THE WAR OF AMERICA THE UNREADY
I suppose the United States will always be unready for war, and
in consequence will always be exposed to great expense, and to the
possibility of the gravest calamity, when the Nation goes to war. This
is no new thing. Americans learn only from catastrophes and not from
experience.
There would have been no war in 1812 if, in the previous decade,
America, instead of announcing that "peace was her passion," instead of
acting on the theory that unpreparedness averts war, had been willing to
go to the expense of providing a fleet of a score of ships of the line.
However, in that case, doubtless the very men who in the actual
event deplored the loss of life and waste of capital which their own
supineness had brought about would have loudly inveighed against the
"excessive and improper cost of armaments"; so it all came to about the
same thing in the end.
There is no more thoroughgoing international Mrs. Gummidge, and no
more utterly useless and often utterly mischievous citizen, than the
peace-at-any-price, universal-arbitration type of being, who is always
complaining either about war or else about the cost of the armaments
which act as the insurance against war. There is every reason why
we should try to limit the cost of armaments, as these tend to grow
excessive, but there is also every reason to remember that in the
present stage of civilization a proper armament is the surest guarantee
of peace--and is the only guarantee that war, if it does come, will not
mean irreparable and overwhelming disaster.
In the spring of 1897 President McKinley appointed me Assistant
Secretary of the Navy. I owed the appointment chiefly to the efforts of
Senator H. C. Lodge of Massachusetts, who doubtless was actuated mainly
by his long and close friendship for me, but also--I like to believe--by
his keen interest in the navy. The first book I had ever published,
fifteen years previously, was "The History of the Naval War of 1812";
and I have always taken the interest in the navy which every good
American ought to take. At the time I wrote the book, in the early
eighties, the navy had reached its nadir, and we were then utterly
incompetent to fight Spain or any other power that had a navy at all.
Shortly afterwards we began timidly and hesitatingly to build up
a fleet. It is amusing to recall the roundabout steps we took to
accomplish our purpose. In the reaction after the colossal struggle of
the Civil War our strongest and most capable men had thrown their whole
energy into business, into money-making, into the development, and above
all the exploitation and exhaustion at the most rapid rate possible, of
our natural resources--mines, forests, soil, and rivers. These men were
not weak men, but they permitted themselves to grow shortsighted
and selfish; and while many of them down at the bottom possessed the
fundamental virtues, including the fighting virtues, others were purely
of the glorified huckster or glorified pawnbroker type--which when
developed to the exclusion of everything else makes about as poor a
national type as the world has seen. This unadulterated huckster or
pawnbroker type is rarely keenly sympathetic in matters of social and
industrial justice, and is usually physically timid and likes to cover
an unworthy fear of the most just war under high-sounding names.
It was reinforced by the large mollycoddle vote--the people who are soft
physically and morally, or who have a twist in them which makes them
acidly cantankerous and unpleasant as long as they can be so with
safety to their bodies. In addition there are the good people with no
imagination and no foresight, who think war will not come, but that if
it does come armies and navies can be improvised--a very large element,
typified by a Senator I knew personally who, in a public speech, in
answer to a question as to what we would do if America were suddenly
assailed by a first-class military power, answered that "we would build
a battle-ship in every creek." Then, among the wise and high-minded
people who in self-respecting and genuine fashion strive earnestly
for peace, there are the foolish fanatics always to be found in such a
movement and always discrediting it--the men who form the lunatic fringe
in all reform movements.
All these elements taken together made a body of public opinion so
important during the decades immediately succeeding the Civil War as to
put a stop to any serious effort to keep the Nation in a condition of
reasonable military preparedness. The representatives of this opinion
then voted just as they now do when they vote against battle-ships or
against fortifying the Panama Canal. It would have been bad enough if
we had been content to be weak, and, in view of our weakness, not to
bluster. But we were not content with such a policy. We wished to enjoy
the incompatible luxuries of an unbridled tongue and an unready hand.
There was a very large element which was ignorant of our military
weakness, or, naturally enough, unable to understand it; and another
large element which liked to please its own vanity by listening to
offensive talk about foreign nations. Accordingly, too many of our
politicians, especially in Congress, found that the cheap and easy thing
to do was to please the foolish peace people by keeping us weak, and to
please the foolish violent people by passing denunciatory resolutions
about international matters--resolutions which would have been
improper even if we had been strong. Their idea was to please both the
mollycoddle vote and the vote of the international tail-twisters by
upholding, with pretended ardor and mean intelligence, a National policy
of peace with insult.
I abhor unjust war. I abhor injustice and bullying by the strong at
the expense of the weak, whether among nations or individuals. I abhor
violence and bloodshed. I believe that war should never be resorted to
when, or so long as, it is honorably possible to avoid it. I respect all
men and women who from high motives and with sanity and self-respect do
all they can to avert war. I advocate preparation for war in order
to avert war; and I should never advocate war unless it were the only
alternative to dishonor. I describe the folly of which so many of our
people were formerly guilty, in order that we may in our own day be on
our guard against similar folly.
We did not at the time of which I write take our foreign duties
seriously, and as we combined bluster in speech with refusal to make
any preparation whatsoever for action, we were not taken seriously in
return. Gradually a slight change for the better occurred, the writings
of Captain Mahan playing no small part therein. We built some modern
cruisers to start with; the people who felt that battle-ships were
wicked compromising with their misguided consciences by saying that the
cruisers could be used "to protect our commerce"--which they could not
be, unless they had battle-ships to back them. Then we attempted to
build more powerful fighting vessels, and as there was a section of
the public which regarded battle-ships as possessing a name immorally
suggestive of violence, we compromised by calling the new ships armored
cruisers, and making them combine with exquisite nicety all the defects
and none of the virtues of both types. Then we got to the point of
building battle-ships. But there still remained a public opinion, as old
as the time of Jefferson, which thought that in the event of war all
our problem ought to be one of coast defense, that we should do
nothing except repel attack; an attitude about as sensible as that of a
prize-fighter who expected to win by merely parrying instead of hitting.
To meet the susceptibilities of this large class of well-meaning people,
we provided for the battle-ships under the name of "coast defense
battle-ships"; meaning thereby that we did not make them quite as
seaworthy as they ought to have been, or with quite as much coal
capacity as they ought to have had. Then we decided to build real
battle-ships. But there still remained a lingering remnant of public
opinion that clung to the coast defense theory, and we met this
in beautiful fashion by providing for "sea-going coast defense
battle-ships"--the fact that the name was a contradiction in terms being
of very small consequence compared to the fact that we did thereby get
real battle-ships.
Our men had to be trained to handle the ships singly and in fleet
formation, and they had to be trained to use the new weapons of
precision with which the ships were armed. Not a few of the older
officers, kept in the service under our foolish rule of pure seniority
promotion, were not competent for the task; but a proportion of the
older officers were excellent, and this was true of almost all the
younger officers. They were naturally first-class men, trained in the
admirable naval school at Annapolis. They were overjoyed that at last
they were given proper instruments to work with, and they speedily grew
to handle these ships individually in the best fashion. They were fast
learning to handle them in squadron and fleet formation; but when the
war with Spain broke out, they had as yet hardly grasped the principles
of modern scientific naval gunnery.
