crash. Its papers went to the Army’s Signal Corps.
This body had set up a small cryptologic group of its own in 1921, hiring a 29-year-old who was on his way to becoming the world’s greatest cryptologist. William F. Friedman–natty, uptight, brilliant–had written some theoretical treatises of landmark importance and had solved German codes in France during World War I. His new job was nominally to improve the Army’s own codes and ciphers, but doing this properly required him to test cryptographic systems offered to it. This gave him experience in cryptanalysis and expanded the Army’s knowledge of it. With the closing of Yardley’s agency, it was logical for the Signal Corps to add code-breaking to its responsibilities, and Friedman became the head of a new Signal Intelligence Service (SIS). He hired three young men who knew languages and mathematics to serve as junior cryptanalysts. The first to report was 21-year-old Frank B. Rowlett, a former teacher from Virginia with an all-American look to him. At 8 a.m. on April 1, 1930, Rowlett found himself entering Room 3406 of the Munitions Building–next door to the main Navy Department building, which housed the navy code-breakers–on Constitution Avenue near the Lincoln Memorial.
Two months later, Rowlett and his colleagues were excitedly combing through the secret files of Yardley’s defunct organization. This most clandestine and most valuable form of intelligence thrilled them. They went on to study basic cryptography and the solution of machine ciphers, clearly the wave of the future. In 1932, their training completed at last, they attacked Japanese diplomatic cryptographic systems, working on messages provided by the Army’s new intercept service.
They first cracked a simple code, the LA. That code did little more than replace the syllables of the plaintext with pairs of code letters listed in a code book. In fact, the system resembled simple cryptograms found in Sunday newspapers. First the Japanese words of the message were transliterated into romanized letters (so that Western telegraphic systems could be used in sending them). This was done by using the katakana (literally, ‘borrowed words’), a syllabary that expresses Japanese words phonetically. The words were then encoded by looking up each syllable.
When the cryptanalysts discovered that LA encrypted only insignificant messages, such as expense or vacation reports, and when they had gained more knowledge of Japanese diplomatic language and communications practices, they then focused on more important messages. These were protected by electromechanical machines that enciphered messages at one end and deciphered them at the other. The machines produced more complicated ciphers because they constantly changed the enciphered letters as the cipher clerk typed the message. Only a counterpart machine, properly set and advancing at the same pace as the sender’s, could decipher the message. That system served two main Japanese diplomatic communication networks–one covering the Far East, the other linking Tokyo with major world capitals.
As difficult as machine systems are, however, study of the cryptograms did yield clues. Vowels, for instance, had a relatively higher frequency than consonants. It appeared that the machine divided the romanized alphabet (used in the katakana transliteration) into two subsets, the six vowels and the twenty consonants. Working with one of the less garbled intercepts, and perhaps with some help from the Navy’s solution of another Japanese cipher machine, Rowlett and Solomon Kullback, one of the other original junior cryptanalysts, struck gold one day: Among their tentative recoveries of plaintext were three letters followed by an unknown and then another letter: oyobi. They knew then that they had cracked the system, because oyobi is romanized Japanese for ‘and.’ They named this machine system Red (not related to the Red Code).
By 1937, for the first time in American history, solutions of foreign messages began going to the White House, probably to President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Gentlemen were once again reading someone else’s mail. It revealed, for instance, advance information about Italy’s possible adherence to the German-Japanese Anti-Comintern Pact. This was in March 1937, six months before American diplomats began reporting on it. Later it provided part of the text of the treaty.
The next year, messages began to appear suggesting that a new machine would supplement and probably eventually replace the older one, which was wearing out. On February 20, 1939, three messages in the new system were intercepted, and over the next three months messages in Red gradually disappeared. Japan’s major diplomatic messages had become unreadable. Faced with the loss of the nation’s paramount intelligence source the SIS mounted a concentrated attack to solve the new machine. Friedman put Rowlett in charge and exercised overall supervision himself. The Americans called the new machine Purple, perhaps in part because its deeper hue fit its deeper mystery.
These half-dozen cryptanalysts were providing the United States with its best secret intelligence on Japan as relations with that nation, which was persisting in its aggression against China, deteriorated. The cryptanalysts plunged into their work in Rooms 3416 and 3418 in the Munitions Building. Room 3418, about 25 feet square with a steel door secured by a combination lock and with barred windows, was known as the vault. As additional cryptanalysts were assigned to the Purple problem, the group moved into larger quarters, finally occupying about eight rooms.
Rowlett worked in Room 3416. His desk was usually neat, for he spread out his worksheets on a nearby table. He was extremely focused on the work, arriving at 7 a.m., an hour early, and leaving at 5 p.m., an hour late. He never hummed or chewed his pencil or muttered to himself; he looked out the window only when something distracted him; he never drank coffee at work, though he did puff on a pipe. His mind did not dwell on the cryptanalytic problems during the 15-minute drive to work from Arlington County, but each morning he would exchange ideas with the other cryptanalysts–Robert O. Ferner, Albert W. Small, Genevieve Grotjan and Mary Jo Dunning, assisted by Leo Rosen, Sam Snyder, Kenneth D. Miller, Glenn S. Landig and Cyrus C. Sturis, Jr.–whose names deserve to be remembered. After the conference, they all would return to their desks. Quiet reigned as they pored over the intercepts, most of which had been teletyped in from the monitoring stations; sometimes they puzzled over statistical and alphabetical tables compiled from the intercepts. Only the rustling of papers and the scratching of pencils disturbed the silence, although for a time the banging and hammering of workmen on another floor proved frustrating.
Reconstructing a cipher system is like solving an immensely complicated scientific problem, with this difference: Nature does not deliberately conceal her secrets. The researchers concoct hypotheses and test them. If x stands for e, will the other cipher-to-plain equivalents that it entails make sense? Or will they merely yield gibberish, or lead to a self-contradiction? Can one recovered alphabet be linked with another? There is no clear way to the answer, as there is in the algebra problems posed in math classes. Particularly in the early stages of a difficult cryptanalysis, the work is one of the most excruciating, agonizing, tantalizing, compelling mental processes known to humans–and, when successful, one of the most satisfying.
Purple had carried over from Red the division of letters into groups of six and 20 letters. But by now the six were not exclusively vowels. Nevertheless, within a few weeks the cryptanalysts ascertained how they were enciphered. This enabled the team to recover the plaintext for those letters. The process was slow and painstaking. Assigned to devise a way to mechanize this pencil-and-paper method, Rosen hit upon the idea of using telephone selector switches, employed in dialing. They worked like a dream, and the solution process was considerably speeded up.
Despite Rosen’s remarkable advance, the totality of Purple still resisted the Americans. Friedman, who had been supervising the work rather loosely, was asked by his bosses–all extremely supportive, financially as well as psychologically–to participate personally. His genius helped considerably. The Navy also lent a hand temporarily, organizing its files the same way as the Army’s to facilitate cooperation. After about four months, however, the Navy returned to its main effort, Japanese naval codes. The SIS pushed ahead. Within Rowlett’s group, teamwork was extremely close; determination was pervasive. No one complained that a task was too menial. Rowlett was confident from the start that they would reconstruct the Purple mechanism the way he and others had reconstructed the Red Code. He never got depressed, even though months went by without a solution. As they sought a breakthrough, the cryptanalysts spent much of their time trying to match possible plaintext–guesses, often educated, as to the cipher-text, or encoded language and numbers. Early in the effort, for example, many identical Japanese telegrams were sent to multiple addresses; some of the telegrams were composed using the Red machine, some the Purple. The cryptanalysts could read Red, which then gave them the text of the same Purple messages. They knew, too, that many diplomatic dispatches began ‘I have the honor to inform Your Excellency that…’ and they often tried that as the start of the plaintext. In a very few cases, the State Department gave them the text of notes to or from the Japanese ambassadors, which the code-breakers used as cribs.
The code-breakers had to make all sorts of guesses. They theorized that the Purple machine would have to advance in some regular fashion, that its mechanism would have to click forward at some prescribed rate. Suppose, for example, that the probable plaintext word Japan was guessed. If the probable a‘s were represented in the cipher-text by, say, x and z, then the cryptographers could hypothesize that the encoding machine had simply moved forward one space with each new letter: x for a, something for p, and z for the next a.
More than a year of painstaking trial-and-error work passed. Then, about 2 p.m. on a warm Friday, September 20, 1940–in the middle of Franklin Roosevelt’s campaign for an unprecedented third term and while Britain anxiously awaited a German invasion from occupied France–Albert Small noticed that Grotjan, a 26-year-old statistician, seemed to be concentrating extremely intently. When he asked, she told him that she had just discovered a couple of the needed intervals and was looking hard for others. He took her in to see Rowlett, who was conferring with Ferner. Grotjan showed the men her discoveries; then a third interval leaped out at the code-breakers. They saw at once that these intervals proved that their concept of Purple was correct. The ebullient Small dashed around the room, hands clasped above his head. Ferner, normally phlegmatic, shouted, ‘Hooray!’ Rowlett jumped up and down. ‘That’s it! That’s it!’ Everybody crowded around. Friedman came in ‘What’s all the noise about?’ he asked. Rowlett showed him Grotjan’s findings. He understood immediately. Grotjan’s discovery constituted the decisive breakthrough in the solution of Purple–it was the greatest moment in the history of American code-breaking. And what did the egghead cryptanalysts do? They sent out for Coca-Colas!
When the euphoria and the effects of the colas had worn off, the cryptanalysts drifted back to work. Grotjan, who seems to have gotten excited about the breakthrough mainly because everybody else did, soberly regarded it as just one step in a series of steps. A week later–the day after Japan started to occupy French Indochina and the very day the Tripartite Pact establishing the RomeBerlinTokyo axis was signed–the SIS handed in its first two solutions of Purple messages. That did not mean its work was done. The settings for the machine changed each day, and the cryptanalysts had to recover these. But the work was facilitated by Rosen’s construction of two American analogues of the Japanese Purple machine, at a cost of $684.65. Later, additional copies of the machine were built, several at the Washington Navy Yard. Some of them were given to the Navy, which had rejoined the Purple work to help with the heavy volume of solutions, and some to the British, so they could read the messages without having to wait for American solutions to be forwarded to them.
Soon Navy Lieutenant Francis A. Raven discovered a pattern to the daily setting changes. With this knowledge, the Americans were able to read reports from and instructions to Japan’s ambassadors on average within a day or so, sometimes within hours. They had gained access to the most secret diplomatic dispatches of the empire of Japan as relations continued to worsen, with an American embargo on the export of iron and steel scrap and, later, with the movement of Japanese forces toward Thailand.
The beginning of wisdom in cryptology is to know that there was no such thing as ‘the’ Japanese code, for Purple was not the only cryptographic system of Japan’s Foreign Ministry, much less the empire. The Japanese Foreign Ministry employed a hierarchy of systems, of which Purple was the apex. Under it came several codes that–unlike Purple, which served embassies exclusively–were used at both embassies and consulates. LA, the simplest, lay at the bottom. Above it rested a two-part system, PA-K2. More complex still was the Foreign Ministry’s J series of codes. The K transposition key for these codes changed daily; the code-breakers had to undertake a fresh analysis with each day’s messages. Some 10 to 15 percent were not solved at all, and those that were took an average of a week from interception through translation to distribution.
By contrast, most Purple messages were solved within hours, and all but 2 to 3 percent of the keys were recovered. Did the Japanese err in assessing the security of their cryptographic systems? Yes and no. Purple was a much more difficult system to solve in the first place, but once solved it was easier to keep up with.
While the Army concentrated on Japan’s diplomatic systems, the Navy’s code-breaking agency–except for its occasional help to the Army–focused on Japan’s naval systems. The agency, again under Safford, now a commander, was called OP-20-G. During the 1930s it continued to read messages in what it called the Blue Code, gaining considerable knowledge about Japan’s naval maneuvers. That code was replaced on November 1, 1938. But the paucity of intercepts in the new code, which the Americans called the flag officer’s code, meant that almost no progress was made in reading it.
On June 1, 1939, the Japanese introduced yet another code. Called JN25 by the Americans, as it was the twenty-fifth Japanese naval code they attacked, it encoded messages dealing with naval operations. Aggie Driscoll, greatly helped by Lieutenant Prescott Currier, attacked the new code. About a year and a half later, in almost the very week that the Army was producing its first Purple solutions, the first JN25 solutions emerged. But the Navy’s satisfaction did not last long. On December 1, 1940, the Imperial Navy substituted a new version, which the Americans called JN25b. But the Japanese foolishly kept the prior version’s latest encipherment in force for the first two months of JN25b’s service. This bared the underlying code and permitted the quick determination of the meaning of 2,000 code groups. When the new encipherment went into effect, OP-20-G requested that the radio intelligence unit on Corregidor Island in the Philippines help with its search for a solution. A British code-breaking unit in Singapore exchanged recoveries of JN25b code groupings with Corregidor. Despite all these efforts, the code remained readable only to a very small degree. By December 1941, only 10 to 15 percent of each message could be understood.
That then was the cryptanalytic situation with Japan on December 6, 1941: The main diplomatic system could be read rapidly and completely; other diplomatic and consular systems could be read with a few days’ delay; the main naval system could be read only slightly.
Nearly all intercepts came from Army or Navy stations listening to commercial frequencies such as RCA’s, which radioed messages from Japan. The intercepts were sent to the SIS or OP-20-G by teleprinter, airmail, courier or radio, re-enciphered in an American system. Translation was a bottleneck because of the difficulty of finding enough qualified people who understood Japanese. On the other hand, not all of the Purple messages were in Japanese: Some of the notes, intended to be handed to the State Department, were in English.
Fifty to 75 intercepts were solved and translated each day. The most important of these were selected for distribution to a handful of high-level officials: the president; the secretaries of state, war and the Navy; the chief of staff and the chief of naval operations; the war plans chiefs of the two services; and some intelligence officers. Fourteen copies of each were typed up, some for the files, and intelligence officers carried them in locked briefcases to these officials, calling attention to some of the more critical dispatches and explaining obscure references. Then they took the papers back with them and burned them. As a cover, the intelligence was called Magic.
What did these messages say? Many revealed the empire’s reaction to world events and American policies. They included the reports of and the instructions to the Japanese emissaries. ‘If the United States expresses too many points of disagreement to Proposal A,’ Tokyo cabled its ambassadors in Washington on November 5 in a Purple message that the Navy solved the same day, ‘and if it becomes apparent that an agreement cannot be reached, we intend to submit our absolutely final proposal, Proposal B (contained in my message #727).’ That other message had been intercepted and solved the day before. Messages to and from the consulates frequently dealt with the movement of U.S. Navy warships into and out of the harbor. On November 15, Tokyo told Honolulu in the J19 code, ‘As relations between Japan and the United States are most critical, make your’ships in harbor’ report irregular, but at a rate of twice a week.’ The Navy cracked that message on December 3.
By the fall of 1941, high levels in the U.S. government had become almost addicted to Magic. Secretary of State Cordell Hull, who looked upon Magic ‘as I would a witness who is giving evidence against his own side of the case,’ was ‘at all times intensely interested in the contents of the intercepts.’ The chief of army intelligence regarded Magic as the most reliable and authentic information that the War Department was receiving on Japanese intentions and activities. General George C. Marshall, the Army chief of staff, called it a ‘priceless asset.’ And when the president was not given Magic intelligence for a few days in November, through a bureaucratic mix-up, he specifically asked for it. This was the situation as the Pearl Harbor strike force slipped out of Japan’s naval bases to assemble in the foggy Kuril Islands north of the main islands of Japan, far from any prying eyes, thence to sail in utter silence across the empty wastes of the North Pacific toward its unsuspecting target: a palm-fringed inlet in Hawaii.
Some people have conjectured that this fabulous decoded information made it clear to Roosevelt and his advisers that Pearl Harbor was going to attacked. They say the president, wanting to bring the United States into the war on the side of Great Britain, traitorously suppressed this information and sacrificed American ships and American lives to achieve his goal. Various theories have been put forth to support this notion.
Safford himself, by then a captain, agreed. He based his argument upon the so-called winds code. Japan had notified its diplomatic posts in a J19-K10 circular telegram on November 19 that if diplomatic relations and international communications were likely to be cut off, it would warn these posts with a fake weather forecast in the middle of the Japanese shortwave news broadcast. If Japanese-American relations were in danger, the forecast would predict ‘east wind rain.’ American code-breakers solved this message on November 28. Immediately, a frantic effort was made to pick up this broadcast. Safford insisted that the ‘winds execute’–the forecast–was heard on December 4 and that the intercept was subsequently removed from the files as part of a coverup. Virtually no one has supported this contention. But even assuming that an execute message had been transmitted, it would at best confirm that relations were strained. In no way could it point to Pearl Harbor.
Rear Admiral Edwin T. Layton has argued that the lack of a Purple machine in Hawaii prevented Admiral Husband Kimmel and General Walter Short, the commanders there, from using Magic-provided information on international affairs to illuminate their situation. This would have enabled them to predict the attack, Layton has claimed. But this is speculation, supported only by hindsight. Moreover, the presence of a Purple machine in the Philippines did not prevent the American forces from being surprised.
Author John Toland found several former radio operators who had been listening in San Francisco or at sea. They said that in the week before December 7, they had heard a cacophony of radio signals from northwest of Hawaii–presumably the strike force heading for Pearl Harbor. They said they reported this, to no effect. But this story founders because, according to the Japanese, the strike force maintained absolute radio silence throughout its voyage. And American naval intercept units, straining to pick up whatever they could on the Japanese naval circuits, heard nothing. U.S. radio-intelligence operators knew that several carriers had dropped out of the traffic picture. They thought that the ships were in home waters, covering a movement to the south–the Philippines or the oil- and rubber-rich Dutch East Indies. Carrier communications had likewise vanished in February and July 1941, and naval radio-intelligence operators hypothesized then that the carriers had been held near Japan–a hypothesis later determined to be factual. But what happened then was not what was happening in December.
Several writers have suggested that the solution of the many messages dealing with ship movements in and out of Pearl Harbor should have alerted the authorities to the impending attack. But similar messages were transmitted about the Philippines, the Panama Canal, San Francisco, San Diego and Seattle. In fact, from August 1 to December 6, 59 such intercepts dealt with the Philippines and only 20 with Hawaii. The writers have pointed to one intercept, instructing the consulate in Hawaii to divide the Pearl Harbor anchorage into smaller areas for more precise reporting of ship locations, as a clear indication of a forthcoming attack. That is hindsight. At the time, the authorities viewed it merely as evidence of the thoroughness of Japanese intelligence or of the need to abbreviate communications.
James Rusbridger, in his book Betrayal at Pearl Harbor, claims that the British code-breaking unit at Singapore solved enough of JN25 to reveal the plan to attack Pearl Harbor and that this information was passed on to Prime Minister Winston Churchill, who withheld it from Roosevelt to ensure American entry into the war, thereby enabling the attack to succeed. Citing the Official Secrets Act, British authorities have denied Rusbridger any access to the records of the unit, and the U.S. Navy reports that it cannot find any of these JN25b solutions, partial or complete, from before December 7. His thesis rests on the memory of an Australian code-breaker working in Singapore. That is a slender reed upon which to base so heavy a charge. Moreover, Rusbridger does not distinguish between the a and b editions of JN25–and does not make clear why Churchill would try to get the Americans to fight Japan instead of Germany.
A retired communications intelligence analyst, Fred Parker, has dredged through the files of Japanese messages intercepted before Pearl Harbor but not solved until afterward. Though he has found no smoking gun, no message referring specifically to an attack on Pearl Harbor, he believes that the messages he has found point clearly to an impending attack there. He cites, for example, the presence of an oiler on what became the strike force’s homeward route and the broadcast of the message ‘Climb Mount Niitaka 1208.’ The oiler obviously was put there, he says, to refuel the returning ships. The 1208 in the message meant December 8, the attack date on the Tokyo side of the international date line. Mount Niitaka (Hsin-kao in Taiwan) was the highest peak in what was then the Japanese empire. Parker contends that a solution of these messages would have suggested an attack on Pearl Harbor. Like the other theories, however, this is hindsight.
Some historians have contended that if only the Army and Navy intelligence officers, and perhaps State Department officials as well, had found the time to analyze all the intercepts as a group, they would have discerned a pattern that pointed to Pearl Harbor. This argument resembles one that Roberta Wohlstetter made in her book Pearl Harbor: Warning and Decision, in which she holds that the noise of the false evidence drowned out the indications of the true signals: ‘We failed to anticipate Pearl Harbor not for want of the relevant materials, but because of a plethora of irrelevant ones.’ This is wrong. There were no true signals, no clear indications of the attack.
The fact is that code-breaking intelligence did not prevent and could not have prevented Pearl Harbor, because Japan never sent any message to anybody saying anything like ‘We shall attack Pearl Harbor.’ The ambassadors in Washington were never told of the plan. Nor were any other Japanese diplomats or consular officials. The ships of the strike force were never radioed any message mentioning Pearl Harbor. It was therefore impossible for the cryptanalysts to have discovered the plan.
What, then, is the answer to the joint congressional committee’s question? What about that ‘finest intelligence’? The simple answer is that, fine though it was, it was not fine enough. Perhaps if the United States had established intercept operators in the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo to obtain enough messages to make a solution of JN25b more likely, or had been able to buy a spy in the top circles of the Japanese government, or had been able somehow to fly aerial reconnaissance regularly above the island empire–then perhaps there might have been a chance that the Pearl Harbor attack would be detected in advance. None of these things could have been easily done. Even if they had, discovery of the plan would not have been certain. Japan had successfully closed all openings through which foreigners might gain information about its intentions. The real reason for the success of the Pearl Harbor attack lies in the island empire’s hermetic security. Despite the American code-breakers, Japan kept her secret. For Americans, the Rising Sun rose in eclipse.
This article was written by David Kahn and originally appeared in the May 2001 issue of World War II.
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b73e8ae3830636755c4a341f861a69fe | https://www.historynet.com/author-historian-t-j-stiles.htm | Author-Historian T.J. Stiles | Author-Historian T.J. Stiles
Author-historian T.J. Stiles must be running short on shelf space. The Minnesota native’s latest book, Custer’s Trials: A Life on the Frontier of a New America, won the 2016 Spur Award from Western Writers of America, the William H. Seward Award for excellence in Civil War biography and the Pulitzer Prize for history. It was Stiles’ second Pulitzer. His 2009 book The First Tycoon: The Epic Life of Cornelius Vanderbilt won the Pulitzer for biography as well as the National Book Award for nonfiction. His 2002 biography Jesse James: Last Rebel of the Civil War also captured its share of awards. Stiles took time from researching his latest project, about Chief Joseph and the Nez Perces, to speak with Wild West.
What’s it like winning two Pulitzers? It’s a hell of a thing. It drops in on you in the middle of an ordinary day, because the Pulitzer board announces the winners and finalists all at once—you only gather weeks or months later for the ceremony. (Kind of like the Spur Award, actually.) A second Pulitzer struck me as ridiculous to even contemplate. So I’m grateful and humbled. Grateful, because I really want to write books that are informative and insightful and also have some artistic merit; the Pulitzer is meant to recognize books with those qualities. At the same time how can I not feel incredibly lucky? With the number of good books published each year, someone else who deserved it didn’t get it because I did. That is humbling.
Which of your three biographies—Jesse James, The First Tycoon or Custer’s Trials—represents your best work? Each is very different from the other and satisfying for different reasons. Jesse James was a fugitive, so that biography had to be highly contextual. Connecting the available details of his life to the history of his era was a real pleasure. Vanderbilt’s life was vast. He was a kind of ruler, spinning plots, building empires. There’s a grandeur to that kind of storytelling, and intellectually it was wonderfully challenging. Custer left such rich trove of sources that I could write a more internal life than I could with Vanderbilt or James. It allowed me to write a more literary book—probing beneath the surface of his personality—and let me bring the women to center stage, which I couldn’t do in my other books.
Any similarities between your chosen subjects? The similarities are much closer with George Custer and Jesse James. If Vanderbilt thought someone was talking about himself too much, he’d cut him off by saying, “That amounts to nothing.” But Custer’s ambitions led him to constantly play a role for the public, and the same was true with Jesse James. All three men were gamblers who loved cards, but only Vanderbilt was any good at it. Both Custer and James got themselves into extremely hazardous situations, again and again, and had to find a way out; there was a self-destructive side to their personalities. Custer repeatedly got himself out of trouble with his skill in combat—until the Little Bighorn. And the argument over that will never end.
What about the men or their times drew you to write about them? I try to write the kind of book I like to read. I want to be transported to another place, to have the visceral pleasure of following a subject in peril, and to have those “aha” moments, when I come to see the world in a different way. The Civil War era, roughly speaking, is when the modern United States came into being. There are a lot of “aha” moments there. I also want to tell dramatic stories about individuals, and the few decades from the start of the California Gold Rush through Reconstruction and the end of the Indian wars is full of drama. If I do my job right, the historical context is integral to the story, making the lives of individuals even more compelling.
How do you set out to research both the principals and their historical periods? I read—through to the endnotes. I compile lists of primary sources. Sometimes I find surprises and delve into areas I didn’t expect. With Custer, for example, I found that during his supposedly quiet years in Kentucky there was a major federal offensive against the Ku Klux Klan, which really ran rampant in the state. I had to read even more than I expected to get a grip on the latest historical thinking. I never want to accept pat explanations. I want to delve into anything that seems off to me in other accounts. There’s a lot of instinct as well as method in research.
Why largely omit the battle from your book? My editor was entirely on board. Readers are sometimes thrown off, but the response has been terrific so far. I think that’s because keeping the Little Bighorn offstage really helps me recount Custer’s life in full; it doesn’t overshadow everything else in my book. I was inspired by James McPherson’s masterwork of history, Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era. When he got to Lincoln’s assassination, he left it entirely offstage. He ends one chapter with John Wilkes Booth swearing to kill Lincoln and starts the next with the aftermath of the assassination. It actually drives home the impact and significance of the event better than would a tick-tock account. In my case I wanted to acknowledge the importance of the Little Bighorn and sketch the basic course of events but not get sucked into it. I wanted to give the reader something of the experience of the American people at the time, who had to piece together what happened in the months and years that followed. I meant the experience to be jarring when I cut from Custer riding over the horizon to the opening of the Reno Court of Inquiry nearly two years later—in a fancy Chicago hotel, no less. And I don’t want to pretend that I have all the answers as to what happened. I left my account transparently incomplete, because there can be no definitive account. Libbie Custer herself could never truly know what happened, never answer all her questions, nor can we answer all of ours.
Which of his trials was the key to understanding Custer? Custer’s trials, real and metaphorical, must be taken together to make sense of the man. Each tells something different. His first court-martial, at West Point, resulted from his desire for social acceptance among other cadets. His second court-martial, in 1867, reflected his disbelief he was subject to the rules like everyone else. He had gotten himself into a professional mess by trying to fix a personal mess in his marriage—or so I think. Yet other trials by fire showed his strengths. In combat he was fierce but in command of himself, as he showed in the Civil War. His battles on the Yellowstone expedition in 1873 rescued him from a crisis in his relationship with Colonel David Stanley, the expedition commander.
Custer is one of those dichotomous figures. What was there to like/dislike about him? It took me an entire book to answer that question. Custer was complicated, with a mix of good and bad traits, who did good and bad things. Soldiers who served in combat with him admired his courage, his personal fighting skills, his tactical judgment. His friends loved his energy and emotional immediacy. He was intense, passionate and had an exuberant sense of humor—though his love of pranks showed a streak of cruelty. He was also brittle and defensive, a sign of the insecurities lying under his ongoing effort to be seen as extraordinary. His friends liked his flamboyance, but others thought it egotistical and vain. He was highly intelligent, intellectually curious and did all he could for his friends; he was also ambitious, opportunistic and disingenuous when it served his purpose. His personal experiences undermined the bigotry taught him by his father; but unlike many of his peers in the Army, he rejected racial equality, black citizenship and the possibility Indians could be civilized. He loved his wife, passionately, and was closely attuned to her, but his craving for female attention probably led him into infidelity and certainly created crises in his marriage, as did his addiction to gambling. I can see how he had both enemies and loyal friends.
What’s your impression of George and Libbie? It’s hard to reduce my opinion of the Custers to a sentence or two. We all know how contradictory real human beings are, yet the historical record often leaves us with a flat portrait of people in the past. By contrast the Custers come across as vividly human, boiling over with emotions, ideas and plans. Armstrong was an extraordinarily talented combat leader but was badly flawed as a manager. Libbie was extremely impressive—well educated, perceptive and stylish in a role that demanded style. She was able to see the unfairness of the limits on women and make friendships across the racial divide, yet in the end she accepted the hierarchies of her time, even as others rejected them. History is not made by archetypes but by people, full of flaws and strengths.
What continues to draw you to the American West? I see the history of the West as a continuous part of the history of the country as a whole. My book on Jesse James, who lived in a Western border state, led me to write about Cornelius Vanderbilt, a New Yorker, which led me to write about Custer, whose life spanned the North, South, East and West. But in the West everything was amplified, concentrated. There an industrializing power battled preindustrial nomads. A corporate economy intersected with cattle drives, bison hunts, traders and sodbusters. A very few people fought very big battles in a huge space—often over issues that went to the core of what America was all about. For a writer and historian what’s not to like?
What drew you to Chief Joseph and the Nez Perce? As I wrote Custer’s Trials, I saw how new ideas of individual equality, regardless of race, were used to undermine a very old idea of liberty—that of group rights. The most humanitarian politicians when it came to freed slaves used those same principles to attack the sovereignty of Indian nations. The same Congress that passed the Ku Klux Klan Act passed a law prohibiting any further treaties with Indian tribes. The Nez Perce War of 1877 was the last major Indian war fought over removal to a reservation—and the general who started it was Oliver O. Howard, a founder of Howard University and head of the Freedmen’s Bureau, providing a natural way of connecting this story to Reconstruction. Joseph lived through the long years that followed, facing federal attempts to break down tribal identity and assimilate individuals. It’s an important story for understanding the difficult history of freedom and equality in the United States.
How did you set about researching Joseph and his people? As I’m writing about someone else’s culture and history—actually several different cultures and histories, since many nations and bands are integral to the book—I have to approach the subject with respect and modesty. Regarding how to research Joseph: There are similarities to Jesse James, who left almost nothing by way of personal writings. To a great extent we have to learn about what Joseph said and did through others. As with Custer and James, the National Archives is a critical resource, whether sourcing accounts of General Howard’s negotiations with Joseph prior to the 1877 war or letters on conflicts with the federal agent on the Colville Resevation in 1886. There are long stretches of his life for which we have few details, so the historical context and secondary characters will play an important role in tying the entire story together. But I have a lot of work yet to do.
What’s next? I have no idea what I’ll do after this forthcoming book. I’d like another change of direction, perhaps into the 20th century. I like to tell good stories and ask big questions. The questions usually lead me to the story, but I have to answer the questions I have for this book before I can ask new ones. WW
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6f1c21aa580815c2b91e45b62a4c87b2 | https://www.historynet.com/avengers-doolittle-raid.htm | The Avengers: The Doolittle Raid | The Avengers: The Doolittle Raid
Four Doolittle Raiders recall the mission that rocked Japan.
The first bombs, four 500-pound incendiary clusters, began tumbling down to Tokyo on Saturday, April 18, 1942, at precisely 12:20 p.m. While little is known of Sergeant Fred A. Braemer’s aim, his timing— as well as that of his brother bombardiers who toggled release switches over targets in Tokyo, Yokohama, Kobe, Nagoya, and Osaka that historic day—was nothing short of perfect.
The Doolittle Raid occurred just days after the fall of Bataan in the Philippines, the crowning catastrophe in a string of demoralizing defeats spanning Pearl Harbor to the Dutch East Indies. It delivered a desperately needed booster shot of morale to the American people, as well as an aerial antidote to the virulent “victory disease” that had swept Japan. The bombs caused little physical damage, but effectively exploded the myth of Imperial Japan’s invincibility and prodded its warlords into making strategic missteps that shifted the course of the Pacific War.
Sixteen U.S. Army B-25 medium bombers, manned by 80 volunteers, powered off the plunging deck of the USS Hornet on that gray, wind-whipped April morning. Five of these heroes lived to see the raid’s 70th anniversary in 2012; four of them attended the commemoration event held at the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force in Dayton, Ohio. There, once the roar of radial engines receded after a flyover of restored B-25s, these last living links to one of the war’s most impossible missions shared the following reflections on the raid, its legacy, their legendary leader, and their extraordinary experiences.
VOLUNTEERS FOR AN “EXTREMELY HAZARDOUS mission”—culled from the 17th Bomb Group, on antisubmarine patrol off the West Coast—arrived at Florida’s Eglin Field in March 1942 for three weeks of intense training and a full introduction to their commander, Lieutenant Colonel James L. Doolittle.
U.S. Air Force
Second Lieutenant Richard E. Cole, 97
Copilot to Doolittle, Crew No. 1, B-25 No. 40-2344
Colonel Doolittle was one of the nicest, best militarily-formed, educated a person that you’d ever want to meet. A straight shooter, he led by example—particularly the development of teamwork. He stressed the importance of being a team member. Even though he was the team chief, he was a team member. So, to this day, the Raiders don’t like to be singled out.
Sergeant David J. Thatcher, 91 Engineer-Gunner, Crew No. 7, The Ruptured Duck
I was in the 95th Squadron—there were four squadrons involved in the raid. We had good flying weather at Eglin, so it enabled us to complete all the training: Flying out over the Gulf of Mexico on the bombing range. Exciting low-level flying, 50 feet off the ground all the time. We didn’t know what we were training for, but morale wasn’t very good for the Allies at the time. The Japanese were advancing through the Pacific and the war in Europe wasn’t going well, either. There was this feeling of urgency. We had a job to do.
ON APRIL 2, THE HORNET and its escort ships put to sea from Alameda, California. The flotilla was joined by the Enterprise-led Task Force 16, under Admiral William “Bull” Halsey. During the tension-filled voyage, the Raiders attended briefings by Doolittle and Lieutenant Commander Steve Jurika, a former naval attaché in Japan, on target selection and escape and evasion. Hornet Captain Marc Mitscher, Doolittle, and Jurika hosted a ceremony that lives on in Raider lore.
Lieutenant Cole They had the bombs that we were going to use, the high-explosive bombs, and Jurika had gotten some medals from the Japanese when he was in the embassy in Japan and he gave them to Colonel Doolittle, who tied them to the tail of the bombs. It was payback time.
THE KLAXON CALLS TO GENERAL QUARTERS sounded at 7:44 a.m. on April 18: a Japanese ship had sighted the U.S. strike force. Though the force was still roughly 170 nautical miles from the intended launch point, at 8 a.m. Halsey erred on the side of caution: “Launch planes. To Col. Doolittle and Gallant Crew: Good Luck and God Bless You.” As the Hornet pitched in the tumultuous seas, the B-25s rumbled airborne and began winging toward Japan in staggered formations at wave-top level. They arrived over their targets just after noon, some greeted by antiaircraft fire and enemy planes.
Lieutenant Cole Everybody thought taking off would be the most difficult thing. It turned out to be one of the easiest. We had plenty of wind and the weather helped; the fact that the ship was moving up and down and around made no difference. When the alert sounded, my first thought was, get to the airplane first. That’s the name of the game as a copilot: get there before the pilot. Otherwise, you get in a one-way conversation! But during the flight Doolittle was very naturally determined and we had no chitchat. Everything was business. When we made landfall, my first impression was that Japan is very nice looking, lots of greenery, well organized. A nice beach. It was like flying over Florida. I had no bad thoughts. I think it’s a waste of time to think about bad things when you can think about good things.
See also: Jimmy Doolittle Reminisces about World War II
U.S. Air Force
Sergeant Edward J. Saylor, 93
Engineer, Crew No. 15, TNT
I took a tug of whiskey right after takeoff. It was the first and last time I ever drank on duty. I didn’t expect to survive the mission. But this was the first combat we had ever been in— hadn’t seen any war movies yet, so we didn’t quite know what to be scared of! [Saylor’s crew hit the Kawasaki Aircraft Factory in Nagoya.] The Japanese could have shot us down, but we surprised them. They thought they couldn’t be hit.
Second Lieutenant Thomas C. Griffin, 96
Navigator, Crew No. 9, Whirling Dervish
Don’t let the guy tell you he was never afraid, when shells are going by you. [Griffin’s crew encountered perhaps the fiercest antiaircraft fire of the raid during its attack on the Tokyo Gas and Electric Company.] Somehow I went through the whole war and was never wounded by a bullet or piece of flak. But on the raid, was I scared? Well, let’s put it this way: I was concerned!
Sergeant Thatcher
We took off at about 9 a.m. and reached Japan about noon. Once we got over the beach, six airplanes came toward us. We were flying so low, I don’t think they saw us. Before we reached Tokyo, we could see antiaircraft fire ahead of us. We were flying right over the ground the whole time, but we had to climb to 1,500 feet to drop our bombs. Our target was the Nippon Steel Factory. We had three 500-pound demolition bombs and one 500-pound incendiary cluster. The demolition bombs exploded and then the incendiary cluster spread out over the area and started fires. There were so many good targets, we couldn’t miss.
VIDEO: Reunion of the 1942 Doolittle Raiders
THE RAID WAS ONLY THE BEGINNING of the expedition. The crew of one B-25 was interned by the Soviets when they landed in Vladivostok. The other 15 bombers maintained a southwest heading toward secret airfields in China’s Zhejiang Province, but as their fuel-starved engines sputtered dead, the crews were forced to bail out, blindly, into stormy darkness before their B-25s splashed into the China Sea or crashed inland.
Lieutenant Cole
People often ask me, what was the most difficult part of the mission? I’ll tell you: standing in an airplane, with the hatch open, at 9,000 feet, in the middle of a big thunderstorm and so forth, and trying to make a decision about jumping out or not!
Sergeant Saylor
The decision to launch early added extra miles to our trip. We didn’t have enough gas. We landed in the China Sea. Our plane done real good on the water landing, bouncing on top of the waves, and came to a rest. It stayed up for 10 minutes. We got out of the airplane and into the life raft, and everything was going pretty good—and then we pushed off the airplane and the aileron snagged a hole in our life raft and we lost half our inflation. There was a rope attached to it that I hung onto all the way ashore, about a half mile or so. We pretty much came in on the tide.
Sergeant Thatcher
That night, it was dark and rainy. I was in the back of the plane when it crashed and I got knocked unconscious for a while, but that was about all. I realized that the airplane was upside down. We hit the water with our wheels down; the plane nosed over. I was the only one able to walk. I was able to get out and help the other four members of the crew up on shore. [For his efforts in aiding his badly wounded crewmates, Thatcher received the Silver Star.] They had been thrown out through the nose. I went back the next morning to see how much damage was done to the plane. The front, where the bombardier compartment was, it was smashed. If they hadn’t been thrown out, they’d have never got out alive.
Lieutenant Griffin
We didn’t know what we were going to run into or how far we were going to get. It was just a day when we had to improvise as we went along. The thought was, maybe ditch next to a ship and be taken aboard—a friendly ship, hopefully. And then we went west across the China Sea thinking that we might possibly make it to the coast and we did. In fact, we got a good tail wind, which helped us a great deal. We flew down through a canyon and got as much as 300 miles inland before we bailed out. I was hung up in a bamboo tree. I knew we were on the side of a mountain. And rather than get down and stumble around in the dark, I just stayed up there all night. The next morning, I climbed down and made my way down the mountain.
For more on the Doolittle Raid, click here to check out our story Countdown to Doolittle Raid
THE WEEKS AHEAD WERE CHARACTERIZED by fear, flight, and the bonds of wartime friendship. Two crews would be captured by the Japanese and subjected to mock trial proceedings. Three Raiders were executed, and one perished in captivity. The majority of the Raiders, however, would live to fight another day, thanks to the aid of Chinese peasants, guerrillas, and government officials. This bravery and loyalty, however, commanded an enormous price: 250,000 Chinese were killed by the Japanese in a retaliatory campaign. The Raiders remain eternally grateful for the help they received.
Sergeant Saylor
With all that training we had, we could have used some survival training, because we had to dodge the Japanese army for a couple of weeks. That was kind of scary. We finally figured out that they were tracking us by our shoes, our footprints. Our shoes had heels; none of the Chinese guerrillas’ shoes did. We were hiding in a Buddhist temple and they tracked us right up to the temple. The Chinese led us back into a cave; the Japanese spent about two hours trying to find us, but after awhile, they gave up. The Chinese did all that they could to help us. In this part of China, there was no transportation, no railroads or anything. We headed for Chungking, which was the provisional capital of China, and here we were on the eastern coast, 2,000 miles away, but we started walking! We ran into a Chinese boy, about 14 or 15 years old; he spoke good English. His family had all been killed in the war. He took up with us and he became our navigator, our interpreter, and our food scrounger. We tried to find him after the war, but couldn’t. I won’t forget him—his name was Pu An.
Sergeant Thatcher
The Chinese underground, the guerrillas, got us out of there. The Chinese had blown up all the roads and highways along the coast to prevent the Japanese from advancing. All we had were trails through the rice paddies. I was walking and the wounded were being carried in sedan chairs. We got into free territory about two days after the crash, but there was no medical help. It took us another day of traveling, about 25 miles, to get to the hospital at Linhai. There we met our first interpreters, a Chinese doctor and his son, who was also a doctor. That was the first medical attention my crewmates received. So by then, the infection had set in and that’s why Ted Lawson had to have his leg amputated. [In 1943 Captain Lawson wrote the earliest firsthand account of the raid, Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo, which became a motion picture of the same name in 1944.]
Lieutenant Cole
Colonel Doolittle always said, whatever happens, you can blame it on him. He took that blame. Sergeant Paul Leonard, the crew chief that went to where the airplane crashed, he related his conversation with Doolittle to me and to the rest of the crew. Doolittle was very depressed. He said that he might end up in Leavenworth. Paul said, ‘No, you’re going to be promoted and get the Congressional Medal of Honor. And if you ever have another airplane, I’m going to be your crew chief.’ I remember meeting General He Yangling at a place…I don’t know whether it was his house or not, but he had a telephone. [Yangling was a provincial official in the area of Tianmu Mountain, near Chuchow, who provided invaluable assistance to the downed Americans.] Doolittle was interested with the telephone to try and find out where every airplane was and where every person was. He spent a lot of time on the telephone. Despite his own feelings of failure, he was worried about us, his men, first.
THE RAIDERS REMAIN SURPRISED at the raid’s lasting lure— which is largely attributable to numerous book and film portrayals, such as the recent Pearl Harbor (2001). But they also understand the significance of their singular accomplishment, and hope their story will endure when they’re gone.
Sergeant Thatcher
At the time, we didn’t think it was important at all. We thought it was just another bombing mission. We figured people would forget about it by now!
Lieutenant Griffin
Hollywood has done a fairly good job portraying us, the Doolittle Raid. But it is Hollywood. Of course, they had to have a lot of women, girlfriends, you know, saying goodbye to the boys before they got in the planes. That’s what the ladies like to see. That’s very important. If you don’t do that, you don’t sell many tickets! But the bigger message gets through. I knew even back then when we accomplished the bombing of Tokyo—and those of us that got back into China alive knew— that we had accomplished something special.
Lieutenant Cole
I hope that [future generations] remember that we were just a member of a big force that finally got rid of the Axis. And we did it by everybody doing something, contributing. And people come up to thank me—we are grateful that we had the opportunity to serve!
THE DOOLITTLE RAIDERS plan to meet for their 71st reunion in April 2013 at Fort Walton Beach, Florida, the home of Eglin Air Force Base.
Originally published in the April 2013 issue of World War II. To subscribe, click here.
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2e01ecc52e1f6806340dcfaf554757a1 | https://www.historynet.com/aviation-history-book-review-red-knight-germany.htm | Aviation History Book Review: The Red Knight of Germany | Aviation History Book Review: The Red Knight of Germany
The Red Knight of Germany: The Story of Baron von Richthofen by Floyd Gibbons
Two dollars doesn’t seem like much today, but it was a whole lot of dough in 1947, when I plunked it down at Amatin’s bookshop in St. Louis for a well-worn copy of The Red Knight of Germany. It was the first book I’d ever purchased, the start of what became a 7,000-volume library. And it was worth every penny.
In those days there were no giants in the field such as Peter Kilduff or Norman Franks, scholars who pore over the daily returns of the squadrons, cross-check archives and present almost every conceivable fact about Manfred von Richthofen’s life. The Red Knight was a flamboyant adventure story written by Floyd P. Gibbons, a foreign correspondent who lost an eye on the Western Front while trying to rescue an American soldier. Far better than most period accounts, Gibbons’ book established the image of von Richthofen as revealed through the baron’s hastily written autobiography, interviews, correspondence and selected reports. Gibbons worked in an evenhanded style, not so much glorifying von Richthofen, as German accounts did, but presenting him as a dedicated warrior burdened with foibles that made him seem all the more human.
Later writers and filmmakers have drawn heavily on Gibbons’ colorful portrait of the Red Baron. As a result of Gibbons’ portrayal, the Fokker triplane and von Richthofen himself have become part of popular culture. You can be sure Charles Schultz read The Red Knight of Germany as a background to Snoopy’s tour as a Sopwith Camel pilot.
Gibbons subscribed to the then-sacred truth of Roy Brown’s victory over the Red Baron, of course, and often embellished his narrative with some imaginary color. But for the most part his words ring true, and it is evident he tried to be scrupulously fair.
No matter how well informed you are about the Red Baron, I urge you to read Gibbons’ work to get the flavor of the times, and a sympathetic—almost affectionate— story of a fallen enemy.
Originally published in the November 2011 issue of Aviation History. To subscribe, click here.
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95761a1d5a26529a45291ebddf9a18d4 | https://www.historynet.com/aviation-history-book-review-squadron-303.htm | Aviation History Book Review: Squadron 303 | Aviation History Book Review: Squadron 303
Squadron 303: The Polish Fighter Squadron with the R.A.F. by Arkady Fiedler, 1943.
Arkady Fiedler, a Polish-born writer of popular travelogues, reached his zenith as a wordsmith when he chronicled the impressive early exploits of free Polish fighter pilots flying with the Royal Air Force in the historic air battle to save Britain in the summer of 1940. His poignant account focused on No. 303 Squadron, also known as the Kosciuszko Squadron, which distinguished itself from the day it entered combat in the final climatic weeks of the clash. It was a time, as Fiedler’s eloquently crafted book makes clear, in which human destiny hung in the balance.
The squadron was named after 18th-century Polish war hero Tadeusz Kosciuszko, whose Lafayette-like example during the Revolutionary War had inspired American volunteers to form a flying unit in 1919 to help defend Poland against the Soviet Union. Twenty-one years later, the Poles proudly fighting under this banner not only helped fend off Britain’s tormenters, but sought to eventually liberate their besieged homeland from the latest in a long string of foreign occupiers. Fiedler vividly describes these Polish fliers’ aerial victories, which resulted in one of the top squadron tallies by the end of the Battle of Britain.
The Polish airmen were initially greeted with skepticism by their British hosts. But once the shooting started and the expatriates were given the opportunity to avenge the loss of their country, it soon became clear that they were extraordinarily effective warriors in their Hawker Hurricanes.
Security concerns prompted Fiedler to use pseudonyms in his wartime book rather than the pilots’ actual names. With the publication of a new translation on the 70th anniversary of the Battle of Britain, the names were incorporated. Also, when Fiedler wrote this highly inspirational story about the forces of good triumphing over the forces of evil, he had no way of knowing that the pilots he so revered would sadly have their dream of a free Poland deferred until the collapse of the Iron Curtain a generation later.
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b2843ee7900176ef254b70ce1afc4d02 | https://www.historynet.com/aviation-history-book-review-the-flying-tigers.htm | Aviation History Book Review: The Flying Tigers | Aviation History Book Review: The Flying Tigers
The Flying Tigers: The Untold Story of the American Pilots Who Waged a Secret War Against Japan by Sam Kleiner, Viking, 2018, $28.
The American Volunteer Group (AVG) that helped China fend off Japanese invaders in the first seven months after Pearl Harbor has probably been detailed in books and assorted media more extensively than any other combat flying organization, so the subtitle of this new book on the legendary Flying Tigers will raise eyebrows with its claim that this is an “untold story.”
While the author benefitted from previously unavailable letters and diaries, these materials only reinforce the longstanding narrative. Publisher hyperbole aside, this is a well-told story by a gifted debut author whose talent has been to weave the disparate parts of this familiar yet complex history into a cohesive, fast-paced whole.
We are reminded that the pilots joined for varied reasons—some for the money, others because of a belief in the cause and still others for the sheer adventure. They were a colorful bunch whose exploits in the air satisfied the thirst back home for heroes at a time when reports of enemy advances around the globe left little cause for cheer. Appropriately, the author focuses on the group’s maverick commander, Claire Lee Chennault, a loyalist of Generalissimo and Madame Chiang Kai-shek who saw in China the opportunity to prove his airpower theory that stressed the primacy of the fighter.
Other major figures such as pilots Tex Hill, Jack Newkirk and R.T. Smith are covered with a flair that captures them in all their glory. Longtime enthusiasts will enjoy retracing well-worn territory while newcomers to the subject will relish this thoroughly researched and finely modulated account of courageous young men at war. Highly recommended.
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babdc0c4f23d6e2e096d8ee3fde3e445 | https://www.historynet.com/aviation-history-briefing-july-2009.htm | Aviation History Briefing- July 2009 | Aviation History Briefing- July 2009
Barn Cub Found
Every collector’s dream is to come across a “barn find,” though often the discovery doesn’t involve a barn. It can be a Merlin engine spotted in a junkyard, a decrepit Stearman parked in a field, Spad wings stored in a warehouse. A remarkable recent find, in fact, involved a Texas ranch hangar: Parked inside it was a 1946 Piper J-3 Cub with only 197 hours in its logbook—the equivalent of a ’46 Ford with 6,000 miles on its odometer— that was last flown in July 1950.
NC7057H was bought new in 1946 by rancher Charles Moseley, who flew it from the Piper factory in Pennsylvania to his sheep ranch near Austin, where both he and his daughter, Charlotte, used it purely as a utility plane: Moseley owned two small ranches, and the plane shuttled between them. When he sold the second ranch in 1950, there was no more use for the Cub, so it was pushed into its hangar and forgotten.
Over the years, a large tree grew directly in front of the hangar door. Untouched but safely out of the weather, the Cub’s fabric eventually sloughed off the wings and fuselage, hanging in tatters. The Plexiglas windows yellowed and the seat fabric disintegrated. The hangar roof settled above the Cub, but the airplane’s rubber landing-gear bungees gave out and the gear legs spread to their stops, saving the aircraft from being crushed.
When 22-year-old Jared Calvert learned about the plane, he assumed it was a runout old bird and would be a good candidate to re-engine and modify. Little did he know that he was about to acquire the lowest-time, most original Cub in the world. Calvert hopes to have it flying again before the end of the year and will restore it to close-to-original condition, with modern fabric (the original was cotton) treated with classic butyrate dope. He’ll have the six original panel instruments rebuilt, but the plywood floorboards simply need refinishing. The Cub’s little 60-hp Continental engine turns freely and has surprising compression, though Calvert will, of course, have it rebuilt.
A college student, Calvert also finds time to help out at the Ranger Airfield, a historic West Texas strip (go to www.myspace. com/rangerairfield to read about its fascinating past and recent revival). When it’s restored, the Cub will be used to give rides at Ranger.
-Stephan Wilkinson
Canadian First Flight Reenacted
Nearly 1,500 spectators gathered on frozen Bras d’Or Lake in Nova Scotia on February 22 to watch a replica of Silver Dart— the first powered heavier than-air machine to fly in Canada—climb 35 feet and travel 4,000 feet in a reenactment of the original 1909 flight. The replica achieved amazing fidelity to the original airplane, incorporating two of its breakthroughs—wingtip ailerons and tricycle landing gear—that were the fruit of collaborations between chief designer Jack McCurdy, his mentor Alexander Graham Bell and Americans Thomas Selfridge and Glenn Curtiss. These innovations, along with a water-cooled 8-cylinder Curtiss engine not duplicated in the replica, made Silver Dart arguably the best and most controllable aircraft in the world at the time.
The Aerial Experiment Association 2005 of Welland, Ontario, built the Silver Dart replica over five years, using bamboo, ash, sitka spruce, Douglas fir, wire and friction tape. The group based its design on drawings in the Canadian Aviation Museum in Ottawa and the Alexander Graham Bell Museum in Baddeck. They substituted a 4-cylinder air-cooled Continental engine for the original, and included rudder pedals, rear wheel brakes, an instrument panel and seat belt and shoulder harness. AEA 2005 plans to remove the temporary equipment and convert the aircraft into a more exact reproduction—complete with Curtiss engine, replica copper radiator and wood propeller—before donating it to the Bell Museum.
Gerald Haddon, grandson of original Silver Dart pilot McCurdy, swooped in behind the replica in a helicopter, and described his vantage point as “picture perfect.” He added: “The big thing about flying the Silver Dart is you’ve got nobody to talk to. You only have your own experience and your wits with you to get you through the air.”
A lack of experience with the fragile bird almost grounded the 2009 reenactment when pilot Bjarni Trygvasson (a former astronaut) suffered a broken nose wheel on his first flight attempt. His plane eventually achieved liftoff, coming off better than the 50th anniversary replica did in 1959, when it crashed in high winds on Baddeck Bay. Even McCurdy had his own problems in 1909. “In taking off I had to clear one old Scot, so doubtful I would fly, that he had started off across the ice with his horse and sleigh,” he said. “I think they both had the daylights scared out of them.” On landing, McCurdy narrowly avoided two girls on skates (see story, P. 46).
Doug Jermyn of AEA 2005 was well aware of the competition between the Wright brothers and Bell’s young engineers. “We were a tiny bit proud that we were able to successfully fly our replica on a budget of about $50,000 on the 100th anniversary,” he said. “The Wright Flyers that were built for the December 2003 centennial [in North Carolina] cost millions and did not fly well—although they had weather problems too!” More info at www.silverdartreplica.com.
-Stephen Mauro
Northrop Tests Hitler’s ‘Stealth’ Fighter
One of the most interesting controversies surrounding any Nazi German aircraft project concerns the all- wing, mostly wood, twin-jet Horten Ho-229 (also known as the Gotha Go-229—see “Radical Luftwaffe Weapons” in the May issue). After World War II, the Horten brothers claimed they had designed the flying wing with stealth in mind. Reimar Horten said he mixed charcoal dust in with the wood glue to absorb electromagnetic waves (radar) being shot at the Ho-229, in effect shielding it from early detection by British ground-based early warning Chain Home radar. Skeptics claim that the Horten brothers didn’t know anything about radar or radar-absorbing materials in the early 1940s, nor did they know how to make a low-radar-profile aircraft.
