Classic Audiobook Collection - Boys Book of Famous Soldiers by J. Walker McSpadden ~ Full Audiobook [history]

Episode Date: October 18, 2022

Boys Book of Famous Soldiers by J. Walker McSpadden audiobook. Genre: history In Boys Book of Famous Soldiers, J. Walker McSpadden gathers a gallery of military lives into a brisk, story-driven introduction to the men who shaped famous campaigns and the eras around them. Written for young readers but engaging for anyone who likes clear, dramatic history, the book moves from one portrait to the next, sketching childhood influences, early ambitions, decisive moments of leadership, and the hard choices demanded by war. Each chapter sets its subject against a vivid backdrop of shifting nations, rival commanders, and battles where discipline, timing, and nerve matter as much as strength. McSpadden is less interested in dry timelines than in the human qualities behind reputation: courage under pressure, loyalty to comrades, the burdens of command, and the way victory can carry a cost. Along the way, the book invites listeners to weigh honor and ambition against the realities of conflict, asking what makes a soldier memorable after the smoke clears. The result is a lively, accessible tour through military history, told through the lives that defined it. For ad-free listening try our premium subscription Chapters (Approximate) (00:00:00) Chapter 00 (00:02:56) Chapter 01 (00:16:22) Chapter 02 (00:32:21) Chapter 03 (00:52:17) Chapter 04 (01:11:33) Chapter 05 (01:32:08) Chapter 06 (01:50:25) Chapter 07 (02:05:54) Chapter 08 (02:20:07) Chapter 09 (02:35:09) Chapter 10 (02:52:51) Chapter 11 (03:10:39) Chapter 12 (03:28:27) Chapter 13 (03:40:20) Chapter 14 (03:53:27) Chapter 15 (04:09:31) Chapter 16 (04:27:53) Chapter 17 (04:38:15) Chapter 18 (04:50:08) Chapter 19 (05:01:36) Chapter 20 (05:13:27) Chapter 21 (05:24:00) Chapter 22 (05:36:32) Chapter 23 (05:50:09) Chapter 24 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers by J. Walker McSpadden. Preface So much has been written about the great soldiers of the world, that it is a matter of considerable hardihood to attempt to present another volume on the subject in any sense new. But the Great War has not only brought to the center of the stage a new group of martial figures, it is also intensified and revivified our interest in those of a bygone day. The springs of history rise far back. we can the better appreciate our leaders of to-day and their problems by comparing them with the leaders and problems of yesterday waterloo takes on a new aspect when viewed from vimy ridge

the present book includes a round dozen of the great soldiers of yesterday and to-day the list is about equally divided among british french and american leaders and is confined through the last two centuries each man selected is typical of a particular time and task his life story can contains a message of definite interest and value. In telling these stories, however, in the limits of brief chapters, we have carefully abstained from the writing of formal biographies. Such a treatment would have resulted merely in a rehash of time-worn data, beginning, he was born, and ending, he died. The plan of these stories is to give a personal portrait of the man, using the background of his early life, to trace his career of boyhood through the formative years. Such data serves to explain the great soldier of later years.

Every schoolboy knows, for example, what Washington did after he was placed in command of the colonial army. But what he did in the earlier years to deserve this high command is a story not so well known. Yet it is both interesting in itself, and serves to humanize its subject. The stately Washington steps down off his pedestal and shoulders again his surveyor's tripod of Boyhood days, while he invites us to take a tramp through the Virginia Wilds. The writing, and we hope the reading, of these life stories, brings in a special message. We discover that in each instance the famous soldier was not a pet of fortune, but was selected for his high and arduous task because of the training received in his formative years.

His peculiar gift of leadership was merely an expression of his indomitable will to forge ahead. He exemplified in his life. the Boy Scout motto, be prepared. End of preface. Section 1 of Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers. This is a Libravox recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibraVox.org.

Recording by Stephanie Lee. Boys Book of Famous Soldiers by Jay Walker McSpadden. Washington, Part 1. The Young Surveyor turn your guns around on them stop them the command was given in peremptory tones to demoralize group of soldiers not waiting for them to carry out his orders the young officer who gave them leaped from his horse and with his own hands turned one of the guns upon the advancing foe had it been the argonne forest and the year nineteen eighteen it would have been a machine gun that the officer manned but the time was over a century and a half earlier than this and the weapon a light brass field-piece which after being fired once might be fired once must be painfully reloaded. Meanwhile, the Redskins came on.

The young officer, whose name has come down to history as George Washington, was trying to stem the tide of defeat. It was the faithful day when old General Braddock of the British Army received his first and fatal lesson in Indian warfare, says an old Pennsylvania ranger who was also in the fray. I saw Colonel Washington spring from his panting horse and sees a brass field piece as if it had been a stick. His look was terrible. He put his right hand on the muzzle, his left hand on the breech.

He pulled with this, he pushed with that, and wheeled it round, as if it had been a plaything. It furrowed the ground like a plough share. He tore the sheet lead from the touch-hole, then the powder monkey rushed up with a fire, when the cannon went off, making the bark fly from the trees, and many an Indian send up his last yell and bite the dust. Yet this resourceful officer, fighting almost single-handed against certain defeat, was was then only a young man a few months past twenty-one. He was displaying the same qualities which were later to make him the commander-in-chief

of a revolution. George Washington was a typical example of the born leader. He had received no set military training save that which the stern necessity of frontier life forced upon him. Yet at nineteen, we find him no less courageous and active when facing the enemy. He had been reared as a farmer boy, with no other intention at first than the successful management of his father's estates in Virginia. but boys in those days had to learn to handle the rifle as readily as the plough and washington was no exception to this rule born in seventeen thirty two every schoolboy knows the month and day at bridges creek virginia his first home was a plain wooden farmhouse of somewhat primitive pattern

with four rooms on the ground floor and a roomy attic covered by a long sloping roof but before he was more than able to walk this house burned down and the family removed to an other farm in what was later stafford keying county, an attractive knoll across the Rappahannock River from Fredericksburg. When George was eleven years old, he lost his father, which threw him to a great extent upon his own resources, so far as outdoor life was concerned, although his education was still the care of his mother, who is pictured as a gentlewoman of the old school, one born to command. To her, Washington owed many traits, among them his courtliness. In those days, the gentle-bred boys always use very formal language when addressing their elders. and so we find Washington writing to his mother, even after he became of age, beginning his leather with,

Honored Madam, and ending Your dutiful son. After his father's death, George Washington made his home for four or five years with his brother Augustine, who lived at the old homestead, now rebuilt, at Bridges Creek, and near there he attended school. It was in no sense a remarkable school being kept by a Mr. Williams, but it was thorough in the fundamentals, the three rs without going in much for the frills some of washington's exercise books are still preserved showing in a good round hand a series of rules of civility and decent behavior in company and conversation such things sound somewhat priggish to-day but in those days they were a necessary part of one's education was probably neither better nor worse than the run of virginia boys of gentle stock in those days just a good-natured fun-loving youngster not especially bright as a scholar but not especially bright as a scholar but in the run of virginia boys of gentle stock in those days just a good-natured fun-loving youngster not especially bright as a scholar but known as a plotter. One of his early playmates was Richard Henry Lee, who also grew up to be a famous Virginian, and between the two some droll schoolboy letters passed. Washington was to be,

like his father, a Virginia planter, and this may have had something to do with the sort of education and received, which was not very extensive, but along with his early training for farm life, there were many echoes of the military, which must have had a lasting influence on the growing lad. His brother, Lawrence, had been a soldier in his majesty's service, and his stories of campaign life so fired George's imagination that he was for throwing his books away at fifteen and going into the Navy. He was too young for the army, but Lawrence, who rather encouraged him, told him that he could get him a berth as midshipman. It is related that the young Medes luggage was actually on board a British man of war anchored in the Potomac when

Madame Washington, who all along had been reluctant to give her consent, now withdrew it altogether, and the dutiful son was saved from the Navy for a larger arena. The boy was then just turned fifteen, and seems to have rebelled from the humdrum life of the plantation. He was at the restless age, and his naturally adventurous disposition sought a more active outlet. This proved to be surveying, a profession then greatly in demand. There were great tracks of wilderness in Virginia still inhabited by Indians and infested by wild animals, which had never heard the sound of the woodman's axe. These tracks had been included in grants from the king, but their boundaries had never been exactly determined.

To make such surveys was a task requiring both skill and courage. Washington was naturally an exact and painstaking boy. He now applied himself to geometry and trigonometry, and at the ripe age of sixteen was ready to sling his somewhat crude surveyor's instruments to cross his shoulder and subdue the wilderness. It promised excitement and adventure, and work was well paid. Washington was even then a strapping big fellow, tall and muscular, and nearly six feet in height. He afterwards exceeded this height, but at sixteen there were naturally some hollows which remained to be filled out. He is described as having a well-shaped, active figure, symmetrical except for the unusual length of his arms, indicating great strength.

His light brown hair was drawn back from a broad forehead, and grayish-blue eyes looked happily and perhaps soberly on the pleasant Virginia hills and valleys. His face was open and manly, set off by a square, massive jaw, and a general expression of calmness and strength. Fair and florid, big and strong, he was, taken for all and all as fine a specimen of his race as could be found in the English colonies. It was at this turning point in his career that Washington was fortunate in finding a friend and protector in Lord Fairfax, whose daughter was the wife of Lawrence Washington.

This distinguished old veteran, a long-time friend of the Washington family, took a particular fancy to the young man. They hunted the fox together and hunted him hard. In those days, fox hunting was no kid glove and pink tea affair. It was one of many perilous outdoor sports that Frontier Virginia could afford, and as they hunted, the old English nobleman had opportunity to learn what sort of stuff this young Virginia was made of. He saw that there was a union of sturdy qualities upon which he could rely. lord fairfax then owned by kingly grant a vast estate stretching across the blue ridge into the untrodden wilderness until the estate was properly surveyed it would be subject to endless lawsuits we can imagine the following conversation on one of their helter-skelter rides together what are you studying now george mathematics sir humph like it in part but some of it is stiff what are you going to do with it well sir hesitated george since my mother objects to me going to me going to be

into the navy, I thought I would turn my hand at surveying. There's lots to be done around here. The very thing! I think I could use you myself. When you are ready let me know, and I'll send you over the hill yonder to mark out where Fairfax starts and where he ends. My cousin George will go with you. So, in some such fashion it was arranged, and in the spring of 1748, George Fairfax and George Washington set forth on their adventures. The Virginia Mountains were just budding forth in the freshness of spring when they started out by way of ashby's gap in the blue ridge entering the valley of virginia thence they worked through the shenandoah region crossing the swollen potomac and surveying the hilly country of what is now frederick county it was a rough and hazardous trip lasting over a month but one that left them fit and seasoned woodsmen they had learned what it was to shift for themselves to defend themselves against prowling beasts in an untrodden wilderness to swim swollen currents to be wet and cold and cold and hungry, to come suddenly upon a war-party of Indians, who would not have scruple to kill them,

how the savages known that these two youths were plotting and dividing at the hunting ground to which they claimed as their own. That all these things were a part of their experience we note from jottings made briefly, but methodically, by Washington in his diary of the trip. As to the survey itself, a Virginia title attorney remarked, many years afterward, that in clearing up old titles the lines surveyed by Washington were more reliable than any others of their day. fairfax was so pleased with its results that he procured for his protege an appointment as public surveyor it was his induction into three years of hard frontier life which was the finest possible schooling to him for his later career as a soldier we find him writing to a friend since you received my letter of october last i have not slept about three or four nights in a bed but after walking a good deal all the day i have lain down before the fire upon a little hay straw fodder or a bare skin whichever was to be had with man

wife and children like dogs and cats and happy is he who gets the birth nearest the fire nothing would make it pass off tolerably but a good reward a doubloon is my constant gain every day that the weather will permit of me going out and sometimes six pistoles this would indicate that he was a thirty lad honestly pleased with honest earnings and no mere adventurer about this time a company was formed called the ohio company for the purpose of opening a trade route through northern virginia and maryland george washington's two elder brothers lawrence and augustine were interested in the enterprise and they naturally called in their young surveyor brother to the consultation the project sounded fascinating but presented many elements of danger the french were becoming more and more active and making warlike preparations to seize and hold all the western frontier in order to develop and hold this land against the french and their indian allies it was necessary to place the work in the hands of a military leader george washington was at this time only nineteen years old but fully grown a man of powerful physique hardened and seasoned by its outdoor life despite his youth and lack of military experience the ohio company secured for him the appointment of adjutant-general of this district washington at once placed himself under several military officers of his acquaintance among them a major muse and soon acquired at least the rudiments of warfare the manual of arms the broader school of tactics he was to acquire for himself in the field of experience an interruption to his military career came in the illness of his brother lawrence a voyage to the west indies was determined upon for the invalid and george accompanied him on the young man's first sea voyage and of which he has left us entertaining glimpses in his ever faithful diary but after a winter in the south seas lawrence grew worse and was brought home to die george though only twenty was made one of the executors to the estate mount vernon which became henceforth his home

shortly afterward we find george washington given still higher office but one which entailed heavy responsibilities the newly appointed governor of the state robert din whitty grew uneasy at the constant reports of alliances between the french and the indians determined to send a commissioner to the french commander to ask by what right he was building forts and english dominions and also to treat with the indians and the way of counter-proposals against the french it was a hazardous mission and one which also involved tact diplomacy and a first-hand knowledge of the wilderness but we are not much surprised to find washington at twenty-one given the commission of major and sent on this undertaking leaving williamsburg with a little company of six he set out on a cross-country trip by horseback of more than a thousand miles the details of this adventurous journey makes interesting reading but cannot find place in this necessarily brief story they reached an indian village near where the city of pittsburg now stands then turned south to the junction of the allegheny and monongahela rivers where dwells a friendly tribe of indians thence they went to fort la bough where the french commander received the virginia major politely, entertained him, but tried at the same time to win his Indian friends away from him. End of Washington, Part 1. Section 2 of Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers

This is a Libravox recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libravox.org. Recording by Stephanie Lee. Boys Book of Famous Soldiers by Jay Walker McSpadden. Washington Part 2 The return journey was terrible. The horses had become so weak that they were useless except as light pack animals.

The little party struggled along on foot. Washington with one companion went on ahead. It was the dead of winter, but when they reached the Ohio River, they found that instead of its being frozen solid as they had hoped, it was a turbulent mass of tossing cakes of ice. There was no way of getting over, writes Washington in his journal, but on a raft which we set about with but one poor hatchet and finished just after sunsetting. This was a whole day's work.

We next got it launched, then went on board of it and set off. But before we were halfway over, we were jammed in the ice in such a manner that we expected every moment our raft to sink and ourselves to perish. I put out my setting pole to try to stop the raft, that the ice might pass by, when the rapidity of the stream threw it with so much violence against the pole that had jerked me out into ten feet of water, but I fortunately saved myself by catching hold of one of the raft logs. Notwithstanding all our efforts, we cannot get to either shore, but were obliged, as we were near

an island, to quit our raft and make to it. The cold was so extremely severe that Mr. Gist had all his fingers and some of his toes frozen, and the water was shut up so hard that we found no difficulty in getting off the island on the ice in the morning, and went to Mr. Frazier's. here they succeeded in procuring horses and a few days more major washington handed in his report to the governor at williamsburg this report stirred the virginia house of burgesses to action it showed that the whole western frontier was imperiled one of washington's recommendations that a fort be built at the fork of the ohio was put into effect at once and at captain trent was sent out with some woodsmen to begin its construction but before the fort was completed a force of french descended upon it in captured it. Near its site, they themselves built a larger one, which they called Fort Duquesne, the site of the later city of Pittsburgh. This action on the part of the French was equivalent to a declaration of war. It was really the beginning of the seven years' war

between England and France, for the control of America, a drama in which Washington was to have no little part. When news of the French move reached the governor, he sent Washington, with a rank of lieutenant-colonel and a small armed force against the invaders. The men were mostly half-tray militia whom Washington had been drilling for some such emergency. They were raw soldiers, but hearty fellows, who thoroughly believed in their young commander. He himself, although but 22, was the seizing campaigner of the Willerness. Now he was essaying his first trial as a soldier. His men marched to a point about halfway to Fort Duquesne, blazing a road for other troops to follow, and constructing a fort to serve as a base of supplies. There he sent out scouts to

reconnoiter. They reported an advancing party of French who were ready to attack any English whom they might encounter. Washington did not wait for them to attack. He decided to attack first. Taking a force of about forty men, he made a night march in the pelting rain to surprise the enemy. It reminds us of his later famous exploit at Trenton. The path, he wrote, was hardly wide enough for one man. We often lost it and could not find it again for 15 or 20 minutes, and we often tumbled over each other in the dark. However, at daybreak on this May day of 1754, they reached the camp of their Indian allies, who in turn took them with stealthy tread to the hollow where lay the French, waiting to ambush the colonists. But it was their turn to be surprised, and they

quickly sprang to their feet and grasped their weapons. Washington gave his men the order to fire, the first of many such orders that were to come in the stormy days of two successive wars, and in a sense this was the opening gun. A lively but briefed. brief skirmish followed. The French lost their commander, Jumanvi, and nine others. The English lost only one man killed, and two or three wounded. The remainder of the French, twenty-to-a-number, were taken prisoners. The affair made a great stir, and was a forerunner of extended hostilities. Washington foresaw the results immediately, and set his men to constructing a fort which was called fort necessity. He had won his first battle, and it greatly inspired his troops.

Writing afterwards to his brother Lawrence, he said, I heard the bullets whistle, and believe me, there is something charming in the sound. Their fort, however, was well named, for presently the French and Indians marched down upon them, 900 strong, and as Washington had all told, but 300 poorly equipped men, they were compelled to surrender. The terms of surrender were liberal enough, permitting the English to return home with their light arms. Thus did Washington's first campaign come to a somewhat inglorious, close. He tendered his resignation, may have felt humiliated over his defeat, although the House

of Burgesses passed a vote of thanks to him and his staff for their bravery and gallant defense of their country. But later when Governor Dinwiddie requested him to head another regiment against Fort de Kizn, Washington politely declined. He had not received sufficient support in the first venture to warrant another such attempt. The next stage in the French and Indian War, and likewise in Washington's military development was the arrival of General Braddock with two regiments of seasoned troops from England. Braddock was an old campaigner of 40 years' experience, who had long since learned all that was to be taught about the art of warfare. He had teach those French a lesson, and as for the Indians, stuff and nonsense. Braddock's arrival made a great stir in the colonies.

It was the first sign of real help from the mother country. The governors of four or five of the colonies met him in Alexandria. It was near Mount Vernon, and the young retired officer watched the preparations with keenest interest. He could not help contrasting this splendid equipment with the scanty packs which his own men had carried. Much to his delight, he was invited by General Braddock to join his staff as an aide-de-comp, a post which Washington joyfully accepted. Braddock had heard something of the Virginia colonel even before leaving England. It was not so much honoring this Colonel Officer as immeasurably strengthening his own good right arm, if he had only had the discernment to know it. As results showed, Braddock did not need his heavy cannon nearly so much

as he needed an insight into wilderness ways. Just before Braddock started West on his ill-fated expedition, he conferred at Frederictown, Maryland, with the postmaster general of Pennsylvania, a strong, practical man who was to obtain some greatly needed horses and wagons for his artillery and supplies this man a middle-aged and rather plain sort of fellow and the youthful virginia colonel whom he may have met then for the first time possibly attracted very little attention in the gaudy military array but american history could ill have spared either benjamin franklin or george washington we will not narrate again in detail here the oft-told story of braddock's defeat how he insisted on marching across the mountains and valleys of pennsylvania as though on parade with banners flying fife's shrilling and drums beating. It was a brave display, and such as the old general was accustomed to in Europe, it would undoubtedly put the French and their skulking allies to instant flight. Against such a method of warfare, Washington raised his voice of counsel, but in vain. The grizzled veteran brushed him aside.

Washington was for rapid marching, with scouting troops deployed on ahead. But this prospect, he writes, was soon clouded, and my hopes brought very low indeed, when I found that instead of pushing on with vigor without regarding a little rough road, they were halting to level every molehill, and to wreck bridges over every brook, by which means we were four days in getting twelve miles. A few days before Braddock reached the vicinity of Fort Duquesne, Washington had fallen sick of a fever and had barely recovered strength enough to rejoin the command, but the slow progress to which he refers enabled him to do so before the attack, though he was still far from well. As he rode up to meet the general, he could not help but admire the beauty of the

the scene. The troops had crossed a ford on the Monong Gahela, about fifteen miles from the fort, and now marched in close formation along its winding bank, as though on dress parade, but his admiration of the display only intensified his sense of danger, the sixth sense of every woodsman. He begged his general to scatter his forces somewhat, or at least send scouts ahead, but Braddock rebuked him angrily for presuming to teach English regulars how to fight. Suddenly the sound of firing was heard at the front, although no attacking party, could be seen. The soldiers had marched straight into an ambush, as Washington had feared. With whoops and yells, the Indians commanded by a few French were firing from behind every

rock and tree. The regulars were thrown into confusion. This type of warfare was new to them. They did not know how to answer it. The front ranks recoiled upon the others, throwing all into wild turmoil. Washington at once threw himself into the fight, counseling, persuading, commanding. A company of Virginians, previously sneered at as raw militia, spread themselves out as a protecting party of skirmishers. The English officers also, be it said, displayed the utmost bravery in trying to rally their men. The general, Azota, toned for his headstrong folly, seemed everywhere at once. He had two horses shot from under him, before receiving wounds in his own body, which were to prove mortal. It was all over in a comparatively short time. The troops which

had so proudly marched with arms glittering in the sun were put to rout by an unseen foe that they were not almost annihilated was due to the presence of washington and the virginians they fought the enemy in kind and protected the fugitives until some sort of order could be restored washington it was who collected the troops and rescued the dying general he it was who led them back to meet the reinforcements under dunbar and he it was who laid the remains of braddock in the grave four days later and read the burial service above him him again had the young soldier to taste the bitter dregs of defeat but it was salutary and a part of the iron discipline which was making him into the future leader that he had not lost any prestige by this experience but rather gained thereby is shown by the call that came urgently to him soon after to take command of all the forces of virginia he did not want the command but felt that after such a vote of confidence he could not decline it and so for three years more he struggled on a general without an army to protect the western frontier of virginia against invasion in april seventeen fifty seven he wrote i have been posted for more than twenty months past upon our cold and barren frontiers to perform i think i may say impossibilities that is to protect from the cruel incursions of a crafty savage enemy a line of inhabitants of more than three hundred and fifty miles in extent with a force inadequate to the task in the winter of seventeen fifty eight his health broke down completely and he feared that it was permanently impaired he resigned his commission and retired to mount vernon for a much-needed rest thus closes the first and formative period of washington's life the period with which the present brief sketch is chiefly concerned as we read of those years of adventure and hardship from an early age be realized that here was being hammered into shape upon the anvil of circumstance a very special weapon for some great need washington was not an accident he was a fine example of what special training could do for the boy who does his bit with all his might and because he was better fitted for the tasks than any other man in america we find him a few years later chosen to lead the colonist forces against mighty england

a pen picture of him at the time from the diary of james thatcher a surgeon in the revolution deserves repeating the personal appearance of our commander-in-chief is that of a perfect gentleman and accomplished warrior he is remarkably tall full six feet erect and well proportioned the strength and proportion of his joints and muscles appear to be commensurate with the pre-eminent powers of his mind the serenity of his countenance and majestic gracefulness of his deportment impart a strong impression of that dignity and grandeur which are peculiar characteristics and no one can stand in his presence without feeling the ascendency of his mind and associating with his countenance the idea of wisdom philanthropy magnanimity and patriotism there is a fine symmetry in the features of his face indicative of a nine and dignified spirit his nose is straight and his eyes inclined to blue he wears his hair in a becoming cue and from his forehead it is turned back and powdered in a manner which adds to the military air of his appearance he displays a native gravity but devoid of all appearance of ostentation his uniform dress is a blue coat with two brilliant epaulets buff-coloured underclothes and a three-cornered hat with the black cockade he is constantly equipped with an elegant small sword boots and spurs and readiness to mount his noble charger in this description somewhat fulsome in its praise we can read between the lines the confidence and affection which inspired his troops during all the trying days of the revolution washington has suffered much at the hands of his biographers they have overpraised him with the result that many readers of to-day have come to regard him as scarcely human a sort of demi-god but one or two more recent biographers have had the courage and conviction to tear aside the mask and we can if we will see washington the man quick-tempered at times perhaps profane in the heat of battle fond of display and good living in his hours of ease but also a man to be trusted in every crisis cool courageous resourceful

a strategist who made the ablest generals that ingley could send over against him suffer by comparison and when the great fight was won and the last of their proud generals cornwallis had crudgingly yielded up his sword it is pleasant to think of washington riding about it to whom do you think a white-haired old man now ninety years of age who had given the young surveyor his first start in life lord fairfax was an old tory an unreconstructed english gentleman of the old school who drank the king's health religiously every day at dinner it must have been mixed feelings therefore that he heard of cornwallis's surrender but pride in his protege must have conquered we can imagine him as lifting his glass with trembling fingers to another toast, here's to George Washington, and to that toast grateful America will ever respond. Important dates in Washington's life. 1732. February 22, George Washington born. 1747, left school. 1748 became a surveyor. 1753, sent by Governor Dinwiddie on a mission to the French.

1754, appointed Lieutenant Colonel and sent against the French and Indians. 1755, joined General Braddock staff with rank of Colonel. 1757, resigned his army commission. 1759, married Martha Dandridge Custis. 1775, appointed Commander-in-Chief of American Forces in Revolution. 1781, received surrender. of Cornwallis, 1788, became first president of the United States, 1797, ended second term as president, 1799, December 14th, died at Mount Vernon.

End of Washington, Part 2. Section 3 of Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers This is a Libravox recording. All Leoprovox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libravox.org. Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers by J. Walker McSpadden, Grant, Part One, The Man Who Came Back. Can a Man Come Back? This is a question one frequently hears nowadays,

and the answer is more often than not a shrug of the shoulders, for the man who has once failed, or even past his first chance of success, is not considered seriously in this busy day and time. He is a down and outer. He cannot come back. But there are exceptions to every rule, and one of the most striking ones in all history, to the above adage, is furnished by the man who led the Union forces to victory in the American Civil War,

and later achieved the presidency. He was a man who at 40 was generally regarded as a failure, a ne'er-do-well, but for the accident of war, he would in all likelihood have ended his days unwept, unhonored, and unsung. We have a picture of this middle-aged man clerking for his younger brothers in a country's store, at $800 a year, and day by day sinking further into the slough of Despond. He was of little real value to the store, even at that meager salary. He was no good at driving bargains or at palavering with the trade.

He tried to keep out of sight as much as possible among the boxes and shelves. His clothing was poor and shabby, his hair and beard long and unkept. The brand of failure was stamped all over him. Yet this was the man who in five short years was to be able to be. become the most famous military leader of his day. The life story of Ulysses Simpson Grant abounds in strange paradoxes. If ever a man was made the plaything of fate, it was he. His career has ever persuaded some writers into the belief that he was the man of mystery. His father, Jesse Grant, was a self-taught man who is said to

have received but six months actual schooling in his life. He was all the more determined that his son, Ulysses, should have the education that he lacked. We find him intervening more than once to drive the boy contrary to the latter's wishes, but to his later good. The father was tall, about six feet, rugged and aggressive, making friends and enemies with equal readiness. Ulysses' mother, however, was quiet, self-possessed, and patient, qualities which she afterwards gave the boy. Jesse Grant said of her in later years, her steadiness and strength of character have been the stay of the family through life.

At the time of Ulysses' birth, April 27, 1822, the family were living in Port Pleasant, Claremont County, Ohio. But when he was still an infant, they removed it to Georgetown, a few miles away, where his father established a tannery. At this time the town was little more than a clearing, hewed out from the virgin forest. Wood was plentiful and cheap, and for this reason Mr. Grant bought a track of land and set up his tannery. Ulysses, or Liss, as the neighbors called him, was the oldest of six children. three boys and three girls. As soon as Ulysses was old enough,

his father started him to school. There were no public schools in those days, so he went to a school maintained by private subscription and taught by a man named John White. White had his own notions about a curriculum, and one of the most important was discipline. On top of his desk, always reposed a bundle of good husky switches, except at frequently reoccurring times when they were beating a tattoo on some hapless scholars back.

It was his boast that he often used up a whole bunch in a single day. However, his school was no different from many another at the time. Beatings were taken as a matter of course. Spare the rod and spoil the child. Ulysses went to this school until he was 14 and mastered the elementary. entry studies. Between whiles, he helped his father at the tannery or on the farm. The tannery work he always hated, but outdoor work, particularly with horses, he delighted in. At seven years of age, he drove a team with all the skill of a man, and it was said that when he could

scarcely walk, he could ride horseback. The story is told of him that at a county fair where a prize of five dollars was offered to anyone who could stick on a trick pony Ulysses wanted after several other boys had got thrown helter-skelter. He flung his arms around the pony's fat neck and stuck on, though as he afterward said, The pony was round as an apple. He tells another amusing story of himself in these early days. He greatly coveted a young colt, owned by a neighboring farmer. And after teasing his father, the latter tried to buy it for him.

But he offered only $20 for the cult, and the owner won at 25. After some dickering, without any result, the boy went to the owner with this message, which he delivered all in a breath. Father says I may offer you $20, and if you won't take that, I am to offer you 22 and a half, and if you won't take that for the cult, I am to pay you $25. It would not take a Connecticut farmer to tell what was the price paid for the cult, he added afterwards when telling the story. This little incident, while amusing, reveals a trait in his character, which persisted

all through life. He was the soul of candor. He called a spade a spade, and he never could. bargain. Another early trait, revealing itself in later years, was something that, in his memoirs, he calls a superstition. It was a dislike to turn back when once started on a journey. If he found himself on the wrong road, he would keep going until he came to some branching road, rather than turn his side. This habit was destined to make some of the generals on the other side in the Civil War, somewhat uncomfortable.

They found that he never quit. Thus grew up the boy Ulysses Grant. He was not considered particularly bright at school, but he was a plodder, going along, keeping his own counsel. He could not talk readily, even in a small company, and was hopeless when it came to Speaking of Peace on Friday at the school. But he was a sturdy outdoor boy. by this time remarkably proficient with horses.