Soon after I began work as Assistant Secretary of the Navy I became
convinced that the war would come. The revolt in Cuba had dragged its
weary length until conditions in the island had become so dreadful as to
be a standing disgrace to us for permitting them to exist. There is much
that I sincerely admire about the Spanish character; and there are few
men for whom I have felt greater respect than for certain gentlemen of
Spain whom I have known. But Spain attempted to govern her colonies on
archaic principles which rendered her control of them incompatible with
the advance of humanity and intolerable to the conscience of mankind.
In 1898 the so-called war in Cuba had dragged along for years with
unspeakable horror, degradation, and misery. It was not "war" at all,
but murderous oppression. Cuba was devastated.
During those years, while we continued at "peace," several hundred times
as many lives were lost, lives of men, women, and children, as were lost
during the three months' "war" which put an end to this slaughter and
opened a career of peaceful progress to the Cubans. Yet there were
misguided professional philanthropists who cared so much more for names
than for facts that they preferred a "peace" of continuous murder to
a "war" which stopped the murder and brought real peace. Spain's
humiliation was certain, anyhow; indeed, it was more certain without
war than with it, for she could not permanently keep the island, and she
minded yielding to the Cubans more than yielding to us. Our own direct
interests were great, because of the Cuban tobacco and sugar, and
especially because of Cuba's relation to the projected Isthmian Canal.
But even greater were our interests from the standpoint of humanity.
Cuba was at our very doors. It was a dreadful thing for us to sit
supinely and watch her death agony. It was our duty, even more from
the standpoint of National honor than from the standpoint of National
interest, to stop the devastation and destruction. Because of these
considerations I favored war; and to-day, when in retrospect it is
easier to see things clearly, there are few humane and honorable men who
do not believe that the war was both just and necessary.
The big financiers and the men generally who were susceptible to touch
on the money nerve, and who cared nothing for National honor if it
conflicted even temporarily with business prosperity, were against
the war. The more fatuous type of philanthropist agreed with them. The
newspapers controlled by, or run in the interests of, these two classes
deprecated war, and did everything in their power to prevent any
preparation for war. As a whole the people in Congress were at that time
(and are now) a shortsighted set as regards international matters. There
were a few men, Senators Cushman K. Davis,[*] for instance, and John
Morgan, who did look ahead; and Senator H. C. Lodge, who throughout his
quarter of a century of service in the Senate and House has ever stood
foremost among those who uphold with farsighted fearlessness and strict
justice to others our national honor and interest; but most of the
Congressmen were content to follow the worst of all possible courses,
that is, to pass resolutions which made war more likely, and yet to
decline to take measures which would enable us to meet the war if it did
come.
[*] In a letter written me just before I became Assistant
Secretary, Senator Davis unburdened his mind about one of
the foolish "peace" proposals of that period; his letter
running in part: "I left the Senate Chamber about three
o'clock this afternoon when there was going on a deal of
mowing and chattering over the treaty by which the United
States is to be bound to arbitrate its sovereign
functions--for policies are matters of sovereignty. . . .
The
aberrations of the social movement are neither progress nor
retrogression. They represent merely a local and temporary
sagging of the line of the great orbit. Tennyson knew this
when he wrote that fine and noble 'Maud.' I often read it,
for to do so does me good." After quoting one of Poe's
stories the letter continues: "The world will come out all
right. Let him who believes in the decline of the military
spirit observe the boys of a common school during the recess
or the noon hour. Of course when American patriotism speaks
out from its rank and file and demands action or expression,
and when, thereupon, the 'business man,' so called, places
his hand on his stack of reds as if he feared a policeman
were about to disturb the game, and protests until American
patriotism ceases to continue to speak as it had started to
do--why, you and I get mad, and I swear. I hope you will be
with us here after March 4. We can then pass judgment
together on the things we don't like, and together indulge
in hopes that I believe are prophetic."
However, in the Navy Department we were able to do a good deal, thanks
to the energy and ability of some of the bureau chiefs, and to the
general good tone of the service. I soon found my natural friends and
allies in such men as Evans, Taylor, Sampson, Wainwright, Brownson,
Schroeder, Bradford, Cowles, Cameron, Winslow, O'Neil, and others like
them. I used all the power there was in my office to aid these men in
getting the material ready. I also tried to gather from every source
information as to who the best men were to occupy the fighting
positions.
Sound naval opinion was overwhelmingly in favor of Dewey to command
one squadron. I was already watching him, for I had been struck by an
incident in his past career. It was at a time when there was threat of
trouble with Chile. Dewey was off the Argentine, and was told to get
ready to move to the other coast of South America. If the move became
necessary, he would have to have coal, and yet if he did not make the
move, the coal would not be needed. In such a case a man afraid of
responsibility always acts rigidly by the regulations and communicates
with the Department at home to get authority for everything he does;
and therefore he usually accomplishes nothing whatever, but is able to
satisfy all individuals with red-tape minds by triumphantly pointing out
his compliance with the regulations. In a crisis, the man worth his
salt is the man who meets the needs of the situation in whatever way
is necessary. Dewey purchased the coal and was ready to move at once if
need arose. The affair blew over; the need to move did not occur; and
for some time there seemed to be a chance that Dewey would get into
trouble over having purchased the coal, for our people are like
almost all other peoples in requiring responsible officers under such
conditions to decide at their own personal peril, no matter which course
they follow. However, the people higher up ultimately stood by Dewey.
The incident made me feel that here was a man who could be relied upon
to prepare in advance, and to act promptly, fearlessly, and on his own
responsibility when the emergency arose. Accordingly I did my best to
get him put in command of the Asiatic fleet, the fleet where it was most
essential to have a man who would act without referring things back
to the home authorities. An officer senior to him, of the respectable
commonplace type, was being pushed by certain politicians who I knew had
influence with the Navy Department and with the President. I would have
preferred to see Dewey get the appointment without appealing to any
politician at all. But while this was my preference, the essential thing
was to get him the appointment. For a naval officer to bring pressure to
get himself a soft and easy place is unpardonable; but a large leniency
should be observed toward the man who uses influence only to get himself
a place in the picture near the flashing of the guns. There was a
Senator, Proctor of Vermont, who I knew was close to McKinley, and who
was very ardent for the war, and desirous to have it fought in the
most efficient fashion. I suggested to Dewey that he should enlist the
services of Senator Proctor, which was accordingly done. In a fortunate
hour for the Nation, Dewey was given command of the Asiatic squadron.
When the Maine was blown up in Havana Harbor, war became inevitable.
A number of the peace-at-any-price men of course promptly assumed the
position that she had blown herself up; but investigation showed that
the explosion was from outside. And, in any event, it would have been
impossible to prevent war. The enlisted men of the navy, who often grew
bored to the point of desertion in peace, became keyed up to a high
pitch of efficiency, and crowds of fine young fellows, from the interior
as well as from the seacoast, thronged to enlist. The navy officers
showed alert ability and unwearied industry in getting things ready.