Award-winning TV documentary producer Michael Jorgensen is a longtime fan of the Ho-229 V3, the single surviving example that is stored at the National Air and Space Museum’s Paul Garber restoration facility in Silver Hill, Md. In early 2008, Jorgensen partnered with the National Geographic Channel to produce a documentary to determine whether the Ho-229 was in fact a “stealth” fighter-bomber—the world’s first such aircraft, predating Northrop’s all-wing B-2 Spirit stealth bomber by almost 45 years. The documentary will air in late June.
For years the engineers at Northrop Grumman Corporation had been interested in the Ho-229, and several of them visited Silver Hill in the early 1980s to study the V3. After Jorgensen and National Geographic reached an agreement on the documentary, Northrop offered to build a full-scale, unpowered Ho-229 replica. In addition, the company said it would take the completed replica out to its classified radar cross section (RCS) test range at Tejon, Calif., place it on a 50-foot articulating pole and shoot electromagnetic energy at it, duplicating the same three frequencies used by the Chain Home radar network in the early 1940s.
Before beginning the build, Northrop experts returned to Garber in September 2008 and ran electromagnetic experiments on the V3’s multilayer wooden center-section nose cones. These cones are threefourths of an inch thick and made up of thin sheets of veneer. It is the glue between each piece of veneer that historians debate. The Northrop team concluded there was some type of conducting element in the glue, since the radar signal slowed down considerably as it passed through the nose cones.
After an expenditure of about $250,000 and 2,500 man-hours, Northrop’s Ho-229 replica was ready to be tested at Tejon in February. The results were surprising. Although Northrop will not release the Ho-229’s actual RCS values, the 53-foot flying wing demonstrated that given its 550-mph speed, wood construction and charcoal or graphite mixed in the glue, its detection by Chain Home radar would have been reduced by 25 to 30 percent compared to the slower piston-engine Messerschmitt Me-109 and Focke Wulf Fw-190 fighters. Chain Home could detect those aircraft up to 80 miles away.
RCS testing also showed that if the Ho-229 had approached England from France flying at 550 mph 50 to 100 feet above the English Channel, Chain Home would not have been able to identify it at all given the clutter coming off the water. This means RAF fighters wouldn’t have been scrambled until ground observers saw the jet flying overhead and it dropped its bombs, turned around and headed back toward France.
Now that the testing is completed, the flying wing will be donated to a yet-to-be-determined aviation museum.
-David Myhra
Scale-Model Spitfire Labor of Love
Airplane modeling requires obsessive attention to detail and a steady hand, but to build exact replicas in 1/3rd or 1/5th scale takes an entirely different skill set. Every component of the original has to be reproduced, only smaller. David Glen of Cambridge, England, spent 11 years constructing a 1/5th-scale Supermarine Spitfire Mk. I. Now on display at the Royal Air Force Museum in London, his model is skinned with litho plate over a balsa core (left in bare metal to reveal the structure) and contains at least 19,000 tiny rivets. Reproduced from microfilm blueprints and workshop manuals held at the RAF Museum, as well as countless photos
Glen took while volunteering at the Imperial War Museum’s Duxford Airfield, the miniature Spit is detailed down to the rudder pedals, control column, undercarriage control lever and instrument dials. Possibly to maintain his sanity—he had no means to blow a bubble hood—he copied the flat canopy of the early model Mk. Is.
Glen was close to shelving the project when an encounter with Michael Fopp, director general of the RAF Museum, strengthened his resolve. Fopp promised to put the model on display, offering a way to bring the project full circle. Glen said, “I don’t pretend the little Spitfire is perfect, but I do hope it has captured something of the spirit and incomparable beauty of this magnificent fighter— perhaps the closest to a union that art and technology has ever come.” He’s now at work on a 1/5th-scale P-51D Mustang.
-Stephen Mauro
Originally published in the July 2009 issue of Aviation History. To subscribe, click here.
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c6530218eeb1b18b1e284e1ddbbcc126 | https://www.historynet.com/aviation-history-briefing-march-2009.htm | Spirit of TWA Transcontinental | Spirit of TWA Transcontinental
The oldest surviving ex-TWA aircraft, a Lockheed 12A Electra Junior, made a coast-to-coast round trip in September to celebrate the opening of the new JFK Terminal 5. The structure is attached to the once-spectacular swooping, science-fictiony terminal originally designed for TWA by the famous Finnish architect Eero Saarinen (which remains shuttered and unoccupied). Terminal 5 is operated by JetBlue, which never had anything to do with TWA but was gracious enough to celebrate the grand old line’s 71- year heritage, from 1930 until it was absorbed by American Airlines in 2001, by sponsoring the flight of the ’37 Lockheed.
The six-passenger Electra Junior, a scaled-down version of the Model 10 Electra made famous by Amelia Earhart, is about the size of its near-contemporary Twin Beech and was never an airliner. It flew for TWA in the early 1940s as a corporate transport and high-altitude research tool, testing de-icing systems and early static-discharge technology. (The Model 12 was the first all-electric metal twin, though it unfortunately failed to make it clear that power-hungry electric de-icing was a bad idea, as it proved to be in later airline use.) In fact, it was often piloted by TWA co-founder Paul Richter Jr., whose daughter Ruth Richter Holden today coowns the airplane.
Richter Holden bought the plane sight unseen in 2005, in large part because of a vague childhood memory. And when she leafed through its original logbooks, there was the entry that proved she had once flown aboard it with her dad, as a little girl. Having helped restore the small twin to its proper TWA colors, Ruth co-piloted the transcontinental flights. Commuter airline pilot Curt Walters, coowner of the Lockheed, served as captain on the initial crossing from Santa Maria, Calif., to JFK, with Kirk McQuown piloting on the return trip, which followed the original routes of TWA’s first coast-to-coast passenger service trip.
To learn more about the Lockheed 12A and TWA’s early history, go to spiritoftwa.com.
Originally published in the March 2009 issue of Aviation History. To subscribe, click here.
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46ca6fe705770c3b03a53181c71c106f | https://www.historynet.com/aviation-history-interview-with-world-war-ii-luftwaffe-ace-gunther-rall.htm | Aviation History: Interview with World War II Luftwaffe Ace Günther Rall | Aviation History: Interview with World War II Luftwaffe Ace Günther Rall
From the time the Luftwaffe went to war on September 1, 1939, its fighter pilots immediately began to make their presence known. Slashing through the skies and inflicting enormous casualties, they amassed previously unimaginable scores of aerial victories. Very few of the great pilots survived the war, yet the fact that Germany’s three leading aces did is testimony to their skill, determination and luck. Günther Rall served on the Eastern and Western fronts, rising to the rank of major and commanding fighter groups and entire squadrons. He finished World War II as the third-highest-scoring fighter ace of all time with 275 aerial victories. His final assignment was in the defense of the Reich itself, and his capture by the Americans was the beginning of a second career for him. Continuing to rise in the Bundesluftwaffe (the new Luftwaffe), he trained in the United States and later commanded German jet fighter units in the 1960s. He is still good friends with many of his old Luftwaffe comrades, and he was reunited with many for the 80th birthday celebration for General Johannes Steinhoff on September 15, 1993, shortly before Steinhoff’s death. After retiring from the new German Air Force, General Rall began working in an advisory capacity for several well-known companies. Today he enjoys retirement, his family and his many grandchildren, and enjoys corresponding with historians. World War II: General, please tell us about your background. Rall: I was born on March 10, 1918, in Gaggenau, which is a small village in the Black Forest. My father was a merchant, and when I was born he was on operations during World War I. He first saw me when he came back. WWII: Do you have any brothers and sisters? Rall: I have a sister who is still alive and lives in Stuttgart, which I consider my hometown. My family moved there when I was 3 years old, and I was brought up and educated in Stuttgart. I was in elementary school and high school, which we called Gymnasium, where I was educated for nine years in Latin and five years in the old Greek, with the education focused more on literature and such, not so much on science or mathematics. I took the final exam, which we call the Abitur. I graduated at the age of 18 and became a cadet in an infantry regiment. WWII: Didn’t you originally join the infantry and then decide that running in the mud wasn’t for you? Rall: Yes. And later I decided to become an air force officer. WWII: When did you begin flying in the Luftwaffe? Rall: I started flying as a senior cadet in the air force, and I went through to the final exam for promotion to Leutnant. In those days the air force did not have the capacity to train all of its own cadets. And we took cadets from the navy and the army. I went to the air force and started flying in 1938 in Neubiberg, which is a suburb of Munich. WWII: When was your first taste of combat? Rall: This was at the age of 21. In 1939 I finally graduated training as a fighter pilot on a base east of Berlin and was transferred to Jagdgeschwader (fighter wing) JG-52. At the beginning of the war I was with this wing, and my first contact with the enemy was in May 1940. This was over France. WWII: After the French capitulated, you served on the Channel Front, did you not? Rall: Yes, we modified our airplanes for flying over sea–you know, with our dinghies in our planes. I was located near Calais. There we opposed the Royal Air Force on the other side and flew missions over the English Channel to the southern part of the British island. We were attacking convoys and things like that. Flights were short because of fuel; we could not fly any farther. WWII: Did the British pilots and officers fight well? Rall: Outstanding. They were a well trained and highly motivated force, with good equipment and good morale. WWII: A mirror image of your Luftwaffe at that time? Rall: Oh, yes, and I was in a wing which at that time was not very experienced, as it was a newly formed wing. We learned our lessons over the British Channel, and we had tremendous losses against the Royal Air Force. I had the highest respect for them. WWII: Were most of your losses during fighter missions or bomber escort missions? Rall: We had unfortunately been assigned to escort Junkers Ju-87B Stukas (dive bombers), very slow-flying aircraft. We had to fly close escort (in Messerschmitt Bf-109Es), which was wrong. We had to stick with them, giving up all of our superiority and speed. So we escorted them over the Channel where the Spitfires and Hurricanes waited upstairs for us, and we had tremendous losses. I lost my group commander. The adjutant and all three squadron commanders were killed in a time span of about two weeks. I, as a young lieutenant, had to take over my 8th Staffel (squadron) as commander at the age of 22. I did this for three years. WWII: I suppose that all of this combat experience trained you and prepared you for when you were later transferred to Russia? Rall: Yes, that is correct. WWII: In what other areas did you serve during the war? Rall: Well, we were withdrawn to Germany, where we trained new pilots, and then went to Romania. We were to protect the oil fields and the bridges over the Danube River down to Bulgaria. We were stationed near Bucharest, the capital of Romania. This was for only a short time, from December 1940 to March 1941. When we moved into Bulgaria, Greece was beginning. I also had operations over Crete in May 1941. I came back with the group from Romania when Crete was finished, and we were given a new airplane, the Messerschmitt Bf-109F, which was a much better aircraft. It had round wingtips and a new Daimler Benz engine, the 603. At that point–June 1941–the war with Russia was just beginning. From then until 1944 I was in the southern part of Russia, moving down to the Caucasus and on to Dnepropetrovsk, Stalingrad, all of the important names. This was a very fast-moving war, contrary to the northern part of the Russian Front, which was more stationary. In the spring I came back to Germany to the Home Defense (Reichs Verteidigung), flying against the Eighth Air Force, as you know, against all the North American P-51 Mustang, Lockheed P-38 Lightning and Republic P-47 Thunderbolt fighters. WWII: Describe the crash in which you injured your back. Rall: This was November 28, 1941. I was flying between Taganrog and Rostov. In those days it was very cold. We had temperatures of minus 40 degrees Centigrade. I flew an afternoon mission, what we would today call a fighter sweep, when my wingman and I ran into Russians. It had just started getting dark, and I had a dogfight with a Russian, shooting him down in flames. In this very late light, I was blinded a little bit. I didn’t pay attention, and a Russian came in behind me. He shot my engine dead and it was over Russian territory, so certainly I moved and turned trying to reach the German lines– not a solid line, but I saw some German tanks. I was flying westward, and I tried to make a belly landing, but I saw where I was going to touch down, in what they call a baikal. This was a little canyon just across my flight direction, and I touched the ground at too high a speed. The aircraft hit and jumped up again. I bounced over a little canyon and pushed my stick forward. I bellied in and crashed on the other side. That was the last I knew, as I saw this wall coming against me, and in the big bang I was knocked out. The rest of the story I learned from my wingman, as he was circling over me and watching what happened. When the battle and crash were over, my wings came off, my engine came off, and thank God these things came off so I didn’t catch fire. I was hanging in the wreckage and nearby was a German tank. The crew jumped out and cut me out of the cockpit. I was unconscious and I didn’t know how I got out. Later that night I ended up in a burned-out school in Taganrog. This was a kind of aid station for the ambulance, and there was no medical treatment there. WWII: You were very lucky. Rall: Yes, I was lucky. In the crash I broke my back in three places–the eighth and ninth thoracic vertebrae and the fifth lumbar vertebra. I was paralyzed for a long time on the right side and my right leg. WWII: How many times were you wounded during the war? Rall: I was wounded three times, but I was shot down about eight times. I bellied in between the front lines, I jumped out and was picked up by Germans in tanks and so on. I was always lucky, except I was seriously wounded three times. The first time it was my back. I was then shot and hit right in the face and in my hand, and the third time I jumped out and a P-47 Thunderbolt shot my left thumb off. WWII: You met your wife, Hertha, while in the hospital. Rall: Yes. She was a medical doctor, and we met after the crash in Russia. I was evacuated in due time and was back in Romania. We were moving back in retreat, and there were no X-ray stations; it was just chaos. In Romania, I was X-rayed and the doctor told me, ‘Flying? You can forget it!’ because my back was broken in three places. I got a full body cast, an extension cast, and when this was fixed after one week, I was transferred on a train, which took eight days to go through Romania and the Carpathian Mountains. We ended up in Vienna, and at night we came to the train station. The doctors came and I had everything written on my chest as to what had happened to me. They took me to the hospital and the next morning Hertha was the doctor who saw me, and afterward she became my wife. WWII: What types of aircraft did you fly? Rall: I flew the Messerschmitt Bf-109 in all of the different marks (variants), the E, F, G and the K model, and of course the Focke-Wulf Fw-190, but I liked the 109 most because I was familiar with it. Certainly I flew the 190, but only the D model long-nosed version, toward the end of the war in some missions. WWII: How would you compare your aircraft with Allied fighters? Rall: When I was injured, I became the commander of the German Fighter Leader School for about four months or so. At that time we had formed a squadron with captured enemy aircraft, and we flew them–the P-38, P-47, P-51, as well as some Spitfires. My left hand was still in bandages, but I was flying all of these aircraft, as I was very eager to learn about and evaluate them. I had a very good impression of the P-51 Mustang, where the big difference was the engine. When we received these aircraft we flew about 300 hours in them. You see, we did not know anything about how they flew, their characteristics or anything before that. In the P-51 there was no oil leak, and that was just fantastic. This was one of the things that impressed me, but I was also very interested in the electrical starting switches, which we did not have. This made it very difficult in starting our engines in the Russian winter. We had the inertia starter. The cockpits of all of these enemy aircraft were much more comfortable. You could not fly the Bf-109 for seven hours; the cockpit was too tight, too narrow. The P-51 (cockpit) was for me a great room, just fantastic. The P-38 with two engines was great, but I think the best airplane was the P-51. Certainly the Spitfire was excellent, but it didn’t have the endurance of the P-51. I think this was the decisive factor. They flew for seven hours, and we flew for one hour and 20 minutes. WWII: That makes quite a difference in aerial combat. Rall: Yes, you would have to get down because you were short on fuel, then look for the nearest air base, and they still had fuel for three hours more. WWII: With all of your experience, which of the commanders was the best fighter leader you served with, as far as taking care of the fliers and the missions? Rall: I can tell you that all the characters you may name are and were good friends of mine, such as Johannes Steinhoff, Adolf Galland, Hannes Trautloft, Werner Mölders and Dieter Hrabak. As Hrabak was my wing leader at one time, and he is one of my closest friends now, I respect him as a fighter leader and as a person. In the war I served in the JG-52 exclusively on the Eastern Front. WWII: Werner Mölders was also a respected man during the Spanish Civil War. Rall: Absolutely, he was a great character and fighter leader, and he was a very strong Catholic. In those days he had his own rules and personality. He was a great man, creating new tactics, leading his men into combat, and being concerned for them and caring for them in the air as well as on the ground. This was, I think, the real Werner Mölders. Despite his young age, he was known as ‘Daddy Mölders.’ It was because of his experience and leadership that he was given the nickname. WWII: What are your personal feelings about Luftwaffe chief Hermann Göring? Is it true that most of the pilots did not like him? Rall: You could not like him. He was perhaps a capable man before the war. He was a great organizer, helping to build the air force after the First World War. Also, he was a great fighter pilot in World War I. As you also know, he was injured in 1923, and he had a very difficult injury. He had to take morphine for the pain and became addicted. It might have changed his character. At the time I became acquainted with him, I was cold to him. He was a big fat man, a very pompous man, and not only I but my comrades felt that he was out of touch with reality. He was certainly not respected as an air force leader. Actually he did not lead the air force at all; it was somebody else, but not Göring. Hermann Göring would make silly statements to Hitler. Hitler said, ‘You are the leader of the air force,’ and he (Göring) made a long statement about the Battle of Britain, you know, that he would triumph over the Royal Air Force, which was wrong, as we had tremendous losses in our fighter fleet that we never recovered from during the war. He said, ‘We can support Stalingrad, the air force can do it,’ which he was not able to do, which was a very wrong and costly statement. WWII: It has been said that Hans-Ulrich Rudel, the great Stuka pilot, was something of a maniac. Did you know him? Rall: Absolutely, he was a bit of a maniac. I flew with him as his fighter escort for his group several times. They were flying normal Ju-87 missions, and we escorted them. This was in Russia, of course. He was a great Stuka pilot, no doubt–after all, he shot up 519 tanks among other things, which is quite something. After the war I was a fellow prisoner with him in France, as guests of the Americans. Rudel and I were in the same camp, and later we were borrowed by the Royal Air Force. I was sent to the British Fighter Leaders School at Tangmere. This was for interrogation, which lasted three weeks. I was there with Rudel as well, and we slept in the same room. Living very close together you get acquainted, and you come to understand the thinking of such a man, but I had known him before that. Anyhow, I was really surprised at this egocentric man; he was the greatest in his own mind, that sort. It was a little disgusting to me. WWII: What do you recall of your meetings with Adolf Hitler, such as the occasion when he awarded you the Oak Leaves and Swords to your Knight’s Cross? Rall: The first time was in November 1942, when I was given the Oak Leaves. As you know, additional honors to the Knight’s Cross, from the Oak Leaves onward, were presented by Hitler personally. I was there with Steinhoff–at that time it was Hauptmann Steinhoff and Oberleutnant Rall–with some others, five of us in all. Certainly we were impressed with his headquarters in East Prussia, at the Wolfschanze (Wolf’s Lair) at Lotzen. We entered, he was standing there, and he handed over our decorations. We sat around the fireplace, and he asked each of us which units we came from, our battle experience and so on. All questions such as this, quite normal. Well, pretty soon he started his own monologue, knowing that we would go back to our unit and repeat what he had told us, and we would remark on what a great guy he was. Well, he started talking about the buildup of the anti-aircraft defense and new communications systems in Russia, the railway system and things like this. He talked about the width of the railroad tracks, how they needed to be made wider for standard German rail traffic and extended into the deeper regions. This was to be the expansion of the Third Reich in the Middle East–the building of villages and towns, all of these very essential things, which was a program he had in mind, no doubt. I asked him then, perhaps I was too courageous, but I interrupted him and asked, ‘Despite all of that, how long do you think this war will be? Because when we moved into Russia, the newspapers said that by the time the first snows came down we would be finished with the war in the East. Instead, we have suffered in the cold over there.’ So Hitler then said to me, ‘Well, I cannot tell you. This might be an open area. We have our settlements here, and when the enemy comes from the depths of the Asian steppe, then we will defend this area. Just like in the days of Genghis Khan.’ WWII: Wasn’t General Steinhoff under the impression that Hitler was a little crazy after meeting him near Stalingrad? Rall: Yes, this is the next point. This was before the collapse of Stalingrad and before El Alamein. This was the apex of his war. From that point on we went backward. It was too optimistic. Well then, nine months later I had to come back again to receive my Swords from Hitler. By that time we had lost the Sixth Army and Stalingrad, as well as El Alamein and the front in North Africa. You know, we had a hell of a time with the submarine war, and this was now a very different Hitler. He was no longer talking about tangible facts. He was talking about, ‘I see the deep valley. I see the strip on the horizon,’ and it was all nonsense. He was speaking about magical figures of manpower and production, a fantasyland. We saw this man as no longer certain, and as infirm. The third time I saw Hitler was when I was summoned to receive my documentation for my Oak Leaves and Swords. It was engraved, gilded and beautifully made with a lovely skirt, frame and so on. WWII: Do you still have these certificates? Rall: No, they were stolen in Vienna, most likely by the Russians. There are some of them still available, but not mine. I gave them to my wife and told her to keep them safe and place them in the bunker in the city of Vienna. When we came back a couple of years later, they were gone and nothing was left. At that time there were only 16 or so (who had been so honored), with names such as Adolf Galland, Helmut Lent, Walter Nowotny, as they were all still alive at that time. Lent and Nowotny died before the war ended. Walter Oesau, Dietrich Pelz, Heinz Bar and I were present when Hitler handed these over. Then we had lunch with him, and as usual he started to talk. The main subject of his speech was the pending Allied invasion. This was January 1944. Everybody expected the invasion all along the Channel coast, wondering when it was coming and how they were coming and so on. At that time he developed his ideas, and you could see that Hitler was hopping around, very uncertain. Also, you know, one thing that was very typical of him was his stating how the British were always having problems with their opposition parties, the Labor Party, the labor unions and so on. It was clear to me that this man was a little out of his mind. Hitler did not have a really clear, serious concept of the situation. Whatever their problems, the British come together during war; they are one nation. WWII: What was your impression of the Messerschmitt Me-262 jet fighter, which you flew? Rall: Well, it was certainly a new dimension. The first time I sat in it, I was most surprised about the silence. If you are sitting in a standard piston-powered aircraft, you have a hell of a noise in the radio headset, background noise and static and such, which I did not experience in the Me-262. It was absolutely clear. With radio from the ground they controlled the flight. They gave me my orders, such as ‘Now accelerate your engines, build your rpm.’ It was very clear. Totally clear. One other thing was you had to advance the throttles very slowly. If you went forward too fast, you might overheat and set the engines on fire. Also, if you were up to 8,000 rpm, or whatever it was, you released the brakes and you were taxiing. Unlike the Bf-109, which had no front wheel and was a tail dragger, the Me-262 had a tricycle landing gear. It was a new sensation, beautiful visibility. You could go down the runway and see straight forward. This was, however, also a weak moment for the Me-262. The aircraft at this point was a little bit stiff and slow during landing and takeoff, but fine when coming up to speed gradually. It was absolutely superior to the old aircraft. WWII: So how did you like the armament of the Me-262? Rall: You know, I never did get to shoot the weapons because when I had about 15 or 20 hours I became commander of the JG-300, which was equipped with Bf-109s. I only made some training flights, but never flew the jet in combat. WWII: What was it like commanding JG-300? Rall: I came to the unit in late February or early March 1945. This was no longer a wing, just a ruin of the former wing because one group was in the north. As you know, a wing has three groups. In the meantime, the Americans got to the Elbe River, cutting this group off, and some managed to escape to the south. I had only two rudimentary groups, and I will tell you something that was typical: when I arrived at the wing to take over, I came by jeep because I had no aircraft. While I was commander of the Fighter Leaders School, they sent me a jeep and said, ‘You are going up to Plattling in Bavaria to take over as commander of JG-300,’ and when I approached the base I saw that some airplanes were standing out on the apron, and my driver said, ‘Oops, we are being attacked!’ We stopped and ran off the road. It was an attack by P-38 Lightnings, and when I finally arrived there were 15 of our aircraft in flames. WWII: These were the Bf-109s? Rall: Yes, and this marked my entrance into the wing. The next day we were transferred to the south, and from there on we had no solid operations. We had no radar, no air situation. We had only narrow contact to higher authority in the division, so we relocated to the area south of Munich. On the way to Salzburg I dissolved the wing, as the war was over, and told the group commanders, ‘This thing is over and you had better go home.’ We gave all that we had, including our food, to the airmen and ground personnel. Then we gave a final salute, and everyone went on his own. As you can imagine, at that time there was no solid warfare. Even the higher ranks came to my headquarters and asked if they could stay there because they wanted to get through it. You could only get out using your feet in a normal unit. So this was a very bad time, and there were no firmly planned or controlled missions. The main fight for me was to try and get fuel for the aircraft. Without it we could not fly, naturally. Even if you listened to the fact that wing so and so dissolved at the hands of the Americans, it was because of this situation, that you were alone and on your own. WWII: What was the mission of JG-300? Were you still expected to intercept and attack bombers? Rall: That was early on, and that time had passed. It did not usually work well. Now we had normal fighter missions. In February 1945, there were no normal fighter missions left, you know. What we were doing was looking for targets of opportunity. We had no idea where the enemy was at any time. We were totally in the dark. WWII: What is your knowledge of Operation Bodenplatte, the fighter sweeps against Allied airfields that took place on January 1, 1945? Rall: I was in the hospital because my left thumb had been shot off, and the wound was still open and I had an infection. I listened in on the higher staff, so this was how I learned about Bodenplatte. As you know, we lost many of our most experienced unit leaders, irreplaceable losses. A total of 58 unit leaders were lost in that operation, I believe. WWII: Which Allied fighter was the most difficult to shoot down in combat? Rall: At the beginning of the war we flew short-range missions and encountered Spitfires, which were superior. And do not forget the Hurricanes. I think that the Supermarine Spitfire was the most dangerous to us early on. I flew the Spitfire myself, and it was a very, very good aircraft. It was maneuverable and with good climbing potential. Then in Russia the first aircraft we encountered were obsolete. The Russians lost about 7,000 aircraft in the first three to four months of the war, but they learned their lessons well and began building better aircraft–the MiGs, Yaks, and the LaG-5. Developed by Semyon A. Lavochkin and Mikhail I. Gudkov from their earlier, unsuccessful LaGG-3 with an in-line, water-cooled engine, the LaG-5 came out in 1943 and had a big radial engine. It was a powerful, excellent aircraft and served as the basis for even better versions: the La-5FN and the La-7. WWII: Soviet General Ivan Kozhedub, the highest scoring Allied ace of the war with 62 victories, recalled fighting against JG-52 many times. He also felt that the La-7 was the best Soviet fighter. Rall: Yes, it was excellent. I remember once I chased a Lavochkin a great distance at full throttle and I still could not get him. He was damned fast. Then by way of foreign aid, particularly in the south around the Caucasus where I was fighting, they brought in Spitfires and the Bell P-39 Airacobra, which I liked and the Russians liked but which was inferior to the Bf-109. It had the engine behind the cockpit. Now the big thing in the Home Defense as far as problems was the P-51. The P-51 was a damned good airplane and it had tremendous endurance, which for us was a new dimension. The P-47, which as you know shot me down, we knew right away. It had tremendous diving speed and could run up to 1,400 kilometers per hour, where the Bf-109 was limited to 1,000 kph. I learned this quickly when they chased me, and I could do nothing else. The structural layout design of the P-47 was much stronger, yet I consider the P-51 the best battle horse you had of all the fighter escorts. WWII: How did the war end for you? Rall: I was at Ainring near Salzburg when we finished the war. I walked with my staff, retreating at night, and we went to the Americans, who did not care too much for us. So at daylight we decided to try and go home. At Lake Chiemsee we could not go any farther and were captured. The Americans took me back to Salzburg and put me in prison. From Salzburg to Neu Ulm, then to Heilbronn, and there the CIC (Counter Intelligence Corps) saw me. They knew my name and they said that all air force officers should report, and they took me very quickly to interrogation. Then seven of us were taken to England. WWII: Is it possible that the Americans and British wanted to recruit Luftwaffe officers since it was the beginning of the Cold War? Rall: Yes, and there was a situation that I will never forget. There was a Mr. Reed, at least that was the name he gave me, his CIC name anyway. When he came to pick me up he asked me, ‘Major, I understand that you flew the 262,’ and I answered, ‘Yes, I did.’ He knew more about me and what I had done than I knew myself. Then he asked, ‘Are you willing to assist us in building up a jet force?’ Well, the war was over, so I said, ‘Yes, sure.’ He also wanted to know if I was willing to go to England, and then to America. I went to England for interrogation. His last question was, ‘Would you be willing to fly with us against the Japanese?’ Well, here I said ‘No,’ and he asked me why not. I told him that they were former allies, and I could not do that. WWII: Did you consider that a matter of honor? Rall: Sure. WWII: How did you become involved in the new Luftwaffe? Rall: General Steinhoff and Dieter Hrabak were already preparing this. I was in industry and Salem school, where my wife was a doctor, and I was in the organization. Well, they sent me letters saying, ‘You have to come’ and so on. The first of January 1956, I was called and I went to Bonn and there I joined the air force again at the rank of major. From there on I underwent the refresher training, at first in Germany, and later we went to train in the Republic F-84 (Thunderjet) in the United States. This was at Luke Air Force Base in Arizona, and from then on I spent quite a lot of time in your country. WWII: Luke Air Force Base must have been quite a change for you from the forests in Germany. Rall: Oh, yes, it was a beautiful time. Just beautiful. I remember those early days were great. It looked different than it looks today. You know, Luke Air Force Base and the whole Arizona area was just beginning to build up. It was not as extensive as it is today. Phoenix was not as big a city as it is now, and it was beautiful. It was such a beautiful time and all we did was fly, and then I came back. I was appointed to a staff (position), and then I became the project officer for the F-104–you know, the Starfighter– which took me again to the States. WWII: Was that when they were putting the F-104 in Germany? Rall: Yes. I was in Palmdale, California, and Edwards Air Force Base. I later became general and division commander. Then I became chief of staff of the Fourth Allied Tactical Air Force, and then I became commander of German Air Force Command, and the chief of that later. WWII: When did you retire from the Bundesluftwaffe? Rall: At the end of 1975. WWII: Can you tell us a little about your family? Rall: My wife died eight years ago. I have a daughter who lives in Paris, France, and is married to a Frenchman. She is a great restorer at the Louvre. She has a good career, and she has two children. Clement is 14 and Anna Louise is 12. My (other) daughter is married and lives in Munich with her husband. My son-in-law is a designer with BMW, and my daughter is also a designer. They also have two children, girls. One is 7 years old and the other is 4 years old. My second daughter, Felicita, and my son-in-law studied for one year in Pasadena, California. Rall: What has your life been like since your retirement? WWII: When I retired, I went into industry, and I was on different boards in an advisory capacity. I am still involved with the industries. I do quite a bit of traveling in the States. There is a great interest in some galleries, as in signing all these paintings and in giving autographs. This is a good chance to get in close contact with some of my former opponents. I am very close friends now with Colonel Hub Zemke; and it was his wing that shot off my thumb (5th Fighter Group), and we know exactly who got me. It was Joseph Powers. I have a lot of friends over there.
This article was written by Colin Heaton and originally appeared in the September 1996 issue of World War II magazine.
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c226acec3b03494b3f35d886a0ee817f | https://www.historynet.com/axis-sally.htm | Axis Sally: The Americans Behind the Infamous Nazi Propaganda Broadcast | Axis Sally: The Americans Behind the Infamous Nazi Propaganda Broadcast
From the deserts of North Africa to the Normandy beaches, GIs listened to the traitorous Axis Sally broadcasting over the radio for Nazi Germany.
Mildred Gillars, the Berlin Axis Sally, attracts a new audience as she arrives in the United States in 1948 to face charges. (National Archives)
“Well, kids, you know I’d like to say to you, ‘Pack up Your Troubles in Your Old Kit Bag,’ but I know that that little old kit bag is much too small to hold all the trouble you kids have got.” —Axis Sally
From the deserts of North Africa to the Normandy beaches, GIs listened to the sensual voice of an American woman broadcasting over the radio for Nazi Germany. The voice, alternately seductive and condemning, wondered aloud if their wives and girlfriends were “running around” with the 4-Fs (men not qualified for military service) back home, and gently pointed out the benefits of surrender. As the men tried to imagine the mysterious beauty behind the microphone, the swing music she played kept them tuning in. She cultivated a persona of worldly allure, ready to welcome the boys and understand their troubles.
The reality behind the voice was less glamorous. Two American women competed for the soldiers’ fantasies: Mildred Gillars, a middle-aged former showgirl from Ohio, broadcast from Berlin; the other, a cross-eyed 30-year-old New Yorker with a honeyed voice named Rita Zucca, broadcast from Rome. One was the willing mouthpiece of her mentor and lover, while the other collaborated with the Nazis for financial gain. But both women became enmeshed in the collective memory of American soldiers and sailors as one indelible figure: Axis Sally.
They, like the women who broadcast for Japan under the name Tokyo Rose in the Pacific theater, entertained their audience despite ham-handed attempts to break the morale of Allied soldiers. As Air Corps corporal Edward Van Dyne said of Axis Sally in 1944, “Doctor Goebbels no doubt believes that Sally is rapidly undermining the morale of the American doughboy. I think the effect is directly opposite. We get an enormous bang out of her. We love her.”
And indeed, both Sallys became women who were wanted and pursued by the end of the war, but in a way that ultimately had nothing to do with desire—and everything to do with treason.
The Germans’ use of foreign nationals in radio broadcasting began early in the war with the hiring of William Joyce, better known as Lord Haw-Haw. Joyce, an American-born Irish fascist, was a protégé of Sir Oswald Mosley, the leader of the British Union of Fascists. He fled to the Reich on August 26, 1939, narrowly escaping arrest in Britain, and the German Propaganda Ministry hired him to write anonymous commentaries on British foreign policy and politics. At the height of his influence, in 1940, Joyce had an estimated six million regular and 18 million occasional listeners in the United Kingdom alone.
Lord Haw-Haw’s success as a broadcaster was aided immeasurably by the lack of forthright reporting at the BBC station, which featured entertainment programming—largely organ music—and severely censored news broadcasts. The BBC’s disadvantage was compounded as Holland, Luxembourg, Denmark, Belgium, and Norway fell in the spring of 1940, and the Germans appropriated Europe’s most popular and powerful commercial stations. Combined with the huge 100-kilowatt transmitters in the Berlin suburb of Zeesen, the Reichsrundfunk, or Reich Radio, broadcast worldwide 24 hours a day in 12 languages.
The Propaganda Ministry and the German Foreign Office hoped to extend Reich Radio’s European success to North America, but needed broadcasters who could communicate with American listeners in terms they could understand. At the outset of the war, American expatriates in Berlin were few and far between. Most had returned home in the face of hostilities, but there were some willing candidates. One of the first was Frederick W. Kaltenbach, an Iowa-born high school teacher fired from his job in 1935 for establishing a student organization based on the Hitler Youth. The Germans dubbed him Lord Haw-Haw for his folksy style, and cast him as the American equivalent of William Joyce. Kaltenbach and Max Otto Koischwitz—a naturalized American citizen and former professor who would play a defining role in the creation of Axis Sally—dominated Berlin’s broadcasts to America in those early years of the war.
Much of the German propaganda effort in 1940 and 1941 was aimed at keeping America out of the war—attacking the idea of American military aid to the British war effort and blaming “Jewish finance” for the conflict. The message was finely tuned, but the thick Teutonic accents of the German newscasters spoiled the effect. “It is advised of the importance of our American newscasts to use as far as possible American-born speakers,” the head of the German Radio and Culture section, Dr. Markus Timmler, wrote in March 1940. Radio officials paid heed, and within a month of Timmler’s memorandum, a 39-year-old former Broadway showgirl named Mildred Gillars—out of work and recruited by a social acquaintance who worked for Reich Radio—walked into the massive Berlin radio complex known as the Big House.
Gillars, who had come to Berlin in 1934 to study music, was promptly hired as an announcer for Reich Radio’s British Service, where she broadcast under the name Midge. Within months she had her own show, playing records and chatting about art and culture—and soon found herself in a quandary. By the spring of 1941 the U.S. State Department was counseling American nationals to return home. But Gillars’s fiancé, a naturalized German citizen named Paul Karlson, warned that he would never marry her if she returned to the United States. Hoping for a wedding ring, she remained in Berlin as the last ships departed. Not long after, Karlson was sent to the Eastern Front, where he died in action.
On December 7, 1941, Gillars was working in the studio when the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor was announced. Stunned, she broke down in front of her colleagues and denounced their allies in the east. “I told them what I thought about Japan and that the Germans would soon find out about them,” she recalled. “The shock was terrific. I lost all discretion.” She knew that such an outburst could send her to a concentration camp—a fear the Germans used to their advantage. Faced with the prospect of joblessness or prison, she produced a written oath of allegiance to Germany and returned to work, her duties limited to announcing records and participating in chat shows.
The apolitical nature of her broadcasts changed one year later, however, when Max Otto Koischwitz cast Gillars’s Midge in a new show called Home Sweet Home. Koischwitz, the married father of three daughters, had started a romantic relationship with the lonely American; now he aggressively encouraged her to broadcast propaganda he wrote for the Reich. “Even Shakespeare and Sophocles could be taken as propaganda,” he told her. Feeling she had no choice in the matter, she relented. “You could not just go around [Nazi Germany] saying, ‘I don’t want to do this’ and ‘I don’t want to do that,’” she later said.
As the Allies engaged in fierce battles in the deserts of North Africa, Home Sweet Home was designed to arouse homesickness. Opening with the quintessentially American sound of a moaning train whistle, the program tugged at the heartstrings and exploited the fears of fighting men. In a playful voice, Gillars portrayed Midge as a young but worldly woman. She played the vixen behind the microphone, taunting the frontline soldiers and casting doubt on their mission, their leaders, and their prospects after the war.
The GIs had several names for the woman on the radio, including Berlin Bitch, Berlin Babe, Olga, and Sally, but the one that stuck for public consumption was Axis Sally. When asked to describe herself on the air, Gillars had said she was “the Irish type…a real Sally.” In a January 1944 article in the Saturday Evening Post, “There’s No Other Gal Like Axis Sal,” Corporal Edward Van Dyne wrote, “Axis Sally is a different proposition. Sally is a dandy—the sweetheart of the AEF [Allied Expeditionary Force]. She plays nothing but swing, and good swing!”
Although the GIs found the propaganda laughable, the lively music drew thousands of listeners. Captured prisoners of war admitted to their German interrogators that they regularly listened to the broadcasts. And so the Foreign Office sought to replicate what they considered a successful formula.
As Allied troops pushed up the Italian peninsula in the summer of 1943, the Italian national radio network in Rome hired a 30-year-old Italian American named Rita Luisa Zucca. The daughter of a successful Manhattan restaurateur, Zucca had spent her teenage years in a convent school in Florence and, as a young woman, had worked in the family business. She had returned to Italy in 1938, working as a typist and renouncing her American citizenship three years later to save her family’s property from expropriation by Mussolini’s government. Fired from her typing job in 1942 for copying an anti-Fascist pamphlet, Zucca was hired as a radio announcer in February 1943. She was teamed with German broadcaster Charles Goedel and given the name Sally; their program, Jerry’s Front Calling, extended Axis Sally’s fame to the Italian front. Every night, Zucca signed off by sending her listeners “a sweet kiss from Sally.”
Desperate to save her family's estate under threat of Italian Fascist rule, 30 year Zucca renounced her citizenship and took over as Gillar's counterpart as Axis Sally on the Italian front. She soon fled after the Allies took control of region, and would later be caught, tried, and sentenced by the Italian government after the war. (Helge Collection)
While the show’s format was almost identical to Gillars’s, Zucca’s broadcasts used intelligence provided by the German embassy in Rome in an attempt to deceive and confuse the advancing troops. For instance, it was Rita Zucca who addressed the Allied troops on July 8, 1943, the night before the invasion of Sicily. Speaking to “the wonderful boys of the 504th Parachute Regiment,” she told them, “Colonel Willis Mitchell’s playboys [the 61st Troop Carrier Group] are going to carry you to certain death. We know where and when you are jumping and you will be wiped out.” The value of this particular revelation backfired when Sally announced to the men that their regiment had been decimated—a full hour before the first plane took off.
In Berlin, Mildred Gillars was incensed when she discovered there was another woman broadcasting as Axis Sally, and threatened to quit. “I felt that I could be responsible for anything that I said and I didn’t want any confusion after the end of the war as to what I said,” she recalled. “It caused a great deal of trouble.” Her threats were empty ones, however, and both Sallys continued their broadcasts until the war’s bitter end.
As the Allies advanced on Rome in May 1944, Rita Zucca traveled north with the retreating Germans and resumed broadcasting from Milan. On September 15, 1944, the cast and crew of Jerry’s Front fled to the sliver of northern Italy known as the Italian Social Republic. The program was now attached to a German military propaganda unit called the Liberty Station. In a castle in Fino Mornasco, near Como, Axis Sally was the guest of honor at a party broadcast live on that station. The GIs who tuned in heard the sounds of merriment, clinking glasses, and laughter. Other radio personalities, including English fascist John Amery (later hanged by the British for treason), took part in the festivities.
The broadcast accentuated the desperation of those final days. It was then the familiar, sweet voice of an American girl floated over the radio to troops on the front lines. “Hello boys…how are you tonight?” Zucca asked the GIs. “A lousy night it sure is…Axis Sally is talking to you…you poor, silly dumb lambs, well on your way to be slaughtered!”
By then the seductive-sounding Zucca was heavily pregnant; her son was born on December 15, 1944. She returned to the microphone 40 days later and continued until her final broadcast on April 25, 1945. With Italian partisans in pursuit she boarded a train to Milan, where she was met by one of her cousins. Zucca took refuge at her uncle’s home in Turin, where she was captured on June 5, 1945.
“When I saw her coming through the door, I said to myself, ‘What the hell is this, another rape case?’” an officer of the IV Corps military police later told Stars and Stripes’ European edition about being one of the first Allied men to lay eyes on the legendary Axis Sally. She was dressed in an American field jacket, a blue print dress, and sandals. As the arresting officers loaded Zucca and her son into a jeep for the overnight drive to Rome, they handed her eight blankets for protection against the cool night air. Although Stars and Stripes was not allowed to interview the prisoner, the correspondent breathlessly described her feminine charms: “True, her left eye is inclined to wander—but that cooey, sexy voice really has something to back it up.”
Stateside newspapers took a more bitter tone and tried to demolish the Axis Sally mystique. “Soft-Voiced ‘Sally from Berlin’ Found to Be Ugly Ex–N.Y. Girl” was a typical headline, with descriptions of the young mother as “[as] ugly and unattractive in person as her voice was appealing.” Another journalist called her “cross-eyed, bow-legged and sallow-skinned.”
Though the press touted her arrest, it soon became clear to the U.S. Justice Department that the Rome Axis Sally could not be prosecuted for treason. When the FBI discovered documentation of her 1941 renunciation of citizenship, J. Edgar Hoover wrote to the Justice Department, “In view of the fact that she has lost her American citizenship, no efforts are being made at the present time to develop a treason case against her.”
Mildred Gellar shortly after her arrest. (Federal Bureau of Prisons)
As the U.S. government’s effort to try Rita Zucca fizzled, it stepped up efforts to track down Mildred Gillars, who had continued to broadcast in Berlin until just before the German surrender. The U.S. attorney general dispatched prosecutor Victor C. Woerheide to Berlin in the summer of 1945; by August, he and Counter Intelligence Corps (CIC) special agent Hans Wintzen had only one solid lead: Raymond Kurtz, a B-17 pilot shot down by the Germans, recalled that a woman who had visited his prison camp seeking interviews was the broadcaster who called herself “Midge at the mike.” Kurtz remembered that the woman had used the alias Barbara Mome. That detail became the key to tracking her down.
Wanted posters went up throughout occupied Berlin, adorned with a dour photograph of Gillars, in which she looked more like a schoolmarm than a legendary woman of glamour and deceit. Wintzen discovered that “Barbara Mome” was selling her property on consignment at various Berlin antique shops to obtain hard currency. The investigation hit pay dirt when the agents found a small table that had belonged to Gillars in an antique shop tucked away on an isolated side street. The shop owner gave the CIC the name of the friend who sold the table to the shop. Under “intensive interrogation,” the man eventually admitted selling the item for Gillars and revealed her address.
On the evening of March 15, 1946, Gillars returned home to a boarding house in the British sector to find a pale, nervous U.S. Army soldier pointing a revolver in her direction. CIC special agent Robert Abeles announced, “Miss Gillars, you are under arrest.” With a surprised “Oh…” she surrendered, and asked to take one possession with her: a photo of Max Otto Koischwitz, the man who had led her down the path to treachery. He had died of tuberculosis in September 1944.
Mildred Gillars spent two and a half years in the Allied prison camp at Frankfurt-am-Main without charges before being returned to the United States in August 1948 to await trial. She was found guilty in March 1949 after a three-month trial and sentenced to 10 to 30 years imprisonment with a $10,000 fine. She served 12 years at the Alderson Reformatory for Women in West Virginia, was paroled in 1961, and became a teacher at a Roman Catholic convent school near Columbus, Ohio.
Gillars’s counterpart in Rome also served time, though far less. In September 1945 an Italian court found Rita Zucca guilty of collaboration. She was sentenced to four years and five months in jail, but was released after serving only nine months. Zucca remained in Italy, and faded into obscurity. The woman who came to replace her as the embodiment of Axis Sally in the memory of the American public died in Columbus of colon cancer in 1988, at the age of 87. Mildred Gillars was buried in an unmarked grave, surrounded by World War II veterans.
This article originally appeared in the January/February 2010 issue of World War II magazine.
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e5add4c43669c6ae905cb96c16d63251 | https://www.historynet.com/b-24-gunner-andy-hocko-on-a-celebrated-mission-we-think-we-know.htm | B-24 Gunner Andy Hocko, on a Celebrated Mission We Think We Know | B-24 Gunner Andy Hocko, on a Celebrated Mission We Think We Know
“I was never a talker, even with my crew. But I’d try to do the best I could to get back to base.”
Andrew Hocko Jr., the son of Slovakian immigrants who settled in Scranton, Pennsylvania, coal country, was a waist gunner aboard Double Trouble, a B-24J Liberator bomber that took off from Pandaveswar, India, on February 13, 1945. Joined by five other bombers from the Tenth Air Force’s 493rd Squadron, 7th Bomb Group, Double Trouble winged southeast over Calcutta and the Indian Ocean before turning east en route to the jungled borderlands between Burma and Thailand. The low-level, “in-and-out” mission would take 15 hours—assuming they returned safely.
The B-24s’ objectives were two railroad bridges—one steel-and-concrete, the other a rickety wooden trestle—spanning the Mae Klong River near Kanchanaburi, a town in western Thailand. The structures were two among hundreds of bridges punctuating the Japanese-engineered 258-mile “Death Railway”—the construction of which claimed the lives of 16,000 Allied POWs and 100,000 Asian conscripts.
A 1952 novel and 1957 movie, The Bridge on the River Kwai, depict a fictional commando raid on a wooden bridge spanning a different, smaller river. However, to memorialize the Death Railway and promote tourism, local authorities now designate Kanchanaburi’s stretch of the Mae Klong as the “River Kwai.” Today these particular bridges (rebuilt since World War II) hold strong symbolic meaning. But in 1945, to Andy and his Double Trouble crewmates, they were little more than coordinates on a map.
During a conversation last November, Andy—who turns 96 in May and is retired from a 30-year records management career at the U.S. Information Agency and residing in Maryland—recalled his World War II odyssey from Scranton to Pandaveswar and a celebrated bombing mission.
Andy Hocko, in 1944 as a newly fledged gunner for a bomb group. (Courtesy of Andrew Hocko Jr.)
How did your war begin?
I was a small guy—97 pounds—when I was drafted in 1942 after graduating high school. I went to Atlantic City [New Jersey] for basic training. The motel we stayed at was right on the beach. The next thing I knew I was going to Elizabeth, New Jersey: the Signal Corps. I was a lineman. I climbed the poles to work on power lines.
But you made it to the Army Air Forces.
I think I was out in California [with the Signal Corps] when I signed up; I wanted to see if I could get in. I ended up in Amarillo [Texas] for more training.
You practiced gunnery from the back seat of a training aircraft. Tell me more about that.
We shot at [aerial target] balloons. [The pilot would say] “Shoot,” so I did. Afterward he would say, “Finished shooting? OK, hold on….,” and back down we’d go. I qualified as a ball turret gunner for the bombing unit I joined—the 493rd Bombardment Squadron—stationed in the Mojave Desert.
Tell me about flying aboard the B-24 to India.
The B-24 was noisy. We flew out of New Jersey in September 1944. Then to New York, Connecticut, New Hampshire, Nova Scotia, the Azores, Algiers, Cairo. When we got to Karachi [now part of Pakistan], the engineer got malaria, so I had to take over [as engineer]. My first mission was actually not with my crew. I was a tail gunner with another crew for a bombing mission to Bangkok. Over Burma, on the way back, a plane flew by. It was a Japanese observation plane; he waved at me, so I waved back to him.
What types of missions did you end up flying aboard Double Trouble?
We would most always bomb railroads, railroad bridges: medium-elevation bombing missions at about 2,000 to 3,000 feet with regular bombs. We had 297 hours of bombing missions. Once we flew to China to deliver gasoline, so I spent Christmas 1944 in China.
These were long missions without protection from fighter escorts. How dangerous were they?
The only thing we faced over the target was light antiaircraft fire—machine guns. We removed the ball turret after a couple of months because we had no enemy plane activity. When our nose gunner spotted antiaircraft fire, he opened up. I was now a waist gunner, and I used a camera to take pictures of our missions.
Were you operating the camera during the February 13 mission against the bridges across the Mae Klong River?
Sometimes we had the camera, sometimes we didn’t; this time I had the camera. They told us, “No testing the camera until you’re in a mission.” I’m sitting on the floor. A hatch door near the back of the plane was open. I tried to take a picture when the bombardier said: “We dropped the bombs.” I even saw where the bomb dropped. I pushed the camera “trigger;” it wouldn’t work. I shook the camera handle. Next thing, the tail gunner said, “The bridge is down.” So, I took the camera and tried it once more. And that’s when I took the picture.
That was a pretty hectic and consequential mission. Are there any others that stand out to you?
One time an enemy bullet came into the bomb bay. It hit a terminal [and loosened some wires]. I knew one of the wires connected to a fuel transfer pump. I got out my pliers, traced the wires, and spliced two ends back together.
So, without that connection, you wouldn’t have enough fuel to get back. How does that make you feel now?
Well, I’m alive. I was able to do what I had to do. I was never a talker, even with my crew. But I’d try to do the best I could to get back to base. That’s what I was interested in: getting back safely. ✯
This article was published in the June 2020 issue of World War II.
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60aae29d8814dacb8709880ea769a405 | https://www.historynet.com/back-to-guam.htm | Back to Guam | Back to Guam
When the navy ordered me to Guam last winter, I was less than enthusiastic about the prospect. It certainly didn’t help that an officer I worked with who had spent some time in Guam in the 1960s referred to the North Pacific island—the southernmost and largest of the Mariana Islands—as “the armpit of the world.” I spent most of the 20 hours it took me to travel there in a state of gloom and doom.
But all that went away when I stepped out onto the beautiful white sand beach the next morning and saw an intriguing hunk of concrete directly ahead. Once I recognized a gun port, I knew what I was looking at: it was a Japanese pillbox, positioned so that its occupant could take aim at American troops advancing from shore.
As the son of an engineering officer in the merchant marine who served in both theaters of World War II, had four ships shot out from under him, and loved to tell war stories, I grew up feeling surrounded by history. That’s the way I felt when I stood in front of that pillbox.
More than 60 years ago, death and destruction were all over this beautiful beach. It began with the surprise Japanese invasion of the strategically located island on December 8, 1941, one hour after the attack on Pearl Harbor (there is a significant time zone difference), which overran Guam’s meager defensive forces in only two days. For the next two and a half years, the native Chamorro population was subjected to beatings, forced labor, executions, brainwashing, and—near the end of the Japanese occupation—internment in concentration camps. Then, on July 21, 1944, 55,000 Americans landed on Asan and Agat beaches to wrest the American territory away from its occupiers. By August 10, after an intense and deadly struggle, the Americans regained control of the island; it soon became the command post for their Western Pacific operations.
Stories I’d heard as a child about tanks and guns rusting away in the jungle came back to me and, inspired by the pillbox on the beach, I became determined then to locate as many other artifacts as I could. I hit some map shops, talked to locals, and soon realized there was much to see. My major quandary at that point was how to work my job around artifact hunting. I decided I could sleep when I got home.
Convincing myself I couldn’t get too lost on a 30-mile-long island, I drove down the Marine Corps Highway to the American invasion site at Asan Beach on the island’s west coast—one of seven locations of Guam’s War in the Pacific National Historical Park. There I examined a defensive cave carved about 40 feet into a rocky cliff, from which Japanese forces launched counterattacks against the Americans.
Photos mounted on placards in the park show how the beach appeared on the morning of the July invasion, when preinvasion bombardment had rendered the entire area a desolate landscape, spiked with the trunks of broken palm trees.
I next headed a little farther south toward the village of Piti, partway up Nimitz Hill. Just above the village, on a hillside overgrown with dense jungle foliage, lie the remains of three Japanese coastal defense guns. Although I knew to look for the guns there, finding them in the quiet jungle setting still felt like a discovery. The weapons—Japanese-made 140mm Vickers-type Model 3 guns, called “Piti guns” by the locals—were never fired. The Japanese had used Chamorro slave laborers to haul the guns, which weigh thousands of pounds each, up the steep hillside. But they weren’t yet operational by the time of the American invasion—something the sight of the open and rusted breeches made me glad of.
About two miles farther up Nimitz Hill is Asan Bay Overlook, one of the better-maintained and more contemporary memorials on the island. This serene, windblown site offers a commanding view of the assault beach. From here Japanese commanders launched a large but ultimately unsuccessful banzai attack early the morning of July 26 in a last-ditch effort to repel the Americans. While I was there, several busloads of Japanese tourists arrived and departed. I briefly wondered why they’d come until I realized they, like me, were paying respects to their slain soldiers.
One of the most moving memorials I came across was dedicated to another group of fallen warriors: the Doberman pinschers that served alongside marines in the liberation of Guam. Sixty dogs entered Guam with the 3rd Marine Division; headstones arranged in a semicircle mark the burial sites of the 25 dogs that died there. These animals were used to flush Japanese troops from their caves, pillboxes, and dugout positions, and served as sentries as well. Dogs accompanied marines into combat throughout the Pacific, and no marine unit with a dog was ever ambushed or its position infiltrated by the Japanese. The War Dog Memorial is located at the U.S. Naval Base; civilian visitors must be accompanied by a military sponsor.
Just outside the entrance to the naval base is the headquarters of the War in the Pacific National Historical Park. And in front of that, resting on keel blocks, is a rare sight: a Japanese Type C midget submarine, possibly the only surviving one of its type. The 78-foot-long sub ran aground in August 1944, was captured, and was displayed on the base until last spring, when the navy donated it to the National Park Service. Outfitted with two torpedoes and crewed by only two men, it was a formidable weapon. Submarines have been a professional focus of mine for more than 30 years, so I found this especially thrilling.