At the age of 15, he had explored the backcountry for miles roundabout. His father, however, had never lost sight of the fact that the boy was to get a good schooling, and he frequently brought up the subject to Lissa's discomfort. The lad was not especially keen for any more books, but the opportunity came, just as others were to come, to shape the whole course of young Grant's life. The son of a neighbor had received an appointment to West Point, but it failed to pass the entrance examination.

Jesse Grant immediately wrote to the congressman of the district in behalf of Ulysses, although the two men were on opposite political sides and had quarreled bitterly. If you have no other person in view and feel willing to consent to the appointment of Ulysses, Will you please signify that consent to the department? Ulysses got the appointment, despite the political feud, and it is pleasant to note that the two men healed their differences

and became good friends again. The boy received news of his appointment without much enthusiasm. He would much rather be a horse-trader, he told his father, but the latter was determined, and Ulysses went. or did his appointment please others in the village who thought the boy dull one man meeting mr grant in the street said bluntly i hear that your boy is going to west point why didn't our representative pick someone that would be a credit to the district this ill-natured speech may have been inspired by the fact that political feeling ran high at the time and jessie grant as a staunch wig and northerner had made a good many enemies ulysses was coached for west point at an academy at ripley ohio conducted by william taylor and passed his entrance examinations with fair grades his best study was mathematics he entered at the age of seventeen it took young grant many a long day to accustom himself to the military academy the hazing encountered by every

refreshmen, he didn't seem to mind, so that the older men soon let him alone. But the drill and the dress, to this farm lad, was deadly. These were the days of the ramrod tactics of Winfield Scott, the starch and stock, and buckram days of the army. Hold fussing feathers, his critics called him, but with all his love of pomp and circumstance, Scott was a splendid soldier, whether on the drill ground or in the face of the enemy. Nevertheless, to Grant, it was a constant trial at first, he felt like a fish out of water. General Charles King thus speaks of him. Plegmatic in temperament and long giving to ease and deliberation in all his movements at home,

this springing to attention at the tap of the drum, this snapping together of the heels at the sound of a sergeant's voice. This sudden freezing to a rigid pose without the move of a muscle, except that the word of command, was something almost beyond him. It seemed utterly unnatural,

if not utterly repugnant, accustomed to swinging along the winding banks of the wide oak or the cow-paths of the pasture lot, this moving only at a measured pace of 28 inches, and 110 to the minute, all in strict unison with the step of the guide on the marching flank or at the head of the column, came ten times harder than ever did the pages of analytical or the calculus.

Grant had no sense of rhythm. He had no joy in martial music. The thrill and inspiration of the drum and fife or the beautiful harmonies of the old academy band were utterly lost on him. in all that class of eighteen forty three it may well be doubted if there lived one solitary soul who found there less to like or more to shrink from than this seventeen-year-old lad who thanks to the opportunities and to the training there given them was in less than a quarter of a century to be hailed as the foremost soldier of more than two millions of men in the union blue but this was only one of the grant paradoxes the contradictions which were to mark his strange career life at west point was not all hardship however in his quiet way grant made a few warm friends on account of his initials he was promptly nicknamed uncle sam which was soon shortened to sam he excelled in two widely different courses mathematics and horsemanship we have already noticed his early skill with and love for horses now it was to stand him in good stead he was assigned during one year to a particularly intractable young horse a big raw-boned sorrel named york One of York's tricks was to rear and throw himself backward with his rider.

But in Grant he found his master, and the steed not only grew tractable, but developed under his rider's training into a famous jumper. Horse and rider are vividly described by General James B. Frye in his reminiscences. The class, still mounted, was formed in line through the center of the hall. The riding-master placed the leaping bar higher than a man's head and called out, Cadet Grant. A clean-faced, slender, blue-eyed young fellow, weighing about 120 pounds, dashed from the ranks on a powerfully built chestnut sorrel horse, and galloped down the opposite side of the hall.

As he turned at the farther end and came into the stretch at which the bar was placed, The horse increased his pace, and, measuring his stride for the great leap before him, bounded into the air, and cleared the bar, carrying his rider as if man and beast had been welded together. The spectators were breathless. Sam Grant graduated from the Military Academy in July 1843, one of 39 out of a class that had originally numbered 100. Among his classmates were Sherman, Thomas, Meade, Reynolds, and other soldiers later known to fame.

It cannot be said, however, that his entry into the army was auspicious. He was still by no means reconciled to the idea of being a soldier. He had not received the assignment he had coveted, the dragoons, and, moreover, his health was poor. He was troubled with a persistent cough, which indicated weak lung. But thanks to his life in the open and horseback riding, he escaped a possible attack of consumption. After a three months furlough, visiting his father's home, now at Bethel, Ohio, he reported for duty at the Jefferson Barracks near St. Louis as a second lieutenant in the infantry. The best horseman in his class had to walk. But there were compensations.

outside of duty Grant could always procure a mount, and about five miles away from the barracks, just an easy canter, was the home of his college chum and roommate, Lieutenant Frederick T. Dent. The Dent's had a big, hospitable country place, and they speedily made Fred's friend feel at home. One member of the family who had heard much about Sam Grant from her brother's letters long before Grant appeared in person, was Julia Dent, now a charming girl of seventeen. It was not long before her friends began teasing her about the little lieutenant with the big epaulets, and while she laughed and blushed she didn't seem to mind. The little round of social gaieties, however, was of brief duration.

Trouble with Mexico was brewing, and in 1844 relations had become so strained that an army of observation, as it was called, was assembled under General Zachary Taylor, old roughen-ready, on the border. Grant's company was ordered to join this army on the briefest notice. The young lieutenant had time only for a brief leave-taking with a dense, and one member in particular, but her final message met all the world to him. In March of the next year, Congress sanctioned the annexation of Texas and trouble with Mexico began in earnest. History records the rapid course of events

which made up the Mexican War. We could only notice the events which directly concerned the career of Grant. His company was part of the expeditionary force of 3,000 men destined to see active service on the border. By the middle of March they had reached the Rio Grande and pitched camp opposite the city of Matamoros. The army was far from its base of supplies and in a country swarming with the enemy. Before war was formally declared, two officers who were caught outside the camp were killed,

and two whole companies captured. There was no railroad, and General Taylor was compelled to send a considerable force back 25 miles for supplies. On the 3rd of May, the returning troops encountered a much larger force of Mexicans. A battle followed, which continued after sundown. During the night, the Mexicans retreated, but were found further on, in a much stronger position. They awaited the Americans on the far side of a pond,

their position being further fortified by logs and branches of trees. The Captain of Grant's company was temporarily absent, and it fell to Grant to lead their advance. By this time, bullets were humming merrily, but he directed his men to deploy to one side, and approached through thicker woods. At last they reached the clearing near the head of the pond, and he ordered a charge. They captured the position immediately in front of them, and made a few prisoners, including one colonel. The engagement all along the line had been too brisk for the Mexicans, and they broke and ran, leaving a considerable quantity of guns and ammunition.

As for the little lieutenant, it was his first battle and first command of a company, and he had reason to feel satisfied with the day's work. End of Grant, Part 1. Recording by Richard Kilmer, Rio Medina, Texas. Section 4 of Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers This is a Libravox recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libravox.org.

Boys Book of Famous Soldiers by Jay Walker McSpadden Grant, Part 2 As one result of the engagement, the Americans now crossed the river and became an army. of invasion. And now that the war had actually begun, volunteers began to flock to the standard. The ensuing months of that year were packed with incident and no little danger. In August, Grant was made quartermaster and commissary of the regiment, a position of responsibility, which he held until the army was withdrawn.

Although Grant's duties were now such as to withdraw him from active fighting, he was demand to take advantage of the fact. The lively battle of Monterey bears witness to this. After a hard encounter on the outskirts of the city, the Americans stormed it from the north and east, and began to drive the Mexicans out street by street. But when the citadel was in sight, the commanding officer, Colonel Garland, found his dismay that they were short of ammunition. We must have ammunition at one. Once, he announced to his men, Who will volunteer to ride back with the message?

I do not wish to detail anyone, as it is extra-hazardous. At once, Lieutenant Grant stepped forward and saluted. I will go, Colonel, he said. You are just the man. If anybody can ride through, you can. But hurry. And Grant did.

Crouching low on his Mustang like an Indian, he dashed down the bullet-swept streets, made the open, and delivered his message to General Twig. The Mexican War was marked by the political rivalry of two American generals, one of whom was destined to win the highest honor in the gift of his country, General Zachary Taylor, Old Ruffin'Ready, and General Winfield Scott, fussing feathers. Both were able leaders, though totally unlike in their methods, Taylor cared nothing for personal appearance or etiquette.

He worked in close contact with his men. Scott, on the contrary, was fond of display and issued his orders through his staff officers. Scott was now given supreme command of the Mexican campaign and summoned all the regular troops for an invasion by way of Vera Cruz, the scene of a later landing in very recent years. Taylor was left with only the volunteers, but he utilized them at Buono Vista to such good effect that at the next election, old Ruffin'Ready became president of the United States.

The very thing that his political foes at Washington had tried to prevent by giving Scott the Supreme Command. Grant's company, with other regulars to the number of 8,000 men, landed at Veracruz, and early in April, began its perilous march into the interior. Roads had to be built and bridges constructed, and the army engineers toiled night and day. Among them were two young West Pointers, George B. McClellan and Robert E. Lee. Thus it was that Grant and Lee first came to know each other

in the wilds of Mexico. By the middle of May they had reached Puebla, which they captured easily, But the army needed supplies, and Quartermaster Grant was sent out with an escort of 1,000 men to forage the surrounding country. They filled their wagons and returned safely. This jaunt delighted Grant's soul. It was far better than bringing up the rear on a dusty line of March. In one of his letters home he writes,

I have been delighted with the Mexican birds. Their plumage is superlatively splendid. they beat ours and show but to my mind do not equal them in harmony i have written this letter with my sword fastened to my side my pistols within reach not knowing but that the next moment i may be called into battle it is an odd coincidence that at a later day we find another soldier destined to lead his country's armies to victory in a far mightier conflict using the soil of mexico as a training ground That soldier was John J. Pershing. One other exploit of grants in the Mexican campaign must be mentioned, as it was not only daring, but it also revealed his resourcefulness. During the attack on Chapultepec, Grant noticed that one of the two main routes,

the San Cosme Road, was flanked by a small Mission Church surmounted by a belfry. He reasoned that if they could mount a house, in the belfry, that section would be made mighty uncomfortable for the Mexicans. He went at once to a superior officer, explained his plan, and secured a detail of men with one gun. The gun had to be taken to pieces, but with it in hand they compelled the priest to open the church doors to them, mounted the steps to the belfry, reassembled the gun, and it was soon beating a lively tattoo down upon the backs of the establishment. astonished Mexicans.

For his gallant conduct at Chappaltebeck, as the official citation read, Grant won his brevet of captain. With the signing of the Treaty of Peace, Grant came home on furlough, and in August 1848 was married to Julia Dent. He took his wife to his father's home, and was made much of by his admiring townsmen. His father was inordinately proud of my Ulysses, now a captain, and cited for gallantry in action. In the darker days that were to follow, he looked back to this time as the very pinnacle of his son's greatness. That there were darker days, and many of them must be chronicled in any true sketch of Ulysses S. Grant.

He was to taste the very dregs of humiliation and despair. He was to see these same admiring friends turned from him one by one with a sneer or reproachful shake of the head. For days of peace were at hand, long days of barrack's routine and enforced idleness. To Captain Grant, these days, coming after the excitement of Mexico, were at first welcome, then speedily grew tedious. He had always hated the humdrum life of the drill ground. now he was shifted after a few months to a camp at san francisco the distance was so great traveling as they did by way of the isthmus of panama this was long before the railroads that he could not take his wife with him his slender pay also would not admit of it wife in all the army camps was free and easy liquor flowed freely and drunkenness was unfortunately common Grant, like others, drank, but not to excess.

With him, however, one glass was sufficient to flush his face and render his walk unsteady. It was not long before the life at this far-removed Western camp began to tell upon him. He quarreled with his commanding officer and finally resigned from the service. He had to borrow money in order to return home, a long and painful job. journey by way of New York, and it was a discouraged, broken-looking man who greeted his wife and his parents. This was the summer of 1854. Captain Grant was then only 32, but it already seemed as though the best and only valuable

part of his life was behind him. The recent conquering hero, with his dashing uniform in epaulets, had become a somewhat seedy-looking individual, with shoulders prematurely. stooped and shuffling gait. The word speedily went round the village, with many a nod and wink, told you so, when up like a rocket, came down like a stick. His wife, however, had not lost her confidence in him. Through all the trying days that were to follow, she remained staunch and loyal. She persuaded her father to let her have a sixty-acre track of land near St. Louis. There she brought

Ulysses and their children, and there he began life anew as a plain farmer. He built with his own hands a log house of four rooms, with chimneys at each end and wide fireplaces. With grim humor,

he called the place hardscrabble. But he liked the place, he liked the freedom of it, with his horses and other livestock. Despite its hardship, he welcomed it as an escape from the petty exactions of military life. Nevertheless, he could not make it pay.

He did not have sufficient capital or bodily strength to succeed. An attack of chills and fever in 1858 put the finishing touch to this episode, and he sold his stock in the farm the following spring. During the ensuing few months, he moved from Pillar to Post, trying various ventures and succeeding with none. The fates seemed against him. In St. Louis, whither he had drifted, he was regarded with open scorn

as what we would now designate a down and out. One reason for his poor success lay in the fact that he was a northerner, and the city was seething with talk of secession. The clouds of civil war were already gathering, and men began to distrust each his neighbor. At this juncture, his father, who seems rather to have turned against him also, came to his relief. He offered Ulysses a position in his leather business, now in charge of the younger boys.

Ulysses thankfully accepted, although the pay was only $50 a month. He brought his wife and boys to Galena, where, at any rate, he was sure of having a roof over his head. the brothers found him of no earthly account at driving bargains or tending store says general charles king he could keep books after a fashion and do some of the heavy work in handling the miscellaneous stock another soldier who became his devoted follower in the later days had his first sight of grant at this down-at-the-heels period i went round to the store he says it was a sharp winter morning, and there wasn't a sign of a soldier or one that looked like a soldier about the shop. But pretty soon a farmer drove up with a lot of hides on his sleigh, and went inside the dicker, and presently a stoop-shouldered, brownish-bearded fellow, with a slouch hat pulled down over his eyes, who had been sitting, whittling at the stove when I came inside, came out,

pulling on an old light blue soldier's overcoat. He flung open the doors, leading down into the cellar, laid hold of the top hide, frozen stiff it was, tugged it loose, towed it over, and slung it down the chute. Then one by one, all by himself, he heaved off the rest of them. A ten minutes tough job in that weather, until he had got the last of them down the cellar, then slouched back into the store again, shed the blue coat, got some hot water off the stove, and went and washed his hands using a cake of brown soap, then came back and went to whittling again, and all without a word to anybody. That was my first look at Grant, and look at him now.

But in all likelihood there would not have been another chance to look at him had not the great Civil War broken out. It was to prove, in his case, that what seemed failure was merely lack of opportunity. When South Carolina seceded and the call for troops came, the stoop-shouldered clerk in the hide store began to straighten up. To call to arms put new life in his blood. He felt his old confidence returning.

He refused a local captaincy after he had demonstrated what he could do in drilling recruits, saying, I have been in the military service fourteen years, and think I am competent to come. command a regiment. He went to Springfield, Illinois, and offered his services, and after some delay, was given a desk job in the adjutant general's office. It was not long before he proved his efficiency, and his advice was sought more and more

by the governor in organizing the state guards. When the 21st regiment was mustered in the service, he was made its colonel. He had put his foot on the first rung of the ladder of six. success. The twenty-first, like other bodies of volunteers, was a loosely-knit unruly set of men. They took military life as a huge picnic, but speedily got over that attitude under Grant. On their first long hike, it is said that their canteens were filled with whiskey instead of water, until Grant went through on a personal tour of inspection and ordered every

campaign emptied out on the ground. The way he took hold of that regiment and licked it into shape, opened the eyes of Governor Yates and his staff. In two months, it was the best drilled regiment in the state, and when President Lincoln wrote to the governor asking suggestions for promotions, Grant's name headed the list. He was made of Brigadier General. The story of the Civil War and Grant's great part therein belonged to a longer chronicle than this. Step by step, this stern, quiet soldier fought his way up, winning his country's battles

and his own as well. In the full tide of war, he found himself, and better still, his country discovered him. He was never after, to prove recreant to his trust. We will fight it out along this line if it takes all summer, is one of his typical remarks, and one most often It was toward the last of the hard-fought war when the southern forces under Lee were doing their utmost to fend off the inevitable. Grant, now commanding general of the Union forces, was still putting into practice the quiet bulldog qualities that had led his armies to victory. Then came the final dramatic scene at the historic surrender at Appomattox. Lee had come to discuss terms with him, and now stood awaiting his arrival erect, courtly handsome, the typical southern gentleman that he was.

Down the road came riding a gaunt-looking man, with the familiar stooped shoulders and the mud-bespattered trousers and boots. It was the general-in-chief on his way to greet his beaten foe. The two men looked each other in the eye, then clasped hands like old friends. Grant recalled the days of the Mexican campaign and was surprised that Lee knew so much about him in those days. He wanted to talk old times, and Lee himself brought up the subject of surrender. Grant took his seat at a table and wrote out the simple and generous terms which allowed officers and men to return to their homes, on giving their word not to take up arms against the United States government again. These fine, dignified features softened as he read the terms, so much more magnanimous than he had dared to hope.

My men are nearly starving, he began. What do you need? interrupted Grant, and gave instant orders that the defeated army should be supplied with rations. Tell the boys to go home and go to work, he said. That was Grant. Important dates in Grant's life. 1822, April 27th, Ulysses Simpson Grant Born. 1839 received appointment to the U.S. Military Academy, West Point.

1843 graduated. 1845 went as second lieutenant to join Taylor's forces in Mexico. 1848, breveted captain for gallantry. 1848 married Julia T. Dent. 1854, resigned his Army Commission. 1861, re-entered Army at outbreak of Civil War, commissioned Colonel, then-Brigadier General. 1863, made Major General. 1864, given Supreme Command of the Union Forces with rank of Lugdier General.

Lieutenant General. 1866, the great of General, created for the first time, and conferred on him. 1868, elected President. 1885, July 23rd, died at Mount McGregor, New York. End of Grant, Part 2. Recording by Richard Kilmer, Real Medina, Texas. Section 5 of Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers This is a Libravox recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain.

For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libravox.org. Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers by J. Walker McSpadden. Lee, Part 1 Lee, the leader of a lost cause. A gray-haired college president sat talking kindly with a young sophomore who had fallen behind in his studies. My boy, he said, you must study if you would succeed. Only patience and industry will prevent your failure here and your failure in afterlife. But, General, you failed, replied the sophomore, with an amazing impertinence.

I hope that you may be more fortunate than I was the quiet answer. literature contains nothing finer than that by way of the retort courteous the speaker was robert e lee the time not many months after the surrender of the southern army many were there to brand him as a failure just as this thoughtless sophomore had done and to all such critics his reply was silence in the seclusion of a small virginia college he lived and worked keeping sedulously out of public affairs writing and saying nothing about his campaigns he left to history the final verdict which has found him not a failure but one of the most brilliant soldiers of this or any land In Lee's early life and ancestry, his nearest parallel is Washington. These two great Virginians were born within a few miles of each other in Westmoreland County. Lee was born just 75 years after Washington, January 19, 1807, and like him, was descended of famous lineage. His father, Light Horse Harry Lee, fought by the side of Washington,

in the revolutionary war and it was he who in a memorial address on the great leader coined the immortal phrase first in war first in peace and first in the hearts of his countrymen still another ancestor richard henry lee had been born many years earlier in the same old mansion where robert edward lee first saw the light of day richard lee it was who was a boyhood of a boyhood of the boyhood friend and confidant of George Washington, and who later became one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. It is not strange, therefore, to find that the career of the first great Virginian profoundly influenced the second. One familiar with the life of Lee, says Thomas Nelson Page, cannot help noting the strong resemblance of his character in its strength, its poise, its rounded completeness to that of

Washington, or fail to mark what influenced the life of Washington had on the life of Lee. The stamp appears upon it from his boyhood and grows more plain as his years progress. The old homestead in which Lee was born deserves some notice on its own account. It was built by Thomas Lee, a grandson of Richard Lee, the immigrant, who came to Virginia about the time that Charles I first was losing both his crown and his head. While Charles II was still in exile, the same Thomas Lee offered the king a haven in Virginia, which was not accepted.

The original brick structure was destroyed by fire, but the house was rebuilt on the same site during the time of Queen Anne, and it is said that she ate it in its reconstruction. This was the ancestral home of the Lee's for several generations. Robert E. Lee, though naturally proud of his lineage, never showed great interest in the family tree. He never had the time or the inclination to study genealogy,

and always said that he knew nothing of it beyond the fact that Colonel Richard Lee had come to America during the reign of Charles I. Upon having a family seal and crest made, he apologized for the seeming parade by saying, I have thought, perhaps foolishly enough, that it might as well be right as wrong. Later, however, when approached on the subject of publishing a family history, he wrote, I am very much obliged to Mr. For the trouble he has taken in relation to the Lee genealogy.

I have no desire to have it published and do not think it would afford sufficient interest beyond the immediate family to pay for the expense. I think the money had better be appropriated to relieve the poor. Harry Lee, Robert's father, was not only a soldier, but also a man of letters. He loved the classics, and has left memoirs written in spirited vein. He had reached Middle Life, however, before Robert was born, and passed away when the boy was eleven. It was the mother's influence, and here again we have a parallel with Washington, which was Paramount in the early days.

She was a Carter of equally old and distinguished family, and is spoken of as an amiable and gracious lady. When Robert was still a child, his family moved to Alexandria, and very shortly, his father went away on a trip for his health, from which he never returned. Between the boy and his mother, the ties became very close. He was devoted to her.

and on her part she said after he went away to school you have been both son and daughter to me long afterward lee alludes to this period in a letter to his own son by way of counsel a young gentleman who has read virgil must surely be competent to take care of two ladies for before i had advanced that far i was my mother's outdoor agent and confidential messenger robert lee obtained his first schooling at the old academy in alexandria then taught by a mr leary who remained always his good friend later he attended a better-known school conducted by a strict quaker benjamin hallowell Brimstone Castle, the boys called it, solely on account of the color of the brick walls. Hallowell himself was rarely, if ever, brimstone in character, though he could be stern enough on occasion. He, theed, and thoued, in the most orthodox style, and decried all warfare. Despite his pacifist teachings, however, Young Lee's earliest ambition was to become a soldier. It was in his blood.

he was fond of outdoor sports especially hunting and horseback riding his lifelong fondness for horses brings to mind the same trait in grant his later antagonist in his older days lee would tell with enthusiasm how as a boy he had followed the hunt not infrequently on foot for hours over hill and valley without tiring again he wrote i know the pleasure of training a handsome horse I enjoy it as much as anyone. His famous steed traveler was known throughout the army of Virginia during the war, and the sight of him caused many a eye to grow moist as he followed riderless the remains of his beloved master to their last resting place. At the Hallowell School, Lee chiefly excelled in mathematics, a study which was later to be of great value to him,

in the engineer's corps of the army. Hallowell paid a tribute to his pupil after the latter became famous, saying, he was a most exemplary student in every respect. One could wish, however, that instead of such idle compliments, the schoolmaster had really searched his memory

and given us some personal anecdotes of Leet's school. There is actually very little on record about his early life. He seems to have grown into an attractive and likable boy, studious, somewhat reserved, and by no means remarkable. One kinswoman writes, I have often said since he entered on his brilliant career that although we all admired him for his remarkable beauty and attractive manners, I did not see anything in him that prepared me for his so far outstripping all his compeers. lee's older brother sydney had already entered the navy and lee himself decided upon the army as his choice of profession

at the age of eighteen he applied for a cadetship at the military academy at west point and received it direct from president andrew jackson himself there is a tradition that when lee presented himself before the hero of new orleans That doughty Tennessean looked him over from head the foot, then passed him on with the Tirst's comment, You'll do. And Robert Lee did. In college he made a record that shines to this day. He was given the coveted cadet adjutancy of his corps. He graduated second in a class of forty-six, and he did not receive a single demerit during his entire college career for Rusty Gunn.

or cap on the floor, or laid at drill, or twisted belt, or any of the hundred and one things that are the bane and stumbling block of the West Pointer's existence. Such a record seems almost too good to be true, and one is tempted to wish for at least one escapade to enliven the narrative. Yet Lee was by no means a prig. Even his detractors of later years never accused him of that. He was popular with his fellows and fond of the given take of the drill ground. His ability to make and hold friends was one of the outstanding traits of his whole life.

His men who followed him through the lost cause fairly idolized him. General Joseph E. Johnson, another southern leader, was a classmate of his at West Point, and gives us this description of him there. We had the same intimate associates who thought as I did that no other youth or man so united the qualities that win warm friendship and command I respect, for he was full of sympathy and kindness, genial, and fond of gay conversation, and even fun. and while his correctness of demeanor and attention to all duties, personal and official, and a dignity as much a part of himself as the elegance of his person, gave him a superiority that everyone acknowledged in his heart. He was the only one of all the men I have known that could laugh at the false and follies

of his friends in such a manner as to make them ashamed without touching their affection for him. Lee graduated from West Point with the class of 29 and the rank of second lieutenant of the engineers. His first important move after leaving school was to choose for wife Mary Custis, daughter of George Washington Park Custis of Arlington, the last branch of the Washington family. Here again the fates linked up the names of Washington and Lee, The two homes at Arlington and Mount Vernon were only a few miles apart on the Potomac, and as a final link in the chain, we find years after, at the close of his life,

Lee was giving his last efforts to building up Washington College, which was to be known thereafter as Washington and Lee. When Mary Custis became Mrs. Robert E. Lee, there was some disparity in their fortunes. She was the heiress of the Custace estate, while he was drawing only the meager pay of his second lieutenant. But such was her pride and confidence in him that she turned her back on money and decided to live on her husband's income. It was harsh training for a time, but it fitted her to become a real helpmate for him, and in the rigorous days of the Civil War she was glad that she had learned early to do without. One of Lieutenant Lee's first assignments in the Engineering Corps was the construction of harbor defenses in Hampton Roads.

As he labored to make these as strong as possible, he little dreamed that it would be his problem, a quarter of a century later, to study how he might demolish them. From Hampton Roads, he was transferred to Washington and made assistant to the chief engineer, an agreeable change as it was transferred. brought him close to his wife's home. Mounted on a favorite steed, he could easily commute back and forth between office and home. On one occasion, it is related that he invited a brother officer, Captain McComb, out home for the night.

As the latter had no mount, Lee took him up behind himself, and down Pennsylvania Avenue they went, saluting other officers whom they encountered with great glee. That was one time when a commutation ticket was good for two. Five years after graduation, he had worked up to a first-lieutenancy, and two years more found him a captain. In 1835 he was appointed on a commission to fix the boundary line between Michigan and Ohio.

A few months later, he was detailed to make an important study of the Mississippi River and Valley, with a view to determine. how to prevent the annual overflows with their consequent damage to property. His researchers were chiefly along the upper river at Illinois. It is said that while there, he was struck with the enormous potential energy of the current, and reported that if a dam were constructed at a certain place, a great storehouse of power would be possible. This was long before the day of the dynamo, by which such power could be harnessed. Many years later, however, his dream came true at the place he had indicated the great power dam nearly a mile long, blocking the father of waters for the first time in its tumultuous career at Keukuk, Iowa.

Farther downstream above St. Louis, he began a system of river improvements which aroused no little opposition among property owners. The dispute that arose was one of the first things which brought the name of Robert E. Lee to public attention. But despite the short-sighted protests of some citizens of St. Louis, Lee went quietly ahead and carried the work through to the permanent betterment of the city. I was sent here to do certain work, and I shall do it, was his terse comment. When he had completed his work on the Mississippi, he was sent to New York, to complete the harbor defenses at Fort Hamilton, down at the gateway of the city. He had made Captain of Engineers by this time, and was looked upon as one of the ablest men

in his line of work in the Army. It was not long before his medal was to be tested in actual warfare. The trouble with Mexico, which had been smoldering for several years, at length, burst into flame. After the first victories along the border under General Zach Taylor, a campaign from the sea was undertaken under General Winfield Scott, who landed at Veracruz. The purpose was to march overland to the capital, reducing the country as they went,

and to make this possible the army engineers were in demand. They answered the call gladly, for the spirit of adventure ran high, and every army officer welcome the chance to see active service. In the Corps of Engineers, we find several names destined to become famous, Lee Beauregard, McClellan, Foster, Tower, Stevens, Toton, and others, while Grant was attached to the commissary of the same army. It was, in effect, a training school for the great drama of a few short years later.

Captain Lee was placed on the personal staff of General Scott and given supervision of important road and bridge building. In a letter to his wife, dated Rio Grande, October 11, 1846, he writes, We have met with no resistance yet. The Mexicans who were guarding the passage retired on our approach. There has been a great wedding of knives, grinding of swords, and sharpening of bayonets ever since we reached the river. this was written while serving with general wool in northern mexico he took part in the battle of guinevista his first engagement and was then summoned to vera cruz by scott

this dowdy old general and former commandant at west point had all along shown a great partiality for lee and in the campaign which was the follow we find him constantly writing of his young staff officer in glowing terms One such incident is typical. Lee had undertaken alone an all-night exploration of a desolate lava track called Pedregal, which had been shunned by scouts and troopers alike. It was treacherous country, difficult to traverse and possibly infested by the enemy. General Scott writes, I had dispatched several staff officers who had, within the space of two hours, returned and reported to me,

that each had found it impractical to penetrate far into pedrigal during the dark. Captain Lee, having passed over the difficult ground by daylight, found it just possible to return to St. Augustine in the dark, the greatest feat of physical and moral courage, performed by any individual in my knowledge pending the campaign. Another general, P.F. Smith, also bears tribute to this and other such, FITS. I wish partially to record my admiration for the conduct of Captain Lee of the engineers. His reconnaissance is, though pushed far beyond the bounds of prudence, were conducted with

so much skill that their fruits were of the utmost value, the soundness of his judgment, and personal daring, being equally conspicuous. End of Lee, Part 1. recording by Richard Kilmer, Rio Medina, Texas. Section 6 of Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers This is a Libravox recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libravox.org.