There was one deficiency, however, which there was no time to remedy,
and of the very existence of which, strange to say, most of our best men
were ignorant. Our navy had no idea how low our standard of marksmanship
was. We had not realized that the modern battle-ship had become such
a complicated piece of mechanism that the old methods of training in
marksmanship were as obsolete as the old muzzle-loading broadside guns
themselves. Almost the only man in the navy who fully realized this
was our naval attache at Paris, Lieutenant Sims. He wrote letter after
letter pointing out how frightfully backward we were in marksmanship.
I was much impressed by his letters; but Wainwright was about the only
other man who was. And as Sims proved to be mistaken in his belief that
the French had taught the Spaniards how to shoot, and as the Spaniards
proved to be much worse even than we were, in the service generally Sims
was treated as an alarmist. But although I at first partly acquiesced in
this view, I grew uneasy when I studied the small proportion of hits to
shots made by our vessels in battle. When I was President I took up the
matter, and speedily became convinced that we needed to revolutionize
our whole training in marksmanship. Sims was given the lead in
organizing and introducing the new system; and to him more than to any
other one man was due the astonishing progress made by our fleet in this
respect, a progress which made the fleet, gun for gun, at least three
times as effective, in point of fighting efficiency, in 1908, as it was
in 1902. The shots that hit are the shots that count!
Like the people, the Government was for a long time unwilling to prepare
for war, because so many honest but misguided men believed that the
preparation itself tended to bring on the war. I did not in the least
share this feeling, and whenever I was left as Acting Secretary I did
everything in my power to put us in readiness. I knew that in the event
of war Dewey could be slipped like a wolf-hound from a leash; I was sure
that if he were given half a chance he would strike instantly and with
telling effect; and I made up my mind that all I could do to give him
that half-chance should be done. I was in the closest touch with Senator
Lodge throughout this period, and either consulted him about or notified
him of all the moves I was taking. By the end of February I felt it was
vital to send Dewey (as well as each of our other commanders who
were not in home waters) instructions that would enable him to be in
readiness for immediate action. On the afternoon of Saturday, February
25, when I was Acting Secretary, Lodge called on me just as I was
preparing the order, which (as it was addressed to a man of the right
stamp) was of much importance to the subsequent operations. Admiral
Dewey speaks of the incident as follows, in his autobiography:
"The first real step [as regards active naval preparations] was taken
on February 25, when telegraphic instructions were sent to the Asiatic,
European, and South Atlantic squadrons to rendezvous at certain
convenient points where, should war break out, they would be most
available.
"The message to the Asiatic squadron bore the signature of that
Assistant Secretary who had seized the opportunity while Acting
Secretary to hasten preparations for a conflict which was inevitable. As
Mr. Roosevelt reasoned, precautions for readiness would cost little in
time of peace, and yet would be invaluable in case of war. His cablegram
was as follows:
"'Washington, February 25, '98.
"'_Dewey, Hong Kong_:
"'Order the squadron, except the Monocacy, to Hong Kong. Keep full of
coal. In the event of declaration of war Spain, your duty will be to
see that the Spanish squadron does not leave the Asiatic coast, and then
offensive operations in Philippine Islands. Keep Olympia until further
orders.
"'ROOSEVELT.'
"(The reference to keeping the Olympia until further orders was due to
the fact that I had been notified that she would soon be recalled to the
United States.)"
All that was needed with Dewey was to give him the chance to get ready,
and then to strike, without being hampered by orders from those not on
the ground. Success in war depends very largely upon choosing a man fit
to exercise such powers, and then giving him the powers.
It would be instructive to remember, if only we were willing to do so,
the fairly comic panic which swept in waves over our seacoast, first
when it became evident that war was about to be declared, and then when
it was declared. The public waked up to the sufficiently obvious fact
that the Government was in its usual state--perennial unreadiness for
war. Thereupon the people of the seaboard district passed at one bound
from unreasoning confidence that war never could come to unreasoning
fear as to what might happen now that it had come. That acute
philosopher Mr. Dooley proclaimed that in the Spanish War we were in a
dream, but that the Spaniards were in a trance. This just about summed
up the facts. Our people had for decades scoffed at the thought of
making ready for possible war. Now, when it was too late, they not
only backed every measure, wise and unwise, that offered a chance of
supplying a need that ought to have been met before, but they also fell
into a condition of panic apprehension as to what the foe might do.
For years we had been saying, just as any number of our people now say,
that no nation would venture to attack us. Then when we did go to war
with an exceedingly feeble nation, we, for the time being, rushed to the
other extreme of feeling, and attributed to this feeble nation plans of
offensive warfare which it never dreamed of making, and which, if
made, it would have been wholly unable to execute. Some of my readers
doubtless remember the sinister intentions and unlimited potentialities
for destruction with which the fertile imagination of the yellow press
endowed the armored cruiser Viscaya when she appeared in American waters
just before war was declared. The state of nervousness along much of
the seacoast was funny in view of the lack of foundation for it; but
it offered food for serious thought as to what would happen if we ever
became engaged with a serious foe.
The Governor of one State actually announced that he would not permit
the National Guard of that State to leave its borders, the idea being to
retain it against a possible Spanish invasion. So many of the business
men of the city of Boston took their securities inland to Worcester that
the safe deposit companies of Worcester proved unable to take care of
them. In my own neighborhood on Long Island clauses were gravely put
into leases to the effect that if the property were destroyed by the
Spaniards the lease should lapse. As Assistant Secretary of the Navy I
had every conceivable impossible request made to me. Members of Congress
who had actively opposed building any navy came clamorously around to
ask each for a ship for some special purpose of protection connected
with his district. It seems incredible, but it is true, that not only
these Congressmen but the Chambers of Commerce and Boards of Trade of
different coast cities all lost their heads for the time being, and
raised a deafening clamor and brought every species of pressure to bear
on the Administration to get it to adopt the one most fatal course--that
is, to distribute the navy, ship by ship, at all kinds of points and in
all kinds of ports with the idea of protecting everything everywhere,
and thereby rendering it absolutely certain that even the Spanish fleet,
poor though it was, would be able to pick up our own navy ship by ship
in detail. One Congressman besought me for a ship to protect Jekyll
Island, off the coast of Georgia, an island which derived its
sole consequence because it contained the winter homes of certain
millionaires. A lady whose husband occupied a very influential position,
and who was normally a most admirable and sensible woman, came to insist
that a ship should be anchored off a huge seaside hotel because she had
a house in the neighborhood.