But the highlight of my visit came at the end of a long and very muddy trek through a savanna on the east side of the island. For more than two miles, my colleagues and I hiked along deeply rutted red clay roads, which were fiercely sticky from a persistent downpour. Every hundred yards or so, we would come across the strange spectacle of yet another abandoned shoe left in the grip of the muddy road.
But when we finally reached the Tank Farm in Yona, it was worth the trip. There, the remains of two Sherman tanks and three amtracs used for Allied target practice have been rusting away since the end of the war. The vehicles were of limited utility during the battle for Guam because, I wasn’t surprised to learn, the sticky red clay soil was so difficult to negotiate. Being able to examine the old vehicles up close and in a natural setting was a moving experience that made me gladly overlook the large blue spiders that seemed to share my affinity for the tanks.
Something with wider appeal to the average tourist is the park at Talofofo Falls. Here, gondolas carry tourists over a series of waterfalls, the occasional pig meanders about, and a monorail system offers grand jungle views. Here is where the last Japanese holdout of the war, a sergeant named Shoichi Yokoi, chose to hunker down and hide until local farmers found and captured him in 1972. He went back to Japan a hero, married—and returned to Guam for his honeymoon.
The latter, at least, is something I understand, because having once been a reluctant traveler to Guam, I’m now hoping the navy will send me back.
When You Go
Guam, the westernmost territory of the United States, is 3,300 miles west of Hawaii and 1,500 miles south of Japan. Air travelers will fly into Guam’s centrally located Won Pat International Airport; car rental is recommended.Where to Stay and EatThe center of tourism on the island is the city of Tumon; many large hotel chains offer accommodations on the mile-and-a-half-long beach on Tumon Bay. Thuy’s Café (671-477-9595), in the nearby capital city of Hagatna, is a warm and friendly mom-and-pop establishment with wonderful Vietnamese and Thai food.
To sample native cuisine and culture, visit the Wednesday night market at Chamarro Village in Hagatna, where vendors offer plates of barbecue topped with a local hot sauce called finadene; lumpia, vegetable egg rolls dipped in garlic sauce; and ahu, shredded coconut boiled in sugar water.What Else to SeeDiving is spectacular around Guam, which is located near the Mariana Trench, the deepest part of the ocean in the world. The clear, warm water is home to healthy coral reefs and other vibrant marine life, as well an array of wrecks, including the Tokai Maru, a Japanese freighter torpedoed by the submarine USS Snapper in 1943, which came to rest beside the SMS Cormoran, a German auxiliary cruiser scuttled in 1917—the only place in the world where shipwrecks from two world wars are known to be touching.
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fec1c6d68bcdb4701eaef8e64e3140c9 | https://www.historynet.com/baseballs-odd-man-out.htm | Baseball’s Odd Man Out | Baseball’s Odd Man Out
Morris “Moe” Berg was a brainy academic who spoke a dozen languages. He was also a spy.
In the fall of 1934 Morris “Moe” Berg, a journeyman backup catcher for the Cleveland Indians baseball team, caught a break—or so it was thought. To the surprise of many people, he was named to a squad of 14 major league ballplayers preparing for a post-season tour of Japan, where he would be in the rarefied company of such superstars as Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Jimmy Foxx, Lefty Gomez, and legendary manager Connie Mack. It was the first time since high school that the whip-smart but light-hitting prodigy had made an all-star team.
Why Berg was picked to join the tour in the first place was never explained. A brainy academic—he graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Princeton University, went on to earn a law degree from Columbia University, and read 10 newspapers a day—Berg was an enigma to his less intellectual fellow ballplayers, a man who was seemingly more interested in international diplomacy than daily batting averages. “He could speak 12 languages,” a former teammate once joked, “but he couldn’t hit in any of them.” It was assumed that Berg’s mastery of languages would come in handy at a time when Japan was growing increasingly hostile to other countries in the region. As it turns out, the veteran baseball player was more than a talented linguist.
He was also a spy.
No one knows exactly when Berg’s baseball career collided with his shadowy spy craft, but altogether befitting a secret agent, he was an enigma to his teammates and friends. His life, then and later, was filled with unanswered questions. Did Berg use baseball as a disguise, or did he honestly enjoy playing the sport? Those who knew him best believed it was a little of both.
The youngest of three children, Berg was born in the East Harlem neighborhood of New York City on March 2, 1902, to Ukrainian-Jewish immigrants, sharing a tenement apartment on East 121st Street with his parents and his two siblings. Berg’s father, Bernard, operated a laundry while teaching himself to read English, French, and German. From his home Moe could look across the Harlem River to Yankee Stadium, where the New York team played. In due time, he would play there himself. After excelling at night classes, the elder Berg earned enough money to open a pharmacy and move the family to a more comfortable apartment in Newark, New Jersey.
From the start, his father encouraged Berg to study and read. Although Moe thrived in school, his real passion, like many kids his age, was baseball. One day a beat cop noticed him zipping a ball around on the street and invited him to join the local Methodist Episcopal Church team—much to the chagrin of Berg’s hard-working father, who viewed baseball as a waste of time and intellect. The only Jew on a team of Italian Catholics and Protestants, the imaginative 7-year-old Moe created his first pseudonym, changing his playing name to “Runt Wolfe.”
At age 16 Berg graduated at the top of his class from Barringer High School in Newark and was selected as the starting third baseman for a nine-man high school “dream team” chosen by the Newark Star Eagle. In the spring of 1918 he was accepted at New York University. The following year, after two semesters playing baseball and basketball at NYU, Berg transferred to Princeton, where he played first base and shortstop. Following in his father’s footsteps, Moe studied languages, excelling in Spanish, Latin, Greek, Italian, German, and Sanskrit. When not playing ball, he tutored his teammates. He was known to confound opponents by yelling tips in Latin back and forth with equally intellectual second baseman Crossan Cooper.
Being Jewish, Berg endured some awkward moments at Princeton. When one of his teammates was nominated for membership in one of Princeton’s prestigious dining clubs, the teammate refused to join unless Berg could also become a member. The club consented on the condition that the two of them not attempt to bring any more Jews into the club. The teammates declined. Feeling responsible for his teammate’s principled refusal, Berg talked him into becoming a member anyway. As for Berg, he never returned to Princeton for class reunions.
Despite the prejudice, Berg played baseball for three years at Princeton. In his senior season he was captain of the team, batting .337 for the year and a sparkling .611 against Princeton’s archrivals, Harvard and Yale. He played against Yale at Yankee Stadium and got three hits in one game. Graduating magna cum laude in 1923, Berg signed a $5,000 contract to play major league baseball with the Brooklyn Robins (soon to be renamed the Brooklyn Dodgers), which was eager to add a Jewish ballplayer to expand its fan base. Batting a dismal .186 as a backup shortstop that first year, Berg packed his bags after season’s end and sailed to Paris, where he enrolled at the prestigious Sorbonne to study Latin, ultimately registering for 32 classes.
Returning in time for spring training in 1924, Berg was exiled to the minor leagues. He spent the next two years playing for the Minneapolis Millers, Toledo Mud Hens, and Reading (Pennsylvania) Keystones. His more than respectable .311 batting average with the Keystones got him a ticket back to the majors with the Chicago White Sox in 1926, but not before he skipped spring training to finish his first year at Columbia Law School. A series of injuries to White Sox catchers gave Berg an opening: He volunteered to catch, even though he had never played the position before. In his first game behind the plate, White Sox pitchers held Babe Ruth hitless and won 6–3. Berg had a found new home.
Never much of a hitter, Berg had developed a strong throwing arm and used his dominating intelligence to help his pitchers call better games. No less a player than Boston Red Sox’s Ted Williams sought his advice. During the second year of his storied career, Williams asked Berg how Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig had hit. “Gehrig would wait and wait and wait until he hit the pitch almost out of the catcher’s glove,” Berg replied. “As to Ruth, he had no weaknesses. He had a good eye and laid off pitches out of the strike zone.” The hitter Williams most resembled, said Berg, was Shoeless Joe Jackson, the former Chicago “Black Sox” great. “But you,” Berg told Williams, “are better than all of them.”
A knee injury Berg suffered in an exhibition game against the minor league Little Rock Travelers in 1929 severely limited his playing time. The following year Berg appeared in only 20 games, hitting a woeful .115. Looking to the future, he took a job in the off-season with the respected Wall Street law firm of Satterlee and Canfield. The Cleveland Indians picked Berg up in 1931, but he played in only 10 games, managing one hit in 13 at bats. The next spring, he joined the Washington Senators as a backup catcher, batting .236 in 75 games with no errors and throwing out 54.3 percent of would-be base stealers, the second best percentage in the American League.
Berg (center) and Japanese ballplayer Takizo Matsumoto (left) with unidentified friend. (Boston Public Library)
Berg’s move to the nation’s capital would change his life. He was frequently invited to embassy dinners and parties, where his quick wit and formidable language skills caught the attention of prominent members of the incoming Franklin D. Roosevelt administration. Following the 1932 season, Berg was invited to accompany fellow major leaguers Lefty O’Doul and Ted Lyons to Japan to teach baseball seminars at Japanese universities. After the other players returned to the United States, Berg made an extended tour of Southeast Asia, the Middle East, and Germany before returning in time to participate in Washington’s pennant-winning season of 1933. It was a sign of things to come.
Berg returned to Japan in 1934 with a team of American League all-stars headed by Babe Ruth—Beibu Rusu to the Japanese—who had just completed his final season with the New York Yankees. Thousands of baseball-mad fans lined the streets of Tokyo to welcome the U.S. team when it arrived in November for a series of 18 exhibition games against a top-flight Japanese collegiate team.
At the time of his surprising selection to the all-star team, Berg, who by now was back with the Cleveland Indians, was known to his teammates as a mediocre player. Rumors were that his language skills had gotten him a spot on the trip as an interpreter, although at that point he spoke limited Japanese. No one suspected that his ball playing was a guise for a top-secret government assignment. In his suitcase he carried a letter signed by U.S. Secretary of State Cordell Hull, addressed to the American consulate in Tokyo and instructing the staff to show the catcher all due cooperation, official and otherwise.
Berg played in a handful of the exhibition games in Japan—the big leaguers won all 18 and Ruth hit 13 home runs—but his real work came afterward. During his downtime Berg would wander the streets of Tokyo in a black kimono and sandals, filming background scenes with a 16mm Bell and Howell motion picture camera provided to him by Movietone News, a newsreel production company that had contracted with him to film the trip for movie theaters back home. The Japanese government strictly prohibited such filming, but either Berg’s status as a big league ballplayer or his disguise as a 6-foot-1 Japanese enabled him to elude the authorities.
After a game at the Omiya fairgrounds near Tokyo, Berg slipped away, trading his uniform for his kimono, slicking back his hair, and buying a bouquet of flowers. Then he nonchalantly walked into the seven-story St. Luke’s International Hospital, one of the city’s tallest buildings. His cover story: a courtesy visit to the daughter of U.S. Ambassador Joseph Grew, Elizabeth Lyon, who had just given birth. Tossing the flowers aside once he had gained entrance, Berg sneaked out a side door to the roof. From there, with a commanding view of the city, he captured panoramic shots of the naval base at Tokyo Bay, commercial and industrial centers, and surrounding military targets. Then he quietly returned to his teammates. He never did see Lyon. His secret video was later shown to U.S. Army Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Jimmy Doolittle and his raiders before their famous bombing raid on Tokyo in April 1942 in retaliation for the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.
Berg with his 16mm Bell and Howell movie camera. (Arthur W. Diamond Law Library, Columbia University School of Law)
Following the Japanese tour, Berg continued his travels in the Far East, Russia, and Poland—all areas of great interest to American intelligence officials. After returning to the United States, he was picked up by the Boston Red Sox to resume his day job as a backup catcher. On October 17, 1938, Berg was invited to be a guest panelist on Information Please, NBC’s popular radio quiz show. Berg, who returned to the show three times, effortlessly demonstrated his wide range of knowledge by answering all types of questions, from astronomy to mythology to the derivation of words and names in Greek and Latin. “He did more for baseball in 30 minutes than I’ve done as commissioner,” Kenesaw Mountain Landis, baseball’s long-serving ruler, said. Berg also wrote a well-received article about baseball for Atlantic Monthly entitled “Pitchers and Catchers.”
After he retired from baseball in 1942 with a career batting average of .243, six home runs, and 206 RBI, Berg accepted a job with Nelson Rockefeller’s Office of Inter-American Affairs, an agency set up to counter Axis propaganda in Latin America. Berg’s linguistic talents came in handy as he met with various government officials in Brazil, Panama, and Peru. His first mission was a goodwill tour of Latin America that allowed him to covertly assess the willingness of political leaders in Latin America to side with the United States in the war.
In August 1943 Berg transferred to the Office of Strategic Services, the forerunner of the Central Intelligence Agency. The OSS was headed by Brigadier General William “Wild Bill” Donovan, who had commanded the 165th (formerly the “Fighting 69th”) Infantry Regiment in World War I. His recruitment was smoothed by a letter from Colonel Ellery Huntington, a partner at Berg’s law firm, Satterlee and Canfield. Berg, Huntington wrote, “would make a good operations officer, either here or on the field.” Placed on the Balkans desk at the OSS, Berg monitored the movements of the exiled Yugoslavian king, Peter II, who was now a student at Cambridge. He also received field reports and cross-checked them with members of the Slavic-American community who likewise had been recruited into the OSS. (Stories that Berg parachuted into Yugoslavia to personally meet with Chetniks and communist partisans under Josip Broz Tito are now considered apocryphal.)
Babe Ruth with geishas during the 1934 tour of Japan. (Bettmann/Getty Images)
In late 1943 Berg was tabbed for a highly sensitive clandestine operation behind enemy lines in Europe. His mission, as part of Project Larson, was to interview top Italian scientists to assess their knowledge of Germany’s atomic bomb program. To prepare, he met with Nobel Prize–winning physicist William Fowler and Vannevar Bush, the chief of the U.S. Office of Scientific Research and Development. In April 1944, after he was officially named an intelligence agent in the Special Ops Branch and authorized to carry a .45-caliber pistol, Berg flew to Italy via Portugal and Algiers. Neither he nor most other Americans knew at the time that the United States was already developing its own atomic bomb in the New Mexico desert under the code name the Manhattan Project.
Berg entered Italy on a submarine the OSS borrowed from the Italian navy at Brindisi. After landing he went to Florence to visit the Galileo Laboratory, where Italian scientists were working on long-range missiles. From his interviews with the Italians, Berg learned that Werner Heisenberg, the preeminent German physicist in charge of the Nazis’ nascent nuclear program, was scheduled to give a lecture in Zurich. Berg made contact with Paul Scherrer, the director of the Physics Institute in Zurich, and arranged to attend the lecture posing as a Swiss graduate student. Armed with a pistol and a potassium cyanide capsule to swallow if necessary, Berg had orders to shoot Heisenberg if Berg determined from the lecture that the Germans were close to developing an atomic bomb.
The Nobel laureate was seated in the front row of the auditorium, surrounded by armed Nazi soldiers. Berg, who had a basic understanding of nuclear physics, took meticulous notes during the lecture. A bit nervous and in over his head when Heisenberg launched into a lengthy discussion of S-matrix theory, Berg nevertheless concluded that nothing Heisenberg said in the lecture justified shooting him. Berg’s snap judgment was confirmed when he attended a post-lecture dinner in Heisenberg’s honor and overheard the German remark that his country was losing the war and was nowhere near developing an atomic bomb. Heisenberg was spared the bullet and Berg the cyanide.
Werner Heisenberg, the German physicist in charge of the Nazis’ nascent nuclear program, was one of Berg’s targets. (Bundesarchiv)
Staying on with the OSS until it was dissolved in 1945, Berg transferred to the staff of NATO’s Advisory Group for Aeronautical Research and Development. In 1951 he asked to be named station chief of the CIA office in Israel, but his request was denied. During the height of the Cold War, Berg was assigned to Europe to monitor the Soviet Union’s atomic program. He made it through the Czech Republic with nothing more than a scrap of paper emblazoned with a red star but ultimately learned nothing of value. The CIA officer who debriefed Berg on his return reported that the former catcher was “flaky.” Berg’s contract expired in 1954.
Financial troubles plagued Berg for the rest of his life. For 17 years he lived with his brother Samuel in Newark before Samuel finally kicked him out, leaving their sister, Ethel, to deal with the eccentric former spy. Berg became a hoarder, spending his days reading stacks of newspapers. No one was allowed to touch his papers until he had read them all. If anyone did, he considered the touched papers “dead” and would go out and buy the same ones again. He also wore the same black suit and tie every day and took three baths.
Awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Harry S. Truman in 1946 for his wartime service, Berg declined to accept when he was told that he couldn’t explain to friends how he had earned the honor. He never married or held a full-time job after his baseball career ended. Instead he led a nomadic existence, carrying only a toothbrush and craftily making friends with train conductors who would let him ride for free. He spent hours at the New York City’s major league ballparks, watching the Yankees, Dodgers, or Giants play. One night he ran into his old friend Joe DiMaggio, who offered him a night’s stay at his upscale Manhattan hotel. Berg spent six weeks living off the Yankee Clipper’s hospitality.
In 1960 Berg made plans to write a book detailing his exploits as a ballplayer-spy. The project foundered after Berg’s cowriter mistook him for Moe Howard of the Three Stooges. The book was never written. Whenever anyone asked Berg what he was working on, he would hold a finger to his lips and whisper theatrically, “Shhh.” It was the closest he came to admitting that he’d been a spy.
In 1933 Berg was one of 240 major league players featured in Goudy Gum Company’s new series of “Big League” baseball cards—the first such cards to be sold with sticks of chewing gum in every pack. (Heritage Auctions)
Berg died on May 29, 1972, at age 70 from injuries he sustained in a fall at his sister’s home. A nurse at the Newark hospital where he died recalled his final words: “How did the Mets do today?” (They won.) In keeping with his stated wishes, his cremated remains were spread over Mount Scopus in Israel.
Later that year Berg’s sister accepted the Medal of Freedom on his behalf and donated it to the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York, where it is displayed alongside his well-worn catcher’s mitt and passport. Berg would have approved. “Maybe I’m not in the Cooperstown Baseball Hall of Fame like many of my baseball buddies, but I’m happy,” he once said. “I had the chance to play pro ball and am especially proud of my contributions to my country. Perhaps I couldn’t hit like Babe Ruth, but I spoke more languages than he did.”
In recent years Berg’s shadowy exploits have inspired a best-selling book The Catcher Was a Spy, by Nicholas Dawidoff; a 2018 movie of the same title starring Paul Rudd; and a 2019 documentary The Spy Behind Home Plate, by Washington-based filmmaker Aviva Kempner. Berg’s major league baseball trading card is prominently displayed at CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia.
Former major league player and manager Casey Stengel, himself a noted eccentric, succinctly summed up Moe Berg. Stengel, like Berg, played for the Brooklyn Dodgers, and once doffed his cap to let a bird fly out. In later years, as manager of the New York Yankees and New York Mets, he was celebrated for “Stengelese,” his fractured use of the English language. Berg, said Stengel, was “the strangest man ever to play baseball.” He would have known. MHQ
Liesl Bradner, a California-based journalist, is the author of Snapdragon: The World War II Exploits of Darby’s Ranger and Combat Photographer Phil Stern (Osprey Publishing, 2018).
This article appears in the Autumn 2020 issue (Vol. 33, No. 1) of MHQ—The Quarterly Journal of Military History with the headline: Baseball’s Odd Man Out
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103d5077a51704e473652a6555bf1b6b | https://www.historynet.com/battle-films-rommel-2012.htm | Battle Films: Rommel (2012) | Battle Films: Rommel (2012)
MY LAST COLUMN EXAMINED The Desert Fox, the well-known 1951 film that helped popularize the image of Field Marshal Erwin Rommel as a gallant, principled soldier who stood up to Hitler and supported the attempt to remove the Nazi dictator from power in the summer of 1944. Rommel, a German television film first broadcast in 2012, depicts a very different man. “I don’t see him as a hero,” said writer-director Niki Stein. “He is a tragic figure. He was a weak man drawn into an incredible internal conflict.”
To make this point, Rommel examines the last 10 months of the field marshal’s life. Rommel (portrayed by Ulrich Tukur) comes across as an average military talent—a competent division commander, says Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt (Hanns Zischler), promoted well beyond his abilities. He has gotten as far as he has only because of Hitler’s patronage and the worshipful publicity supplied by Joseph Goebbels, the Nazi minister of propaganda.
Although not officially a member of the Nazi Party, Rommel might as well be. He is among the members of the German high command who visit Hitler at his private mountain retreat in Berchtesgaden to swear fealty to the dictator. Rommel tells his chief of staff, Lieutenant General Hans Speidel (Benjamin Sadler), that he has heard of terrible things about “mass executions” and “the massacre of the Jews in the occupied territories.” He asks Speidel, who has served on the Eastern Front, if he can confirm this. Speidel does. Rommel merely digests this information. As he says later in the film: “That’s just politics. We’re soldiers. Politics doesn’t concern us.”
The Holocaust may not concern other members of the Wehrmacht either, but Germany’s deteriorating military position does. Speidel puts Rommel in touch with General Carl-Heinrich von Stülpnagel (Hubertus Hartmann), who tells him of a conspiracy afoot to arrest Hitler and put him on trial for war crimes in hopes that Germany can then negotiate peace. Rommel responds that Stülpnagel is proposing a military coup; he indignantly refuses to go along.
A point in Rommel’s favor is that he does not report his knowledge of the conspiracy, but that is as far as he goes. Instead, after D-Day he approaches Hitler and edges toward asking him to consider a negotiated peace. Hitler demands that Rommel restrict himself to discussing purely military matters. The Allied nations will never negotiate with his regime, says the dictator. All that is left is the fanatical resistance of each and every German. “Are you prepared to do this?” he demands of Rommel, who gives no indication that he is not.
On July 9, the field marshal meets with Lieutenant Colonel Caesar von Hofacker (Tim Bergmann) and learns that the conspiracy now focuses on assassinating Hitler. He asks if Rommel will work for “a different Germany, with a different government.” The film cuts immediately to another scene, with the clear implication that Rommel has once again refused to go along.
Rommel toys instead on the idea of opening the front and allowing the Western Allied forces to pass through, but nothing comes of this. On July 17, he is gravely wounded when a Spitfire strafes his staff car. Three days later, a bomb explodes in Hitler’s headquarters. It fails to kill the dictator and the conspirators are quickly rounded up. One of them implicates Rommel, but only of knowing about the assassination plot. Rommel’s involvement extends no farther than his failure to report this knowledge to the Gestapo.
That, however, is enough. On October 14, two generals visit Rommel at his home, where he is recuperating, and accuse him of conspiring against Hitler. “What?” Rommel asks in surprise. The generals tell him that he can either undergo public trial, in which case his family will suffer, or take cyanide, in which case his family will be left alone and his wife will receive his full pension. Rommel agrees to commit suicide. He leaves with the generals, but maintains to the last, “I am innocent.”
Needless to say, the film outraged the field marshal’s elderly son, as well as his granddaughter and one military historian who had cooperated with its production, all of whom believed the film downplayed Rommel’s role in his resistance against Hitler. But Rommel matters less for its accuracy or inaccuracy than its portrayal of a figure who is a proxy for ordinary Germans. Hitherto, German film depictions of life under Hitler’s regime drew a sharp distinction between the Nazis and ordinary Germans, who were shown as being themselves victims of the regime. Rommel runs directly counter to this reassuring picture. “Please watch, this film explains a little how it was back then with our grandparents, with Hitler, with fear, with joining in,” pleaded one German columnist. “The Rommel film shows how a man believes he is serving a king and realizes too late that he is a devil.” ✯
This column was originally published in the December 2018 issue of World War II magazine. Subscribe here.
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ef3973999f4dd9cd7614240715320ead | https://www.historynet.com/battle-for-chitor-storming-the-last-hindu-fortress-in-1567.htm | Battle for Chitor: Storming the Last Hindu Fortress in 1567 | Battle for Chitor: Storming the Last Hindu Fortress in 1567
The walls had been breached. The Mogul forces were closing in on the gallant Rajput defenders inside Chitor Garh, the fort of Chitor. Suddenly, flames were seen rising up in the air from three places inside the fort. The courtiers of Akbar the Great, the Mogul emperor, gave various explanations for the fires. Then Raja Bhagwant Das, a Rajput leader who had allied himself with the Moguls, said that the fires could only mean one thing. The johar–the Rajput custom of burning their women to death in the face of impending defeat–had been performed. Now the Rajput warriors sallied forth to meet the invaders in a desperate last stand with their traditional cry of ‘death for all before dishonor.
It was Tuesday, February 23, 1568. For more than four months, the Mogul army had undertaken a costly and grueling siege of the fort, directed personally by their commander in chief and emperor, Akbar. Now the campaign had reached its apocalyptic climax.
Abu-al-Fath Jalal-ud-Din Muhammad Akbar was born on October 15, 1542. His grandfather and the first of the Mogul emperors, Babur, was a Chaghatai Turk who came from an area in what is now Uzbekistan in Central Asia–and was a descendent of the Mongol conquerors Genghis Khan and Tamerlane. Akbar became emperor at the age of 14 upon the death of his father, Humayun, in 1556. In his nearly 50 years on the throne (15561605), Akbar proved to be a tolerant statesman, a shrewd administrator and an avid patron of the arts. He was also a strong-willed individual and a brilliant military commander whose courage and determination enabled him to become master of a vast empire that covered almost two-thirds of the Indian subcontinent. One of the greatest testaments to Akbar’s military and political skills was his subjugation of the martial Rajput kingdoms.
The domain of Rajputana or Land of the Rajputs (in what is now the desert state of Rajasthan) occupied the northwestern portion of India and had presented special difficulties for preceding Muslim rulers, as well as the Moguls. The hostile Rajput kingdoms lay across the routes that ran south from the principal Muslim centers of Delhi and Agra and were uncomfortably close to Dehli and Agra themselves. Mogul rulers also feared that the independent Rajput kingdoms could provide a safe haven for rebels plotting against them. Furthermore, Rajputana bordered on Gujarat, an important center of commerce with western Asia and Europe. To Akbar and the Moguls, therefore, there were potentially huge political and economic advantages to be gained by securing Rajputana.
The Rajputs (sons of kings) had begun to settle in northern and northwestern India after the breakup of the mighty Gupta empire in the late 5th century. They were probably descendants of Central Asian invaders who had contributed to the fall of the Gupta dynasty. Others believe that the Rajputs were the descendants of the kshatriyas (warrior caste, the second tier of the Hindu caste system), who had lived during the Vedic period between 1500 and 500 bc, when an Indo-European people from Iran, called the Aryans, settled in India.
The Rajputs were governed by a chivalric warrior’s code not unlike that of the knights of medieval Europe. It emphasized compassion for defeated foes, generosity toward the helpless, fair play in battle, respect for women, and conduct of warfare by elegant forms and ceremonies. The Rajputs were renowned for their courage on the battlefield.
Their proud martial tradition and passion for war enabled the Rajputs to become the dominant power in northern India by the 9th century, but internecine conflicts led to the emergence of numerous petty kingdoms within their own domain. From time to time, the Rajputs would form confederacies to repel the Turko-Afghan armies that invaded India from the 8th century onward. Such unity tended to be only temporary, however, and their internal discord would ultimately prove to be their undoing.
The victory of Turkish forces from Afghanistan under Muhammad of Ghur over the Rajputs in the second battle of Tarain in 1192 firmly established a Muslim presence in northern India. Nevertheless, the Rajputs maintained their independence in Rajputana and remained a power to be reckoned with in northern India until the arrival of the Moguls in the 16th century.
Akbar fully realized that the Rajputs were tenacious opponents, so he adopted a shrewd policy that combined both military action and diplomacy. For instance, he married Hindu princesses and arranged similar marriages for his heirs. After he defeated a Rajput chieftain, Akbar would make him an ally rather than depose him. As long as they acknowledged Akbar’s suzerainty, paid tribute and supplied troops when required, the Rajput rulers were allowed to retain their territories. That policy of conciliation and compromise won a number of Rajput kingdoms over to Akbar’s side and further weakened whatever remained of Rajput unity. Even as they watched their brothers surrender their independence, however, the Sesodia Rajputs of Mewar refused to bow to Mogul authority.
The Sesodian clan was considered the most powerful and recalcitrant of the Rajputs, carrying the banner of Rajput independence and zealously opposing the Muslim invaders. The Rana of Mewar (rana was a royal title, and rani was the female equivalent) was recognized as the foremost among the 36 royal tribes of the Rajputs. The formidable fortresses of Chitor and Ranthambhor, both in Mewar, were regarded as bastions of Rajput sovereignty and strength.
Mewar, however, had the misfortune of being ruled in 1567 by a weak and incompetent ruler, Rana Udai Singh II. Udai Singh’s defiance was one of the main reasons that Akbar marched against the Sesodias. Akbar also realized that without establishing his suzerainty over the dominion of the Sesodias, he could not hope to be the master of northern India. He was determined to capture the fort of Chitor in particular, thereby setting an example so that no other fortress would dare to resist his army in future.
On October 20, 1567, Akbar arrived at the outskirts of Chitor Garh and pitched camp. A ferocious thunderstorm greeted the Mogul army, as if to serve as an ominous warning against their undertaking. When the storm calmed and the sky cleared, the fortress of Chitor became visible in the distance.
Chitor was the capital of Mewar and had served as the stronghold of the Sesodias since 728. Chitor was formerly called Chitrakut after Chitrang, a Rajput chieftain. Located in present central Rajasthan in northern India, 111 kilometers from Udaipur, Chitor Garh (garh means fort) is the finest medieval Hindu fortification to survive in any state of completeness.
Chitor was situated on a steep, isolated mass of rock that rose some 558 feet from the plain, and was 31Ž4 miles long and 1,200 yards wide in the center. On the summit of the rock stood Chitor Garh. The principal approach to the fortress was from the southeast angle of the present-day location of the lower town (the town was built at the foot of the escarpment after the Sesodias abandoned the fort in 1568) by a steep road that ran for nearly a mile, then made two zigzag bends that were defended by seven massive gates. The summit of the rock, which sloped inward on all sides, collected rainwater that filled several tanks, ensuring an abundant water supply that added to the fort’s capacity to withstand a protracted siege. Unlike most forts in Rajputana, which only enclosed the residence of the clan’s ruler, Chitor Garh held a veritable city within its walls: magnificent palaces, temples, houses and markets. Some of the remains of Chitor Garh can still be seen today.
A 9th-century Hindu chronicle, the Khoman Rasa, described Chitor Garh as the chief amongst eighty-four castles, renowned for strength…it is within the grasp of no foe. Formidable as it was, Chitor had, in fact, been sacked twice before by Muslim forces. It was first taken in 1303 by the Delhi Sultan Alauddin Khalji and was sacked again in 1535 by Bahadur Shah, the sultan of Gujarat. On both occasions, the johar or ritual death by immolation was performed when defeat seemed imminent, after which the Rajput warriors, having taken a vow of death, staged a desperate final charge. Ironically, it was Akbar’s father, Humayun, who intervened and restored the Sesodias after the second sack. That enabled Udai Singh to become rana in 1541.
When he got wind of the Mogul army’s approach, Udai Singh fled to the relative safety of the distant hills, after using scorched-earth tactics to devastate the countryside. When Akbar was informed of the rana‘s flight, he considered pursuing him but decided against it because of the distance involved and the inhospitable terrain.
The rana left the fort in command of two teenage Rajput princes, Jaimal and Patta, ages 15 and 16 respectively. Chitor was defended by a garrison of 8,000 warriors, supported by 40,000 peasants. Several other Rajput clans and their chiefs were also at the fort during this time. The garrison was evidently prepared for a long siege, since it had a well-stocked supply of ammunition, grain and other provisions. And the fort had plenty of firepower, including archers, a corps of crack musketeers and a number of artillery pieces.
When Akbar arrived at the summit of Chitor hill on October 21, 1567, he pitched his camp, which extended 10 miles to the northeast of the hill. The site of the camp was marked by a 30-foot limestone pyramidal column, or tower, known as Akbar’s lamp, which served as a beacon to stragglers at night and denoted the imperial headquarters (such markers were a regular feature of Mogul camps of significant size).
The Mogul army included some 3,000 to 4,000 horsemen and 300 war elephants. The soldiers were armed with swords, lances, matchlocks, and bows and arrows. In addition, there were about 5,000 builders, carpenters, stonemasons, sappers and smiths to construct siege engines and to mine the fort’s walls.
Accompanied by his courtiers and surveyors, Akbar made a reconnaissance of his target and ordered batteries to be set up at various strategic points around the fort. It took about a month for the whole circumference of the fort to be invested.
There were three principal batteries, one of which was Akbar’s, located opposite the Lakhuta gate in the north. The second battery, under Shujaat Khan and other officers, and the third, under Asaf Khan and other officers, were emplaced at unspecified locations. Meanwhile, Akbar sent his officers to devastate the rana‘s territory, hoping to find Udai Singh in the process, but they found no trace of the rana.
The opening phase of battle began when some overzealous Mogul troops launched a reckless direct assault upon the fort. Not surprisingly, the Moguls’ arrows and bullets glanced off the surface of the walls and battlements, whereas those the garrison discharged exacted a heavy toll on them.
After that minor debacle, Akbar decided that strategic planning rather than reckless courage was what was needed if the fortress was to be taken. Accordingly, the emperor adopted a two-pronged strategy. One entailed mining the walls of the fort in front of the royal battery, whereupon a party of selected Mogul troops would rush into the fort as soon as the breach was made. While the sappers dug mines under the walls, stonemasons opened the way by removing obstacles with their iron tools.
The other strategy called for the construction of sabats, or covered passageways, an ingenious siege contrivance that was peculiar to India. A sabat was a sinuous sheltered passageway that was constructed out of gunshot range, with earthen walls on both sides and a roof of planks strongly fastened together and covered with rawhide. When a breach was made by mines, troops would rush in under the cover of the sabat. Akbar ordered the construction of two sabats: one to be commenced from the royal battery and the other to be built in front of Shujaat Khan’s position.
At the same time, in the emperor’s presence, an exceptionally large mortar was cast to demolish the walls of the fort. When the defenders became aware of this and saw that the Moguls were making daily progress toward the destruction of the fort, they sent out two representatives to Akbar to bargain for peace, offering to become subjects of his court and to send an annual tribute. Several Mogul officers advised him to accept the offer, but Akbar was adamant: Nothing short of the rana surrendering in person would persuade him to lift the siege. As they were unwilling–or perhaps unable–to deliver the rana, the Rajputs had no choice but to continue the defense of their fort with renewed fervor.
While the sabat in front of the royal battery was being constructed, artillerymen and marksmen inside the fort kept up such a fusillade that about 200 Mogul laborers were killed daily, even though they protected themselves with rawhide shields. The corpses were buried in the walls of the sabat. But the workers were kept going by lavish gifts of gold and silver coins from the emperor–the amount of which was calculated according to the number of containers of earth added to the sabat. The sabat opposite Akbar’s position was soon completed near the fort. It was reported to be so extensive that 10 horsemen abreast could ride along it and so high that an elephant rider with his spear in his hand could pass under it.
At the same time, two mines close to each other were brought to the wall of the fort and filled with large quantities of gunpowder. A party of fully armed and accoutered Mogul soldiers, noted for their bravery, stationed themselves near the wall, ready to rush in when it was breached. On December 17, the gunpowder of both mines was set to explode at the same time. One part of the bastion was blown up, inflicting heavy casualties on the defenders. Unknown to the Moguls, however, only one mine had exploded. When the soldiers rushed toward the large breach and were about to enter, the second mine exploded (apparently, the match used to ignite the gunpowder of the mine that exploded first had been shorter than the other match, so the mines failed to discharge simultaneously).
Moguls and Rajputs alike, battling in the breach, were hurled into the air together, while others were crushed by falling debris. The blast was so powerful that limbs and stones were hurled a great distance from the fort. Mogul reinforcements and Rajput troops then engaged in a brief skirmish until the Rajputs succeeded in quickly repairing the demolished part of the wall. About 500 Mogul soldiers, including a significant number of noteworthy men, were killed, while a large number of Rajputs also perished. On the same day, another ill-timed mine exploded in front of Asaf Khan’s battery and claimed 30 more lives.
Akbar viewed these botched undertakings as temporary setbacks that should serve to inspire even greater exertion and resolve on the part of the Moguls. To ensure that the assault on the fort would continue unabated, he ordered the construction of the sabat in front of Shujatt Khan’s battery to be speeded up.
The emperor also frequently visited the sabat in his sector and fired at the garrison from loopholes in the sabat. One day, Akbar saw that some of his men were admiring the marksmanship of one of the musketeers of the fort when, at that very moment, a shot from that marksman hit Jalal Khan, one of Akbar’s attendants. Akbar was reported to have said to his injured attendant, Jalal Khan, that marksman does not show himself; if he would do so, I’d avenge you. Although he could not see the marksman, Akbar took aim at the barrel of the musket that projected from a loophole. He fired but could not determine whether his shot had found its mark. It was only later that Akbar learned that his shot had indeed killed the sharpshooter, who was identified as Ismail, head of the musketeers.
Akbar proved to be quite a marksman himself, killing many noted members of the garrison. But the emperor also came close to losing his own life on a few occasions. Once, a large cannonball that fell near Akbar killed 20 soldiers but left him unscathed. On another occasion, a soldier standing near Akbar was hit by a bullet, and the emperor was saved from the same round only by his coat of mail.
When the second sabat was completed, the Mogul forces prepared to launch a full-scale assault on the fort. The Mogul troops went about their operations with such vigor and intensity that for two nights and a day they had neither food nor sleep, inspired by the personal example of Akbar, who was supervising the operations and keeping up a fusillade upon the garrison from the sabat. Special quarters had been erected for Akbar on top of the sabat, and the emperor stayed there during this crucial period.
On the night of February 22, the Moguls attacked the fort from all sides and created several breaches in the walls. The Rajput warriors put up a stubborn resistance. At one point in the fighting, Prince Patta’s mother commanded Patta to don the saffron robe, which would indicate his desire to die for his gods and his country. She also armed his young bride with a lance and accompanied her down the rock. The defenders of Chitor saw mother and daughter-in-law die heroically, fighting side by side.
The Moguls had destroyed a large part of the wall at the end of the sabat that faced the royal battery. The defenders collected such combustible materials as muslin, wood, cotton and oil to fill the breach, intending to set fire to the heap when the Mogul troops approached to prevent them from entering the fort.
Akbar was in a vantage point inside a specially made gallery on top of the sabat at the time, and he saw a man wearing a chieftain’s cuirass directing the proceedings at the breach. The emperor took out a matchlock he had christened Sangram (Akbar was said to have killed a few thousand birds and animals with this gun during his hunting trips). He then fired at the Rajput chief, but no one could be certain whether the chieftain had been hit.
An hour had passed when Akbar received reports that the Rajputs had inexplicably abandoned their defenses. At about that time, fire broke out in several places in the fort. Akbar’s Hindu adviser, Raja Bhagwan Das, told the Mogul emperor that the Rajputs must be performing their custom of johar.
It came to light later that Akbar’s shot had indeed found its target–none other than Jaimal. The Rajputs, disheartened by the death of their leader, had gone back to their homes to gather their wives, children and property in preparation for the johar. As many as 300 women, including nine ranis and five princesses, and an unknown number of children perished in three houses that served as fiery furnaces.
Although the defenses appeared to have been abandoned, the Moguls decided to proceed cautiously. They took advantage of the lull in the fighting to regroup in preparation for an organized assault on the fort. When the Mogul forces were massed, the soldiers entered the fort through several breaches.
The Rajputs, meanwhile, had finished eating their last betel nuts together and donned their saffron robes. They then sallied forth to meet their enemies and their destiny. Akbar, who was watching the close hand-to-hand combat from atop the sabat, then ordered his war elephants to be taken into the fort to join the onslaught.
At dawn on February 23, the Mogul emperor, accompanied by several thousand men, entered the fortress mounted on a majestic elephant. By then the Rajputs had been routed. People were fighting everywhere, and bodies lay in every street, lane, passageway and bazaar. Some Rajputs died fighting in temples, while others fought to the death in their own homes. Many Rajput warriors had made their last stand in the rana‘s house, from which they emerged in twos and threes to die fighting.
Initially, only about 50 elephants entered the fort, but by the battle’s end, there were as many as 300. The elephants did much damage, and a few were singled out for special praise. One such elephant, named Jangia, had its trunk cut off by a Rajput’s sword. Despite the severe injury, Jangia, who had killed 30 men before he was wounded, crushed another 15 before dying of his wounds.
On another occasion, an elephant trampled a Rajput, rolled him up in its trunk and brought him before Akbar. The mahout (elephant driver) said he did not know the man’s name, but he appeared to be a leader, as a large number of warriors had fought around him. That leader turned out to be the 16-year-old Patta.
The emperor also witnessed an act of Mogul chivalry in the battle. A Rajput warrior had challenged a Mogul soldier to combat when another Mogul decided to come to his aid. But the Mogul soldier waved his compatriot away, saying that it was against the rules of chivalry to render assistance when an opponent had challenged him. The Mogul then single-handedly disposed of the Rajput.
Nearly 30,000 Rajputs were killed, the majority mercilessly slaughtered when Akbar ordered a general massacre of the population. This uncharacteristic barbarity was to remain the only major blemish on the emperor’s otherwise enlightened reign. The peasantry had evidently incurred Akbar’s wrath when they participated as auxiliaries in the fighting. Akbar also may have been exasperated by the fierce resistance put up by the tenacious Rajput defenders. Many, mostly peasants, were made prisoners; few Rajput warriors survived to, in the words of their creed, stain the yellow mantle by inglorious surrender. The Mogul troops also engaged in systematic pillaging of the palaces, temples and residences.
Akbar had particularly wanted to punish the musketeers who had exacted such a heavy toll on his troops when the sabats were being built. Apparently, they had managed to escape by a clever stratagem. In the confusion of battle, they tied up their wives and masqueraded as Mogul soldiers escorting prisoners of war. Mogul losses may have been small, but it is hard to believe the claims of Mogul sources of the time that only one soldier, Zarb Ali Tuwaci, had died in the fighting that followed the final storming of the fort.
After he fled from Chitor, Udai Singh II and his small band of followers took refuge among aboriginal hill tribes and later founded the city of Udaipur, which was named after him. He died four years after the fall of Chitor at the age of 42. In 1616, Akbar’s son and successor, Jahangir, handed Chitor back to the Sesodias, but they had already comfortably settled at Udaipur. Jahangir would not–or dared not–allow them to rebuild the defenses of the fortress, and Chitor was abandoned.
Akbar had known that Chitor would be difficult to take. If his efforts were successful, he had planned to make a thanksgiving pilgrimage to the tomb of Khwaja Muiddin Chisti in Ajmer, about 120 miles from Chitor. Akbar set out on his trek on February 28, 1568. In 1571, when he built his new capital city of Fatehpur Sikri, 24 miles west of the old capital of Agra, Akbar erected statues of Jaimal and Patta in front of one of his gates–as much a testament to the merits of his gallant foes as to his great conquest.
This article was written by Jeffrey Say Seck Leong and originally appeared in the February 1999 issue of Military History magazine. For more great articles be sure to subscribe to Military History magazine today!
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0c8eee7d6d640831f6fcac66c596aa07 | https://www.historynet.com/battle-of-antietam-controversial-crossing-on-burnsides-bridge.htm | Battle of Antietam: Controversial Crossing on Burnside’s Bridge | Battle of Antietam: Controversial Crossing on Burnside’s Bridge
In 1951 Bruce Catton indicated in his book Mr. Lincoln’s Army that Major General Ambrose Burnside deserved much of the blame for the incomplete Union victory at the Battle of Antietam. Throughout the 1862 Maryland campaign Burnside had commanded a wing composed of two corps — his own IX Corps and Major General Joseph Hooker’s I Corps — in Major General George McClellan’s Army of the Potomac. At Antietam, however, McClellan took Hooker’s corps away from Burnside, posting the two halves of Burnside’s wing at either end of the army. Catton observed that Burnside, ‘getting a bit stuffy for once in his career, refused to yield his position as wing commander, forwarding McClellan’s orders for the IX Corps to the nominal commander of that corps instead of implementing them directly. That led to delays and confusion, Catton concluded, causing the IX Corps to take much longer than expected to cross Antietam Creek and attack the right wing of Robert E. Lee’s army.
Jacob Dolson Cox, a Canadian-born brigadier general, served as the official commander of the IX Corps on that Wednesday morning of September 17, 1862. A couple of decades later Cox pointed out that he and Burnside were standing together on the same knoll, watching the conflict unfold on McClellan’s right, when the first attack order arrived. The delay that ensued as a result of Burnside passing the order on to Cox could not have exceeded 15 or 20 seconds, because Cox said that Burnside read the brief message and immediately handed it to him. What took time was the tough job of getting troops across the creek.
In Burnside’s sector Antietam Creek could be conveniently crossed in two places: on the Rohrbach Bridge or at Snavely’s Ford, almost a mile downstream. General McClellan had been monitoring Burnside’s performance somewhat critically for the previous couple of days, and on the eve of the battle McClellan sent his own chief engineer, Captain James Duane, to personally position Burnside’s divisions before the bridge and the ford. Duane performed that duty vicariously, through junior officers, and they mistakenly placed Isaac P. Rodman’s division in front of a reputed cattle ford, about midway between the bridge and Snavely’s Ford.
Once Burnside received the order to attack, he sent a brigade against the bridge, which turned out to be such a strong position that the Confederates held it for nearly three hours with a portion of one brigade. Rodman, meanwhile, moved forward to cross at the designated ford, only to find it too deep for infantry.
Earlier that year Captain Duane — the same man who had been directed to position those brigades — had published a manual for engineer troops that began with advice on river crossings. A river with a moderate current may be forded by infantry when its depth does not exceed three feet, read the third sentence of the manual, but that applied to a routine crossing, uncomplicated by the immediate presence of enemy resistance. Duane’s engineers could not approach close enough to learn that Antietam Creek ran too deep for infantry there, that the banks dropped too abruptly or that the bottom shifted treacherously. They ought, however, to have been able to see that the opposite shore consisted of a steep bluff that infantry would have had to scale in the face of point-blank musketry. Rodman perceived those deadly deficiencies as soon as he advanced, so he veered downstream to locate the rumored pedestrian ford near Farmer Snavely’s house.
Burnside Bridge was built during the late 1830s to help the farmers of the prosperous agricultural region connect with the nearby C&O Canal and National Road. (Libary of Congress)
Those who later denigrated Burnside’s performance at Antietam based their arguments on two specific misrepresentations: minimization of the difficulty that the stream posed, and exaggeration of the time it took him to put his troops across the creek. Catton described the creek as insignificant and so shallow that a man could wade it in most places without wetting his belt buckle. Although Catton was a marvelous literary stylist, he may never have even laid eyes on Antietam Creek. He was simply echoing the words of Henry Kyd Douglas, who served on the staff of Confederate General Stonewall Jackson. In 1899 Douglas put together his memoirs — not published until 1940 as I Rode with Stonewall — in which he wondered if it was sarcasm that had prompted people to rename the Rohrbach Bridge after Burnside. He challenged his readers to examine Antietam Creek.
Go and look at it, he urged, and tell me if you don’t think Burnside and his corps might have executed a hop, skip, and jump and landed on the other side. One thing is certain, they might have waded it that day without wetting their waist belts in any place. To buttress his opinion, Douglas recalled that a U.S. Army officer once remarked to him that he was puzzled how Burnside prevented his troops from dashing impulsively across the creek.
Since Douglas took part in the battle and grew up only a few miles from the creek, scholars took him at his word without accepting his implied challenge to test the depth of the stream. The National Park Service even mounted a plaque on the eastern end of Burnside’s Bridge with Douglas’ snide comment etched upon it that is still there. Yet except for the U.S. Army officer whom Douglas left conspicuously unidentified, that criticism did not seem to take root until the publication of I Rode With Stonewall.
Lately more careful historians such as Dennis Frye have demonstrated that Douglas had a penchant for hyperbole and invention, and his observations about the depth of the creek help to illustrate those flaws. Douglas’ route to and from Sharpsburg and his duties during the battle took him nowhere near the creek that day, or on any other day in 1862. For that matter, during Douglas’ entire life there was little to bring him in close contact with the Antietam in that vicinity; he may have known it better when he lived near its shallower upstream reaches, at Hagerstown.
Antietam Creek drains four counties in Pennsylvania and Maryland, and the crossings Burnside faced lay three miles short of the mouth, where it empties into the Potomac as a sizable stream. During high water periods it can become a perfect torrent just downstream from Burnside’s Bridge, and only the most experienced whitewater raftsmen would dare test it then. Even with the sedimentary accumulation behind a shallow concrete dam just downstream from the bridge, the creek lies too deep and muddy today, and its banks are too steep, to meet the criteria of Captain Duane’s good ford for infantry.
Were it not for the crossing of the Antietam and his unhappy stint as commander of the Army of the Potomac, students of the Civil War would likely view Maj. Gen. Ambrose E. Burnside in a more positive light. Burnside recalled that his losses at the bridge were “fearful, the enemy being posted in rifle-pits and behind barricades….” (Libary of Congress)
On Sunday, June 5, 1994, I took Major Douglas up on his dare to examine Antietam Creek. I ate breakfast that morning in a Hagerstown diner. There, I met an old man who had lived his whole life in the area, and he assured me that the depth of the creek had not increased noticeably since he was a boy, despite the paving of permeable ground that accompanies widespread development.
My visit came in the middle of a weeks-long drought, and the water under Burnside’s Bridge flowed at about the same level as it had in the photographs taken four days after the battle. I followed the creek bank on the nature trail to Snavely’s Ford and crossed, which soaked me to the top of my inseam. The banks there sloped easily, and the bottom felt stable even though the current ran quite strong. At a height of 5 feet 10 inches, I am about 2 inches taller than the average Civil War soldier, but an infantryman of even minimum height might have surged across there with relative ease.
Then I moved upstream to the first bend above Snavely’s Ford. The banks there, vertical and slick with mud, stood 4 feet or more out of the water. I let myself down into chest-deep water and started across, but less than one-third of the way across my feet became tangled in the branches of a submerged tree, and I turned back.
From there to the next big bend upstream, the bluffs on the far shore — the side the Confederates held — reached a height of 60 feet or more at an angle of 50 or 60 degrees, and the banks yawned head-high out of the water, still vertical or even concave. It would have been impossible to cross there, so I made no further attempt until I reached the outside curve of the large bend, a few hundred yards below the bridge. There, I found most of the creek bed only 3 feet deep, but in the main channel I suddenly dropped in, to my chin.
I made one last crossing just below the bridge itself, upstream from the postwar dam. The bed of the stream has filled in behind the dam, so the water came only to my waist, but stones made the bottom precarious footing. Twice I stumbled enough to fall into the water, which bothered me not at all because the temperature was already near 90 degrees — and no one was shooting at me. Passage here during the battle would have proved far more difficult, though, because this was the location that the Confederates kept under the most murderous fire during the battle.
If Antietam Creek were so insignificant a watercourse, one might wonder why local farmers had established any fords in the vicinity in the first place. After all, cattle hardly need as shallow a crossing as infantry. Major Douglas’ sarcastic comments notwithstanding, except for the bridge and Snavely’s Ford, the creek would have provided a perfectly effective military obstacle on June 5, 1994, and a great deal of evidence confirms that it served just as effectively on September 17, 1862.
A quarter of a century after the battle, a New York Zouave who navigated Snavely’s Ford remembered that it was at least waist deep. In 1903 a Rhode Island lieutenant recalled that he had found even that crossing breast deep. The historian of General Joseph Kershaw’s Confederate division acknowledged that the creek was not fordable for some distance above the Potomac, and he concluded that it could be waded without difficulty only at the upstream end of Lee’s defensive line, well above Burnside’s front.
Brigadier General Jacob D. Cox commanded the IX Corps during the fight on September 17, 1862. While some argue that confusion between Cox and Burnside helped impede the Union attacks on the bridge, Cox dismissed that argument. (Libary of Congress)
All three of those sources suffer from a distance in time from the event, as does Douglas’, and the last of the three may reflect more hearsay than recollection. They all predate the appearance of Douglas’ memoirs by decades, though, and none of them seems to have borne any partisan intent to refute any innuendo about the fordability of the creek, for no such accusation had been made prior to the 1940 publication of Douglas’ book. Even more convincing is the contemporary report of Colonel George Crook, whose brigade formed the upstream extremity of Burnside’s line. Though the creek should theoretically have been even more shallow there than at the bridge, and although no Confederates opposed the crossing there, Crook thrashed about for more than two hours before he found one spot where a few men could wade the creek at a time.
Bruce Catton’s repetition of Douglas’ assertion encouraged two more historians to assail Burnside. In a 1956 monograph for Civil War History, Martin Schenck accused the general of sulking over his demotion from wing command, reasoning that nothing but petulance could have caused him to spend so much time crossing his troops. To support his hypothesis, Schenck cited only three secondary works, selected reports from the Official Records and a single Confederate memoir — namely Douglas’ claptrap.
Schenck charged Burnside with wasting five hours, insisting that Burnside’s attack order came at 8 a.m. Schenck skipped over McClellan’s initial report to quote instead from the general’s revised report, dated nearly a year later. In his first report, written just four weeks after the battle, McClellan admitted that Burnside received no order to attack until about 10 a.m. Only in 1863, as McClellan prepared a more defensive report with an eye to presidential ambitions, did he claim that he sent Burnside his instructions two hours earlier. Burnside’s report, which Schenck did not consult, likewise timed the arrival at 10. Jacob Cox initially estimated that it reached them about 9 o’clock, but — judging by events that he witnessed elsewhere on the battlefield at the same time — Cox later acknowledged that the order probably arrived nearer to 10 a.m.
Generals’ reports are the less reliable half of the Official Records, for they often represent the efforts of an officer to account for his shortcomings in the wake of a failure. Battlefield correspondence more frequently yields the truth, as it does in this instance: McClellan’s actual order is published in a supplemental volume that Schenck also overlooked, and it is headed 9:10 a.m.
Allowing a couple of minutes for transcription, a few more minutes to assign the envelope to the courier and to explain the location of Burnside’s headquarters, and 15 minutes for that rider to gallop overland with it, Burnside would not have had it in his hands before 9:30. Any of the likely variations from that basic scenario, such as a wrong turn or a halt for directions, would have brought the delivery closer to 10. Certainly it must have been that time before the first troops moved against the bridge and the bogus ford.