Boys Book of Famous Soldiers by Jay Walker McSpadden, Lee, Part 2 At Veracruz, Lee had the pleasure of meeting his older brother from whom he had long been separated. This was Lieutenant Sidney Smith Lee, who had entered the Navy before Robert went to West Point. Now for the first time,

the brothers, sailor and soldier, fought side by side. But it was with mixed feelings that Robert Lee passed through this experience. he was brave enough on his own account but he constantly trembled for sidney he had placed the battery in position to reduce the town and thus describes the ensuing action the first day this battery opened smith served one of the guns i had constructed the battery and was there to direct its fire no matter where i turned my eyes reverted to him and i stood by his gun whenever i was not wanted elsewhere oh i felt awfully and am at a loss what i should have done had he been cut down before me i thank god that he was saved he preserved his usual cheerfulness and i could see his white teeth through all the smoke and din of the fire when the soldiers moved inland after capturing vera cruz the sailors were left behind and lee had to bid his brother farewell

the records of the six months campaign in mexico contain many references to lee's skill and bravery he was then forty years old in the heyday of his vigor he would remain in the saddle from dawn to twilight if necessary and never shirked the duty no wonder that scott was proud of him and came to rely upon him more and more at chapoltepec he writes captain lee was constantly conspicuous varying important orders till he fainted from a wound and the loss of two nights sleep at the batteries. The campaign certainly showed that Lee was a soldier and the son of a soldier. He was repeatedly cited for meritorious conduct and was breverted, Major, Lieutenant Colonel, and Colonel in rapid succession. This proved not merely his bravery, but his ability in planning engagements and discovering the weak points of the enemy,

features which he was to turn to such remarkable account in many famous battles of the Civil War. When peace with Mexico was declared, Lee was given a welcome furlough, and went back to Arlington to visit his wife and children. He had been so constantly away from home that he failed to recognize his youngest son, whom he had left as an infant,

and it is said that he himself was first, recognized by a faithful dog. His son and namesake, R. E. Lee, in his recollections, speaks of his father's love for animals. He once rescued a dog that was near drowning in the narrows, and it became his devoted follower through life. In a letter home he writes, one of many such references, Can not you cure poor speck, his dog, cheer him up, take him to walk with you and tell the children to cheer him up. We have already spoken of his favorite horse

traveler. After the Great War, during which horse and rider were inseparable, Lee wrote a description and tribute to his equine friend which must appeal to every true lover of horses. Lee's two elder sons held true to the family traditions by both entering West Point. Lee himself was presently sent there by the government as superintendent, just 23 years after he had graduated. He served in this capacity for three years, then was given an assignment to the cavalry with rank of lieutenant colonel. For the next five years, his duty took him into several states, chiefly in the west and southwest. It was an unsettled time on the border, both from the Mexicans and the United States. at the South and the Indians in the West, and constant police duty was necessary.

It was arduous and lacked the thrill of a real campaign, but in any event it kept leave from growing rusty as a soldier. Unconsciously to him and to his government, it was shaping him and fitting him for the great drama just ahead. For slowly but surely the North and the South were drifting apart. At first the discussion had been political, but now it was growing more and more personal and bitter. The disputed questions were slavery and state's rights. A preliminary cloud in the sky was the fanatical raid of John Brown, who in 1859, tried to stir up the Negroes of Northern Virginia against their masters.

The raid was promptly crushed at Harper's Ferry, and Lee, with his regiment of cavalry, assisted in restoring order. But though John Brown's body lay a-mouldering in the grave, his soul went marching on. While many southerners did not own slaves and did not believe in slavery, the question of state's rights found them with undivided front. Had not this doctrine been expressly implied in the federal constitution, had not this right been invoked more than once in the north by the staunch state of Massachusetts, for example, as early as 1809 and as lately as 1842. Thus they reasoned,

and when matters at last reached the breaking point in 1861, the southern states, following South Carolina's lead one by one, felt that they were acting only within their recognized rights. The actual call to arms brought a heartbreaking time to many homes. In some had actually parted father and son, or brother and brother. While it created no such chasm in the Lee's family, it brought to Robert E. Lee the bitterest and most trying decision

of his whole life. Lee had loved his country. He had served her faithfully for 32 years. His actions, rather than his words, had proved his entire devotion. But the words, too, were not lacking, as references to his letters will show. One such glimpse of his heart is seen

in a letter written from Texas in 1856. In telling his wife about his Fourth of July celebration, he says, mine was spent after a march of 30 miles, on one of the branches of the brassos, under my blanket, elevated on four sticks driven into the ground, as a sunshade. The sun was fiery hot, the atmosphere like a blast from a hot air furnace.

The water, salt, still my feelings from my comfort, were as ardent, my faith in her future is true, and my hope for her advancement as unabated as they would have been under better circumstances. When finally the choice had to be made between state and nation, Lee was sore beset. He had no interest in the perpetuation of slavery. His views all tended the other way. In this enlightened age he wrote, There are few, I believe, but will acknowledge that slavery Slavery has an institution is a moral and political evil.

He had already set free his own slaves and was in favor of freeing all the slaves in the South. But when it came a question of deserting his own state, his beloved Virginia, the problem was far more difficult. All night nearly he paced his chamber, says Thomas Nelson Page, often seeking on his knees the guidance of the God he trusted in. But in the morning light had come. His wife's family were strongly union in their sentiments, and the writer has heard that powerful family influences were exerted to prevail on him to adhere to the union's side. My husband has wept tears of blood, wrote Mrs. Lee,

to his old commander Scott, who did him justice to declare that he knew he acted under a compelling sense of duty. Lee had no illusions as to the sternness of the contest and the sacrifices that he with others would have to make. His own beautiful home lay just across the river from Washington. He must have seen with prophetic vision how it would be seized by the federal government and held for other purposes, an act of confiscation that was only partially atoned for a half a century later. He also knew that Virginia being a border state would bear the brunt of the war.

I can contemplate no greater calamity for the country than the dissolution of the Union, he wrote in January, and in April that dissolution came. Nor did the fortunes of war itself swerve him from the belief that, in serving his state, he was doing his highest duty. After it was over, and he had gone into retirement of work,

in Washington College, we find him writing to General Boregarde as follows. I need not tell you that true patriotism sometimes requires men to act exactly contrary at one period to that which it does at another. And the motive which impels them, the desire to do right is precisely the same. History is full of illustrations of this. Washington himself is an example. Here he invokes the example that had been his guiding star since early boyhood. He fought at one time against the French under Braddock, in the service of the king of Great Britain. At another, he fought with the French at Yorktown, under orders of the Continental Congress against him.

He has not been branded by the world with reproach for this, but his course has been applauded. While Lee was wrestling with his momentous decision, a further temptation was placed in his path, which he thrust aside. He was offered the high post of Commander-in-Chief of the Union forces. This offer came as a suggestion from Scott that Colonel Lee would be worth fifty thousand troops on our side, and although Lincoln had never met him, he was glad to exceed to the suggestion. Lee quietly remarked in declining the honor, I stated as candidly and as courteously as I could

that, though opposed to secession and deprecating war, I could take no part in an invasion of the southern states. Such was the manner of man who was soon chosen to lead the Confederate armies. Let us pause for the final picture of the man himself from a composite by men who knew him. In physique, Lee was every inch a man. He stood five feet eleven inches in height, weighed 175 pounds, and there was not an ounce of superfluous flesh on him. He was, as fine-looking a man as one would wish to see, said General Hunt, of perfect figure and strikingly handsome.

General Miggs added. Lee was a man, then in the vigor of youthful strength, with a noble and commanding presence, an admirable, graceful, and athletic figure. General Preston remarked that he had a countenance which beamed with gentleness and benevolence. J.S. Wise said, I have seen all the great men of our times, except Mr. Lincoln, and I have no hesitation in saying that Robert E. Lee was incomparably

the greatest looking of them all. And Alexander H. Stevens, when he saw Lee for the first time, and talked of the newly-born confederacy, was moved in his enthusiasm to say, as he stood there fresh and ruddy, as it David from the sheepfold, in the prime of manly beauty, and the embodiment of a line of heroic and patriotic fathers

and worthy mothers, it was thus I first saw Robert E. Lee. I had before me the most manly and entire gentleman I ever saw. Lee's fame is a true gentleman. the general of the first rank has survived the overly enthusiastic eulogies of his friends and the first caustic comments of his foes. His strategy has come to be recognized as of the highest order. To begin with, he had to build his army from the ground up, but ended by having one of the

most perfect fighting machines in the history of warfare. His men obeyed him with a devotion that was almost idolatrous. suggested the uniform of quiet gray on account of its protective coloring and against all the army traditions of ages that an army should march into action in gaudy and glittering attire. It was not until the great World War of a century later that wise military leaders followed his example and dressed their troops as inconspicuously as possible. It is not the province of this short sketch to trace General Lee's campaigns step by step to the final meeting with Grant at Appomattox.

Army after army was sent to meet him from the North's far greater resources, only to be baffled or defeated in the South. And it was not until he forsook his successful tactics of the defensive and assumed the offensive on his invasion of Pennsylvania that he encountered serious defeat at Gettysburg. But after all, the great foe to whom his troops had finally to succum was general starvation. The resources of the South were literally exhausted. My men are starving, said Lee, tersely to Grant, and, back of them, lay a suffering land

that had literally been bled white. It was indeed a bitter lesson that the South had learned, but the verdict of history is that it was salutary. The union was greater than any state or group of states. It had required a war to rectify that fatal flaw in the Constitution, but out of the fires of that terrible conflict was fused a union strong and great that should be far better fitted to withstand the shock of time. Since that bygone day, when Lee laid aside his sword forever

and as men went straggling back to their plowshares, America has been engaged in two other wars, and among the first to respond to the bugle call and line up behind old glory have been the sons and grandsons of that staunch line of gray, the men who followed Lee. If the souls of great soldiers ever come back to Earth, we can imagine no finer picture than the leader of a lost cause, again looking up to the stars and stripes,

and pledging it his silent allegiance. We can see him on his familiar gray charger, at the head of his forces, fighting again for his beloved country. We can seem to hear his voice ringing in command. On, men of Virginia, on, men of the South. We are Americans all. Important dates in Lee's life.

1807. January 19th, Robert Edward Lee, Born. 1825, entered West Point. 1829, graduated second in his class, made second lieutenant in engineers. 1831, Mary, Mary Custis, 1838, appointed captain, 1845, joined General Scott's staff in Mexico, 1845, 1848, made colonel for gallant conduct. 1852, appointed superintendent of West Point. 1855, appointed lieutenant colonel of cavalry in service against Indians.

1861, made general in Confederate Army. 1865, surrendered to Grant. 1865, accepted presidency of Washington, College, Virginia, 1870, October 12, died at this college. End of Lee, Part 2. Recording by Richard Kilmer, Rio Medina, Texas. Section 7 of Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers. This is a Libravox recording.

All Libravox recordings are on the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visitlibrovox.org. by Stephanie Lee. Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers by Jay Walker McSpadden. Napoleon, Napoleon, the friendless boy who was to sway mighty armies. Hayseed, Hayseed, Hayseed, thus mocked a group of schoolboys of a mate who stood moodily by and glowered upon them.

Although their words were not English, Hayseed was what they meant by the punning French phrase. This boy from the South, who did not speak as they did, or act as they did, and wore cheaper clothes with the butt of their ridicule. He calls himself Napoleon, they said. He means le pionnet, straw nose. And the way they rattled it off sounded like his name turned round. No wonder the southerner glared.

How this moody and unpopular schoolboy grew from childhood without intimate friends, without being understood, into a masterful leader of men is one of the strange puzzles of history. It totally upsets that other paradox. the child is father the man for there was little to indicate in the child bonaparte the man napoleon he was not even born on the land with which his name is for ever associated france he first saw the light of day upon the isle of corsica a rocky point in the blue waters of the mediterranean some fifty miles west of italy by a treaty this island passed from genoese into french control in seventeen sixty nine and it will always be a disputed question as to which flag napoleon was born under he always claimed the date of august fifteenth seventeen sixty nine as his natal day which would make him nominally of french birth but the boy napoleon spoke italian charles bonaparte the future emperor's father was not a remarkable man although he stood well in his home town of ajasio he practised law and must have worked early and late trying to provide for his large family his wife letitia a woman of great personal beauty and force of character was the mother of thirteen children napoleon being the fourth in a family of this size it was a case of every fellow shift for himself which rule napoleon followed out with a vengeance he himself

said in later years. I was self-willed and obstinate. Nothing on me, nothing disconcerted me. I was quarrelsome, exasperating. I feared no one. I gave a blow here and a scratch there. Everyone was afraid of me. My brother Joseph was the one with whom I had the most to do. He was beaten, bitten, bitten, scolded. I complained that he did not get over it soon enough. His mother alone was able to manage him, but she had other things to do as well, so it is not strange that he escaped from the leash. He relates one amusing incident where he was caught red-handed. In the garden behind their house was a clump of fig trees, which Napoleon was fond of climbing. His mother forbade him to do so, both for fear of damage to himself and to the fruit, but the self-will boy persisted.

One day when I was idle, and at a loss for something to do, he relates, I took it in my head to long for some of those figs. They were ripe. No one saw me, or could know any. of the matter. I made my escape, ran to the tree, and gathered the whole. My appetite being satisfied I was providing for the future by filling my pockets when an unlucky gardener came in sight. I was half dead with fear and remained fixed on the branch of the tree, where he had surprised me. He wished to seize me and take me to my mother. Despair made me eloquent. I represented my distressed, promised to keep away from the figs in the future, and he seemed satisfied. I congratulated myself on having come off so well,

and fancy that the adventure would never be known, but the traitor told all. The next day my mother wanted to go and gather some figs. I had not left any, there was none to be found. The gardener came, great reproaches followed, and an exposure. The upshot of it was a sound thrashing. But despite all the trials that the boy gave his mother, there always existed between them a strong affection. Napoleon never spoke of her in after years except in words of praise.

It is to my mother, to her good precepts and upright example, that I owe my success and any great thing I have accomplished. And again, my mother was a superb woman, a woman of ability and courage. The boy's first regular schooling was obtained at a small village school kept by nuns. We have a picture of him there as a small, thin boy with a shock of unruly hair, a face not always clean, and stockings half off. But how many other boys have been guilty of such conventional? sins, only they do not get immortalized in the sober pages of history. He next went to a more advanced day school, and then to a seminary conducted by the Abbe Reco.

While not a prize student, he was fond of geography, history, and mathematics, and even as a lad his wonderful memory for names and dates began to assert itself. He had what is known as a photographic mind, when once it had received an impression, the record was permanent. one other bent early asserted itself it was for warlike scenes the boy not only read greedily of caesar and alexander and other great conquerors of the past he drew pictures on the walls of regiments of soldiers which in fancy he commanded his brother joseph would jeer and then there was more trouble joseph generally got the worst of it both bodily and mentally no sooner was the fight over than the conqueror made good his vantage i went to complain before he had time to recover from his confusion. I had need to be on the alert. Our mother would have repressed my warlike humor. She would not have put up with my caprices. Her tenderness was allied with severity.

She punished, rewarded all alike. The good, the bad, nothing escaped her. My father, a man of sense, but too fond of pleasure to pay much attention to our infancy, sometimes attempted to excuse our faults. Let them alone, she replied, it is not your business. It is I who must look after them. The father, a man of happy-go-lucky disposition, would shrug his shoulders and laugh. But when it came to choosing a profession for the two boys, he did not hesitate. Joseph, the browbeaten, should become a priest, he said, while Napoleon must study soldiering, which decision suited at least one of the boys to a tea. Napoleon was only nine years old when this decision was made, but very precocious. He talked and reasoned like a boy five years older. His unruly disposition

probably hastened the choice as well. His parents felt that a school where there was stern discipline would be the best thing for him. Accordingly, his father obtained for him an appointment to one of the Royal Military Schools, and on April 23, 1779, he was formally enrolled at Brienne, France, as a student. The die was cast.

He was to become a soldier. The next five years, however, were by no means a joyous period in his life. The first months he felt like a fish out of water, nor did he try very hard to adapt himself to his environment it was all frightfully strange and different from the sunny island in the mediterranean he found himself transported suddenly to the northern gloom of the champagna region the very language was different he must unlearn italian and learn french it always came hard to him to the end of his days he never could spell correctly although he did learn in time to express himself with clarity and precision he found himself also thrown into contact with a group of youngsters who were by no means disposed to put up with his overbearing ways many of them were the sons of wealthy parents while he at times was in strait in circumstances they were fastidious in dress while he had inclined to the slovenly small wonder that they derided him or that he withdrew within the shell of his pride and stayed there he had no intimates one schoolmate who perhaps came nearest to making a friend of this stand-offish chap from the south and he was to enjoy a large measure of his confidence in after-life was bourienne the latter wrote his famous memoirs of napoleon

which give us many interesting personal glimpses. Here is one of the earliest. At Brienne, Bonaparte was remarkable for the dark color of his complexion, which the climate of France afterwards very much changed, as well as for his piercing and scrutinizing glance, and for the style of his conversation, both with his masters and companions. His conversation almost always gave one the idea of ill-humor, and he was certainly not very sociable.

This, I think, may be attributed to the misfortunes of his family during his childhood, and the impressions made on his mind by the subjugation of his country it is interesting to note that at this time the boy was still far from reconciled to the idea of being french he resented the fact that his father's sword at one time had helped to further the conquest of corsica by france it was to this fact indeed that napoleon himself owed his appointment to this military college but the boy does not let this consideration sway him i hope some time to be in a position to restore her freedom to corson's he exclaimed napoleon's isolation from his fellow cadets was not entirely to his disadvantage breyne possessed a good library and here day after day the boy might be found pouring over the stories of great exploits of the past and dreaming his own day-dreams but his sword was not for france he pictured himself as her conqueror one of his favorite books was plutarch's lives of illustrious men he devoured the iliad and the odyssey hole with my sword by my side and homer my pocket, I hope to carve my way through the world, he wrote to his mother. Another well-thumbed volume was Caesar's Gaelic Wars. Rebred of more than one instance of ill-will showing between Napoleon and a click of aristocratic

classmates. But we do not find that he was ever afraid of them, or that he ever acted the sneak or the coward. Morose he often was, and sullen, but it seemed born of the spirit of misunderstanding which still lurked within his breast, against the world at large. He had simply not found himself. one anecdote related of these school days reveals him as the potential leader and shows that the other boys despite their ridicule recognized his ability during one unusually severe winter a heavy fall of snow visited the school napoleon suggested that they build a fort and drew up plans for a complete series of fortifications the others fell in with his scheme and upon its completion of battle royale ensued which lasted for several days and put more than one of the participants in the hospital for

pairs. In charge of one of the two armies, now attacking the fort, and now playing the part of its defenders, was Napoleon Bonaparte. He was in his element at last. By the time that he had completed his five years at Brienne, he was made commander of a company of cadets. His first official report card is worth reproducing. School of Brienne. State of the King's scholars eligible from their age to enter into the service or to pass to the school at Paris. To wit, Monsieur de ponaparte napoleon born the fifteenth august seventeen sixty nine in height four feet ten inches ten lines has finished his fourth season of good constitution health excellent character submissive honest and grateful conduct very regular has always distinguished himself by his application to mathematics understands history and geography tolerably well is indifferently skilled in merely ornamental studies and in latin in which he has only finished his fourth course would make an excellent sailor deserves to be passed on to the school at paris two points are especially interesting in this report the first that napoleon had a submissive character

the second that he would make an excellent sailor the following year when another inspector visited the school he added a note that was more accurate character masterful impetuous and headstrong and he decided that napoleon should enter the military school at paris accordingly in the fall of seventeen eighty four he bade brianne farewell without regrets on either side and turned his face toward the capital no one seeing this slender almost dwarf figure with a thin face high cheek-bones and sunken inquiring eyes would ever have imagined that Paris was welcoming her future lord. History holds strange secrets within her pages. At the military school he chose the artillery as his particular branch of service. To what good use he put his study of the field guns, we find evidence in his first appearance on the field of actual warfare. At the outset he made few friends.

It seemed to be the bitter experience of Brienne all over again. The trouble was that he was one of the students being educated at the state's expense, a perfectly proper system which we ourselves follow at West Point and Annapolis. But many of these French students came of wealthy families and, like young Prigs, looked down upon the King's scholars as charity patients. Napoleon justly resented this, and even went so far as to indict a memorial against his condition of affairs at Brienne, which did not tend to enhance his popularity. However, he did begin to find himself in a social way, with matureer years and a broader outlook, he began to emerge from his shell. He made a few good friends,

one or two being among the gentler sex. One lady in particular, Madame de Colombeier, took a fancy to this gawky country lad, and frequently invited him to her home in the country. Her daughter, Caroline, was also a welcome friend, and the memory of those simple but pleasant hours remained with him all his life as a ray of sunshine among the all too gloomy days of youth. We were the most innocent creatures imaginable, he says. we contrived little meetings together i well remember one which took place on a midsummer morning just as daylight was beginning to dawn it will scarcely be believed that all our happiness consisted in eating cherries together the young artillery student now lieutenant also visited the parmonde and madame juno then a little girl gives a clever cartoon of him as he appeared in full regimentals at the age of sixteen there was one part of his dress which had a very droll appearance that was his boot They were so high and wide that his thin little legs seemed buried in their amplitude.

Young people are always ready to observe anything ridiculous, and as soon as my sister and I saw Napoleon enter the drawing-room, we burst into a loud fit of laughter. Bonaparte could not relish a joke, and when he found himself the object of merriment, he grew angry. My sister, who was some years older than I, told him that since he wore a sword he ought to be gallant to ladies, and, instead of being angry, should be happy that they joked with him. You are nothing but a child, a little schoolgirl, said Napoleon, in a tone of contempt. Cecile, who was twelve or thirteen years of age, was highly indignant at being called a child,

and she hastily resented the affront by replying to Bonaparte, and you are nothing but a puss and boots. End of Napoleon, Part 1. Section 8 of Boys' Book of Famous Soldiers This is a Librevox recording. All Librevox recordings are in the public domain. more information or to volunteer, please visit Librabox.org. Recording by Stephanie Lee.

Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers by Jay Walker McSpadden. Napoleon, Part 2 Napoleon at this time was hard put to it to keep up appearances as an officer on his slender income. His father had passed away, and he could not expect further help from home. He was now his mother's oldest advisor, and we find him. writing her sage letters which sound like a man of forty. Indeed, his brain matured early. At fourteen, he wrote and spoke like a man. He was subject to fits depression and melancholy,

and even thoughts of suicide, but these, fortunately, were passing whims, and gradually the resolute nature he was to evince in later years began to assert itself. A favorite motto with him as a man was, the truest wisdom is a resolute determination and already he was putting it into practice soon after obtaining his commission he left school on his first assignment of active duty some riots have broken out at lyon and his regiment of artillery was sent there but things speedily quieted down leaving to him the monotony of garrison life and telling about it afterward he remarked when i entered the service i found garrison life tedious i began reading novels and that kind of reading proved interesting i made an attempt at writing some this task gave range to my imagination it took hold of my knowledge of positive facts and often i found amusement in giving myself up to dreams in order to test them later by the standard of my reasoning powers i transported myself in thought to an ideal world and i sought to discover wherein lay the precise difference between that and the world in which i lived thus we see in the young soldier the same recluse and dreamer of brianne in boyhood parlance to-day he flocked by himself building air castles which in part were to become reality as for his early attempts at authorship he tried his hand with indifferent success at fiction essays and history but it is said that he destroyed all this work with the exception of a fragment letters on the history of corsica which was to have told the story of his beloved island he returned home on a visit not long after to help his mother settle up the family estate her mother settle up the family estate her mother's

her means were very meagre and her family unusually large in addition his father's affairs had become involved he had been advanced some money by the french government to plant mulberry trees in connection with the silkworm industry and a part of this advance was as yet unpaid on the score of ill health napoleon prolonged his stay at adjaccio for some months and did not rejoin his regiment until the spring of seventeen eighty eight he stayed on the island to aid the family from his own pay and to get a further advance on the mulberry grove and also as a means of getting away from other people he was a pronounced recluse indulging in long rambles over the island and finding his sole pleasure in authorship upon the very threshold of his public career he still appeared as the most unlikely object upon which fortune would bestow her favour and as if there were not barriers enough to his success he was still an alien in heart from france he wore her uniform and served under her flag but he was corsican through and through still resenting with a southern impetuosity the means by which the french had come conquered Corsica. But unknown to him and many a wiser head, the hour of destiny was at hand. The dark days of the French Revolution were rapidly approaching, when it seemed as if the whole world would be engulfed in disaster. With the fateful year of 1789, the hour struck, and Napoleon was then just twenty years of age. On the first echoes of revolution which reached

Corsica, Napoleon was on the alert. He thought he saw a golden opportunity to throw off the shackles of the conqueror. But what? one of the first acts of the national assembly was to recognize the full rights of the island as a part of the state of france and napoleon who had already made an attempt to organize a sort of home guard felt himself disarmed france has opened her bosom to us he said henceforth we have the same interests and the same solicitudes it is the sea alone which separates us with but one lapse he became a loyal son of france henceforth the assembly builded stronger than it knew when it recognized corsica after the first mutterings of revolt france became comparatively quiet for nearly two years napoleon joined his regiment in seventeen ninety one and was promoted to first lieutenant in the fourth artillery stationed at valence it was at this time that the ill-starred king louis the sixteenth tried to flee from the country but was seized and held a prisoner the national assembly was in complete control and bonaparte with other officers of the army subscribed to a new oath of allegiance it was by no means a compulsory act on his part but in tune with his own active impetuous spirit he became secretary of a club called the friends of the constitution and composed an address to the national assembly at the same time occurred an episode which reveals the duplicity of his nature for napoleon could be unscrupulous when he had his own ends to serve taking advantage of the general state of turmoil he obtained another leave of absence and returned to corsica

there although wearing the french uniform he again fomented trouble against the authorities he organized the company of corsican volunteers with which he was to make a bold stroke for liberty but the movement failed ingloriously and ended only by getting him into disrepute with both his government and his neighbors he saw that his future safety and career lay with the army so he deserted the popular cause the corsicans were so incensed that they declared him an outlaw and his family infamous in june In 1793, the Bonaparte's removed from the island, and only a few short years found him its conqueror in the name of France. The last spark of his Corsican spirit was extinguished. Only the outbreak of war with Austria prevented the court-marshal which the recreant officer deserved. Instead, such was France's need of trained men that after a brief interval he was actually

promoted to a captaincy. As he himself said, the beginning of a revolution was a fine time for an enterprising young man. His first actual taste of warfare occurred at Toulon, where his regiment was now stationed. Many of the inhabitants of this southern port were royalists, and they sought to hold the city for the king. The Republican troops were ordered to capture the town, which they did after a lively siege and assault. The commander of artillery having been wounded, Napoleon was ordered to take his place. His skill, coolness, and bravery during this engagement are well attested. A soldier serving a gun near him was killed. At once Napoleon took his place at the gun and served until

relieved. Aiding the royalist in the harbor was a fleet of ships under the English and Spanish, and here it was that Napoleon was to strike his first blow at his lifelong antagonist, England. He submitted a plan for the bombardment of the fleet, and the capture of a fort which they had heavily fortified on shore called, from its strength, the little Gibraltar. As a result of a spirited attack at dawn, the shore batteries capitulated. and a few hours later the foreign ships sailed away in haste. Napoleon's superior officer Du Jomier complimented him highly for his share in the attack and mentioned him in the official dispatches to this effect. Among those who distinguished themselves most, and who most aided me to

rally the troops and push them forward are citizens Bonaparte, commanding the artillery, Arina and Sersoni, Adjutant's general. As a direct result of this first taste of battle, he became, in February 1794, a general of brigade, with charge of the artillery and stores of the Army of Italy, as the southern expeditionary forces were called. But his feet were by no means firmly fixed on the ladder of fortune. These were the days of the reign of terror, where no man's life for liberty was assured. At one time, Napoleon was deprived of his command, and was in imminent danger of losing his head. He had incurred the suspicion of the tribunal, as had many other unfortunate, but he was finally pardoned, not because of any sentiment or justice, but because of

the advantages which might be derived from his military information and knowledge of localities for the service of the Republic. In the swift turn of events, it was not many months before this pardon of convenience was actually turned to the advantage of the tribunal, and of Napoleon himself. A rival government called the Central Committee was set up, and the streets of Paris were in an uproar. Something had to be done, and done quickly. Revolutions rise or fall overnight. The command of Republican troops was entrusted to Paul Barra, and one of his staff officers with Napoleon Bonaparte. Barra had the foresight to bring up as many artillery as possible, as his men were few. Napoleon saw that these guns were placed so as to enfilade the principal streets.

His experience at Toulon, as well as his natural genius for strategy, stood him in good stead. the whiff of grapeshot which he fired on that October day in 1795 cleared the streets of the opposition, and likewise cleared the pathway for him leading eventually to a throne. The whole world knows of the later deeds of this slim figure, who thus steps masterfully forward to the center of the most troubled stage in Europe. Days of conflict and turmoil were yet to follow for Napoleon, but never days of uncertainty. He had bound himself. In six short years the brooding misanthrope, the Gawks,

young man who shunned his fellows became the self-possessed leader of men wielding a power of personal magnetism that was almost uncanny at twenty-six his larger career may be said to have begun this slight boyish figure takes command of the army of italy and leads that memorial campaign to the conquest of italy before he was thirty promptly nicknamed the little corporal by his army the term was speedily turned from one of derision to positive affection napoleon himself accepted it as a compliment he learned to understand his men to fraternize with them to bring out the best that was in them this was one of the chief secrets of his marvellous career he was an able strategist a skilled diplomatist a man of vision and cunning but despite all these and other high qualities he would have fallen short of success if he had not possessed his ability to read and to sway the hearts of men whence came this power to one who had been a lonely and derided boy it was as though a magician's wand had touched him over night we have space to give only one picture from the crowded panorama of this world conqueror emperor and exile it will serve to show the powerful magnetism of his personality perhaps serve to explain in some slight degree the magic of the mere name of napoleon throughout the ranks of his armies napoleon the mighty had fallen he had been sent into exile on the isle of elba but had escaped and now with a little army of a thousand men was marching boldly north to reconquer france the news spread rapidly and the king now on the throne sent marshal ney a former general under napoleon to capture him nay promised his king to bring the fallen leader bound into his presence and determined to make his promise good set forth on the road to marseilles it was a gray day in early spring the sky looked forbidding and a chill of winter was in the air

as the king's army moved forward they described in the distance a smaller band approaching at its head rode a familiar figure the little corporal with shoulders stooped as though bending toward his horse's mane he gave no orders to his men who marched forward uncertain As the distance narrowed down to a matter of yards, Napoleon seemed for the first time to note the presence of the opposing troops. He saw at a glance that many of the men now confronting him had formerly followed him. Dismounting he walked rapidly towards them, tore open his great coat, and offered his breast to their rifles. Who among you would fire upon his emperor, he cried. Instantly the army, officers, and men lowered their weapons and toss their caps high in air.

