John J. Pershing

“ There is slight cause for wonder that a murmur ran from one to another in the expectant crowd: "Truly here comes a man!" And the man was to be followed by millions, clad in the uniform of the land from which he came.
We may be sure that when this soldier, General [4] John Joseph Pershing, stepped ashore and General Dumas greeted the American in the words, "I salute the United States of America, which has now become united to the United States of Europe," there was a cause for the deep emotion that manifested itself in Pershing's dark eyes. ”

“ When, however, Pershing and his sister informed their mother that he had passed the best examination and was to receive the appointment to West Point, she expressed her strong disapproval of the plan to make a soldier of John. Her objections were finally overcome, and she consented, partly because she believed her boy when he said "there would not be a gun fired for a hundred years" and partly because she was even more eager than he for him to obtain a good education. ”

“ The Pershings got land grants in Pennsylvania, and began to prosper. As the clan multiplied the sons and grandsons began to scatter. They had the pioneer spirit of their ancestors.
At length, John F. Pershing, a grandson of Daniel, the first immigrant, went to the Middle West, to work on building railroads. These were the days, just before the Civil War, when railroads were being thrown forward everywhere. Young Pershing had early caught the fever, and had worked with construction gangs in Kentucky and Tennessee. ”

“ Everyone does know, however, the instantaneous activity and enthusiasm which seized with compelling force upon the people of the United States.
But there must be a military leader. What was more natural than that the choice should fall upon General John Joseph Pershing? General Funston had died suddenly at San Antonio, Texas, and there was no one now to outrank the leader of the punitive expedition into Mexico. ”

“ He was in the Union Army and was the first man to observe Memorial Day in Laclede, taking his own children and the children of his neighborhood, [15] with flowers from his own garden, to decorate the graves of the soldiers. Mr. Pershing (John Fletcher Pershing) was president of the school board at Laclede and it was through his work that the graded schools were organized and new buildings erected. He was also postmaster in Laclede."
Of his mother—the best report from Laclede is that she was a "splendid home maker." Why is it that most great men have had great mothers? ”

“ Three thousand miles from home, an American army is fighting for you. Everything you hold worthwhile is at stake. Only the hardest blows can win against the enemy we are fighting. Invoking the spirit of our forefathers, the army asks your unflinching support, to the end that the high ideals for which America stands may endure upon the earth.
This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was published before January 1, 1928. ”

“ He served with signal results in the campaign against the little "brown" men in the Philippines; was in charge of the expedition which chased Villa into Mexico.
General Pershing was born in 1864 in Laclede, Missouri, and is tall, wiry and strong. Every inch of his six feet is of fighting material. He is a man of action and has a penchant for utilizing the services of young men rather than staid old officers of experience. Pershing is a real military man, and has been notably absent from such things as banquets and other functions where by talking he might get into the lime light. ”

“ Already in France Americans were drilling in preparation for active fighting. Among these were detachments of college students from Harvard, Princeton, Yale, University of Chicago, Williams, University of California, and many other American colleges, but a vast concourse of men from every class and condition in life in the United States was making ready to join their fellow soldiers across the sea. From no man in all the world was more expected than from General Pershing. ”

“ It is the quality which makes of a man or a boy "a good sport." He appreciates his antagonist and also—in the end—is appreciated by his antagonist.
A writer in the Missouri Historical Review, whose words have before been quoted, pays the following tribute to this quality in General Pershing:
With his scholarly attainments, his ability as a writer and speaker and his grasp of big problems, Pershing might have developed into a statesman: he [250] certainly would have succeeded as a business man if he could have contented himself with the humdrum life in a downtown office ”

“ Pershing is always on the move. One of his aides told me that he never had more than five minutes' notice of where the General was going or how long he would stay. No man in the army has covered so much territory as Pershing. He has been in practically every village occupied by the American troops. He has inspected every hospital and every training camp. ”

“ He was no major-general of engineers or of the Q. M. C. who, however specially capable for his task, had not been in combat service. Here was Pershing's favorite adjutant, fresh from victories in the field, come back from the limelight at the front to help "count the beans and rustle freight." This of itself gave him a prestige that affected the state of mind of the whole organization. He must be a man of action; and the S. O. S. wanted action. He knew his regulars and his reserves, and Headquarters at Chaumont, and the needs of the army from ship's hold to the fox-holes. ”

“ Long rows of corn had to [26] be planted and cultivated, pigs and cattle must be fed and cared for, and the "chores" on a Missouri farm began early in the morning and were not all done when at last the sun set. The boy Pershing did much of his labor on the farms that his father had leased near the village. Frequently the farm-work lasted until late in the fall and thereby interfered with attendance at school. Here, too, there were obstacles to be overcome and the commander of our army in France was early learning his lessons of control and self-control in a little hamlet in Missouri. ”

“ If such opinions exist, their record has not been brought to the attention of the writer. As a rule, Americans have no comparative degree in their estimates of men. They like a man or they do not like him. He is either a success or a failure, good or bad, wise or foolish. Between the two extremes there is little standing room, and into one category or the other they cast nearly everyone. If General Pershing has not escaped this condition, his consolation doubtless is that he is [226] merely sharing the common lot of his fellow-citizens. ”

“ Perhaps there is no better proof of the ability and sterling character of General Pershing anywhere to be found than the fact that the little brown Moros whom he defeated and overthrew, later made him a datto of their tribe—an official position that granted him full power of life and death over every man, woman and child in their numbers and also made him a judge as well as a ruler over them. ”