There were many such instances. One stood out above the others. A
certain seaboard State contained in its Congressional delegation one of
the most influential men in the Senate, and one of the most influential
men in the lower house. These two men had been worse than lukewarm about
building up the navy, and had scoffed at the idea of there ever being
any danger from any foreign power. With the advent of war the feelings
of their constituents, and therefore their own feelings, suffered an
immediate change, and they demanded that a ship be anchored in the
harbor of their city as a protection. Getting no comfort from me, they
went "higher up," and became a kind of permanent committee in attendance
upon the President. They were very influential men in the Houses, with
whom it was important for the Administration to keep on good terms; and,
moreover, they possessed a pertinacity as great as the widow who won her
case from the unjust judge. Finally the President gave in and notified
me to see that a ship was sent to the city in question. I was bound
that, as long as a ship had to be sent, it should not be a ship worth
anything. Accordingly a Civil War Monitor, with one smooth-bore gun,
managed by a crew of about twenty-one naval militia, was sent to the
city in question, under convoy of a tug. It was a hazardous trip for the
unfortunate naval militiamen, but it was safely accomplished; and joy
and peace descended upon the Senator and the Congressman, and upon the
President whom they had jointly harassed. Incidentally, the fact that
the protecting war-vessel would not have been a formidable foe to
any antagonists of much more modern construction than the galleys of
Alcibiades seemed to disturb nobody.
This was one side of the picture. The other side was that the crisis at
once brought to the front any amount of latent fighting strength. There
were plenty of Congressmen who showed cool-headed wisdom and resolution.
The plain people, the men and women back of the persons who lost their
heads, set seriously to work to see that we did whatever was necessary,
and made the job a thorough one. The young men swarmed to enlist. In
time of peace it had been difficult to fill the scanty regular army and
navy, and there were innumerable desertions; now the ships and regiments
were over-enlisted, and so many deserters returned in order to fight
that it became difficult to decide what to do with them. England, and
to a less degree Japan, were friendly. The great powers of Continental
Europe were all unfriendly. They jeered at our ships and men, and with
fatuous partisanship insisted that the Spaniards would prove too much
for our "mercenaries" because we were a commercial people of low ideals
who could not fight, while the men whom we attempted to hire for that
purpose were certain to run on the day of battle.
Among my friends was the then Army Surgeon Leonard Wood. He was a
surgeon. Not having an income, he had to earn his own living. He had
gone through the Harvard Medical School, and had then joined the army
in the Southwest as a contract doctor. He had every physical, moral,
and mental quality which fitted him for a soldier's life and for
the exercise of command. In the inconceivably wearing and harassing
campaigns against the Apaches he had served nominally as a surgeon,
really in command of troops, on more than one expedition. He was as
anxious as I was that if there were war we should both have our part in
it. I had always felt that if there were a serious war I wished to be in
a position to explain to my children why I did take part in it, and not
why I did not take part in it. Moreover, I had very deeply felt that it
was our duty to free Cuba, and I had publicly expressed this feeling;
and when a man takes such a position, he ought to be willing to make his
words good by his deeds unless there is some very strong reason to the
contrary. He should pay with his body.
As soon as war was upon us, Wood and I began to try for a chance to
go to the front. Congress had authorized the raising of three National
Volunteer Cavalry regiments, wholly apart from the State contingents.
Secretary Alger of the War Department was fond of me personally, and
Wood was his family doctor. Alger had been a gallant soldier in the
Civil War, and was almost the only member of the Administration who felt
all along that we would have to go to war with Spain over Cuba. He liked
my attitude in the matter, and because of his remembrance of his
own experiences he sympathized with my desire to go to the front.
Accordingly he offered me the command of one of the regiments. I told
him that after six weeks' service in the field I would feel competent to
handle the regiment, but that I would not know how to equip it or how
to get it into the first action; but that Wood was entirely competent
at once to take command, and that if he would make Wood colonel I would
accept the lieutenant-colonelcy. General Alger thought this an act of
foolish self-abnegation on my part--instead of its being, what it
was, the wisest act I could have performed. He told me to accept the
colonelcy, and that he would make Wood lieutenant-colonel, and that Wood
would do the work anyway; but I answered that I did not wish to rise on
any man's shoulders; that I hoped to be given every chance that my deeds
and abilities warranted; but that I did not wish what I did not earn,
and that above all I did not wish to hold any position where any one
else did the work. He laughed at me a little and said I was foolish, but
I do not think he really minded, and he promised to do as I wished. True
to his word, he secured the appointment of Wood as colonel and of myself
as lieutenant-colonel of the First United States Volunteer Cavalry. This
was soon nicknamed, both by the public and by the rest of the army,
the Rough Riders, doubtless because the bulk of the men were from the
Southwestern ranch country and were skilled in the wild horsemanship of
the great plains.
Wood instantly began the work of raising the regiment. He first
assembled several old non-commissioned officers of experience, put them
in office, and gave them blanks for requisitions for the full equipment
of a cavalry regiment. He selected San Antonio as the gathering-place,
as it was in a good horse country, near the Gulf from some port on which
we would have to embark, and near an old arsenal and an old army
post from which we got a good deal of stuff--some of it practically
condemned, but which we found serviceable at a pinch, and much better
than nothing. He organized a horse board in Texas, and began purchasing
all horses that were not too big and were sound. A day or two after he
was commissioned he wrote out in the office of the Secretary of War,
under his authority, telegrams to the Governors of Arizona, New Mexico,
Oklahoma, and Indian Territory, in substance as follows:
The President desires to raise --- volunteers in your Territory to form
part of a regiment of mounted riflemen to be commanded by Leonard Wood,
Colonel; Theodore Roosevelt, Lieutenant-Colonel. He desires that the men
selected should be young, sound, good shots and good riders, and that
you expedite by all means in your power the enrollment of these men.
(Signed) R. A. ALGER, Secretary of War.
As soon as he had attended to a few more odds and ends he left
Washington, and the day after his arrival in San Antonio the troops
began to arrive.
For several weeks before I joined the regiment, to which Wood went ahead
of me, I continued as Assistant Secretary of the Navy, trying to
get some coherence of plan between the War Department and the Navy
Department; and also being used by Wood to finish getting the equipment
for the regiment. As regards finding out what the plans of the War
Department were, the task was simple. They had no plans. Even during the
final months before the outbreak of hostilities very little was done in
the way of efficient preparation. On one occasion, when every one knew
that the declaration of war was sure to come in a few days, I went on
military business to the office of one of the highest line generals of
the army, a man who at that moment ought to have been working eighteen
hours out of the twenty-four on the vital problems ahead of him. What he
was actually doing was trying on a new type of smart-looking uniform
on certain enlisted men; and he called me in to ask my advice as to the
position of the pockets in the blouse, with a view to making it look
attractive. An aide of this general--funnily enough a good fighting man
in actual service--when I consulted him as to what my uniform for the
campaign should be, laid special stress upon my purchasing a pair of
black top boots for full dress, explaining that they were very effective
on hotel piazzas and in parlors. I did not intend to be in any hotel
if it could possibly be avoided; and as things turned out, I had no
full-dress uniform, nothing but my service uniform, during my brief
experience in the army.