Vive l'emperere, they shouted, and placed him at their head. They turned and marched back upon Paris. Important dates in Napoleon's life. 1769, August 15th, Napoleon Bonaparte born. 1779, entered school at Brienne. 1784, entered military school at Paris. 1786, became junior lieutenant. 1791, made Louis.

lieutenant. 1792. Maid Captain. 1794. Maid General of Brigade for Services Against English at Toulon. 1795. Clear the streets of Paris with his artillery and was appointed to command of Army of Italy. 1796. Mary Josephine du Boonei. 1797. Completed conquest of Italy. 1798 Egyptian campaign 1799 Made First Consul of France

1804 Crowned Emperor 1807 won Battle of Austerlitz 1813 Russian campaign 1814 abdicated the throne and was sent to Elba 1815 Return to France 1815 defeated

at Waterloo and sent to St. Helena. 1821, May 5th, died at St. Eleanor. End of Napoleon, Part 2. Section 9 of Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers. This is a Libravox recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libravox.org. Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers by Jay Walker McSpadden

Wellington, Part 1 Wellington, Iron Duke Of all the curious parallels of history, none is stranger than that of Napoleon and Wellington, who were to meet as rivals on the fatal field of Waterloo. They were born in the same year, 1769, and in each case the exact date is somewhat uncertain. Wellington in later life always celebrated the 1st of May, but was not sure that it was his rightful birthday.

Both were born upon islands, the one in Corsica, the other in Ireland, which islands, by the way, were constantly striving to achieve their independence. Both were born into large families. Napoleon was a fourth child, and Wellington, a fourth son. The father of each is described as an easy-going, indulgent man, without force of character, while the mother was the moving genius of the family. Between Napoleon and his mother existed a lively affection, while Wellington's mother never seemed to care for this child,

and constantly spoke of him in terms of reproach. Both boys attended military schools in France, far from their own homes and friends, and consequently, drew apart from their comrades, lived their own lives, and carved out their own destinies. These are but a few of the very early parallels of two famous soldiers who were afterward to decide the fate of Europe at the points of their swords. The family name of Wellington, before he received a dukedom, was Wellesie or Wellesley. As a boy he was known as Arthur Wellesley. His father was the Earl of Mornington, his mother, a daughter of Lord Duganan. The Earl is spoken of as a lover and composer of music. Arthur had three brothers who were all destined to do noteworthy things.

His oldest brother, who bore the title of Lord Wellesley, aided him no little in choosing his profession of soldier. The boy's birthplace was Dangon Castle, Dublin. Almost nothing is known as to his earlier years, beyond the sorrowful fact that his mother was not fond of him, almost had an aversion to him, and spoke of him openly as the fool of the family. From this we infer that Arthur was a son. silent, reserved lad, who did not shine at his studies, but who nevertheless did a heap of

thinking. Being misunderstood at home, he withdrew more and more into his shell, thus forming a crust of reserve, which was to be more or less a handicap to him all through life. For the Iron Duke, as he came to be called, never threw off his diffidence, nor won the hearts of his soldiers, as did that other recluse, Bonaparte. Arthur Wellesley's first school away from home was Eton, the great prep school of so many English boys. The fact that he attended there helped to give rise to the proverb that Waterloo was won on the cricket fields of Eton.

But as a matter of record, the boy was not interested in this sport. He preferred the fiddle to the racket, as he had inherited. his father's love of music. I was a player of the violin once myself, sir, he remarked in after years to a friend, but I soon found that fiddling and soldiering didn't agree, so I gave it up, sir, I gave it up. Only one other antidote is recorded of his life had eaten,

and this was a fight, nor was it a case of choose your weapons. It was plain fists. He began with first, principles. A fellow student, Robert Smith, who is chiefly noted as having been the brother of Sidney Smith, the noted essayist and preacher, was enjoying a swim in the river near the campus. Arthur could not resist the impulse to throw mud at his bare back. Stop that, yelled Smith. You make me, taunted wellesley.

You just wait till I come out, replied his victim. dare you to come, said Arthur. Bob promptly waited out, and they mixed. Just which boy got the better of it is not clear, but if justice ruled, the future conqueror of Napoleon should have received his first trounce scene. One other fight is recorded of his early school days,

and this does not mean that Arthur was naturally of a pugnacious disposition, for he wasn't. It simply means that one's battles, little or big, are always remembered, rather than the pleasant, though colorless, ways of peace. On a visit home, he got into an argument with a blacksmith's boy named Hughes. In this instant, might was right. The Smith's muscles were brawnier, and the Etonian got soundly licked. That is, if we can take the word of Hughes, who was wont to boast in later years, that he beat the man, who beat Napoleon. At Eaton came the usual question which confronts every boy in his teens,

the choice of a business or profession. His mother did not think he was good for anything. In writing of her children about this time, she says, They are all, I think, endowed with excellent abilities, except Arthur, and he would probably not be wanting, if only there was more energy in his nature. But he is, so wanting in this respect that I really do not know what to do with him. He took no interest in the law or the church. He seems to have moped along in a lackadaisical sort of way in the classroom. He had not given an indication of shining in any direction.

Consequently, there was nothing left for a gentleman's son except the army. It was a makeshift choice. Those were the days of the American Revolution. progress of this struggle must have appealed powerfully to the English boys, and the final defeat of the trained British troops by the raw colonials must have been a bitter blow. There came an insistent demand for more and better schools for the officers. England seems to have been poorly equipped in this respect. Wellesley, himself, like many, another English boy, was sent across the channel to France. The chosen school was

was at Angiers on the main, and was conducted by the Marquis of Pigny, a celebrated military engineer of the time, in connection with the school, was a fine riding academy. It was in 1785 that Arthur entered this school. He was then 16, a thin, gangly-looking boy, who perhaps because he had grown too rapidly, could not be persuaded to take much interest in anything. He felt out of his element, and ill at ease, although he was not the only English lad here. He is described by General McKenzie, who was a schoolmate as not very attentive to his studies, and constantly occupied with a little terrier called Vic, which followed him everywhere.

This is about as definite a glimpse of him as we can get, but it does enable us to picture him as idling about the strength. of this picturesque old town of climbing the steep cliffs which rise from the water's edge at the confluence of the streams which flow by enjures at the top of the hill we can see him whistling to vick and tossing down one of the gentler slopes a stone or a stick for the faithful terrier to retrieve did this idle schoolboy dream dreams of future greatness on the battlefields of the land that was now teaching him to draw the sword who shall say although at angiers only a short time about twelve months it was by no means time wasted he perfected his french and learned many things about manners and customs that were to be of good service likewise through his family's influence he made the acquaintance of several french noblemen who must undoubtedly have given him a broader point of view and perchance some good advice on the subject of soldiering his father had died in seventeen eighty one but his older brother who had made his mark as a soldier and man of letters took a lively interest in him and constantly urged him on england is indebted no little to this brother richard who probably more than any other was the guiding star in the making of her great soldier. In the days just after the American War, the British Army was not well organized or officered. Instead of the fighting machine that it afterward became, it was sort of a gentleman's

training school, so far as the officers were concerned. Anyone who had good family connections or money could get a commission. The skill and experience were supposed to come late. on the field of action. This fact explains the early promotion of Arthur Wellesley. At the age of 17, soon after leaving Anjures, he was made an ensign in a regiment of infantry, and within five years, by the time he was 22, he had been made a captain.

Nor did his rapid advancement end here. In 1793 he became a major, then a lieutenant colonel, and then by 1796, he was a full-fledged colonel at 27. The secret power at court was his brother Richard, who was secretary to pit the statesman. But another friend was Lord Westmoreland, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland,

who took a fancy to him and made him a staff officer. One historian puts it regarding army commissions. Wealth and interest were nearly all-powerful. It was the palmy day of public, purchase, which George III had tried and failed to abolish. And until the Duke of York became commander-in-chief, infants of both sexes, figured in the army lists as holders of commissions. It is interesting to note, to resume our parallel, that this was a stormy time of the French

Revolution, when Napoleon was painfully carving his way upward by the edge of the sword, and by push rather than pull had achieved high command in early life. But we would do the young Wellington a grave injustice if we pictured him as leading a life of inactivity, awaiting a promotion through pull. He had qualities which now began to assert themselves and were to contribute to his larger fame. For one thing, he was something of a diplomat.

He remembered names and faces and turned every acquaintance to account. Later he was credited with a marvelous memory, such as also had his great French rival. These qualities, it is true, were slow and ripening. At the age of 21, he was elected to the Irish House of Commons from his home county. This was done in order to give him parliamentary training,

and such service was allowed without the necessity of relinquish, his military rank or duties. It was merely an extra tail to his kite. He is thus described by a colleague Sir Jonah Barrington. Wellesley was then ruddy-faced and juvenile in appearance, and popular enough among the young men of his age and station. His address was unpolished. He occasionally spoke in Parliament, but not successfully, and never on important subjects. and he vince no promise of that unparalleled celebrity and splendor which he has since reached, and where to intrepity and decision, good luck and great military science have justly combined to elevate him. Although he made no great mark as a parliamentarian, he did make friends at this time,

who were destined to influence his life. One was the brilliant, though somewhat unprincipled Lord Castle Ray. who was to aid him to obtain the chief military command of the English army in Spain. Another was a certain young lady, Charlotte Packingham, who found his tongue more eloquent, then did his colleagues in the House of Commons. She was the daughter of Lord Longford, who was not so easily won over to the young man's suit.

In fact, the nobleman gave him a curt no. He was looking for a more brilliant match for his daughter, daughter, then a subaltern. So the young people had to give each other a sad farewell, but it was not to be forever. Ten years later, when the young soldier had won his spurs and had returned from his brilliant campaign in India, a major general, the parental gates were unbarred. The Lady Charlotte had remained constant through all the years of waiting and separation, and they were happily wedded.

End of Wellington, Part 1. Recording by Richard Kilmer, Real Medina, Texas. Section 10 of Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers This is a Libravox recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libravox.org. Boys Book of Famous Soldiers by J. Walker McSpadden. Wellington, Part 2. That Wellesley took more than a perfunctory interest in his military duties

is evident, even during his earliest years of service. For example, he wished to determine for himself just how much weight in the way of equipment a soldier could carry in light-marching order. I wished, he says, to have some measure of the power of the individual man compared with the weight he was to carry, and the work he was expected to do. I was not so young, as not to know that since I had undertaken a profession, I had better endeavor to understand it. And he adds, it must always be kept in mind that the power of the greatest armies depends upon what the individual soldier is capable of doing and bearing. It is but another way of saying, a chain is no stronger than its weakest link. Or, as we put it today, it depends upon the man behind the gun.

Thus Wellington early discovered and put into practice the indefinable something we call morale. As a lieutenant-colonel of the 33rd foot, he took up his work in earnest, with the result that in a few months it was officially declared the best drilled regiment in Ireland. But the young commander was not content with this. He did not want to remain at home, as a mere drill sergeant, when affairs were so active abroad. Due partly to the outbreak of the French Revolution, all Europe seethed with war. France was in revolt against the world, and all the neighboring powers were pitted against her. England had maintained a strict neutrality at first, but when Belgium was overrun,

felt compelled to intervene, just as in the similar great war of aggression begun by Germany in our own time. Naturally, young Wellesley wanted to be in it. He wrote to his brother Richard in portuning him to use his influence in this direction. I will serve as a major to one of the flank corps, he wrote, as his own regiment was the last for service. The request was not granted, however. and he had to wait until spring of 1794 for his chance to see active service.

It was a parlous time to go over. The French had defeated one army after another of the Allies and were in the heyday of their first success. The trouble seemed to be lack of unity of command and lack of able leadership. The Duke of York was in command of the British Army, but allowed himself to be outmaneuvered, repeatedly. By the fall of that year, when Wellesley was with the army, the campaign resembled a route. During a series of rear-guard actions in the retreat through Holland and Flanders,

Colonel Wellesley came first into official notice. It was at Meuse, a stream made forever memorable in the recent Great War. A retreat had been ordered during the night to avoid a superior force of French. One regiment, however, had mistaken its orders and engaged the enemy. The result was a hopeless tangle of infantry and cavalry, with the enemy taken advantage of the confusion to press the attack. The 33rd had been ordered to support the rear. Colonel Wellesley, seeing the danger, ordered his regiment to halt in a field, alongside of the road, leaving the way clear for the retreat. as soon as the stragglers had gotten by he threw his regiment again in solid formation across the road and they advanced upon the charging french with such coolness and precision

that the attackers were forced to halt it was only an incident of warfare but it showed his promptness of decision and the fruits of discipline in his regiment all that ensuing winter the french harried their army Wellesley was stationed on the Val, a branch of the Rhine, and he gives some idea of their arduous life in a letter dated December 20, 1794. At present, the French keep us in a perpetual state of alarm. We turn out once, sometimes twice, every night. The officers and men are harassed to death, and if we are not relieved, I believe there will be very few of the latter remaining shortly. I have not had the clothes off my back for a long time and generally spend the greatest part of the night upon the bank of the river, notwithstanding,

which I have entirely got rid of that disorder which was nearly killing me at the close of the summer campaign. Although the French annoy as much at night, they are very entertaining during the daytime. They are perpetually chatting with our officers' and soldiers, and dance the carmen all upon the opposite bank whenever we desire them. But occasionally, the spectators on our side are interrupted in the middle of a dance by a cannonball from theirs. In this somewhat humorous recital, Wellesley makes no mention of the suffering which they must have undergone for lack of food and supplies of all kinds.

He purposely puts the best face on it and bears his troubles stoically. But young as he was, he marveled at the inefficiency and lack of coordination of the high command. Once, when a dispatch was received by the general during dinner from their ally, Austria, he tossed it aside unopened with a remark, that will keep till morning. During three months on the Valle, Wellesley decrees, that he was in direct touch with headquarters only once and adds. We had letters from England, and I declare that those letters told us more of what was passing at headquarters than we learnt from headquarters ourselves.

It has always been a marvel to me how any of us escaped. One result, nevertheless, of this isolation, was to throw the young Colonel back upon his own resources. It was the finest possible training for his later career. When Colonel Wellesley returned to England the next year, he thought for a time of resigning his command. One reason was undoubtedly the poor state of the Army in equipment and discipline. Another was the fact that he owed his brother money

on account of promotions in the service, and his officers' pay was not enough to repay it. He was always scrupulous in matters of debt. His application for discharge, however, was not accepted. England had need of all her trained men at this time. In addition to the trouble in France, there were other affairs demanding attention. In Spain and India, the whole world seemed to need readjusting at once.

Wellesley's next assignment was to accompany an expedition against the French settlement in the West Indies, which set sail in October, 1795. But when only two days out, the ships encountered a terrible storm. One ship sank, with all on board, others were badly crippled, and hundreds of sailors perished. The expedition put back to England.

Although Wesley escaped the full effects of this storm, the exposure left his health undermined. His regiment was ordered abroad in the spring, this time to the East Indies, and when they set sail in April he was too ill to accompany them. It was not until February 1797 that he joined them in Calcutta. Arthur Wellesley was now in his 28th year. All that had passed hitherto might be regarded as his schooling. He had been an obscure and foolish boy at school,

To all appearance, he had failed to make his mark as a military student on the main, he had been a dilettant staff officer and a resident member of Parliament. Money and family had apparently made him what he was, neither better nor worse than many another young British officer. In his brief campaign in France, he had conducted himself creditably, but had come away with a distaste for the service, as it was then conducted. To revert to our former parallel,

Napoleon at 28 was on the high road to world mastery. Wellington at 28 had not yet found himself, but now, on his trip to India, he was on the threshold of his career. His deeds there and on other fields were to astonish the world. Did they also astonish the silent officer himself? It would require a detailed account of the Indian campaign to trace adequately the gradual rise of this officer in the service. For his was not a meteorotic or spectacular rise.

It was by gradual steps, but each step found him fully prepared. This perhaps is as near the secret of the great soldier's success as we can get. He was never a self-advertiser. He never talked much, but he was keenly observant, and his wonderfully retentive memory aided him at every turn. He could go through a countryside once, and then be able to map out an attack, using every natural advantage to its utmost. And best of all, his superiors were beginning to discover his merits.

They soon found, beneath his quiet exterior, a keen intellectual. and an indomitable will. Within two months after reaching Calcutta, he was consulted by General St. Leger on a plan to establish artillery bases and was also nominated to command an expedition against the Philippines, then under Spanish control,

but he preferred to remain and fight it out in India. I am determined that nothing shall induce me to desire to quit this, country until its tranquility is ensured, he said, which recalls the mind the famous saying of Grants, we will fight it out along this line if it takes all summer. Wellesley's next appointment was as commander of the Mysore Brigade. His brother Richard, Marquis of Wellesley, had been appointed Governor General of India, and the two men were destined to exercise a strong influence on affairs in that disturbed country.

While nominally, in control of the land, the English possessions actually included only the narrow strip running along the various sea coasts, the interior being overrun by unruly tribes of suppoys under Tipo Sahib. It required careful planning and equipping of armies, marching from opposite sides of India, to meet and crush this formidable,

rebellion. In all this strenuous work of field and garrison, Wellesley took an active part. At one time, as governor of Sarangin as Patom, at another as Brigadier General, personally directing assaults upon some native fortress, and after its capture, restoring order and discipline, and thus ensuring the respect and confidence of the natives. I have been like a man who fights with one hand and defends himself with the other, he wrote at this period, I have made some terrible marches, but I have been remarkably fortunate, first in stopping the enemy when they intended to press to the southward and afterward by a rapid march to the northward in stopping Sinthia.

In 1803 he was made Major General with the title of Sir Arthur Wurtheworthew. Wellesley, and two years later, returned to England as one of her most trusted and esteemed commanders. And England had need of just such men as he. There was still more stirring years ahead in Spain and elsewhere, until this strong, silent man had emerged into the Iron Duke of Wellington, who should meet that other man of destiny on the plain of Waterloo. Wellington won a success by his infinite capacity for taking pains. His life defies the biographer to analyze whether through the medium of a lengthy volume or a brief chapter, because it was made up of so many little things.

There were the duties of each day, but he not only did them thoroughly, he also learned through them the larger grasp of the next day's problems. A contemporary pen picture of the Suppoy General on his return to England in 1805 will serve to show us what manner of man he appeared to be to his subordinates. Captain Scherer, who has left this portrait, says, General Wellesley was a little above the middle height, well-limbed and muscular, with little encumbrance of flesh, beyond that which gives shape and manliness to the outline of the figure. With a firm tread, an erect carriage, a countenance strongly patrician, both in feature, profile, and expression,

and an appearance remarkable and distinguished. Few could approach him on any duty or on any subject, requiring his serious attention, without being sensible of a something strange and penetrating in his clear light eye. Nothing could be more simple and straightforward than the matter of what he uttered, nor did he ever in his life

affect any peculiarity of pomp of manner or rise to any coarse, weak loudness in his tone of voice. It was not so that he gave expression to excited feeling. His reputation as a great soldier will stand for all time, not because he defeated Napoleon, but because his whole military career was built upon duty.

It was not ostentation, but merit that won him the supreme command. His ideals were always high. We must get the upper hand, he advised, and if once we have that, we shall keep it with ease, and shall certainly succeed. Important dates in Wellington's life. 1769, May 1st, Arthur Wellesley-born. 1785, attended military school at Angiers, France. 1787 entered British Army as Ensign.

1793 became Lieutenant Colonel. 1794 saw his first active service in Flanders. 1796, Colonel, sent to India. 1803, Major General 1805 married Charlotte Packingham 1808 made Lieutenant General and sent to command Peninsular War 1814 created Duke of Wellington

1815 defeated Napoleon at Waterloo 1827 Prime Minister 1852 September 14th died. End of Wellington, part two. Recording by Richard Kilmer, Rio Medina, Texas. Section 11 of Boys Book of Famous Soldiers.

This is a Libervox recording. All LibraVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libravox.org. This recording by Hear His.com. Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers by J. Walker McSpadden, Gordon, Part 1 Gordon, the man who discovered China. The name Gordon brings in mind the warrior, perchance the Highland Laddie, who with bagpipes

fiercely blowing charges down the rocky slope against the enemy. Chinese, Gordon, as one of this warlike clan will be known for all time, came indeed of a race of warriors, and was born in martial surroundings. But the man himself was far from being of that stern stuff that glories in a fight. As boy and man, he was quiet, lovable, and of intensely religious nature. Gordon means spear, and the name was probably given to the clan several centuries ago. Its members had always been famous in battle. Chinese Gordon's great-grandfather led a very eventful life. He was taken prisoner. in the Battle of Prestopans, and later went to Canada on the special expedition which rested

that dominion from the French. His son took part in many battles and served with distinction. The next in line, the father of Chinese Gordon, was Lieutenant General Henry William Gordon, a soldier of the highest type. General Gordon lived at Woolwich, long noted for its arsenal. It was only nine miles out from St. Paul's, and is an object of interest. at any time, but in times of war. It fairly bristles with activity. Small wonder then that a boy coming from such a line of ancestors and born almost in a gun carriage should have chosen to become a soldier. With any other environment, Chinese Gordon would have become a preacher. Of course, the name Chinese was not the way he was christened. Charles George are his baptismal names, but few people know

that fact now. He was the youngest child in a large family, five sons and six daughters. This calls to mind other large families from which sprang famous soldiers, Napoleon, for example. Charles was born in 1833 after his father had reached middle age and had settled down in the piping times of peace. The elder Gordon had won his spurs in the Napoleonic Wars. We know very little of the boyhood of Charles. We know very little of Gordon, beyond the fact that during the first ten years of his life he lived at the Pigeon House Fort in Dublin Bay, next to the Fort of Life, and later on, on the island of Kourfu. All of these places are spots of great natural beauty, a vista of stretching sea or mountaintop, which the frowning fortress only aided in romance and charm.

Many a long ramble must the boy have had, storing his memory with these quiet sylvan pictures, Not far from Lith was the famous battlefield of Presbypans where, nearly a century before, his great-grandfather had been taken prisoner. From his father or brothers, he must have heard many a wild tale of the Highlanders and their exploits. As a child, however, this did not appeal to him. He loved nature in her quiet moods best. He was timid and nervous, to such an extent that the firing off of the cannon, when the colors were lowered at sundown, would make him jump half out of his boots.

It was only by the sternest sort of self-control that he obtained the mastery of himself. Not that Charles Gordon was ever a coward. Morally, he was ever unflinching. He abhorred a lie, and was always ready to stand up for his convictions. But his physical frame was made of weaker stuff, much to his own vexation.

One of the few early stories related of him is that he had difficulty in learning to swim. He could not get the stroke, and he had a horror of being in water over his head. So he made a practice of deliberately throwing himself into deep water, when out with his mates knowing that it was sink or swim, or a case of being pulled out. He was then only nine.

A few years later, another instance reveals his determination. A great circus was a good circus was. advertised in London, a novelty in those days, and the Gordon boys had been promised the treat. But just before its arrival, Charles fell into disgrace. He was charged with some sort of fault, which he did not think should have been laid to his door. Later, he was forgiven, and told that he might attend the circus, but his pride was aroused, and he refused to go. When he was ten, the first definite step toward making him a soldier was taken. For, of course, being a Gordon, he must be a soldier. He was sent to school at Troughton, preparatory to entering as a cadet,

the Royal Military Academy at Woolwich. At that time, its commandant was a veteran of Waterloo, a peppery old chap who had left one of his legs on the soil of France as a souvenir. He was a martinet as to discipline, and Charles, who had become accustomed to doing a good deal of thinking for himself, came into frequent clashes with him. One day the old man said, Gordon, I'm tired of fooling with you. You are incompetent. You will never make an officer. The young cadet, a boy of 16, gave him look for look, without quailing. Then, by way of reply, tore his epaulets from his shoulders, turned on his heel, and strode out of the room. Naturally, the guardhouse was next in order, where the culprit could cool his heels and meditate

upon the sinfulness of superior officers. In this particular case, he seems to have blamed it upon the missing leg, for he remarked, long afterwards, never employ anyone, minus a limb, to be in authority over boys. They are apt to be irritable and unjust. He remained in the military academy four years. having been put back six months by way of discipline and left it without any regrets. At this time, indeed, he had a positive distaste for the army. It was all drill and monotony.

One day was too much like the other. What was the good of it all? Why did men have to learn to kill each other anyhow? Were we not put on earth for a higher mission? Thus reasoned the young man, who all his life was subject to moods of introspection and intense religious thought, surely strange material out of which to build a soldier. He sensed this fact himself and was not at all anxious to enter the army, and frequently in later life expressed a lively dissatisfaction for the service. He was an exemplification of the poet's line,

I feel two natures struggling within me. When he entered the service, as a second lieutenant of the engineers, at the age of 19, There was little to attract one in the army life. The long peace of Europe, which had followed the defeat of Napoleon, seemed likely to last forever. Except for a relatively small outbreak in France in 1848, all Europe was quiet. Consequently, the army held little attraction to an active young man. It was all drill and the petty details of garrison life.

But underneath the placid surface, the political pot of Europe was really boiling. furiously, only waiting a chance to bubble over. That chance soon came. Gordon's first assignment was to Pimbrook, where plans were required for the forts at Milford Haven. Here, with other engineers, he worked for a few months, when he was ordered to the island of Kourfu. This was not altogether to his liking. He had spent a part of his boyhood there in the Lonian Islands, but felt that they were off the map, so far as real activity was concerned. Then the bubbling pot at last boiled over. Russia, impatient of bounds, had begun her march southward, past the Black Sea and toward

the coveted lands of Turkey. The balance of power, that precarious something that has always kept Europe on edge, and particularly in the Balkans, was upset. Whether England wanted to or not, she must. get into the breach. Thus began the Crimean War, a desperate struggle that was to bear some glorious pages in England's history, and some dark ones as well. It was to see the charge of the light brigade, splendid in itself, but brought about because

someone had blundered. It was to produce a Florence Nightingale, but also the hideous sufferings which she helped to Assange. for England was unprepared. Her years of idleness had broken down her military organization. Splendid fighting men she still had, but the fighting machine itself was rusty. Young Gordon, perhaps through his father's influence, obtained a transfer from Corfu to the Crimea.

The father did not much like his new billet. He may have sensed something of what was coming, but he did not fear for his son. Get him into real action, I say, he would remark. That will show whether there's any stuff in him. I guess there is. He added grimly, thinking of Charles's troubles in college. All the time he was in the academy,

I felt like I was sitting on a powder barrel. In mid-December of 1854, Gordon set sail from England on his first real job as a soldier. He was going with the task of building some wooden huts for the soldier, and lumber was being shipped at the same time. But the soldiers, for whom these shelters were intended, were even then dying from exposure on the plains of Sebastian Pole. It was the first lesson of unpreparedness.

Of this, however, the young engineer was then ignorant. He was in high spirits over the prospect of action and seeing the world. He arrived at Marseilles, very tired, as he writes to his mother, but not too tired to give her a detailed description of what he has seen thus far. The pretty towns and villages, vineyards and rivers, with glimpses of snowy mountains beyond. On New Year's Day he reached his destination, Balaklava. It was the depth of winter, and disaster stared the British in the face.

The Russians were having the best of it. They were out-generaling the enemy at every turn, The British could do little more than dig in and hang on with the bulldog stubbornness, which has always marked them. At first, the young lieutenant heard little of this. His duties as construction engineer kept him busy six miles back of the battle line. I have not yet been to Sebastian Paul, he writes on January 3rd, and do not hear anything of the siege.

We hear a gun now and then. No one seems to interest himself about the siege. but all appear to be engaged in foraging for grub. Two days later, he writes, We have only put up two huts as yet, but hope to do better soon. The army was suffering from both cold and hunger, and was in pitible plight. Again, he writes, Lieutenant Dront, 9th Regiment, and another officer of some 16th regiment,

were frozen to death last night, and two officers of the 93rd Regiment were smothered by charcoal. The streets of Balaklava are a sight, with swell English cavalry and horse artillery carrying rations, and officers in every conceivable costume foraging for etibles. There was little military glamour in such sights as this. No wonder young Gordon felt sick of it all. But he never gave the slightest indication of quitting.

He only worked all the heart. to help do his bit. As spring advanced, he had an opportunity to work closer to the lines. He received orders to construct trenches and rifle pits, which at times was extremely hazardous and brought him under fire. On one occasion a Russian bullet missed his head by a scant inch. At last, in the month of June came his first chance to do some real fighting. Every branch of the service was marshaled by the commanding general, Lord Raglan, for a massed attack. What happened can be best described in Gordon's own words. About 3 a.m., the French advanced on the Molokov Tower in three columns, and ten minutes after this our signal was given. The

Russians then opened with a fire of grape that was terrific. And again, they mowed down our men in dozens, and the trenches being confined were crowded with men who foolishly kept in them instead of rushing over the parapet, and, by coming forward in a mass, trusting to some of them at least being able to pass through untouched to the Redden, where, of course, once they arrived, the artillery could not reach them,

and every yard nearer would have diminished the effect of the grape by giving it less space for spreading. We could thus have moved up the supports and carried the place. Unfortunately, however, all men dribbled out the ends of the trenches, ten and twenty at a time,

and as soon as they appeared, they were cleared away. Thus ended the first engagement in which Gordon took part. The Allies suffered defeat, and Lord Raglan died a few days later of a broken heart. It was not an auspicious baptism of fire. In August, another assault was made, which also met defeat. Gordon ends his account with the remark,

We should have carried everything before us if the men had only advanced. Perchance, one reason why the men failed to advance was that their morale had been lowered by reason of the privations they had undergone. This was before the days of the Red Cross, the Army canteen, or the YMCA with its homely comfort. The men had had to shift for themselves. Nursing the sick and wounded was almost unknown until the white. white-clad figure of Florence Nightingale showed the world its dereliction. Listen to what this devoted pioneer among nurses has to say.