In his adulatory 1957 biography George B. McClellan, Shield of the Union, Warren Hassler fell for both the 8 a.m. attack order and Douglas’ jibe about the depth of the creek. Relying on McClellan’s self-serving autobiography as well, Hassler described the commanding general dispatching a second staff officer to Burnside at 9 a.m. with orders to carry the bridge at the bayonet. He also cited the highly suspect 1894 reminiscence of one William Biddle, who insisted that McClellan sent Colonel Thomas Key to IX Corps headquarters at noontime with a third — and imperative — order to take the bridge at all costs.
Burnside’s troops had made their way over both creek crossings by 1 p.m., but the spearhead division that took the bridge had exhausted its ammunition, so Burnside moved fresh brigades in to replace it. Before continuing his assault into the village of Sharpsburg, he also brought his artillery and ordnance over the same bridge the rest of his infantry used, and realigned Rodman’s isolated division with the troops who had crossed at the bridge. By then McClellan had allowed the fighting on the right to fizzle out, so Lee managed to attend to Burnside a little more effectively. McClellan himself had infected his subordinates with the absurd notion that Lee fielded 100,000 men that day, so with his own back to the creek Burnside proceeded somewhat cautiously with his 13,000.
Hassler tried to revise the estimate of McClellan’s available troops downward, and Lee’s upward, from a Union strength of more than 80,000 and a Confederate force of about 40,000 to some 69,000 for McClellan and more than 57,000 for Lee. That would have reduced McClellan’s advantage in numbers from 100 percent to about 20 percent. When it came to assessing Burnside’s performance, however, Hassler reverted to the traditional tale of overwhelming Union forces — at least on Burnside’s front.
Characterizing Burnside’s realignment of troops as sitting down on the job, Hassler supposed that this additional delay prompted McClellan to send Captain Biddle with the imaginary fourth directive to move forward. To bolster this final message, Biddle ostensibly carried a signed order to relieve Burnside and replace him with another officer. That alleged order was supposed to be handed over if Burnside dawdled any further.
Here, Hassler misunderstood his own source, for in Biddle’s doubtful tale it was Colonel Key who carried both the third and fourth orders, while Biddle himself delivered none. That error is merely incidental to the overall historiography, though, for the entire story of those last orders exudes an aroma of fiction.
No one else mentioned any order for Burnside’s removal during the 32 years that intervened between the battle and Biddle’s revelation — including McClellan, who supposedly wrote the order and who later tried his best to discredit Burnside’s performance. It seems fairly obvious that Biddle’s account simply represented another of those inventive recollections that pollute the stream of history, and Civil War history in particular. Like other authors of such imaginative recollections, Biddle had to leave his fable unpublished until after the deaths of all the principal actors who might have contradicted it.
McClellan and his contemporary apologists spent the remainder of the 19th century building the case against Burnside with half-truths, sarcasm and outright lies. Similar prejudice among subordinate generals also played a subtle part in Burnside’s defeats at Fredericksburg, only three months after Antietam, and the debacle at the Petersburg Crater in 1864. Those disasters seemed to corroborate the image of Burnside as a bumbling incompetent who could do nothing right.
That relentlessly negative image carried into a second century with slipshod research, jaundiced interpretation and ill-considered conclusions. For two decades after the Civil War centennial, most popular histories reflected the pejorative portrait of Ambrose Burnside that had prevailed among McClellan’s partisans during and after the war. Only in the 1980s, when historians like Stephen Sears and A. Wilson Greene began producing more carefully researched and objectively analyzed studies of the Maryland campaign and the role of the IX Corps, did the tide begin to turn toward a more equitable assessment of Burnside’s services along Antietam Creek.
This article was written by William Marvel and originally appeared in the January 2006 issue of America’s Civil War magazine.
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52530ea42d6e48fda428a9ba761dc8e9 | https://www.historynet.com/battle-of-gettysburg-general-george-sears-greene-at-culps-hill.htm | Battle of Gettysburg: General George Sears Greene at Culp’s Hill | Battle of Gettysburg: General George Sears Greene at Culp’s Hill
The Union left had almost broken late on the afternoon of July 2, 1863, the second day of fighting around Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. Lieutenant General James Longstreet’s Rebels had hit the Federals hard for more than an hour, with the 15th and 47th Alabama storming up Little Round Top, the key high ground on the Union left flank. Only the heroics of Colonel Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain and his tiny 20th Maine had prevented the hill’s capture.
Major General George G. Meade, commanding the Union Army of the Potomac at Gettysburg, responded to the threat on his left by ordering up reinforcements just after 6:00 p.m. Reserve units from Major General John Sedgwick’s VI Corps, brigades from Meade’s old V Corps, and battered portions of the I Corps all answered his call. Meade then called for the XII Corps, which was guarding the Union right on Culp’s Hill.
Upon receiving Meade’s instructions, Major General Henry Slocum — normally the commander of the Union XII Corps, but at Gettysburg the commander of the army’s right wing — requested permission to leave one of his two divisions on Culp’s Hill as a precaution. But Meade was adamant in his call for all available troops and allowed Slocum to pick only one brigade to stay behind. So Slocum made his choice: the weight of Meade’s questionable decision would fall on the shoulders of Brigadier General George Sears Greene, an austere 62-year-old Rhode Islander who commanded a veteran brigade of New Yorkers, the 3d Brigade of the XII Corps’ 2d Division.
Strengthening the Union left at the expense of the right “nearly proved a calamity to the whole army,” Colonel Lewis R. Stegman of the 102d New York, in Greene’s brigade, later wrote. “It was a suicidal move.” Meade had taken a risky gamble that his right was secure for the day, even though Confederate batteries had just exchanged fire with Federal artillery on Culp’s Hill between 4:00 and 5:00 p.m. Greene, however, approached the predicament calmly.
As a descendant of Nathanael Greene, George Washington’s second-in-command, and as the father of two Union soldiers and a Federal naval officer, Greene seemed to have Yankee blue in his blood. He had graduated second in his class from the U.S. Military Academy and afterward spent 13 years in uniform. For the next 25 years, he worked as a civil engineer, rising to the top ranks of his profession before the Civil War drew him back into the army.
At ease, Greene looked more like a kindly preacher than a soldier, but he could conjure up a fierce gaze that, coupled with his commanding voice, made subordinates scramble. One of his soldier sons, Francis Vinton Greene, described him as “a very strict disciplinarian” who demanded “unquestioning obedience to his orders.” In essence, he demanded that his troops respect him, and they did. Eventually he even won their affection.
When Greene first arrived at Culp’s Hill early on the morning of July 2, he immediately realized his position demanded breastworks. Disregarding the objections of his division commander, Brigadier General John Geary, Greene ordered construction to begin. Captain Jesse H. Jones of the 60th New York noted that the men took to the task eagerly because they “instinctively felt that a life and death struggle was impending, and that every help should be used.” Fortunately, the hillside yielded ample supplies for their work. The result was an imposing rampart of wood, stones, and earth that would give Confederate attackers few targets.
The breastworks offered a measure of security, but the fact remained that Greene’s troops on the hill’s ridge held an incredibly vulnerable and tenuous position. When the other five XII Corps brigades headed south in response to Meade’s order just before 7:00 p.m., Greene’s five regiments — a total of just 1,350 men — had to occupy all the vacated works. As dusk set in, Greene ordered his 60th, 78th, 102d, 137th, and 149th New York to stretch out in a line one man deep, with one foot of space between the men. The fortified trenches were nearly half a mile long, and as Green inspected them, he wondered if he had enough manpower to hold his ground.
It was already too late to do anything more than wonder, however. By 7:15 p.m. skirmishers led by Lieutenant Colonel John C.O. Redington of the 60th New York spotted Confederates crossing Rock Creek, near the foot of Culp’s Hill. As the drab butternut-and-gray mass approached, the skirmishers fired a few volleys and raced up the rocky, wooded hill for the safety of the breastworks. As they frantically leapt over the works, Greene dispatched a courier to XI Corps commander Major General Oliver O. Howard and to Brigadier General James S. Wadsworth of the I Corps’ 1st Division with an urgent plea for reinforcements.
The Confederate advance was long overdue. Miscommunication and vacillation had plagued General Robert E. Lee’s Confederate Army of Northern Virginia all day. Lee had planned for Longstreet’s First Corps to attack the Federal left while Lieutenant General Richard Ewell’s Second Corps hit the Union right. He later amended the plan so that Longstreet would attack after Ewell first made a feint. Ideally, Ewell’s display would then expand into a full assault. This scheme, originally set to unfold in the morning, was postponed until the late afternoon because Longstreet failed to move.
As dusk settled in, Ewell launched an entire division at Greene’s single understrength brigade. Three brigades of Maryland, North Carolina, Virginia, and Louisiana troops under the command of Major General Edward Johnson waded through Rock Creek and stormed up the rise through the near-darkness created by the canopy of leaves that blocked the fading sun. Johnson’s fourth brigade, the famed Stonewall Brigade commanded by Brigadier General James Walker, had been engaged with Union forces to the east on Brinkerhoff Ridge. Walker had orders to rejoin the division as soon as possible, but he deemed it more prudent to protect the division’s flank and rear with his tired-out troops.
Random shots rang out as the Confederates approached the top of Culp’s Hill. Federals crouched anxiously behind their bulwarks, listening to the ominous footfalls in the woods. Suddenly, the lead Confederate ranks appeared out of the shadows, and Greene’s officers ordered the New Yorkers to open fire. “Out into the night like chain-lightning leaped the zig-zag line of fire,” recalled the 60th New York’s Captain Jones. Scores of Southerners dropped as the New Yorkers’ burst of flame and lead found its mark. Rebel officers pulled their shocked troops back into the woods to regroup.
For the adrenaline-charged Union troops, the respite was brief. Their shaken attackers reorganized quickly and opened fire from behind large rocks and trees. But it soon became clear that with the Federals heavily entrenched on high ground and shrouded in darkness and smoke, Johnson’s men could not capture the hill with long-range fire. The order to charge came again.
About 8:00 p.m., Confederates from Virginia and Maryland under the command of Brigadier General George H. Steuart assaulted Greene’s extreme right. Holding the position were the 456 men of Colonel David Ireland’s 137th New York, a hefty regiment by mid-war standards. As the Confederate fire intensified, the 71st Pennsylvania arrived to reinforce the hill. Greene immediately posted them to Ireland’s right, momentarily slowing Steuart’s momentum. Strangely, however, the 71st stayed on the line only long enough to exchange several volleys with the Confederates, then withdrew suddenly at the height of the attack. Such an unintelligible retreat left the Union right, as Greene put it, “in a very critical position.”
About this time, units from the I and XI Corps began to reach Culp’s Hill. The 14th Brooklyn, 6th Wisconsin, and 147th New York arrived first. Greene sent the 147th New York into the heart of his lines; the 6th Wisconsin, under the command of Colonel Rufus Dawes, to take and hold the breastworks to the 137th New York’s right; and the 14th Brooklyn to Ireland’s immediate aid.
Ireland, whose men had been fielding fire from three sides, desperately moved his line through the dark, smoky air behind a traverse of stacked wood, rocks, and brush that stood perpendicular to the brigade line. His new position faced the attackers and temporarily kept them at bay, but he needed more men to hold it. The Federal reinforcements arrived just in time to help stop Steuart’s determined troops. Even though they gained part of the vacant Union works, the attacking Virginians and Marylanders were unable to push through the thin, defiant line.
Meanwhile, the fighting raged on all along the line. On Greene’s left, six regiments of Virginians under the command of Brigadier General John Marshall Jones tangled with the 60th and 102d New York. In the center, Brigadier General Francis R. Nicholls’s five Louisiana regiments stormed the works in front of the 78th and 149th New Yorkers. With help from the 82d Illinois, 45th New York, and 61st Ohio of Howard’s XI Corps, however, Greene’s troops on the left and at the center held fast. The Confederates made four separate charges between 7:00 and 10:00 p.m., but each met the same bloody end.
Though 755 men from the I and XI Corps bolstered the five New York regiments, Greene never had more than 1,350 troops in line to face 4,000 to 5,000 Confederates. He maintained his bristling defense of the hill by using his limited resources wisely, rotating troops to and from the battle line to restock their cartridge boxes and clean their weapons. The eager Union troops cheered on their comrades as they raced back and forth, pushing each other to greater and greater heights of fervor and determination. Greene rode up and down the line, showing no regard for his personal welfare.
About 10:00 p.m., the Confederate attacks ceased, though sporadic musket fire continued for some time. At the same time, Union Brigadier General Thomas Kane’s 2d Brigade of the 2d Division returned and was followed soon by the other XII Corps units. For the second time that day, a Union flank had bent but not broken. The left flank had been severely pressed on Little Round Top, but Chamberlain and his 20th Maine had stood firm. Now the right flank had been tested, and it too had been saved by a small, gutsy force and a gallant leader.
Fire opened up again about 4:00 a.m. the next day as the Confederates tried one last time to take Culp’s Hill. But lacking a demonstration by Longstreet on the Union left, and with the entire Union XII Corps back in place on the hill, three more Confederate attacks proved fruitless. Ewell withdrew his frustrated forces late in the morning, and tired Federal soldiers fetched water down at Rock Creek. There, they tallied the awesome price their foes had paid trying to unseat them. Greene reported 391 dead Rebels immediately in front of his works. His men found another 150 corpses on the creek’s banks and roughly 2,000 muskets strewn all over the hill. Adding the 130 prisoners captured, Greene estimated the Confederate losses at 2,400, including several officers. By contrast, the 3d Brigade’s losses amounted to a mere 307 killed, wounded, and missing.
Greene’s service as a field commander did not end at Gettysburg. The aging general fought on until a Confederate bullet struck him in the face at the Battle of Wauhatchie, Tennessee, in October 1863. Though he briefly returned to the battlefield in 1865, his duty had been served. He was breveted a major general of volunteers before he marched in the Grand Review of the Armies in Washington just after the war. He performed his last act as an officer as a member of a courts-martial panel, on which he served until early 1866.
After the war, Greene returned to civil engineering and worked diligently to compile his proud family’s genealogy. He lived until 1899 — a vigorous old warhorse until the end.
The magnitude of Greene’s heroic defense of Culp’s Hill cannot easily be overstated. Had Ewell’s forces overwhelmed the small Union force, the Federal rear would have been exposed to direct attack, and the Army of the Potomac, with Confederates already in place in its left and center fronts, would then have been encircled. The fight that Greene’s stalwart men put up on the night of July 2 ranks among the best of any Civil War brigade. Anything less than their tireless, courageous effort would have given the Confederates victory. Greene offered his troops his “hearty commendations for the good rendered their country.” Greene also credited Slocum, who had seen the danger in leaving the hill unprotected, with “having saved the army from a great and perhaps fatal disaster.”
Although Greene credited others for the victory, he was the true hero. Since his reentry into the army as the 60th New York’s colonel in January 1862, his hard-driving style had brought him much praise and a promotion. He had led a division at Antietam in September 1862, skillfully managing limited resources to give his men every advantage possible. At Gettysburg Greene remained conspicuous, constantly moving along his lines to encourage his besieged troops.
Greene’s most important contribution at Gettysburg was his early-morning decision to construct breastworks. At that point in the war, many officers on both sides still opposed their use. Confederate General John Bell Hood, for example, felt they “would imperil that spirit of devil-me-care independence and self-reliance” that supposedly helped make Confederate troops effective. Some thought breastworks diminished soldiers’ courage. Not Greene; he believed human lives were too important to be sacrificed to bravado and unproved theories.
Without the protection of breastworks, Greene’s heavily outnumbered brigade probably would have been swept from the hill, to the great peril of the Union army. Under Greene’s direction, the works were perfectly located, and constructed not only to protect the defenders but also to conceal them. Thus the 4,000 to 5,000 attackers did not know their enemy was a mere 1,350 men. Greene’s 25 years as an engineer, designing and building railroads and waterworks such as the Central Park Reservoir in New York City, had paid off. And his aggressive leadership style made him the ideal man to lead the defense of Culp’s Hill.
Joshua Chamberlain became a national hero after the Battle of Gettysburg. Glory, however, did not immediately come to George Sears Greene. Part of the reason for Greene’s relative obscurity is that even his fellow Rhode Islanders were slow to lionize him. They reserved most of their adulation for another native of their state, the equally devoted but less skilled Major General Ambrose E. Burnside, partly because Burnside had marched off to war in 1861 in command of Rhode Islanders. Greene, on the other hand, was employed in New York when the war broke out, and he received his commission in 1862 from the Empire State’s governor, Edwin Morgan. Consequently, he led New York troops almost exclusively during the war. Still, the main factor in Greene’s passage into obscurity may well have been that Meade did not properly credit Greene or his scrappy New York troops in his official report on the Gettysburg Campaign.
Slocum waged a lively campaign to correct that oversight. On December 30, 1863, he wrote a letter to Meade proclaiming, “the failure of the enemy to gain possession of our works was due entirely to the skill of General Greene and the heroic valor of his troops.” Meade’s failure to acknowledge that fact in his report, the letter continued, was an “injustice which not even time can correct.” Meade agreed that Greene’s efforts were heroic and countered that he did not properly credit the Rhode Island general only because his subordinates had misinformed him. He made some meek attempts to have the record changed, but with little effect.
Others had immediately realized the importance of Greene’s efforts and had never forgotten it. At an 1888 ceremony to dedicate a monument to the 3d Brigade, Longstreet gave Greene and his New Yorkers “the credit of having successfully prevented the Confederates from turning Meade’s right flank.” Longstreet, a friend of Greene’s in the antebellum U.S. Army and a circumstantial enemy at Gettysburg, left Greene that day in 1888 with the highest praise: “There was no better officer in either army.”
This article was written by Eric Ethier and originally published in the December 1997 issue of Civil War Times Magazine. For more great articles, be sure to subscribe to Civil War Times magazine today!
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5c563ff3314cee8fe6078cfd6ce88414 | https://www.historynet.com/battle-of-gettysburg-major-eugene-blackford-and-the-fifth-alabama-sharpshooters.htm | Battle of Gettysburg: Major Eugene Blackford and the Fifth Alabama Sharpshooters | Battle of Gettysburg: Major Eugene Blackford and the Fifth Alabama Sharpshooters
On the hot afternoon of July 1, 1863, a 24-year-old Confederate officer and his elite unit stood very much in harm’s way. Major Eugene Blackford ordered his corps of sharpshooters to deploy off the eastern side of Oak Hill to screen and protect the division of Major General Robert Rodes as it tackled the Union I Corps west of Gettysburg. Along with the brigade of Brigadier General George Doles, Blackford’s men had to maintain a connection across more than a mile of open valley floor that stretched eastward to the Harrisburg-Heidlersburg Road, the avenue of approach for Major General Jubal Early’s division. The Federal XI Corps, determined to prevent the capture of the town, advanced north of Gettysburg to contest the Confederate assault.
Blackford was a Virginian by birth, born in Lynchburg, and was the youngest of five brothers, all of whom rose to positions of rank and responsibility in the Confederate military. Miraculously, they would all survive the Civil War. He moved to Alabama before the conflict, beginning his Southern military service on May 15, 1861, as a captain in Company K of the 5th Alabama Infantry, just 10 days after the regiment was organized at Montgomery. He was made major of the regiment on July 17, 1862. In an era when a certain amount of flamboyance seemed required of regimental officers, Blackford carried out his duties with quiet competence. The few mentions of him in The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies are positive and praiseworthy. In a memoir of Stonewall Jackson, James Power Smith speaks approvingly of the ‘well-trained skirmishers of Rodes’ division, under Major Eugene Blackford,’ and he places Blackford alongside Jackson when Stonewall gave his fateful order to Rodes at Chancellorsville: ‘You can go forward then.’
By the Battle of Gettysburg, Blackford had been placed in charge of a select battalion of marksmen culled from the ranks of the 5th. The first day of that fight may have been his finest hour as a combat commander. His sharpshooters were instrumental in driving back Colonel Thomas C. Devin’s cavalry videttes thrown north of the town to guard the approaches from Carlisle, Harrisburg and York. Throughout the early afternoon, Blackford’s thin screen did yeomen’s work parrying efforts by the XI Corps to gain advantageous positions north of town. In the general attack begun upon Early’s arrival on the field, Blackford’s command initially assisted Brig. Gen. John B. Gordon’s brigade, entered the town and then attached itself to Brig. Gen. Stephen Ramseur’s brigade. After standing in reserve during most of July 2, the sharpshooters were slated to take part in Rodes’ miscarried attempt to launch an attack on the east face of Cemetery Hill. Blackford’s handpicked men then earned their pay by infiltrating and occupying homes as close as possible to the enemy’s lines during the night, and at dawn on July 3 opening a galling fire upon Union artillery and skirmishers. In his report of the action, Blackford claims his men even drove off a Federal battery after they shot down most of its crew.
Captain William W. Blackford, the oldest of the Blackford boys, served on the staff of Maj. Gen. J.E.B. Stuart at the time of the Gettysburg battle, and the cavalry commander ordered him to take a message to General Robert E. Lee on July 3. After delivering the communication, the elder Blackford rode into the Confederate-controlled town, where he managed to find Eugene and his marksmen. William recounted their visit in his memoir, War Years With Jeb Stuart, remembering that he encountered his brother and his fellow officers in a home along ‘main street on the side next Cemetery Ridge’ where, in a room ‘pervaded by the smell of powder … and the growl of musketry,’ they were incongruously ‘lolling on the sofas,’ enjoying wine and ‘all sorts of delicacies taken from a sideboard.’
After sharing some of the food and drink with his brother, Eugene obligingly took him on a tour of the sharpshooting lair, which consisted of the second floors of several houses. William described the location in detail: ‘Eugene’s men had cut passways through the partition walls so that they could walk through the houses all the way from one cross street to the other. From the windows of the back rooms, against which were piled beds and mattresses, and through holes punched in the outside back wall, there was kept up a continuous rattle of musketry by men stripped to the waist and blackened with powder. It was a strange sight to see these men fighting in these neatly … furnished rooms, while those not on duty reclined on elegant sofas, or … upon handsome carpets.’
Cavalryman Blackford also noted that feathers pervaded every room, the results, he concluded, of Federal shells exploding in the upper floors and shredding feather-stuffed mattresses. Union snipers had also been worrying the Alabamians with gunfire, and the ‘pools of blood’ William noted on the floors and carpets indicated that some of their shots had been true.
After Gettysburg, Eugene Blackford receded into the curious anonymity that had cloaked him prior to the battle. Following the Battle of Cedar Creek in October 1864, he was relieved from his command for poor conduct during the fight, but was reinstated by Confederate President Jefferson Davis, who was heavily lobbied by Blackford’s peers, subordinates and superiors. Although the 5th Alabama surrendered at Appomattox Court House, Blackford’s name does not appear on the parole roster for either the regiment or the brigade. After the war he settled in Maryland, working as a farmer and a teacher, before dying on February 4, 1908.
The following excerpt of Eugene Blackford’s memoir is located in the Civil War Miscellaneous Collection of the United States Military History Institute in Carlisle, Pa. It details the activities of a promising young officer and the marksmen of the 5th Alabama sharpshooters.
July 1st 1863. At 7 a.m. we moved on and about 10 heard firing in front, tho’ some miles away. An hour after I was sent for hastily by Gen. R[odes] who told me that we were close up on the enemy in the town of Gettysburg and that [Lt. Gen. A.P.] Hill had blundered, and it was feared w[oul]d bring on a general engagement before any body was up. Early’s Division was 15 miles behind and [Maj. Gen. Edward] Johnson’s nine. I was directed to deploy my corps across the valley to our left, and do my best to make the enemy believe that we had heavy infantry supports, whereas there was not a man.
This we did driving off the cavalry opposing us in the pike. They repeatedly charged but my men rallying coolly & promptly sent them back every time with more empty saddles. Repeatedly during the day would they advance lines of battle against us, but our men knowing what was at stake, stood firm behind a fence, and made so determined a front that the Yankees were persuaded that we were heavily supported. All this could be seen by the whole Div. in the hills to our right, whose position would have been turned at once if the enemy had gotten [wind of] this. I was afterwards mentioned in Gen. R[odes]’s report of this battle. Thus did we fight it out until the sun was well nigh down, and I almost exhausted by running up & down the line exhorting the men, and making a target of myself. My loss was considerable, mostly however in wounded.
About 6 o’clock the enemy advanced a triple line on my left. I rushed up there and did my best, but it was useless to do more than give them what we had, and then run for it. So we kept up a terrible popping until they came within 200 yards, the Yankees not firing again, expecting to meet a heavy force of rebels over the hill. Then sounding the retreat away we went at our best speed. I was much concerned, but could do nothing against that mass. We had not gone more than 100 or so yards, when ‘Halt, Halt’ was heard, and just in front of me to my infinite delight could be seen a long line of skirmishers of Early’s Division sweeping on to the front.
Soon afterwards we met his dusty columns hurrying up. I knew then that all was safe. Sounding the rally my men were soon around me, and allowing them a little time to [rest], I too went to the front close after Early. We overtook them as they were entering the town, and my men took their own share in the plundering that went on. I employed myself with the aid of such men as I had with me in destroying whiskey, of which there was an enormous quantity in the town. [In] half an hour many men were dead drunk, and others were wild with excitement. It was truly a wild scene, rushing through the town capturing prisoners by hundreds; a squad of us would run down a street and come to a corner just as a whole mass of frightened Yanks were rushing up another. A few shots made the whole surrender, and so on until we caught them all.
In what was the great error committed the troops should have been pushed on, but no, no one was there to take the responsibility, and in the morning the enemy were strongly fortified. The result of this day had been glorious, 5,000 prisoners for us, and much plunder. That night I slept with my men in a barn in the outskirts of the town. In it there were countless [illegible], of which we made a great soup, thickened with artichoke. This was made in the boiler used to prepare food for the cattle, but it was as good as any I ever saw.
In the morning [July 2] the enemy now crowded on the heights, our lines were drawn around, and my men thrown out into the meadow between the lines. Here we lay in the broiling sun until about 1 p.m. when beginning to feel hungry, I sent a detail to catch chickens, which they cooked in a large pot found in a cottage, thro’ which my line went. This soup contained about 60 chickens, and the entire contents of the garden in the way of onions & potatoes. Saw it was necessary to feed the men as no rations had been issued since the morning before, and none could be obtained soon. As soon as it was ready a detail from each company came up and received its share. Thus were 150 men fed.
Just after we had eaten it, that awful cannonade began between our batteries and those of the enemy, we being just between them, received the benefit of all the’shorts,’ and had a vast number of shell to pass away [over] us. I have never in my life seen such things so awful. Many of the men … went to the side to get out of the range. At 6 p.m. it cleared, and I restored my line. About dusk I was recalled and joined the column marched towards the town from the heights.
I must state however an incident which occurred just after I had re-established my line as I have stated. I went back on the heights in my rear where our line had been stationed, and found that very little damage had been done by the artillery fire of the enemy, tho’ as we afterwards learned, ours being converging was fearfully destructive. I went at once to a fine house on the Cashtown Road, which I had visited in the morning under these circumstances: I went to the well to get water, and noticing a greenhouse, I stopped to admire some flowers. The ladies within, observing this mark of humanity in a smoke-begrimed soldier, and being ready to grasp at straws eagerly, now sought my protection against some of the Yankee soldiers wounded within; their feeling were very intense, one had drawn his pistol and threatened to shoot them, the poor creatures were too much scared to see what they had but to keep out of the room where he lay and they would be safe enough as he had lost a leg.
I went in however and had then discovered it to be a hospital, whereat they were very artful; upon inquiring my name they were very much struck by it, and asked me at once if I were related to Mrs. Caroline B. of Lynchburg. They there told me that their name was Smooker and that they were related to the Steenburgers. After some [time] passed I asked them did they not dread the artillery fire?; this was a new idea, and threw them into much consternation. I advised them [what] … was best to be done, I asked if they had any yellow flannel, whereof a hospital flag could be made. After much search they produced a red flannel petticoat inch, which I connected to the top of the house and tied it to the lightning rod, whence I afterwards saw it waving from afar. The presence of one of the Yankees within too dangerously wounded to be moved justified me in this. I would not otherwise have done it, even for the protection of the women. From the top of the house I had a splendid view of the position of the enemy and would have enjoyed it had I not been a mark for the enemy’s sharpshooters.
In the evening when I returned after the cannonade I found the house deserted. The enemy rarely respected the red flag, and indeed conducted the war in an altogether barbarous manner. I should here mention that when we advanced into the town the evening before I captured a beautiful Solinger saber, very light and elegantly made. It belonged to a Yankee Col. of infantry who surrendered it twice. I soon valued this blade more than all my other possessions, and wore it constantly until the end of the war, when I was enabled to preserve it safely.
I have said that we moved towards the town about dusk. I soon found that it was for the purpose of making a night attack. When I heard this my heart beat more quickly than I ever knew it to do before, and I had seen some cruel fights. I knew well enough what a night attack would be with troops as badly disciplined as ours, or indeed with any save veterans, and they equipped with white shirts, or some uniform visible at night. When the column was formed we moved silently with bayonets fixed close up beneath the enemy’s works. There in two lines we gave our instructions to the men. I well remember what feelings I had as I fastened my saber knot tightly around my wrist. I knew well that I had seen my last day on earth … .It was to be a bayonet affair, the guns were all inspected to see that none were loaded. Then we lay silently waiting the word to advance, when to my relief I must say, I saw the dark masses of men wheeling to the rear — the idea had been abandoned. I was ordered to remain where I was with my corps & await orders.
In about 1/2 an hour Gen. R[odes] came to me saying that he wished me to draw a skirmish line as closely across the enemy’s works as I possibly could, and when daylight came annoy them within all my power. I was more in my element, and went diligently to work to comprehend the ground, and mature my plan. Meanwhile the men went to sleep; I only keeping one or two with me as a guard. I found that the enemy were on a hill shaped like a V with the apex towards the town, and almost in it … .In that angle where were nearly 100,000 men, all massed densely so that every shot from our side told.
This hill was about as high as the tallest house in the town, I soon laid my plan and began deploying my men at ‘A’ moving on the line designated toward ‘B.’ It became necessary to break passages thro’ nearby houses, and thro’ every thing else we met, so that there was a great deal of labor undergone ere this line was established. By daylight however all was ready. My orders were to fire incessantly without regard to ammunition and began as soon as my bugle sounded.
The day [July 3] broke clear, and as soon as it was light there lay just before us on the slope of the hill a battery of six Napoleons; they were not more than 400 yards off. Men and horses were all there, standing as if on parade. One signal from my bugle and that battery was utterly destroyed. The few survivors ran back to their trenches on up the hill. The poor horses were all killed. The guns did us no good as we could not get there, but they could not be used against our men, and that was a great deal.
The firing now was incessant. To supply them with ammunition I kept a detail busy picking up cartridge boxes full of it, left by hundreds & thousands in the streets. These they brought in a small bakers cart, found in a bakery just across the street. They were then sent along the lines and piled near each marksman. The men soon complained of having their arms & shoulders very much bruised by the continual kicking of the muskets but still there could be no rest for them. The Yankees were as thick as bees not more than 500 yards off and could not do us any great harm as they were afraid to shell us out, lest they should burn up the town, and the brick walls protected us very well from the minnies. If I had a good many casualties, it was a mere trifle compared to with the enormous damage they inflicted. The enemy’s papers alluded [to] this in all their accounts of the battles. I had every thing now in good order, the line was well established, and they … .Many of the men were on the roofs of houses behind chimneys, whence they could pick off the gunners.
Complaint being made that the men had nothing to eat, I detailed my four buglers who had nothing to do to get the bakery in operation and make biscuits. The result was the manufacture of several thousand pretty fair biscuits. They then went in pursuit of meat, and after a while returned loaded with every delicacy for a soldier: hams, cheese, fish, pepper spices — and reported such a strike that I went myself to see. I found a family grocery well stocked which had some how escaped the plunderers. My men took an abundance of sugar, coffee, rice &c to last us some days, and served them out to my poor hungry fellows. I never heard such a cheer as they gave in seeing the sumptuous repast sent them. My Hd Qrs were in a pine house, thro’ which the line ran, and there finding an abundance of crockery, spoons &c, the buglers prepared an elegant dinner for me, for which I wished the officers to come. There we dined luxuriously, and afterwards went to our works with renewed vigor.
About 10 a.m. an officer reported to me from my left saying that he commanded the skirmishers of [Brig. Gen. Harry] Hays’ Louisiana Brig. and had been ordered to receive directions from me. I showed him where to connect with me, and left him. About an hour or more after I went over to see what he was about, and found a truly amusing scene. His quarters were in a very [nice] house, and he had selected the parlor as his own bivouac. Here one was playing the piano, which sounded sadly out of harmony with the roar of musketry. Without several men were laying around on the sofas, and the room was full of prints & engravings which the rude fellows examined, and then threw down on the floor. On the table there was have a doz. brands of wines and liquors of which all partook freely. The commanding officer thought it was very strange that I at once insisted upon his visiting his posts, and making the men fire. I ran rapidly back across the street. A Yankee fired at me, but I was behind the wall in time, the ball having struck the … post & … struck me on the knees, hurting me very much for a trice, but not by any means disabling me.
I could write a month of the nice events of this day, but must stop, only narrating my intense excitement when I saw [Maj. Gen. George] Pickett’s Division during … the charge, their waver, when almost in the works, and finally fall back. How my heart ached when I saw the fearful fire with which they were received. I could scarcely contain myself. The attack made the enemy mass more than ever, and so expose themselves to our fire more plainly. I fired 84 rounds with careful aim into their midst, one gun cooling while the other was in use. My shoulder pad became so sore that I was obliged to rest. Now and then the enemy’s gunners would turn a gun or two on us, and give us a shot, but this was too destructive of the lives of gunners, so it was soon stopped. A Yankee sharpshooter established himself in a pit in the street to which I have alluded, and keeping his gun ready cocked, fired away at any one attempting to cross at our end. Many of the men of mine, and of the adjoining battalion, amused themselves by drawing his fire, running quickly across, seeing how much behind the bullet would be which was sure to follow. At this reckless sort of sport, where a stumble or fall would have been almost certain death, they carried themselves as … children at play.
Thus the sun went down the same steady fire being kept up from my line. This evening also another tremendous cannonade occurred, the [greatest] ever known on this continent certainly, probably the greatest that ever occurred. It is a low estimate to say that 500 pieces were in action. I enjoyed its grandeur this time more than that of the day before, not being under range. At night little was done, I kept up a very vigil watch, making rounds frequently.
Towards day I was awakened by a staff officer, who told me to withdraw my men at daylight, and fall back thro’ the town to the base of the ridge in which the main line was stationed and there deploy. At dawn therefore with a heavy heart I called in the men silently, and sullenly drew slowly out of the town, returning the sour looks of the citizens with others equally as stern. The enemy did not molest us at all, tho’ I was in hope that they would, being in a savage mood. A heavy rain was falling too, and just then I remembered that it was the 4th of July, and that the villains would think more than ever of their wretched Independence Day.
Soon after we formed our new line, a battalion of Yankee skirmishers came out of the town and deployed in our front. They used the bugle, the first I had seen with them. Their signals sounded clear & [distant], thro’ the damp air. I moved against them at once, but they slowly withdrew, and evidently were but overseeing us. A squad of them however came forward and gained unobserved a small house filled with hay midway between our lines, from which they began to annoy us with their fire. Taking a few men I went forward at a run, and came up quite close before the rascals could get out of the rear. They lost no time then in scudding away to their lines, but one of my men brought one down before they reached it … I fired the hay, and soon there was a magnificent blaze.
So we went on all the day, but seeing work ahead of me, I slept most of it away, leaving the command to one of my subordinates. At nine I reported to Gen. R[odes] who directed me to assume command of the sharpshooters from each of the Brigades (4) and line our rear when the army moved, which it would begin to do at midnight. I was to keep my line until day or longer if I saw fit, and then follow keeping a half mile or more in the rear, and acting as rear guard. Accordingly by 11 p.m. the troops all disappeared on the proscribed route and I was left in sole command at Gettysburg. It was the first time I had ever commanded more than one battalion and now I had five. My only embarrassment was in not knowing the officers but this I soon remedied, and got on quite well.
At sunrise I quitted my positions, and followed the main body. I continued my route unmolested until about 12 o’clock when some cavalry appeared, but they did not molest us. At 2 p.m. so many came up that I halted and deployed. They then brought up a field piece but did not use it. Seeing that they now wished to molest us, I hit upon this plan. All the front rank men kept their round & fired away, the rear rank men meanwhile retired to some good positions in the rear. I then formed a new line leaving vacancies for those of the first. I here would seize a favorable occa-sion after the new line was formed, and retreat at a run, suddenly disappearing before the enemy. These would then come in quickly thinking our men had been routed, they would be checked by the fire of the new line, snugly posted behind trees, stone fences &c. My worry had been that when I wished to retire, the enemy would push us so that we were in danger of being broken, but by this arrangement I [avoided] all difficulties — I had read of it in [General Sir William F.P.] Napier’s Peninsular War, as being a dodge of Marshal [Nicolas Jean de Dieu] Soult.
The men towards evening became worn out for food, so seeing that we would not hear from our [commissary] for a week or more, as it had gone to the Potomac, I sent orders to the officer to take all the provisions they could find in the houses by which we passed. In one occasion, riding along at the head of my own battalion marching quickly in retreat, we passed a cottage situated some distance from the main road & not visited by stragglers — around it were countless fowls, my hungry fellows looked eloquently to me for leave, I told the bugler to sound the ‘disperse,’ and then shouted ‘one minute.’ Instantly a hundred cartridges were drawn which thrown skillfully at the heads of the fowls bringing them down by scores; these fellows were used to the work evidently, but now they knew that it was for their actual subsistence as we had nothing, and were following in the rear of a great Army, which would leave us nothing. When the ‘Assembly’ sounded two minutes afterwards, every man had one, two or more chickens slung over his gun, and the march was resumed with out delay.
This article was written by Noah Andre Trudeau and originally appeared in the July 2001 issue of America’s Civil War magazine.
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80723091f0a4fa813494b335286676ef | https://www.historynet.com/battle-of-hurtgen-forest-the-9th-infantry-division-suffered-in-the-heavily-armed-woods.htm | Battle of Hürtgen Forest: The 9th Infantry Division Suffered in the Heavily Armed Woods | Battle of Hürtgen Forest: The 9th Infantry Division Suffered in the Heavily Armed Woods
Hürtgen. If a single word can cause a U.S. Army veteran of the European theater to shudder, it would be that. The foreboding image of dark forests, steep hills, voracious mud, pillboxes, constant rain and shells bursting in treetops immediately comes to mind. It was the sort of battlefield where soldiers walked a few feet from their foxholes and were never seen again.
It is not surprising, therefore, that the GIs who endured that hell on earth would prefer to push such awful memories out of their minds and may explain why, in the years since, the story of the Hürtgen Forest battles remains a historical stepchild of more glorious encounters such as D-Day and the Battle of the Bulge. What little has been done on Hürtgen has often focused on the November 1944 battles involving the 28th Infantry Division and has ignored the horrible prelude to the “Bloody Bucket’s” mauling, which occurred over 10 days in October.
The struggle for the 50 square miles of heavily wooded and hilly terrain south of Aachen actually began in mid-September. With their supply line stretched to the breaking point, the Allies’ rapid advance through France had finally slowed down at the Siegfried Line, the formidable defensive belt that blocked Germany’s western border and guarded the entrance to the Ruhr Valley. Hoping to seize Aachen and establish a firm breach in the Siegfried Line before winter’s onset, Maj. Gen. J. Lawton Collins, commanding VII Corps, ordered Maj. Gen. Louis A. Craig’s 9th Infantry Division to seize the villages of Hürtgen and Kleinhau. After some initial progress, the American drive stalled when two of Craig’s regiments were diverted north to assist the 3rd Armored Division, which was embroiled in a brutal battle at the Aachen suburb of Stolberg.
A newsreel cameraman follows a squad of infantrymen as they disappear into the trees of the Hürtgen Forest at the start of the attack. The 9th Division’s assault was intended as a diversion in support of the First Army’s drive on Aachen. What the Americans did not know was that hidden in the woods were thousands of German soldiers eager for an opportunity to administer a strong counterblow that would blunt the Allied drive into the Third Reich.
In early October, Craig was ordered to resume his attack in the Hürtgen Forest. Now, however, he would have to do so minus his 47th Infantry Regiment, which remained in support of the 3rd Armored, and with understrength units sent from the fighting around Aachen. To further complicate matters, Collins made it clear that the 9th Division’s effort was regarded only as secondary — supporting the Allies’ main attack at Aachen. That meant Craig would be at the bottom of the list for reinforcements, artillery or air support, though the general took some comfort knowing he was not expected to begin his assault until three days after VII Corps began its renewed push toward Aachen.
The villages of Germeter and Vossenack, as well as the crossroads settlement of Reichelskaul, were designated as the 9th Division’s initial objectives. Lieutenant Colonel Van H. Bond’s 39th Infantry Regiment would attack on the left. Once it had occupied Germeter, the 39th would seize Vossenack while guarding against an enemy counterattack from the north. Meanwhile, after capturing Reichelskaul, Colonel John G. Van Houten’s 60th Infantry Regiment would reorient itself to the south to guard against a German counterthrust from the direction of Monschau. The division would then push on against the town of Schmidt. Jump-off time was originally set for October 5 but was later postponed for 24 hours.
The initial thrust would be conducted by four battalions. In addition to support from two regimental cannon companies, Craig had four divisional howitzer battalions along with three battalions of reinforcing artillery, for a grand total of 96 pieces. A company of 4.2-inch mortars was attached to each regiment, along with a company each from supporting tank (746th) and tank destroyer (899th) battalions.
Against this small force were the Landsers of Maj. Gen. Hans Schmidt’s 275th Infantry Division, which had briefly fought north of Aachen before being transferred to the Hürtgen in late September to fill a gap between the 12th Volksgrenadier Division and the 353rd Infantry Division. On October 1, LXXIV Army Corps directed Schmidt to take over the entire Hürtgen sector, including the area occupied by the 353rd. As the 353rd’s headquarters and service units departed, its combat units were absorbed by the 275th. Schmidt also received the 353rd’s artillery component, giving him a total of 25 pieces, as well as six assault guns from Sturmgeschütz Brigade 902.
Schmidt’s division had originally consisted of a pair of grenadier (mechanized infantry) regiments: GR 983 led by a Colonel Schmitz and GR 984 commanded by Colonel Joachim Heintz. Schmidt deployed Schmitz’s men in reserve while assigning the northern sector to Heintz. The center was allocated to one of the 353rd’s former units, Lt. Col. Friedrich Tröster’s GR 942, while the southern sector was the responsibility of Colonel Feind’s GR Replacement and Training Battalion 253. Feind commanded 1,000 men and was placed along the weakest portion of the line.
The Americans knew few of these details when they began their attack at 1000 hours on October 6. Craig opened with fighter-bombers striking at otherwise invisible targets that U.S. artillery units had marked with columns of red smoke. Once the planes departed, there was a five-minute preparatory artillery barrage, then the U.S. foot soldiers began surging forward.
Assaulting the extreme northern end of the line held by GR 253, the 1st and 3rd battalions of Colonel Bond’s 39th Infantry gained 1,000 yards while suffering 29 casualties. Lieutenant Colonel Oscar H. Thompson’s 1st Battalion attacked with A and B companies in the lead, trailed by C Company. Captain Jack Dunlap’s B Company drew first blood when it overran an outpost and killed or captured 30 men. Crossing a creek, Dunlap’s men pushed on until they encountered several pillboxes, whereupon he decided to hold up for the night. Thompson then brought his other companies on line and waited for daylight.
On the 1st Battalion’s northern flank, Lt. Col. Richard H. Stumpf’s 3rd Battalion of the 39th Infantry advanced with L Company on the left and K Company on the right, with I Company in reserve. For the first 1,000 yards, the lead companies met only sniper and small-arms fire, but by late afternoon, heavier resistance had begun to build. Although L Company reduced an enemy strongpoint without too much delay, K Company was pinned down by accurate fire from a position southeast of the battalion sector. As evening approached, Stumpf decided to hold in place until darkness to allow K Company to safely disengage. General Schmidt was sufficiently alarmed by American progress in this sector to order Captain Riedel’s Fusilier Battalion 275 to launch a counterattack against the Americans the next morning.
Colonel Van Houten’s 60th Infantry attacked enemy defenses southwest of Reichelskaul. On the left, Major Lawrence Decker’s 2nd Battalion moved forward 500 yards before its lead platoons were pinned down. Every attempt to advance ended in failure and heavy losses. By the time the attack petered out, 130 of Decker’s officers and men had become casualties.
To the right, Van Houten’s 3rd Battalion of the 60th soon encountered difficulties of its own. After a short eastward advance, the battalion ran into a pillbox which, together with heavy mortar fire and a strong enemy response on the left flank, occupied the attention of two of Van Houten’s companies for the remainder of the day. By nightfall, however, K Company was able to move about 1,000 yards to the southeast. At 1600 hours, the colonel directed that his 1st Battalion, commanded by Lt. Col. Lee Chatfield, move north until it linked with the 39th Infantry. At daybreak Chatfield would launch an attack to the east in order to outflank the Germans, barring Decker’s advance.
Both sides were prepared to launch their own attacks at almost the same time. Fusilier Battalion 275 went forward only to encounter Americans who had been expecting some sort of reaction to their previous day’s advance. Captain Riedel was wounded and the survivors of his unit pinned down. Captain Dunlap took advantage of the situation by infiltrating GIs into the woods just west of Germeter, but Colonel Thompson would not let him enter the village for fear it would expose his B Company to counterattacking panzers.
By noon the 1st Battalion had succeeded in bypassing II/GR 942. Schmidt reacted by deploying Landesschützen Battalion I/9 to the rear of II/GR 942. The American success also convinced him that “the southernmost elements of GR 253 defending a line of West Wall bunkers were thus in danger of being enveloped from the rear.” Schmidt ordered Colonel Feind to block off the threat of a further enemy penetration in that sector. In response, U.S. Engineer Battalions 16 and 275 occupied positions between Reichelskaul and Raffelsbrand while three companies of Engineer Battalion 73 dug in along the Hürtgen-Germeter road.
During the night of October 7-8, Colonel Schmitz sent reinforcements to the aid of GR 253. Fortress Infantry Battalion 1412 and Luftwaffe Fortress Battalion 5 were also dispatched by LXXIV Army Corps to reinforce the 275th. In addition Schmidt received two companies of civilian police from Düren, hurriedly issued with army uniforms and rifles. He combined the police into an ad hoc formation named Battalion Hennecke (after its commander). Several howitzer batteries from the 89th Infantry Division, an anti-aircraft artillery regiment and elements of an artillery corps were ordered to occupy positions where they could augment the fire of Major Sturm’s Artillery Regiment 275.
A column of GIs ascends a hill and enters the forest. Many of the men sent into the woods as replacements were unprepared for what they would face. An Army historian later noted, “Any numerical advantage the Americans may have possessed lay in bug-eyed replacements, who began to arrive in small, frightened bunches.”
The 39th Infantry planned to renew its advance at 0800 hours, but a heavy barrage began falling on its lead battalions an hour before the attack was to begin. The 3rd Battalion suffered a serious setback when its L Company commander was killed and casualties disorganized his unit. Immediately following the barrage, a German force of 150 to 200 men counterattacked the 1st Battalion but was repelled by Captain Ralph Edgar’s A Company. The Germans then shifted their efforts farther north, hitting L and I companies. Colonel Bond sent G Company from the 2nd Battalion, which quickly overran three enemy machine guns. The loss of the automatic weapons seemed to take the fight out of the Germans, who retired to the east. Thirty German soldiers were killed during the engagement, and 27 others, including a wounded company commander, were captured.With fresh troops and additional artillery, Feind planned to launch a coordinated counterthrust at dawn, using I/GR 983 and Engineer Battalion 275. His intended target was Colonel Chatfield’s 1st Battalion, 60th Infantry, now located just west of Reichelskaul. Advancing northwest from Simonskall, the German counterattack crumbled when it came under intense mortar, artillery and small-arms fire.
After thwarting the enemy counterattack, Bond ordered his lead elements to resume their advance at 1100 hours. Bolstered by the arrival of supporting tanks, L and I companies moved forward. By 1215 hours, L Company had gained 200 yards and captured three pillboxes. The 3rd Battalion’s progress slowed and finally came to a halt shortly before 1800 hours. Still lacking supporting tanks, Thompson’s 1st Battalion did not attempt to advance across the open ground surrounding Germeter.
The 1st Battalion, 60th Infantry, launched its own attack against the Reichelskaul road junction at 1100 hours and was met by intense artillery and mortar fire. B Company, accompanied by several tanks, was able to detour north into the 39th’s zone of operations before veering back east again. This small force pushed to within sight of the crossroads before holding up for the night. The 2nd Battalion, however, was unsuccessful in overcoming the enemy to its front. Although the Germans had been pushed back, two days into the attack the Americans had yet to defeat the 275th, which continued to maintain an unbroken line of resistance. The bloodletting would continue.
During the night, Van Houten made plans to push eastward now that supporting tanks and tank destroyers had linked with his leading elements. Led by a platoon of M4 Shermans from the 746th Tank Battalion, Van Houten’s 1st Battalion pushed out into open ground south of Germeter at daybreak.
The 39th joined the attack at 0700 hours, but without artillery preparation. This time, supporting tanks were available and actively engaged. The 1st Battalion made a short advance to the edge of the clearing surrounding Germeter before being brought to a halt. C Company suffered particularly heavy casualties when it attempted to breach a barbed wire entanglement. Only the tanks attached to B Company were in position to place effective fire on the enemy defenders. By 1900 hours, a platoon from C Company finally succeeded in working several men close enough to the outskirts of Germeter to begin exchanging hand grenades with the Germans. Unable to support them however, at nightfall Thompson ordered them to pull back.
The 3rd Battalion moved out 45 minutes behind the 1st. As it advanced, the sound of tracked vehicles could be heard near Wittscheidt, and for the rest of the afternoon occasional high-velocity rounds exploded in treetops throughout the battalion’s sector. Despite enemy sniper fire, I Company was able to occupy Wittscheidt by 1615 hours. With darkness approaching, Colonel Stumpf decided to halt his advance. To forestall the possibility of an armored counterattack from the direction of Hürtgen, he directed I Company to mine the road leading to Wittscheidt and to register artillery on all likely enemy routes of approach.
Any plan to resume the advance the next day was forestalled by a dawn counterattack by Battalion Hennecke that overwhelmed two platoons from I Company, capturing 41 men. The German success meant that Bond would have to spend the rest of the day just trying to retake the ground he had lost. The 1st Battalion likewise did not attack as planned. Each time Thompson’s men tried to move forward they received accurate small-arms fire as well as direct fire from German self-propelled guns.
Things went somewhat better for the 60th Infantry. The 1st Battalion pushed off at noon to seize the Raffelsbrand road junction south of Germeter. In what seemed to be a nightmarish repetition of the opening days of the attack, the thinned ranks of hungry and bone-weary GIs trudged forward while steadily losing men to incoming fire. The situation changed dramatically when one of the lead companies overcame a German pillbox covering the road between Reichelskaul and Raffelsbrand. Buoyed by success, the Americans pushed southward, collecting 100 prisoners and securing their objective by nightfall. With Raffelsbrand in American hands, Van Houten ordered the 3rd Battalion to redeploy to Reichelskaul to protect Chatfield’s rear and maintain pressure on German units massing southeast of Germeter.
The loss of the road junction persuaded Schmidt that he needed additional troops. LXXIV Army Corps agreed to loan two rifle companies from the 89th Infantry Division, provided they were used only along the threatened southern flank. The reinforcements would not arrive until dawn on October 11, however, and in the meantime Schmidt sent a company each from GR 983 and GR 984 to strengthen Colonel Feind’s GR 253.
The Americans’ position was also somewhat precarious. With no reserves available, Van Houten had nothing to send to Chatfield’s aid. To the east, the 2nd Battalion, 60th Infantry, was still being held back by the stubborn defenders of II/GR 942. To the north, the 39th Infantry remained stalled outside Wittscheidt and Germeter.
October 11 brought success and failure for both sides. American attempts to exploit success at Raffelsbrand produced nothing but longer casualty lists. A German counterattack struck Chatfield’s men before daylight, and though beaten back, Chatfield reported that “the enemy maintained pressure here for the rest of the day and crowned it before dark with a bayonet charge.” When the Americans tried to bring up reinforcements, they were pinned down by several pillboxes along the Reichelskaul-Raffelsbrand road that they had bypassed the previous day.
The 1st Battalion, 39th Infantry, was finally able to enter Germeter but found that its defenders had abandoned their positions during the night. Hoping to seize more ground, Thompson ordered Captain Edgar’s A Company, supported by Lieutenant Robert Sherwood’s 1st Platoon of C/746th Tank Battalion, to probe eastward toward Vossenack. The column had only covered 500 or so yards when a Panzerschreck knocked out the lead tank, and the remaining American armor and infantry withdrew. A subsequent advance by A Company under cover of smoke ended with the destruction of two more Shermans.
The Americans had some success to the north and west of Germeter. Leaving I Company behind to protect the northern approaches to the town, K and L companies encountered little resistance as they moved eastward from Wittscheidt. By late afternoon, Stumpf’s battalion had advanced nearly a mile and was preparing to attack Vossenack from a ridge northeast of the village. The 2nd Battalion was also able to advance.
Craig’s men had at least been gradually moving forward, but ominous events had occurred during the night that would soon threaten what little progress they had made. Accompanied by the LXXIV Corps commander, Lt. Gen. Erich Straube, Seventh Army commander Lt. Gen. Erich Brandenburger visited Schmidt’s command post. After hearing a candid assessment of the situation, Brandenburger promised to send Regiment Wegelein, a unit composed of well-trained and well-equipped troops to the front. Numbering 161 officers and 1,639 enlisted/officer cadets, the force was organized with three battalions of three companies each and a regimental heavy-weapons company. Its commander, Colonel Helmuth Wegelein, was an experienced leader.
Schmidt and Wegelein quickly agreed that a counterattack against the northern flank of the Americans had the best chance of producing favorable results. Wegelein would launch his assault from an assembly area near Hürtgen, advancing southwest until he isolated the American battalions near Germeter.
Following a brief but concentrated artillery preparation, Wegelein’s men advanced from their positions just before dawn, moving purposefully along the wooded plateau paralleling the Germeter-Hürtgen road. A platoon of dismounted armor crewmen from 746th Tank Battalion, securing a roadblock along the left flank of 2nd Battalion, 39th Infantry, was the first to encounter this new threat and was quickly scattered. By 0700 hours, Wegelein had succeeded in isolating several of Lt. Col. Gunn’s rifle companies. As testament to the isolation caused by the densely wooded terrain, the 39th’s 3rd Battalion was completely unaware that the nearby 1st Battalion was being cut to pieces.
