“A few days after that German aviators flying over the American lines
dropped notes announcing that Lieut. Quentin Roosevelt had been killed
by two bullet wounds in the head and had been buried with military
honors by the Germans.
“After the armistice was signed, we saw the aviator who had killed
Quentin. He was a non-commissioned officer and one of the most expert
flyers in the enemy’s air service. After the armistice he was acting
as an inspector in the surrender of German airplanes to the Allies.
“This man said that when he learned that the officer whom he had
brought down belonged to so prominent a family in America he felt
sorry.
“‘He was identified by a metal identification-plate fastened by a
little chain to his wrist,’ said the German, ‘and I was then told of
the young man’s prominence and his own personal popularity. Of course,
even if I had known during the battle who he was, I would not have
hesitated to try my best to down him; because, if I hadn’t, he surely
would have downed me.
“‘He made a gallant fight, although I recognized almost from the
beginning of our duel that he was not as experienced as some others I
had encountered and won out against.
“‘As it was, he dipped and circled and looped and tried in a variety
of ways to get above and behind me. It was not at all an easy task for
me to get the upper hand and down him.’”
[Illustration:
© _Underwood and Underwood._
When the Great American Patriot Died Flyers Dropped Wreaths from the
Air Over the Roosevelt Home at Sagamore Hill]
Simple praise this is, but sincere we feel. The German felt sorry for
our boy-hero. “He made a gallant fight,” he said. And he was not the
only German who was forced to give due admiration to the dauntless
American. The enemy buried him with military honors, and marked his
grave. The German Cross, however, has been removed from the grave of
Quentin. The grave is now simply fenced with stones. The French strew
flowers over it. It bears a soldier’s inscription:
“Here rests on the field of honor First Lieutenant Quentin Roosevelt,
killed in action July, 1918.”
A memorial just as eloquent in its simplicity is the letter from
General Pershing to the father of Quentin:
“Lieutenant Quentin Roosevelt during his whole career in the air
service both as a cadet and as a flying officer was a model of the best
type of young American manhood.”
Quentin is a hero—a soldier—an officer—yet most of all he remains to
our memory as our ex-President’s youngest boy. Eleanor Reed expresses
this lasting appeal in her poem to Quentin, in the New York _Times_:
“Young Roosevelt is dead—and I whose son
Is just a little boy, too young to go,
Read with bewildered eyes the tales recalled
Of pranks the little White House boy had played.”