Fancy working five nights out of the seven in the trenches. Fancy being 36 hours in them at a stretch, as they sometimes were lying down or half-lying down, often 48 hours with no food but raw salt pork, sprinkled with sugar, rum, and a biscuit. Nothing hot, because the exhaustive. soldier could not collect his own fuel, as he was expected to do, to cook his own rations, and fancy through all this the army, preserving their courage and patience as they have done,

and being now eager, the old ones, as well as the young ones, to be led into the trenches. There was something sublime in the spectacle. Sublime, granted, but no soldier fights well on an empty stomach. Despite their hardships and reverses, however, the Allies were at last successful in the capture of Sebastian Pole, but it was a barren victory, as the Russians had set fire to the town and destroyed practically everything of value. The war soon afterwards ceased, and with it the first hard lesson in Charles Gordon's military training. He had entered it a somewhat careless youth, he came out of it, a seasoned veteran. That his government had learned to appreciate his services is shown by the fact that he was soon afterward placed on a joint commission of the English, French, Russians, and Austrians to lay down a boundary line between Russia and her neighbors at the southwest. It was only one of many later attempts to define the Balkans.

The newly seated territory is in great disorder, writes Gordon. The inhabitants refuse to obey the Maldives and, own nobody's authority. This is caused, I suspect, by Russian intrigues. Already, cracks were beginning to show in the new boundary wall. End of Gordon, part 11. Recorded by Herehis.com. Section 12 of Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers.

This is a Libervox recording. All Liberbox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libravox.org. recorded by Herehis.com Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers by Jay Walker McSpadden Gordon Part 2

After three years of steady but interesting work following up the ravages of war Gordon returned home It was a rest well earned And likewise needed For there were still more strenuous days ahead Then back he went In the spring of 1858

to complete his work in the Caucasus. I am pretty tired of my post as peacemaker, he writes, for which I am naturally not well adapted. I am quite in the dark as how my mission has been fulfilled, but it is really immaterial to me, for I will not accept other work of such an anomalous character. The other work that was being stored up for him was of quite different nature.

He might have called it anomalous, but it was to tax and bring out every resource in him. China, that land of distance and mystery, was undergoing a period of upheaval. A usurper had tried to seize the reins of government, and the French and British ships had been attacked. The British sent a force of reprisal, somewhat like that, sent against the Boxer rebellion in recent years. This was 1860, and Gordon, was sent out with the rank of captain.

The first work of this expeditionary force was scarcely worthy of a civilized country. They set fire to a summer palace and gardens of a prince who had mistreated some English prisoners. It was a piece of vandalism that went against the grain with Gordon. You can scarcely imagine the beauty and the magnificent of the palaces we burnt, he writes. It made one's heart. heart sore to destroy them. It was wretchedly demoralizing work.

In the spring of 1862, Gordon had become a major and was ordered, with a lieutenant Cardin, to explore the Great Wall of China. This was more to his liking. The two men were congenial, and well-fitted by temperament and experience for the task. They penetrated provinces in the interior, never before entered by a white man,

and had a variety of adventures, some amusing, others exciting. During the winter it grew extremely cold high up in the mountains. He relates that eggs were frozen as hard as if they had been boiled. At another time they are caught in a terrific dust storm, which he thus describes. The sky was as dark as night. Huge columns of dust came sweeping down,

and it blew a regular hurricane, the blue sky appearing now and then through the brakes. The quantity of dust was indescribable. A canal, about 50 miles long and 18 feet wide and 7 deep, was completely filled up. From these more or less peaceful incidents, Gordon was presently called to more exciting events. The great Taiping rebellion had been raging for some. months. It was the work of a Chinese schoolmaster who said that heaven had sent him to rescue China. He chose for title, The Heavenly King, and with some thousands of fanatical followers overran a large part of the interior. His seat of government was in Nan King.

In his first clashes with the small British army in 1862, his troops had the better of the argument. They spoke with open contempt of the foreigners and all English, whether soldiers or missionaries, were in imminent danger. Things came to such a pass that an American named Ward obtained permission to organize a band of volunteers for mutual protection. This band did remarkable work, and soon grew from a force of 200 to 2,000, every man of them ready to die in his tracks. They met the fanatical followers of the heavenly king more than halfway and gave them such thorough doses of hot shot and cold steel

that the rebels finally ran at sight of them. It is said that wardsmen fought 70 engagements in one year and won every fight. The imperial Chinese government was very grateful for their aid and conferred upon them a high-sounding name which meant ever-victorious army. Unluckily, Ward lost his life in leading an assault and left his army without a general. Li Hong Chang, the statesman, who was later known as the grand old man of China,

came to the British commander, General Stavely, and asked him to appoint a British officer to lead the ever-victorious army. Stavely cast about him, and his eye fell upon Major Gordon, who was then engaged upon a survey of the defenses of Shanghai. He had known Gordon and admired him. He believed that here was the man for the task. What he was before Sebastopol, he has been since, faithful, trusty, and successful, reasoned the general. Before Peking and Shanghai,

he was invents just the qualities that are needed now. Although he has never been in command, he will rise to this occasion, to which he is more fitted than any other man I know. Gordon at first declined the honor, perhaps through false modesty, and the command was given to Captain Holland with bad results. Holland traded too much on the invincibility of the ever-victorious army and attacked a strongly fortified position at Tatsun. His forces were driven off with the loss of 300 men. It was a grievous loss, but the morale loss was far deeper.

his men lost spirit while the rebels were extravagant in their glee. Something had to be done at once. Again, they came to Gordon with the offer of leadership, and this time he accepted, but not without some misgiving. In a letter home dated March 24, 1863, he writes, I am afraid you will be much vexed at my having taken the command of the Sun-Kang-Force, and that I am now a Mandarin. I have taken the step on consideration.

I think that anyone who contributes to putting down this rebellion fulfills a humane task, and I also think tends a great deal to open China to civilization. Gordon soon proved that he had both courage and resourcefulness. He did not risk another assault upon Tatsun, as the rebels expected, but decided to attack them in another quarter. He took 1,000 men by river to an inland town, Chengzhou. Here was a loyal Chinese garrison, which had been besieged by the rebels and was in sore straits. The coming of Gordon was a bold and unexpected move, as the rebels must have outnumbered his force five to one.

But Gordon had brought two field pieces along, and at once opened fire. By nightfall, the enemy had enough of it and retreated. The next morning, the ever-victorious army marched triumphally into Shang-Zu where they received a great welcome. Gordon thus received reinforcements not only from this garrison, but also from some of the rebel forces who had begun to smell a mouse, and decided to come over while the coming was good. Gordon was much interested in some of these young rebel chiefs. He says that they were very intelligent and were splendidly dressed in their silks. and had big pearls in their caps.

The head man was about 35 years old and was ill and worn with anxiety. He was so very glad to see me, and chinchined most violently, regretting his inability to give me a present, which I told him was not the custom of our people. This rapid victory was productive of several good results. It once more put the rebels on the run.

It restored the more, of his troops and gave them confidence in their new leader, and it brought him many recruits. One especially gratifying result was that several British officers asked leave to serve under him. Gordon had made a firm friend of Li Hong Chang, who aided him in every possible way. He introduced much-needed discipline into his troops, who had been at first mere adventurers, and also established regular grades of pay. The Chinese government was glad to assume these payments, while the English authorities were well content with the unique arrangement.

Whether or not Gordon would have called it anomalous, it was working, and that was the main thing. Gordon saw to it that his men were well armed, well-paid, well-dressed, and well-fed. Always he had the horrible example of the Crimean campaign before his eyes, and he was resolved that never again if he could help it should such conditions recur. He was thus one of the first of our generals to meet the need of a modern army in a modern way, as he wrote at the destruction of Sebastopol,

The old army is dead. After Gordon had got his new army in readiness, and not until then, he launched his systematic campaign against the rebels. First he moved against Queen San, an important stronghold. It was a large city, some four or five miles in circumference, and clustered about a commanding hill. This city and its approaches were held by a force of about 12,000. Against them, Gordon brought a force of 2,000 infantry and 600 artillery.

On the east side of the city there was a considerable body of water, Lake Yang Sing, and on the other side of the city, side of the lake, the village of Su Chow, also occupied by the rebels. Gordon brought up his fleet of small ships and one steamboat on which he had placed guns, and, running in between the two towns, cut the enemy in two, throwing them into such confusion that both towns were soon taken by assault. Gordon wrote home an amusing account of this battle. It seems that the rebels inland were unused to steamboats, and when this vessel charged up with whistle going, they thought it's some sort of wrathful God or demon. The horror of the rebels at the steamer is very great. When she whistles,

they cannot make it out, he says, and adds that because of this victory, he has been given the rank of Swing Ping, or Red Button Mandarin, about equivalent to Brigadier General. These engagements were but the forerunner of many similar ones. His army took town after town until order was once more restored and broke the beck of the rebellion. The grateful Chinese government showered him with titles. He was made at Tietu, which gave him the highest rank in the Chinese army. The emperor himself commanded that he should be awarded with a yellow riding jacket

to be worn on his person and a peacock's feather, to be carried on his cap. Also, that there be bestowed on him four suits of the uniform proper to his rank of Titu in token of our favor and desire to do him honor. It must not be inferred that Gordon came into his high honors in China easily. He was constantly beset by difficulties. His own men on more than one occasion tried to start a mutiny,

and it was only by a display of his highest and sternness. qualities of leadership that he restored order. The Chinese officials also had to be handled with diplomacy. They were accustomed to bargaining, and could not believe at first that Gordon was not working for selfish ends. It was only when they realized the true character of the man that their esteem and affection were fully enlisted. The emperor wished to bestow on him a large sum of money, and this was refused. The Chinese were non-pulsed. Prince Kung reported to a British officer as follows. We do not know what to do.

He will not receive money from us, and we have already given him every honor which it is in the power of the emperor to bestow. But as these can be of little value in his eyes, I have brought you this letter, and ask you to give it to the Queen of England that she may bestow on him some reward, ward which would be more valuable in his eyes.

The love of this strange race of people for a foreign officer was not idly bestowed. They were the first to recognize his highest qualities, and though he later won high rank under the Union Jack, it is as Chinese Gordon that his name will most frequently appear in history. A fellow campaigner in China writes, What is perhaps most striking in Gordon's career in China is the entire devotion with which the native soldier served him, and the implicit faith they had in the result of operations in which he was personally present. In their eyes, General Gordon was literally a magician to whom all things were possible.

They believed him to bear a charmed life, and a short stick or rat in cane which, he inevitably carried about, and with which he always pointed in direction the fire of artillery or other operations, was firmly looked on as a wand or talisman. These notions, especially the men's idea that their general had a charmed existence, were substantially aided by Gordon's constant habit, when the troops were under fire, of appearing suddenly, usually unattended, and calmly standing in the very hottest part of the fire. As to Gordon's personal appearance, a pin picture by Comrade in Arms

Colonel Butler deserves place. In figure, Gordon, at 40 years of age, stood somewhat under middle height, slight but strong, active, and muscular. A profusion of thick brown hair clustered above a broad open forehead. His features were regular, his mouth firm. and his expression, when silent, had a certain undertone of sadness,

which instantly vanished when he spoke. But it was the clear blue-grey eye and the low, soft, and very distinctive voice that left the most lasting impression on the memory of the man who had seen and spoken with Charles Gordon, an eye that seemed to have looked at great distances, and seen the load of life carried on many shoulders, and a voice that, like the clear chime of some Flemish Belfrey, had in it fresh music to welcome the newest hour,

even though it had rung out the note of many a vanished day. Important dates in Gordon's life. 1833, January 28th, Charles George Gordon born. 1849, entered Royal Military Academy Woolwich. 1852, commissioned second lieutenant of engineers. 1854 sent to the Crimea to construct huts and trenches. 1862, sent as major to explore Great Wall of China. 1863, took command of ever-victorious army in China.

1864, crushed native rebellion and given highest rank in Chinese army. Army. 1874, sent on first expedition to Egypt and the Sudan as colonel. 1881, made Major General. 1884, sent in command of expedition to the Sudan. 1885, January 24, lost his life in the massacre at Khartoum. End of Gordon, Part 12. This recording by hearhis.com. with the strong will.

When one is picking out soldiers, one usually chooses big men. You see a strapping fellow going by in regimentals, and you say, My, what a dandy soldier. Well, there have been some big men in stature who have been big soldiers, such as Washington, but it is interesting to note that many of our great generals have been undersized. Such were Grant, Wellington, and Napoleon. Such was Lord Roberts, who became Earl and Marshall,

and was one of the best loved leaders that England has produced. He was associated with two great campaigns to extend the British Empire, in India and South Africa, and passed away in the midst of the Great World War within a few months of Kitchener. And yet as a boy, no one would have picked him out as destined to become a famous soldier. One recent biographer, Wheeler, calls him a weak boy with a strong will, and we cannot do better than repeat this as giving some sort of key to him. his career. Roberts himself has left an entertaining story of his life in 41 years in India,

which shows that a soldier's life is not tinsel and parade, but is made up of infinite hardship. The weak boy must indeed have to have a strong will in order to pull through. Frederick Roberts was born in India at a time when his father, Abraham Roberts, was lieutenant colonel of infantry at Khan Boar. This fine old soldier gave a lifetime of service to the crown, and was active in the border raids in India. His son lived to complete the task which he began of helping to open India to the civilized world. For his services, Abraham Roberts,

became a general and was knighted. The son, who was destined to win still higher honors, began his career September 30th, 1832. Although the boy was born amid the smell of gunpowder, he must have been a disappointment to his soldier of father. He was puny and sickly, and for a time it did not seem likely that he would live at all. So when he was only a few months old,

he was taken from the uncongenial air of India and brought by his parents to England. Here he spent his boyhood away from the father and mother who were forced by official duties to return to the east. His home was a charming country house at Clifton near Bristol, where for the first years he had private tutors. One interesting experience was in a small school at Carrick-McRoss in Ireland. Then, at 11, he attended public school at Hampton,

but almost nothing is set down in detail as to these early years, which would show that besides being a weakling, he was in no sense remarkable. He was merely another of those small, backward urchins that one may see at any recess on any public school playground. Still, his father was set upon his receiving a military education. It will do no harm anyway and may straighten his shoulders a bit, he doubtless said. and so at thirteen young roberts was entered at eton that training ground of so many of england's soldiers he made his first mark in this famous school by winning a prize in mathematics the obscure lad was beginning to assert himself to the end of his days robert held a warm regard for eton once when at the end of a great campaign he was presented with a sword of honor on this boyhood's drill ground he said to a younger generation then assembled to you boys who intend to enter the army the study and sports of this place are your best training. England's greatest general, himself at Etonian,

is reported to have said that the Battle of Waterloo was won in the Eton playing fields. In thus expressing himself, the Duke, Wellington, meant that bodily vigour, power of endurance, courage and rapidity of decision are produced by the manly games which are fostered here. Undoubtedly, there was a personal touch to these remarks, as Roberts recalled how he himself had begun to gain these sterling qualities on the cricket field and gridiron. When fifteen, he entered the military college at Sandhurst, but remained there only two terms. By nature he was a studious chap, doing especially well in German and mathematics. So easily did he solve problems in algebra and geometry that his mates promptly nicknamed him deductions.

Leaving Sandhurst, he put in a few months at a preparatory military school at Wimbledon, but his father's return to England in 1849 marked the first definite step in his plans. Colonel Roberts, after several years away from his son, was delighted to see that the thin chest was indeed filling out, and the shoulders throwing back. Do you think you can stand India now, my lad? he asked. Why not, sir? replied the boy, briefly. Then I think that the East India Company's service is the place for you.

Colonel Roberts himself had been connected with this great company, which was the forerunner of the government in India, and he was right in thinking that its service offered many chances of advancement, Accordingly, the boy was entered in the company's own military school at Addisgum, and in less than two years had become a second lieutenant in the Bengal artillery, a military company maintained as part of this huge commercial enterprise. In 1852, in his 20th year, he received his first marching orders. They were to report for duty.

He set sail by way of Suez, but there was no canal in those days to make possible an all-water journey. Instead, at Alexandria, he changed to a small, inland steamer, going by canal and river to Cairo. Thence a hot, dusky trek across the desert was necessary, in order to reach Suez. Once in Calcutta, the young Sabaltern lost no time in proving that he was not a mollycoddle. He began by riding every horse in the battery, or troop, as it was called in those days. Thus, he tells us, I learned to understand the amount of nerve, patience, and skill necessary to the making of a good horse-artillery-driver, with the additional advantage that I was

brought into constant contact with the men. Roberts was early learning the secret of more than one great general's success, to know his men. In later life he could call many a man by name, and knew just what each could do, while they responded with a close affection and the nickname by which he will be known to history. Bob's, it is said that Napoleon expected his officers to know the names

and personal histories of every man in their command. As another result of Robert's fellowship with the rank and file, he became a crackshot and expert horseman. During the fighting and the mutiny of Indian sepoys, he proved himself a good swordsman as well. And even when he became commander-in-chief, he would ride with a tent-pegging team of his own staff. It was a long and thorough service that he was destined to receive.

He joined the quartermaster general's office before the mutiny broke out, and remained in it for more than 20 years. During this period, he gradually worked his way up from one post of responsibility to another, doing it so gradually that even he himself hardly noticed the advance. On one occasion, for example, he superintended all the arrangements for embarking the Bengal Division, which sailed from Calcutta to take part in an expedition against Tabasinia. But Harah must have chafed at the long delay in getting into the field.

He asked his father more than once to get him transferred to Burma, where war had broken out, and there was a chance for active service. The transfer was not granted. The only thing that came to break up the humdrum of those first years was a cyclone. It was actually welcomed, anything for a change. Roberts gives a detailed account of it in his autobiography. He and a native servant were caught out in the open when the storm descended with little warning. I shouted to him, the servant, as loudly as I could, he relates.

But the uproar was so terrific that he could not hear a word, and there was nothing for it but to try and make my own way home. The darkness was profound. As I was walking carefully along, I suddenly came in contact with an object, which a timely flash of lightning showed me was a column, standing in exactly the opposite direction from my own house. I could now locate myself correctly, and the lightning became every moment more vivid. I was enabled to grope my way by slow degrees to the mess, where I expected to find someone to show me my way home. But the servants, who knew from experience the probable effects of a cyclone, had already closed the outside Venetian shutters and barred all the door. doors. In vain I banged at the door and called at the top of my voice. They heard nothing.

In desperation he had to make his way as best he could back to his own bungalow, about half a mile away, only to find that also barred against him. I had to continue hammering for a long time before they heard and admitted me, thankful to be comparatively safe inside a house. Another disappointment of Roberts lay in the fact that he was still away from his father, who seemed destined all his life to remain a stranger to him. The junior often was stationed at Dum Dum, famous as the birthplace of the soft-nosed bullets, now prescribed in civilized warfare. His father had been appointed to the command of the troops of Peshawar, and now wrote him a welcome note bidding him come to join him. This was easier said than done,

but was finally accomplished after three months of toilsome and dangerous travel. He used every sort of native conveyance, barge, post-shez, palanquin, pony and shank mares. But it was interesting and full of novelty to the barracks bound soldier. He went by way of Benares, Al-Habad, Kanpur and Myrout, places destined to win unpleasant fame in the mutiny. Peshawahua, his destination, proved no less fascinating than the way stations. It commanded the caravan route between India and Afghanistan, and guarded the entrance to Khyber Pass. Lord Dalhousi described it as the outpost of the Indian Empire, a very accurate title. At Peshawar at last, Frederick Roberts became acquainted with his father, who proved a good comrade.

The junior officer served as aid to camp on the general staff and went with him on several expeditions, outwardly peaceful, but inwardly full of danger. India then was a seething caldron of trouble. Nevertheless, this period with his father is described by Frederick Roberts as one of the brightest and happiest of my early life. Unfortunately, the senior officer's health showed signs of breaking, and again father and son had to part. Robert's resigned his command and returned to England at the end of the year 1853. Peshawar was a notoriously unhealthy station and Young Roberts also soon began to feel the effects of the climate. He was still far from robust and traded continually on his will and nerve.

The native fever sapped his energy and he was sent to recuperate to Kashmir. He was enthusiastic about the scenery here and his tramping and shooting trips in the bracing climate soon gave back his strength and Vim. It was about this time that he realized his pet ambition of joining the horse artillery. He also set himself with a will to the study of Hindustani, as he realized that his usefulness in the quartermaster general's office would be vastly increased if he could deal directly with the natives. This was a turning point in Robert's career.

It was to be his first stepping stone upward, and it illustrates the point that even though opportunity may knock at the door, one must be ready for her, that Roberts finally won his largest success was due not so much to his genius, as to his industry. Edison says that genius is made up of 2% inspiration and 98% perspiration. End of Roberts Part 13. Recording by Shiromi Osereo.

Shiromi.net Section 14 of Boys' Book of Famous Soldiers. This is a Librevox recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information, or to volunteer, please visit Libravox. dot org recording by shiromi arsario boy's book of famous soldiers by j walker mc spadden roberts part two the great mutiny in which roberts and many other british soldiers was to be plunged had its immediate cause in a strange thing greased cartridges how so insignificant a thing could have started so great a trouble is one of the strange true stories of history there were of course other contributory factors but this This was the match that touched off the magazine. At this time, England employed a great many native troops.

To be exact, there were about 257,000. While the British regulars numbered only 36,000, the latter were outnumbered 7 to 1. The Ordnance Department adopted a new rifle, the Enfield, at this juncture, and sent a consignment to India. The cartridges for the rifle were greased for easy loading and were to be bitten by the soldiers. This last act at once set the sepoys soldiers in an uproar. It was against their religious scruples to touch meat of any kind, and they heard it stated that the objectionable cartridges were greased, with pigs and cows fat.

As soon as the commanding officers saw the trouble, they ordered that the cartridges be withdrawn, but the mischief was done. The mutiny which flared up here among the native soldiers spread quickly from city to city. Runners went from camp to camp, urging that they throw off the hated British yoke. In some places no written or verbal message.

was exchanged. A basket of unleavened cakes was brought in and broken by way of pre-arranged signal. After the first outbreaks, councils of war were hurriedly held on the part of the British officers and field expeditions organized. One of the officers, Colonel Neville Chamberlain, was assigned to the command of what was called the movable column, or chief army of pursuit. Roberts was made one of his staff officers, the most wonderful piece of good fortune that could come to me, he says. Shortly Afterward, Chamberlain was made adjutant general to the army before Delhi, and then came orders for all the artillery officers to join in this attack. Roberts was to see active service at last. He found himself under fire at Delhi for the first time on June 30, 1857. While it was only a skirmish,

it was a lively one while it lasted. With some 1100 men and a dozen guns, Major Coke went on an expedition against a troublesome group of rebels, and Roberts accompanied him as a staff officer. When the enemy appeared the only way to reach them in time was by crossing a swamp. Another troop of rebels unexpectedly appeared in force but were put to route. A few days later a similar skirmish occurred, which for a time looked more serious. Roberts was posted across a road with a squad of men and two guns. The enemy attacked them with a crossfire. How he and his band escaped is a mystery. During their enforced retreat, Roberts felt a stinging sensation in his back but managed to keep going. It was found afterwards that his life had been saved by the slipping of his knapsack down from his shoulders.

This had been penetrated by a bullet which had ended his body close to his spine. Its force had been broken, but the wound was still so severe as to lay him up for several weeks. The almost superhuman difficulties which lay in the path of this handful of Englishmen scattered throughout India are summed up in a letter by another officer, Hodson, as follows. The whole country is a steaming bog. I keep my health wonderfully, thank God, in spite of heat, hard work and exposure, and the men bear up like Britons. We all feel that the government ought to allow every officer and man before Delhi to count every month spent here as a year of service in India.

There is much that is disappointing and disgusting to a man who feels that more might have been done, but I comfort myself with the thought that history will do justice to the constancy and fortitude of the handful of Englishmen who have for so many weeks, months, I may say, of desperate weather amid the greatest toil and hardship, resisted and fight. finally defeated the worst and most strenuous exertions of an entire army and a whole nation in arms. An army trained by ourselves and supplied with all but exhaustless munitions of war, laid up by ourselves for the maintenance of the empire.

I venture to aver that no other nation in the world would have remained here, or have avoided defeat had they attempted to do so. The story of the rise and fall of the Indian mutiny is the story of the life of Roberts. Insofar as the rise is concerned, his was an inconspicuous but well-played. part, acting as staff officer and lieutenant of a gunner's company by turns, he was always in the thick of it. If it were the command of guns at a difficult salient before Delhi, it was send Roberts. If it were an urgent message for more ammunition at Agra, send Roberts. If it were an escort for the rescued women and children at the historic relief of Lucknow, send Roberts.

This slender, undersized officer, in spite of his physique, seemed indefatigable. He had several narrow escapes from death in hand-to-hand encounters with seapoys. Once, a mutineer fired point-blank at him at twelve yards away, but for some providential reason Robert's horse reared just at the moment of firing and received the bullet in his own head. At another time, a fanatic danced out in front of his horse, waving a turban to frighten it, and at the same time whirling a wicked-looking scimitar around his head. Roberts drew his pistol, but the weapon missed fire. The fanatic sprang forward, and it is probable that the career of a future field marshal would have ended then and there, had not a lancer spurred his horse in between and run the fellow down.

On still another occasion his presence of mind saved the flag from capture and brought him the first of his many honours, the Victoria Cross. An assault had been made on the village of Kudagange, and the pursuit was being followed up in brave style, when some of the rebels suddenly faced around and took steady aim at those who were charging them. Roberts was off the party, and had gone to the rescue of a man who was on the verge of being run through by a bayonet when he saw two sepoys running off with the Union Jack. He spurred his horse in pursuit and, leaning over, wrenched the standard out of the hands of one

of the men at the same time sabering him. The other sepooy took advantage of the opportunity to take steady aim at Roberts, point blank, but the weapon missed fire. Roberts returned with the flag, and for reward of his gallant action, was given the VC that most coveted of British decorations. Another officer in writing of the event says, Roberts is one of those rare men who, to uncommon daring and bravery in the field and unflinching hard-working discharge of duty in the camp, adds the charm of cheery and unaffected kindness and hospitality in the tent, and his acquaintance and friendship are high prizes to those who obtain them. With the end of the mutiny, Roberts was sent to England on sick leave for a much-needed rest. In April 1858, exactly six

years after his arrival at Calcutta, he turned over his duties of deputy assistant quartermaster general to his successor, though much against his will. He felt that again he was in danger of being put upon the shelf, and his intensely active nature longed for still further field service. In a little over a year, however, he was recalled to India, and there given a unique task, the first viceroy to India. Canning determined to impress the natives by a pomp and display dear to their own hearts, and show the majesty of England by holding a series of derbours or triumphal processions. These extended right across India from city to city for a thousand, miles. To Roberts was assigned the important task of arranging all the details of the tour,

and he did it with characteristic thoroughness. It was like moving a mammoth circus, what with elephants, tents, supplies of all kinds, and gorgeous trappings to be handled. These derbors lasted for six months, and the viceroy not only complimented Roberts for his work, but gazetted him for the rank of brevet major. The next few years were much of a piece, a routine of office and field work which, if it brought nothing sensational to the conscientious young officer, still kept his feet in the path of glory. It was not until the year 1875 that he reached the goal for which he had long striven, quartermaster general of the army in India, which carried with it the rank of Major General. With this title, his larger work in India

may be said to have fairly begun. For nearly 20 years longer, his military career was to be continued there, and in the neighbouring country of Afghanistan. it is all recounted in his forty-one years in india a recital of constant adventure and interest for his services he was made a peer of england receiving the title of baron roberts of kandahar an address presented to him by the native and english residence on his leaving india is worth repeating The history of the British Empire in India has not, at least in the last thirty years, produced a hero like your lordship, whose soldier-like qualities are fully known to the world. The country which has been the cradle of Indian invasions came to realize the extent of your power and recognized your generalship. The occupation of Kabul and the glorious Battle of Kandahar are amongst the brightest jewels

in the diadem of your lordship's baronage. Terrible in war and merciful in peace, your excellency's name has become a dread to the enemies of England and lovely to your friends. That last phrase, lovely to your friends, is a true, though oriental summing up of one great secret of Robert's renown. He has been called the best-loved soldier of England, and he possessed in a special degree the power of attracting and holding the love and respect of the East Indians. They felt that he would always deal fairly by them. When he went to Mandalay in 1886, he saw that if he wished to win the confidence of the people of Upper Burma, he must win over the Buddhist priests.

This he did and even persuaded his government to pension the three head priests. They showed their gratitude, he says, by doing all they could to help me, and when I was leaving the country, the old Thathana Bain accompanied me as far as Rangoon. We corresponded till his death, and I still hear occasionally

from one or other of my Fungi friends. As for his own soldiers, they came fairly to worship him. To them he was not a lord or general or field marshal, but just Bob's. and our bobs. Wellington commanded the respect of his men, but Roberts, their love. Lord Roberts, well, he's just a father, is the testimony of one gunner in the South African War. Often goes around hospital in Bloomfontein, and it's, well, my lad, how are you today? Anything I can do for you,

anything you want, never forgets to see that the man has what he asks for. Goes to the hospital train, are you comfortable? Are you sure you're comfortable? Then it's buck up, buck up to those who need it. but when he sees a man dying it's can i pray with you my lad i've seen him many a time praying with not a dry eye near tears in his eyes and ours he is a lord a favorite story about him relates to an audience with queen victoria the famous veteran was then sixty-eight and for several years had been living in retirement now his sovereign asked him to buckle on his sword again and go to retrieve the fallen british fortunes in south africa you do not think that you are too old for this arduous task asked the queen. You are not afraid of your health breaking down? I have kept myself fit, replied the old soldier, for the past twenty years, in the hope that I might command in such a campaign as this. The remark, I have kept myself fit, is a keynote of his life.