“ At the general headquarters of the American Army in France the members of the graduating class of the Lycee presented to the American Commander a marvelously bound volume of episodes in the history of France. This beautiful work, however, was "to be transmitted to Warren Pershing from his comrades of the Lycee."
What other people than the French would have thought of such a dainty and yet effective way of expressing their admiration of a man? Sometimes a son objects to being known chiefly because he bears the name of his father. ”

“ He seems wise with his own wisdom, which is constantly in touch with the wisdom of everyone who may have business with him. He will not be knocked off his feet; he will do no military stunts. The American soldiers will not go into action until we have enough troops to hold our part of the line and we will not start an offensive until we can back it up. This all came glowing out of the firm, kind, wise, soldierly face of General Pershing, and it needed no words to verify it. ”

“ He wants to see everything. Once while observing a French offensive he expressed a desire to go forward and see a line of trenches which had just been captured from the Germans. The French tried to dissuade him but the General complained that he could not see just how things were going from any other position and so into the German trench he went.
Pershing has developed in France. Like every other man in the American army he has had to study modern warfare, but more than that he has caught something of the spirit of the French. ”

“ All the officers and men of the troops who had the privilege of participating in the Fourth of July ceremony in Paris will retain unforgettable recollections of the enthusiastic reception accorded to them. Proud of the confidence France places in them they are heartened more than ever to do their duty until common victory comes."
One day in France he saw two American soldiers at work on a woodpile. One glance was sufficient to show him that the two men were working out a form of punishment for some misdeed. As we know General Pershing is a believer in strict and if necessary stern discipline. ”

“ And those who are aware of the spirit of many a young American student in college or worker on some quiet farm, will understand why General Pershing has made so much of this idealism which he says is the backbone of the American fighting men in France. ”

“ They say that when a second lieutenant swore at him one day in the heat of a game he made no complaint but laid for the young man later on and sent him sprawling off his horse in a wild scrimmage. He will fight broadsword duels with anybody regardless of rank if his opponent promises to be a man who can test his mettle. And yet it was a bit surprising that when the command of one of the crack divisions in France was open, General Pershing chose Bullard for the command because Major General Robert H. Bullard is perhaps the worst dressed major general in the American army. ”

“ To know men as well as maps, to study soldiers as well as supplies, to grasp the varying and differing elements that compose an army—these are the essential elements in a successful leader of men. To the German war lords their men may be merely "cannon fodder." To the public a French soldier may be a poilu, a British fighter a Tommy, an American a doughboy. To General Pershing every one that carries a gun is above all else a man. ”

“ It would be as impertinent as it is impossible for one who has not been associated with General Pershing for a long time directly and closely to attempt anything like an analysis of the man or his career. There are, nevertheless, certain qualities that have become more or less the possessions of the public because they have been manifested in his public service. It is therefore permissible to refer briefly to certain of them.
As a foundation for all his work is a strong, vigorous body which at all times has been cared for in a way to make it the servant and not the master of the man. ”

“ Those who do not have a personal acquaintance admire him no less for what they believe him to be. It is a common remark in the ranks, even by those who never even saw their leader, "What a fine man Pershing is." ”

“ An officer who served under him in the Punitive Expedition into Mexico and was thrown into close relations with him writes: "I have had the pleasure of knowing many of our [227] great men, but Pershing is the biggest of them all. He combines the rugged simplicity of Lincoln with the dogged perseverance of Grant; the strategic mystical ability of Stonewall Jackson and the debonair personality of McClellan. In one quality, that of intuition, he may be inferior possibly to Roosevelt, but in cold logic and in supreme knowledge of human nature and of soldier nature I have never met his equal." ”

“ In other words Pershing is a soldiers' soldier. No man can strike such hard blows as he does and leave no scars. There are men here and there in the army who do not love him but their criticism almost invariably ends, "but I guess I'll have to admit that he's a good soldier."
Pershing is not a disciplinarian merely for the sake of discipline but he believes that it is the gauge of the temper of any military organization. His interest in detail is insatiable. He can read a man's soul through his boots or his buttons. Next to the Kaiser, Pershing hates nothing so much as rust and dust and dirt. ”

“ Nor did he mention the words of General Baldwin, a brave soldier of the Civil War, who said of him: "Pershing is the coolest man under fire I ever saw." And he makes no mention of the earnest protest of a certain foreign officer, the representative of his own government in the Santiago campaign, who begged the daring troops not to make the now famous charge up San Juan Hill because they would be rushing into certain death. ”

“ Sometimes fighting against obstacles that appeared almost insurmountable, struggling to obtain an education in the schools, not faltering when tragic sorrows came, his determination succeeding in military campaigns where previous centuries of fighting had failed—the career of General Pershing has been a continuous overcoming. Confidence in a great leader is an essential condition of victory and the writer has tried to present facts to show that the trust of the American people in their military leader is well founded. ”

“ Doubtless General Pershing, whatever his simpler tastes might have dictated, was well aware that behind all the formal display was the deep-seated desire to honor the country whose personal representative he was.
After a visit to a training camp to witness the British method of training for fighting in the trenches, he was the guest at a luncheon [167] of Lord Derby, the British Secretary of State for War. Although the day had been strenuous, nevertheless in the evening he and eighteen members of his staff were the guests of the British Government at a formal war-dinner. ”