Part 8 (1/2)

Roosevelt immediately referred him to Mr. Root, then Secretary of War, with the result that he was appointed Governor of Moro Province to do {169} the work there amongst these new wards of the United States under different conditions which he had already done in Cuba.

Wood felt very strongly that it would be far better for him to be there during the administration of Roosevelt in order that their personal relations.h.i.+p might not be misunderstood. This was the more forcibly brought in upon his consciousness by the occurrence at that time of what is known as the Rathbone affair.

Major Estes G. Rathbone, formerly an a.s.sistant postmaster-general and at this time detailed to duties in the newly organized Post Office in Cuba, had been charged with wastefulness of public moneys and unwarranted expenditure of public funds for personal expenses. He, with certain a.s.sociates, was brought to trial and convicted. He was sentenced to a long term of imprisonment. It was one of the few cases of malfeasance in office which occurred in Cuba during Wood's administration and was dealt with by the regular courts in the regular manner.

Nothing further would have come of it in all probability had not the extraordinarily close {170} relations of Wood and Roosevelt furnished an excuse. The fact that Roosevelt was President of the United States and that as such he proposed the name of Wood for advancement to Major-General of Regulars from Brigadier-General added fuel to the flames. The fact that Wood was the senior Brigadier and that as such he would naturally become Major-General in regular seniority seems to have carried no weight at the time. Even then the Rathbone affair would have had no connection with the matter of this appointment had not Major Rathbone possessed personal friends high politically in the government of the time, and had not the regular army officers looked with disfavor upon the appointment even in regular order of a man who had been an army surgeon and who was not what is known as a line officer originally.

All these influences, however, coming together at the same time caused an uproar in Congress over his appointment which, while it cleared Wood entirely, still made a political scandal that hurt to the quick the man who had just accomplished what he had accomplished in Cuba.

Wood was charged with conduct unbecoming {171} an officer; that he made an intimate friend of an ex-convict in Santiago, and employed him as a newspaper correspondent to blacken the character of eminent American officers and advertise himself; that Rathbone was unjustly accused and convicted through Wood's direct agency; that Wood had been guilty of extravagance; that he had accepted while Governor-General presents from a gambling house in Havana, and so on.

All this evidence and much more was laid before the Committee of the Senate on Military Affairs and was most thoroughly aired. The result was the absolute vindication of Wood, his confirmation as Major-General of the Regular Army and a report which is a part of the records of the Senate in which it is written that:... ”not one of them has a better claim, by reason of his past record and experience as a commander, than has General Wood; and in the opinion of the Committee no one has in view of his present rank equal claim to his on the ground of merit measured by the considerations suggested.”

The whole episode thus ended in still greater credit to General Wood.

It is only interesting {172} and in point here and now because it brings out the fact that the man himself never had the support of the Was.h.i.+ngton Army Department men until his service in the Philippines, except here and there amongst those officers who have served under him. Doubtless his extraordinary executive work in getting the Rough Riders ready for action and his methods which over-rode precedents and destroyed red tape throughout the whole of the War Department of that day had much to do with this. That there should follow in so few months his remarkable success in Santiago, his appointment as Governor-General of Cuba, his quick and successful organization and administration of the Island so that it could be turned over to the Cubans in such short order--all tended to fan the flames of prejudice.

Hence when the opportunity of the Rathbone affair occurred the flames became a veritable conflagration, which, however, burned only those who brought the charges and touched the character of Wood himself not at all.

In the meantime early in 1903 he started upon his duties in the Philippines. Instead of proceeding by the usual route through California and {173} over the Pacific to Manila, Wood decided to make the voyage the other way round with a definite plan for acquiring data upon his new subject and relative to his new duties as he went along.

In Egypt he spent some time with Lord Cromer, then just preparing to give up his work there as Viceroy. Cromer, like all other persons in executive capacities throughout the world, knew well all that General Wood had done in Cuba. He had a very high appreciation of what had been accomplished in the time, because from his own experience he knew better than most men what the difficulties had been. He took a great liking for the quiet, stalwart American and told him that his administration in Cuba was one of the finest in Colonial history and the best in our generation. Later when Lord Cromer was asked to suggest some one to succeed himself in Egypt he said that unfortunately the best man was unavailable since he was an American citizen named Leonard Wood.