I suppose that war always does bring out what is highest and lowest in
human nature. The contractors who furnish poor materials to the army or
the navy in time of war stand on a level of infamy only one degree above
that of the participants in the white slave traffic themselves. But
there is conduct far short of this which yet seems inexplicable to any
man who has in him any spirit of disinterested patriotism combined
with any power of imagination. Respectable men, who I suppose lack the
imagination thoroughly to realize what they are doing, try to make money
out of the Nation's necessities in war at the very time that other men
are making every sacrifice, financial and personal, for the cause. In
the closing weeks of my service as Assistant Secretary of the Navy we
were collecting ships for auxiliary purposes. Some men, at cost to their
own purses, helped us freely and with efficiency; others treated the
affair as an ordinary business transaction; and yet others endeavored,
at some given crisis when our need was great, to sell us inferior
vessels at exorbitant prices, and used every pressure, through Senators
and Congressmen, to accomplish their ends. In one or two cases they did
accomplish them too, until we got a really first-class board established
to superintend such purchases. A more curious experience was in
connection with the point chosen for the starting of the expedition
against Cuba. I had not supposed that any human being could consider
this matter save from the standpoint of military need. But one morning
a very wealthy and influential man, a respectable and upright man
according to his own lights, called on me to protest against our choice
of Tampa, and to put in a plea for a certain other port, on the ground
that his railroad was entitled to its share of the profit for hauling
the army and equipment! I happened to know that at this time this
very man had kinsfolk with the army, who served gallantly, and the
circumstances of his coming to me were such as to show that he was not
acting secretly, and had no idea that there was anything out of the way
in his proposal. I think the facts were merely that he had been trained
to regard business as the sole object in life, and that he lacked the
imagination to enable him to understand the real nature of the request
that he was making; and, moreover, he had good reason to believe that
one of his business competitors had been unduly favored.
The War Department was in far worse shape than the Navy Department. The
young officers turned out from West Point are precisely as good as the
young officers turned out from Annapolis, and this always has been true.
But at that time (something has been done to remedy the worst conditions
since), and ever since the close of the Civil War, the conditions were
such that after a few years the army officer stagnated so far as his
profession was concerned. When the Spanish War broke out the navy really
was largely on a war footing, as any navy which is even respectably
cared for in time of peace must be. The admirals, captains, and
lieutenants were continually practicing their profession in almost
precisely the way that it has to be practiced in time of war. Except
actually shooting at a foe, most of the men on board ship went through
in time of peace practically all that they would have to go through in
time of war. The heads of bureaus in the Navy Department were for the
most part men who had seen sea service, who expected to return to sea
service, and who were preparing for needs which they themselves knew by
experience. Moreover, the civilian head of the navy had to provide for
keeping the ships in a state of reasonable efficiency, and Congress
could not hopelessly misbehave itself about the navy without the fact at
once becoming evident.
All this was changed so far as the army was concerned. Not only was it
possible to decrease the efficiency of the army without being called
to account for it, but the only way in which the Secretary of War could
gain credit for himself or the Administration was by economy, and the
easiest way to economize was in connection with something that would not
be felt unless war should arise. The people took no interest whatever in
the army; demagogues clamored against it, and, inadequate though it
was in size, insisted that it should be still further reduced. Popular
orators always appealed to the volunteers; the regulars had no votes and
there was no point in politicians thinking of them. The chief activity
shown by Congressmen about the army was in getting special army posts
built in places where there was no need for them. Even the work of the
army in its campaigns against the Indians was of such a character that
it was generally performed by small bodies of fifty or a hundred
men. Until a man ceased being a lieutenant he usually had plenty of
professional work to attend to and was employed in the field, and, in
short, had the same kind of practice that his brother in the navy had,
and he did his work as well. But once past this stage he had almost
no opportunity to perform any work corresponding to his rank, and but
little opportunity to do any military work whatsoever. The very best
men, men like Lawton, Young, Chaffee, Hawkins, and Sumner, to mention
only men under or beside whom I served, remained good soldiers, soldiers
of the best stamp, in spite of the disheartening conditions. But it
was not to be expected that the average man could continue to grow
when every influence was against him. Accordingly, when the Spanish War
suddenly burst upon us, a number of inert elderly captains and field
officers were, much against their own wishes, suddenly pitchforked into
the command of regiments, brigades, and even divisions and army corps.
Often these men failed painfully. This was not their fault; it was the
fault of the Nation, that is, the fault of all of us, of you, my reader,
and of myself, and of those like us, because we had permitted conditions
to be such as to render these men unfit for command. Take a stout
captain of an out-of-the-way two-company post, where nothing in the
world ever occurred even resembling military action, and where the only
military problem that really convulsed the post to its foundations was
the quarrel between the captain and the quartermaster as to how high a
mule's tail ought to be shaved (I am speaking of an actual incident).
What could be expected of such a man, even though thirty-five years
before he had been a gallant second lieutenant in the Civil War, if,
after this intervening do-nothing period, he was suddenly put in command
of raw troops in a midsummer campaign in the tropics?
The bureau chiefs were for the most part elderly incompetents, whose
idea was to do their routine duties in such way as to escape the
censure of routine bureaucratic superiors and to avoid a Congressional
investigation. They had not the slightest conception of preparing
the army for war. It was impossible that they could have any such
conception. The people and the Congress did not wish the army prepared
for war; and those editors and philanthropists and peace advocates who
felt vaguely that if the army were incompetent their principles were
safe, always inveighed against any proposal to make it efficient, on the
ground that this showed a natural bloodthirstiness in the proposer. When
such were the conditions, it was absolutely impossible that either the
War Department or the army could do well in the event of war. Secretary
Alger happened to be Secretary when war broke out, and all the
responsibility for the shortcomings of the Department were visited
upon his devoted head. He was made the scapegoat for our National
shortcomings. The fault was not his; the fault and responsibility
lay with us, the people, who for thirty-three years had permitted our
representatives in Congress and in National executive office to bear
themselves so that it was absolutely impossible to avoid the great bulk
of all the trouble that occurred, and of all the shortcomings of which
our people complained, during the Spanish War. The chief immediate cause
was the conditions of red-tape bureaucracy which existed in the War
Department at Washington, which had prevented any good organization
or the preparation of any good plan of operation for using our men and
supplies. The recurrence of these conditions, even though in somewhat
less aggravated form, in any future emergency is as certain as sunrise
unless we bring about the principle of a four years' detail in the staff
corps--a principle which Congress has now for years stubbornly refused
to grant.
There are nations who only need to have peaceful ideals inculcated, and
to whom militarism is a curse and a misfortune. There are other nations,
like our own, so happily situated that the thought of war is never
present to their minds. They are wholly free from any tendency
improperly to exalt or to practice militarism. These nations should
never forget that there must be military ideals no less than peaceful
ideals. The exaltation of Nogi's career, set forth so strikingly in
Stanley Washburn's little volume on the great Japanese warrior, contains
much that is especially needed for us of America, prone as we are to
regard the exigencies of a purely commercial and industrial civilization
as excusing us from the need of admiring and practicing the heroic and
warlike virtues.
