from General Pershing requesting that $50,000 worth of sheet-music
for the bands of the A. E. F. be shipped without delay. As the chief
of the purchasing unit, to whom the order was turned over, did not
feel qualified to select the music for some 3,000,000 of his fighting
countrymen, he delegated the task to a committee consisting of Lieutenant
R. C. Deming, bandmaster at Camp Meigs, Mr. Ward Stephens, the noted
organist and authority on music, and Irving Berlin, the most famous
composer of popular music in America, who was at that time a sergeant
in the Coast Guard but who was borrowed from that organization by the
Quartermaster Corps. The selection and classification of this great mass
of music—the largest single order of its kind ever given—necessitated the
committee working almost night and day for weeks, it being enormously
assisted in its task by the enthusiastic co-operation of the various
music printers and publishers, both of these trades making great
financial sacrifices in order to promote the pleasure and inspiration of
the boys overseas.
Have you ever gone into one of those huge emporiums which make a
specialty of supplying equipment for sportsmen, to purchase an outfit
preparatory to a fishing-trip in Canada or a shooting expedition in
the Rockies? If so, you will remember how much time and thought you
devoted to comparing the merits of the various types of clothing and
other equipment which you were shown. It probably took you the better
part of an hour to decide whether you would be more comfortable wearing
Canadian shoepacks or hobnailed ankle-boots. You had a long discussion
with the salesman as to the relative merits of whipcord, Harris tweed,
and gabardine. Even making the choice between a slouch hat and a cloth
cap presented a perplexing problem. But this was only the beginning,
for you had to decide on a rain-coat, a tent, a cot, blankets, pillows,
cartridge-belts, fly-books, cooking utensils, and heaven knows what
besides. And after you had made your final decision you were probably
far from being satisfied with what you had selected. Yet this outfit,
over which you had spent so much thought, was, probably, to be used
only during a brief summer’s vacation. Picture, then, the task faced
by the Quartermaster Corps when it was suddenly called upon to provide
complete equipment for some 4,000,000 men for an indefinite period.
At first thought it might seem easy enough to purchase clothing for
soldiers—a coat, a pair of breeches, an overcoat, a hat, and a pair of
shoes for each man—until you are reminded that no one of these simple
articles of uniform was standard for civilian use, either in material,
pattern, or color. Everything had to be made to order. Everything had,
moreover, to be better made than if it were intended for civilian use,
for the men for whom these articles were intended were not going out to
shoot elk or catch trout; they were going to a country 3,000 miles away
for the purpose of killing Germans, and no one could say how long the
business would take them. It was a Titanic task, this equipping of the
men who took up arms against Germany. The organization which handled the
buying end of it was roughly as follows: in Washington the Clothing and
Equipage Division of the Office of the Director of Purchase, where all
the activities were centralized; in Philadelphia a purchasing office,
which was a branch of the great Quartermaster Depot in that city, and in
New York a procurement office which kept constantly in touch with the
raw-material markets of the world.
The innumerable special-service units which were constantly being
added to the rapidly expanding army required all sorts of strange,
new equipment and special clothing. The cooks and bakers had to have
cotton aprons and the blacksmiths leather ones. The linemen of the
telegraph battalions had to have special gloves. Hoods were needed for
the motorcycle despatch-riders, overalls for the men of the stevedore
battalions, helmets for the camp firemen, garments of fur and leather for
the flying-men. The prisoners began to come streaming in and for them
had to be designed clothing which would insure their speedy recognition
and recapture in case they attempted to escape. The convalescents at the
hospitals needed special suits. The expeditionary troops sent to Siberia
and the Murman Coast required outfits which would keep them warm through
the long arctic winters. And uniforms had to be provided for the army’s
women nurses. Besides this vast quantity of clothing there were tents
to be provided, cots, blankets, towels, shaving outfits, brown-canvas
bags for filtering water, and the blue-denim bags in which the soldiers
kept their personal belongings. These things were not in existence
anywhere; they had to be made from the outset. To produce them in the
enormous quantities required, not only took the maximum output of all the
factories and mills already engaged in the manufacture of such articles,
but hundreds of other plants had to change over their machinery in order
to meet the army’s needs, and the Quartermaster Corps had to send experts
to give instruction at these plants in the new manufacturing processes
and methods. Nor was it enough for the Quartermaster Corps to thus become
itself a manufacturer of clothing and equipment. It had to manufacture
the cloth used in the clothing, and, going still further, it had to
provide the raw cotton and wool used in making the cloth, as well as
the hides for the leather used in the shoes. And it had to produce this
staggering volume of equipment quickly, for the Germans would not wait.