The puny boy of the long ago was to survive this campaign with flying colors and to lend his counsel in the great war of our own time. It was a long life and full of service. In an address to a children's school, when a man of 80, he summed up his creed by saying, In the first place, don't be slack in anything that you are doing, whether it be work or play, do it with all your might. You will find that this great empire can only be maintained

by the exercise of self-denial, by training, by discipline, and by courage. Important dates in Robert's life. 1832, September 30th. Frederick Roberts born, 1845, entered Eton's school. 1847 entered military college at Sandhurst 1852 went as second lieutenant of Bengal artillery to India 1857 fought in the mutiny and won Victoria Cross 1858 returned to England on leave

1859 sent back to India major 1875 quartermaster general of army of India 1885 commander-in-chief in India 1885 Commander-in-Chief in India 1891 Created a Pier 1895 Created Field Marshal

1900 South African Campaign 1901 Commander-in-Chief of British Army 1914 November 14 Died in France End of Roberts Part 2

Recording by Shiromi Arseria Shiromi.net Section 15 of Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers This is a Libravox recording All Libravox recordings are in the public domain For more information or to volunteer Please visit Libravox.org Boys Book of Famous Soldiers by J. Walker McSpatt

Kitchener, Part 1 Kitchener, the soldier of deeds, not words. When Chinese Gordon lost his life in Khartoum, Egypt, in 1884, because the British Relief Force reached him two days too late, a young officer accompanying the expedition, was getting his first glimpse of a land that was destined to make him famous. Kitchener of Cartoon was to become as widely known in a later generation as Chinese Gordon was in his own. Each won his spurs in a foreign land. Kitchener was then a cavalry officer of 35 and did not seem destined to get much higher in army circles.

Yet he had never lost faith in himself. After his first expedition to Egypt, when he was still only a major, he remarked droly to a fellow officer, "'Never mind, my dear fellow, a few years hence you and I will be generals, and these people who annoy us now, meaning the red tape departmental clerks, will be looking out of their club windows

with all their teeth falling out of their heads.' During this same expedition, he spoke to the fact that their commanding officer had missed the key point by saying, It's the same with everybody. We must stop floundering, or people will forget that cartoon is our objective and always will be. Prophetic words for Kitchener of Cartoon. Who was this strong, stern, silent soldier, whose career linked up past wars with the great

world war of our own day? Like Wellington and Roberts, Kitchener came from Irish stock. He was born near Lestowl, June 24, 1850, his father, Colonel Henry Kitchener, having bought a considerable estate in the counties of Cary and Limerick. Colonel Kitchener had seen a good deal of active service himself and still more of garrison life.

He determined to retire, and after buying some 2,000 acres of land in Ireland, at a bankrupt sale, he built a hunting lodge called Gunnarrow. Borough House. This was Herbert Horatio Kitchener's birthplace. Whether the name of the house had anything to do with his warlike career history does not state. But certain it is that he was a born soldier, a man of iron

almost from his boyhood. Yes, said his old nurse, in talking about him only a few years ago, I know that he is a great man, and they tell me that he has no heart and that everybody is afraid of him. But they are wrong. He's really one of the most tender-hearted men in the world. And whenever he comes to see me, he is my boy, just as he was in the old days in Ireland, when he used to run to me in all his troubles and fling his arms around me and hug me. Ah, there is no body left who knows the real master Herbert, as I know him.

As a boy at school, Herbert Kitchener was not very brilliant. Like Wellington, whose mother called him the fool of the family, Kitchener did too much daydreaming to make much headway with his studies. His first teacher was a governess who gave up in despair. Then he was sent to a private school where he did not do any better. His father lost patience. Just before an examination he'd, made a dire threat.

Young man said the Colonel, if you fail, I'll make you tow the mark. I'll send you to a girl's school. Apparently, the threat did not have the desired effect. He flunked and was transferred to the other school. This time he was told that failure meant that he would be taken out of school entirely and apprenticed to a hatter.

The warning had the desired effect. Herbert buckled down to work and not only passed his examinations, but even began to show a decided liking for mathematics, which study was to be of good service in later life. By this time the family had moved into a more pretentious home, known as Crota House. Little is related of his boyhood life there. It was quiet and uneventful. The boy was of reserved nature, preferring to sit quietly in the corner and listen, while others did the talking. Yet when drawn out, he could talk well, preferring to reason rather than argue. His chief outdoor sport was swimming. The home was only a few miles inland from the Atlantic coast, and he and his brother often rode over for a dip.

His father was of industrious and thoroughgoing type. The family motto was thorough, and the Colonel lived up to it. K of K also became a master of detail, and here on his father's estate, he learned his first lessons in it. Colonel Kitchener constantly preached the value of time and practiced what he preached. Instead of settling down to a life of ease, he was always at work on the estate. He reclaimed large tracks of bogs, turning them into fertile land. He raised breed horses and cattle. He set up his own factory for making bricks, tiles, and drain pipes.

His own life of energy and organization was the best possible example to his boys. That Herbert, with all his apparent indolence, was profiting by it, became evident years afterward. When the boy was fifteen, his father determined on a complete change of environment for him. I want you to see something else beside Ireland, he said. Herbert was accordingly sent to Switzerland to a French school conducted by Mr. Bennett. It was in Villanue, at the eastern end of Lake Geneva. In this scenic spot of Europe, he remained for some four years, paying occasional visits home, but becoming more and more a cosmopolitan,

instead of merely a shy Irish lad. He learned to speak French like a native and got a start in German and Italian. Languages always came easy to him. Meanwhile, he trudged about the mountain country on many long excursions with a camera slung across his shoulders, learning in art, that he was soon to put to good use. Thanks to this outdoor life, he grew up into a strong, well-built fellow, with a physique that was to stand the test of many hard days to come. His father wanted him to follow in his own footsteps and become a soldier. He used his influence to place him in the Royal Military Academy at Woolwich.

Herbert entered there as a cadet in his 19th year. Two years later, while still a cadet, we find him getting his foretaste of actual warfare. It was the summer of 1870. War had been declared by France against Prussia. The short but terrible war so skilled. beautifully engineered by Bismarck. Herbert Kitchener had gone to spend a summer vacation with his father at Dion in the north of France and promptly got imbued with the war fever. He enlisted in a battalion in the second army of L'Oray, commanded by General Chasney. This army, like other

well-intentioned but poorly organized troops of the French, was driven steadily back by superior German forces, until the enemy bombarded and captured Paris. It is interesting to note that Kitchener's first and last military service was on behalf of the French against their hereditary enemies, and that history came dangerously near to repeating itself in the German drive of 1914 against Paris. That it did not do so was due in no small measure to the grim veteran who was now Secretary of War, and to his wonderful army of volunteers, dubbed Kitchener's Mob. Whether or not Kitchener did any actual close-up fighting in these early days we do not know.

One novel experience, however, is placed to his credit. He made an ascent in an observation balloon with two French officers. In those days, the big bags were risky and unknown quantities. and an assent was something to talk about. The ill-starred war over, young Kitchener returned to Woolwich and his school duties as though nothing special had happened. Why did you go off and join the French army,

he was asked by the commandant? Please, sir, came the straightforward answer. I understood that I should not be wanted for some time, and I could not be idle. I thought I might learn something. He had indeed. if nothing more than the power of a thoroughly prepared enemy against an unready land. The next stage in Kitchener's career was picturesque but full of hardship.

It was in connection with an exploring expedition to the Holy Land. In 1865, a society called the Palestine Exploration Fund had been founded, its object being to study the history and geography of the country. Seven years later, it had entered on the gigantic task of surveying a tract of about six thousand square miles, much of it desert or mountainous country. Kitchener was just graduating from the military academy with the usual rank of lieutenant and was casting about for active service. He could not brook the idea of settling down to garrison life. The post of assistant to the leader of this Palestine expedition was offered to him, and he accepted with alacrity. While a private enterprise, it had the sanction of the War Department, and promised to provide thrills as well as work.

The fact that it was the Holy Land of Bible Story also appealed to Kitchener, witness one of the first entries in his journal. Looking down on the broad plain of Estrelaan, it is impossible not to remember that this is the greatest battlefield of the world. From the days of Joshua and the defeat of the mighty hosts of Cicera, till almost in our own days, Napoleon the Great fought the battle of Mount Tabor. And here also is the ancient Magidot, where the last great battle of Armageddon is to be fought. lieutenant kitchener reported for duty in palestine in the fall of eighteen seventy four the exploration party was then working in the hill country south of judah which was still a sealed book to the rest of the world their job was to search in every hole and corner of the country and see what is there and classify everything in proper form to quote the words of their prospectus for this work they required both surveyors and to the first For this work, they required both surveyors' instruments and the camera. In the use of the latter, Kitchener had shown aptitude at school,

and it is said that this fact had something to do with his appointment. It is evident from the first official report that he made good. His chief, Lieutenant Condor, states that he succeeded in securing some excellent photographs under peculiarly unfavorable circumstances. The climate did not set well with him at first, and after two attacks of fever, he recovered his health sufficiently to take part in the Dead Sea work of 1875.

At Wadi, Serial, reports Condor, we were caught in the most tremendous gale, which we have yet experienced in tents, and our next march of 19 miles, in a perfect hurricane, of bitter wind, with showers of sleet and hail, necessitated by the fact that all our barley and other stores were consumed was the hardest bit of experience we have yet encountered. Our dogs and two mule-tears were unable to face the storm and took refuge in caves.

Old sheik, hazmas, fell off his pony twice and had to be tied on. The brave beasts struggled for eleven hours, and crossed more than one torrent of cold water up nearly to the girths. But by eight at night they were in a warm stable, and we had found refuge in Hebron, in the house of a German carlite Jew, whose hospitality was as great as a subsequent charge was high. At times the ground was so uneven and devoid of trails

that they could not march much faster than one mile an hour. The only human beings they encountered were the Bedouin Arabs, sly, furtive fellows, who were always ready for a trade, but who would kill a man just as readily for his shirt. The slow progress, however, did not worry Kitchener particularly. He made good use of the time in photographing old walls, caves, and natural strongholds. For instance, five days were spent in gathering data and records of the ruins of a fortress, erected at Ascalon by Richard Cordillian during his famous crusade. Here it was that Kitchener's skill in swimming and presence of mind were put to the test.

Lieutenant Comber was swept off his horse while fording the stream and was an imminent danger of drowning when Kitchener sprang to his aid and towed him ashore. Despite the danger and hardships, Kitchener reveled in this wild life. life. One of the party says of him, he was as good company as a man could wish to have, full of life and good spirits. We none of us thought much about our toilets, and he least of all,

why after a few months traveling about in Palestine, he looked more like a tramp than an officer in Her Majesty's Army. His clothes wouldn't have fetched the three-penny bit at any old dew shop in Whitechapel. End of Kitchener, Part 1. Recording by Richard Kilmer, Rio Medina, Texas. Section 16 of Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers This is a Librevox recording.

All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libravox.org. Boys Book of Famous Soldiers by J. Walker McSpadden. kitchener part two it was in this first field service that he won a reputation which clung to him through his whole career they said that his chief amusement was work and his relaxation was more work He was of seemingly tireless energy and could never understand the let-downs of others. The boyhood traits of silence was also marked in the man. Although he picked up languages easily, he used them sparingly.

It was said of him later that he could keep silent in ten languages. In a letter home from Palestine, he throws a side light on this working phase of his nature. The non-commissioned officers, he says, though ready to go through any amount of work or danger, are much discouraged at the prospect of an indefinite delay without employment, which, in my opinion, is more trying in this climate than work. Not long after, the round of work and routine duty was varied by a first-class fight. The Moslem Shik had become so impertinent one day that, Lieutenant Condor ordered him out of his tent. The sheik drew a knife and was promptly disarmed

and made prisoner by the British. Instantly, he lifted up his voice, calling for his men. The response was prompt. They seemed to spring up out of the very rocks, and soon there were two hundred of them, howling and dancing around a handful of Englishmen. Condor thus relates the happening. Lieutenant Kitchener and I were immediately surrounded. Three came to me and asked me, with curses, what I was doing. An old man thrust his battle-ax violently into my side, but I did not like to strike him,

though I had now a hunting crop in my hand. I told them they were mad and would be severely punished if they struck an Englishman. About this time, other members of the party saw a gun-laping, leveled at me five yards off, but fortunately the man's hand was caught before he fired. A man now came into the crowd which surrounded me and dealt me a blow on the head with a large club with great violence, causing two wounds to the side of my head, covering my face with blood. A second blow, directed with full force at the top of my head, must inevitably have brained me, had I not put my head down to his chest. My servants gave me up for dead.

The blow fell on my neck, which ever since has been so stiff and swollen that it is impossible to turn it round. The rest of the party saw me fall. As soon as I got up, I dealt this man a blow in the face with the handle of my whip, which staggered him, but my whip flew out of my hand and left me entirely unarmed. I must inevitably have been murdered, but for the cool and prompt assistance of Lieutenant Kitchener, who managed to get me and engage one of the clubmen, covering my retreat.

A blow descending on the top of his head was parried with a cane, which was broken by the force of the blow. A second wounded his arm. His escape is unaccountable. Having retired a few pages, from the thick of the fray, I saw that the Muslims were gradually surrounding us, stealing behind trees and through vineyards, and I well understood that in such a case, unless the soldiers

arrived at once, we must all die. Many of the servants had indeed already given up hope, though no one fled. I gave the order to leave the tents and fly round the hill. Lieutenant Kitchener was the last to obey this order, being engaged in front. He retreated to his tent, and whilst running he was fired at and heard the bullet whistle by his head. He was also followed for some short distance by a man with a huge scimitar, who subsequently wounded with it more than one of our people. The timely arrival of the regular soldiers undoubtedly saved the little party from massacre. Another enemy, the Eastern Fever, was more successful in attack. Both Condor and Kitchener had to return to England to recuperate.

In 1877, Kitchener went back, this time in command of the expedition, and by mid-summer had completed his survey of Northern Palestine. He had covered, all told, one thousand miles of country, making photographs and maps which aided immeasurably to the general knowledge. On his way back to England, Kitchener stopped in Turkey, which was then at war with Bulgaria. His observations on the quality of soldiers in these two peoples, as recorded in an article, written for Blackwood's magazine,

are interesting in the light of later wars. The publication of the results of the Palestine exploration first bought Kitchener to public notice. He was officially thanked and began to be regarded as a marked man. He had won his first spurs. His next task was along similar lines. The island of Cyprus occupied a strategic position in the Mediterranean, and, moreover, had been the scene of much turmoil. The British government desired to set up a stable regime there, and to this end decided to make a careful survey of the island and its resources.

They naturally turned to Kitchener to do the work. The satisfactory way in which he had carried it through earned him the warm approval of Lord Derby, then Secretary of State for the colonies. One of his associates in Cyprus says of him there, we saw little of Kitchener at the club, or anywhere else, where Englishmen mostly congregated, although he sometimes turned up at the Jim Conna meetings to contribute his share to their success. A Kitchener was always a hard worker, a gentleman with a long head, who thought much but said little. It is easy enough to prophecy when you know, but honestly to my mind he looked a man who would go far if he only had his chance.

As an immediate result of this work, Kitchener was given the rank of Major, and sent with Lord Wosley's expedition into Egypt, then in the throes of civil war. One reason for his promotion was his ability to speak Arabic. His several years in the East had not only taught him the languages, but valuable insight into manners and customs. The campaign was short and short. summary. The rebel forces were routed and order established in northern Egypt. Kitchener's ability to organize, and his knowledge of the people soon made him indispensable.

His name occurred so frequently in the official reports that Lord Cromner, in the home office remarked, this Kitchener seems to have a finger in every pie. I must see him and find out what he is like. Later, after seeing him, Cromner, said, the man's got a lot in him. He should prove one of our best assets in Egypt. The next event, and a dramatic one in Kishner's life, was concerned with the attempted rescue of Gordon some three years later. This famous general had been sent to subdue the Sudan, which literally means land of the blacks, and had not received sufficient reinforcements. It was a blunder on the part of the home government for which

Gordon was to pay with his life. A relief force under Wolseley was sent too late. Kitchener was fully alive to the peril of the situation, but being only a subordinate could not do much to hasten affairs. He did

know, however, that a widespread conspiracy was being hatched, which threatened the safety of Wollesley's forces as well. How he got at the bottom of this conspiracy is related by Charles Shaw, a Canadian journalist who accompanied the expedition.

A group of Arabs who had been in a brawl were lying tied hand and foot in the guardhouse, when a tall man, also securely tied, was thrown in with them. Although dressed like a native, Shaw relates, he looked a different brand of Arab than I had been accustomed to. He was Kitchener, and he was after the conspiracy. i didn't know much arabic in those days but we could hear the dongolese talk and talk in excited tones the whole night the tall man occasionally saying a few words when we paraded before the large open-faced orderly tent next morning we were almost paralyzed to see lord wosley himself seated at the little table with kitchener beside him both in full staff uniform A tall, fine-looking Arab was being examined through the interpreter. He didn't seem impressed by the glittering uniforms,

or the presence of the commander-in-chief, or embarrassed by their questions. Once or twice an expression of surprise flitted over his face, but his eyes were always fixed on Kitchener, who would now and again stoop and whisper something in Lord Wozley's ear. Once he raised his voice, The prisoner heard its intonation and recognized him. With a fierce bound, the long, lithe Arab, made a spring, and was over the table,

and it seized Kitchener by the throat. There was a short, swift struggle. Wowsley's eye glistened, and he half drew his sword. Kitchener, athletic as he was, was being overpowered, and the Arab was throttling him to death. There was a rush of the guard, and within ten minutes a cordon of centuries surrounded the Modir of Donegal's tent. Within three days he was a prisoner in his palace at Dongola, guarded by half a battalion of British soldiers. The conspiracy was broken. How widespread it was, only a half-dozen white men knew at the time.

To it the treachery of the Egyptian garrisonate cartoon, and the death of Gordon was due, and the preservation of the desert column, the relief force, can be placed to its discovery. The next few years in Kitchener's life, which we can but summarize, show him wielding a masterful hand

in the pacification of Egypt. After Gordon's death, the command was reorganized, and Kitchener became a lieutenant colonel of cavalry. His duties took him to the extreme outposts. Halfway down the Red Sea over against Mecca is Sukkim, the southern outpost of Egypt. Su Kim has the distinction of being one of the hottest stations on Earth and one of the most desolate, comparable to central Arizona in the hot season.

Here Kitchener served as governor from 1886 to 1888 with distinction. The following year found him fighting on the front of the front of the country. of the Sudan, the wild, vast, back country, to the south and west. From 1889 to 1892, he served as adjutant general of the Egyptian army, nominally as an officer of the Sultan's viceroy, the Ken dive, but in reality the visible presence of England's protecting power. He received several high decorations, which would show that he won the esteem and confidence of his Egyptian patrons. Finally, in 1893, the Kendive made him Sardar, or Commander-in-Chief.

South of the Egyptian frontier on the Upper Nile, among the cataracts, the three cities, Dongola, Berber, and Khartoum, form a triangle of trading centers. Kitchener saw that these were the strategic points in the United States. the control of Upper Egypt, and in 1896 led an expedition thither. Ever since the death of Gordon, the country had been unsettled. It remained the Kitchener to wield the avenging sword. He laid a light railroad southward along the Nile, and marched swiftly, taking his supplies with him. At Omdurman, he finally met the enemy and inflicted a crushing defeat. At Khartoum, where Gordon had been slain, he set up a stable government.

He came back to civilization, a major general in the British army, a peer of England, and Kitchener of Khartoum. This popular title was speedily shortened to K of K, and was as well known wherever English to Tommies assembled as Bob's, the affectionate nickname of Lord Roberts. But Kitchener never won the deep affection of the rank and file that Roberts inspired. He was taciturn, aloof, and a stern disciplinarian.

His name evoked fear and respect, but never love. And yet his men would follow him through fire and water, for they had unbounded confidence in his ability. It was his name that was placarded through London when the recruiting began. for the Great War, not the Kings. Will you serve with Kitchener, the poster said,

and they responded, three million strong, Kitchener's mob, which was to become so soon a skilled army under his guidance. They tell of him that when he took the post of Secretary of War on his first visit of inspection to the office, he looked around and said, Is there a bed here? When answered in the negative, he gave the brief order, have one brought in. Thereafter, for several weeks, he literally lived in his office night and day.

He had at last found a job that measured up to his fullest requirement for hard work, and he reveled in it. Incidentally, he delivered the goods, but nobody marveled at that. It was nothing more than was expected of him. says an anonymous writer in the living age, England never fully understood Lord Kitchener, and perhaps he never fully understood his countrymen. They weaved innumerable myths around this shy and solitary man

who revealed himself to few. To them, his figure loomed gigantic and mysterious through the sandstorms of African desert and the myths of the Himalayas. In their hour of trial, he could, came among them for a space and then vanished forever in the wild northern seas. He was a good man to fight for or to fight against, and he found a worthy end. Important dates in Kitchener's life.

1850, June 24th, Herbert Horatiochioner, born. 1865, sent to Switzerland to school. 1868, entered Royal Mo. Military Academy at Woolwich. 1870, volunteered in French Army against Prussia. 1874, sent as second lieutenant to Palestine, with Exploration Party.

1878, surveyed island of Cyprus for British government. 1885, Lieutenant Colonel and Calvary in Egypt. 1893, Sardar, or Commander-in-Chry and Chief. Chief of Egyptian Army 1898 Created a Baron 1900 Chief of Staff to Roberts

in South Africa 1902 made General and Commander-in-Chief in India 1911 Council General in Egypt 1914 Secretary of War

Field Marshal 1916 June 5th lost his life at sea. End of Kitchener, Part 2. Recording by Richard Kilmer, Rio Medina, Texas. Section 17 of Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers. This is a Libravox recording.

All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libravox.org. Recording by Stephanie Lee. Boys' Book of Famous Soldiers by J. Walker McSpadden. Hague Part 1 Hague, the man who led the contemptibles. There goes young Hague. He says he intends to be a soldier. The speaker was a young student at Oxford University,

as he jerked his thumb in the direction of a slight but well-set-up fellow, a classmate, who went cantering past. The chanter mark made more than once during the college days of Field Marshal Hague, struck the keynote of his career. From early boyhood, Douglas Haig was going to be a soldier, and he stuck to his guns in a quiet, systematic way until he wan out. The story of Hague's life, till the time of the Great War, was the opposite of spectacular, and even in it, his personal prowess was kept studiously in the background. With him it has always been, my men did thus and so. Yet in his quiet way, he has always made his presence felt with telling effect.

He has been the man behind the man behind the gun. By birth, Haig was a fifer, which sounds military without being so. He was a native of Cameron Bridge, County of Fife, and came of the strictest Presbyterian scotch. If he had lived a few centuries back, he would have been a covenanter, the kind that carried a Bible in one hand and a gun in the other. He was born June 19, 1861, the youngest son of John Haig, a local justice of the peace. his mother was a vich of midlothian the family while not wealthy was comfortably situated the hague children grew up as countrywise rather than town-bred having many a romp over the rolling country leading to the highlands but more than once on sister jaunt would come the inquiry where's douglas we doubt whether they ever shortened it to dug as they would have done in america and back would come the answer oh he stayed by the house the morn he got a new book fray the library ken douglas was indeed bookish and was inclined to favour the inglenook rather than the heather as he grew older he discovered a strong liking for books on theology it was the old presbyterian streak cropping out

the last thing one would expect from such a boy was to become a soldier a divinity student yes perhaps a college professor but a soldier never yet it was to soldiering that this quiet boy turned the one thing which linked him up with the field was horsemanship he was always a devotee of riding and soon learned to ride well with a natural ease and grace he received a general education at clifton then entered brazeno's college oxford at the age of twenty he was never a hail-fellow well-met sort of person reserve was his hall-mark but the longer he stayed in college the more of an outdoorsman he became every afternoon would find him mounted on his big gray horse for a gallop across the moors or perhaps an exciting canter behind the hounds on the scent of a fox it was then that his habitual reserve would melt away and he would wave his hat and cheer like a high school boy the record of his classes is in no sense remarkable he turned in neat and precise papers he turned in neat and precise papers without making shiny marks in any particular study literature and science were his best subjects well son how goes it now his father would ask ready to make a lawyer out of yourself douglas would shake his head he could never share his father's enthusiasm for the law i guess not father he would reply quietly somehow i am not built that way i want to try at soldier life so his father let him follow his bent and procured for him a position in the seventh regiment of hussars his career as a soldier was threatened at the outset by the refusal of the medical board to admit him to the staff college on the ground that he was colorblind but this decision was overruled by the duke of cambridge then commander-in-chief who nominated him personally this was in eighteen eighty five england was then as nearly at peace as she ever became and it seemed that young hague was destined to become a feather-bed soldier

but it was not for long they presently began to stir up trouble down in egypt and england found as on many previous occasions that she didn't have enough regulars with a job in hand the revolt of the maudie had occurred cartel tomb had fallen, and the brave Gordon had lost his life. A relief expedition into the Sudan was organized under the command of a tall stern soldier named Kitchener, who began his first preparations to march into the interior about the time that Haig was putting on his first Hussar uniform. The campaign in Egypt drag, despite the zeal of the leader, in disgust, Kitchener returned to England to demand more men. The request was at last granted, and by December 1888, he was in command of a force of over 4,000 troops, of which number 750 were British regulars. Those were indeed the days of the little contemptibles, but right manfully they measured up to their tasks.

And in the British force was the seventh hustlers, including Hague. He was about to achieve his life's ambition, at last, to see real service as a British soldier. Hague was then a well-knit young man of twenty-seven. His outdoor exercise had browned and hardened him, until he looked thoroughly fit for the exacting job ahead. He was slightly under medium size, but tough and wiry to the last degree. His shoulders were broad, his head well set, and the bulging calves of his legs showed the born cavalrymen. He had fair, almost sandy hair, a close-cropped mustache, and steel-blue eyes which met honestly and unflinchingly the gaze of any with whom he talked. he looked then as in later years every inch a soldier and speedily won the confidence of his superiors the silent kitchener who was a keen judge of men soon took a fancy to this quiet young lieutenant a friendship sprang up between them that was destined to bear far-reaching fruit

the two men were both reserved in demeanour but in a different sort of way kitchener was taciturn and often inclined to growl haig was a man of few words and no intimates but greeted all with a pleasant smile. To this young Scotsman, Kitchener unbent more than was his want, and was actually seen shaking hands with him at parting on a later occasion, which all goes to show that even commanding officers can be human. On the march into the Sudan, Kitchener was in command of the Egyptian cavalry also. The Cadiz was exceedingly anxious that the rebellion be crushed speedily, and had made Kitchener the Sardar. One of the first actions in this campaign was the Battle of Gameza. Three brigades were sent to stormed the forts held by the dervishes, and a heavy and sustained fire from three sides soon drove the enemy out in disorder. Some five hundred dervishes were slain, and the remaining numbering

several thousand fled across the desert toward Handub, closely pursued by the British Hussars and the Egyptian cavalry. This was only the first of many such actions. Further and further south the rebels were driven. Kitchener pushed a light railroad across the desert as he advanced, so that he would not suffer from the same mistake which had ended Gordon. getting cut off from his base of supplies. And in the thick of it was Hague, learning the actual trade of war in these frequent brushes on the desert, riding hard by day, sleeping the sleep of exhaustion at night.

On more than one occasion the chief sent him on a special quest with important messages, and always Hague got through. He seemed to bear a charmed life. Lucky Hague, the men began to call him, and the title stuck. Entering the desert as a lieutenant, he was promoted to captain, then brevited a major. He was mentioned in the dispatches for bravery and won a medal from the Qadiv. All this was not done in a few short months.

The Egyptian campaign stretched into years, and at times must have seemed fearfully monotonous to these soldiers, so far removed from home comforts. Here is the way one writer describes the Sudan. The scenery it must be owned was monotonous, and yet not without haunting beauty. Mile on mile, hour on hour, we glided through sheer desert, yellow sand to right and left, now stretching away endlessly, now a valley between small,

broken hills. Sometimes the hills sloped away from us, then they closed in again. Now they are a diaphanous blue on the horizon, now soft purple as we ran under their flanks. But always they were steeped through and through with sun, hazy, immobile, silent. One of the culminating battles of the campaign was that of Atbarra, where the backbone of the dervish rebellion was broken. It is estimated that here 8,000 dervishes were killed, 2,000 wounded, and 2,000 made prisoners. The battle began with a bombardment by the field guns. Then came the British cavalry at a gallop.

The Camerons in front, the columns of Warwick's, Seaforce, and Lincoln's behind. Bugles, bagpipes, and the instruments of the native regiments made strange music as the army pressed forward intent on reaching the riverbank. The native stockades were reinforced with thorn bushes, but these were torn away by the men. men with their bare hands and their eagerness to advance. Hayes' regiment was one of the first to penetrate, but once past the stockade they encountered many of the defenders who put up a fierce fight.

Several British officers lost their lives, and it was due to Hayes' ability and presence of mind that he was not at the least severely wounded. Two dervishes attacked him at once from opposite sides. One aimed a slashing blow at his head with a scimitar. Haye quickly ducked, and the scimitar went crashing against the weapon of the other dervish. Hague's luck again. Others were not so fortunate. Never mind me, lads, go on, said Major Urquhart, with his dying breath. Go on, my company, and give it to them, gasped Captain Findlay as he lay.

At the head of the attacking party strode Piper Stuart, playing the march of the Cameron men, until five bullets laid him low. Truly the spirit of the fiery old covenanters was there. End of Hague, Part 1. Section 18 of Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers. This is a Libravox recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libravox.org. Recording by Stephanie Lee.

Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers by Jay Walker McSpadden. Haig, Part 2. The final battle of the Sudanese campaign, Khartoum, put the finishing touches to the rebellion and gave to Kitchener the title K of K, Kichener of Khartoum. this battle was noteworthy in employing the cavalry in an open charge across the plains against the dervish infantry it was just such a charge as a skilled horsemen such as haig would keenly enjoy despite the danger winston churchill the british minister thus describes it the heads of the squadrons wheeled slowly to the left and the lancers breaking into a trot began to cross the dervish front in a column of troops thereupon and with one accord the blue-clad men dropped on their knees and the lancers breaking into a trot began to cross the dervish front in a column of troops thereupon and with one accord the blue-clad men dropped on their knees and and there burst out a loud, crackling fire of musketry. It was hardly possible to miss such a target at such a range.