Our people are not military. We need normally only a small standing
army; but there should be behind it a reserve of instructed men big
enough to fill it up to full war strength, which is over twice the peace
strength. Moreover, the young men of the country should realize that it
is the duty of every one of them to prepare himself so that in time of
need he may speedily become an efficient soldier--a duty now generally
forgotten, but which should be recognized as one of the vitally
essential parts of every man's training.
In endeavoring to get the "Rough Riders" equipped I met with some
experiences which were both odd and instructive. There were not enough
arms and other necessaries to go round, and there was keen rivalry among
the intelligent and zealous commanders of the volunteer organizations as
to who should get first choice. Wood's experience was what enabled us to
equip ourselves in short order. There was another cavalry organization
whose commander was at the War Department about this time, and we had
been eyeing him with much alertness as a rival. One day I asked him
what his plans were about arming and drilling his troops, who were of
precisely the type of our own men. He answered that he expected "to give
each of the boys two revolvers and a lariat, and then just turn them
loose." I reported the conversation to Wood, with the remark that we
might feel ourselves safe from rivalry in that quarter; and safe we
were.
In trying to get the equipment I met with checks and rebuffs, and in
return was the cause of worry and concern to various bureau chiefs
who were unquestionably estimable men in their private and domestic
relations, and who doubtless had been good officers thirty years
before, but who were as unfit for modern war as if they were so many
smooth-bores. One fine old fellow did his best to persuade us to take
black powder rifles, explaining with paternal indulgence that no one yet
really knew just what smokeless powder might do, and that there was a
good deal to be said in favor of having smoke to conceal us from the
enemy. I saw this pleasing theory actually worked out in practice later
on, for the National Guard regiments with us at Santiago had black
powder muskets, and the regular artillery black powder guns, and they
really might almost as well have replaced these weapons by crossbows
and mangonels. We succeeded, thanks to Wood, in getting the same cavalry
carbines that were used by the regulars. We were determined to do this,
not only because the weapons were good, but because this would in all
probability mean that we were brigaded with the regular cavalry, which
it was certain would be sent immediately to the front for the fighting.
There was one worthy bureau chief who was continually refusing
applications of mine as irregular. In each case I would appeal to
Secretary Alger--who helped me in every way--and get an order from him
countenancing the irregularity. For instance, I found out that as we
were nearer the July date than the January date for the issuance of
clothing, and as it had long been customary to issue the winter clothing
in July, so as to give ample leisure for getting it to all the various
posts, it was therefore solemnly proposed to issue this same winter
clothing to us who were about to start for a summer campaign in the
tropics. This would seem incredible to those who have never dealt with
an inert officialdom, a red-tape bureaucracy, but such is the fact. I
rectified this and got an order for khaki clothing. We were then told we
would have to advertise thirty days for horses. This meant that we would
have missed the Santiago expedition. So I made another successful appeal
to the Secretary. Other difficulties came up about wagons, and various
articles, and in each case the same result followed. On the last
occasion, when I came up in triumph with the needed order, the worried
office head, who bore me no animosity, but who did feel that fate had
been very unkind, threw himself back in his chair and exclaimed with a
sigh: "Oh, dear! I had this office running in such good shape--and then
along came the war and upset everything!" His feeling was that war was
an illegitimate interruption to the work of the War Department.
There were of course department heads and bureau chiefs and assistants
who, in spite of the worthlessness of the system, and of the paralyzing
conditions that had prevailed, remained first-class men. An example
of these was Commissary-General Weston. His energy, activity,
administrative efficiency, and common sense were supplemented by an
eager desire to help everybody do the best that could be done. Both in
Washington and again down at Santiago we owed him very much. When I was
President, it was my good fortune to repay him in part our debt,
which means the debt of the people of the country, by making him a
major-general.
The regiment assembled at San Antonio. When I reached there, the men,
rifles, and horses, which were the essentials, were coming in fast, and
the saddles, blankets, and the like were also accumulating. Thanks to
Wood's exertions, when we reached Tampa we were rather better equipped
than most of the regular regiments. We adhered strictly to field
equipment, allowing no luxuries or anything else unnecessary, and so
we were able to move off the field when ordered, with our own
transportation, leaving nothing behind.
I suppose every man tends to brag about his regiment; but it does seem
to me that there never was a regiment better worth bragging about
than ours. Wood was an exceptional commander, of great power, with a
remarkable gift for organization. The rank and file were as fine natural
fighting men as ever carried a rifle or rode a horse in any country or
any age. We had a number of first-class young fellows from the East,
most of them from colleges like Harvard, Yale, and Princeton; but
the great majority of the men were Southwesterners, from the then
territories of Oklahoma, Indian Territory, Arizona, and New Mexico. They
were accustomed to the use of firearms, accustomed to taking care of
themselves in the open; they were intelligent and self-reliant; they
possessed hardihood and endurance and physical prowess; and, above all,
they had the fighting edge, the cool and resolute fighting temper. They
went into the war with full knowledge, having deliberately counted the
cost. In the great majority of cases each man was chiefly anxious to
find out what he should do to make the regiment a success. They bought,
first and last, about 800 copies of the cavalry drill regulations and
studied them industriously. Such men were practically soldiers to
start with, in all the essentials. It is small wonder that with them as
material to work upon the regiment was raised, armed, equipped, drilled,
sent on trains to Tampa, embarked, disembarked, and put through two
victorious offensive--not defensive--fights in which a third of the
officers and one-fifth of the men were killed or wounded, all within
sixty days. It is a good record, and it speaks well for the men of the
regiment; and it speaks well for Wood.[*]
[*] To counterbalance the newspapers which ignorantly and
indiscriminately praised all the volunteers there were
others whose blame was of the same intelligent quality. The
New York _Evening Post_, on June 18, gave expression to the
following gloomy foreboding: "Competent observers have
remarked that nothing more extraordinary has been done than
the sending to Cuba of the First United States Volunteer
Cavalry, known as the 'rough riders.' Organized but four
weeks, barely given their full complement of officers, and
only a week of regular drill, these men have been sent to
the front before they have learned the first elements of
soldiering and discipline, or have even become acquainted
with their officers. In addition to all this, like the
regular cavalry, they have been sent with only their
carbines and revolvers to meet an enemy armed with long-range
rifles. There have been few cases of such military
cruelty in our military annals." A week or so after this not
wholly happy prophecy was promulgated, the "cruelty" was
consummated, first at Las Guasimas and then in the San Juan
fighting.
Wood was so busy getting the regiment ready that when I reached San
Antonio he turned most of the drilling of it over to me. This was a
piece of great good fortune for me, and I drilled the men industriously,
mounted and unmounted. I had plenty to learn, and the men and the
officers even more; but we went at our work with the heartiest good
will. We speedily made it evident that there was no room and no mercy
for any man who shirked any duty, and we accomplished good results.