It was compelled, moreover, to make its purchases in a market glutted
with orders from the Allied governments and from the domestic trade. And,
to increase the difficulties under which the corps labored, it had to buy
on credit, and to do so in the face of cash competition, for Congress
did not make sufficient funds available until twelve weeks after the
declaration of war. Nevertheless, the whole enormous undertaking was
successfully carried through, and, save in rare instances, the soldiers
never lacked for clothing or other Q. M. supplies.
Wool was the most important of the raw products to be procured, since
it entered into the composition of more items than any other material.
Soon after the declaration of war the Quartermaster Department estimated
that about 100,000,000 pounds of scoured wool would be required to meet
the initial demands of the army. An inventory of all wool supplies,
including wool ordered from abroad as well as the stocks on hand in
this country, revealed the startling fact that there was in sight only
about 35,000,000 pounds—barely more than a third of the amount needed.
To insure the procurement of this wool and to head off speculation in
domestic wool prices, for the American sheep were then about to be
sheared, the government itself, in July, 1917, entered the wool business.
It immediately optioned practically all the wool in the hands of all the
dealers in the United States; it fixed a price for the domestic supply
for the ensuing year; it arranged to procure the entire 1917 clip if
needed; it took over all wool under import licenses, and it sent its
buyers to South America and the other foreign markets. There was a wool
administrator to buy wool, a wool-purchasing quartermaster to pay for it,
and a wool distributor to sell it to the government contractors. Within
a year the Clothing and Equipage Division had absorbed the entire wool
trade of the United States. In fact, there was no wool market again and
no public sale of wool until after the signing of the Armistice.
The largest of the foreign markets which was available from the
standpoint of accessibility was the Argentine. Australia and New Zealand
were, of course, enormous markets, but the shortage of tonnage made it
impossible to spare many bottoms for the long voyage to the antipodes.
As a result of the shipping situation, when the fighting ceased there
was an appalling shortage of wool everywhere in the world except in
Australia and New Zealand. America was short of wool, there was a little
in England, France had practically none, and in Germany and Austria there
was none at all. But Australia and New Zealand had _a billion pounds_—and
no ships.
At first the better grades of wool appeared to be adequate to meet the
demands of the army, but later changes were made in the specifications
for various cloths—uniform cloth being increased from 16 to 20 ounces,
overcoating from 30 to 32 ounces, shirting flannel from 8½ to 9½ ounces,
and blankets from 3 to 4 pounds—which made it necessary to utilize
grades of wool which previously had been used only in coarse materials,
such as carpet. In order to obtain the necessary weight and warmth, the
lower grades of wool were blended with the higher grades, though this
frequently entailed a sacrifice of fineness of texture and appearance.
This explains why many of the uniforms worn by our returning soldiers
looked rough and uneven in color. But the necessary cloth was provided
and it was warm and it wore well. The trouble was that it was not
provided soon enough. During the autumn of 1917 and the succeeding winter
thousands of our soldiers, both in France and in the camps at home,
did not have sufficient clothing to keep them dry or warm. Hundreds of
American soldiers went into action wearing British uniforms—even to the
buttons bearing the royal cipher and crown!