Horses and men fell at once. The only course was plain and welcome to all. The colonel, nearer than his regiment, already saw what lay behind the skirmishers. He ordered, Right wheel into line, to be sounded. The trumpet jerked out a shrill note, heard faintly above the trampling of the horses and the noise of the rifles. On the instant the troops swung round and locked up into a long galloping line. Two hundred and fifty yards away, the dark blue men were firing madly in a thin film of light

blue smoke. Their bullets struck the hard gravel into the air, and the troopers to shield their faces from the stinging dust, bowed their helmets forward, like the cuirassiers at Waterloo. The pace was fast and the distance short, yet before it was half covered, the whole aspect of the affair changed. A deep crease in the ground, a dry water course, a core, appeared where all had seemed smooth, level plain, and from it there sprang, with a suddenness of a pantomime effect and a high-pitched yell a dense white mass of men nearly as long as our front and about twelve deep a score of horsemen and a dozen bright flags rose as if by magic from the earth the lancers acknowledged the apparition only by an increase of pace in such a melee as then followed that trooper was lucky indeed who escaped without a scratch as a result of his bravery at at barra and cartoum haig's name was mentioned in the official dispatches he returned to england wearing the cadizabeth's name was mentioned in the official dispatches he returned to england wearing the cadd Steve's medal and the honorary title of Major. It is probable, however, that little more would

have been heard of him had not the South African War broken out soon after. It is the lot of military men to vegetate in days of peace. They live upon action. Hague was no exception to this rule. He welcomed New Fields. He went to South Africa as aid and right-hand man to Sir John French, the general whom he was to succeed in later years on the battlefields of France. In this war, Haig is not credited with many personal exploits. His was essentially a thinking part, yet he served as chief of staff in a series of minor but important operations about Colesburg, which prepared the way for Roberts's advances. As usual, Hague pinned his faith upon the cavalry. All his life he had made a close study of this arm of the service, and was of opinion that it was not utilized in modern

warfare nearly so much as it should be. He was a warm admirer of the American officer, J.E. B. Stewart, the Confederate General whose dashing tactics turned the scale in so many encounters. Now he tried the same strategy in the operations around Colesburg, and paved the way for later victory. Hague somewhat resembled another southern leader, Stonewall Jackson, in his piety. It was not ostentatious, but simply part and parcel of the man. Due to his Presbyterian training, Hague did not swear or gamble or dance all night. He was more apt to be found in his tent, went off duty, either reason.

or riding. They tell of him that one day at the officer's mess, after a particularly lively brush with the bowers, the quartermaster asked him if he had lost anything. Yes, replied Hague solemnly, my Bible. Not once did his countenance relax its gravity, as he met the grinning faces across the table. But despite their chafing, there was not a man there who did not respect the courage of his convictions, no less than the bravery of the man himself. almost daily he risked his life in these cavalry operations until the hague luck became a watchword the end of the south african war found hague promoted to acting adjutant general of the cavalry and soon after his return home he was made lieutenant-colon in command of the seventeenth lancers this was in nineteen o one about this time he paid a visit to germany then at peace and professing a warm affection for england one result of this visit was a letter which showed him possessed with wonderful powers of analysis and four foresight. He practically predicted the war that was to come. He summed up his observations in a long

letter to a friend which, in the light of events of the war, is little short of uncanny. It gave the German plan with a mastery of detail, shrewd prophecy, an earnest warning. The future commander-in-chief of the British armies in France was convinced of the certainty of the conflict and besought the authorities to make better preparation, but his warnings fell upon deaf years. It required thirteen years to demonstrate the truth of Hague's predictions, and then the blow fell. The Kaiser viewed his strong hosts and boasted that he would soon wipe out England's contemptible little army. He very nearly did so, and would certainly have succeeded, had it not been for the fighting spirit of such men as Hague. During the intervening years since the South African

campaign, he had risen by fairly rapid stages to Inspector General of the Cavalry in India, a situation which he handled with great skill for three years, then Major General and Lieutenant General. At the outbreak of the World War, he was hurriedly sent to France, under the command of Sir John French, his old leader in Africa. French was generosity itself in his praise of Hague in these early days of disaster. In the retreat from Moll, it was the skillful manner in which Sir Douglas Hague extricated his corpse from an exceptionally difficult position in the darkness of the night, that won his laudation. At the Esna on September 14, 1914, the action of the first corpse on this day, under the direction and command of Sir Douglas Haig, was of so skillful, bold, and decisive a character,

that he gained positions which alone have enabled me to maintain my position for more than three weeks of very severe fighting on the north bank of the river. In the first battle of Ipre, the chief honors of victory were again awarded to him. Throughout this trying period, Sir Douglas Haig, aided by his divisional commanders and his brigade commanders, held a line with marvelous tenacity and undaunted courage. Again and again, the generous French pays tribute to his friend, which, while deserved, reflects no less honor upon the speaker, he was big enough to share honor. It is not strange, therefore, when French was superseded, for strategic reasons, that Haig should have been given the chief command. The appointment, however, left most of the world frankly amazed.

Hague had come forward so quietly that few save those in official circles knew anything about him. It was nevertheless but a matter of weeks, possibly days, before a quiet confidence born of the man himself was manifest everywhere. One war correspondent who visited headquarters in the midst of the war's turmoil, thus describes his visit. The environment of the commander-in-chief is strongly suggestive of his conduct of the war. Before war became a thing of precise science, the headquarters of an army head seethed with all the picturesque detail so common to pictures of martial life couriers mounted on foam-flecked horses dashed to and fro the air was vibrant with action the fate of battle showed on the face of the humblest orderly

but to-day g hq as headquarters are familiarly known are totally different although army units have risen from thousands to millions of men and fields of operations stretch from sea to sea and more ammunition is expended in in a single engagement than was employed in entire wars of other days, absolute serenity prevails. It is only when your imagination conjures up the picture of flame and fury that lies beyond the horizon line that you get a thrill. An occasional motor-car driven by a soldier chauffeur chugs up the gravel road to the chateau, and from it emerge earnest-faced officers whose visits are usually brief. Neither time nor words are wasted when myriad lives hang in the balance and an empire is at stake. Inside and out, there is an atmosphere of quiet confidence,

born of unobtrusive efficiency. The same writer on Meeting Hague says, I found myself in a presence that, even without the slightest clue to its profession, would have unconsciously impressed itself as military. Dignity, distinction, and a gracious reserve mingle in his bearing. I have rarely seen a masculine face so handsome and yet so strong. His hair and mustache are fair,

and his clear, almost steely blue eyes search you, but not unkindly. His chest is broad and deep, yet scarcely broad enough for the rows of service and order ribbons that plant a mass of color against the background of khaki. Into every detail of daily life at General Headquarters, the commander's character is impressed. After lunch, for example, he spends an hour alone, and in this period of meditation the whole fateful panorama of the war passes before him. When it is over, the wire's splutter and the fierce life of the, the coming night, the army does not begin to fight until most people go to sleep, is ordained.

This finished, the brief period of respite, begins. Rain or shine, his favorite horse is brought up to the door, and he goes for a ride, usually accompanied by one or two young staff officers. I have seen Sir Douglas Hay galloping along those smooth French roads, heads up, eyes ahead, a memorable figure of grace and motion. He rides like those latter-day centaurs, the Australian ranger and the American cowboy. he seems part of his horse such was a man who did his full share in turning the german tide throughout the four long years of war he faced the enemy with a calm courage which if it ever wavered gave no outward sign and that is one reason why the little contemptibles grew and grew until they became a mighty barrier stretching across the pathway of the invader from sea to sea and saying with their allies you shall not pass important dates in haig's life eighteen sixty one june nineteenth douglas haig born eighteen eighty eighty eight enter brazenose college oxford eighteen eighty five joined seventh hussars british army

eighteen ninety eight served in sudan mentioned in dispatches and breveted major eighteen ninety nine served in south africa d a a g for cavalry then staff officer to general french nineteen o one lieutenant colonel commanding seventeenth lancers nineteen o three inspector general cavalry india nineteen o four major general 1910, Lieutenant General 1914, General, commanding First Army in France 1915, Commander-in-Chief of British Forces 1917, Field Marshal, 1919, created an Earl,

1928, January 30th, died in England. End of Hague, Part 2. Section 19 of Boy's Book of Famous Soldier This is a Libravox recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information, or to volunteer, please visit Libravox.org. Boys Book of Famous Soldiers by J. Walker McSpadden. Jofra, Part 1.

Shofra The Cooper's son who remade the armies of France. Let's name him Joseph, said Charles Joffre to his wife, as they viewed their first child with much pride. That doesn't seem to be enough, responded Madame Joffre. So unusual a baby deserve better treatment, she thought. Then how about Joseph Jacks? That's a good, sensible-sounding name.

That sounds well, she admitted. But still it lacks something. I'll tell you. Let's call him Joseph Jack's Cizier. Sounds like a soldier, said the father. Well, who knows? perhaps he'll be a general someday, Madam Jopha replied. So the infant, who lay quietly blinking on his natal day, January the 12th, 1852,

was to be known as Joseph to his friends, but took to weigh in his name for future reference was Césaire, as the French folk pronounced the name of the great Roman conqueror. Truly, there was nothing very auspicious in the start of Joseph Jophrer, his father was merely a cooper in a straggling hillside town of the Pyrenees in southern France, River Salters. But he was a good Cooper. His neighbours had a saying that is preserved to this day.

Barrels are as good as those made by good old Giles Jofra. The town itself had some 6,000 inhabitants and was situated on the River Argley, about nine miles from the city of Pyrpignan. The Jopra home was a very plain and humble dwelling, set alongside of the Cooper Shop. and neither better nor worse than his neighbours but the well-to-do workmen of to-day would turn up his nose at it nevertheless in this home were born eleven children the oldest of whom was the future marshal of france and the father continued to live there for thirty years or more it is related of him that even as a baby joseph never cried but endured his various troubles with silent stoicism as he grew older this trait of silence became ingrown it was allured to as jophrer's jophrushabye's

was taked eternity. But as a matter of fact, the gift of silence in him, as both a boy and man, did not indicate a sullen or unfriendly disposition. It was merely that he had his head in the clouds. He made a life job of thinking, like the seated statue by Rodin. As one result of this trace, little is reported concerning his childhood. No antidotes are related of him at all, except one doubtful story about a fight which he had with a schoolmate. The latter wanted him to stop and take part in some game. Jopra replied that he didn't have time. The other fellow came back with a taunt, and then Jopra waded in.

He did not have any chums for the same reason. Lack of time, and doubtless he missed a great deal out of boyhood from this fact. It is said that in the study hall he would erect great piles of books between himself and the next boy, so as not to be disturbed. Yet he didn't shine particularly as a student. He was simply busy, thinking. It was not until he was sent to college at Perpignan, that he really began to take an interest in books,

and his favourites were the more solid studies, algebra, descriptive geometry, surveying and draftsmanship. His bent, even at this early day, seemed to be civil engineering. The ambition of every middle-cast French home in those days was to send a son to the army, have him studied to become an officer.

Mama Jopre had not forgotten the seat, in her older son's name, and in a family conclave it was decided that he should be sent to Paris to try for the entrance examination in the École Polytechnique. Charles Joffre accompanied his son to the capital and left him in a private school. Like his son, the coup was a man of few words, but what he must have done at parting was to clap the boy on the shoulder and say, now, go to it. Joseph Joffre did. When he returned to his boyhood home only four years.

years later, he was wearing the shoulder straps of a lieutenant and had seen active service, but this is getting ahead of our story. There was really nothing else for him to do but go to it here in Paris. He was a big hulking lad of fifteen, with a bullet-head set upon a thick neck and broad shoulders, an awkward figure dressed in ill-fitting clothes. All his life, Joffre paid little attention to dress. Here, at the awkward age, he looked out of place with the well-dressed city boys. They tried to have fun at his expense, but he withdrew into his shell more than ever, and they soon learned to let him alone. It must have been a lonely life that young Jopha led, but we have no direct evidence that he ever felt lonely. His books and his daydreams seemed always to have made up for a lack of human companionship.

The other fellow is contented themselves with saying of him, he is too slow and methodical to amount to much. He did not indeed make a specially brilliant record in his entrance exams to the polytechnic, but his stumbling block was not mathematics or science, it was German. He could never abide the language. Joseph Joffre entered this famous military training school in 1869 at the age of 17. Within a few months the school course was broken up by the German invasion, and Joffre, with other cadets, promptly volunteered for service. Much to the delight of his family, he was made a second lieutenant attached to the engineering court.

His first practical field work was in throwing up fortifications in defence of Paris, but the Germans were not to be stopped by Jofra in their march on the French capital at this time. That was reserved for a later day and another war. The short but terrible conflict of 1870 over, Jopra returned to college and graduated therefrom in 1872 with the rank of full lieutenant. One of his classmates of this time was Ferdinand Forch. But if the two future marshals there became acquainted, no story of their meeting has come down to us. Schofre's first work at Fort Building had been so well done that immediately upon graduation the government set him to work.

The memory of the stinging German defeat was with them, stirring them into action. They wanted defences everywhere. Jopra was employed upon them at Paris, first. Monspellier and even in faraway Brittany, until he was disposed to grumble at his fate. This is all very fine, he said, but I don't want to spend the rest of my days building forts. I want to command troops and see some real fighting. It was the Caesar cropping up in him again. Without question, he was a born builder of fortifications. One day, the great Marshal McMahon came by on a tour inspection. He was much delighted with

the series of defenses he had built near Paris. I congratulate you, Monsieur le Captain, he said. By one sentence he had promoted the young lieutenant to a captaincy. It was about this time that a fall from his horse very nearly cut short his military career. He was so severely injured that the doctors feared that his mind was affected, and he was sent home for a complete rest. At home he did not complain. That was not his nature.

but he spent several days pacing back and forth in his little upper room. Then came a day when he burst into the downstairs room, where sat his parents, his face beaming, showing the strain which he had overcome. It's all right, Montpierre, he cried joffly. I have solved it, I will get well. What he had been doing was to set himself an abstruse and difficult problem in mathematics in order to see if his brain would respond. It did so, he solved it, and thus had no more fears as to his own.

own ultimate recovery. Another story told by his sister of these early army days shows further his power of mental abstraction. My brother was always lost in thought, says Madame Artus. No matter what he did, his thoughts never left him, once they caused his arrest as a spy. It seems that at Verbon, not far from his hometown of Rivers Altars, they were constructing a fort. Jofra sauntered over to inspect it.

He was clad in civilian. in dress, and he evinced so much interest in what was going on that the commanding officer promptly seized him for a suspicious character. Did my brother protest? Not he, but when they brought him before the military court, his Catalonian brogue was enough to convince anybody as to where he was born. Why didn't you tell him who you were, I asked. Too busy thinking about the fort was his reply. One other antidote of this time has come down to us and is worth repeating. his father bought a piece of farmland that was badly in need of ditching, in order to drain it properly during the wet season and irrigate it during the dry.

The sun sketched out a scheme of cross-trenches, but his father demurred. Then Joseph exploded. Trenches! What the devil! I know all about trenches! Trenches are my speciality! The great war of later years was to show whether or not this confidence in his own abilities was misplaced. By the year 1884, his reputation, as a builder of trenches and forts was firmly established. Although official promotion had come slowly,

when Admiral Corbeir telegraphed to the home office from the Isle of Formosa for a reliable officer to place in charge of this work, Joffre was sent. He spent nearly a year there, and it was a year of the hardest kind of work. He could get only indifferent help, so he worked early and late to make up the deficit. From there he was sent on similar work to the province of Tonkin, Indochina. here he practically rebuilt the town of anoy clearing and guttering the streets draining the neighboring marshes which had made the settlement a pest-hole and building permanent roads

the town of vitri was similarly cleaned up for these important lavers he received the first recognition in nearly ten years he was given official thanks and decorated with the cross of the legion of honor a fellow officer who knew him at this time says captain joffre was a solidly built prion calm and clear-headed with a firm walk and a hard blue eye he seldom smiled and he spoke still more rarely he never put punished except in extreme cases, and then hard. Natives feared him for his silence, but loved him for his justice. This portrait of him, about a quarter of a century before the Great War, is easily recognizable in the commander of the later day. End of Jopra, Part 1. Recording by Adam Tomkins. Section 20 of Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers.

This is a Librevox recording. All Livrevox recordings are in the public domain. information or to volunteer please visit librivox dot org boys book of famous soldiers by j walker mc spadden jophrer part two in eighteen ninety one he paralleled the career of general fox somewhat by taking a professor's chair he was appointed instructor in fortifications at the military school of fontainebleau where he remained for two years the work did not appeal to him particularly and he is spoken of there as a thorough teacher but not popular he had not mingled enough with others to get their point of view a welcome change from this was a summons from headquarters to go to timbuktu and help suppress a native rebellion it was all the more welcome as here for the first time he was promised a chance to do some real fighting timbuctoo was then being overrun by the tuaregs a tribe of terrible brigands called the veiled men of western sudan they had massacred the european settlers and ended by killing two french officers colonel bonnier and lieutenant potrault who had recently headed expeditions against them it was a wild and treacherous land and the relief expedition would scarcely have child's play of it Jopra went at it without the slightest misgiving.

Like many another soldier, he was a firm believer in luck, and here certainly the fates were proprietus. He set forth on his journey from Sago, on Christmas Day, 1893, commanding a force of 30 French and 300 natives. They crossed deadly swamps and dry, trackless deserts. There were some deaths by the wayside, but Jopra pushed on. His progress was slow as he stopped to make friends with native juries. chiefs and enlist their aid were possible.

At last they reached Timbuktu, only to find orders awaiting them to prepare for evacuation, in the face of the threatening to Arreg army. Jofre for once disobeyed orders, and decided instead to attack. He did so, and administered a crushing defeat to the brigands. He followed this up so thoroughly that the whole district was restored to peace. Then the soldier gave place to the engineer. He cleaned up the town, in another sense. and returned home.

Look was on my side, he said briefly after receiving official congratulations and the rank of lieutenant-colonel. I might have met the fate of Bonnier-O-Bautur, had the goddess of good fortune not attended me. But those who knew him believed that it was something more than luck. That Chofro was a fatalist is evinced by another instant of this march in Sudan. An insect's sting had poisoned his left eye so severely that the sight was. threatened. The doctor at the force advised him to wear a bandage. Jopra would not agree. I could not command my troops if I were blindfolded, he said. Then it must be blue glasses, said the doctor.

But an glass shops are not found in the desert, and Jopra went on without protection. A few days later a soldier received a packet from home and brought it to him. It was a pair of blue glasses. I told you I was in luck, said Jopra. However, he narrowly escaped blindness, and ever afterwards, A thin veil-like film covered the injured eye. One result of the Timbuktu campaign was an official report written by Jopra, and afterwards published in book form under the title, translated, Operations of the Jopra column before and after the capture of Timbuktu. The story is a straightforward soldierly narrative.

One French critic recently said of it, about of Jaffre's election to the French Academy, a rather unique honour, I defy anybody who knows the pleasure which words can give us in evoking things to deny that this report is a piece of most effective writing. With Joffre, who has no idea or desire to give us fine writing, the effect produced is that of reality itself. The names of the tribes he meets or describes take on a strange virtue, as if we heard them on the spot. Even the French officer's names scattered over a narrative from which all attempt at picturesqueness is banished, produced. picturesqueness. On the whole, he is a primitive, and with all the primitive simple charm and power.

After the Sudanese adventure came, a trip to Madagascar. This time, more for constructing, from which it seemed that he could never escape. The problem down there was a vectatious one, due to a do-nothing policy of a predecessor. Things were in bad shape. Shofaro arrived after a long sea voyage, gave one look around, and then things began to happen. If men are responsible, responsible for this order, he said centeniously, it is easy to suppose that men can restore the needed order, and the forts and barrackses went up in record time. We never expected to see that job done, reports one soldier.

The thing was so old that he had a cobwebs over it, when Joffre took hold it went up by magic. They concocted another saying about him, down in the distant island, which was, There goes old man's system. At another time, an officer, remarked, Schofre wants what he wants when he wants it, and furthermore he knows why he wants it. In 1901 at the century's turn, and when he was rounding off his half-century, his long-delayed promotions

began to arrive. He was made Brigadier General, and henceforth began to force rapidly to the front. One reason for his slow advancement was that he was no politician or time server. He never pushed himself forward, and so much work of his was done in the remote promises that the general staff hardly knew him at all. We remember, too, that he had made no friends at school, who would follow his career or speak a good word for him in official ears. When he did, at last receive recognition, it was upon absolute merit, but when he reached the general staff, the remark was frequently heard, who is the Schofre? We never heard of him. It was not long, however, before he made his presence felt in Paris official circles.

They came to depend more and more upon this stocky, hard-headed Gascon and his opinions. He never minced words and he went to the root of the matter. In 1911, when the need was universally felt of a thorough reorganization of the French army, a much-needed house-cleaning, they cast about for some man big enough for the job. In a conference, General Powell, a warm adherent of Jopra, shook his single good fist in the face. of the staff officers, and exclaimed, there is only one band who can do the job. So they sent for Jopra,

and made him chief of the general staff, with full power to reorganise. It was well for France that they did so, and fortunate that he had three full years of work before the blow fell, and the invaders were again at their gates. No German could be more thorough than Jophrah, said one officer, for no lasting results can be obtained without the utmost care.

he has limitless patience, joined with a wonderful breadth of view. His methods resemble the head of a great business. In his intricate work of reconstructing the army, he revealed another and surprising side to his nature. From being cold and aloof, he showed a human sympathy for his men, down to the last private. It was as though the man who had held himself aloof from the intimates

wanted to take the whole French army into his heart, and the men responded with an affection, and confidence which were later to produce the fine results of leadership in the war. He was no longer Geoffrey the Silent, but Papa Geoffrey. Says one writer, Jopre is a soldier of democracy. That is why he sets America aflame with enthusiasm, as he did France. His thickest frame, firmly knit and vigorous,

his clear eyes which observe you from beneath bushy eyebrows, his firm and kindly mouth, his bristling mustache, the simplicity of his manners, his clean-cut reserved language, all that goes to show there is nothing in him of bluster and affectation. He is truly Papa Jopra, the father and even the grandfather of the Pollyus. It is the Pollyne himself beneath the white panache of this unique Marshal of France. When in 1914 the Germans struck, they anticipated an easy march upon Paris, such as that of forty years before. This time a different Schofler stood in their path, in place of the young lieutenant, not yet out of his teens,

they found a grizzle veteran who matched them with their methods as thoroughgoing as their own, but who preferred to control his men with love rather than fear. Your French soldiers are brave, said one German officer contemptuously, but as for discipline, bah, our legions will brush you aside. Our men may not have the machine-like discipline that you affect, was the French officer's reply, but we replace it with something far better, a love of country that will cause us to sacrifice

the last drop of blood. But your great generals, where are they? asked the other. They will make themselves felt in due time. At their head stands one who is yet to fight his first great battle, yet I advise you not to arouse him. The world knows the rest of the story of that mighty invasion, how the black invading line curved onward and inward until it threw its shadow, upon Paris. Then, when the final blow was about to be struck, the coup de grace, as the Germans

firmly believed, up from the south came the army of Jopre. It had retreated and retreated until the moment for its counter-blow. Now, with the precision of a sledgehammer, it struck and struck again, until a surprised enemy turned and fell back. Paris was saved. In the gallery of the world's great soldiers, the homely, kindly figure of Jopre may well find place. He sees a seems to occupy a niche quite by himself. He is not spectacular, nor a hero, but a simple man among men whose results are built upon a lifetime of patient endeavour. He is Rodin's statue of the thinker come to life. Important dates in Geoffrey's life. 1852. January the 12th, Joseph Jacques Cusair Geoffrey, born. 1867, entered Preparatory Military School, Paris.

entered Polytechnic Academy. 1870, volunteered an army to defend Paris against perussians. 1870, commissioned second lieutenant. 1876, commissioned captain for work on fortifications. 1884, sent to Formosa to construct barracks and trenches. 1885, decorated Legion of Honor Tonkin. 1891, Professor in Military School.

Fontainebleau. 1893, sent to Madagascar on construction work. 1894, headed expedition to Timbuktu. 1901, Brigadier General. 1911, Chief of General Staff. 1914, Commander-in-Chief, French Army, and 1916, the Marshal of France. End of Geoffre Part 2. Recording by Adam Tompkins.

soldiers. This is a Libravox recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libravox.org. Recording by Becky Cook. Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers by Jay Walker McSpaden. Fosh, Part 1. Fosh, the schoolmaster in war. To wait until one is 63 years old before even smelling patter, and then to find oneself in command the greatest allied army that the world has ever seen, such is the remarkable story of the French general Ferdinand Fosch. His life, like that of more than one famous soldier, is a bundle of paradoxes or contradictions, but prove once again that truth is stranger than fiction. Those of us who know and love Dumas' swash-buckling hero D'Artagnan will remember that he was a gascon, and always

spoiling for a fight. Fosch was another Gascan who passed three score of his life peacefully enough, but when he did get into the fight at last, it was a corker. The Gascany of France and Spain, Fort is in the Pyrene separating the two countries, has produced some famous men, other than Fosch and D'Artagnan. In the fighting days of the Republic and the First Empire, it gave to France Murat, Marbeau, and Bessers. From Gascany at a later date, Kempapa Joufrey to do his sturdy bit in saving France. The ancestral home of the Fosh family is on the Guran River, among the foothills of the Pyrenees. Here the river is hardly more than a trout stream, threading its way down the wooded slopes,

or murmuring through the valleys. It is just such a spot as any boy would like to call home. The father of Ferdinand Fosch had been born here during the days of the First Empire, when the fame of the Corsican was ringing around the world, and had constantly been born in consequently been christened Napoleon. He married the daughter of one of Bonaparte's officers, Colonel Dupre, and the family were naturally ardent, loyalist. De Napoleon Fosch and Sophie Dupre were born four children, a daughter and three sons, and the second son was christened Ferdinand. The father at this time had entered the French Civil Service,

and in 1851 when Ferdinand was born, was at Tarb in the Upper Pyrenees as Secretary of the Prefecture. the family name of fosh does not sound french and as pronounced in gascony with a hard guttural sound it is more like german it would seem to indicate that in an earlier day the ancestors that lived on the rhine up in northern france they have softened the name to sound like fush the meaning of the name is said to be fire and certainly the germans kindled a greater fire than they could quench when their invasion produced the quiet leader with a flaming name Napoleon Fosch did not rise very high in his official positions. His work was chiefly clerical, and caused him to remove from one town to another. He did not want to lose sight of his boys, by placing them in an academy, but kept them with him, placing them in first one public school, and then another as he was compelled to move. The first school that Ferdinand attended was the old college at Tarb, where he remained until ten or eleven years old.

the family home at valentine in the country was always visited in the summer and other holiday seasons and here the youngsters had many a romp their father on his infrequent visits home would enter into the sport like one of them a favorite excursion was up one of the neighboring hills to a cliff known as the bou de puix which commanded a wonderful view up and down the valley here they would take their lunch and feel like true mountaineers from tarb the family moved to polinac where napoleon foch was public treasurer after ferdinand and his brothers that attended the school at this place for a time they were moved to the town of rudis and another school in these early days fash was on par with the average schoolboy neither better nor worse if local records are to be believed he did however win an honorable mention at tarb for good work in the general course consisting of geography history latin and theology at twelve he began to show a decided bent for mathematics that scene a quenon of the successful soldier he had also developed into a great reader but preferred history to works of fiction one of his chief military heroes was quite naturally napoleon and he must have taken part in imagination with the charge of the old guard at waterloo or thrilled at the tale of austerlitz but never in the wildest flights of his imagination could he have dreamed of commanding a far greater army than was ever assembled under the eagles of napoleon in eighteen sixty seven at the age of sixteen another change came in his schooling his father was stationed at st itin near leon and Ferdinand was entered at St. Michael, a Jesuit college nearby.

Here he studied for his university examinations, and made his choice of a life profession, and it is not strange to note that he decided to be a soldier. The choice made his future studies, as is the way in French colleges, were planned to follow specialized lines. It was not alone necessary to choose the army, for example. One must elect a certain branch of the army. Fosh's aptitude at mathematics led him to take him to take. take up the artillery. The principal school of this branch of the service was the Ecole Polytechnique at Paris, but a stiff entrance examination was required here. So Fosch decided to do preliminary work

at St. Clement's College Mets, a training program with a high reputation. In those days, the city and fortress of Mets were on French soil. This was just before the short but memorable Franco-Prussian war, but already the air was rife with rumors of an impending conflict. The French, however, were undisturbed. They thought, and expressed the open opinion, that it would be fought out on the other side of the Rhine, and that the peace terms would be dictated in Berlin. Metz.

How much history does that name suggest in the light of the Great War? If the young artillery student could have foreseen the backward and forward swing of the pendulum, as exemplified in that ancient city, how his blood would have quickened. The summer of 1870 arrived, ferdinand fosch a well-grown lad of nineteen went home to sainte deen on his first vacation it had been his first year away from home and there must have been a joyful reunion but over the vacation season hung a war-cloud in the middle of july france was persuaded to declare war her first great clash with germany was on the news however was not displeasing to ferdinand he had supreme confidence in the ability of the trained french army to subdue the prussian militia All France had been soundly fooled as to the extent of the German preparedness. Fosh thought of Mets as the starting point of a war which was to wage its victorious course eastward,

but the reverse soon proved to be the case. From Mets the Germans drove westward into France. The school at St. Clement was transformed into a military hospital. Ferdinand remained at home watching the turn of events with surprised eyes. When the defeat at Sadan came in September, it seemed to him like the end of the end of the of the world. Then came the frantic call from Paris for new troops. Young Fosh was one of the first to respond to this appeal. He could do his bit at any weight, and once the second army was assembled, the invader would see. But alas, he was destined to do no fighting. For four months he remained

with his regiment, a high private in the rear ranks, doing drill and garrison duty until peace was declared. The war was over. France had concluded a shameful peace, but one that was forced upon her. This sort of war had brought bitter disillusionment to a host of French boys, and they always thought in their hearts the day of reckoning which must come later on, and hoped they would be alive to see it. Such must have been the dream of Fosh, the sleeping firebrand. For the present, there is nothing for it but to doff his uniform and take up his studies again. The College of St. Clement had ceased to be a hospital and again was full of classrooms. But over the old fort floated a strange flag, the black, white, and red emblem of Germany,

and German officers strutted everywhere on the streets. The French signs over the shops and on the street corners were rapidly disappearing. Soon came an official order from Berlin for bidding the teaching of French in the schools of Alsace and Lorraine. The work of benevolent assimilation was begun. Fosh privately shook his fist at the broad backs of the swaggering conquers, and set to work at his studies with renewed Vim. French or German, the old Jesuit college was going to aid him in his task of becoming a soldier, and then his country would have one more recruit at any rate.