The fact is that the essentials of drill and work for a cavalry or an
infantry regiment are easy to learn, which of course is not true for the
artillery or the engineers or for the navy. The reason why it takes
so long to turn the average civilized man into a good infantryman
or cavalryman is because it takes a long while to teach the average
untrained man how to shoot, to ride, to march, to take care of himself
in the open, to be alert, resourceful, cool, daring, and resolute, to
obey quickly, as well as to be willing, and to fit himself, to act on
his own responsibility. If he already possesses these qualities, there
is very little difficulty in making him a soldier; all the drill that is
necessary to enable him to march and to fight is of a simple character.
Parade ground and barrack square maneuvers are of no earthly consequence
in real war. When men can readily change from line to column, and column
to line, can form front in any direction, and assemble and scatter, and
can do these things with speed and precision, they have a fairly good
grasp of the essentials. When our regiment reached Tampa it could
already be handled creditably at fast gaits, and both in mass and
extended formations, mounted and dismounted.
I had served three years in the New York National Guard, finally
becoming a captain. This experience was invaluable to me. It enabled me
at once to train the men in the simple drill without which they would
have been a mob; for although the drill requirements are simple,
they are also absolutely indispensable. But if I had believed that my
experience in the National Guard had taught me all that there was to
teach about a soldier's career, it would have been better for me not to
have been in it at all. There were in the regiment a number of men who
had served in the National Guard, and a number of others who had served
in the Regular Army. Some of these latter had served in the field in
the West under campaign conditions, and were accustomed to long marches,
privation, risk, and unexpected emergencies. These men were of the
utmost benefit to the regiment. They already knew their profession, and
could teach and help the others. But if the man had merely served in
a National Guard regiment, or in the Regular Army at some post in a
civilized country where he learned nothing except what could be picked
up on the parade ground, in the barracks, and in practice marches of a
few miles along good roads, then it depended purely upon his own good
sense whether he had been helped or hurt by the experience. If he
realized that he had learned only five per cent of his profession, that
there remained ninety-five per cent to accomplish before he would be a
good soldier, why, he had profited immensely.
To start with five per cent handicap was a very great advantage; and if
the man was really a good man, he could not be overtaken. But if the
man thought that he had learned all about the profession of a soldier
because he had been in the National Guard or in the Regular Army under
the conditions I have described, then he was actually of less use than
if he had never had any military experience at all. Such a man was
apt to think that nicety of alignment, precision in wheeling, and
correctness in the manual of arms were the ends of training and the
guarantees of good soldiership, and that from guard mounting to sentry
duty everything in war was to be done in accordance with what he had
learned in peace. As a matter of fact, most of what he had learned was
never used at all, and some of it had to be unlearned. The one thing,
for instance, that a sentry ought never to do in an actual campaign is
to walk up and down a line where he will be conspicuous. His business
is to lie down somewhere off a ridge crest where he can see any one
approaching, but where a man approaching cannot see him. As for the
ceremonies, during the really hard part of a campaign only the barest
essentials are kept.
Almost all of the junior regular officers, and many of the senior
regular officers, were fine men. But, through no fault of their own, had
been forced to lead lives that fairly paralyzed their efficiency when
the strain of modern war came on them. The routine elderly regular
officer who knew nothing whatever of modern war was in most respects
nearly as worthless as a raw recruit. The positions and commands
prescribed in the text-books were made into fetishes by some of these
men, and treated as if they were the ends, instead of the not always
important means by which the ends were to be achieved. In the Cuban
fighting, for instance, it would have been folly for me to have taken my
place in the rear of the regiment, the canonical text-book position. My
business was to be where I could keep most command over the regiment,
and, in a rough-and-tumble, scrambling fight in thick jungle, this had
to depend upon the course of events, and usually meant that I had to be
at the front. I saw in that fighting more than one elderly regimental
commander who unwittingly rendered the only service he could render to
his regiment by taking up his proper position several hundred yards in
the rear when the fighting began; for then the regiment disappeared in
the jungle, and for its good fortune the commanding officer never saw it
again until long after the fight was over.
After one Cuban fight a lieutenant-colonel of the regulars, in command
of a regiment, who had met with just such an experience and had rejoined
us at the front several hours after the close of the fighting, asked me
what my men were doing when the fight began. I answered that they were
following in trace in column of twos, and that the instant the shooting
began I deployed them as skirmishers on both sides of the trail. He
answered triumphantly, "You can't deploy men as skirmishers from column
formation"; to which I responded, "Well, I did, and, what is more, if
any captain had made any difficulty about it, I would have sent him
to the rear." My critic was quite correct from the parade ground
standpoint. The prescribed orders at that time were to deploy the column
first into a line of squads at correct intervals, and then to give an
order which, if my memory serves correctly, ran: "As skirmishers, by the
right and left flanks, at six yards, take intervals, march." The order I
really gave ran more like this: "Scatter out to the right there, quick,
you! scatter to the left! look alive, look alive!" And they looked
alive, and they scattered, and each took advantage of cover, and forward
went the line.
Now I do not wish what I have said to be misunderstood. If ever we have
a great war, the bulk of our soldiers will not be men who have had any
opportunity to train soul and mind and body so as to meet the iron needs
of an actual campaign. Long continued and faithful drill will alone put
these men in shape to begin to do their duty, and failure to recognize
this on the part of the average man will mean laziness and folly and
not the possession of efficiency. Moreover, if men have been trained
to believe, for instance, that they can "arbitrate questions of
vital interest and national honor," if they have been brought up with
flabbiness of moral fiber as well as flabbiness of physique, then there
will be need of long and laborious and faithful work to give the needed
tone to mind and body. But if the men have in them the right stuff, it
is not so very difficult.
At San Antonio we entrained for Tampa. In various sociological books
by authors of Continental Europe, there are jeremiads as to the way
in which service in the great European armies, with their minute and
machine-like efficiency and regularity, tends to dwarf the capacity
for individual initiative among the officers and men. There is no such
danger for any officer or man of a volunteer organization in America
when our country, with playful light-heartedness, has pranced into war
without making any preparation for it. I know no larger or finer field
for the display of an advanced individualism than that which opened
before us as we went from San Antonio to Tampa, camped there, and
embarked on a transport for Cuba. Nobody ever had any definite
information to give us, and whatever information we unearthed on our
own account was usually wrong. Each of us had to show an alert and
not overscrupulous self-reliance in order to obtain food for his men,
provender for his horses, or transportation of any kind for any object.
One lesson early impressed on me was that if I wanted anything to eat it
was wise to carry it with me; and if any new war should arise, I would
earnestly advise the men of every volunteer organization always to
proceed upon the belief that their supplies will not turn up, and to
take every opportunity of getting food for themselves.
Tampa was a scene of the wildest confusion. There were miles of tracks
loaded with cars of the contents of which nobody seemed to have any
definite knowledge. General Miles, who was supposed to have supervision
over everything, and General Shafter, who had charge of the expedition,
were both there. But, thanks to the fact that nobody had had any
experience in handling even such a small force as ours--about 17,000
men--there was no semblance of order. Wood and I were bound that we
should not be left behind when the expedition started. When we were
finally informed that it was to leave next morning, we were ordered to
go to a certain track to meet a train. We went to the track, but the
train never came. Then we were sent to another track to meet another
train. Again it never came. However, we found a coal train, of which we
took possession, and the conductor, partly under duress and partly in a
spirit of friendly helpfulness, took us down to the quay.