Lacking reserves to blunt the enemy thrust, Colonel Bond requested help from General Craig, who directed elements of the divisional reconnaissance troop — augmented by a platoon of light tanks — to assist the embattled 39th Infantry. As the situation grew more serious, Craig ordered the 47th Infantry at Schevenhütte to dispatch two rifle companies and a company of medium tanks from the 3rd Armored Division to reinforce Bond. Rushed to the point of greatest crisis, these reinforcements were finally able to halt the German advance when it reached the road leading west out of Germeter.
The abortive counterattack cost the Germans nearly 500 casualties, with little to show in return. The failed operation, however, produced at least one positive result for the Germans: Surprised by the strength and intensity of their assault, Bond ordered Stumpf’s battalion to abandon its plans to attack Vossenack in order to reduce the salient Wegelein had created.
Schmidt planned on renewing the counterattack on October 13, but orders from LXXIV Army Corps directed the immediate removal of all officer candidates from the combat zone, which cut in half what remained of Wegelein’s unit and forced him to spend badly needed time reorganizing his remaining personnel. While he was doing so, the 3rd Battalion, 39th Infantry, launched an attack of its own against Wegelein’s troops. K Company led the effort, trailed by L Company. As the latter moved up on line, both of its leading platoons were ambushed and wiped out. K Company maneuvered to attack the enemy facing L Company while the 1st Battalion sent B and C companies into the fight. Another counterattack inflicted heavy losses on the right platoon of Dunlap’s company, but the American advance continued.
At 1730 hours, a German bearing a white flag approached B Company and requested a brief cease-fire while his unit prepared to surrender. Dunlap sent the man back with a message that he would hold his fire for five minutes. When the German emissary did not reappear within the stated time, B Company resumed its advance, only to run into a torrent of small-arms fire. It was now almost dark, and the enemy seemed to be on all sides. Fearing that his exhausted company was losing its cohesion, Dunlap ordered his men to fall back a short distance and dig in.
Facing four enemy battalions at Raffelsbrand, the 1st Battalion, 60th Infantry, was experiencing its own difficulties. Just before dawn, a surprise German attack seized a pillbox occupied by C Company. Although the seven GIs inside were able to escape, a counterattack by 30 men was unable to regain the position. Three Sherman tanks and two infantry companies eventually arrived to lend a hand, but even with those reinforcements, a heavy crossfire from several machine guns prevented the Americans from making any progress. One of the tanks was hit by an antitank rocket that wounded several men and forced the crew to evacuate the vehicle. A daring German soldier then ran out to the tank and drove it behind a nearby pillbox before the Americans could react. With this, the Americans lost all momentum, and at 1730 hours they began to fall back, suffering heavy casualties from enemy artillery and mortar fire.
That evening Wegelein went to Schmidt’s headquarters to protest orders for a renewed advance on the morning of October 14, stating that communications to his battalions and companies were so poor there was a risk that all units might not receive a regimental order. Schmidt replied that he would accuse Wege-lein of cowardice if he did not resume his attacks.
Determined to show that he was no coward, Wegelein spent a busy night personally delivering the orders to his units. He still had more visits to make as the sun rose on the 14th. At 0800 hours, however, the colonel was shot and killed by a sergeant from the U.S. 39th Infantry, and his regimental adjutant was captured moments later.
The fighting sputtered on and off for two more days, but it was clear that both sides were too exhausted to achieve significant results. At a cost of 4,410 casualties, the Americans succeeded in pushing their front line an average of 3,500 yards to the east. Nonbattle losses (sickness, injury, etc.) for American units totaled nearly 1,000. The toll for the defenders was also high — approximately 2,000 killed or wounded and 1,308 prisoners.
After breaking off the offensive, Collins made the questionable claim that the sacrifices of Craig’s men had drawn off German units that could have been thrown into the battle for Aachen. Although it is true that 19 German infantry and engineer battalions opposed six American infantry battalions, many of the defending units were much smaller than their counterparts. In any case, though the Hürtgen fighting might have prevented some German units from being sent to Aachen, their redeployment would not have altered that city’s eventual fate.
More important, given the experience of the 9th Division during the opening phase of the battle, the larger question is why senior American leaders such as Generals Courtney Hodges, Omar Bradley and Dwight D. Eisenhower chose in November 1944 to send division after division into the dark and foreboding woods right until the start of the German Ardennes offensive that December. By the time major combat operations in the area finally ceased, six U.S. divisions had been fed into the meat grinder and some 33,000 soldiers had become casualties without achieving a breach in the Siegfried Line.
According to the U.S. Army’s official history, “The real winner appeared to be the vast, undulating blackish-green sea that virtually negated American superiority in air, artillery, and armor to reduce warfare to its lowest common denominator.” Given the terrible cost, it seems clear that Maj. Gen. James Gavin might have been more correct when he said, “For us the Hürtgen was one of the most costly, most unproductive, and most ill-advised battles that our army has ever fought.”
Mark Reardon is a historian at the U.S. Army Center of Military History. This article originally appeared in the December 2006 issue of World War II magazine. For more great articles subscribe to World War II magazine today!
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2abaec8aa8be12bd1fd7342be8cfea0b | https://www.historynet.com/battle-of-palmetto-ranch-american-civil-wars-final-battle.htm | Battle of Palmetto Ranch: American Civil War’s Final Battle | Battle of Palmetto Ranch: American Civil War’s Final Battle
By May 11, 1865, nearly everyone in the United States and in the moribund Confederacy considered the Civil War over. Both of the South’s principal armies had capitulated. Lieutenant General Richard Taylor had surrendered most of the remaining Confederate forces east of the Mississippi. President Jefferson Davis had just been captured, and his cabinet had scattered to escape Yankee vengeance. Even the elusive Confederate guerrilla William Quantrill had been fatally wounded. The martyred president, Abraham Lincoln, had been buried a week before, and Federal troops had begun their long occupation of Dixie. Arrangements were underway for a grand review — a victory parade — in Washington, and the War Department was preparing to muster out most of the huge Union Army. Peace had come at last.
As usual, things were different in Texas. Hostile forces still faced each other at the southernmost tip of the state, where the Rio Grande spilled into the Gulf of Mexico. On Brazos Santiago Island lay nearly 2,000 Union troops, including the 62nd and 87th U.S. Colored Infantry, the 34th Indiana and a few dozen loyal Texans who had volunteered for cavalry service but remained dismounted. Across the bay and several miles inland, fragmented battalions of Confederate cavalry guarded the Mexican border, beyond which French imperial forces and native Juaristas vied for control of the northern province.
The Western Sub-District of Texas, commanded by Confederate Brig. Gen. James E. Slaughter, encompassed virtually all of Texas below San Antonio. Slaughter, a Virginia native who had served in the U.S. Army from the Mexican War until Texas seceded, had been assigned his post some eight months before by Maj. Gen. John G. Walker, whom Slaughter had previously served as chief of staff. As late as the end of 1864, Slaughter had been able to count more than 2,600 soldiers under his command, but with the new year that number began to dwindle rapidly. On the last day of January 1865, only 1,722 of those men remained, of whom fewer than 1,450 officers and men stood ready for duty. By March 31, Slaughter’s returns revealed only 1,200 men of all ranks present. With spring, desertions increased rapidly, and Slaughter began to suspect that he could not rely on those who remained.
Slaughter’s troops consisted almost entirely of cavalry, from a tiny detachment at Fort Clark 200 miles up the Rio Grande to his heaviest concentration of several companies and a light battery at Brownsville and Fort Brown, about 20 miles from the river’s mouth. By April 6, 1865, Slaughter had made his headquarters at Brownsville, which he styled the Southern Division of his subdistrict.
Colonel John Salmon Ford — a Mexican War veteran, former captain of Texas Rangers, onetime Austin mayor and an already legendary character — commanded Slaughter’s Southern Division. Ford, popularly known as ‘Old Rip,’ had been appointed colonel of Texas troops early in 1861, when Slaughter was still a lieutenant in the U.S. Army. Ford had accepted the surrender of Brazos Santiago in February of that year, and he had spent most of the war on duty in southern Texas. For about a year he served in the Conscription Bureau in Austin; the camp of instruction near Tyler was named in his honor, although he may have felt little honored after Camp Ford became notorious as a prison pen.
In the spring of 1865, Colonel Ford’s immediate force amounted to nine companies of cavalry in two battalions. In addition, three more unassigned companies and Captain O.G. Jones’ six-gun battery were stationed at Fort Brown. He also exercised control over half a regiment of cavalry that covered the river below Ringgold Barracks, too far away for assistance on short notice. Between the end of January and the end of March, his troop strength shrank almost 20 percent; as April opened, he had only 763 officers and men to guard about 100 miles of river, and only 625 of them were fit for duty. By May, desertion had diminished Ford’s command even further.
In that remote corner of the Confederacy, few military units adhered to numerical state designations, instead taking the names of their commanders. The largest organized force on which Ford could call was the six-company battalion temporarily commanded by Captain William N. Robinson, who could still muster about 250 troopers when every man answered the bugle. Ford posted Robinson about 15 miles from the Rio Grande at Palmetto (also spelled Palmito) Ranch. A smaller vanguard lay a little closer to the enemy, at White’s Ranch.
Despite the precaution of maintaining that outpost at White’s Ranch, Ford did not anticipate that there would be significant trouble with the Union troops at Brazos Santiago. In March he and a civilian emissary had corresponded with Federal Maj. Gen. Lew Wallace on the subject of peace, and although they came to no conclusions, it was evident even to the Confederate forces that the rebellion was about finished.
Many of the Texas cavalry companies had scattered in an effort to find grass for their horses; some of those mounts were so broken down that Slaughter hoped he might be able to replace them with a few hundred mustangs.
At Brazos Santiago, a change in command appears to have ended the unofficial truce. Colonel Robert B. Jones of the 34th Indiana left for home in April, turning the island over to Colonel Theodore H. Barrett of the 62nd U.S. Colored Infantry. Unlike Jones, Barrett had never led his regiment in combat, and he seems to have thirsted for a little battlefield glory before the war ended altogether. In the wee hours of May 11, Barrett summoned his lieutenant colonel, David Branson, and gave him instructions that would lead to the last clash of arms between organized Union and Confederate forces.
At 4 a.m. Branson, who had been appointed lieutenant colonel directly from the noncommissioned ranks of the 28th Illinois less than a year and a half before, gathered 250 of his men and a full complement of officers on the waterfront, with a view to crossing over to Port Isabel. However, a storm kicked up, and the steamer he intended to use broke down, so Barrett ordered the expedition back to camp.
Later in the day, he found enough small boats to cross the troops over the shorter passage to Boca Chica, at the southern end of the island, and in the evening Branson moved his command down there. Along the way he picked up 50 recruits from the Union 2nd Texas Cavalry Battalion and two of their officers, all of whom still lacked horses. The two lieutenants had not even acquired rank insignia.
Branson procured 100 rounds of ammunition and five days’ rations for each man, and by 9:30 p.m. all of them had reached the mainland. Followed by two mule-drawn supply wagons, the procession started immediately for White’s Ranch, where Robinson’s forward companies were reportedly still camped.
Branson reached White’s Ranch at 2 a.m. on May 12 and silently surrounded the main building. Upon springing the trap, however, he learned that his prey had withdrawn to Palmetto Ranch a couple of days earlier. His men had already been on their feet for more than 24 hours, so Branson gave up any hope of surprising the Palmetto Ranch detachment before daylight. He marched his command another 1 1/2 miles upriver, then scattered the men into the chaparral for a few hours’ sleep.
French forces patrolled the Rio Grande on the Mexican side, and by 8:30 that morning their videttes had spotted the Federal troops. The news quickly drifted over the river to the Confederates, and French troops appeared on the bank opposite Branson’s camp. Branson nevertheless formed his 300 riflemen and marched them toward Palmetto Ranch.
Palmetto Ranch was 112 miles away, but Branson did not arrive there until noon. A flurry of musketry erupted between Branson’s skirmishers and Robinson’s pickets without drawing blood on either side. When the Federal infantrymen had driven the startled Confederates away from the hilltop hacienda, they settled down to count up their prizes: two or three sick Texans, a couple of horses and rations for 190 men, including four beef cattle. Captain Robinson, who could initially collect only about 60 of his retreating battalion, sent word of the attack back to Colonel Ford at Brownsville. Ford instructed Robinson to hold on while he rounded up other scattered companies and brought them to his assistance.
Robinson did more than hold on. With his little command he returned to the ranch on Palmetto Hill and launched a bold midafternoon assault on the Union troops, who were enjoying a siesta. Branson, who thought he faced ‘a considerable force of the enemy,’ thought his position untenable and immediately began to retreat. He backpedaled to White’s Ranch, losing one Texan.
Once he had dug in for the night, Branson sent a courier back to Brazos Santiago with an appeal for help. Colonel Barrett ordered Lt. Col. Robert G. Morrison to take 200 of his 34th Indiana to Branson’s aid. Morrison, an experienced officer who had led his regiment through the Vicksburg campaign, took his men to Boca Chica in skiffs. Barrett followed with some acting staff officers, and they all reached White’s Ranch at dawn on May 13.
At Barrett’s direction, Branson detailed a platoon from his regiment to guard the captured supplies, the few prisoners and the wounded Texan. Then, while the Hoosiers stopped to cook breakfast, the black regiment started back toward Palmetto Ranch, about three miles away, skirmishing briskly with Robinson’s cavalrymen. Half an hour later, Morrison put his men back in line and trailed after Branson, lagging a mile or so behind.
At 11 a.m. Colonel Ford started to Robinson’s aid with as much of the rest of the battalion as he could muster, adding to it the three independent companies and the battery from Fort Brown. After an urgent appeal from Captain Robinson, Ford sent one company galloping ahead while he remained behind to personally hurry the main body forward.
The advance of Barrett’s little brigade passed Palmetto Hill again, burning what remained of the supplies at the ranch before pressing on after Robinson’s weary troopers. Two companies of the 34th Indiana preceded the 62nd as skirmishers. One company deployed on the right, while the other — 27 men of Company K, under 2nd Lt. Charles A. Jones — fanned out on the left in the thick chaparral along the riverbank. Their sporadic fire escalated sharply as Ford’s reinforcements began to show up.
Ford threw most of his men into line at 3 p.m. He later calculated that his entire force, some of whom were ‘volunteers,’ had amounted to 275 cavalry and 25 foot soldiers to work the six guns. Years afterward he explained that the volunteers were French soldiers who had crossed the river to see a little action. Riding around in civilian dress, Ford placed one section of the battery on either end of his line and kept two guns in reserve. He gave Robinson the rest of his original battalion, bracing his right with the three companies under Captain D.M. Wilson.
Later Colonel Barrett claimed that he had wanted to bivouac that night on Telegraph Road, a better-drained thoroughfare that led directly to Port Isabel, where a transport could carry his troops back to Brazos Santiago. The arrival of Ford, whose force Barrett overestimated by a factor of two, changed those plans. Though Barrett still commanded 500 officers and men, he started falling back before the 300 Texans.
Veteran officers in the 34th Indiana found Barrett unimpressive, charging that he asked the most junior officers their opinions and requested their cooperation rather than giving orders. At one point he acceded to Lieutenant Jones’ request for 100 men to perform a ‘little maneuver’ on the Confederates, apparently directing Colonel Branson to follow the second lieutenant’s instructions. To even Jones’ surprise, Branson submitted, although Ford’s arrival canceled the experiment.
Ford took one company each from Robinson and Wilson to swing around his left and assail the Federal right. Two companies under Captains J.B. Cocke and John Gibbons strung out parallel to the Rio Grande, but wary Yankees saw the movement. Barrett directed Colonel Morrison to confront that threat with two more companies of the 34th, and Morrison sent Captain Abraham M. Templer out with Companies B and E.
The first rounds from Ford’s artillery struck the Federals at about 4 p.m., when Barrett’s line had fallen back to within a mile and a half of Palmetto Hill. Those first shells alarmed the Union soldiers, who had not suspected the presence of any guns and had none with which to reply. When Cocke and Gibbons opened fire on his right, Barrett started his main body to the rear at the double-quick. Lieutenant Jones reported that his men were too exhausted to serve as the rear guard, so Barrett ordered the 50 Texans to cover the retreat. First Lieutenant James Hancock, who commanded the Texans, complained that his men had already expended all but a couple of rounds of ammunition apiece, but Barrett ordered him out anyway with a promise to relieve him soon.
The two fleeing Union regiments left 100 of their comrades behind. Captain Templer, one lieutenant and 48 Indiana infantrymen were surrounded and compelled to throw down their arms. Company E was the color company of the 34th, and the prisoners included the men who carried the national and state flags. Sergeant John R. Smith, who bore the Stars and Stripes, took the state flag from Corporal George Burns and disappeared into the chaparral with both banners. He tried to swim the river with them, but when troops on the Mexican side fired on him he swam back, evidently losing the state flag near the far side. Troubled by an old foot wound, Smith could not outrun his pursuers, but he tucked the U.S. flag beneath some undergrowth along the riverbank just before Confederate cavalrymen caught up with him.
Lieutenant Hancock, his second lieutenant and 20 of their Union Texans also surrendered when they were cut off. In addition, nearly 30 stragglers from the 34th fell into enemy hands while their regiment raced toward Palmetto Ranch. The precipitous retreat quickly exhausted the Indiana troops. A few of the laggards did manage to swim the Rio Grande without interference.
Now Colonel Barrett ordered out several companies of skirmishers from the 62nd U.S. Colored Infantry to cover his rear and flank. The white regiment and the black one crossed paths near Palmetto Ranch, each breaking the other’s ranks. The 34th, which had been behind, took the road nearest the river, while the 62nd bore to the left and slowed its step to quick time. Still trotting at the double-quick, the 34th overtook the 62nd despite having the longer road around a bend in the river, and when the white regiment reached the far side of Palmetto Hill, it had taken the lead in the retreat. One witness later testified that Colonel Barrett had promised the Indiana troops he would stop and fight at Palmetto Hill, but instead he barely slowed the retreat.
Barrett ordered Morrison to keep up with the wagons, which rolled ahead of the harried column. Canteens, haversacks and even rifles littered the road in its wake. Morrison stayed near the head of his regiment, trying to reassure the men and maintain a pace that would not wear them out before they reached the relative safety of Boca Chica. He threw a company ahead to hold back anyone with the inclination to bolt, but the column still moved steadily forward. Occasionally a shell or a solid shot whistled overhead, after which a volley or two would come echoing back from the rear guard.
When the fugitives reached White’s Ranch, they still had another 12 miles to Boca Chica. Ford’s Confederates pursued doggedly, but from there the narrow peninsula foiled any flanking maneuvers. All the Confederates could do was hasten the withdrawal with artillery fire. Three miles from Boca Chica, one of the Federal wagons became mired in a bog, but the Indiana regiment filed around it and made for the boats. The sun had just set when the first of Morrison’s men reached the landing, rushing into the water to secure their places in the skiffs. A staff officer tried to hold them back so the wounded could cross first, but they ignored him.
The enemy was no longer in sight by now, so there was no need for such frenzy. With Union reinforcements just across the inlet, Colonel Ford preferred not to linger, but as he started back upriver he encountered Brig. Gen. Slaughter, who rode up at the head of 120 men of the other cavalry battalion. Slaughter told Ford to resume the pursuit. Ford argued against it, but Slaughter insisted and threw out such a heavy line of skirmishers that the Federals feared he meant to charge.
About 2l2 miles from the landing, Colonel Branson deployed his skirmishers one final time. Company K of the 62nd, under Captain Fred Coffin, spread out and leveled another volley at the Confederates, who returned it. The two lines fired ineffectually at each other for a few more minutes, and then Captain Coffin turned his line back to Boca Chica. The Texans eased their horses forward again, but the last shots of the Civil War had been fired. Slaughter thought better of his aggressiveness, and Barrett ferried the rest of his men across without further molestation.
When all the reports had come in, Colonel Barrett discovered that he had lost only one man killed, Private John Jefferson Williams, of Jay County, Ind. Nine men had been wounded and 103 officers and men captured, most of them from the 34th Indiana. Colonel Ford summarized his losses as ‘five or six, wounded.’ The prisoners from the 34th Indiana carried their comrade’s body to the outskirts of Brownsville, where they buried him.
One black soldier, Sergeant David Clark, evidently fell out on the retreat and spent the night of May 13 huddled in the chaparral a mile below Palmetto Ranch. Ford’s men found him as they swept back through at noon the next day. He was the last prisoner ever taken by the Confederate Army, and as Texans prodded him back toward Brownsville that afternoon, other horsemen came galloping up to the column with the battered national colors of the 34th Indiana. Military authorities recovered the state flag on the Mexican shore a couple of days later. The commander of the post at Bagdad, Mexico, turned it over to an Indiana lieutenant.
Within a fortnight of the battle, an official armistice ended the fighting in Texas, and on May 30 the 34th Indiana marched into Brownsville to begin occupation duty. That did not end the matter, though, for Colonel Barrett’s poor showing in his only engagement led him to bring charges against Colonel Morrison, on whom he tried to blame the disaster.
A court-martial sat on the case through late July and most of August, listening to conflicting stories divided along partisan lines. Witnesses from Morrison’s regiment gave testimony that supported him, while Barrett’s officers recounted versions that flattered their leader. Even Colonel Ford appeared on Morrison’s behalf, offering the embarrassing information that Barrett had fled before a force barely half the size of his own. Despite lax discipline in the 34th and the relative disorder of its retreat, the court refused to convict Morrison on a single charge or specification.
Apparently by virtue of overweening ambition, Colonel Barrett had initiated a perfectly unnecessary battle. Through his incompetence, he had given the dying Confederacy the satisfaction of claiming victory in the last battle of the war.
This article was written by William Marvel and originally published in the February 2006 issue of Civil War Times Magazine.
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7a33fca5ec29ccec5a8bb1235cc0e089 | https://www.historynet.com/battle-of-stalingrad-operation-winter-tempest.htm | Battle of Stalingrad: Operation Winter Tempest | Battle of Stalingrad: Operation Winter Tempest
Stalingrad–Stalin’s City–the industrial center on the Volga River, attracted German and Soviet divisions in the latter part of 1942 like a magnet draws metal shavings. During the heady days of that summer, the men of General der Panzertruppe Friedrich von Paulus’ vaunted Sixth Army had sensed nothing but victory in the air. As summer dwindled into fall, however, their air of confidence was replaced by a growing sense of uncertainty and futility.
Grim hand-to-hand fighting had erupted in Stalingrad in September, and no relief was in sight. The once-powerful divisions of the Sixth Army had been severely mauled during savage house-to-house combat within the city. By early November, the great city was like a twisted, stinking corpse, full of smoldering ruins and unburied dead. Tens of thousands had already died in Stalingrad. There was little left standing to fight for, and those buildings still intact were under constant fire. Still, the Germans had orders to take the city, while the Russians had strict orders to prevent its capture. As winter approached, many of the Germans–and Soviets as well–must have been asking themselves why they were fighting and dying for such a worthless piece of real estate.
The answer was quite simple. They were dying to fuel the egos of two men–Adolf Hitler and Josef Stalin. Hitler, who had originally planned a vast breakthrough into the oil-rich Caucasus, had become fascinated with the possibility of capturing the city that bore Stalin’s name. All the operational plans so carefully made for the German offensive in southern Russia in 1942 had been drastically altered by the Führer‘s obsession. Stalin also saw the battle for the city as a matter of honor. The Germans, he decided, would be stopped and defeated at the city that bore his name.
Once the Sixth Army reached Stalingrad, the battle had developed into small-unit actions that pitted the professionalism of the Germans against the tenacity of the Soviets. Paulus had two panzer divisions, two motorized divisions and 17 infantry divisions under his command as he approached the city in August 1942. By mid-September, however, the battle for the city proper had begun, and the German armored and mechanized units proved to be totally unfit for the street fighting that followed. Special engineer formations had to be called in to help eliminate pockets of enemy resistance within the city. The engineers suffered heavy casualties, but they gradually helped the German infantry take control of most of Stalingrad. The Soviets, however, always managed to ferry enough troops across the Volga to prevent a total takeover of the city.
Paul Böttcher, a member of the 24th Panzer Division, described his feelings during that fall: ‘We were the victors and, as we headed towards Stalingrad, we thought that we would capture the city in a few days. That was a mistake. The Russians that defended the city were brave, dogged and tough. We had heavy losses in men and equipment. The Russians had half-finished tanks, which they dug into the ground to fire at us. They fought us to the last man.’
With winter fast approaching, the Sixth Army’s parent formation, Army Group B, was dangerously overstretched. The German commanders were forced to call upon their Italian and Romanian allies to fill the gaps, especially to the northwest and southeast of Stalingrad. The troop shortage had been caused by Hitler’s all-or-nothing policy of capturing both the Caucasus oil fields and Stalingrad, which soon became a recipe for disaster.
The Red Army had learned much in the 1 1/2 years since Hitler had first sent his armies thundering into the Soviet Union. Incompetent Soviet generals had, for the most part, been replaced by cool professionals. The situation in and around Stalingrad presented those men with their first opportunity to show that they were able to level the playing field against the German invaders.
On November 19, while Soviet forces of the Southwest Front army group inside Stalingrad, under General Nikolai F. Vatutin, held onto their tenuous bridgeheads on the western bank of the Volga, troops of the Don Front, commanded by General Konstantin K. Rokossovsky, attacked the Third Romanian and Eighth Italian armies, which were in a defensive posture on the Don River, northwest of Stalingrad. A day later, General Andrei I. Yeremenko’s forces of the Stalingrad Front opened an offensive against the Fourth Romanian Army, stationed south of Stalingrad.
The assault was brilliant in both planning and execution. The Romanian divisions, many of them poorly led and poorly equipped, melted away under the Soviet onslaught. During the first four days of the attack, the Third Romanian Army lost approximately 75,000 men and almost all of its heavy equipment. The Fourth Romanian Army fared little better.
Josef Bannert was a member of the German 62nd Infantry Division, which was attached to the Eighth Italian Army. ‘When the first Russian attack began from the west bank of the River Don,’ he wrote 43 years later, ‘ the Romanian and Italian units remained in their positions for only a little time. The Russian forces advanced on the left and the right of the German units, which were used as ‘corsets’ between the Italians and the Romanians. As our allies disintegrated, we were also forced to retreat or be surrounded.’
By November 23, Yeremenko’s IV Mechanized Corps had linked up with Vatutin’s IV Tank Corps near Kalach, forming an iron ring around the Sixth Army and parts of the Fourth Panzer Army that had not been quick enough to escape the encirclement. Thus began perhaps the most critical period in the battle for Stalingrad.
Although the Soviets had succeeded in encircling the city, they still needed time to consolidate their position. An inner ring had to be formed to put pressure on the trapped enemy forces, and an outer ring was also needed–to thwart any rescue attempt. German sources generally agree that during the last week of November the Sixth Army had the ability to break through the encircling Soviet divisions. Indeed, the commander of Army Group B, Col. Gen. Maximilian Freiherr von Weichs, urged Paulus to attempt such a breakout.
Upon hearing of the encirclement, Hitler was inclined to issue an order for the Sixth Army to fight its way through to the rest of Army Group B. In fact, Paulus had requested permission to abandon Stalingrad on November 20. Unfortunately for the German soldiers fighting in Stalingrad, Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring was able to convince Hitler that his Luftwaffe could provide the supplies–about 550 tons per day–necessary to keep the Sixth Army a viable fighting force. That assurance, which would later result in the decimation of the Luftwaffe transport command, was enough to convince Hitler to order Paulus to stand and fight. Stalingrad was declared a ‘fortress,’ and the garrison was expected to defend the city to the death. Thus, instead of attempting to pierce the Soviet ring of steel, the Sixth Army began to form a defensive position, allowing the Red Army time to consolidate its gains and reinforce both the inner and outer rings around Stalingrad.
After the war there were many who questioned Paulus’ actions and strict obedience to Hitler’s orders. Lieutenant General Carl Rodenburg, commander of the encircled 76th Infantry Division, wrote: ‘During the period from 20-28 November, my division, with its left flank on the Don, was engaged in heavy fighting. At this time, the leadership of the army and the leadership of the Army Group were in agreement about the breakout. The Chief of the General Staff, General [Kurt] Zeitzler, proposed this to the highest leadership [i.e., Hitler] and attempted to get Hitler’s agreement. However, after Göring’s speech concerning his ability to supply the army, Hitler would hear no more about it [a breakout].
‘As for the claim that von Paulus must have had a similar resolve,’ Rodenburg continued, ‘there was a memorandum from the LI Armee Korps [a unit of the Sixth Army] saying that the Luftwaffe supply would not work and that a breakout, against orders, was demanded. This memo also said that the army commander [Paulus] and his chief-of-staff did not have the same resolve to go against orders.’
Field Marshal Erich von Manstein, the man who would oversee the planned rescue of the Stalingrad garrison, also questioned Paulus’ motives. ‘The only possibility would have been to present Hitler with the fait accompli of the army’s departure from Stalingrad,’ Manstein later speculated, ‘especially if the supreme command shrouded itself in silence for 36 hours, as in fact happened. It is of course possible that such a course of action would have cost Paulus, among others, his head. One can assume, however, that it was not worry over such an outcome that prevented Paulus from doing unilaterally what he saw as correct. Rather it was his loyalty to Hitler that led him to seek permission for the army to break out.’
Immediately after word of the Soviet attack reached the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (OKW), or German high command, orders were sent to Manstein, the conqueror of Sevastopol, to take command of the Stalingrad sector. Manstein had been engaged in the siege of Leningrad until a few weeks before, and his headquarters was now located in Vitebsk. Because of inclement weather, he was forced to travel south by train.
Manstein’s new command, designated Army Group Don, was composed of the Sixth Army, Army Group Hoth (the VI and VII Romanian Army Corps, LVII Panzer Corps and XLVIII Panzer Corps), the battered Third Romanian Army, and Army Detachment Hollidt, which consisted of one panzer division, one Romanian tank division and three German and four Romanian infantry divisions. Army Detachment Hollidt was holding a tenuous line on the Chir River, some 60 kilometers from Stalingrad.
General Karl Hollidt’s forces were the nearest to Stalingrad, but he could do little to help the entrapped Sixth Army. Hollidt later recalled his position: ‘A success was not possible, at that moment, for a relief of Stalingrad because there were not enough vehicles on hand. Also, Army Detachment Hollidt was itself forced into a defensive position by superior enemy forces, which were attempting to force their way through to Rostov.’
Manstein decided that Army Group Hoth, which was located about 100 kilometers southwest of Stalingrad, would be his main striking force, but he needed time to receive the necessary reinforcements and to prepare for the counterattack. As he considered the Romanian corps all but useless, Manstein had to rely on his German divisions. Reinforcements for the LVII Panzer Corps headquarters arrived in the form of three panzer divisions: the 17th, the 23rd and the 6th. The 11th Panzer Division was also transferred from Army Group Center to reinforce the XLVIII Panzer Corps.
For the approximately 250,000 men trapped inside the Stalingrad pocket, each day of waiting brought new privations. Rations were cut, and then cut again. Horse meat became a prized commodity. The troops scavenged for extra food, and they began to show signs of physical deterioration. The Soviets were relentless in their attacks, and casualties soon mounted to serious levels. The wounded lay in filthy hallways, and cellars were soon converted into makeshift operating rooms. At that point, however, morale was still fairly good, for the troops knew that Manstein was now in charge of getting them out.
It took 18 days for Manstein to assemble his forces and finalize his plans. He was in constant teletype communication with Paulus, who had been promoted to colonel general on November 30. The relief attempt was code-named ‘Winter Tempest.’ Once the attack began, plans were also made for the Sixth Army to attempt a breakout to link up with the advancing armored columns under the code name ‘Thunderclap.’
Winter Tempest began on December 12, with Manstein sending Hoth’s panzer divisions to smash through a line held by infantry divisions from General N.I. Trufanov’s Fifty-first Army. The weather in southern Russia was still fairly good, as the usually harsh winter had not yet set in. Manstein used the weather to good effect, concentrating air attacks from his meager Luftwaffe support on key Soviet positions.
Hitler had insisted on holding back the 17th Panzer Division, but the 6th and 23rd Panzer divisions made good progress, catching the Soviets by surprise. Soviet units were forced to retreat to the northern bank of the Askai River, where they were ordered to hold at all costs. Yeremenko sent off a series of worried communiqués to Stalin, asking for assistance. His main concern was that the panzer spearheads would penetrate the rear areas of General Fedor I. Tolbukhin’s Fifty-seventh Army, which occupied the southwest sector of the Stalingrad pocket, and that Paulus would then launch a breakout attempt of his own to meet the advancing German armor.
Stalin replied in no uncertain terms. The panzers must be stopped. He told Yeremenko that the Second Guards Army was on its way but, until it arrived, every available unit was to be thrown before the Germans. Yeremenko used the last of his reserves, the 235th Tank Brigade and the 87th Rifle Division, as well as a tank corps from the Stalingrad sector, to try to hold the Askai line. The Germans had already succeeded in establishing fairly strong bridgeheads on the northern bank, however, and were bringing more men and equipment across every hour.
For the next five days a desperate battle was fought in the hills and valleys between the Askai and Mishkova rivers. The seesaw affair broke down into individual unit combat actions. Soviet infantry companies, supported by dug-in T-34 tanks, lay in wait throughout the rugged countryside, and it was up to platoons and companies of panzergrenadiers to overcome them. Massed Soviet armor also assaulted the panzer divisions as they pushed forward. On December 14, Panzer Regiment 11 of the 6th Panzer Division reported that it had fought off an attack of some 80 Soviet tanks, destroying 43 of them in the process.
The battle finally swung in favor of the Germans when Hitler released the 17th Panzer Division. Under the weight of three German armored divisions, the Soviet defenses began to buckle. By December 18, Hoth’s tanks were advancing rapidly to the Mishkova River, fighting off enemy attacks from the flanks as they drove forward.
It was the 6th Panzer that took the lead, with the 23rd Panzer covering the right flank and the 17th Panzer covering the left. In the early hours of December 20, the 6th Panzer’s armored group, commanded by Colonel Walther von Hünersdorff, reached the Mishkova near the town of Gromoslavka. There, the Germans ran into lead elements of the Second Guards Army, which had been streaming south to stop the attack.
By then, Hünersdorff’s tanks were running low on fuel and were faced by a numerically superior enemy. Nevertheless, while waiting for his supply columns to arrive, he deployed his tanks to engage the Soviets. As the panzers blazed away at the Soviet tank and anti-tank positions, the 1st Battalion/Panzergrenadier Regiment 114, commanded by a Major Hauschildt, crossed the river and secured a bridgehead after a bitter fight. Hünersdorff immediately sent reinforcements across and was able to expand the German hold to a 3-kilometer perimeter. Stalingrad was now only 48 kilometers away.
That was later seen as the high-water mark of Winter Tempest. The battered panzer divisions ran into a stone wall in the form of the Second Guards Army after they crossed the Mishkova, and there were ominous signs that the Soviets were ready to open a new attack against Army Group Hollidt and the XLVIII Panzer Corps, which held the Chir River line.
It was time for Thunderclap to commence. If the Sixth Army could begin its breakout, it would certainly take pressure off the panzer divisions at the Mishkova River and possibly allow them to continue their offensive. However, confusion and indecision were rampant in the highest ranks of the entrapped army.
On the 18th Manstein had sent an officer from his staff, a Major Eismann, into the Stalingrad pocket to discuss Thunderclap with Paulus. In his memoirs, Manstein says that he gave the order for Thunderclap to begin on the 19th and that Paulus replied that he would need four to six days to initiate the breakout. Hitler, however, still demanded that Stalingrad be held, so Paulus had to decide whom to obey, Army Group Don or the Führer.
One of Paulus’ immediate concerns was his supply of fuel for the panzers needed to spearhead Thunderclap. He had approximately 100 serviceable tanks, but his supply records show that there was only enough fuel for a 30-kilometer advance. That would put his forces 18 kilometers short of the LVII Panzer Corps’ position.
There is, however, another factor that must be taken into account in evaluating Paulus’ response. In dealing with the harsh realities of the Eastern Front, German supply personnel soon realized that if their particular unit was in better shape than another unit, excess men, equipment and supplies would soon be siphoned off to the needier formations. Therefore, the amount of fuel and other supplies on hand was often, in reality, more than was officially reported. Since supply officers at each level–company, battalion, regiment and division–hedged their estimates, the difference between reported amounts and actual amounts of supplies could be substantial. Hence, it is possible that there may really have been sufficient fuel supplies on hand to make the linkup with the LVII Panzer Corps.
Paulus used the fuel issue, coupled with Hitler’s order to hold Stalingrad at all costs, to delay a decision concerning Thunderclap. As the days slipped away, the LVII Panzer Corps’ hold on the Mishkova bridgehead became more precarious. At Stalingrad, heavy Soviet attacks forced Paulus to use some of his precious tanks to seal what could have been dangerous penetrations. In the end, Paulus decided not to initiate Thunderclap, thus sealing the fate of the Sixth Army.
Winter Tempest was over, but the agony of the Sixth Army was to continue for more than a month. Soviet pressure finally forced the LVII Panzer Corps out of the Mishkova bridgehead. By the end of December, the Soviets had driven the panzer divisions back to their original Winter Tempest jumping-off positions. That effectively negated any chance for another attempt to free the German forces at Stalingrad.
Winter had now set in, adding snow and freezing winds to the already appalling conditions in the city. Soviet advances west of the city had also caused severe hardships. The nearby airfields, which had been used as hubs for the Stalingrad supply operation, had been overrun, forcing the Luftwaffe to use installations farther west. That, in turn, cut the tonnage of materials that each aircraft could carry, since more fuel would be needed for each flight.
Losses through combat during the final days of December were severe. Karl-Heinz Niemeyer of the 94th Infantry Division wrote: ‘The 94th was so heavily decimated during December that the remaining men were combined with the remainders of the 16th and 24th Panzer Divisions to form a Kampfgruppe [battle group].’ A new problem had also appeared. German soldiers were dying at their posts for no apparent reason. Autopsies on the bodies showed that the men were dying from malnutrition and physical exhaustion.
On January 9, thousands of leaflets were dropped over the German lines. General Rokossovsky offered surrender terms to the Sixth Army, and every man inside the pocket could read for himself what kind of provisions were included in the offer. The wounded and sick would receive immediate medical attention, and all those surrendering would be well fed. Prisoners were also promised a safe return to Germany after the war. There was also a warning: Anyone who offered resistance would be killed without mercy.
Receiving no reply, Rokossovsky resumed his offensive on January 10, unleashing a 7,000-gun barrage on the German positions. A combined armored and infantry attack followed, hitting the Germans and pushing them back. Local commanders hurriedly deployed 88mm guns from the 9th Flak Division to try to blunt the attack. The big guns destroyed more than 100 tanks, but the Soviets still kept advancing.
On January 14, the Soviets captured the Pitomnik airfield, leaving Gumrak as the only serviceable airstrip available to the Sixth Army. The capture of Pitomnik effectively ended the German aerial defense over Stalingrad. Only one German aircraft managed to escape, its pilot flying westward to safety. The following day, Paulus reported to OKW that several artillery pieces had been destroyed and abandoned because they no longer had any ammunition.
As Rokossovsky’s attack continued, losses mounted on both sides. German wounded lay unattended because of a lack of medical supplies, and morale inside the pocket rapidly began to plummet. During the final week of January, the carnage reached new heights as the pocket was steadily reduced. Soviet shells rained down everywhere within the pocket, forcing the starving defenders to seek shelter in the cellars of the ruins that were once Stalingrad.
The final blow for the Sixth Army came on January 25, when Gumrak airfield was lost. With the fall of Gumrak, the Sixth Army was completely isolated, and supplies would have to be airdropped. Making matters worse, there were now more than 20,000 wounded inside the pocket, with an equal number of men too sick or malnourished to bear arms. A sense of hopelessness now pervaded the highest levels in the entrapped army.
On January 26, the Sixty-second and Twenty-first Soviet armies linked up to split the pocket in two. The XI Army Corps, under General der Infanterie Karl Strecker, anchored itself around the tractor works in the northern part of the city. A larger pocket, consisting of the Sixth Army headquarters, the VII and LI Army Corps and the XIV Panzer Corps, was centered in an area around the railroad station. Another formation, the IV Army Corps, had been destroyed earlier in the day.
By now, some commanders were taking it upon themselves to end the killing. General der Infanterie Walter von Seydlitz-Kurzbach, commander of the LI Army Corps, repeatedly asked for Paulus’ permission to surrender during the last week of January. When his pleas were refused, he ordered his troops to expend all of their ammunition, making any further resistance impossible.
January 29 saw the Soviet forces destroy the XIV Panzer Corps and further reduce the German pocket. By now, the meager rations of the Sixth Army were being given only to those capable of fighting, leaving nothing to sustain the wounded, and the command structure within the pocket had almost completely collapsed.
At midday on January 30, the newly appointed Field Marshal Paulus was taken prisoner. His sense of duty still held firm; taken before Maj. Gen. Laskin, chief of staff of the Sixty-fourth Army, Paulus surrendered only his immediate staff. He was then driven away to a lengthy captivity. He was held under house arrest in Moscow until 1953.
The commanders of the VIII Army Corps, Generals Seydlitz-Kurzbach and Walther Heitz, surrendered their commands on January 31, but Strecker’s XI Army Corps still held out in the northern pocket. Finally, Strecker’s division commanders convinced him of the futility of further resistance. On February 2, Strecker surrendered with 33,000 men. The XI Army Corps had begun the battle for Stalingrad with 80,000 troops.
On December 18, there had been approximately 249,000 officers and men inside the Stalingrad pocket. Of that number, 42,000 sick, wounded and specialists were flown out before the last airfield fell. Another 85,000 lay dead on the battlefield, leaving about 122,000 German soldiers, and their Italian and Romanian allies, to surrender. Only about 6,000 men ever returned home. The rest lay buried somewhere in the Soviet Union.
After the war, Paulus reflected on his decisions at Stalingrad: ‘What convincing and solid arguments could have been brought forward by the Commander-in-Chief of the Sixth Army for his conduct contrary to orders in the face of the enemy, especially when he had no way of knowing the eventual outcome?…Does the prospect of one’s own death or probable destruction or the capture of one’s troops relieve one of the responsibility of soldierly obedience?…Before the troops and officers of the Sixth Army as well as before the German nation I bear the responsibility that I carried out the orders to hold on issued by the supreme command until the collapse.’
This article was written by Pat McTaggart and originally appeared in the November 1997 issue of World War II magazine. For more great articles subscribe to World War II magazine today!
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1d7a03b80c776a1b1514ae4ac40ff3c4 | https://www.historynet.com/battle-of-stones-river.htm | Battle Of Stones River | Battle Of Stones River
By the afternoon of December 30, 1862, the cannoneers of Captain Warren P. Edgarton’s Battery E, 1st Ohio Artillery Regiment, were exhausted and worn down from hard marching and coping with adverse weather. Now, moving in column with their infantry support, Brigadier General Richard W. Johnson’s 2nd Division of Major General William S. Rosecrans’ Army of the Cumberland, the Buckeye gunners were on their way to cover the right flank of Brigadier General Jefferson C. Davis’ division, advancing down the Franklin Road three miles or so west of Murfreesboro, Tennessee. As soon as Davis’ column came within range, Confederate artillery began to lay in spherical case shell among the Union infantrymen. The enfilade fire quickly drove the men of the division to lie flat on the ground, and Brig. Gen. Edward N. Kirk ordered Edgarton’s battery forward, supported by a regiment of infantry.
Covered by a cedar thicket, the gunners moved to within 700 yards of the Rebels, went into battery, and blasted out six rounds of solid shot. The shellfire forced the Confederate artillery to limber up and retire, leaving behind a wrecked caisson. Edgarton’s Ohioans then turned their attention to Confederate infantry coming up in support and kept up a brisk fire until dark.
The artillerists of Battery E were tired and famished after the action, and Kirk allowed them to go into bivouac amid a grove of cedars 100 yards behind their initial position. Edgarton complained to his brigadier that he could not properly place his guns in battery at that site. Kirk assuaged the young captain’s fears by replying that his cannons would be well-protected and that the Union infantrymen would provide sufficient time to limber up the guns and go into battery in the event it proved necessary.
Orders were circulated that no fires would be permitted that Tuesday evening, and Edgarton’s Ohioans bit down on flinty hardtack and drank cold and brackish water as they sullenly watched the brigade of Union Brig. Gen. August Willich form on their flank facing due south. The battery’s horses needed water, but in the darkness, with the enemy so near, the horses would have to wait until morning. Edgarton kept the horses in harness, hobbled near the guns and caissons.
Willich’s 1st Brigade lay on the extreme right of Maj. Gen. Alexander McD. McCook’s line, refusing the Federal right flank along the intersection of the Franklin Road and Gresham Lane. Willich issued orders for the 39th and 32nd Indiana to push forward a strong line of videttes without delay. At 3 a.m. Lt. Col. Fielder A. Jones, commanding the 39th Indiana, sent a company forward to probe the woods on the regiment’s front.
On Willich’s left, in a southwest-northeast line, the brigades of McCook’s 1st, 2nd and 3rd divisions fell in, anchored on their left by the Wilkinson Turnpike, a road that ran east of the Nashville Turnpike. Major General George H. Thomas’ center wing took up the Federal line, followed by Maj. Gen. Thomas L. Crittenden’s left wing, whose own left was secured by Stones River. Altogether, Rosecrans counted nearly 60,000 effectives.
Rosecrans’ nemesis, General Braxton Bragg, had taken up residence in middle Tennessee, south of Nashville, with the intention of providing his long-suffering troops with the opportunity to forage. Bragg had come under severe censure following his ill-fated invasion of Kentucky and the climax of the campaign, the Battle of Perryville, on October 8, 1862. The ignominious retreat of his army into Tennessee after that fight, as well as the paucity of forage and victuals, had inflicted incredible suffering on the Confederate rank and file. The emaciated ragamuffins marched out of Kentucky, a trek of more than 200 miles, subsisting only on parched corn and fouled water.
To make matters worse, Brig. Gen. Samuel Jones, commanding the district, failed to procure all the rations for Bragg’s army that Bragg expected to issue upon his arrival in the region. At the same time, the Confederate government unwisely permitted Robert E. Lee’s commissary general, Lucius Northrop, to purchase existing foodstuffs for the Army of Northern Virginia in the middle Tennessee region while Bragg’s command was fighting at Perryville. The final insult, delivered by an unsympathetic Mother Nature, was a 6-inch snowfall on November 1. Near starvation and now freezing, the Army of Tennessee began to disintegrate.
The unionists were in something of a quandary as well. On October 28, President Abraham Lincoln had replaced Maj. Gen. Don Carlos Buell, commander of the Army of the Ohio, with Rosecrans. The new commander’s primary responsibility was to return the army to its nominal strength–nearly 7,000 soldiers had deserted since the bloodbath at Perryville–in order to prepare it for an advance into Tennessee.
Also troubling the Federal general were reports that Nashville, recently seized by Union troops, was about to fall. Rosecrans put his army’s three wings on the road for the Tennessee capital on November 4, with the van of the army arriving three days later. For the next two months, the opponents warily watched each other.
Once in Tennessee, Rosecrans began immediately to correct disciplinary problems within the army, improve morale and rejuvenate his cavalry. He also created a pioneer command of combat engineers whose specialized duties included constructing field fortifications, corduroying roads and building repair bridges. It was obvious that the Union army intended to stay in Tennessee for a long time.
By Christmas, Rosecrans had solved his most vexing problem, the lack of rations. A two-month supply was stored in Nashville warehouses. Meanwhile, he had received information that two of Bragg’s cavalry brigades, under redoubtable raiders Nathan Bedford Forrest and John Hunt Morgan, had been ordered west to assist other departments. With that threat removed, Rosecrans moved south at once to challenge Bragg.
On the evening of Tuesday, December 30, Rosecrans and Bragg faced each other a few miles west of Murfreesboro. Bragg had waited all day Tuesday to receive a Federal attack that never materialized. Eager to seize the initiative, he took advantage of the Union lethargy to plan an assault of his own. After much discussion between Bragg and his corps commanders, Lt. Gens. Leonidas Polk and William J. Hardee, Polk suggested that his corps strike the right wing of McCook’s corps. Without debate Bragg assented; the assault would begin at dawn on Wednesday, December 31.
Unaware of these momentous Southern plans, Captain Edgarton kept busy prior to sunrise on December 31, finding a creek to the rear of his position and ordering half the battery’s horses taken back to the stream to be watered. Colonel William H. Gibson, commanding the 49th Ohio of Willich’s brigade, recalled later that ‘at dawn of day orders were received to build fires and make coffee. A little later the colonel ran into Willich, who was riding to his left to confer with his division commander, Johnson. Willich told Gibson to support the picket line in the unlikely event the Rebels advanced.
By early morning on the 31st, some 4,400 Confederates were ready to attack. Just after 6 a.m. the order to advance was quietly given, followed a few minutes later by the command to go double-quick. Five hundred yards in the rear, Maj. Gen. Patrick Cleburne’s division anxiously awaited the order to join the advance.
Kirk’s bluecoats saw them first. Moving swiftly, Maj. Gen. John McCown’s Confederate division piled out of the fog and mist, rushing toward the Union line. Colonel J.B. Dodge, who would eventually command the bri-gade after Kirk fell, reported that the Southerners came on formed in close columns, with a front equal to the length of a battalion in line and ten or twelve ranks in depth. The Union videttes managed to fire a single volley at the rumbling mass of graycoats, then fell back in panic, sounding the alarm.
Major Alexander P. Dysart’s 34th Illinois formed a double column in front of Edgarton’s artillery park on the right of Kirk’s brigade. When the firing started, Dysart quickly got his regiment moved into line, then went looking for Willich. Along the way he ran into Kirk, who ordered him to advance the 34th and give Edgarton’s Ohioans time to go into battery.
Dysart moved his regiment into an open field just as McCown’s Rebels broke through the cedar brakes to the east. The Union regiment immediately took a volley of musketry and smartly returned a fusillade of its own. Dismayed, the major saw more Rebels than he had ever seen before–five times as many men as he had himself. In a few short minutes nearly 70 of Dysart’s men were down, either dead or wounded.
The 34th got the order to retire on Edgarton’s battery. Dysart’s stalwart lads had no sooner reached the guns than they were swept away in the inexorable tide of fleeing soldiers, losing five color-bearers at the guns.
Southern bullets were now beginning to zip and hum into the clutch of men gathered about Edgarton’s battery. Kirk was shot down while attempting to rally his infantry. Although the tide was rolling against them, the Union troops gamely tried to slow the Confederate attack. Edgarton, Lieutenant Albert G. Ransom and their men managed to get one or two of their Parrot rifles into battery and fired shells and canister at the fast-closing enemy. Colonel J.C. Burks, commanding the 11th Texas Cavalry, fell disemboweled by the Union fire.
The Ohio artillerists made the dismounted Texans pay a heavy price for assaulting the battery, but the Lone Star soldiers succeeded in overrunning the gun crews, capturing Edgarton and a number of his men and horses. Several of the Ohioans were bayoneted in the fight for their guns.
On the left of the 34th Illinois, the 29th Indiana was responding promptly to the Confederate assault. Upon hearing the initial firing, Lt. Col. David M. Dunn ordered Lieutenant S.O. Gregory’s Company C forward in support of the picket line, and the unit soon found itself being enfiladed. After firing four or five volleys while lying in a prone position, the obstinate Hoosiers joined the dash to the rear.
On the left of the brigade line, the 77th Pennsylvania faced the assault of the 1st Arkansas Rifles, under the command of Brig. Gen. Evander McNair. The Federal pickets fell back on the regiment as the Pennsylvanians fought with desperate valor. The charge of the 1st Arkansas Rifles was broken, and the attackers were driven into a nearby cornfield, where the Union soldiers then found themselves without support and all but surrounded by Confederates. Without delay they fell back.
Kirk’s 2nd Brigade had suffered 826 casualties out of 1,933 effectives. More important, the brigade’s unity had been broken and individual soldiers scattered, running for their lives. In their flight southwest, they disrupted other Federal lines.
The 32nd and the 39th Indiana, posted on the Franklin Road, were hit simultaneously by McNair’s shock troops and Kirk’s fleeing men. Lieutenant Colonel Frank Erdelmeyer was unable to get his seven companies of the 32nd Indiana into line before they were swamped. Lieutenant Colonel F.A. Jones, commanding the 39th Indiana, managed to get Company A and part of Companies D and K into line behind a fence when the enemy opened a murderous fire. Almost half of Jones’ command fell dead or wounded under the first Confederate volley. They returned fire as best they could before Jones ordered a withdrawal.
The 49th Ohio was hit in flank and rear simultaneously by the 14th and 15th Texas Cavalry (dismounted). During the melee, Willich had been captured, and Colonel Gibson of the 49th Ohio assumed command of the brigade. Lieutenant Colonel Levi H. Drake then briefly led the 49th until he fell dead while cheering on his men. The Ohioans did not even have time to grab their stacked muskets before the wild-eyed Texans swept through their campsite.
The 10th and 11th Texas Cavalry (dismounted) and the 4th Arkansas drove into the 89th Illinois. Colonel M.F. Locke, commanding the 10th Texas, had suffered at the hands of Edgarton’s guns earlier; nearly 80 soldiers of the regiment had been knocked down in the assault. As Locke’s Texans closed upon the line of Illinois troops, pushing ahead of them the fugitives from Kirk’s brigade, Lt. Col. Charles Truman Hotchkiss, commanding the 89th, ordered his men to lie down. When the Texans came within 50 yards, Hotchkiss ordered his left wing to volley, and the Union musketry swept the line of the Texans.
Still the Rebels came on, overrunning the ranks of the last regiment to offer organized resistance, the 15th Ohio. The Ohioans joined the swarm of Federals sprinting for the rear. We stood to deliver our fire and say good morning, then took to our heels and ran, Private Robert Stewart recalled.
Inadvertently, the retreating Federals hurt the Rebel advance by sowing confusion among the attackers. While they were falling back, Cleburne’s usually well-oiled division was attempting to execute the right wheel movement that Bragg had ordered. But in the melee that followed the initial breakthrough, Cleburne’s complex maneuver became unhinged. His left brigade, under Brig. Gen. St. John Liddell, found itself running to perform the movement, while the center brigade, led by Brig. Gen. Bushrod Johnson, marched at a measured parade-ground stride. On the right, Brig. Gen. Lucius Polk’s command was becoming dangerously exposed as it moved to keep up with the other brigades. Hardee solved Polk’s dilemma by bringing up Brig. Gen. S.A.M. Wood’s brigade to fill the gap.
General Davis, hearing the firing on his right, ordered back Colonel Sidney Post’s 1st Brigade, in effect refusing the division’s right flank. Post’s amalgamated force of three Illinois regiments and one Indiana regiment fell in along a lane, with the 74th and 75th Illinois, both novice regiments, posted behind a split-rail fence on the east side of the road. The two remaining regiments, the 59th Illinois and 22nd Indiana, formed on the west side of the lane, with Captain Oscar Pinney’s 5th Wisconsin Battery dropping trail in a cornfield between the two regiments. Pinney’s well-maintained Parrott rifles had the benefit of a half-mile-deep field of fire, and his gunners worked swiftly to go into battery.