The Quartermaster Corps introduced endless economies in order to save
wool. More economical patterns were made for uniforms. Originally 1.45
yards of cloth were required to make a pair of wool breeches. A cheaper
cutting pattern reduced this figure to 1.222 yards, thus saving nearly
a quarter of a yard of cloth on every pair. Since the purchases of wool
breeches amounted to 10,300,000 pairs, this single economy resulted in a
saving of over 2,300,000 yards of cloth on breeches alone. It was also
found that cotton linings could be substituted for the wool facings of
coats and overcoats without sacrificing either serviceability or warmth.
Another important cloth economy came when the designers of the Clothing
and Equipage Division eliminated the right-hand pocket of the “O. D.”
shirt on the ground that this pocket was not used enough to justify the
additional expense.
Americans have always believed, or pretended to believe, that, so far
as the uniforms of our fighting forces are concerned, smartness is not
essential. This is a mental attitude which we inherit, no doubt, from
our pioneering forefathers, and which was strengthened by those Civil
and Spanish War generals who tucked their trousers in their boots,
pulled their slouch hats over their eyes, and wore handkerchiefs instead
of collars. So, when the first contingents of the Expeditionary Forces
set sail for France, we excused the obvious shortcomings of their
uniforms by asserting that they “looked businesslike and American”—an
assertion which was, however, open to some doubt. If our soldiers looked
military—_and they did_—it was not because of their uniforms but in spite
of them. No one recognized more quickly than the Commander-in-Chief of
the A. E. F. that the uniform of the American soldier was lamentably
lacking in smartness, a lack which was made painfully apparent when it
was contrasted with those worn by the soldiers of the Allied nations.
When, therefore, General Pershing recommended the adoption of a
smarter-looking uniform, the Clothing and Equipage Division undertook to
design one, with, incidentally, an eye to the saving of cloth. The coat
of the uniform, formerly called the blouse—a ridiculous and inappropriate
designation which is now obsolete—was cut with new lines which made it
slimmer and more graceful while retaining all the warmth and comfort of
the old garment. As the soldiers usually filled the patch-pockets of
their old blouses with all sorts of articles they were usually unsightly
bulges, but on the new coat the patch-pocket is retained only in
appearance, the pocket actually being on the inside. It is not known to
most Americans that the breeches which had been worn by American soldiers
for twenty years or more have been replaced by trousers so far as the
A. E. F. is concerned. The soldiers themselves were not particularly
enamored of the breeches, which frequently caused chafing under the knee
and always caused a burst of expletives when a man tried to put them on
in a hurry. Moreover, it was often found impossible for the surgeons
to remove breeches from a man wounded in the legs without cutting the
cloth and thereby ruining the garment. All these objections have been
obviated, however, by the adoption of trousers, which have the added
value of increased warmth. Following General Pershing’s recommendations,
the overcoat, which was much too long to be worn in the trenches, was
redesigned, a new garment being evolved which was smarter and more
practical. Other changes are the adoption of the spiral woollen puttee in
place of the canvas legging and the substitution of the jaunty overseas
cap for the impractical and universally unbecoming campaign hat.
The redesigning of the uniform—which, by the way, never appeared in
the field—accomplished several surprising economies. Merely by the
substitution of trousers for breeches, the lacings, eyelets, tape, and
stays thus eliminated amounted to 95¼ cents on each garment, and had
the war lasted until July 1, 1919, would have saved the taxpayer nearly
$17,000,000 on orders placed or in sight. The change in the design of
the overcoat saved 62 cents per garment—an estimated saving, by July 1,
of nearly $900,000. It was found that the service coat could be made for
$1.60 less than the old blouse, which by July 1 would have effected an
economy of close to $5,000,000. The changes in these three garments not
only gave the American soldier a much better-looking uniform but it saved
the American Government enough money to build a first-class battleship,
and, what was most important of all, it effected an enormous economy
in the consumption of raw wool, which, once exhausted, could not be
replaced with all the money on earth.
In making its earlier clothing contracts the government paid the
contractor a percentage of the value of the yardage which he saved by his
economy in cutting and it also permitted him to keep his own clippings.