We are not surprised to find, therefore, that he passed his entrance examinations with flying colors, and in November 1871 donned his uniform as a cadet at the A-Col of Polytechnique. This building, like the one at the Met, still bore evidences of the recent war. During the siege of Paris it had been used as a hospital, and in the Civil War which followed the peace, when the empire was overthrown, it had been through severe fighting. Shellholes were still to be seen in its roofs and walls. But such scars seemed to make it still more what it was in name, a military school. Fosh already felt like a soldier. Among Fosch's fellow students were two others who were destined to play a part in the World War. One was a cadet named Rufé, who was to be a destined to become a general in command of the third army of France during 1914. The other was a short, stocky fellow, who came from the Gaskin country near Fosh's home, and who had been more fortunate than he in seeing some actual fighting during the recent war. He had been in command of a battery of guns during the siege of Paris, and had also taken a physical part in the fighting. Fosh looked at

this strapping cadet, and then at his own much slighter frame, and a feeling akin to envy came over him, as he may have said to himself, If only I could have got into it like that fellow Jaffray. End of Fosch, part one, recording by Becky Cook. Section 22 of Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers. This is the Libervox recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit

Libravox.org. Recording by Becky Cook. Boys Book of Famous Soldiers by Jay Walker-Mixbaden. Fosch, part two. During the second year of his work here in 1873, it was announced that, as the Army was short of officers, the course would be shortened for the more advanced students so that they could receive their commissions as soon as possible. Among the students who were granted this honor were Chafray and Fosh, the former choosing

the engineers, and the latter the artillery. As a special aid in completing his course, Fosh secured a transfer to the Artillery School at Fountain Blow. Here he felt more at home and in more congenial surroundings. He was out of the city with its clamor and clang. Always a country boy at heart, he recalled his beloved San Tietien in these parks and hills. He had always been fond of horseback riding, and now he had full opportunity of perfecting himself in this art. The daily canters kept his body sound, his brain clear. He came out third in his classes, a highly creditable mark, and received his commission as a sub-lutonet. He was a soldier at last. As reword for his scholarship, he was informed that he might

choose any post where he would prefer to be stationed. He selected Tarb, his birthplace, and town nearest his home. Truly, the fates were kind. Two years were spent with the garrison at Tarb in a round of regimental duties. Then the routine began to pile upon him. He wanted something approaching active service. He had perfected himself in artillery maneuvers, and during his four months as a volunteer in the war he had drilled in the infantry, so he now applied for transfer to the third branch, the cavalry. His love of horses may also have influenced this desire. He received the transfer and spent a year at the cavalry school at Salmer. On completing this course he was given a commissionist captain and placed in command of a field battery in Brittany. This transfer marked the beginning of a new

era of his life, from being a Gaskin, who was now about to become a Briton. He spent so many years of his life in brittany that in later years he called his soldiers my brother britons another reason for his change of sentiment was his fortunate marriage to a lady whom he met at ren where his regiment was stationed mademoiselle julie her name means welcome and to the lonely and possibly home-sick soldier her advent must have been welcome indeed he bought a home at finisterre that wild rocky well wooded cape which jets out into the at atlantic it was an old manor house set in the midst of an estate which from the outset spilled the world home for him there were long sloping meadow lands flanked by stately trees and hills beyond the old house itself with its sombre gray walls and quaint dormer windows seemed always to have nestled here such an idyllic setting a way out on the most sheltered spot of france fire removed from the tramp of an invader or the other changes which came to the central provinces of france while pleasant in the extreme was hardly the fitting environment to produce a soldier a real fighting man it might produce a fine preacher or artist or poet or farmer but not likely a famous general but fosh did not yield to the blandishments of his new home to the extent of vegetating here his active mind was looking continually forward he could not rest content with mediocrity or a merely comfortable living do what you want come what may was his guiding motto he applied for admission to the equil de guerre a higher school recently established for staff officers but admission to its walls came by favoritism or political pool and it was many months eighteen eighty five before he gained admission

the course which he took required two years to complete years which kept him away from home but were worth while he graduated a sport in a large class and better still had made some valuable acquaintances here His professors and classmates soon recognized in this quiet, studious artillery captain, a man worth watching, one who would do an emergency. The next eight or ten years were filled with the usual routine of an army officer in peacetimes. He was transferred from one post to another for periods of two or three years, but always it was an active field service which he liked, rather than the routine of office duty. He established a brilliant reputation for horsemanship and cavalry tactics, which later were to be of advantage. But still he had never seen actual warfare, nor heard the bullets whizz about his head. He was an academic soldier, and seemed destined to remain one for the rest of his natural life when, in 1895, he was appointed assistant professor of military history and strategy in the

Ecole de Guerre, the college from which he had last graduated a few years before. The faculty had not forgotten him. It was an honor in a way, but Fosh doubtless debated long before he accepted it. It meant they giving up of his freedom of his broad outdoors. He was a major by this time, and after a few years of lecturing he was made full professor with the rank of lieutenant-colonel. The work in his classes was highly important. This being a post-graduate school, the men to whom he lectured were not cadets but trained soldiers, many of them seasoned veterans. They would have instantly detected any flaw in his teaching. The impress which this college professor then made upon the future heads that the French army was destined to have a profound and far-reaching effect.

In the years to come, when France and the civilized world was in search of a leader big enough to measure up to the crisis, they turned to this quiet college professor. Fosch won his position as the most gifted and original of the professors in the École de Guerre by no trick or sensational methods. He spoke in an even, almost monotonous voice, using few gestures. But his speech was clear-cut and precise. He reminded his heroes of a scientist dissecting a foreign body, as he expounded the clash of armies or the turning points of battle. He had, in fact, precise knowledge of an event in which he had never actually participated. He had analyzed war, and had resolved it into its component parts as though it were heated in a test tube.

And how exact were his theories, later events were to show. In 1901, Fos returned for a time to act of service, being given command of the 29th Regiment, Alon, after the classroom routine this change was indeed welcome a few months later we find him stationed again in his beloved brittany with the rank of colonel but promotion had come slowly during these years he prepared his class lectures for a book publication forming two volumes the first being his sense celebrated principles of war and the second the conduct of war in these books who proved himself a master of terse epigrammatic statement there did not seem to be a superfluous word in them They were favorably received by military critics everywhere, and still further established his reputation. But it was not until 1907 when Fosh was 56 that he at last received the rank of brigadier-general with an assignment to the general staff at Paris. With this belated appointment, it seemed that the tale of his military career was told. Fate had even more than one surprise in store. Even then,

however. The position as the head, or director-general of the Ecole de Guerre was vacant. A keen rivalry arose among several generals for the appointment, but Fosh did not present his name. He belonged to the wrong party, the clerical or church party, and the anti-clericals were then in power. Clemenceau was Premier, this being his first term. One day Fosch was surprised by being invited to dine with the Premier. When he arrived, he was still further surprised to note that he was the only guest. The Tiger did not broach the subject of the invitation until the coffee cups were cleared away. then he said abruptly, and apropos of nothing that had gone before,

"'I have some news for you, General. You are appointed director of the École de Gere.' "'But I am not a candidate, sir,' replied Fosh, taken completely by surprise. "'Possibly not,' replied the Premier dryly. "'But you are appointed, nevertheless, and I am sure you will do good work there.' "'I thank you for the honour,' said Fosh, with some embarrassment. "'But aren't there difficulties?' I am a churchman, you know. Clemenceau left.

Probably you are not aware, continued Fosh finding it difficult to proceed, that one of my brothers is a Jesuit. Clemenceau left again. I know all about it, and I don't care a rap, he answered. One general, or rather, Monsieur le Directors, you may consider yourself appointed, Jesuit or no Jesuit.

We need men of your stamp to train up officers in our army. fash held this responsible position for several years just preceding the great war whether he saw it or not lowering upon their horizon he bent every effort to making the command of the french army fit ready for any emergency he had never forgotten the dreadful invasion of his boyhood days with him the teaching of preparedness was almost as sacred as religion and when the great war at last descended fosh was like a shining sword in its path one that had never been allowed to rust in its scathe was a great war at last descended fash was like a shining sword in its path one that had never been allowed to rest in its The story of his dogged perseverance and his brilliant strategy has been fully told in the annals of war. Two or three strongly characteristic points yet demand mention. He was a firm believer in the element of surprise. He outguessed the enemy, and he never knew when he was beaten. The weaker we are, the more important it is for us to attack, is one of his famous sayings. At the Battle of the Marne, when his core was hard-pressed at a critical salient, he told

telegraphed Jafrey. My left flank has been driven in. My right flank has been driven in. Consequently, nothing remains but for me to attack with my center. And attack he did, hurling back the surprised Teutants and aiding Jafrey to turn the invader and save Paris. Fosch, in brief, is a soldier of the intellectual type. His headquarters, when at last he made Marshal of France and Generalissimo of the Allied forces, resembled a classroom more nearly than the center of a vast and far-reaching activity. There is no bustle, no confusion. Orderlies poured over papers and presented reports quietly. The commander looked over them with keen a praising glance, then issued orders without raising his voice. But that very quietness and precision pronounced the doom of Germany.

It was a triumph of a brute force. If in America we have had a schoolmaster in politics, the French have had a schoolmaster in war, one who taught that. Hanna lesson. Important dates in Fosha's life. 1851, October 2nd, Ferdinand Fosch born. 1862, entered school, Tarb, France. 1867. Into Jesuit College of St. Michael.

1870, volunteered in the Franco-Pression War but saw no service. 1871. Entered the Polytechnic Academy. 1873 2nd Lieutenant in Artillery 1878 Captain Mary Julesille bienvenot

1885 Entered Ecole de Guerre a college for staff officers 1891 Major in Artillery 1900 Lieutenant Colonel Professor in the Ecole de Guerre

1905 Director of the Ecole de Guerre 1914 General in Command 12th 20th Corps. 1917, Chief of General Staff. 1918, Commander-in-Chief of Allied Forces.

1918, Marshal of France. End of Fosch part two, recording by Becky Cook. Section 23 of Boys' Book of Famous Soldiers. This is a Libervox recording. All Libervox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer,

please visit Librevox.org. Recording by Cancamangus Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers by Jay Walker McSpadden Purging, Part 1 Purging, the leader of America's biggest army It was a historic moment on that June day in the third year of the World War On the landing stage at the French Harbor of Boulogne

was drawn up a company of French soldiers who looked eagerly at the approaching steamer. They were not dress parade soldiers nor smart cadets, only battle-scarred veterans home from the trenches, with a tired look of war in their eyes. For three years they had been hoping and praying that the Americans would come, and here they were at last. As the steamer slowly approached the dock, a small group of officers might be discerned, looking as eagerly landward as the men on shore had sought them out. in the center of this group stood a man in the uniform of a general in the united states army there was however little to distinguish his dress from that of his staff except the marks of rank on his collar and the service ribbons across his breast

to those who could read the insignia they spelled many days of arduous duty in places far removed america was sending a season to soldier one tried out as by fire the man's face was seemed from exposure to the suns of the tropics and the sands of the desert but his dark eyes glowed with the untamable fire of youth he was full six feet in height straight broad-shouldered and muscular the well-formed legs betrayed the old-time cavalryman the alert poise of the man showed a nature constantly on guard against surprise the typical soldier in action such was general purging when he set foot on foreign shore at the head of an american army the first time in history that our soldiers had ever served on european soil america was at last repaying to france her debt of gratitude for aid received nearly a century and a half earlier and it was an alsatian by descent who could now say lafayette we come who was this man who had been selected for so important a task the eyes of the whole world were upon him when he reached france his was a task of tremendous difficulties and a single slip on his part would have brought shame upon his country no less than upon himself that he was to succeed and to win the official thanks of congress are now matters of history the story of his wonderful campaign against the best that germany could send against him is also an oft-told story but the rise of the man himself to such commanding position is a tale not so familiar yet none the less interesting the great-grandfather of general pershing was an emigrant from alsace fleeing as a boy from the military service of the teutans he worked his way across the baltimore and not long thereafter volunteered to fight in the american revolution

His was the spirit of freedom. He fled to escape a service that was hateful because of represented tyranny, but was glad to serve in the cause of liberty. The original family name was Fierching, but was soon shortened to its present form. 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. 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. Now as the railroads pushed still further west, he went with them as Section Foreman, after first persuading an attractive Nashville girl, Ann Thompson, to go with him as his wife. Their honeymoon was spent among the hardships of a construction camp in Missouri, and here at La Claid, in a very imprimitive house, John Joseph Purging was born, September 13, 1860. The boy inherited a sturdy frame and a love of freedom from both sides of the family.

His mother had come of a race quite as good as that of his father. They were honest, law-abiding, God-fearing people, who saw to it that John and the other eight children who followed. were reared soberly and strictly. The Bible lay on the center table, and the willow switch hung conveniently behind the door. After the line of railroad was completed, upon which the father had worked, he came to La Claid and invested his savings in a small general store.

It proved a profitable venture. It was the only one in town, and Pershing's reputation for square dealing brought him many customers. A neighbor pays him this tribute. John F. Pershing was a man of commanding presence. He was a great family man and loved his family devotedly. He was not lax and ruled his family well. The Persian family were zealous church people. John F. Pershing was the Sunday school superintendent of the Methodist Church all the years he lived here.

Every Sunday you could see him making his way to church with John on one side and Jim on the other, Mrs. Pershing and the girls following along. john f pershing was a strong union man and although local feeling ran high between the north and the south he retained the esteem of his neighbors he had one or two close calls from the bushwhackers as roving rangers were called but his family escaped harm at times during the war he was entrusted with funds by various other families and acted as a sort of local bank after the war he was postmaster the close of the war found the younger john a stocky boy of five He began to attend the village school and to take an active part in the boyish sports of a small town. There was always plenty to do, whether of work or play, one of his boyhood chums writes, John Pershing was a clean, straight, well-behaved young fellow. He never was permitted to loaf around on the streets.

Nobody jumped on him, and he didn't jump on anybody. He attended strictly to his own business. He had his lessons when he went to class. He was not a big talker. He said a lot in a few words, and didn't try to cut any swell. He was a hard student. He was not brilliant, but firm, solid, and would hang on to the very last. We used to study our lessons together evenings.

About 9.30 or 10 o'clock, I'd say, John, how are you coming? Pretty stubborn. Better go to bed, hadn't we? No, Charlie, I'm going to work this out. Another schoolmate gives us a more human picture. picture. As a boy, Pershing was not unlike thousands of other boys his age, enjoying the same pleasures in games as his other boy could companions. He knew the best places to shoot squirrels

or quail, and knew it to find the hazel or hickory nuts. He knew, too, where the coolest and deepest swimming pools in the locust, muddy, or turkey creeks were. Many a time we went swimming together in Pratt's pond. About this time, Pershing's father added to his other ventures the purchase of a farm near La Claid, and the family moved out there. Then there was indeed plenty of work to do. The chores often began before sunup, and lasted till after dark, and the children were lucky to find time for schooling during the late fall and winter months. John, however, kept doggedly at it, and managed to get a fair, common school education. When he was barely in his teens, his first set task was given to him, to teach in a Negro school. This school had been

established after the war ended, but the teacher had gone, and no one else seemed available for the job. John was sober and studious, and besides was so well-grown for his age that they banked on his ability to lick any Negro boy that got obstreperous. He succeeded sufficiently in this venture to cause him to take up teaching regularly in white schools, with a view to paying for his education. He wanted to study law, and his parents encouraged the idea. His work in these country schools was invaluable to him in teaching him how to govern others. A former pupil of his rights, though he never sought a quarrel, young Pershing was known as a game fighter, who never acknowledged the feat. One day at Prairie Mound, at the noon hour, a big farmer with red sideburns rode up to

the schoolhouse with a revolver in his hand. Pershing had whipped one of the farmer's children, and the enraged parent intended to give the young schoolmaster a flogging. I remember how he rode up cursing before all the children in the schoolyard, and how another boy and I ran down a gully because we were afraid. We peaked over the edge, though, and heard Pershing tell the farmer to put up his gun, get down off his horse, and fight like a man. The farmer got down and John stripped off his coat. He was only a boy of 17 or 18 and slender, but he thrashed the old farmer soundly. And I have hated red sideburns ever since. After several terms of country school teaching, young Pershing saved up enough money to enter the state

normal school at Kirksville, Missouri. One of his sisters went with him. He remained there for two terms, doing his usual good study work, but was still dissatisfied. He wanted to get a better education. About this time, he happened to notice an announcement of a competitive examination in his district for an entrance to West Point. The soldiering side did not appeal to him, but the school side did. I wouldn't stay in the army, he remarked to a friend. There won't be a gun fired in the world for a hundred years, I guess. If there isn't, I'll study law, but I wanted education, and now I see how I can get it. His mother was by no means sold on the idea of his becoming a soldier either, and it was only when he assured her that there wouldn't be a gun fired in a hundred

years that she finally consented. If she could have looked ahead to his future career and final part in the greatest war the world has ever known, one wonders what her emotions would have been. Pershing passed his entrance examination by a narrow margin and then entered a training school at Highland Falls, New York, for tutoring in certain deficient branches. At last, in June 1882, when he was just rounding his 22nd year, he became a freshman in the Great Academy on the Hudson. The young plebe from the West speedily fell in love with the institution and all that it represented. He found the soldier life awakening in him, along with his desire for a good education. education. Four happy years were spent there, and while he didn't shine, being number 30 in a class of 77, his all-around qualities made him many friends among both faculty and students. He was made ranking cadet captain in his senior year and chosen class president. 25 years later, writing from clear around the world at Manila to his class at a reunion, he gives a long, breezy account of his experience there, from which we have space to quote only a

few sentences. This brings up a period of West Point life whose vivid impressions will be the last to fade. Marching into camp, piling bedding, policing company streets for logs or wood carelessly dropped by upperclassmen, pillow fights at tattoo with Marcus Miller, saber-drawn, marching up and down, superintending the plebe class, policing up feathers from the general parade, light artillery drills, double-timing around old Fort Clinton at morning squad drill. "'Wiley Bean in the sad fate of his searsucker coat, "'midnight dragging, and the whole summer full of events "'can only be mentioned in passing.

"'No one can ever forget his first guard tour "'with all its preparation and perspiration. "'I got along all right during the day, "'but at night on the color line my troubles began. "'Of course I was scared beyond the point "'of properly applying any of my orders. "'A few minutes after taps, "' ghosts of all sorts began to appear from all directions.

I selected a particularly bold one and challenged according to orders. Halt! Who comes there? At that the ghost stood still in all its tracks. I then said, Halt, who stands there? Whereupon the ghost, who is carrying a chair, sat down. When I promptly said, Halt, who sits there? The career of 86 at West Point was in many respects remarkable. There were no cliques, no dissensions, and personal prejudices or selfishness, if any existed never came to the surface. From the very day we entered, the class as a unit has always

stood for the very best traditions of West Point. End of Pershing, Part 1. Recording by Cancamangis Section 24 of Boy's Book of Famous Soldiers. This is a Libervox recording. All Libervox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit org recording by cancamangus boys book of famous soldiers by j walker mcspadden pershing part two while pershing was still in west point the indian chief geronimo was making trouble in the southwest for several years he led a band of outlaw braves who terrorized the southern border general crook was sent in pursuit of him and afterwards General Miles took up the chase. Finally, in August 1886, the chief and his followers were rounded up.

Pershing graduated in the spring of this year, with the usual rank given to graduates, second lieutenant, and was immediately assigned to duty under Miles. He had an inconspicuous part in the capture, but the next year in the special maneuvers he was personally complimented by the general for marching his troops with a packed train of 140 mules in 46 hours, and bringing in every animal in good condition. Doubtless his early experience with the Missouri brand of mule aided him. Thereafter, for the next five years, Pershing's life was that of a plainsman. He was successively at Fort Bayard, Fort Stanton, and Fort Wingate,

all in New Mexico, in the center of troubled country. In 1890 he was shifted north, to take the field against the Sioux Indians in South Dakota, and in the Battle of Wounded Knee, he had a considerable taste of burnt powder, where the tribe that had massacred General Custer and his band was practically wiped out. The next year he was stationed at Fort Niagara-Brara,

in Nebraska, in command of the Sioux Indian scouts. This rapid summary of a busy and adventurous life on the plains does not convey any idea of its many activities, but it was an exceedingly valuable period of training to the young officer. He was finding himself, and learning something of the inner art of military science that he was later to put to such good use. Here is the opinion of an officer who was Persian senior

in the 6th Cavalry by 6 years, all of them spent in the Apache country. In those days, when a youngster joined a regiment, he was not expected to express himself on military matters until he had some little experience. But there was a certain something in Pershing's appearance and manner which made him an exception to the rule. Within a very short time after he came to the post,

a senior officer would turn to him and say, Pershing, what do you think of this? And his opinion was such that we always listened to it. He was quiet, unobtrusive in his opinions, but when asked he always went to the meat of a question in a few words. From the first he had responsible duties thrown. on him. We all learned to respect and like him. He was genial and full of fun. No matter what the work or what the play he always took a willing and leading part. He worked hard and he played hard,

but whenever he had worked to do, he never let play interfere with it. His experiences in the Wild West, and it was the Wild West in those days, cannot be passed over without relating one typical anecdote. Three cattle rustlers, white men, had gotten into a fight with a fight with the Zuni Indians, who caught them driving off some cattle. Three of the red men were killed before the outlaws were finally surrounded in a lonely cabin. Word was sent of their predicament to the nearest fort, and Lieutenant Pershing was sent with a small detachment to their rescue. He rode straight up to the Zuni chief, who was now on the warpath, and told him he must call off his braves, that the United States government

would punish these men. The chief finally grunted assent, and Pershing strode forward alone into the clearing and approached the cabin. At any time a shot might have come out, but disregarding his own danger he went on, pushed the door open, and found himself looking into the muzzles of three guns. A single false move on his part would probably have ended him, but he did not waver. He folded his arms and said quietly, Well, boys, I've come to get you. The outlaws laughed noisily and swore by way of reply. You might as well come along, he went off. without raising his voice. My manner posted all around this cabin. More profanity,

but the men at last consented to go, if they could carry their guns. They wouldn't budge otherwise. You'll come as I say, and you'll be quick about it, said Pershing, a note of command coming into his voice. And they did. The next duty which fell to Lieutenant Pershing was quite different. From chasing Indians and outlaws on the plains, he was assigned to the task of putting some half-baked cadets through their paces. September 1891, he became professor of military science and tactics at the University of Nebraska. The discipline at the school was of a piece with that of other state colleges, where a certain amount of drilling was demanded, but beyond this, the students were allowed to go their own gate.

At Nebraska, it had become pretty lax, but the arrival of the new instructor changed all that. A student of this time, in a recent article in the Red Cross magazine, gives a humorous account of what happened. It was the general belief that the students in these western colleges, many of them farmer's sons, could never be taught the West Point idea. But the lieutenant, who had just arrived from Lincoln, received an impression startlingly in contrast to the general one. He looked over the big crowd of powerful young men, and himself a storehouse and radiating

center of energy and forcefulness, recognized the same qualities when he saw them. By George, I've got the finest material. in the world," he told the Chancellor, his steel-like eyes alight with enthusiasm. You could do anything with those boys. They've got the stuff in them. Watch me get it out." And he proceeded to do so. By the middle of the first winter the battalion was in shape to drill together.

Moreover, the boys had made a nickname for their leader, and nicknames mean a great deal in student life. He was universally called the Lute, pronounced Lute, of course, in the real American accent. As though there were but one lieutenant in the lieutenant in the real American accent. tenant in the world. This he was called behind his back, of course. To his face they called him sir, a title of respect which they had never thought to give to any man alive. By the end of that first academic year, every man under him would have followed the loot straight into a prairie fire and would have kept step while doing it. As he gradually got his group of officers licked into shape,

he found less to do personally. So he promptly complained to the chancellor to this effect and asked, like Oliver Twist, for more. After a moment's stupefaction, the lute was then doing five times the work that any officer before him had ever done. The Chancellor burst into a great laugh and suggested that the lute should take the law course in the law school of the university. He added that if two men's work was not enough for him, he might do three men's, and teach some of the classes in the Department of Mathematics. Without changing his stride in the least, the young officer swept these two occupations along with him, bought some civilian clothes and a derby hat,

and became both professor and student at the university, where he was also military attache. During the next two years, he ate up the law course with a fiery haste which raised the degree of classwork to fever heat. Those who were fellow students with him and survived, found the experience immensely stimulating. Of course he graduated, and was thus entitled to write another title after his name, that of Bachelor of Arts. About this time also, he was promoted to a first lieutenantcy, the first official recognition for his many long months of work. Then he was sent back to the field again, to join the 10th cavalry at Fort Assiniboine, Montana. Next came a welcome command to take the position of assistant instructor of tactics at West Point.

It was almost like getting back home to see these loved hills, the mighty river, and the familiar barracks again. But after a few months here, the Spanish war broke out. Eager to get into the action, he resigned his position at the Military Academy and was transferred to his former regiment, the 10th cavalry. This regiment was sent immediately to Santiago and took part in the short but spirited fighting at El Caney and San Juan Hill, where a certain colonel of the Rough Riders was in evidence. side by side these two crack regiments charged up the slope, dominated by the Spanish fort, and here Roosevelt and Pershing first met.

We would like to fancy these two intrepid soldiers as recognizing each other here in the din of battle, but the truth is sometimes more prosaic than fiction, and the truth compels us to reprint this little anecdote from the world's work. Five years after the Spanish war, when Roosevelt was president, and Pershing was a mere captain.

He was invited to luncheon at the White House. Captain Pershing, said the President, when the party was seated at the table. Did I ever meet you in the Santiago campaign? Yes, Mr. President, just once. When was that? What did I say? Since there are ladies here, I can't repeat just what you said, Mr. President.

There was a general laugh in which Roosevelt joined. Tell me the circumstances then. Why, I had gone back with a mule team to Saboni to get supplies for the men. The night was pitch black, and it was raining torrents. The road was a streak of mud. On the way back to the front, I heard noise and confusion ahead. I knew it was a mired mule team. An officer in the uniform of a rough rider was trying to get the mules out of the mud,

and his remarks, as I said a moment ago, should not be quoted before the ladies. I suggested that the best thing to do was to take my mules, and pull your wagon out, and then get your mules out. This was done, and we saluted and parted. "'Well,' said Roosevelt, "'if there ever was a time when a man would be justified in using bad language, it would be in the middle of the rainy night, with his mules down in the mud,

and his wagon loaded with things soldiers at the front needed.' Pershing, as a result of the Cuban campaign, was twice recommended for brevet commissions, for personal bravery and untiring energy and faithfulness. General Baldwin said of him, Purging is the coolest man under fire I ever saw. But it was not until 1901 that he became captain. He had now been transferred at his own request to the Philippines,

whether or not he won promotion through the slow-moving machinery of the war office, his energetic spirit demanded action. The soldier's duty is to go wherever there is fighting, he said, and vigorously opposed the idea that he began, given a swivel-chair job. His first term of service in the Philippines was from 1899 to 1903. In the interval between his first and second assignments, the latter being as governor of the Moros,

he returned to America to serve on the general staff and also to act as special military observer in the Russo-Japanese War. His duties during the years, while arduous and often filled with danger, were not of the sort to bring him to pay. public notice. But they were being followed by the authorities at Washington, who have a way of ticketing every man in the service as to his future value to the army. And Pershing was making good. He had turned forty before he was captain. Out in the Philippines, he worked up to a major.

Now advancement was to follow with a startling jump. It all hinged upon that luncheon with Roosevelt, about which we have already told, and the fact that Roosevelt had a characteristic way of doing things. The step he now took was not a piece of favoritism toward Pershing. It arose from a desire to have the most efficient men at the head of the army. Pershing was nominated for brigadier-general, and the nomination was confirmed. Of course, it created a tremendous sensation in army circles. The president, by his action, had jumped to new general 862 orders. On his return to the Philippines, as governor of the Morp.

province. He performed an invaluable service in bringing peace to this troubled district. He accomplished this partly by force of arms, partly by persuasion, the little brown men found in this big Americano, a man with whom they could not trifle, and also want on whose word they could rely. It was not until 1914 that he was recalled from the Philippines, and then very shortly was sent across the Mexican border in the pursuit of Via. It would seem as though this strong soldier was to have no rest, that his muscles were to be kept constantly inured to hardship, so that in the event of a greater call to arms,

here would be one commander trained to the minute. The fates had indeed been shaping Persian from boyhood for a supreme task. Each step had been along the path of a definite goal. The punitive expedition into Mexico was a case in point. It was a thankless job at best, and full of hardship and danger. A day's march of 30 miles across an alkali desert under a blazing sun is hardly a pleasure jaunt, and there were many such during those troubled months of 1916. Then one day came a quiet message from Washington, asking General Pershing to report to the president.

The results of that interview were momentous. The Great War in Europe was demanding the intervention of America. Our troops were to be sent across the seas to Europe for the first time in history. The government needed a man upon whom it could absolutely rely to be commander-in-chief of the expeditionary forces. Would General Pershing hold himself in readiness for this supreme task? The veteran of thirty years of constant campaigning stiffened to attention. The eager look of battle, battle for the right, shone in his eye. Every line of his upstanding figure denoted confidence.

a confidence that was to inspire all America and then the world itself in this choice of leader. He saluted, I will do my duty, sir, he said. Important dates in Pershing's life. 1860, September 13th, John Joseph Pershing born. 1881, entered Highland Military Academy, New York. 1882 entered U.S. Military Academy, West Point.

1886, graduated from West Point, senior cadet captain, sent to Southwest as second lieutenant 6th Cavalry. 1891, Professor Military Tactics, University of Nebraska. 1898, took part in Spanish-American War. 1901, Captain First Cavalry, Philippines. 1905 married Francis Warren 1906

Brigadier General 1914 recalled from Philippines 1915 lost his wife and three children in a fire 1915 sent to Mexico in pursuit of Via 1917

sent to France as commander-in-chief of American Expeditionary Force nineteen nineteen appointment of general made permanent nineteen twenty four retired from active service end of purging part two