Load solid shot, fire by section, on my command! Pinney shouted as he cast his gaze along the line of eager Confederate infantrymen 1,000 yards to his front. Section One, Fire! came Pinney’s command, and the roar of 12-pounder Parrott rifles thundered across the glen. Section Two, Fire! Section Three, Fire!
Pinney’s fire found the mark. The 17th Tennessee, commanded by Colonel A.S. Marks, had advanced in fine style before halting 150 yards in front of the Federals and firing a volley. In the ensuing artillery fire, Marks fell severely wounded, and command devolved upon Lt. Col. Watt Floyd. At the same time, Colonel John M. Hughes, commanding the 35th Tennessee, took a serious head wound and was carried to the rear. His replacement, Lt. Col. Samuel Davis, observed later that I never saw in any battle a more regular and constant fire.
Captain Hendrick E. Paine, commanding the 59th Illinois, which was posted west of Pinney’s guns, ordered his men to fire, and lie down and load. Bushrod Johnson, seeing the damage being inflicted on his Confederates, sent a message to Captain Putnam Darden of the Jefferson Flying Artillery to bring up his guns. I immediately moved by the left flank, Darden reported, to an elevated position, and came into battery to the right under a murderous fire of canister, from one of the enemy’s batteries, posted about 400 yards distant.
Both Union and Confederate brigades became locked in battle. Sam Davis of the 25th Tennessee reported, Although a great many of our men were killed and wounded at this place, the line was not confused, and the men continued to fire without noticing those killed or wounded. Paine commented, I do not know how long we remained in that position, but my men poured a deadly and destructive fire upon the enemy.
Bushrod Johnson’s Tennessee regiments paid special attention to Pinney’s Parrott guns, and men and horses began to fall to the Southern musketry. For 30 minutes, the forces fired on one another at a distance of 75 yards. Casualties began to rise. Pinney fell beside his guns–he and many of his cohorts would be left on the field. Post ordered the guns limbered up and withdrawn, but 18 of the battery horses were down, leaving two badly shot-up beasts to pull one of the Parrott rifles. The men of the 59th Illinois ran to the guns, tied ropes to them and began to pull them out of the fray. They got off five of the guns under a deadly fire.
Four hundred yards northwest of Post’s position, Colonel Philemon Baldwin, commanding the 3rd Bri-gade of Richard Johnson’s 2nd Division, had no sooner prepared for the Confederate assault than the enemy, in immense masses, appeared in my front at short range, their left extending far beyond the extreme right of my line. Baldwin’s regiments took up a truncated line, with the 6th Indiana and 1st Ohio making up the front and a section of guns from the 5th Indiana placed in advance. Two additional sections went into battery in a cornfield to the rear of the Ohioans. The 5th Kentucky (Union) formed the second line, with the 93rd Ohio acting as brigade reserve.
Major Joab A. Stafford, commanding the 1st Ohio, reported that at a range of 150 yards he opened fire on the Confederates. First Lieutenant Henry Rankin, commanding the two 12-pounders to the left of the 1st Ohio, opened with canister on the butternut columns, while the two other sections of Captain Peter Simonson’s 5th Indiana Battery opened with case shell.
Facing the ferocious Federal gunfire, the attacking Southerners threw themselves down in order to avoid the deadly blasts. Battle smoke swirled about the cornfields, obscuring the ranks of both sides. Remnants of Willich’s and Kirk’s brigades, broken and dispirited, halted long enough to show the flag, fire a volley, then run again, with the Confederates in battle-crazed pursuit.
The Union infantry along Baldwin’s line began to break for the rear. Simonson, however, switched his battery to canister, obliqued his Parrott rifles, lowered his barrels to zero degrees and fired. Several dismounted Rebel cavalrymen were killed or wounded. A retaliatory volley from the Arkansans, however, put down 24 of the Union cannoneers killed or wounded. With great difficulty and valor, the shredded remnants of the 5th Indiana Battery managed to drag off all but two of their pieces with the help of some infantrymen.
To the right of Baldwin’s collapsing line, the Confederate brigades of Wood and Polk plowed into the cedar brakes, confident that their way was unobstructed. Within minutes both units had been bushwhacked. Union regiments of Colonel William Carlin’s 2nd Brigade caught the unsuspecting Rebels in motion and volleyed into their massed lines. In just another of the day’s hurried maneuvers, Polk right wheeled his bri-gade, called up one 12-pounder from the Helena Battery, and enfiladed Carlin’s line.
Carlin tried to withdraw his brigade in an orderly manner, but both he and his mount were hit by rifle fire and knocked down. Colonel Hans Heg, commanding the 15th Wisconsin, maneuvered his regiment where it could best cover the retreat of the remaining troops and slowed down the Confederate advance long enough to get out the infantry and the brigade’s artillery. The hard-fighting 15th Wisconsin was the last out to safety.
By now, two of McCook’s Union divisions had been broken and scattered. Only one officer stood to stem the Confederate tide: the irascible, bandy-legged Ohioan, Brig. Gen. Phil Sheridan.
Unlike the two Federal divisions farther south, Sheridan had his soldiers alert and ready prior to the dawn attack. At this time the enemy, who had made an attack on the extreme right of our wing against Johnson and also on Davis’ front, had been successful, and the two divisions on my right were retiring in great confusion, he reported. Sheridan’s 3rd Division made a valorous stand along the Wilkinson Pike, slowing down the Confederate attack long enough for Rosecrans to cobble together a second line.
The following day, January 1, 1863, both sides paused to catch their breath and regain some of their strength, and no major fighting took place. On the 2nd, though, the tempestuous battle resumed when Bragg commanded Maj. Gen. John C. Breckinridge’s division to assail the Union left. Massed Union artillery smashed this effort, and it was the Confederates’ turn to fall back in gory confusion. Bragg retreated from the area on January 3, and Rosecrans claimed victory–an unlikely outcome considering the catastrophe his forces had suffered on December 31. Overall, both sides lost more than 18,700 killed or wounded in the midwinter battle.
For the unfortunate Captain Edgarton and his gunners, Stones River held no moments of glory. Captured, discredited and dishonored, Edgarton would be exchanged a few months later and then be called upon to report why he had sent half his horses to be watered on the morning of the fateful assault. Laying much of the responsibility for the battery’s terrible location on his slain brigadier, Edward Kirk, Edgarton requested, As I have been charged with grave errors on the occasion of the battle, I respectfully request that I may be ordered before a court of inquiry, that my conduct may be investigated.
Such an investigation was never completed, but a note was made of Edgarton’s performance at Stones River and placed in the official records: Edgarton, captain…Company E, 1st Ohio Artillery…was guilty of a grave error in taking even a part of his battery horses to water at an unseasonable hour, and thereby losing his guns. Edgarton’s military career was over, but at least he had his life–unlike many soldiers who were there during the rout of the Union right that cold December morning in 1862.
This article was written by Robert Cheeks and originally appeared in the September 1999 issue of America’s Civil War magazine. For more great articles be sure to subscribe to America’s Civil War magazine today!
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45b5bba3e3b8a78d9fdc1a7c1cd587bb | https://www.historynet.com/battle-of-the-hedgerows.htm | Battle of the Hedgerows | Battle of the Hedgerows
The city of St. Lô was the U.S. Army’s key to breaking out of Normandy into the French hinterland.
On the morning of July 11, 1944, the 116th Regiment, 29th Infantry Division, advanced toward Martinville Ridge, two miles east of St. Lô. The German defenders were deployed in ideal positions along a sunken road fortified with barbwire and mines. The “Stonewallers” of the 116th—a Virginia National Guard regiment that traced its heritage to Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson’s command in 1861—attacked at 0600 hours, preceded by a furious one-hour artillery barrage. As the 116th moved toward the hedgerows, dozens of men were mowed down by enemy fire. Captain Charles Cawthon, 2nd Battalion executive officer, recalled the horror: “A pall of smoke was over the fields, holding in it the sweet, sickening stench of high explosives, which we had come to associate with death. The attacking riflemen, visibly shrunk in numbers, crouched behind the farthermost hedgerow while volumes of artillery, mortar, tank and machine gun fire flailed the fields beyond.”
By the time the Stonewallers finally penetrated the first line of defense, the rifle companies, normally numbering 150 to 180, had been reduced to about 60 men apiece. For the American GIs, this bloody struggle became an all too familiar scene throughout their advance on St. Lô— an operation that came to be known as the “battle of the hedgerows.”
By the end of June 1944, the U.S. First Army had successfully established a beachhead on the Normandy coast and captured the port of Cherbourg. Supplies and reinforcements were rapidly building up for a powerful offensive, designed to break out of the Normandy pocket. One of the first objectives was to capture the crossroads town of St. Lô and then use that location as a jumping-off point for a major breakout into the heartland of France. Taking the city, however involved a grueling struggle for gains—often measured in terms of a few hundred yards—through a succession of hedgerows against a bitterly determined enemy.
St. Lô was inhabited by approximately 12,000 people and located on the high ground above the Vire River. The older sections of town dotted the river bluffs, while the newer parts of the city spread across the Vire Valley and up the slopes of several encompassing hills, offering a commanding view of the city and surrounding countryside. Although Allied bombers had reduced the city to a pile of rubble, it still had significant military value. Branching out from St. Lô were a series of eight major roads and a rail line. On the western edge of town was an important bridge that spanned the Vire River.
The approaches to St. Lô were swarming with strongpoints, and a powerful occupation force, primarily survivors of the 352nd Infantry Division, which had been fighting the Americans since the first landings at Omaha Beach, was entrenched in the city and surrounding hills. As if that was not enough, the First Army would have to operate in terrain characterized by swampy fields, steep wooded hills and an extensive maze of hedgerows.
Some of the best German defenses in Normandy were not built by Field Marshal Erwin Rommel but by farmers more than 1,000 years before the battle. The terrain, locally called the bocage, consisted of small, irregularly shaped fields enclosed by ancient overgrown hedges. Grown primarily to keep cattle in and to mark boundaries, these massive lines of shrubbery grew up to 15 feet high, limiting visibility to one field at a time, and were extremely dense obstacles, even for tanks. They formed thousands of square miles of tough terrain connected by a network of sunken roads. Often the brush connected overhead, trapping the GIs inside a tunnel of vegetation. First Army commander Lt. Gen. Omar N. Bradley recalled, “It was the damndest country I’ve ever seen.”
Using the natural camouflage and concealment of the hedgerows, the Germans dispersed small, heavily armed antipersonnel and antitank units that dug in. The primary weapon of defense was the MG42 light machine gun, supported by artillery and mortar fire. At the corners of each field the Germans emplaced heavy machine guns to pin down attacking infantrymen in the open. Light machine guns were positioned to the front and flanks, to inflict casualties on advancing GIs seeking cover and concealment.
Bradley’s plan to seize St. Lô called for a broad front offensive designed to prevent the Germans from concentrating their forces. Major General Troy Middleton’s VIII Corps would capture the city of Coutances in the west, while Maj. Gen. Charles H. Corlett’s XIX Corps joined forces with the V and VII corps in an advance on St. Lô.
On July 3, the VIII Corps moved out from its jumping-off point toward Coutances. The Germans—taking full advantage of the high ground—employed 88mm antitank guns, tanks and machine guns to stop the American advance cold. General Dietrich von Choltitz’s LXXXIV Corps established a formidable line of defense near the town of La Haye du Puit, which dominated the approaches to Coutances. By early evening, Middleton’s corps had suffered more than 1,000 casualties with little ground gained. By nightfall on July 8, the VIII Corps had suffered an additional 3,000 casualties—nearly 40 percent of its available riflemen—and was still bogged down. At that point, Bradley was beginning to have second thoughts about his decision to launch the drive toward Coutances.
On July 4, Bradley shifted his focus to St. Lô. The first prong of the advance was led by the VII Corps commander, Maj. Gen. J. Lawton “Lightning Joe” Collins, and the men of 4th, 9th and 83rd Infantry divisions. However, swampy terrain and narrow roads forced Collins to commit only one division at a time. The inexperienced 83rd Division, commanded by Maj. Gen. Robert C. Macon, led the attack, followed by the 4th and 9th divisions, respectively. The objective was to reach the Périers–St. Lô highway; from there, the corps could spread out and advance southwest toward St. Lô.
The attack was immediately met with German artillery and machine gun fire from Major Friedrich von der Heydte’s battle-hardened 6th Fallschirmjäger (paratroop) Regiment and elements of the 17th SS Panzergrenadier Division. The results were devastating. On the first day of operations, the 83rd lost 1,400 men for a meager 200-yard gain. The swampy hedgerow terrain was hardly conducive to offensive action, and rain and cloud cover negated the possibility of any Allied air support.
On July 5, the battle recommenced along the Carentan-Périers road, but the 83rd Division’s attack units barely advanced a mile up the road at a cost of 750 casualties. In his book The Normandy Campaign, Victor Brooks described the Americans’ frustration: “Communication breakdowns, wrong designation of map locations, and less than inspired leadership turned what had already been an agonizingly slow advance into a glacial crawl.”
In an attempt to break the bloody stalemate, Collins ordered the more experienced 4th Infantry Division to the front line. The veteran “Ivy Division” accomplished little, however, and by July 7 the First Army had advanced less than 2l⁄2 miles.
As the VII and VIII corps were slugging it out against a determined enemy, General Corlett’s XIX Corps (the 29th, 30th and 35th Infantry divisions) began its offensive against Kampfgruppe (battle group) Heinze, the last force standing between them and St. Lô. The mission was to cross the Vire River and Taute-Vire Canal, then advance south toward St. Jean de Daye, a crossroads town fronting St. Lô.
The Vire was a rapid stream that was 10 feet deep and 60 feet wide with high, steep banks while the Taute-Vire Canal was 5 feet deep and 20 feet across, with gently sloping banks. The plan called for a two-pronged attack on St. Jean de Daye, located three miles from both the river and the canal. In order to achieve the objective, Maj. Gen. Leland S. Hobbs, commanding officer of the 30th Division, needed to get his men across both water barriers.
At 0300 hours on July 7, 32 assault boats from the 30th Division entered the river, preceded by a bombardment by eight field artillery battalions. As waves of GIs pushed across the Vire, German riflemen, machine-gunners and mortar crews opened up from the opposite banks. The much diminished enemy—stretched thin to defend a massive front—was unsuccessful against the larger American force and was forced to pull back to St. Lô. By nightfall, the capture of St. Jean was complete.
While the men of the 30th Division prepared for a thrust on St. Lô, the German high command was finalizing plans for a major counterattack. General Paul Hausser, commander of the German Seventh Army, responded to the American crossing of the Vire by ordering troops from the St. Lô garrison to temporarily block the XIX Corps advance until reinforcements arrived from Caen. This tactic was a temporary solution until Hausser could meet with the Army Group B commander, Rommel, to discuss strategy. Mindful of the critical situation facing him, Rommel decided to pull the tough Panzer Lehr Division out of Caen and bring it west to defend St. Lô. He also deployed the 2nd SS Panzer Division in the Vire-Taute region to slow down Hobbs’ advance until Panzer Lehr arrived on the battlefield. The German high command felt that if St. Lô capitulated, the whole front line might collapse.
To prevent Rommel from shifting his men over to the St. Lô sector, Bradley ordered the First Army to “attack all along the front.” Middleton’s VIII Corps—reinforced by the newly arrived 8th Infantry Division—pressed that attack on the right flank, and on July 9 La Haye du Puits finally fell. Meanwhile, Collins’ VII Corps renewed the attack along the Carentan-Périers road, but gained little ground at heavy cost. Major General Raymond Barton’s 4th Infantry Division lost 2,300 men in 10 days of fighting. The 83rd Division didn’t fare much better, losing 5,000 men in the same time span. Barton summed up the situation: “The Germans are staying in there just by the guts of their soldiers. We outnumber them 10 to 1 in infantry, 50 to 1 in artillery, and by an infinite number in the air.”
Aided by the cover of darkness and inclement weather, Lt. Gen. Fritz Bayerlein, the wily commander of the superb Panzer Lehr Division, was able to redeploy most of his vehicles to the final assembly area. By the evening of July 10, the Panzer Lehr and 2nd SS Panzer divisions sat poised for a dawn attack against General Hobbs’ 30th Division. Allied intelligence caught wind of the German counterattack, however, and a deadly game of chess ensued as Bradley ordered elements of the 9th Infantry and 3rd Armored divisions into position to counter Rommel’s move.
In the early morning hours of July 11, Bayerlein’s Panzer Lehr Division, taking advantage of poor weather conditions, delivered a staggering blow to the Americans. The 902nd Panzergrenadier Regiment, supported by 20 tanks, attacked advance units of the U.S. 30th Division, while the 901st Panzergrenadier Regiment, supported by a dozen Panzerkampfwagen Mark V Panthers, slammed into elements of the 9th Division.
At the onset, the Panzergrenadiers gained the upper hand in the growing slugfest. Bayerlein’s powerful forces advanced behind the American lines and overran two battalion command posts, capturing several units of GIs assigned to guard the Vire Canal. By 0630, the Panzer Lehr Division had momentarily blocked the American offensive. Nevertheless, an endless supply of M4 Sherman tanks from the 3rd Armored Division—combined with the efforts of the 30th and 9th Infantry divisions—began to weaken the German attack. American GIs opened up with deadly crossfire from positions in the bocage, while the 899th Tank Destroyer Battalion challenged the enemy panzers. In the afternoon, the cloud cover cleared, and American fighter-bombers raced across the battlefield, pounding the remaining tanks. By nightfall, Bayerlein had paid for temporarily containing the First Army’s breakthrough with the loss of 500 to 700 men, including several battalion commanders, and 32 tanks.
Two years later, while interrogated as a U.S. Army prisoner of war, Bayerlein recalled that Panzer Lehr lost 50 percent of its attacking force—a low estimate in comparison to American claims. Bayerlein attributed the carnage to the exhaustion of his men prior to battle and the difficulty of operating Panthers in the confined bocage. The interrogation report stated that “his armor had to fight at maximum ranges of 200 yards because hedges concealed everything farther away.” In hindsight, light tanks could have performed better in the difficult hedgerow terrain, but Bayerlein did not bring them because his intelligence sources had informed him the area was suitable for tank operations. Consequently, the Panzer Lehr was severely crippled by the combined onslaughts of the U.S. 9th and 30th divisions, eliminating the possibility of a large-scale counterattack west of the Vire.
On the morning of July 11— as the Panzer Lehr Division was making its thrust behind the American lines—the First Army launched simultaneous attacks in an effort to close in on St. Lô. The 2nd Infantry Division (V Corps) attacked Hill 192, a promontory overlooking the St. Lô–Bayeux road east of the city. Defending that dominating observation post was a single battalion from Lt. Gen. Eugen Meindl’s II Parachute Corps. At 0600 the 2nd Division began its assault, overwhelming stubborn resistance to secure Hill 192 by noon. When the dust settled, the 2nd Division’s artillery alone had fired 20,000 rounds on the German position.
Meanwhile, Maj. Gen. Charles H. Gerhardt, commander of the 29th Infantry Division (XIX Corps), began his attack in conjunction with the 2nd Division’s assault on Hill 192. That morning the 29th Division’s 116th Regiment advanced toward Martinville Ridge, located on the eastern outskirts of St. Lô. Paratroopers of the German 3rd Fallschirmjäger Division—recently arrived to reinforce the 352nd Division—waited patiently in the hedgerows for the Stonewall Brigade. As the Americans unknowingly entered the enemy kill zone, dozens of them were cut down by explosions and machine gun fire.
“My squad, as far as I remember, was really butchered up,” recalled Private John Robertson of Company F. “Some of us were blown forward, some backward. It was a big mess. When I regained my senses, I got up and started limping back. As I was slopping along thinking about why my shoe was full of water, I felt my leg and my hand went all the way to the bone. It was blood that I was slopping in.”
Throughout the remainder of the day, Gerhardt doggedly ordered his battalion and regimental commanders to continually assault the German defensive positions, regardless of casualties. After several attempts, the 116th finally broke through. That night, following a 3,000- yard advance, the weary Stonewallers dug in.
Many soldiers from the 29th “Blue and Gray” Division became casualties because Gerhardt tried to push through positions deemed untenable. “Uncle Charlie,” as he was known to the men of the 29th, was an uncompromising commander whose enthusiasm often exceeded his judgment. He either relieved or threatened to relieve commanding officers who were unwilling to attack because of high casualty rates.
The next day, July 12, Gerhardt ordered the 116th and 175th regiments to push along Martinville Ridge and bypass Hill 122, another key position located north of St. Lô. This heavily defended summit rose more than 300 feet above sea level and provided the Germans with excellent observation for control of mortar and artillery fire. Gerhardt’s decision would prove costly. As the men of the 29th Division made their way along the ridge, German observers on the high ground radioed artillery batteries atop Hill 122. Suddenly, a German artillery barrage pounded Gerhardt’s men as they advanced toward Martinville. By nightfall, the 29th Division had suffered more than 1,000 casualties with little appreciable gain.
At that point, Gerhardt realized that St. Lô could not be captured without first taking Hill 122, so he ordered his division, including clerks, cooks, drivers and other rear-echelon personnel, to fix bayonets and prepare to advance on the city. Some rifle companies were critically understrength, and at least one platoon was down to its last three men. Cynical whispers began spreading among the troops that “Gerhardt has a division in the field, a division in the hospital and a division in the cemetery.” Uncle Charlie did little to silence the sarcasm when he told his commanders to “expend the whole battalion if necessary as long as they capture St. Lô.”
Gerhardt planned a full-scale attack all across the 29th Division front—to commence on July 13—with the main force concentrating on Martinville Ridge. The 2nd and 3rd battalions of the 175th Infantry, supported by two companies of the 747th Tank Battalion, would lead the advance southwest, pass through the 116th and attack due west along the Bayeux highway into St. Lô. Prior to the attack, U.S. Army Air Forces fighter-bombers would soften up the German defenses.
Although the plan was militarily sound, it began to unravel from the onset. First, the airstrike was called off because of poor weather. Next, two companies from 747th Tank Battalion were unable to support the attack because of ammunition and fuel shortages. And last, communication problems between the 2nd and 3rd battalions bogged down the advance, resulting in a gain of a few hundred yards at a cost of 152 casualties.
Fortunately for the Blue and Gray, there were indications that the fighting was also taking its toll on the Germans. American artillery, called down to support troop movements, had apparently caught the Germans by surprise. The road was littered for miles with dead soldiers, dead horses and shattered enemy equipment. The foul smell of burnt flesh was everywhere.
While the 29th Division continued its advance on St. Lô, corps commander Charles Corlett ordered the 35th Infantry Division to capture Hill 122. On July 15, the 35th Division’s 134th Infantry Regiment reached the hill’s crest. The next day, the 35th Division secured the objective, just 3,000 yards north of the city.
With Hill 122 firmly in American hands, Gerhardt ordered all nine of his rifle battalions to advance on St. Lô. “This is a critical time,” he said. “We’re going to throw the book at them.” Major Thomas Howie, newly appointed to command the 3rd Battalion, 116th Infantry, was ordered to attack La Madeleine, where troops of the 2nd Battalion had been cut off, and then make a thrust directly into the city. Prior to the pre-dawn July 17 attack, Howie told his men “to keep going no matter what.” Only two men per platoon were allowed to fire their rifles; the others were ordered to use bayonets and hand grenades. The idea was to achieve total surprise.
The 3rd Battalion jumped off before sunrise and quickly broke through the German line, reaching La Madeleine at first light. The highway into the city was now open. Howie called his company commanders together to discuss the situation. “We had just finished the meeting,” Captain William Puntenney, Howie’s executive officer, recalled. “The COs had just been dismissed, and before they could get back to their companies, the Germans began dropping a mortar barrage around our ears. Before taking cover in one of our foxholes, Major Howie turned to take one last look to make sure all his men had their heads down. Without warning, one of the shells hit a few yards away. A fragment struck the major in the back and pierced his lung. ‘My God I’m hit,’ he murmured, and I saw he was bleeding at the mouth. As he fell, I caught him. He was dead in two minutes.”
Captain Puntenney immediately took command of the battalion and called in artillery and airstrikes on the German positions. As the Blue and Gray reached the outskirts of St. Lô, they were met with heavy German machine gun fire from positions inside a cemetery. In the battle that ensued, American riflemen and tankers exchanged fire with German machine guns and 88s through a labyrinth of gravestones. Because of overwhelming fire superiority, the tide of the battle eventually turned in favor of the Americans, and the Germans pulled out.
The battle for the city turned each block into a miniature battlefield. Positioned in two- and three-story buildings, German snipers fired from the windows, while others tried to make last stands behind piles of rubble. On July 18, General Meindl began to see the writing on the wall and requested permission to evacuate the city. Mindful that his defenses were too weak to hold the city, theater commander Paul Hausser permitted Meindl to withdraw his men southward, save for a delaying force to hold off the Americans as long as possible. The next morning, after 18 days of hedgerow fighting, St. Lô finally fell.
Bradley had secured his jumping-off point for a major breakout offensive into the French heartland, but the victory had not come cheap, costing more than 15,000 American casualties.
Daniel R. Champagne is a history teacher and the author of Dogface Soldiers: The Story of B Company, 15th Regiment, 3rd Infantry Division. For further reading, try Beyond the Beachhead, by Joe Balkoski.
Originally published in the April 2006 issue of Military History. To subscribe, click here.
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06bac0c590583419de06fed278b3e90b | https://www.historynet.com/beech-starship-little-bighorn-with-wings.htm | Beech Starship: ‘Little Bighorn With Wings’ | Beech Starship: ‘Little Bighorn With Wings’
Expectations were high when Burt Rutan teamed up with Beech to produce the Starship business aircraft, but the result was a rare failure for the innovative designer.
In 1955 the Beech Aircraft Company considered marketing the French Morane-Saulnier MS.760 Paris jet in the United States. On learning that it was necessary to step over a side rail in order to enter the aircraft, president and chairwoman Olive Ann Beech, whose relationship to the company founded by her late husband resembled that of a queen to her subjects, decreed that there were to be no Beech aircraft that a lady could not enter with modesty and dignity. Since at the time the Paris was the only jet being offered to private owners, her ukase became known as the “no jets” rule.
In consequence of the no jets rule, Beech Aircraft Corporation went on to become the dominant manufacturer of twin turboprops for business and personal use. Its King Air, which went on the market in the same year as the first Learjets, accounted for about half of all twin-turboprop sales.
By 1979, however, the King Air, then 15 years old, was getting long in the tooth, and Cessna’s light Citation jet was nibbling at its sales. Beech engineers began to contemplate a more modern, higher-performance twin turboprop. The requirement was straightforward: an eight-passenger turboprop that would weigh less than 12,500 pounds—to keep it in a desirable FAA certification category—and do 350 knots, or about 400 mph. The study had not gone far, however, when Mrs. Beech sold the company to defense conglomerate Raytheon.
During the management transition that followed, the design study, called NGBA for Next Generation Business Aircraft, languished. Work on what would become the Beech Starship did not resume until 1981.
But the story of the Starship really began years earlier, and far from Beech’s Wichita headquarters, in a ramshackle ex-Army barracks at Mojave Airport in the southern California desert. There, an unknown aeronautical engineer named Elbert “Burt” Rutan built a two-seat airplane that he called the VariEze. It was a dramatic-looking thing, with raked fins at the tips of slender swept wings and a smaller, straight horizontal surface at the front of a narrow fuselage in which two people sat in tandem. Behind them, a modified Volkswagen engine drove a little wooden propeller. The VariEze was sleek and fast, and when it flew overhead you felt that you were seeing the future.
Rutan sold plans for the VariEze and for a slightly larger successor, the Long-EZ, to amateur builders. For a time they were the best-selling homebuilt types on the market, and they triggered a “canard revolution” during which a good many new designs from all over the world used the same sweptwing, tail-forward, pusher-propeller formula. Rutan, who did not shy away from publicity, became a familiar character in the aviation press, usually introduced as “canard guru Burt Rutan.”
Beech engineers were aware of Rutan’s designs, and one of the configurations discussed for the NGBA was a canard. Pusher propellers mounted at the trailing edge of the swept wing, well behind the cabin, seemed to promise a reduction in cabin noise. The engineers also apparently believed that eliminating the tail cone might yield an airplane with less surface area. Since much of an airplane’s drag is due to the friction of air against its skin, reducing surface area is one avenue to increased performance.
In mid-1982, Beech let a contract to the Rutan Aircraft Factory for a feasibility study and configuration proposals for the NGBA. Rutan delivered at least two proposals. One was a canard very similar in appearance to the VariEze, another a three-surface airplane similar to the Piaggio Avanti, which was under development in Italy at the time and to which the Starship would later be unfavorably compared.
Burt Rutan (left) and Beech president and CEO Linden Blue (right, shown in 1980 while CEO of Lear Fan Ltd.) partnered in 1982 to develop the Starship. (Left: Paul Harris/Getty Images; Right: Lear Fan Ltd.)
In the meantime, Raytheon had hired Linden Blue, a businessman with ample aeronautical experience, as president and CEO of Beech. Before his hiring had been publicly announced, Blue called Rutan, whom he knew, and asked him about the NGBA, which Rutan had been instructed to keep in extreme secrecy.
“How do I know you’re really with Beech?” Rutan coyly replied.
Shortly afterward, Blue called a meeting that has come to be known as the “beauty pageant.” Beech engineers expected the Rutan proposals to be one part of a wide-ranging discussion, but it didn’t turn out that way. Beech’s new president pounced on the VariEze-like design, and before the meeting ended he signed a contract for a second phase that required Rutan’s newly formed company, Scaled Composites, to deliver an 85-percent-scale flying prototype for aerodynamic evaluation.
A week after the beauty pageant, Blue announced the schedule for the program: The scaled-down proof of concept (POC) airplane, together with a full-scale fuselage mockup, would be presented at the National Business Aviation Association (NBAA) convention in Dallas in the summer of 1984. In the meantime, design work would proceed on the full-scale airplane, with a two-year target for first flight. Not only that: Blue wanted it to have every feature that future airplanes were expected to have, including a three-phase electrical system, carbon composite structure and “glass panel” instruments and avionics. “With all the improvements coming, along with Moore’s Law,” he later said, “I felt we needed to go with the latest and greatest.” (Moore’s Law states that computer processing speeds double every two years.)
Beech engineers, habitually conservative and familiar with the inevitable pitfalls and delays, were aghast. Normally, they would have started with a wind tunnel model. They would not have bothered with a scaled-down POC—that was a novel approach, pioneered by Rutan—but if there was going to be a POC they would expect its design to await wind tunnel results, and once it was built they would carefully evaluate it before proceeding with the final article. As it turned out, Beech engineers did get their wind tunnel model, but Blue’s breakneck timetable telescoped the development process so that what would logically have been successive phases of design and testing instead overlapped one another.
But the Beech team’s feelings were not altogether negative. As project engineer Bill Brown recalled, “In Beech engineering we saw the whole Starship thing as a chance to get something going, as opposed to the usual study it to death and never get a go-ahead.”
Blue had one beef with the design that he had ostensibly chosen on the basis of its looks. Like the VariEze, it had a swept wing but an unswept foreplane. Blue thought the foreplane ought to be swept as well. But sweep would create an aerodynamic problem, compromising the foreplane’s ability to balance the airplane when its flaps were extended for landing.
In the summer of 1983, during the annual Experimental Aircraft Association convention, Rutan, Scaled aeronautical engineer Doug Shane and freelance aerodynamicist John Roncz, who had designed airfoil sections for previous Rutan projects, got together over a pitcher of beer at Robbins Restaurant in Oshkosh to discuss the problem. Rutan sketched two solutions on a napkin. In one, the entire foreplane would move fore and aft on rails to balance the flaps. The other was more daring and more elegant: a variable-geometry foreplane that would cruise with jet-like sweepback, but swing forward as the flaps went down for landing. The variable-sweep solution won out, and so, at the expense of some increased weight, cost and complexity, Linden Blue’s aesthetic difficulty with the unswept foreplane was resolved.
In 1983 during the EAA fly-in, Rutan sketched two canard configurations on a napkin; the variable-geometry foreplane (at top) won out. (John Roncz via Peter Garrison)
Beech, in consultation with Rutan and Roncz, developed the loft lines, which define the precise size and shape of the airplane, and delivered them to Rutan late in 1983. The POC was by far the largest airplane Rutan’s shop had ever built using the foam-and-fiberglass construction techniques that he had developed for his homebuilts, but it rapidly took shape. Shortly before its first flight, however, word came from Beech that wind tunnel analysis had shown that it would not get off the ground. At that time, the Rutan Aircraft Factory was running crude aerodynamics software on an Apple II; Beech had much more sophisticated resources.
“Holy s—!” Rutan recalls thinking. “They’re probably right!”
Rutan’s brother Dick, a former F-100 jock and now test pilot, wasn’t buying it. “Let’s fly it,” he said. And they did. It flew beautifully. The ominous Beech analysis turned out to have suffered from a GIGO error—“garbage in, garbage out”—arising from the misapplication of methods that had been developed for airplanes whose flying surfaces were arranged in the conventional way.
As planned, the POC swooped into the NBAA convention in Dallas in 1984, creating the expected sensation. It brought tears to some eyes. To think that this beautiful vision of the future had come from stodgy, conservative Beech, of all places!
As flight tests with the POC proceeded, the full-scale article was being engineered and tooled. Despite their identical shape, they were entirely different airplanes. The carbon-fiber structure, a pioneering choice that was expected to result in a 15 percent weight savings, had to be designed, tested and certified by the FAA, which had no experience with composite structures. Neither did Beech.
Linden Blue, on the other hand, did have such experience. He had been involved with the Lear Fan, a novel design with two turbines buried in the aft fuselage and geared to a single pusher propeller. The Lear Fan, he would later say, was really a “black metal” airplane; it was built using construction techniques appropriate to aluminum, including rivets, but out of parts made of carbon-epoxy composite. Proper composite construction required a fresh start. Blue was convinced that the right approach for building the fuselage, at the very least, was filament winding, a highly automated but as yet untried approach in which epoxy-soaked carbon fibers are wrapped around a rotating fuselage-shaped mold by a computer-controlled moving spool. Beech engineers, knowing that they were already way out on a limb building a large composite airplane, preferred a simpler and more intuitive method, in which sheets of carbon cloth, pre-impregnated with epoxy, were cut to shape and laid down in molds, then baked under a partial vacuum. The engineers won, and Blue left after a short two-year tenure. “I was unwilling to preside over an airplane that was going to be fundamentally flawed,” he said.
Blue’s legacy, however, remained. As Max Bleck, who became president of Beech in 1987, would later relate, the schedule for certification by the end of 1985 had been exceedingly optimistic. Repeated schedule slippages, extending over years, created the widespread impression of a failing project.
Not that the Starship didn’t have plenty of problems of its own.
The POC uncovered a major aerodynamic issue: If the airplane slowed excessively with the canard in its swept position, as might happen when cruising at very high altitude, the main wing would stall and the nose would pitch up. To the pilot, it would appear to be in level flight, but perplexingly descending at 6,000 feet per minute. The wing could be unstalled by extending the flaps and swinging the foreplane forward—the two actions were interconnected—but the situation was unacceptable in a production airplane.
“Burt had a different safety philosophy than the FAA,” explained Bill Brown. “Burt would restrict the airplane to avoid any potential scenarios; the FAA requires no unsafe scenarios.” Various tricks to prevent the pitch-up were tried. One approach would have been to increase the “washout,” or twist, of the wing, so that its outer panels would remain unstalled. Since they were farther aft, this would result in the airplane pitching down rather than up—the desired behavior. But the wing could not be changed, because, under the compressed schedule, the master plugs—huge aluminum castings machined to the proper shape—had already been made.
Finally, small vertical blades below the leading edge, dubbed “vortilons,” did the trick on the POC. But the solution did not work on the first full-scale prototype, which was ready to fly early in 1986. It was equipped with an ejection seat, just in case. Running out of aerodynamic tricks, engineers were finally obliged to resort to the traditional solution for bad low-speed behavior: an electromechanical “stick pusher” that would sense the impending stall and push the control stick forward, overpowering the pilot.
Stalling behavior was not the only respect in which the full-scale airplane failed to duplicate the characteristics of the POC. It was also much slower—50 knots shy of the predicted airspeed. This was mysterious: It was the same shape, just bigger, and ought to have had about the same drag coefficient.
The usual suspect in such cases is propeller efficiency, that is, the percentage of power put into the props by the engines that actually ends up propelling the airplane. Typically, nose-mounted (“tractor”) propellers achieve 85 percent efficiency, more or less. As Brown recalled aerodynamicist David Bernstorf saying, you could scale up tongue depressors and get 85 percent. In theory a pusher propeller ought to be a little more efficient, in part because its slipstream is not partially blocked by a fuselage or nacelle. But that is true only when the fuselage or nacelle ahead of the pusher propeller is smooth and symmetrical, like a blimp or torpedo. Rotating through the wing’s wake, the Starship’s propeller blades encountered a constantly changing inflow stream. It was impossible to design a blade that was optimal for all conditions.
Starship NC-5 makes a flight in 1990. This Starship has since been dismantled for parts. (Paul Bowen)
Another problem was the orientation of the engine nacelles. With engine-out handling and power-related pitch changes in mind, Beech engineers had canted the engines two degrees nose-down and three degrees nose-in. Both cants proved aerodynamically unfavorable; the upward tilt of the engine meant that the propeller plane was misaligned with the wake of the wing, while the pigeon-toed stance of the nacelles created a drag-producing divergent channel between them and the sides of the fuselage. Eventually, with the missing knots proving extremely difficult to find, the nacelles were sawed off and re-installed with cants exactly opposite to the original ones. The airplane immediately picked up 10 knots.
Several knots were lost when smooth “weeping wing” de-icers were replaced with old-fashioned rubber boots. The reason for the change was far from aerodynamic: It was feared that traces of the ice-resistant slime that oozes from the low-drag de-icers might stain the clothes of someone who carelessly brushed past the wing while boarding. Some speed, but not enough, was regained when different engines—a last resort—brought the power up from 1,500 to 2,400 horsepower. Eventually, the Starship hit a wall at 335 knots. That became its official maximum speed; it cruised at around 310.
At the same time that Beech aerodynamicists were fighting a losing battle against drag, structural engineers were in retreat before ever-increasing weight. The carbon composite structure had only a slight effect, because so much of the airplane was made of something else. Eventually, the Starship exceeded the 12,500-pound limit of its intended certification category by 2,400 pounds.
The first production airplane finally reached the market in 1989. To call its reception lukewarm would be kind. Lots of explanations for its commercial failure have been proposed, but the simplest is that it cost as much as a jet and was 100 knots slower. The Starship, as Richard Collins wrote in AOPA Pilot magazine in October 1990, was not only a runway hog, requiring more distance to get airborne than some jets, but was also “over on weight, short on cruise speed, noisy in the cabin, and a bit truck-like to fly.” This from a writer who normally tucked his unflattering opinions away between the lines. Beech advertised in Pilot, however, and so Collins had to find something good to say: “Where the Starship is perfect is in sizzle….I looked down at the shadow streaking across the ground and was struck with the feeling that, finally, after 39 years of flying, I had found a next-generation general aviation airplane.”
Sizzle was not enough; for $4 million, customers wanted some steak as well. Beech built only 50 production Starships. When it could not sell them, it tried leasing them instead. Finally giving up, Raytheon bought back as many as it could and destroyed them. A few are still in private hands; not too surprisingly, human nature being what it is, their owners love them. Raytheon admitted to having spent $350 million on the Starship, though insiders say the amount was more like $1 billion.
Proverbially, success has many fathers, but failure is an orphan. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that failure is always someone else’s baby. Drew Steketee, a former head of Beech corporate communications, later hinted at the internal frictions that arose after Linden Blue bypassed Beech’s own engineering staff in virtually turning over the Starship’s aerodynamic design to Burt Rutan, and alluded darkly to “detested Raytheon corporate types.” Rutan, who became a Beech vice president for a time and was briefly married to the daughter of one of the old guard executives, blamed the Starship’s faults on decisions made by Beech engineers, who, in turn, pointed out that Rutan had never taken one of his designs through the FAA certification process.
Unfortunately for the hundreds of people who worked on the project, the Starship’s commercial failure eclipsed the fact that they had actually accomplished something quite remarkable. They had created a revolutionary airplane, developed and validated manufacturing and certification procedures for a new method of construction, and created the first glass panel in a general aviation airplane. They had done much of this the old fashioned way, without the help of powerful digital tools. Linden Blue had demanded the almost-impossible, and Beech had almost delivered it. Only someone who has designed, built and certificated an airplane could appreciate how much Beech actually achieved. But commercial failure upstaged technical success. The rest of the world saw the Starship just as a Fortune magazine article, dripping with schadenfreude, did: “It’s a dud,” the author gloated. “A fiasco. A Little Bighorn with wings.”
L.A.-based writer Peter Garrison has designed, built and flown a couple of airplanes of his own, but has never exposed them to the merciless scrutiny of the marketplace. Further reading: Burt Rutan: Aeronautical and Space Legend, by Daniel Alef; and Beechcraft: Staggerwing to Starship, by Edward H. Phillips.
This feature originally appeared in the March 2019 issue of Aviation History. Subscribe here!
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6a334e87dd34cfb13d723d36feed00b0 | https://www.historynet.com/behind-barricade-identity-devils-den-sharpshooter.htm | Behind the Barricade: How diligent research revealed the identity of the Devil’s Den ‘sharpshooter’ | Behind the Barricade: How diligent research revealed the identity of the Devil’s Den ‘sharpshooter’
A Confederate soldier, his youthful face turned toward the viewer, lies behind a stone wall built between two boulders in Gettysburg’s notorious Devil’s Den. His head rests on a knapsack, and his rumpled uniform coat makes it almost appear as if he is asleep under a blanket. But relics of war intrude on the scene so there is no mistaking he is a casualty of ferocious combat. A musket leans against the wall in the background, and an open cartridge box lies at his side. A cap is next to his head, where it landed after the soldier fell dead. Photographer Alexander Gardner took the arresting image on July 6, 1863, and when he published it for public consumption, he titled it “Home of a Rebel Sharpshooter” to convey that the soldier was a marksman who had been picking off Union soldiers on Little Round Top, seen in the distance, before a shell fragment fired by a Union cannon snuffed out his life.
An overarching question about the image had long intrigued me: Just who was the unfortunate Confederate casualty? The desire to answer that set me on a research quest to find a name, and I am confident I have been successful. But first a bit of history on the image with one of the most intriguing Civil War photography backstories.
Gardner and his assistant, Timothy O’Sullivan, actually staged that dramatic scene by moving the dead soldier, who was not a sharpshooter but a common foot soldier, from another location in Devil’s Den to the barricade to create a dramatic tableaux, complete with carefully dressed accessories that included the musket, accoutrements, and uniform items. Gardner and Sullivan took two plates of the Confederate at the wall, one of which was a stereoview. The fact that the corpse was photographed in two separate locations went unnoticed for nearly a century until Frederick Ray, an illustrator for Civil War Times, wrote the short article, “The Case of the Rearranged Corpse” in the October 1961 issue of this magazine.
In 1975, photographic historian William Frassanito published his groundbreaking book on Gettysburg photographs titled Gettysburg: A Journey in Time. In his study of the “sharpshooter” photographs, Frassanito identified the body in its first location and estimated the body was moved 40 yards (later revised to 72 yards) to the stone barricade. And now, the story of the image continues, with the great possibility that the soldier in the image has been identified.
Before that hypothesis is explained, a bit of background on Gardner and the battle situation at Devil’s Den will be helpful. When the war began, Gardner had been managing Mathew Brady’s Washington, D.C., gallery. In September 1862, Brady assigned Gardner to take images of the aftermath of the Battle of Antietam. Those images of battlefield dead shocked the nation, but Brady got the fame, not Gardner. That prompted Gardner to leave Brady, and in the spring of 1863, he opened his own gallery in Washington with his brother James. He also took with him photographers O’Sullivan, James Gibson, William Pywell, David Knox, John Reekie, and W. Morris Smith.
It is one of the Civil War’s most iconic, poignant photographs.
Soon, Gardner and a few of his photographers were following the Army of the Potomac in June as it chased the Army of Northern Virginia’s movement toward the Potomac River. Gardner’s exact whereabouts in the days leading up to the battle are murky, but it is clear that Gardner arrived on the battlefield late on the afternoon of July 5, possibly after he had stopped in Emmitsburg, Md., on July 4 to check on the welfare of his son attending a boarding school there. And it is possible he may have sent the rest of his photographic team on to Gettysburg that day.
Historians only have a general idea of the travels of Gardner’s team during their time at Gettysburg, but it is certain that during the morning to early afternoon on July 6, they were busy photographing scenes on the Trostle and Rose farms on the southern portion of the battlefield. A Union officer in the 17th Maine, Charles Mattocks, witnessed the photographers at work and wrote in his journal on July 6 that, “Photographic artists have been busy in taking views upon the battlefield. Groups of the dead, graves, dead horses, and in fact almost everything forms the base of their operations.”
Then the photographers most likely made their way to the Devil’s Den area when they happened upon the fallen Confederate soldier in an open space on the west side of the rock formation, near what is now known as the “Triangular Field.” The youthful appearance and relatively good condition of the body may have piqued their interest enough to spend extra time on this particular soldier. They expended six exposures on him, including three stereoviews at various angles and a large format photograph at the downhill location.
His Own Man: Burly Alexander Gardner emigrated from Scotland and started his photographic career in the mid 1850s. (Library of Congress)
At the sharpshooter’s position Gardner took one stereo format photo and one large view version. It is unknown who came up with the notion to move the body, but perhaps Gardner was eager to make a name for himself and move out from under the shadow of Brady, his former mentor.
Brady would also travel to Gettysburg, but he began taking images around July 15, after the bodies had been interred in their hasty graves. The public expected another death series from Brady, so he took some of his own artistic license. In several photographs, Brady had posed an assistant as a dead soldier. And even though those portrayals were rather unconvincing, and although Gardner had truly captured the horrors of the three-day battle, Brady’s Gettysburg views again received most of the recognition.
In August 1863, Brady’s photographs appeared in Harper’s Weekly, a nationally circulated newspaper, in the form of woodcuts. The next month, Gardner released his Incidents of the War catalog that contained all his Gettysburg views. But it was not until 1865, after the end of the conflict, that Gardner’s Gettysburg views appeared as woodcuts in Harper’s Weekly. A montage of several of Gardner’s photos included the “sharpshooter” photographs, titled “A Sharpshooter’s Last Sleep.” The image of the dead Confederate at the barricade also appeared in Gardner’s Photographic Sketch Book of the Civil War that was published that same year, 1865.
I knew it would be a daunting task to identify the dead soldier, and the probability that I would find the answer was extremely low, but I kept on through the twists and turns of my investigation. The results, it turned out, surpassed my expectations and were more than I could have hoped for. I first set out to investigate some notions that are still prevalent today. Shockingly, some people believe that the “sharpshooter” was a live person posing as a dead soldier, just as Brady had used his assistant for a few of his views. As is clear from the detail of the soldier’s face, however, one eye remains slightly open, his face had swollen, and hands had shriveled up, all indications of the onset of decomposition.
In September 1862, Brady assigned Gardner to take images of the aftermath of the Battle of Antietam. Those images of battlefield dead shocked the nation, but Brady got the fame, not Gardner. Perhaps Gardner was eager to make a name for himself and move out from Brady’s shadow.
I then looked into some of the identifications attributed to the soldier in the past and focused in on one intriguing possibility. In 1911, family members claimed that the soldier was Andrew Hoge, who died at the Battle of Gettysburg. His story appeared in Confederate Veteran magazine in 1925. The story of Hoge’s death seemed plausible and even contained a detail not known to the general public. Gardner had inexplicably mentioned a canteen in his rough draft of the narrative for the photograph even though there was no canteen visible in any of the six photographs (the detail never made it into the final draft of Gardner’s Sketch Book).
But Hoge’s cousin was present when he died and wrote that he had closed his eyes and placed a canteen between his elbow and his body before he left him. After digging further, I found that an early photograph of Hoge shows a similar facial likeness to the sharpshooter. I can see why Hoge’s family members could have thought the soldier was their relative and why they would have rationalized him being in Devil’s Den. There is one glaring problem with this theory: Hoge and his cousin were both members of the 4th Virginia Infantry, and as Frassanito pointed out in another of his books, Early Photography at Gettysburg, that regiment was nowhere near Devil’s Den during or after the battle. I had to resume my search.
Lots of Attention: This image was taken at the first location of the “sharpshooter” before he was dragged to the stone barricade at Devil’s Den. (Library of Congress)
In 2014, John Heiser, a historian at Gettysburg National Military Park, wrote a series of articles on the photo for the park’s blog, From the Fields of Gettysburg. He surmised that the casualty was a Georgian because Brig. Gen. Henry L. Benning’s 2nd, 5th, 17th, and 20th Georgia infantry occupied both locations throughout the day and into the evening of July 3 where the dead Confederate was photographed.
The number “2” is stenciled on the haversack under the body, one of several clues that leads the author to believe he served in the 2nd Georgia Infantry. (Library of Congress)
Heavy skirmishing began in the Devil’s Den vicinity late in the afternoon on July 3, after the repulse of Pickett’s Charge. Emboldened Pennsylvania regiments of Colonel William McCandless’ brigade pushed toward the rock formation about 5:30 or 6 p.m., eager to take back ground lost by the Union on July 2. McCandless’ men began turning Benning’s left flank, forcing the Confederate commander to withdraw his regiments from Devil’s Den to the west under heavy fire.
Heiser was leaning toward the idea that the soldier was a member of the 15th Georgia because that regiment served as the brigade’s rear guard as their fellow Georgia regiments retreated toward the Emmitsburg Road, and I agreed with that. But, although the 15th lost more than 100 men at Gettysburg, I found only three reported as being killed in action on July 3. Two were mortally wounded and had been buried miles away from Devil’s Den. The remaining soldier was Everard Culver, who was just 19 years old when he was killed.
Everard had four brothers in the regiment, and Edgeworth Bird, a member of the 15th, wrote home that they were “very distressed that poor Ev’s body could not be recovered from the hands of the enemy for burial.” Because of the age of Culver and that his body was left on the field, this possibility required further investigation. I could not find a photograph of Everard, but I managed to find one of his brother who bore little resemblance to the “sharpshooter,” and my suspicion that Everard was the soldier in the photograph began to diminish.
Just who was the unfortunate Confederate casualty?
My search of the 17th Georgia’s casualties yielded no candidates, and I turned my attention to the 2nd and 20th Georgia, but I could find no soldiers who were killed in action on that date. It was disheartening, and I feared that incomplete Confederate records may have stalled my investigation, but I continued my search and finally got the break I needed.
I found the accounts of two soldiers from the 2nd Georgia Infantry: William Houghton’s Two Boys in the Civil War and After and copies of John Bowden’s papers in the Gettysburg battlefield library. Houghton, who served in Company G of the 2nd, had mentioned that when they received orders to withdraw, they formed up again about where Gardner may have taken his first image of the body. The other soldier, Bowden from the 2nd’s Company B, wrote that a soldier was killed crossing the “danger point” where the regiment was exposed to Union fire during their withdrawal.
Uncanny: An 1850s image of John Rutherford Ash, when he was about 13 or 14, shares striking similarities with the Devil’s Den corpse, including dark hair and a unique, small “widow’s peak” hairline feature. The teenager and the slain soldier also have thin noses, narrow chins, attached earlobes, and distinctive eyebrows. (Clockwise From Left: Courtesy Georgia Archives, Vanishing Georgia Collection, fra112; Library of Congress (2))
I finally found a soldier listed in Robert K. Krick and Chris L. Ferguson’s book, Gettysburg’s Confederate Dead: An Honor Roll From America’s Greatest Battle, who was killed in action late in the afternoon or the early evening of July 3, when Benning’s Brigade was driven from Devil’s Den. His name was John Rutherford Ash of Company A of the 2nd Georgia.
Private Ash was only 25 years old when he died at Gettysburg, and his body was never recovered. Ash was born in 1837, and by searching the Find a Grave website, I found that a memorial stone, not a gravestone, had been erected for him in the Hebron Presbyterian Cemetery in Banks County, Ga., along with another one for his younger brother who was killed at Vicksburg in April 1863. The date of death on John’s stone is July 4, but it is reasonable to believe that the information about his death came from a comrade, and I recalled that John Bowden had mistaken the regiment’s withdrawal date as July 4 in his account.
Ash and the dead soldier shared the same exact facial features…the likeness was haunting
My good luck persisted when I found a crisp 1850s photograph of John Ash at the Georgia Department of Archives and History, and I stared at it on my computer screen in disbelief. Ash and the dead soldier at the barricade shared the same exact facial features, including their ears, nose, chin, lips, and eyebrows. The likeness was haunting. I also realized that if Ash was killed on July 3, it would help explain why his body was not as decomposed as others photographed by Gardner. It would be reasonable to believe that John Ash and the Devil’s Den casualty photographed by Gardner are one and the same, even if absolute proof may forever remain elusive.
I am hopeful, however, that in the future, more information will come to light to help confirm the identification one way or the other. Gardner’s actions in staging the photograph on July 6, 1863, were morally wrong and unethical by our standards, but he clearly explained the intent of his photograph in his Sketch Book: “Such a picture conveys a useful moral: It shows the blank horror and reality of war, in opposition to its pageantry. Here are the dreadful details! Let them aid in preventing such another calamity falling upon the nation.”
Scott Fink, an Army veteran who received the Purple Heart for injuries sustained in Iraq, frequently travels to Gettysburg from his home in Olney, Md. His forthcoming book, Photo History: Gettysburg, will delve into great detail about the “sharpshooter” image as well as other photographs.
A Moving Controversy In 1998, a new theory emerged about the “sharpshooter” photographs when James Groves, a Maryland artist, produced an online study of the images titled The Devil’s Den Sharpshooter Re-Discovered, in which he concluded that the photographs at the barricade were taken first and then the body was moved for additional images in the vicinity. The premise of his study was based on an account by Union artillery Captain Augustus P. Martin, who was stationed on Little Round Top. Martin claimed that just after the battle he saw a “dead Confederate lying upon his back behind a stone wall” who had been killed by a Federal artillery fire. Martin explained the dead Rebel had been an actual sharpshooter, whose accurate shooting had drawn Union shellfire. Martin’s telling seemed to establish the Rebel had died at the stone wall, and was then moved farther downhill, thereby validating Groves’ speculation. Captain Martin’s story first appeared in the Gettysburg Compiler in 1899, and he was very likely aware of Gardner’s photograph and “sharpshooter” caption. Also in 1867, local Gettysburg photographers had taken photos at the barricade, and their caption indicates they were aware of Gardner’s photograph. Furthermore, photographer William Tipton had reprinted Gardner’s image around the time of Martin’s 1899 article. Therefore, Gardner’s published story about the image was well known by 1899, and it is plausible that Martin molded his account to mesh with Gardner’s. Some of Groves’ key points have been disproved, while others have maintained their merit. Nothing, however has convinced me the soldier was a specialized sharpshooter. As I continue to study Gardner’s Gettysburg photography, I agree with Frassanito’s theory that the soldier was dragged to the barricade to compose an absorbing image. While I may disagree with Groves’ conclusions, I do applaud his effort to challenge perceptions of the famous photograph.–S.F.