All kinds of other organizations, infantry and cavalry, regular and
volunteer, were arriving at the quay and wandering around it, and there
was no place where we could get any specific information as to what
transport we were to have. Finally Wood was told to "get any ship you
can get which is not already assigned." He borrowed without leave a
small motor boat, and commandeered the transport Yucatan. When asked by
the captain what his authority was, he reported that he was acting "by
orders of General Shafter," and directed the ship to be brought to
the dock. He had already sent me word to be ready, as soon as the ship
touched the pier, to put the regiment aboard her. I found that she had
already been assigned to a regular regiment, and to another volunteer
regiment, and as it was evident that not more than half of the men
assigned to her could possibly get on, I was determined that we
should not be among the men left off. The volunteer regiment offered
a comparatively easy problem. I simply marched my men past them to the
allotted place and held the gangway. With the regulars I had to be a
little more diplomatic, because their commander, a lieutenant-colonel,
was my superior in rank, and also doubtless knew his rights. He sent
word to me to make way, to draw my regiment off to one side, and let his
take possession of the gangway. I could see the transport coming in,
and could dimly make out Wood's figure thereon. Accordingly I played for
time. I sent respectful requests through his officers to the commander
of the regulars, entered into parleys, and made protestations, until the
transport got near enough so that by yelling at the top of my voice I
was able to get into a--highly constructive--communication with Wood.
What he was saying I had no idea, but he was evidently speaking, and
on my own responsibility I translated it into directions to hold the
gangway, and so informed the regulars that I was under the orders of
my superior and of a ranking officer, and--to my great regret, etc.,
etc.--could not give way as they desired. As soon as the transport was
fast we put our men aboard at the double. Half of the regular regiment
got on, and the other half and the other volunteer regiment went
somewhere else.
We were kept several days on the transport, which was jammed with men,
so that it was hard to move about on the deck. Then the fleet got
under way, and we steamed slowly down to Santiago. Here we disembarked,
higgledy-piggledy, just as we had embarked. Different parts of different
outfits were jumbled together, and it was no light labor afterwards to
assemble the various batteries. For instance, one transport had guns,
and another the locks for the guns; the two not getting together for
several days after one of them had been landed. Soldiers went here,
provisions there; and who got ashore first largely depended upon
individual activity. Fortunately for us, my former naval aide, when I
had been Assistant Secretary of the Navy, Lieutenant-Commander Sharp, a
first-class fellow, was there in command of a little ship to which I had
succeeded in getting him appointed before I left the Navy Department. He
gave us a black pilot, who took our transport right in shore, the others
following like a flock of sheep; and we disembarked with our rifles,
ammunition belts, and not much else. In theory it was out of our turn,
but if we had not disembarked then, Heaven only knows when our turn
would have come, and we did not intend to be out of the fighting if we
could help it. I carried some food in my pockets, and a light waterproof
coat, which was my sole camp equipment for the next two or three days.
Twenty-four hours after getting ashore we marched from Daiquiri, where
we had landed, to Siboney, also on the coast, reaching it during a
terrific downpour of rain. When this was over, we built a fire, dried
our clothes, and ate whatever we had brought with us.
We were brigaded with the First and Tenth Regular Cavalry, under
Brigadier-General Sam Young. He was a fine type of the American regular.
Like General Chaffee, another of the same type, he had entered the army
in the Civil War as a private. Later, when I was President, it was my
good fortune to make each of them in succession Lieutenant-General of
the army of the United States. When General Young retired and General
Chaffee was to take his place, the former sent to the latter his three
stars to wear on his first official presentation, with a note that they
were from "Private Young to Private Chaffee." The two fine old fellows
had served in the ranks, one in the cavalry, one in the infantry, in
their golden youth, in the days of the great war nearly half a century
before; each had grown gray in a lifetime of honorable service under the
flag, and each closed his active career in command of the army. General
Young was one of the few men who had given and taken wounds with the
saber. He was an old friend of mine, and when in Washington before
starting for the front he told me that if we got in his brigade he would
put us into the fighting all right. He kept his word.
General Young had actively superintended getting his two regular
regiments, or at least a squadron of each, off the transports, and late
that night he sent us word that he had received permission to move at
dawn and strike the Spanish advance position. He directed us to move
along a ridge trail with our two squadrons (one squadron having been
left at Tampa), while with the two squadrons of regulars, one of the
First and one of the Tenth, under his personal supervision, he marched
up the valley trail. Accordingly Wood took us along the hill trail early
next morning, till we struck the Spaniards, and began our fight just as
the regulars began the fight in the valley trail.
It was a mountainous country covered with thick jungle, a most confusing
country, and I had an awful time trying to get into the fight and trying
to do what was right when in it; and all the while I was thinking that
I was the only man who did not know what I was about, and that all the
others did--whereas, as I found out later, pretty much everybody else
was as much in the dark as I was. There was no surprise; we struck the
Spaniards exactly where we had expected; then Wood halted us and put
us into the fight deliberately and in order. He ordered us to deploy
alternately by troops to the right and left of the trail, giving our
senior major, Brodie, a West Pointer and as good a soldier as ever wore
a uniform, the left wing, while I took the right wing. I was told if
possible to connect with the regulars who were on the right. In theory
this was excellent, but as the jungle was very dense the first troop
that deployed to the right vanished forthwith, and I never saw it again
until the fight was over--having a frightful feeling meanwhile that I
might be court-martialed for losing it. The next troop deployed to the
left under Brodie. Then the third came along, and I started to deploy it
to the right as before.
By the time the first platoon had gotten into the jungle I realized that
it likewise would disappear unless I kept hold of it. I managed to
keep possession of the last platoon. One learns fast in a fight, and I
marched this platoon and my next two troops in column through the jungle
without any attempt to deploy until we got on the firing line. This
sounds simple. But it was not. I did not know when I had gotten on the
firing line! I could hear a good deal of firing, some over to my right
at a good distance, and the rest to the left and ahead. I pushed on,
expecting to strike the enemy somewhere between.
Soon we came to the brink of a deep valley. There was a good deal of
cracking of rifles way off in front of us, but as they used smokeless
powder we had no idea as to exactly where they were, or who they were
shooting at. Then it dawned on us that we were the target. The bullets
began to come overhead, making a sound like the ripping of a silk dress,
with sometimes a kind of pop; a few of my men fell, and I deployed the
rest, making them lie down and get behind trees. Richard Harding Davis
was with us, and as we scanned the landscape with our glasses it was
he who first pointed out to us some Spaniards in a trench some
three-quarters of a mile off. It was difficult to make them out. There
were not many of them. However, we finally did make them out, and
we could see their conical hats, for the trench was a poor one. We
advanced, firing at them, and drove them off.