But later on, when the shortage in wool became more acute, the cloth
issued to the contractor was calculated more closely, he received no
credit for his savings, and all clippings had to be turned in. These
clippings were sent to the base sorting-plant in New York, where they
were baled and shipped to mills to be used as reworked wool, in blankets
and other articles. From September, 1917, to December, 1918, this plant
handled over 17,000,000 pounds of wool clippings, the total sales of
which produced $5,500,000.
Wool was not only made up into clothing but it went into such knit
goods as undershirts, drawers, stockings, gloves, and puttees. This
branch of the war woollen-goods industry found itself confronted with
a serious problem in the lack of suitable machinery, for though there
were numerous manufacturers of knit goods, their mills had been devoted
to the production of specialties, such as men’s union suits and women’s
underwear. These concerns had, therefore, to make great changes in their
machinery, and sometimes to remodel their plants, before they could knit
underclothing in the sizes required for the army. Toward the close of
the war every machine in the United States that could make hosiery was
knitting socks for soldiers.
At one time there was a serious shortage of needles, which we had
formerly obtained from Germany. When this source of supply was cut
off we turned to Japan, but the Japanese needles proved anything but
satisfactory: they were not properly tempered and their frequent
breakage caused much loss and delay. A rumor reached the ears of the
Quartermaster-General that there were 10,000,000 knitting-needles in
Sweden, whereupon purchasing agents were despatched to Scandinavia
post-haste. They returned a few weeks later bringing with them a
million needles, which helped to relieve the situation, the American
needle-makers meanwhile being pushed to the limit.
Though the production of the regulation service uniform constituted the
bulk of the Manufacturing Branch’s activities, it was by no means the
whole of them. It went into an entirely new field, for example, when
it bought uniforms for the women nurses of the army. There was a trim
little Norfolk suit of navy blue which cost the government about thirty
dollars; a cotton uniform for indoor wear that cost three dollars; a
long, belted ulster costing in the neighborhood of twenty-eight dollars;
to say nothing of blouses made from navy-blue silk, jaunty hats of blue
velour, stout tan walking-boots, and hospital shoes of white canvas. When
it came to lingerie, however, the “Q. M.” balked. It permitted the nurses
to purchase that for themselves.
Then there was the special clothing required for the soldiers fighting
on the Siberian steppes and the frozen wastes around Archangel. These
garments were designed by men who had had experience in the arctic and
were intimately familiar with the peculiar conditions existing on the
world’s remotest battle-line. Our soldiers in Russia were supplied with
caps and mittens made from muskrat fur, overcoats of moleskin or of duck
lined with sheepskin, Alaskan parkas with hoods lined with the fur of the
wolf, woodsmen’s heavy knee-length socks, Canadian shoepacks, such as the
trappers and _voyageurs_ wear in the Northern woods, and special heavy
underwear. These outfits, which cost about a hundred dollars each, were
supplied to approximately 15,000 men.
And, finally, there was the clothing for prisoners of war and interned
enemy aliens. This was not manufactured for the purpose but, instead,
the uniforms discarded by our own men were dry-cleaned, repaired, and
dyed a special shade of green—a glaring emerald-green—so that the wearer
could be distinguished as a prisoner as far as the eye could see him.
I remember watching a column of German prisoners leaving the prison
stockade near Atlanta one morning on their way to work. In the front
rank, his red mustache bristling fiercely, was a peculiarly haughty and
insolent head steward whom I had known in those days, now long past, when
self-respecting persons crossed the Atlantic on German liners. He was
fatter than when I had last seen him, and in his bright-green prisoner’s
uniform he looked for all the world like an animated cabbage. There is
a certain appropriateness in the fact that the uniforms with which we
supplied our captured Germans cost the government just thirty cents
apiece.