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f37b7627e27c3bfec940100c0a3bfbb4 | https://www.historynet.com/bell-x-1-dropping-the-orange-beast.htm | Bell X-1: Dropping the Orange Beast That Broke the Sound Barrier | Bell X-1: Dropping the Orange Beast That Broke the Sound Barrier
The first supersonic flight would not have been possible without the help of countless support personnel, including the man who oversaw the project and piloted the X-1’s B-29 mother ship.
During the past 70 years, numerous books, articles, documentaries and movies have told the story of how U.S. Air Force pilot Chuck Yeager broke the sound barrier in a Bell X-1 on October 14, 1947. But Yeager was far from alone in his pursuit of that historic milestone. Scores of other individuals who contributed to the success of the project have gone largely unnoticed by the general public. They were the Bell engineers and mechanics, the ground crew and the men who carried that orange beast into the sky. Without them, the world would never have heard of Yeager.
America’s first rocket-powered research plane, the X-1 was designed to push the unknown limits of high-speed and high-altitude flight with a superbly designed airframe and liquid-fueled rocket motors. In March 1945, the U.S. Army Air Forces contracted with Bell and the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) to develop the XS-1 (its original designation) and fly it up to and beyond the transonic “barrier.”
The huge B-29 Superfortress was the only aircraft then capable of lifting a fully fueled X-1 to its launch altitude of 25,000 feet. Bell extensively modified Superfortress serial no. 45-21800 to accommodate the X-1, removing the bulkhead between the bomb bays, the bay doors and large sections of the fuselage for the rocket plane’s nose, wings, high tail and stabilizer. Removing so much of the bomber’s hull reduced structural integrity, so a steel longitudinal spar was installed through the centerline. To eliminate glare from the polished aluminum skin and provide a highly visible reference point for the X-1 pilot, the entire underside of the B-29 was painted black.
The rocket plane, painted bright international orange, was hung from a standard D-4 bomb shackle, which could be released by the B-29’s copilot. A retractable ladder allowed the X-1 pilot to descend and enter the tiny starboard hatch. He and the flight engineer were protected from the icy 250-knot wind blast by a thick shield.
The first tests were conducted by Bell pilots and engineers at Pinecastle Army Air Field in Florida. In the spring of 1946, the entire project moved to Muroc Army Air Field in California’s Mojave Desert. Adjacent Rogers Dry Lake had 65 square miles of flat natural runways and plenty of space for emergency landings.
At Pinecastle, a pit had been dug into the ramp for the X-1 to be raised into the bomber, but it was poorly designed. After the move to Muroc, some engineers proposed using a heavy crane to lift the 70,000-pound B-29 over the X-1. Saner heads prevailed, however, and an improved pit was dug for the X-1.
An X-1 is hoisted into the B-29’s bomb bay. (NASA)
Bell and the NACA began powered test flights at Muroc in late 1946. The NACA was in no hurry, and by early 1947 the X-1 had only reached .84 Mach. But the Army Air Forces wanted it done as quickly as possible in order to gain an advantage over the Soviet Union in the development of high-speed military aircraft. As the program crept closer to its goal, Bell’s chief test pilot, Chalmers “Slick” Goodlin, encountered buffeting and loss of elevator effectiveness as he approached .86 Mach. Goodlin allegedly demanded an exorbitant pay bonus to take the X-1 past Mach 1, prompting the AAF to officially take over the project on June 30, 1947.
That was how Major Robert L. Cardenas, head of the AAF Technical Base’s Bomber Test section at Wright Field in Ohio, came to be called in front of Colonel Albert Boyd, head of Flight Test. Cardenas, now 98, had a sterling career in both Army khaki and Air Force blue.
“Colonel Boyd said, ‘Major, we’re taking over the sound barrier project from the NACA,” remembered Cardenas. “I’ve already selected Captain Yeager as pilot, Lieutenant Bob Hoover as backup and Captain Jack Ridley as flight engineer and copilot.’ He explained I would be the B-29 commander and in overall charge of the project, and he wanted it to be done ‘progressive and brief.’”
Boyd, known throughout Flight Test as a superb pilot and leader, handed Cardenas a handwritten note. “That note repeated what he’d just told me. The key words were ‘progressive’ and ‘brief.’”
Cardenas said he had met Yeager, Hoover and Ridley, but had never worked closely with any of them. “Chuck and Bob were both in the fighter section, so we didn’t have much contact. But after we flew out to Muroc we got along fine. Hoover was an outstanding pilot, and Ridley was a really nice guy who was one of the best flight engineers I ever met.”
Philip Kaufman’s 1983 box office hit The Right Stuff, based on Tom Wolfe’s book, tells a highly apocryphal version of the sound barrier saga. Cardenas and Bell engineer Dick Frost are not even mentioned, while Ridley is portrayed as a laid-back, gum-dispensing sidekick to Yeager. But the reality is far more interesting. Jackie “Jack” Ridley was one of the brightest engineers in the Air Force in 1947. He had been a star pupil of the brilliant Caltech aerodynamicist Theodore von Kármán. His folksy wit led many to underestimate his razor-sharp mind. Yeager, who lacked an engineering background, relied heavily on Ridley to understand the aerodynamic factors involved in breaking Mach 1. This not only helped ensure success, but saved the pilot’s life more than once. Frost was Bell’s best engineer on the X-1. His innate familiarity with the rocket plane and its systems was crucial to the success of the project.
“Jack Ridley was almost a twin to Dick Frost,” said Cardenas. “They were from different backgrounds, but they seemed to think exactly alike. Frost handled all the direct hardware and modifications to the X-1 after the Air Force took over.”
From August 6 until October 12, Cardenas and his team took Yeager and the X-1 up for three unpowered and eight powered flights, each one moving closer to the goal of Mach 1. The flights were always made in the early morning so Yeager would not have the sun in his eyes when he landed on the lake bed.
Yeager (left) and Air Force engineer Captain Jack Ridley stand beside 46-062, which the pilot named "Glamorous Glennis" in honor of his wife. (U.S. Air Force)
On the night before each flight, liquid nitrogen, used to drive the X-1’s fuel pumps and controls, was pumped into the 14 spherical tanks. Then the aircraft was backed down into the specially shaped pit. Cardenas steered the B-29 over the pit, guided by signals from crew chief Jack Russell and the other ground crew. When the bomb bay was directly over the orange X-plane, heavy straps were slung under it for hoisting.
Russell was a skilled and dedicated Bell mechanic, responsible for keeping the X-1 maintained and its XLR11 rocket engine in working order. In short, he made sure the X-1 was ready to fly. “Without Jack Russell, we would not have made it to Mach 1,” Cardenas said.
Before dawn the B-29 was towed to the fueling facility, where a modified tanker filled the X-1 with 3,000 pounds of liquid-oxygen and ethyl-alcohol fuel. Time was of the essence, as the LOX began to boil off immediately, forming a layer of frost on the fuselage. While Russell supervised the fuel loading, Cardenas and his crew conducted the preflight check and pulled the B-29’s propellers through before starting the engines.
Cardenas and copilot Ridley taxied the B-29 out to the runway, with Yeager sitting on an empty apple crate behind the pilot. Cardenas said that lifting the B-29 into the air with the 13,000-pound X-1 on board was a delicate operation. “The X-1’s belly hung less than two feet off the ground,” he explained. “I could only lift the nose wheel about eight inches off the runway to keep from scraping the X-1’s tail. I watched the horizon through the nose. It was a matter of feeling the air and using my experience to pull back on the yoke just enough to generate lift.”
At 12,000 feet Yeager, with Ridley behind him, crawled through the hatch to the unpressurized bomb bay. The air temperature was well below zero, and the airstream howled in the confined space. Clad only in a flight suit and leather jacket, Yeager stepped onto the ladder fitted to the right side of the bomb bay, then wormed his way into the X-1’s hatch outside the B-29. Ridley remained on the ladder as the X-1 door was lowered by another crewman. He helped Yeager fit it into place.
The next steps were to disconnect the X-1 from the B-29’s power, and then check to make sure its internal battery was working properly. After a radio check to link Yeager with the B-29 crew, the first-stage nitrogen regulator was used to pressurize the LOX and fuel tanks.
The X-1 team included (from left) Ed Swindell, Bob Hoover, Bob Cardenas, Yeager, Dick Frost and Ridley. (USAF Flight Test Center)
Cardenas climbed the B-29 to 25,000 feet, keeping close enough to Rogers Dry Lake for Yeager to glide to a safe landing if the X-1’s rocket engine failed. “I made a long turn until we were about 40 miles out,” Cardenas said. “Then I lowered the B-29’s nose and advanced the throttles to 250 knots indicated airspeed.”
When all was ready Cardenas began his verbal countdown from 10 to zero. “I held up my hand for Ridley to get ready. When I reached zero I dropped my hand and he pulled the release handle.”
Once Yeager was free of the B-29 he was on his own but for the two Lockheed F-80 chase planes, piloted by Frost and Hoover. Frost flew low chase for the initial drop in case anything went wrong, which it often did. As an experienced test pilot and one of the first men to fly the X-1, he knew how to fix or deal with most problems.
Hoover, today remembered as one of America’s finest pilots, flew high chase about 10 miles ahead of the B-29 to give Yeager an aiming point. After the X-1’s four rocket chambers ignited, it streaked past Hoover like he was standing still.
Meanwhile Cardenas and Ridley circled in for a landing. “Once we dropped Chuck all we could do was watch his white contrail streak away into the blue sky,” said Cardenas.
Every flight presented challenges, and one nearly ended in disaster when Ridley pulled the release and the X-1 failed to drop free. After conferring with the copilot, Cardenas told Yeager to jettison the X-1’s fuel and climb back into the B-29. “He could only dump about half the fuel,” recalled Cardenas. “I had to make a nearly perfect three-point landing to keep the X-1 from striking the ground.”
During one flight Yeager’s windscreen iced over so badly he couldn’t see, so Dick Frost talked him down to a safe blind landing on the lake bed. The icing problem persisted until the indispensable Jack Russell came up with a simple solution. Before each flight he applied a coating of Drene shampoo to the inner surface of the canopy. It solved the problem and they continued to use it even after the Air Force found a chemical that cost $18 a bottle.
On the seventh powered flight, in early October, the team hit a real barrier that threatened to bring the entire program to a halt.
“Chuck lost elevator effectiveness at .92 Mach,” Cardenas explained. “We all sat down in the hangar and talked about what to do. Frost said, ‘Well Bob, I think that shock wave is getting close to the elevator hinge and blanking it out. But we built the horizontal stabilizer so it could be unlocked to be raised and lowered. I can run it into the hangar and put in a vertical worm gear to be operated with the nitrogen system. That would let Chuck adjust it in flight.’ I turned to Ridley and asked him, ‘Jack, do you think that tail is going to fly off the first time Chuck tries to adjust it in flight?’ Jack said, ‘I don’t know, Bob.’”
This put Cardenas as project manager in a difficult position. He had to decide whether to allow Frost and Russell to modify the X-1’s stabilizer and run the risk of it tearing off at .92 Mach. If he followed normal protocol, he would have sent the X-1 back to Wright Field for a full structural analysis by a team of Bell and Air Force engineers. That would take weeks. But he had an ace in the hole. “I had that note from Colonel Boyd,” he said with a smile. “He wanted the project done ‘brief.’ So I told Dick, ‘Run it into the hangar and do it.’ I took the responsibility. I knew Dick and Jack would do their best to make it work.”
On the next flight, as Yeager approached .92 Mach the shock waves slammed into the elevator, rendering his pitch controls useless. But Dick Frost’s marvelous modification saved the day as Yeager set the stabilizer to two degrees down and regained control. At .94 Mach the buffeting ceased entirely.
The team’s ultimate goal was within reach, but Cardenas soon had another serious concern on his mind. “Two nights before we were going to try and break Mach 1, I got a call from someone. I don’t know who it was, but the caller said that Chuck had run into a fence on his horse out at Pancho’s [Pancho Barnes’ Happy Bottom Riding Club] and broke two ribs. ‘I know what he has to do,’ the caller said, ‘and I know you’re in charge. I thought you should know.’ From that moment on I had a lot to think about. Should I pull Chuck off the flight and give it to Hoover? Bob was a terrific pilot but I owed it to him to let him have a couple of powered flights before trying to go supersonic. But Boyd wanted it done brief. It was on my mind for two days. If I let Chuck fly and something happened to him, it would be my fault. My neck was stuck out a mile.”
Yeager was unaware that Cardenas knew about the broken ribs. “Chuck never said anything,” recalled Cardenas, “and Hoover also kept quiet.”
There was little doubt Yeager could make the Mach 1 attempt even with broken ribs. But after climbing into the X-1, he’d still have to close and lock the hatch, which would require some heavy lifting and leverage.
A second B-29 and a Lockheed F-80 accompany the B-29 mother ship as it unleashes the X-1. (U.S. Air Force)
Jack Ridley came up with a simple solution, using a broom handle. This has become one of the legends surrounding the X-1 story. In The Right Stuff, Ridley cuts off a piece of the broom being used by Russell.
“The part in the movie where Ridley cuts off Jack Russell’s broom is misleading,” commented Cardenas. “Russell was in charge of keeping the X-1 maintained. And that also meant keeping it clean. He was a fanatic about keeping the sand and dust out of the hangar. He was constantly sweeping and cleaning. That X-1 was his baby. But in the movie his real role is not even mentioned.”
On the night of October 13, Cardenas, having weighed every factor for success or failure, decided to let Yeager make the attempt to break Mach 1. But the tension among the Air Force personnel, the NACA scientists and the Bell engineers was palpable. The morning of October 14 was no different from the routine that began at Pinecastle nearly two years earlier, with one major exception.
“I was going through our usual preflight check when an F-80 landed on the base,” Cardenas remembered. “I went over to see who it was. Down comes Colonel Kendall Paul, one of Boyd’s deputies. I asked him what he was doing there and he said, ‘Bob, I’m here to be your copilot today.’ I knew right away that somehow Boyd had learned about Chuck’s broken ribs. He sent Paul out to be the one who actually dropped the X-1. Boyd knew my neck was stuck out a mile. He took the responsibility. That’s the kind of leader he was. He backed up his men.”
Cardenas and his crew carried the X-1 to 25,000 feet. Colonel Paul pulled the release and the rocket plane fell free.
That day the sky over Muroc was rocked by a sonic boom. “We heard that his Mach meter had fluctuated off at Mach 1.06,” said Cardenas. “Chuck had broken the barrier and that was great, but he was only one man on a great team. Chuck was the one who did it, but he was far from alone in the sky.”
Today the sky over the Air Force Test Center at Edwards AFB echoes with the sounds of advanced military and research aircraft. The lake bed still serves as an airfield, marked by long lines of runways and taxi areas. The special pit for the X-1 is still there, an odd remnant of a vanished era. But the men who made the first leap into the supersonic age are mostly gone. Jack Ridley died in a plane crash in Japan in 1957. Today Edwards’ Mission Control Center is named in his honor. Dick Frost went on to develop escape systems and other high-speed aircraft. He died in 1996. Jack Russell died in 1997. Besides Chuck Yeager, only Bob Cardenas, now a retired brigadier general living in San Diego, carries the torch of mankind’s first foray into the supersonic realm.
Frequent contributor Mark Carlson is the author of Flying on Film: A Century of Aviation in the Movies 1912-2012 and The Marines’ Lost Squadron: The Odyssey of VMF-422. Further reading: Bell X-1, by Peter Davies; Supersonic Flight: Breaking the Sound Barrier and Beyond, by Richard P. Hallion; and Chasing the Demon, by Dan Hampton.
This feature originally appeared in the May 2019 issue of Aviation History. Subscribe here!
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e364b9dab6a8fba7e3d72f513bae012a | https://www.historynet.com/benedict-arnold-general-in-the-battle-of-saratoga.htm | Benedict Arnold: General in the Battle of Saratoga | Benedict Arnold: General in the Battle of Saratoga
The season was changing. Hot afternoons gave way to cool evenings and cooler mornings as summer turned to autumn in New York’s upper Hudson Valley. Beneath the green, red, and orange canopy of leaves shrouding the hills that straddled the Hudson River, a different sort of transformation was taking place. Four months into British Lieutenant General John Burgoyne’s invasion of the northern colonies, his army had collided with Major General Horatio Gates’s entrenched Americans. Now, on September 19, 1777, the first of two fateful battles–bound to alter the course of the American Revolution–had begun.
At Gates’s headquarters behind the American lines on Bemis Heights (named for Jotham Bemis, a local tavern keeper), 36-year-old Major General Benedict Arnold seethed with impatience. The fiery Connecticut native held command of the American left wing, which Burgoyne had attacked that morning. After directing the American defense for much of the day, Arnold now found himself wasting his energy by repeatedly requesting that Gates give him reinforcements. He ached to sweep the field before dark.
Gates eventually sent portions of Brigadier General Ebenezer Learned’s brigade to support the Americans who were battling across a wide, stump-filled field called Freeman’s Farm. Shortly afterward, Deputy Quartermaster Colonel Morgan Lewis reported in at headquarters and told Gates of the indecisive fighting. That was enough for Arnold. ‘By God, I will soon put an end to it’ he declared, and mounted a horse to go and lead the troops himself.
‘You had better order him back,’ Lewis told Gates. ‘The action is going well. He may, by some rash act, do mischief.’
Gates immediately sent an aide to bring him back, and Arnold angrily complied. By this time Learned’s unguided infantry had wandered too far to the west, where they were all but wiped out by Brigadier General Simon Fraser’s British troops. Meanwhile, 500 German soldiers under Major General Baron Friedrich von Riedesel had marched to Freeman’s Farm and stopped the final American advance. Darkness then descended, ending the contest.
Left in command of the field, Burgoyne could technically claim victory in the First Battle of Saratoga (also known as the Battle of Freeman’s Farm), but he had suffered 560 casualties, almost twice the American total. The British Army had shrunk to less than 7,000 effectives, while Gates could boast of nearly 12,000 Continentals and militia. The Americans could still win a victory. All the soldiers needed, Arnold believed, was inspiration, but he doubted it would come from his commander.
Horatio Gates, American commander of the Northern Department, held a military position in America that far exceeded anything he could have achieved in his native England, where he had been born a commoner. Writer Hoffman Nickerson characterized Gates as ‘a snob of the first water’ who possessed ‘an unctuously pious way with him.’ Although Gates was an ambitious man, dynamic leadership was not part of his makeup. The former British officer did not believe American troops could stand up to British infantry in the open field. Though his men clearly outnumbered those of his opponent, Gates remained cautious and believed his army was better off fighting from behind fortifications.
Arnold, in contrast, was daring and imaginative. He had proven his abilities during the doomed attempt to capture Quebec in 1775 and at the Battle of Valcour Island the next year. At Saratoga his views differed from those held by Gates. From the first reports of British movement on the morning of September 19, Arnold pestered his commander for permission to send riflemen to the woods west of Freeman’s Farm. There, Arnold believed, the quick-moving Americans could set an ambush for the approaching columns. Gates permitted him to send out a ‘reconnaissance in force’ shortly before 1:00 p.m., and Arnold eagerly dispatched Colonel Daniel Morgan’s famed Rangers and Major Henry Dearborn’s light infantry.
Arnold fed additional regiments into the fray, about 3,000 Continental troops and militia in total. Captain Ebenezer Wakefield remembered Arnold ‘in front of the line, his eyes flashing, pointing with his sword to the advancing foe, with a voice that rang clear as a trumpet and electrified the line.’ Arnold’s division tangled with Fraser’s column on the left and Burgoyne’s personally led column in the center. Hemmed in by the river and Gates’s right wing on the heights, Riedesel’s German units sat motionless until 5:00 p.m., when Burgoyne sent for him to reinforce his besieged center. If Gates had countered this move, Arnold felt, the Americans would have carried the day. But Gates, citing a shortage of ammunition, was content with a draw.
Within days of the battle, tension between Gates and Arnold boiled over. Gates made no mention of Arnold or his division in his battle report to Congress, though they had done all of the fighting. Even more galling to the ultra-sensitive Arnold was his commander’s September 22 decree that Daniel Morgan would thereafter report only to him. Arnold stormed into Gates’s headquarters. A loud argument ensued, and the two men exchanged ‘high words and gross language.’ Gates questioned Arnold’s very qualification for command. He also told Arnold that he planned to assume direct command of the left wing as soon as Major General Benjamin Lincoln arrived to take over the right.
The eruption between Gates and Arnold had been coming for some time. The two had once been friends, but army politics and petty jealousy had turned them into rivals. Arnold had angrily resigned his commission in July after Congress promoted five junior officers to major general ahead of him. The promotions were part of a new political system that balanced the number of generals from each state, and Connecticut already had their fair share with two major generals, Israel Putnam and Joseph Spencer. At General George Washington’s request, Arnold had agreed to set the issue aside.
Arnold had infuriated Gates by becoming friendly with Major General Philip Schuyler while serving under Schuyler in the Northern Department. Gates hated Schuyler because Schuyler held a command that Gates desired for himself. Arnold’s friendship with his enemy irked him. Congress replaced Schuyler with Gates in August, but friction between Gates and Arnold remained. Arnold immediately annoyed Gates by adding two Schuyler partisans, Lieutenant Colonel Henry Brockholst Livingston and Lieutenant Colonel Richard Varick, to his staff. Gates, in turn, leaned increasingly on his aide, James Wilkinson, a 20-year-old lieutenant colonel and schemer of questionable principles. Arnold soon became an unwelcome guest at army headquarters.
Following his argument with Gates, Arnold drafted a long letter to his superior. The grievances he detailed included the poor treatment he had received since Gates arrived and the lack of credit extended to his division following the First Battle of Saratoga. ‘I am thought of in no consequence in this department,’ he complained. Arnold asked for a pass to leave camp, and Gates sent it over the next day, but Arnold hesitated, desperately wanting to participate in the coming fight. Gates requested that Arnold dismiss Livingston. He refused, but Arnold’s loyal aide left on his own accord. Gates then issued general orders thanking Arnold’s division for its gallant service in the battle but again did not mention its commander. Meanwhile, Brigadier General Enoch Poor circulated a petition asking Arnold to remain, and every line officer, except the newly arrived Lincoln, signed it.
Arnold agreed to stay, but he had become essentially a man without a job. For the moment he quenched his restlessness by irritating Gates with a series of notes filled with military advice. Gates ignored him, and on October 1 Gates assumed command of the left wing and handed Lincoln the right.
While intrigue enveloped the American camp, Burgoyne’s deteriorating army had not moved. Nearly a year earlier, ‘Gentleman Johnny’–a nickname Burgoyne’s men had given to him as a tribute to the humane way he treated them–had bet a friend that he would ‘be home victorious from America by Christmas Day, 1777.’ In June of that year, Burgoyne had led his army south from Canada down the Champlain-Hudson corridor with a grand plan for dividing New England from the other colonies. He expected to link up with General William Howe’s army at Albany, and their combined force would move south to crush Washington’s main Continental Army. Howe instead sailed south to capture Philadelphia, leaving Burgoyne to fend for himself.
Burgoyne captured Fort Ticonderoga on July 6, 1777, but after that his plan began to unravel. On August 16, General John Stark’s New Hampshire militia smashed a 1,200-man column of German and British soldiers sent into nearby Bennington, Vermont, in search of horses. A week later Arnold led an American force that scattered Lieutenant Colonel Barry St. Leger’s 2,000-man column as it approached from the west.
Now, Burgoyne was considering a follow-up attack for the morning of August 21 when he received a note from Lieutenant General Sir Henry Clinton in New York City. Clinton was about to march north with 2,000 men to menace the Americans at Forts Montgomery and Clinton. The possibility that Gates would be forced to dispatch troops to the forts or–even better–that Clinton would come to his support convinced Burgoyne to dig in and wait. In fact, he really had nowhere else to go. Retreat north was not only distasteful, it was no longer a practical option. His army’s rations would last, at best, another two to three weeks. And, although British forces controlled Fort Ticonderoga 60 miles to the north, American soldiers freely roamed the area north of Saratoga. Burgoyne decided his only real choice was to persevere–to drive through Gates’s army and on to Albany.
On October 7, as the last wisps of morning fog disappeared under the rising sun, 1,500 British and German troops, backed by another 500 Loyalists, Indians, and Canadians, moved out from the main British camp. Burgoyne personally led the three columns, which he had placed under Fraser on the right, Riedesel in the center, and Major John Dyke Acland on the left. By about 2:00 p.m. the force had reached a wheat field just west of Freeman’s Farm. The long lines of red and blue-coated soldiers sat quietly as Burgoyne, Riedesel, and Major General William Phillips (Burgoyne’s long-time artillery chief) climbed to the roof of a cabin for a better look at the American position. They were disheartened–Burgoyne’s spyglass revealed only a depthless sea of trees.
The British columns were exposed and their opponents knew it. American pickets had been watching the advance every step of the way and reporting back to Gates. After some urging, Gates sent Wilkinson off to the left with the message, ‘Order on Morgan to begin the game.’
With battle about to begin anew, Benedict Arnold itched to join in. Swallowing his pride, he asked Gates for permission to ride to the front to see what was happening. ‘I am afraid to trust you, Arnold,’ Gates warily replied. On September 19, against Gates’s wishes, Arnold had brought on a general engagement and added to his reputation in the process. Gates did not want an encore. But when Arnold promised not to do anything hasty, Gates sent him out–with Lincoln alongside as a precaution.
The two generals returned a short time later with the news that the enemy was moving strongly on the left. Gates said he would send Morgan’s riflemen and Dearborn’s infantry west, to flank the enemy. Arnold knew the situation demanded more vigor, and his reply betrayed his disgust. ‘That is nothing, ‘ he declared, ‘you must send a strong force.’
Determined not to go down that road again, Gates fumed, ‘General Arnold, I have nothing for you to do. You have no business here.’
With Arnold apparently out of the picture, Lincoln finally convinced Gates that more men were indeed needed. Poor’s brigade would storm the British left while Morgan flanked Burgoyne. When these two pincers squeezed the trapped enemy, Learned’s brigade would be sent in to overrun the center.
Morgan’s 300 riflemen quickly closed in on Fraser’s position while Poor’s 800 veteran New Hampshire Continentals crept through the woods toward the British left. Just after 3:00 p.m., Acland’s men opened fire from the crest of a hill on Poor’s approaching troops. The British were about to mount a bayonet charge when the Americans raced up the hill in a frenzy, swarming over the stunned grenadiers and wounding Acland in both legs. With exquisite timing, Morgan’s men smashed through the outnumbered infantry of Major Alexander Lindsay, Earl of Balcarres, on Fraser’s far right. Then Dearborn’s light infantry suddenly appeared behind the wavering British, scattering them in all directions.
In less than an hour Burgoyne’s ambitious foray had devolved into a desperate fight for survival. Most of his shocked troops were retreating. Only the center, composed mainly of Germans under Colonel Johann Friedrich Specht, refused to budge.
About this time the fate of Burgoyne’s army was sealed. Two miles away at the American headquarters, Arnold had been fuming impatiently while the battle raged. Gates had humiliated him. But Arnold had seen his superior squander a clear-cut victory three weeks earlier and–command or no command–he was not going to let that happen again. He mounted a horse and headed for the front. Gates sent Major John Armstrong galloping after him, but Arnold outran him.
A few minutes later Arnold caught up with some of Learned’s Connecticut militia. ‘My old Norwich and New London friends,’ he shouted as he rode by, and the cheers of the men rang in his ears. Within moments Arnold was at the head of Learned’s brigade, exhorting the troops to follow him, ‘Come on brave boys, come on!’ Three of Learned’s regiments charged uphill into withering fire from Specht’s men. American and German cannon exchanged canister fire. Finally, as Balcarres’ British troops fled past their position, the Germans broke.
Fraser was still trying to form a new line on the right, but one of Morgan’s sharpshooters put an end to that. Conspicuous in his scarlet and white uniform and mounted on a large gray horse, Fraser suddenly crumpled backward with a bullet in his abdomen. He would die the next morning.
By this time most of Burgoyne’s men had fallen back to the protection of the two massive redoubts the British had built at Freeman’s Farm during the weeks after the first battle. Arnold wasted no time leading a charge against the nearest to him, the Balcarres Redoubt. He waved his sword and dashed among the troops as musket balls and grapeshot whizzed around them. But the huge log walls–bristling with abatis and defended by desperate infantry–kept the Americans out.
Looking north toward the less-heavily defended Breymann Redoubt, Arnold spied an opening, and in a heartbeat he raced for it through a hail of lead. As Morgan and Dearborn attacked it head-on, Arnold led a furious charge toward a pair of cabins that separated the fortifications, then turned his force headlong into the Breymann Redoubt’s unprotected left flank. Dozens of shocked Germans dropped in the rush; countless others ran for their lives.
Arnold had just entered the works when a German soldier fired at him, striking him in the same leg he had nearly lost in the Quebec Expedition. Another bullet killed his horse, which fell and crushed Arnold’s leg beneath it. As Massachusetts soldiers chased off enemy soldiers and burned British tents, Connecticut militiamen carried Arnold off the field. His left leg was ruined, but Arnold would not allow it to be amputated. Several agonizing months of recovery would leave it two inches shorter than the right.
By now darkness had fallen and the Second Battle of Saratoga had ended. At 1:00 a.m., with his army shattered, Burgoyne issued an order for the troops still on the field to withdraw. British and German losses for the day totaled 278 killed, 331 wounded, and 285 captured–roughly half the force that had ventured forth that morning. America
Burgoyne’s army began a quiet retreat north late the next night. Hampered by heavy rain and harassed by American militia, the infantry, artillery, and the bateaux floating up the Hudson River made slow progress. By the evening of October 9 the army had reached Saratoga, only eight miles from the battlefield, with American forces completely surrounding it. Burgoyne opened negotiations on October 14, and after some haggling over terms, Gentleman Johnny surrendered his army three days later.
The most significant result of the American victory was that it convinced Louis XVI of France to support the American cause. On February 6, 1778, American commissioners and the French government signed the Franco-American Alliance. By the middle of March, France and Great Britain were in a state of war. American fortunes would ebb and flow for some time, but French cash, soldiers, and naval support would permanently buttress their efforts.
Gates, whom Arnold called ‘the greatest poltroon in the world and many other genteel qualifications,’ had contributed little to either battle. His plan to hold his position and fight from behind breastworks made tactical sense. But it smacked of extreme caution at a time when his army had a decisive edge in manpower and when aggression was the order of the day. ‘This gentleman [Gates] is a mere child of fortune,’ Major General Nathanael Greene wrote to Brigadier General Alexander McDougall the following January; ‘the foundation of all the Northern successes was laid long before his arrival there; and Arnold and Lincoln were the principal instruments in compleating the work.’ Washington agreed and presented both men with elaborate sets of French epaulets as symbols of his thanks.
Nevertheless, Gates made his name with the victory. Congress authorized the minting of a gold medal in his honor. New Jersey governor William Livingston declared that Gates’s ‘glory is as yet unrivalled in the annals of America.’ In 1780 a crushing defeat in the Battle of Camden, South Carolina, would take much of the luster off Gates’s reputation. The capable Greene would replace him.
Arnold was conspicuously absent from the formal British surrender ceremony at Saratoga. By mid-October he lay convalescing in an Albany hospital. (Lincoln, wounded on October 8, also missed the ceremony.) Gates downplayed Arnold’s role in the battles, but Arnold had essentially directed the first battle and clinched victory in the second. Burgoyne later told Parliament that he had expected, with good reason, that Gates would keep his men within their fixed lines. But when ‘Arnold chose to give rather than receive the attack,’ Burgoyne lost the chance to follow up with a move on Gates’s right (particularly during the second battle). The aggressive tactics convinced British Lieutenant Thomas Anburey, for one, that the Americans were ‘not that contemptible enemy we had hitherto imagined them, incapable of standing a regular engagement, and that they would only fight behind strong earthworks.’
Arnold never again led American troops in battle. His wound kept him on inactive duty until the summer of 1780. On September 25 Arnold fled to the enemy. Papers captured from British officer and spy Major John André revealed that Arnold had plotted to turn West Point over to the British.
Arnold ultimately defected due to perceived grievances he had suffered at the hands of Congress and the military, his mounting debts, corruption charges filed against him by Pennsylvania civil authorities that resulted in Arnold demanding an investigation to clear his name, and his indignation at the French alliance.
Only in recent years have historians fully acknowledged Arnold’s contributions to the American cause. The virtual burial of his outstanding military reputation began as soon as news of his treason came to light. Brigadier General ‘Mad Anthony’ Wayne, for one, suddenly attributed Arnold’s bravery to heavy drinking, ‘even to intoxication.’ In the years since, the name Benedict Arnold has become virtually synonymous with ‘traitor.’
Ironically, it was Arnold–the American general and the hero of Saratoga–who sealed the French alliance that helped guarantee independence for the country he had betrayed.
This article was written by Eric Ethier and originally published in the August 2001 issue of American History Magazine. For more great articles, subscribe to American History magazine today!
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8f6a1c659f0d329460f42948d988e1e3 | https://www.historynet.com/best-vietnam-war-books.htm | Top Five Vietnam Books to Read this Winter | Top Five Vietnam Books to Read this Winter
With the holidays encroaching upon us, Vietnam magazine has pulled together some recommended reads to make your literary season bright (or at least more interesting). Here are 5 of our favorite books from fall and winter 2020 about the Vietnam War and those who served.
.shop-button { background: linear-gradient(rgb(51, 51, 51) 0%, rgb(85, 85, 85) 100%); cursor: pointer; color: white; fill: none; display: inline-block; font: 1em normal Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-weight: 700; padding: 0.5em; stroke-miterlimit: 4; stroke: white; vertical-align: text-bottom; border: 0; } .shop-button:hover { background: var(--secondary-color, black); color: var(--on-secondary, white); fill: none; stroke: black; } .shop-button:active { color: black; fill: none; stroke: black; } .shop-button-container { align-items: center; display: flex; justify-content: left; } .shop-button-text { font-weight: bold; } They Were Soldiers: The Sacrifices and Contributions of our Vietnam Veterans Buy Now By Joseph L. Galloway and Marvin J. Wolf, Nelson Books, 2020
By the time this reviewer returned home from a tour in Vietnam as an artillery battery commander circa 1970, the stereotypical image of Vietnam veterans was well-established in the consciousness of the general public. We were all assumed to be incurably and permanently traumatized by the war: drug-addled, unemployable, homeless misfits; or soulless, psychopathic killers deserving of fear. The typical villain-of-choice in Hollywood films and TV “cop shows” of that era was a “deranged Vietnam vet” driven by combat experiences to commit homicidal mayhem. Years of daily bombardments by “all the bad news that’s fit to print” media coverage of the war convinced the public that those who fought in Vietnam were poor, ignorant dupes who should be either pitied or feared—no “in-between.”
In They Were Soldiers, co-author Marvin J. Wolf explains this egregiously mistaken perception: If Vietnam was a lost cause and ‘a bad’ and ‘unnecessary war,’ that was hardly the fault of those who left homes and loved ones behind to fight for objectives that a lawfully elected government chose to pursue. Nevertheless, the false and misleading generalization persists that Vietnam veterans are a legion of broken soldiers, sailors, and marines, a lost generation, warped and wounded by wartime experiences and rejected by the greater society.
No one I served with in Vietnam expected to come home to a national “Thank You” of ticker-tape parades down Main Street, passing through cheering crowds of grateful Americans waving flags and throwing bouquets. Yet no one I personally know was spat upon, denounced as a “baby killer” and viciously taunted by mobs of war protesters as is so often told by vets who claim to “distinctly remember” such abuse. Maybe it happened; it just didn’t happen to me or anyone I served with. It seems such claims have become some obligatory Vietnam War vet cliché, a “must-repeat anecdote” required of all vets, regardless of whether it happened to them or not. Myself and most vets I know arrived home quietly and anonymously (in my case at Travis Air Force Base in California during the middle of the night), caught a connecting flight to an airport near home, kissed our wives, proceeded to get on with our lives.
Overwhelmingly, the nearly 3 million Americans who served in Vietnam (over two-thirds volunteers) have lived productive and successful lives making the United States a better place for all Americans to live and prosper. However, documented proof of the successes and contributions of Vietnam vets has been sparse and not widely publicized—until now.
Thankfully, authors Wolf and Joseph L. Galloway tell the stories of nearly half a hundred Vietnam vets who served nobly—sometimes heroically—and went on to forge outstanding careers in private and public life, much like the heralded “Greatest Generation” of World War II vets. Wolf explains: “[But] now…it is possible to see the real accomplishments of America’s Vietnam generation. Like [their] parents, the so-called Greatest Generation, [their] efforts have transformed America in myriad ways: America is immeasurably richer, fairer, and better because of the Vietnam generation’s contributions. [In this book] you will meet some Vietnam veterans, men and women who sacrificed for their country, who returned to a nation that turned its back on them, and who nevertheless went on with their lives, made further sacrifices and important contributions to their families, to their communities, and to the commonweal. [They] are living proof that the Vietnam generation is every bit as worthy of respect and admiration as the generations that preceded [them].”
The authors present 48 Vietnam vet stories in four categories: Artists and Professionals; Healers; Officeholders; and Government Service. The interesting and inspiring stories comprise both men and women, American-born and Vietnamese, united by their distinguished service in Vietnam and later outstanding contributions to the United States. I personally worked for or with three of the book’s vets: Colin Powell, Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman and secretary of state; Barry McCaffrey, commander of the U.S. Southern Command and director of National Drug Control Policy; and Dick Armitage, deputy secretary of state for Powell.
Other vets whose names will be recognized by many include Jan Scruggs, who came up with the idea for the Vietnam Veterans Memorial; Oliver Stone, Academy Award-winning filmmaker; Frederick W. Smith, founder of FedEx; Charles “Chuck” Hagel, former U.S. senator and defense secretary; and Diane Carlson Evans, a nurse who led the effort to build the Vietnam Women’s Memorial. These inspiring stories of Vietnam vets’ “sacrifice and contributions” are heartfelt and authentic.
The authors clearly know of what they write. Galloway, co-author with Lt. Gen. Hal Moore of We Were Soldiers Once…and Young and We Are Soldiers Still, served four tours in Vietnam as a reporter, received the Bronze Star Medal for his actions in the 1965 Battle of Ia Drang and is the “Ernie Pyle” of the Vietnam War. Joe epitomizes the character, courage and commitment to the humble “GI serviceman” exemplified by the beloved WWII reporter Pyle until he fell to Japanese machine-gun fire during the 1945 Okinawa campaign. Wolfe received one of only 60 battlefield promotions from enlisted man to officer during the Vietnam War and has published 17 books. —Jerry Morelock
.shop-button { background: linear-gradient(rgb(51, 51, 51) 0%, rgb(85, 85, 85) 100%); cursor: pointer; color: white; fill: none; display: inline-block; font: 1em normal Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-weight: 700; padding: 0.5em; stroke-miterlimit: 4; stroke: white; vertical-align: text-bottom; border: 0; } .shop-button:hover { background: var(--secondary-color, black); color: var(--on-secondary, white); fill: none; stroke: black; } .shop-button:active { color: black; fill: none; stroke: black; } .shop-button-container { align-items: center; display: flex; justify-content: left; } .shop-button-text { font-weight: bold; } Long Daze at Long Binh, South Vietnam, 1966-68 Buy Now By Stephen H Donovan and Frederick Borchardt
Anyone who has seen the movie or TV show M*A*S*H knows the show’s setting is in Korea but its spirit is in Vietnam. Well, imagine M*A*S*H actually set in Vietnam. That’s what the authors of Long Daze at Long Binh do with the anecdote-filled story of their time as medics at the 24th Evacuation Hospital in Long Binh, a large military base about 20 miles northeast of Saigon.
Steve Donovan and Fred Borchardt alternately prod each other to revive the details of one amusing memory after the next. Their tales may raise a nostalgic smile among the vast majority of American participants in the Vietnam War since there has to be something among the succession of shaggy dog stories to which everyone in that war can relate.
For that small band of brothers who humped the boonies and wonder what gives support troops in the rear the right to say anything about the war, need I remind you of the roles they played when you were wounded or came back to a semi-edible meal or needed more ammo or lined up for your paycheck or handed in the paperwork for your trip home?
In any case, if one of the authors’ attempts at Vietnam humor falls flat, there’ll be another around the next corner that may not. —Jon Guttman
.shop-button { background: linear-gradient(rgb(51, 51, 51) 0%, rgb(85, 85, 85) 100%); cursor: pointer; color: white; fill: none; display: inline-block; font: 1em normal Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-weight: 700; padding: 0.5em; stroke-miterlimit: 4; stroke: white; vertical-align: text-bottom; border: 0; } .shop-button:hover { background: var(--secondary-color, black); color: var(--on-secondary, white); fill: none; stroke: black; } .shop-button:active { color: black; fill: none; stroke: black; } .shop-button-container { align-items: center; display: flex; justify-content: left; } .shop-button-text { font-weight: bold; } Storms over the Mekong: Major Battles of the Vietnam War Buy Now By William P. Head, Texas A&M University Press, 2020
Military historian William Head’s latest book on the Vietnam War was an enormous undertaking. Head, the chief historian at the 78th Air Base Wing History Office at Robins Air Force Base in Georgia, took on the complex task of researching and analyzing what he calls nine of the war’s “most significant and game-changing combat events.” All battles in the book were significant during the American effort in Vietnam and each changed the course of the war.
Head dives deep into these battles. His portrayals of four of them could easily stand on their own as concise books about their subjects, including the chapters on the Battle of the Ia Drang Valley in 1965 and the siege of Khe Sanh in 1968. The other two longest and most detailed chapters deal with Head’s longtime Vietnam War specialty: the U.S. air war. Those chapters cover Operation Rolling Thunder (1965-68) and what Head terms the “air battles” after Rolling Thunder: Operations Arc Light, Command Hunt I-VII, Menu, the 1972 North Vietnamese Easter Offensive and Linebacker I and II.
Head delves into the best secondary and primary sources to describe and analyze each engagement in detail, including maps. He presents each battle predominantly from the American military perspective, covering overall strategies and battle tactics and summarizing what historians, politicians and pundits have to say about them. He then comes to his own conclusions about why the battles took place and why they turned out as they did. Head also offers his judgment on each battle’s impact on the overall struggle in Vietnam. The last chapter takes a big-picture look at the war.
Head believes most of these engagements were tactically successful but strategically disastrous—especially true of the 1968 Tet Offensive and the Khe Sanh siege.
“There is truth in the U.S. claim of victory at Khe Sanh and during the Tet Offensive,” he writes. However, “the unintended psychological victory of the Vietnamese communists during this period led to the beginning of the end for the American presence in Vietnam.”
According to Head, the infamous Battle of Hamburger Hill in May 1969 was “another bloody tactical victory” for the United States, yet also “another that became a strategic defeat.” After so many troops lost their lives taking that hill, the brass almost immediately gave it back to the enemy, creating “a public outrage,” Head writes. That reaction “led to a reassessment of U.S. policy and its commitment to South Vietnam.” Consequently, U.S. Army Gen. Creighton Abrams was forced by President Richard Nixon to end his policy of “maximum pressure” against the North Vietnamese Army.
Soon Nixon began withdrawing U.S. ground forces under his “Vietnamization” program to gradually turn all combat operations over to South Vietnamese forces.
Head offers a similar critique of the air campaign. The U.S. “did not lose in Vietnam for lack of an air effort,” he states, “even though one can argue the lack of a focused air effort over the North from 1965 to 1968, and the collateral damage wrought in the South due to the air campaigns, cost the allies popular support and squandered any real possibility of military success.”
One minor criticism is that the title and cover art—a painting of two infantrymen in the field with helicopters roaring overhead—do not reflect the breadth of the book’s subject. The subtitle, however, resolves that.
Storms over the Mekong is a valuable book. It is a good starting point for anyone seeking to learn the main military lessons of the Vietnam War and how major engagements during the war contributed to its final outcome. — Marc Leepson
.shop-button { background: linear-gradient(rgb(51, 51, 51) 0%, rgb(85, 85, 85) 100%); cursor: pointer; color: white; fill: none; display: inline-block; font: 1em normal Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-weight: 700; padding: 0.5em; stroke-miterlimit: 4; stroke: white; vertical-align: text-bottom; border: 0; } .shop-button:hover { background: var(--secondary-color, black); color: var(--on-secondary, white); fill: none; stroke: black; } .shop-button:active { color: black; fill: none; stroke: black; } .shop-button-container { align-items: center; display: flex; justify-content: left; } .shop-button-text { font-weight: bold; } Spreading Inkblots from Da Nang to the DMZ: The Origins and Implementation of U.S. Marine Corps Counterinsurgency Strategy in Vietnam, March 1965 to November 1968 Buy Now By David Strachan-Morris, Helion & Co., 2020
Counterinsurgency was one of the American military’s few strategic programs that seemed to have some success in Vietnam. The primary tool of the Marine Corps’ counterinsurgency effort was the Combined Action Platoon. CAP units tried to counter the influence of the Viet Cong in rural villages and turn their allegiance to the South Vietnamese government, a process known as “winning hearts and minds,” or pacification. To gain a village’s support, the CAP Marines created defense plans for protection against Viet Cong attacks, provided medical care, built schools and helped establish local entrepreneurial enterprises.
British army veteran and University of Leicester history lecturer David Strachan-Morris analyzes the effectiveness of those programs in Spreading Inkblots from Da Nang to the DMZ. He explains that the CAP counterinsurgency method began with joint military and civilian projects done in concert with “local indigenous forces” employing “economic and political means” to “pacify” an individual village. Once that was accomplished, those pacified villages ideally would “gradually expand outwards until the areas linked up and a whole region, or even country, was brought back under government control,” like spreading ink blots.
Strachan-Morris gives the general concept of counterinsurgency a passing grade, with the caveat that it is “not enough by itself to win wars.” Looking at the Marine Corps program specifically, he sees only middling effectiveness. He concedes that CAP and other hearts-and-minds programs often constituted an “effective tool” at the “operational or tactical level,” but they had little impact on the overall war effort. Most of the positive results occurred “within a specific area” for “a specific period of time.”
Strachan-Morris attributes the limited success of the Marines’ CAP initiative and other pacification efforts to interservice rivalry between the Army and Marines in setting American strategy. Army Gen. William Westmoreland, the top U.S. commander as head of Military Assistance Command, Vietnam, during the critical years 1964-68, famously was no fan of the hearts-and-minds approach, or the Marines for that matter.
Westmoreland “did not believe that pacification had no place in the ground war in Vietnam, he just didn’t necessarily believe that it was a matter for the U.S. military,” Strachan-Morris writes. That’s why Westmoreland was lukewarm at best to Marine commanders’ plans to divert significant resources to counterinsurgency programs.
Additionally, Westmoreland—at least at the start of the big American troop buildup—resented having to deal with his Marine brothers-in-arms. Adm. U.S. Grant Sharp, the commander of naval forces in the Pacific, told Marine Commandant Gen. Wallace Green in June 1965 that Westmoreland and Maxwell Taylor, then U.S. ambassador to South Vietnam and a senior adviser to President Lyndon B. Johnson, “do not like Marines and will do everything to prevent the Marine Corps from getting credit for their accomplishments in South Vietnam,” as Strachan-Morris recounts.
The 158-page book, which began life as the author’s doctorate dissertation, is not exactly a rapid-read, page-turner. Readers will encounter some dense sentences and detailed charts and graphs. On the other hand, Spreading Inkblots is filled with facts and analysis based on solid primary- source evidence. It provides a valuable overview of a comparatively little-known aspect of the American war in Vietnam and an in-depth assessment of how the counterinsurgency effort’s plusses and minuses fit into the military’s overall strategic picture. —Marc Leepson
.shop-button { background: linear-gradient(rgb(51, 51, 51) 0%, rgb(85, 85, 85) 100%); cursor: pointer; color: white; fill: none; display: inline-block; font: 1em normal Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-weight: 700; padding: 0.5em; stroke-miterlimit: 4; stroke: white; vertical-align: text-bottom; border: 0; } .shop-button:hover { background: var(--secondary-color, black); color: var(--on-secondary, white); fill: none; stroke: black; } .shop-button:active { color: black; fill: none; stroke: black; } .shop-button-container { align-items: center; display: flex; justify-content: left; } .shop-button-text { font-weight: bold; } Operation Linebacker I 1972: The first high-tech air war Buy Now By Marshall L. Michel III, Osprey Publishing, 2019
On March 30, 1972, a dozen divisions of North Vietnamese soldiers and armor entered South Vietnam, not as an infiltrating supplement to the Viet Cong in the south, but as a conventional invasion force. With almost all American ground forces withdrawn from the country and the Army of the Republic of Vietnam hard-pressed in all sectors, the only recourse left to the United States was air power.
But in contrast to President Lyndon B. Johnson and his ill-executed Operation Rolling Thunder (1965-68), President Richard Nixon unleashed Operation Linebacker with none of its predecessor’s restrictions on bombing North Vietnam. Besides making strategic strikes on the North, B-52 Stratofortress aircraft rained death on whatever they caught out in the open, while close air support helped ARVN forces to hold onto Kontum in South Vietnam’s Central Highlands and An Loc farther south and to eventually retake Quang Tri in northern South Vietnam.
In a prequel to his earlier offering in Osprey’s Air Campaign series, Operation Linebacker II 1972, U.S. Air Force veteran Marshall L. Michel III takes a hard look at the motivations and miscalculations on both sides in Operation Linebacker I 1972.
Aside from being an all-out aerial confrontation, Linebacker I was noteworthy as “the first high-tech air war,” Michel contends.
North Vietnam had honed its triad of MiG-21 fighter jets, SA-2 surface-to-air missiles and anti-aircraft artillery, coordinated by ground control, into the world’s most formidable air defense system. On the American side, the aircraft attacked with an unprecedented arsenal of electronic tricks up their sleeves and Navy fighters were ready to take on the MiGs with air crews schooled in air-to-air combat through the Top Gun training program.
The result, Michel believes, was not a complete U.S. victory but enough of a tactical success to save Saigon and bring Hanoi back to the Paris peace talks. The Linebacker I campaign also field-tested a deadly array of advanced weapons for future conflicts.
One curious oversight in the author’s otherwise excellent research is attributing the North Vietnamese invasion plan primarily to Gen. Vo Nguyen Giap, without so much as a mention of Le Duan, who had politically outmaneuvered both Giap and Ho Chi Minh to advance his own costly agenda of waging war with “big battles” rather than guerrilla fighters. —Jon Guttman
Each of these book reviews has been featured in Vietnam magazine.
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37159b1706767e06fb691264d8c99ef9 | https://www.historynet.com/betrayal-at-ebenezer-creek.htm | Betrayal at Ebenezer Creek | Betrayal at Ebenezer Creek
What Davis perhaps forgot was that the able-bodied male fugitives–sturdy workmen like these ex-slaves in Virginia– were serving as pioneers, carving a path for his corps. (National Archives)
Brigadier General Jefferson C. Davis had few complaints about the able-bodied black men who were supplying the muscle and sweat to keep his Union XIV Corps on the move with Major General William T. Sherman’s 62,000-man army. The black ‘pioneers’ were making the sandy roads passable for heavy wagons and removing obstacles that Rebel troops had placed in his path. Davis was irritated, though, by the few thousand other black refugees following his force toward Georgia’s coast. He had been unable to shake them since the Union army stormed through Atlanta and other places in Georgia in late 1864, liberating them from their owners.
The army fed the pioneers in exchange for their labor. It also took care of the refugees who worked as teamsters, cooks, and servants. It did not, however, assume responsibility for the others. So every day, hundreds of black women, children, and older men wandered into the camps, begging for food. That was not so bad when forage was plentiful, but fall had turned to winter and the sandy soil closer to the ocean was not exactly fertile. Living well off the land was but a fond memory.
‘The rich, rolling uplands of the interior were left behind, and we descended into the low, flat sandy country that borders for perhaps a hundred miles upon the sea,’ recalled Captain Charles A. Hopkins of the 13th New Jersey Infantry. ‘…The country is largely filled with a magnificent growth of stately pines, their trunks free–for sixty or seventy feet–from all branches…. These pine woods, though beautiful, were not fertile and rations–particularly of breadstuffs–began to fail and had to be eked out [supplemented] by rice, of which we found large quantities; but also found it, with our lack of appliances, very difficult to hull.’
Besides exacerbating the food-shortage problem, the refugees tested Davis’s volatile temper by slowing down his march. Davis was eager to reach Savannah, the destination of Sherman’s 250-mile destructive ‘March to the Sea’ from Atlanta to Georgia’s coast. But at every step of the 25 miles left in Davis’s march, the XIV Corps would have to contend with Major General Joseph Wheeler’s Confederate cavalry corps, a constant hindrance and annoyance. Quicker movement would make it easier to evade the Rebel horseman as well as to defend against them.
So as Davis’s men approached the 165-feet-wide and 10-feet-deep swollen and icy Ebenezer Creek on December 3, the general envisioned more than merely another mass pontoon-bridge crossing. He saw an opportunity to rid himself of the refugees in a manner he thought would be subtle enough to elude censure. Controversy might follow, but he was used to that.
General Jefferson Davis, known to some by the derisive nickname ‘General Reb’ because of his name, was a veteran Regular Army soldier who loved battle. Short-tempered and a proficient cusser, he had a nasty reputation and was infamous in his time for a furious, short-lived feud with Union Major General William Nelson. In August 1862 Nelson and Davis had got into a heated argument over the defense of Louisville, Kentucky, where Nelson was in command. Nelson ordered Davis, a brigadier general, to leave. The two men met again a few weeks later in a Cincinnati hotel. Davis demanded an apology from his superior, and Nelson stubbornly refused to give him one. Minutes later the angry brigadier shot and killed the major general at point-blank range. Davis was arrested but later released. Though plenty of questions went unanswered, no charges were ever filed against him.
As the XIV Corps prepared to cross Ebenezer Creek, Davis ordered that the refugees be held back, ostensibly ‘for their own safety’ because Wheeler’s horsemen would contest the advance. ‘On the pretense that there was likely to be fighting in front, the negroes were told not to go upon the pontoon bridge until all the troops and wagons were over,’ explained Colonel Charles D. Kerr of the 126th Illinois Cavalry, which was at the rear of the XIV Corps.
‘A guard was detailed to enforce the order, ‘ Kerr recalled. ‘But, patient and docile as the negroes always were, the guard was really unnecessary.’
Though what happened once Davis’s troops had all crossed remains in dispute, it seems fairly certain that Davis had the pontoon bridge dismantled immediately, leaving the refugees stranded on the creek’s far bank. Kerr wrote that as soon as the Federals reached their destination, ‘orders were given to the engineers to take up the pontoons and not let a negro cross.’
‘The order was obeyed to the letter,’ he continued. ‘I sat upon my horse then and witnessed a scene the like of which I pray my eyes may never see again.’
How many women, children, and older men were stranded cannot be determined precisely, but 5,000 is a conservative estimate. ‘The great number of refugees that followed us…could be counted almost by the tens of thousands,’ Captain Hopkins of New Jersey guessed. Major General Oliver O. Howard, commander of the right wing of Sherman’s army (which included Davis’s corps), recalled seeing ‘throngs of escaping slaves’ of all types, ‘from the baby in arms to the old negro hobbling painfully along the line of march; negroes of all sizes, in all sorts of patched costumes, with carts and broken-down horses and mules to match.’ Because the able-bodied refugees were up front working in the pioneer corps, most of those stranded would have been women, children, and old men.
What happened next strongly suggests that Davis did not have the refugees’ best interest in mind when he delayed their crossing of the creek, to say nothing of his apparently having ordered that the bridge promptly be dismantled. Davis’s unabashed support of slavery definitely does not help his case, though Sherman insisted his brigadier bore no ‘hostility to the negro.’
Painting by Dave Russell
Kerr saw Wheeler’s cavalry ‘closely pressing’ the refugees from the rear. Unarmed and helpless, the former slaves ‘raised their hands and implored from the corps commander the protection they had been promised,’ Kerr wrote. ‘…[but] the prayer was in vain and, with cries of anguish and despair, men, women and children rushed by hundreds into the turbid stream and many were drowned before our eyes.’
Then there were the refugees who stood their ground. ‘From what we learned afterwards of those who remained upon the land,’ Kerr continued, ‘their fate at the hands of Wheeler’s troops was scarcely to be preferred.’ The refugees not shot or slashed to death were most likely returned to their masters and slavery.
Kerr’s descriptions of the atrocity apparently met widespread skepticism, and he was forced to defend his integrity. ‘I speak of what I saw with my own eyes, not those of another,’ he asserted, ‘and no writer who was not upon the ground can gloss the matter over for me.’ Still, he left it to another officer, Major James A. Connolly of Illinois, to blow the whistle on Davis. ‘I wrote out a rough draft of a letter today relative to General Davis’ treatment of the negroes at Ebenezer Creek,’ Connolly wrote two weeks after the incident. ‘I want the matter to get before the Military Committee of the Senate. It may give them some light in regard to the propriety of confirming him as Brevet Major General. I am not certain yet who I had better send it to.’
Connolly decided to send the letter to his congressman, who evidently leaked it to the press. Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton reacted to the subsequent bad publicity by steaming down to Savannah, which Sherman’s army had captured on December 21, to investigate the matter. Stanton did not preannounce his visit, but Sherman had received advance notice about it from President Abraham Lincoln’s chief-of-staff, Major General Henry W. Halleck. ‘They say that you have manifested an almost criminal dislike to the negro…, [that] you drove them from your ranks, preventing their following you by cutting the bridges in your rear and thus caused the massacre of large numbers by Wheeler’s cavalry,’ Halleck wrote.
Stanton arrived on January 11 and began asking questions. ‘Stanton inquired particularly about General Jeff. C. Davis, who he said was a Democrat and hostile to the negro,’ Sherman later wrote. Stanton showed Sherman a newspaper account of the affair and demanded an explanation. Sherman urged the secretary not to jump to conclusions and, in his postwar memoirs, reported that he ‘explained the matter to [Stanton’s] entire satisfaction.’ He went on to say that Stanton had come to Savannah mainly because of pressure from abolitionist Radical Republicans. ‘We all felt sympathy…for those poor negroes…,’ Sherman wrote, ‘but a sympathy of a different sort from that of Mr. Stanton, which was not of pure humanity but of politics.’
Sherman’s attitude toward black people is perhaps best illustrated in his own words, in a private letter he wrote to his wife, Ellen, shortly before he left Savannah to continue his march up the coast. ‘Mr. Stanton has been here and is cured of that negro nonsense,’ he wrote. ‘[Secretary of the Treasury Salmon P.] Chase and others have written to me to modify my opinions, but you know I cannot, for if I attempt the part of a hypocrite it would break out in every sentence. I want soldiers made of the best bone and muscle in the land, and won’t attempt military feats with doubtful materials.’ As he admitted in his memoirs, ‘In our army we had no negro soldiers and, as a rule, we preferred white soldiers.’
‘The negro question was beginning to loom up…and many foresaw that not only would the slaves secure their freedom, but that they would also have votes,’ his memoirs further reveal. ‘I did not dream of such a result then, but knew that slavery, as such, was dead forever; [yet I] did not suppose that the former slaves would be suddenly, without preparation, manufactured into voters–equal to all others, politically and socially.’
In course, when considering Sherman and his actions, it’s important to remember that his ideas about black people, though shocking today, were hardly unique in his time. The majority of Union volunteers, and of Northerners in general, were at most ambivalent about emancipation and were vehemently opposed to black suffrage.
Given the prevailing beliefs of the time, it might be no surprise that Union authorities justified the incident at Ebenezer Creek as a ‘military necessity.’ None of the officers involved was even officially reprimanded. Most of them advanced in their military and, later, civilian careers.
Davis’s commander, Howard, who had been described as ‘the most Christian gentleman in the Union army,’ went on to found Howard University, a black college in Washington, D.C. He also became the first director of the Freedmen’s Bureau, which the Federal government set up to help the recently freed slaves make the transition from slave to citizen.
Wheeler’s cavalry was roundly condemned for its part in the affair, but the reputation of its young commander was evidently not harmed. Wheeler went on to serve in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1885 to 1900 and as a major general of volunteers in the Spanish-American War in 1898.
Davis handled the Ebenezer Creek commotion with the same coolness that had taken him back to battlefield command so soon after the Nelson shooting. Again he was never punished or even reprimanded. In fact, he was later made a brevet major general.
Then there is William T. Sherman, the field commander ultimately responsible for Davis’s actions. Sherman was rewarded with the Thanks of Congress for the revolutionary ‘total war’ he waged during his March to the Sea. At the May 1865 Grand Review of the Armies, the huge parade through Washington, D.C., to celebrate Union victory, Sherman was hailed as a war hero. A few years later, newly elected President Ulysses S. Grant made Sherman a full general and general-in-chief of the U.S. Army.
Sometime during those postwar years, Sherman offered a rosy recollection of the reception he and his men had received as they marched through Georgia. ‘…the Negroes were simply frantic with joy,’ he said. ‘Whenever they heard my name, they clustered about my horse, shouted and prayed in their peculiar style, which had a natural eloquence that would have moved a stone.’ Apparently, though, it did not move Sherman deeply enough to make him seek justice for the soon-forgotten victims of the Ebenezer Creek incident.
This article was written by Edward M. Churchill and originally published in Civil War Times Magazine in October 1998.
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a87d6a805a44390e3e9cd462af00317e | https://www.historynet.com/big-ben-americas-secret-agent.htm | American History Review: Big Ben, America’s Secret Agent | American History Review: Big Ben, America’s Secret Agent
While in London, Benjamin Franklin helped foment a plot involving a slave that contributed to the colonies’ separation from Great Britain Somersett: Or Why and How Benjamin Franklin Orchestrated the American Revolution by Phillip Goodrich, philgoodrichauthor.com, 2020; $15.95 Diplomat, writer, scientist, and Founding Father Benjamin Franklin helped draft the Declaration of Independence and U.S. Constitution, and signed both. So much has been written about him that you may wonder if there’s anything left to discover. Enter Phillip Goodrich. The author—a practicing general surgeon and amateur history buff—takes readers deep into Franklin’s psyche and the intrigue leading to the American Revolution. His route runs from Franklin’s frenetic efforts to secure aid for Pennsylvania from its Penn family proprietors during the French and Indian War to his trip to London in 1757 to make additional appeals for that aid to pondering alternatives after losing his appeals and being humiliated when presenting colonists’ grievances. Franklin’s inner circle of Thomas Pownall and Quakers Dr. John Fothergill and David Barclay, meeting regularly at Fothergill’s lodgings on Harpur Street, slowly face the inevitability and necessity of independence for the American colonies. “This requires,†says Franklin’s Scottish philosopher friend David Hume, replying to a hypothetical question posed by Franklin, “a single protagonist throughout the process to maintain that provocation.†Franklin reluctantly comes to realize he would have to be that protagonist. But Franklin needs a catalyst—at least one legally manumitted, or freed, American or British slave—to ignite the simmering coals of unrest in the colonies. Such a catalyst presents himself on June 22, 1772, when British slave William Somersett, for whom the book is named, is freed by Lord Mansfield of the Court of Kings Bench, a case with ramifications on both sides of the Atlantic. Franklin has prepared for this day and immediately sets his plan in motion with a coded editorial in The London Chronicle using Quaker pronouns to alert his Philadelphia Quaker friend Anthony Benezet, who forwards Franklin’s previously written provocative letters to John Hancock for mailing to colonial leaders. The die is cast. Goodrich’s well-written, well-researched, somewhat folksy narrative history reads like a thriller. His thesis, that Franklin surreptitiously orchestrated the American Revolution, is well-developed. But he leaves us hanging, wondering why Somersett is so important, until half-way through the book. Although the end is well-known—the colonies gain independence—there are enough twists and turns along the way to captivate historians and fiction lovers alike. Even those who think they know the details of Franklin’s life and the seeds of the Revolutionary War will learn something new in this book. —Alice Watts contributes regularly. This post contains affiliate links. If you buy something through our site, we might earn a commission. Thanks!
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25411b47bccd1abf0aad509d37f1532d | https://www.historynet.com/big-ears-three-and-the-battle-of-bien-hoa.htm | ‘Big Ears Three’ and the Battle of Bien Hoa | ‘Big Ears Three’ and the Battle of Bien Hoa
A 19-year-old sentry assigned to a listening post at a U.S. air base gets caught in the crossfire during a Viet Cong attack.
On January 29, 1968, the night sky above the sprawling Bien Hoa Air Base, where I was on sentry patrol, appeared to be on fire. Large numbers of flares shot high into the air and burst into brilliant light, illuminating the landscape before slowly descending to earth. The flares, accompanied by the occasional rattle of mixed rifle and machine gun fire, marked a celebration of Tet, Vietnam’s lunar New Year. I observed the sight from my post at a fuel dump and hoped the remainder of the night would be quiet.
As the hours dragged into January 30, one of our squadron’s three-man security alert teams pulled up in a vehicle and told me that the bases at Da Nang and Pleiku had been attacked at 3:30 a.m. and that Bien Hoa, about 60 miles north of Saigon, might be on the enemy’s hit list. In addition to checking on sentries, security teams patrolled their designated area. If the teams detected any attempted penetration of the barbed-wire fence around the base’s perimeter, they would greet the Viet Cong with slugs from an M60 machine gun and M16 rifles, as well as rounds from a 40mm grenade launcher.
Only minutes after the team had driven away to check the next post, an enemy rocket suddenly screamed over me and struck a nearby hangar, severely damaging the structure and the aircraft inside. Seconds later, the air-raid siren let everyone know Bien Hoa was under attack. More missiles struck randomly across the base. The unguided Chinese-made rockets (105mm and 122mm) had a limited range but caused serious damage wherever they landed. That rocket attack, however, was nothing compared to the life-and-death struggle I would face over the next 36 hours.
I had arrived at Bien Hoa early in January and was assigned to the 3rd Security Police Squadron, part of the U.S. Air Force’s overall security force in Southeast Asia. Trained as a specialist in police security after enlisting in the Air Force in September 1966, I was first assigned to Sewart Air Force Base near Nashville, Tennessee, in 1967. In the late 1960s the base had become a bustling center of intensive training for crews flying Lockheed C-130 Hercules and de Havilland DHC-7 Caribou transport planes. Many of those crews were bound for South Vietnam and Thailand, and our squadron’s job was to provide security for Sewart. Bored with what I considered to be mundane duty and ready for some excitement, I volunteered for a transfer to South Vietnam. The Air Force gladly obliged, and early in January 1968 I was winging my way across the Pacific Ocean in a Boeing 707 packed with soldiers, airmen, sailors and Marines.
Within 24 hours of arriving at Bien Hoa, I began about three weeks of intensive combat training. The instruction prepared us to defend the base from an attack that intelligence sources indicated could occur any day. The squadron, a force of more than 100 men under the command of Lt. Col. Joseph A. Lynn, was part of the 3rd Combat Support Group of the Pacific Air Forces. It had been protecting the base since November 1965. In January 1968, however, the unit was generally unprepared both in manpower and weaponry for any major assault. Bien Hoa had two east-west runways (each nearly 2 miles long) that were used by the U.S. Air Force, Army, Navy and Marine Corps, as well as the South Vietnamese Air Force, chiefly for bombing missions and close air support to assist ground troops fighting the Viet Cong.
After the combat training, I was assigned to a Quick Reaction Force, which gave me the opportunity to learn even more about the base and its security procedures. I stood my first post alone on January 8 and occasionally served as a Security Alert Team member until January 30, when the rumor mill really went into overdrive after intelligence indicated that a massive attack throughout South Vietnam was imminent. My experiences over the next 36 hours were etched so deeply in my memory that even today I can recall in detail the sights and sounds of combat. Above all, however, I remember the searing stench of death in my nostrils.
It began the afternoon of January 30 when we hurried to prepare all of the squadron’s resources, human and material. At guard post we were again told a night attack was coming. The officers and senior noncommissioned officers said we were to defend the base “at all costs”—words that generated intense fear in a 19-year-old kid from a dairy farm in South Jersey.
A staff sergeant and I were assigned to Defense Post 3 on the far east end of the base. Each of us carried an M16 with plenty of ammunition, along with a hand-held Motorola radio for communications with the 3rd Security Police Squadron’s command post on the base. Our primary purpose was to listen for any evidence of enemy troop movements just outside the perimeter, and we were given the code name “Big Ears Three.” About 2 a.m. on January 31, a truck took us to a section of the perimeter fence along the east end of the base.
Our post was about a quarter-mile from Bunker Hill 10. The bunker, inside the perimeter fence, was manned by a small group from our squadron, equipped with M60s, M16s, .38-caliber Smith & Wesson “Combat Masterpiece” revolvers and 40mm grenade launchers. The staff sergeant and I spent the early hours of the night lying on the ground and listening for any unusual activity in a village uncomfortably close to the other side of the fence. Occasionally we would check in with the command post, but the night remained relatively calm.
At 3 a.m. January 31, that calm was shattered when the first of more than 150 rockets, backed up by a barrage of mortar fire, roared across the sky to strike the base. The airborne attack lasted for one hour and was aimed chiefly at the flight line, where planes were parked within fortified walls. The aircraft included U.S. Air Force North American F-100 Super Sabres, twin-engine Cessna A-37 attack jets and piston-powered Douglas A-1 Skyraiders flown primarily by the South Vietnamese. The fusillade of rockets and mortars was the initial phase of the Viet Cong’s plan to neutralize Bien Hoa Air Base. The enemy forces reasoned (correctly) that they would have a better chance of conquering Saigon if they could prevent the base from providing effective air support to the city’s defenders.
Bien Hoa, we found out, was not the only target during the night of Jan. 30-31, 1968. A massive, well-planned and coordinated offensive was launched across South Vietnam during Tet. About 100 cities and 20 air bases were attacked by more than 80,000 North Vietnamese and Viet Cong troops, including two infantry battalions and an infantry company assigned to destroy Bien Hoa’s formidable air power. When the aerial bombardment ended at about 4 a.m., ground forces almost immediately began a direct assault on Bunker Hill 10.
Big Ears Three was ordered to hold its position and, if possible, help defend Bunker Hill 10’s right flank against the waves of enemy troops. Only a few minutes after the ground attack began, a Russian-made rocket-propelled grenade struck the road about 50 feet from where the sergeant and I were positioned. We were showered with dirt and debris from the RPG’s impact but were not hit by any flying shrapnel. That grenade, however, made it clear to me that the enemy knew where we were. Trembling with fear, I cautiously crawled out to the road to see what was happening at Bunker Hill 10. A major firefight was in progress there. It seemed surreal—screaming men, machine gun fire, RPG explosions, the staccato sound of small arms all jumbled together to create a cacophony of death and destruction.
I reported what I had seen to the sergeant, who tried to tell the command post about the hot battle at the east end of the runway, but he couldn’t get through because there was so much radio traffic. He was still trying to relay that information when a 1½-ton truck slowly drove by us, obviously headed for Bunker Hill 10. Perhaps the driver was trying to resupply the bunker with much-needed ammunition. The truck had traveled about 50 yards beyond our post when it took a direct hit from an RPG. The round blew the cab to pieces and sent the steel roof flying upward end-over-end as the flaming wreckage careened into a ditch on the side of the road.
Although I could see that a small number of the enemy had fought their way past Bunker Hill 10, many more were lying dead in front of it and along the perimeter road, victims of the ferocious fighting in and out of the bunker. The sight was made even worse by the bullet-riddled bodies of the attackers. Some were hanging in one piece across the perimeter’s barbed wire, but the bodies of others had been torn to shreds by M60s and were sprawled grotesquely on the killing field.
It was obvious that we were in no position to help Bunker Hill 10. The sergeant, finally able to reach the command post on the radio, requested permission to fall back across the road and take up a defensive stance that would give us a better field of fire. His request was denied several times before we were finally ordered to proceed across a large field behind us toward the base’s flight line.
Unfortunately, by the time we received that order, the sergeant and I had become mixed in with the enemy soldiers who had managed to bypass Bunker Hill 10. The field was dominated by grass as high as 8 to 10 feet. With the sergeant leading the way, we raced through the grass in the general direction of the flight line. The tall grass, however, was so thick that it not only slowed our progress but also wrenched the M16 out of my right hand, taking away my only weapon.
It was decision time: keep moving or go retrieve that rifle. I stopped in my tracks, wheeled around and ran back to where I hoped the M16 had fallen. I remember praying out loud, “Oh, God! Please help me!” My hands were shaking badly as I fell to my knees and frantically began to search the ground. A few seconds later my hand hit the rifle. I picked up the weapon and resumed my run toward the flight line.
I had not gone more than 50 feet when a bullet whizzed by my right ear so close the earlobe fluttered. I will never forget the distinct sound of that bullet, probably fired from an AK-47 assault rifle belonging to a Viet Cong who was catching up to me. The adrenalin kicked in and my legs shifted into high gear until I was out of the grass. Finally in the open, I was able to see the sergeant and threw myself down beside him in a small depression that afforded us only minimal cover. Our location was not good. We were still short of the flight line and in the same general area as the enemy. Thanks to a dead radio battery, the sergeant was unable to inform the command post of our new position.
By now it was about 6 a.m., and the dawn was slowly beginning to illuminate the battlefield. That allowed aircraft to take over the defense of the air base’s east end. Helicopters from the Army’s 334th Gunship Company, based at Bien Hoa, soon detected the enemy troops in the field where we were hunkered down. Their gunships, Bell UH-1 Iroquois “Hueys” and AH-1 Cobras, made repeated strafing runs, flying very low over our position and blasting rocket and machine gun fire with devastating success. Many of those rockets hit their human targets so close to where we were lying that every impact caused us to bounce a few inches off the ground and plop down again. The sergeant feared we would be killed by our own forces.
Amid all the confusion of the battle, I heard another helicopter coming in for what I assumed would be a firing pass from behind our position. I turned and looked up to see a Cobra bearing down on us. The helicopter fired a salvo of rockets I was certain were aimed at us. I remember thinking, “This is the end, and there won’t be enough body parts left to send home after those rockets blow me to smithereens.” Fortunately, the rockets struck the enemy less than 200 feet in front of our little hole in the ground. For the next few hours, the gunships continued to fire, killing dozens of attackers before returning to their landing pads to refuel and rearm. Attack helicopters from the 118th Assault Helicopter Company joined the gunships of the 334th and hammered the enemy incessantly. The close air support the Army aviators were giving the 3rd Security Police gradually began to seal the defeat of the attackers. We owed a lot to those Army pilots and their gunships.
The sergeant and I could hardly believe we were still alive. We looked up as a lone Huey passed above and to our left. The cabin side door slid open, and a senior master sergeant from our squadron was peering down at us to determine who we were—friend or foe. We were not about to stand up, so we frantically waved our hands. The message was received and acknowledged with a salute. Big Ears Three had been found at last, and we assumed that the command post would be duly informed.
As is often the case in war, no one got the word. Shortly after the Huey departed, we were shocked to suddenly receive blistering machine gun fire from one of our own Security Alert Teams spoiling for a fight. The sergeant and I could not have known that the team was a few hundred yards behind us, but we quickly recognized our predicament when they opened up with their M60s. As the bullets began whizzing closer and closer to our heads, we tried desperately to become one with the dirt in that little hollow of earth. I remember the bullets striking the ground 10 to 20 feet in front of where we were lying. They kicked up big plumes of dirt that fell down on us. I am convinced we survived only because the gunners on the truck could not angle their weapons low enough to hit us. Had they been on higher ground, we would have been killed.
By noon it became obvious that the fight was finally winding down. The enemy attack had failed. A small number of commandos with multiple charges packed in satchels had reached the places where the aircraft were parked, but they did little damage and eventually were captured or killed. Around 2 p.m. the sergeant and I were relieved by other units sent to “mop up” enemy soldiers still alive or hiding on the battlefield. As we walked out of that field of death and flagged a ride on a flatbed truck back to our squadron, both of us were trying to grasp all that had transpired during the past 24 hours.
I remember sitting down on my bunk in Hut 27 and writing a few lines in my daily journal: “I thank God that I’m alive. VC penetrated the perimeter and were all around us. Retreated from Defense Post #3 to cover. Quite a ways to go but made it OK. Not enough room here to even start describing it. Many mortars and rockets began the attack.” In the wake of the fight, I guess I suffered from the “shock and awe” of battle because I had absolutely zero appetite for three days and managed to grab only a little sleep. In the end, Big Ears Three survived the Battle of Bien Hoa and lived to tell the tale. Incredibly, throughout the entire ordeal neither the sergeant nor I had an opportunity to fire even one shot at the enemy.
In retaliation for the enemy’s ground assault, the next day a flight of F-100s flew a series of low-level bombing attacks that destroyed the villages outside the east end of the base. I watched from our barracks as the 500-pound bombs fell very near where the sergeant and I had spent nervous hours on the perimeter the night before. According to the Air Force report on the attack, one member of the 3rd Security Police Squadron was killed (at Bunker Hill 10), along with three other Air Force personnel, while 26 men were wounded. On the enemy’s side, 139 were killed (based on a body count) and 25 were captured.
My one-year tour of duty at Bien Hoa ended late in December 1968. During that time I had experienced one major ground battle and 36 rocket and mortar attacks. The Battle of Bien Hoa had not only demonstrated to me the horror of war but, more important, had awakened me to the potential brevity of life and how quickly one can die. Now, 47 years later, that battle continues to remind me to never take anyone or anything, particularly your life, for granted.
After his Vietnam tour, Edward H. Phillips was assigned to the Strategic Air Command at Grand Forks Air Force Base in North Dakota, where he continued in the Security Police until his discharge in September 1970. He has researched and written eight books on the history of aviation in Wichita, Kansas.
Originally published in the April 2015 issue of Vietnam. To subscribe, click here.
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596a89ae075bdd84d0b5903790d83470 | https://www.historynet.com/biographer-nancy-plain.htm | Biographer Nancy Plain | Biographer Nancy Plain
Inspired in childhood by the standout figures of American history, author Nancy Plain has focused her own career on writing biographies geared to young readers. Her subjects range from men and women of the French Renaissance to some of the most celebrated characters of the American West, including Chief Joseph, Charles M. Russell and Solomon D. Butcher. Recently elected vice president of Western Writers of America, Plain has already garnered her share of recognition, including four Spur Awards for juvenile nonfiction books. She recently co-edited a forthcoming cookbook anthology for WWA, and her next project is a book about the Underground Railroad. Plain recently spoke with Wild West about her books and the writing process.
What inspired your writing? For as far back as I can remember, I’ve loved to read biographies. I’m dating myself, but does anyone remember the Landmark series of books, those great children’s biographies? Of course, in those olden days biographers did things we avoid like the plague now, such as inventing dialogue between historical characters. But those books got me hooked on reading about the lives of extraordinary people. I just ate up that whole series, and in my adult life, too, I always browse the biography section in the bookstore first. As far as young adult readers go, I enjoy the challenge of introducing them to characters from the past. With young readers you can assume your subject is new, and I like starting from scratch.
What do you look for in a subject? I look for a character who accomplished great things during interesting times. Describing a subject in the context of his or her historical period is great fun. So, for instance, when writing about Eleanor of Aquitaine, I delved into the beginnings of Gothic architecture and wrote about the creation of the code of courtly love. With Charlie Russell not only did I get to write about his fabulous paintings, but also I tried to give the reader a feeling for those last days of the open range. There’s no such thing as just straight biography; the writer is always immersed in the time period as well.
How do you develop the “voice” of a biography subject? Well, the voice of the subject is just that: his or her own voice. I always choose a subject who has left us great primary material—letters, diaries, journals, etc.—so the person can speak for himself. In the case of pioneer photographer Solomon D. Butcher I had his very amusing autobiography, as well as countless memoirs and letters by his fellow Nebraska sodbusters. Those memoirs were really poignant. And of course John James Audubon was a prolific and emotional writer. One of my hardest jobs in writing his biography was deciding what to put in and what to leave out. So many delicious quotes to choose from.
Do you have a favorite story about Charlie Russell? One memorable thing about the cowboy artist was his sheer kindness. He was beloved by so many. He would dash off sketches for his friends at the drop of a hat (he literally made one drawing in the lining of someone’s hat). He loved to have a good time, too, and his tall tales had his friends constantly in stitches. I love that his horse Monty was probably his best friend, and that when he found a family of skunks nesting under his porch, he couldn’t bear to kill them. “They seem to like it there,” Charlie wrote to a friend.
Your thoughts on Chief Joseph? When I think of Chief Joseph, and by extension the Nez Perce people, I think of their courage and ability to endure. That’s what sticks most in my mind. It’s almost unimaginable to me what they went through in being kicked out of their ancestral home in the beautiful Wallowa Valley, and what they went through in their harrowing flight for freedom. This kind of courage can be an example to us. Everybody needs courage in life.
What about Solomon Butcher? Solomon thought of himself as a regular guy. He didn’t consider himself an artist, never set out to be “great.” But he had a dogged persistence. True, he took to photography partly because he hated breaking sod. His neighbors thought he was just lazy. But he had a kind of courage, too—the courage to follow the promptings of his heart. And look what he accomplished: the most complete photographic record in existence of the sodbuster era. The more you look at those wonderful pictures, the more you see in them.
How about John James Audubon? Audubon’s ramblings on the American frontier fascinate me. He hiked and rode horseback through the wilderness, floated down rivers on flatboats, journeyed up the Missouri on a steamboat and much more, all in search of birds and quadrupeds.
And Elizabeth “Libbie” Bacon Custer? Oh, the tragedy of her life. I can’t understand why, after Custer died, this beautiful woman never remarried and made the rest of her long life a monument to her dead hero.
Why should young readers learn about these individuals? Because, as historian Patricia Nelson Limerick says, “It is beautiful to bring back history.” I want young people to see history as an infinite number of stories, not as a series of columns in a textbook. If you like stories, you’ll like history—if it’s presented the right way. Also, we are better off as a nation if citizens know some American history. How can we understand the present if we don’t? How can we value what we have?
In addition to your Western biographies, you’ve written about Marie Antoinette, Louis VXI and Mary Cassatt. What attracts you to those subjects? What attracts me to any subject is the drama of the life and times. It doesn’t get any more dramatic than the French Revolution. I always try to present a story in an evenhanded way, but I am still horrified thinking about those lines of people—bakers, street cleaners, aristocrats, even the old and confused—waiting for the guillotine. By the way, Marie Antoinette never said, “Let them eat cake.” I have it on good authority.
How important are the visuals in your books? I do love to write about artists and photographers, because no matter how well I try to tell their story, their own work always tells it better.
Do you have a favorite? My favorite topic is always the one I’m working on at the moment. It has to be, otherwise I’d lose interest. As far as a story unearthed during research, there are so many that stay with me. But I do like one story told by a pioneer schoolteacher: She describes dismissing her little students after school one day and watching them head toward home, holding hands and singing. She hears them singing long after she’s lost sight of them in the tall prairie grass.
What can writers do to inspire young readers? Writers for young readers should just try to tell a good story, and tell it, as much as possible, as if they are talking to a friend. Tell it simply and clearly, with colorful details and plenty of primary-source quotes.
Do the young people you speak to have a real interest in the American West and its stories? Kids love to hear about the West. In the case of Charlie Russell they are fascinated by the fact he essentially ran away from his home in St. Louis at the age of 16 to become a Montana cowboy. He didn’t actually run away—his trip West was a birthday present from his parents—but he never came back, except for short visits. Kids can relate to characters from the past if they are presented as the real people they were.
Any other comments? Only that I feel incredibly lucky to have become a writer. I started out as a freelance copy editor and began my first book, on Mary Cassatt, as a kind of dare to myself. The funny thing is that a lot of the books I read for research are books I would’ve read for pleasure anyway. And just to give a shout-out to Western Writers of America: I was reading many of the members’ books long before I’d ever heard of the organization itself. This has been an unexpected journey in many ways. WW
BOOKS BY PLAIN: Among her titles are four WWA Spur Award winners—This Strange Wilderness: The Life and Art of John James Audubon; Light on the Prairie: Solomon D. Butcher, Photographer of Nebraska’s Pioneer Days; Sagebrush and Paintbrush: The Story of Charlie Russell, the Cowboy Artist; and With One Sky Above Us: The Story of Chief Joseph and the Nez Perce Indians.
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154be15a6131d9e3e9180ce72c04aa4b | https://www.historynet.com/bizarre-b-17-collision-over-the-north-sea-during-world-war-ii.htm | Bizarre B-17 Collision Over the North Sea During World War II | Bizarre B-17 Collision Over the North Sea During World War II
At dawn on December 31, 1944, while the Battle of the Bulge raged, two young airmen took off from Thorpe Abbotts, England, and flew their Boeing B-17G Flying Fortress in formation with hundreds of others in what was to be a ‘maximum effort’ over Germany by every available flier. That New Year’s Eve would soon require the maximum effort these two men could muster to stay alive in what has to be considered one of the most unlikely incidents in aerial history.
It was the 22nd mission for 1st Lt. Glenn H. Rojohn, a native of Greenock, Pa., the pilot of B-17 No. 42-231987, and 2nd Lt. William G. Leek, Jr., from Washington state, his co-pilot. Both men had been scheduled for leave after flying several missions in a row. But their plans were interrupted at 4 a.m. that day when they were awakened for the so-called maximum effort, which meant, as Rojohn later explained, ‘Everyone flies.’ Thirty-seven heavy bombers took off with the 100th Bomb Group that day. Only 25 planes returned to England.
Following breakfast and briefing at the base, home to members of the 100th Bomb Group from June 1943 to December 1945, Rojohn and Leek learned that their target would be Hamburg, a port city with numerous oil refineries and submarine pens. Second Lieutenant Robert Washington, the ship’s navigator, recalled the start of that, his 27th, mission: ‘Takeoff on the morning of December 31, 1944, was delayed because of fog, and when we assembled the group and departed the coast of England, we learned that the fighter escort had been delayed due to the weather.’
It took ‘almost as much time to rendezvous to go on a mission as it did to complete a mission,’ Rojohn recalled, ‘because the weather in England was always bad, and we had to circle around and around until we broke out above the overcast. Our squadrons [Rojohn flew in C Squadron] then formed, and we met other groups until we got into a long line of traffic heading toward Germany. This particular day we flew over the North Sea to a point south of Denmark and then turned southwest down the Elbe River to Hamburg. We were somewhere in the neighborhood of 25,000 feet [altitude]. At that time I don’t think much was known about the jet stream, but we had a tail wind of about 200 nautical miles an hour. We got into the target pretty quick. Over the target, we had just about everything but the kitchen sink thrown at us.’
Leek’s recollections of the Hamburg mission were equally vivid: ‘The target and the sky over it were black from miles away. The flak was brutal. We flew through flak clouds and aircraft parts for what seemed like an hour.’
While Rojohn does not like to criticize his commanding officers, he thinks a mistake was made that day. ‘Instead of hitting the target and angling out over Germany still on a southwesterly direction and then out over Belgium, they turned us at 180 degrees back toward the North Sea,’ Rojohn said. ‘So an 80-knot tailwind became an 80-knot headwind. We were probably making about 50 or 60 mph on the ground.’
‘When we finally got clear of the coastal flak batteries,’ recalled Washington, ‘we turned west and skirted the flak area by flying between Heligoland and Wilhelmshaven. The flak was heavy as we crossed the coastline. I’m not certain whether we headed northwest between Bremerhaven and Kuxhaven, or due west over the little town of Aurich and across the coastline near Norden.’
Over the North Sea, Rojohn remembered, they were flying at 22,000 feet when they ‘encountered wave after wave of German fighters. We just barely got out over the North Sea, and the sky was rumbling around us with exploding flak and German [Messerschmitt] Me-109 fighter planes so close I could see the faces of the young German pilots as they went by. They were just having a field day with our formation. We lost plane after plane.’
According to an account written by Tech. Sgt. Orville E. Elkin, Rojohn’s top turret gunner and engineer: ‘The fighters came from every direction, 12 o’clock, 6 o’clock, from the bottom and from the top. Your body becomes cold and numb from fright as you realize that only one-sixteenth of an inch of aluminum stands between you and this battery of firepower.’ Ten planes were quickly lost.
Leek had been at the controls when the crew came off the bomb run. He and Rojohn alternated the controls each half hour. ‘On this mission,’ Leek recalled, ‘the lead plane was off Glenn’s wing, so he flew the bomb run. I should have kept the controls for at least my half-hour, but once the attack began, our formation tightened up and we started bouncing up and down. Our lead plane kept going out of sight for me. I may have been overcorrecting, but the planes all seemed to bounce at different times. I asked Glenn to take it, and he did.’
Rojohn maneuvered to take a position to fill the void created when a B-17 (No. 43-338436) piloted by 2nd Lt. Charles C. Webster went down in flames and exploded on the ground. ‘I was going into that void when we had a tremendous impact,’ Rojohn recalled. Feeling the bomber shudder, the men immediately thought their plane had collided with another aircraft. It had, but in a way that may never have happened before or since.
Another B-17 (No. 43-338457), piloted by 1st Lt. William G. MacNab and 2nd Lt. Nelson B. Vaughn, had risen upward. The top turret guns on MacNab’s plane had pierced through the aluminum skin on the bottom of Rojohn’s plane, binding the two huge planes together, as Leek said, like ‘breeding dragonflies.’ The two planes had become one.
Whether MacNab and Vaughn lost control of their plane because they were seriously injured or the planes collided because both Rojohn and MacNab were moving in to close the open space in the formation is uncertain. Both MacNab and Vaughn were fatally injured that day and were never able to tell their own story.
Staff Sergeant Edward L. Woodall, Jr., MacNab’s ball-turret gunner, remembered that when a crew check was called just prior to the midair collision, everyone had reported in. ‘At the time of the impact,’ Woodall said, ‘we lost all power and intercom on our aircraft. I knew we were in trouble from the violent shaking of the aircraft, no power to operate the turret, loss of intercom, and seeing falling pieces of metal. My turret was stalled with the guns up at about 9 o’clock. This is where countless time drills covering emergency escape procedures from the turret paid off, as I automatically reached for the hand crank, disengaged the clutch and proceeded to crank the turret and guns to the down position so I could open the door and climb into the waist of the airplane. I could see that another aircraft was locked onto our aircraft and his ball turret jammed down inside our aircraft.’
In the 1946 book The Story of the Century, John R. Nilsson reported that E.A. Porter, a pilot from Payton, Miss., who witnessed the midair collision, had sounded the warning over the radio: ”F for Fox, F for Fox, get it down!’ — however MacNab, whose radio was dead, did not hear. Not to see the collision which seemed inevitable, Porter turned his head, while two of his gunners, Don Houk of Appleton City, Missouri, and Clarence Griffin of Harrisburg, Illinois, watched aghast, as MacNab and Rojohn settled together ‘as if they were lifted in place by a huge crane,’ and many of the 100th’s anguished fliers saw the two Fortresses cling — Rojohn’s, on top, riding pick-a-back on MacNab’s, how held together being a mystery. A fire started on MacNab’s ship, on which three propellers still whirled, and the two bombers squirmed, wheeled in the air, trying to break the death-lock.’
Washington opened the escape hatch and’saw the B-17 hanging there with three engines churning and one feathered. Rojohn and Leek banked to the left and headed south toward land.’
‘Glenn’s outboard prop bent into the nacelle of the lower plane’s engine,’ recalled Leek. ‘Glenn gunned our engines two or three times to try to fly us off. It didn’t work, but it was a good try. The outboard left engine was burning on the plane below. We feathered our propellers to keep down the fire and rang the bail-out bell.’
‘Our engines were still running and so were three on the bottom ship,’ Rojohn said. When he realized he could not detach his plane, Rojohn turned his engines off to try to avoid an explosion. He told Elkin and Tech. Sgt. Edward G. Neuhaus, the radio operator, to bail out of the tail, the only escape route left because all other hatches were blocked.
‘The two planes would drop into a dive unless we pulled back on the controls all the time,’ wrote Leek. ‘Glenn pointed left and we turned the mess toward land. I felt Elkin touch my shoulder and waved him back through the bomb bay. We got over land and [bombardier Sergeant James R.] Shirley came up from below. I signalled to him to follow Elkin. Finally Bob Washington came up from the nose. He was just hanging on between our seats. Glenn waved him back with the others. We were dropping fast.’
As he crawled up into the pilot’s compartment before bailing out, Washington remembered, ‘I saw the two of them [Rojohn and Leek] holding the wheels against their stomachs and their feet propped against the instrument panel. They feathered our engines to avoid fire, I think. [Shirley] and I went on through the bomb bay and out the waist door, careful to drop straight down in order to miss the tail section of the other plane which was a little to the right of our tail.’ Because of Rojohn’s and Leek’s physical effort, Shirley, Elkin, Washington, Staff Sgt. Roy H. Little (the waist gunner), Staff Sgt. Francis R. Chase (the replacement tail gunner), and Neuhaus were able to reach the rear of the plane and bail out. ‘I could hear Russo [Staff Sgt. Joseph Russo, Rojohn’s ball-turret gunner] saying his Hail Marys over the intercom,’ Leek said. ‘I could not help him, and I felt that I was somehow invading his right to be alone. I pulled off my helmet and noticed that we were at 15,000 feet. This was the hardest part of the ride for me.’
Before they jumped, Little, Neuhaus and Elkin took the hand crank for the ball turret and tried to crank it up to free Russo. ‘It would not move,’ Elkin wrote. ‘There was no means of escape for this brave man.’
‘Awhile later,’ recalled Leek, ‘we were shot at by guns that made a round white puff like big dandelion seeds ready to be blown away. By now the fire was pouring over our left wing, and I wondered just what those German gunners thought we were up to and where we were going! Before long, .50-caliber shells began to blow at random in the plane below. I don’t know if the last flak had started more or if the fire had spread, but it was hot down there!’ As senior officer, Rojohn ordered Leek to join the crew members and jump, but his co-pilot refused. Leek knew Rojohn would not be able to maintain physical control of the two planes by himself and was certain the planes would be thrown into a death spiral before Rojohn could make it to the rear of the plane and escape. ‘I knew one man left in the wreck could not have survived, so I stayed to go along for the ride,’ Leek said.
And what a ride it was. ‘The only control we actually had was to keep [the planes] level,’ said Rojohn. ‘We were falling like a rock.’ The ground seemed to be reaching up to meet them.
Washington recalled that, from his vantage point while parachuting, ‘I watched the two planes fly on into the ground, probably two or three miles away, and saw no more chutes. Shirley was coming down behind me. When the planes hit, I saw them burst into flames and the black smoke erupting.’
At one point, Leek said, he tried to beat his way out through the window with a Very pistol: ‘Just panic, I guess. The ground came up faster and faster. Praying was allowed. We gave it one last effort and slammed into the ground.’ As they crashed in Germany at Tettens, near Wilhelmshaven, shortly before 1 p.m., Rojohn’s plane slid off the bottom plane, which immediately exploded. Alternately lifting up and slamming back into the ground, the remaining B-17 careened ahead, finally coming to rest only after the left wing sliced through a wooden headquarters building, as Rojohn recalled, ‘blowing that building to smithereens.’ Russo is believed to have been killed when the planes landed.
‘When my adrenalin began to lower, I looked around,’ Leek said. ‘Glenn was OK and I was OK, and a convenient hole was available for a fast exit. It was a break just behind the cockpit. I crawled out onto the left wing to wait for Glenn. I pulled out a cigarette and was about to light it when a young German soldier with a rifle came slowly up to the wing, making me keep my hands up. He grabbed the cigarette out of my mouth and pointed down. The wing was covered with gasoline.’
Rojohn and Leek sustained only slight injuries from the crash, which shocked even the two pilots when they took a look at the wreckage of their B-17. ‘All that was left of the Flying Fortress was the nose, the cockpit, and the seats we were sitting on,’ Rojohn later recalled.
Following their capture, Rojohn said, he and Leek were forced to undress’so they could search us for weapons, which we had thrown out on the way down. They put us into a truck and drove through the countryside to pick up the survivors. The Germans then put us all into an old schoolhouse where we were finally able to talk with each other.’
Even though their lives were now in the hands of the Germans, the Americans were able to find a little humor in the situation. ‘Our captors didn’t know what to do with us because we were in a part of Germany where they didn’t take many captives,’ Rojohn said. ‘They put us in a dark, damp building way out in nowhere. All of a sudden the door opened up and everybody popped to attention. A German captain came in and barked something to his men. I didn’t understand what he had said, but Berkowitz [2nd Lt. Jack Berkowitz, MacNab’s navigator] heard the same words and fainted dead away. The next day they brought us back to the schoolhouse. Berkowitz, the only one of us who could understand German, told us the German captain had said, ‘If they make a move, shoot ’em.’ That was too much for him and he fainted.’
Watching the planes fall piggyback to earth, German soldiers on the island of Wangerooge could not believe what they were seeing — ‘crazy Americans flying with eight motors.’ In fact, the Germans were so concerned that the Americans had developed a devastating new weapon that Berkowitz was shipped to an interrogation center in Frankfurt, Germany, and put into solitary confinement. After questioning him for two weeks, his interrogators gave up on the idea of a new American aircraft threat, and Berkowitz was transferred to a prison camp near the North Sea.
Seventeen-year-old Rudolf Skawran, who was shooting at the American bomber formations from Wangerooge, said his fellow soldiers were ordered by flak commander Captain Dinkelacker to leave the connected planes alone. Dinkelacker wrote in his log book at 12:47 p.m. that day, ‘Two Fortresses collided in a formation in the NE. The planes flew hooked together and flew twenty miles south. The two planes were unable to fight anymore. The crash could be awaited so I stopped the firing at these two planes.’ There was no way for Rojohn, Leek or the crew members to know that the Germans on the ground had ceased firing at them.
Civilians on Wangerooge stood and watched with amazement as the two planes flew over them. The youngest spectators ran to Rojohn’s plane and removed what they could get away with quickly — a machine gun and ammunition, some rations and chewing gum.
Little and Chase did not survive their jumps from the plane. Technical Sergeant Herman G. Horenkamp, Rojohn’s friend and the tail gunner for all of his 21 previous missions, had not reported for the mission that day because he had frostbite from the mission the previous day. Chase, who Rojohn and Leek had never seen before and never did meet face to face, was Horenkamp’s replacement that fateful day.
All of the survivors from the B-17 piloted by Rojohn were captured by the Germans almost immediately, as were four other men who bailed out of MacNab’s plane — 2nd Lt. Raymond E. Comer, Jr., Tech. Sgt. Joseph A. Chadwick, Berkowitz and Woodall.
Woodall told Rojohn years later that he was grateful to him and Leek because they carried him for several miles when broken bones sustained in his parachute landing kept him from walking after his capture. Rojohn has no recollection of that.
After the war, like thousands of other soldiers, Glenn Rojohn came back home to marry and raise a family. He eventually went to work with his brother Leonard in their father’s air conditioning and plumbing business in McKeesport, Pa. Rojohn, who received the Distinguished Flying Cross and the Purple Heart, said he owes his life to Leek: ‘In all fairness to my co-pilot, he’s the reason I’m alive today. He refused my order to bail out and said ‘I’m staying with you.’ One of us could have gotten out of that plane. He’s the reason I’m here today.’
Rojohn searched for 40 years through Social Security and veterans records to find his co-pilot, Leek, but was unsuccessful until 1986, when he was given a telephone number in the state of Washington. Rojohn called the number and reached Leek’s mother, who asked him if he wanted to talk to Bill, who was visiting from California at the time. The two pilots were reunited for one week in 1987 at a 100th Bomb Group reunion in Long Beach, Calif. Leek died the following year.
But Robert Washington, the navigator that day over the North Sea, still remembers the pilots’ remarkably cool handling of the bizarre situation. ‘Glenn said that he doesn’t consider himself a hero; but I do!’ said Washington. ‘I will never forget his calm, matter-of-fact response as I paused at the flight deck on my way out through the bomb bay and waist door. He may have said, ‘Get on out, Wash,’ or merely motioned with his head, but I knew he and Bill Leek had made their decision and several of us who jumped over land probably owe our lives to their courage.’
This article was written by Teresa K. Flatley and originally appeared in the May 1997 issue of World War II. For more great articles be sure to pick up your copy of World War II.
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27fac5d5c98eb4e06ef96f28446da1a0 | https://www.historynet.com/black-force-recon-marine-battlefield-commission-vietnam-war-hero-snubbed-for-the-medal-of-honor.htm | Black Force Recon Marine, Battlefield Commission, Vietnam War Hero … Snubbed for the Medal of Honor? | Black Force Recon Marine, Battlefield Commission, Vietnam War Hero … Snubbed for the Medal of Honor?
At the end of March 1967, Marine 2nd Lt. Jim Capers stepped off on what was to be a four-day foot patrol into the jungles near Phú Lộc, Vietnam.
He snaked through that jungle terrain, sporting a recent battlefield commission as a second lieutenant, leading just nine 3rd Force Reconnaissance Company Marines and a dog named King.
The mission: maneuver through rugged enemy territory and locate a suspected North Vietnamese regimental base camp. That meant creeping up on a force of 1,500 or more enemy soldiers with support far in the rear.
They weren’t there just to gather more intel for reports back to headquarters. They were to observe the NVA regiment to protect the flank of Company M, 3rd Battalion, 26th Marines.
The first day of that planned four-day march, the recon team found out there wasn’t any reason to “suspect” a regiment was in those deep jungles. They bumped into a 20-soldier force.
Two more contacts on the second day, which resulted in 22 enemies killed in action, but also severely wounded one of his Marines. That might have sent another team home. But Capers pursued the enemy calling fire on their base camp, which reports following these events would show thwarted an attack on Company M.
On the final day of their jungle jaunt, an enemy daisy-chained claymore mine triggered an attack on his team. Capers sustained multiple wounds from both the explosion and subsequent “dense barrages of direct and indirect enemy fire.”
Bleeding profusely and moving under two broken legs, Capers shook off the shock and continued fighting, directing his men in the counterattack. Even after taking on morphine he coordinated supporting fire and moving his team to the helicopter extraction that saved their lives. “While struggling to maintain consciousness and still under attack, Major Capers demanded continuous situation and status reports from his Marines and ensured the entire team was evacuated before himself,” his award citation reads. “Barely able to stand, Major Capers finally boarded the helicopter and was evacuated.” What the citation doesn’t say is that at least two times Capers got off the tiny H-34 helo because it loaded down too heavy and couldn’t take off. But he wanted to get his men out of there. It finally went airborne, later crash landing. One man lost a kidney, another lost a leg ― all of the Marines but the dog survived that battle. That award was for a Silver Star Medal. Capers didn’t receive the citation until 2010, which was 43 years after the actions of that fateful day. Ultimately, Capers would receive two Bronze Star Medals with “V” for valor and three Purple Hearts. He is one of the most decorated Marines in Force Reconnaissance history. He is also black. ‘One of history’s most outstanding special operations team leaders’ Many believe that the medal doesn’t begin to recognize Capers deeds that day, which was just one day of a career that spanned the early days of Marine Force Recon and its covert deeds in Vietnam. David “Bull” Gurfein, CEO of United American Patriots, said his group is leading efforts to get another review of the actions and Capers’ citation for a potential upgrade to the Medal of Honor. “I was approached by Marines who served with him, not one person said anything bad about Maj. Capers,” Gurfein told Marine Corps Times. “Every one of them said he deserved the Medal of Honor.” The United American Patriots group has gained attention in recent years for its advocacy on behalf of military members and veterans charged in criminal cases. Most notably among them is Army 1st Lt. Clint Lorance, who was pardoned in 2019 by President Donald Trump after serving prison time on murder charges stemming from actions in Afghanistan. The group also supported Army Green Beret Maj. Matthew Golsteyn, who was facing much-delayed charges in connection with an alleged murder in Afghanistan in 2010. Currently, a high-profile case that they are seeking to have charges dismissed involves two Marine Raiders and a Raider corpsman charged in the death of a U.S. military contractor and retired Army Green Beret, who died following an after hours altercation outside a nightclub in Iraq. Capers award push is an effort to see that the major gets the credit he is due and ensure that internal politics didn’t play a role in the four-decade delay and selection of the Silver Star Medal, Gurfein said. There’s ample evidence that the harrowing mission had its fair share of valor, and Capers was at the center of the action. At the same 2010 ceremony where Capers received his Silver Star Medal, fellow team members Ron Yerman, Richard Crepeau, John Moran and Billy Ray Smith each were awarded the Bronze Star Medal with Combat “V” for actions during the same mission. Retired Maj. Gen. Paul Lefebvre, former Marine Special Operations Command chief, said at that ceremony that Capers was, “one of history’s most outstanding special operations team leaders.” ‘Ask a Marine’ The now 83-year-old Capers was recently celebrated by the Bishopville, South Carolina, community with the installation of three bronze plaques. Capers lived in Bishopville, South Carolina, as a child but his sharecropper family left the Jim Crow-era South for life in Baltimore, where he spent the rest of his youth. One plaque is a map of North and South Vietnam. The other details Capers career of heroics. The middle plaque is a reproduction of a famous recruiting poster where Capers at the center in his blue dress uniform above the words “Ask a Marine.” Those three plaques were titled “The Place, The Legend, The Man.” Capers is likely the first black Marine featured prominently on a Marine Corps recruiting poster. He is also possibly the first black Marine to receive a battlefield commission in the Vietnam War. While he was in college, Maj. Gen. James L. Williams, who is also black, saw that recruiting poster and said to himself, “I’d really like to know who that is and someday I’d really like to join Force Recon,” Williams said in a 2018 documentary about Capers, titled “Major Capers: The Legend of Team Broadminded.” The Marine Corps was slow to integrate blacks into the ranks, keeping segregated in all-black units through the end of World War II. Under presidential orders, all services were forced to desegregate. However, with the reduction in forces following the war, the Corps forced black Marines to leave the service or become stewards. Hispanic and Asian Marines were allowed to integrate during this period and into the Korean War. This was the backdrop for Capers when he graduated high school in 1956 and enlisted. Capers first served in the infantry and then in the reconnaissance community, where he eventually worked in first, second and third recon battalions. In his more than two decades in the Marine Corps he saw his share of discrimination. Not being able to eat in restaurants off base with his men, slights and snubs from white officers, even generals. But he also experienced camaraderie among his Marines that transcended prejudice, he said. After the 1967 battle he and those wounded on his team were medically evacuated for treatment in Japan. While in the hospital there, he said the assistant to the 3rd Marine Division commanding general said he was being put in for the Medal of Honor. He said that he was told at least two battalion commanders wrote recommendations for him for the medal. “But they never went forward,” Capers said. Capers told Marine Corps Times that he believes his race played a role in the lack of submission for the award during the war. After having worked in some of the leading edge experimentation with the early reconnaissance units, being recognized for helping chance special operations tactics through unorthodox approaches to guerilla fighting in Vietnam, Capers was summoned to the Pentagon to talk with the Secretary of the Navy. Then a major, he stood outside of the secretary’s office alongside his escort, a white junior Marine captain. A Marine general exited the office and went straight to the captain, saying he must be the decorated Marine he’d heard so much about. After a few tense moments, the captain corrected the general, telling him he was talking to the wrong person. “I had the rank on, he just assumed because I was black, even though I was in charge, in full uniform, he walked by me,” Capers said. “Then he turned and said, ‘Oh, you’re the famous Maj. Capers.’ I didn’t want to talk to him. He disrespected me. He didn’t respect my rank, he thought, ‘this African American can’t be the guy going to see the Secretary of the Navy. That created some issues.” He was told through back channels that one commander in the authorization chain for medal upgrades said he would, “die and go to hell before he saw me get the Medal of Honor.” There have been more than 3,400 Medals of Honor awarded since the decoration was created during the Civil War, according to Army data. Black service members have received only 89 Medals of Honor. Since the late 1990s at least 15 medals have been awarded due to administrative oversight, clerical errors or upgrades, so medal upgrades are not without precedent. A 2016 to 2019 review of awards for Iraq and Afghanistan actions resulted in four upgrades to the Medal of Honor, 30 service crosses and 23 Silver Star Medals. Those who received upgrades to the Medal of Honor as a result of the reviews included Senior Chief Petty Officer Britt Slabinski, Army Sgt. Ronald Shurer and Sgt. Travis Atkins along with Air Force Tech Sgt. John Chapman. That three-year review did not result in any upgrades to the Medal of Honor for Marines. Marine Corps Commandant Gen. David Berger was involved in the previous packet that resulted in the Silver Star Medal. His current involvement was not immediately clear, Berger’s spokesman told Marine Corps Times. Capers rose to the rank of staff sergeant and led a group known as “Team Broadminded” in Vietnam, conducting more than 50 classified missions. Those missions included recovery operations to retrieve secret items and the pilot’s body of a downed Air Force B-57 that had crashed behind enemy lines. Capers took a team deep into enemy territory on another mission, ordered by President Lyndon B. Johnson to attempt a rescue of four U.S., two Australian and 26 South Vietnamese Prisoners of War at a jungle camp. While the major’s exploits parallel a Hollywood script and many are detailed in his memoir, “Faith Through the Storm,” it was the final mission to Phú Lộc that has supporters calling for another review that might give the Marine what they say is his due ― a Medal of Honor. Originally published on Military Times, our sister publication.
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