For more than forty years the woollen shirts worn by American soldiers
have been made at the great Quartermaster Depot at Jeffersonville, in
southern Indiana. In order to give employment to as many of those who
needed it as possible, it has always been the policy of the depot to
distribute the sewing of the shirts among the women of the community,
so, upon the outbreak of war, there were some 2,000 sewing operatives
working for the government in or near Jeffersonville. When word was
received from Washington that shirts were required in enormous quantities
and with the least possible delay, appeals were made by means of posters
and through the press to the women throughout that region to increase
the output of shirts for our soldiers. The response was as quick as it
was gratifying. Women who did not need the money gave up their duties or
their pleasures and turned to sewing. Soon there was scarcely a woman
along that portion of the Ohio who was not, like the industrious Sister
Susie, sewing shirts for soldiers. The number of operatives jumped from
2,000 to 20,000 almost overnight; the yearly output of shirts rose from
600,000 to 8,500,000. The operatives were required to call at the depot,
where unmade garments, which had already been cut, were issued to them,
together with the necessary trimmings and a completed shirt to be used
as a guide, the garments being sewn at home and returned to the depot
for inspection. In order to care for the thousands of women who came
flocking into Jeffersonville to secure shirts, first-aid stations had
to be established at the depot. A Sanitary Bureau was also organized
and a corps of sanitary inspectors were employed to visit the homes of
all the operatives to see that the shirts were being sewn under proper
sanitary conditions. As a further precaution, the shirts were fumigated
upon their return to the depot, thus insuring the soldier against any
risk of contagion from this source. When the Armistice, was signed the
Jeffersonville Depot was the largest shirt-manufacturing establishment in
the world, and “The Song of the Shirt” was heard for miles up and down
the banks of the Ohio.
* * * * *
In supplying the army with such articles as sheets, pillow-cases, towels,
gauze, denim, duck, and webbing, the Cotton Goods Branch of Purchase and
Storage procured over 800,000,000 square yards of cotton textiles—enough
to have covered an area four times the size of the District of Columbia.
It also purchased enormous quantities of burlap for packing, for bags,
and for the use of the Camouflage Service, as well as silk for flags,
hat-cords, and badges. Though it was never found necessary to resort to
the use of paper fabrics, the division had in its possession samples of
paper cloth and articles made from it which had been captured from the
enemy. These paper textiles were carefully analyzed and studied, and had
it become necessary to provide a substitute for cotton, we were prepared
to produce one which would have astonished the Germans.
One of the characteristics of the equipment of the European soldier
is the number of articles made of leather. He has leather belts,
cross-belts, cartridge-belts, bandoliers, gun-slings, map-cases,
knapsacks, sword and bayonet scabbards, chin-straps, and not infrequently
his head-gear is likewise made of leather. Not only is all this leather
costly, but it is stiff, heavy, cracks easily, and requires constant
work to keep it clean. Owing to the extreme scarcity and the almost
prohibitive cost of leather, its use was confined in the American
Army to saddles, bridles, harness, leggings, and Sam Browne belts,
virtually all other articles of equipment formerly made of leather,
such as cartridge-belts, packs, bandoliers, scabbards, gun-slings,
pistol-holsters, and the like, being made of cotton webbing. To supply
the army’s enormous demand for these articles it was necessary to
convert to the manufacture of this cotton webbing many plants which had
theretofore been engaged in the production of hose, cotton belting, and
asbestos brake linings. All the plants thus adapted to the emergency
manufacture of webbing were dependent on purchased yarns which they had
to secure in the open market. In the South, where most of this yarn
was produced, the securing of power was a very serious problem. Many
of the mills depended upon electricity generated by water-power, so
when this water-power ran very low it was necessary for the government
to step in and allocate the available power among the mills working on
army contracts according to the most pressing needs. Then there was the
inevitable question of labor. In many of the plants employees had to be
given special courses of instruction before they could produce the new
materials on which they were set to work. In the South, particularly,
much trouble and delay was caused by the question of child labor and
the working hours for women and minors, for in its later contracts the
government inserted clauses insisting on the observance of certain
regulations designed to benefit and protect the workers. In some
instances contracts were returned to the government because of this
child-labor clause, whereupon orders were issued virtually compelling the
mills to produce the goods called for, whether they wanted to or not. I
doubt if any government in the world, while engaged in a life-and-death
struggle, would have found time to show such solicitude for the weakest
and least influential of its people.
* * * * *