He gave him all the facilities for studying the government and administration of the British protectorate and helped him wherever and {174} whenever he could. Wood's great interest was the study of the way in which men of different and conflicting religious beliefs were handled, and he collected large quant.i.ties of books and doc.u.ments to be studied later as he proceeded eastward. No man could have asked for higher appreciation than was accorded him voluntarily by the able and experienced administrator of Egyptian affairs.

From Cairo he proceeded to India and spent sufficient time to acc.u.mulate information there. He was to govern a Mohammedan population mixed up with Confucians, cannibals, headhunters and religions of twenty different varieties, and he studied as he went along all the methods employed in similar situations to preserve order without creating religious wars.

He even made a special journey to Java at the invitation of the Dutch government, where the Dutch governor gave him all the a.s.sistance in his power. Here he found the problem more closely allied to his own than elsewhere.

So that on his arrival in Manila he had gathered information upon most of the problems which would shortly confront him from sources {175} of unquestioned authenticity and from men of unquestioned ability. Some friend one night in Manila spoke of the large number of books that filled the walls of his house and wondered when he expected to get time to read them. Wood's answer was that he had read them all and only used them now as reference books to refresh his memory.

New as the problems were, therefore, he had by the time he began active work as Governor whatever preparation any one could secure for the work in hand.

The Spaniards had failed in their government in the Philippines as they had elsewhere. In Mindanao and Sulu--the country, or islands, inhabited by the Moros--they had failed signally because of their intolerance of the religious beliefs of the people and their careless impatience generally towards a colony which from its very nature could not produce much money. Furthermore they did not send sufficient military forces or sufficiently able officers to maintain their supremacy. And finally they did not deal with the people through the native clergy and priests. Consequently when the Americans came in the Moros were united only {176} in their hatred of the white race, placed no confidence in anything their rulers told them and only obeyed white-man-made laws as long as the white man was in sight.

After all a sultan or datu had his position and authority which had come down to him through generations and his religion which had been taught him from birth. He saw no reason why he should give up these without a struggle just because some other man arrived with a different religion and a different form of sultan government. The country was such that it was easy to avoid the new rulers.

Transportation over large parts of the southern islands was through jungle and pathless forests where even riding a horse was impossible.

Streams without bridges, settlements without approaches except a trail, tropical climates to which only the Moros themselves were accustomed spread over a land of almost impenetrable jungle. The Moros themselves understood such a situation and could easily move from one spot to another, one island to another, one settlement to another; while the army had to fight its way in and then fight its way out again.

{177}

While the problem of administration was not unlike that in Cuba in so far as the organizing of courts, law, education, native officials and so on went, there were here in Moroland the infinitely more difficult and delicate tasks of dealing with many different religious laws and customs and the hereditary rank and rights of tribal rulers, none of which existed in Cuba.

The quality of statesmans.h.i.+p in Wood which dealt with these problems and settled them so that from a slave-holding, polygamous, headhunting land there arose a self-governing community is of the highest order.

It was put into force in the commander's usual, commonplace, thorough way without haste or excitement, but where necessary by force of arms which required more than a hundred engagements and many hard-fought battles. Wood first spent some time in Manila going over the situation with Mr. Taft. There he learned Taft's wishes and views and prepared his military forces. He was both military commander and civil governor of the Moroland and as such was again an absolute autocrat. When he was ready he started directly {178} into the jungle from Zamboanga.

The journey took him and his staff through forests, over unfordable rivers, across mountain ranges on foot, across the straits that separated one island from another in dugouts, into forts, into towns, into villages and hamlets in a nerve-racking journey of over a month without a pause except for necessary sleep.

He wanted to see with his own eyes and hear with his own ears at first hand what was the condition of affairs, what was going on, what were the different and varying situations in order that he might the more correctly and certainly draw up plans for the reorganization of the colony. In one village he was a military commander issuing orders; in another he was a criminal or civil judge sitting in session; in another he was a listener to the advancement of the plans and the religious ceremonials of the sultans or datus of the place.

Naturally all came to see him. He was the embodiment of the new conquerors and curiosity alone would have brought every one, to say nothing of policy which brought those who desired {179} to impress him in order that special favors might be expected for themselves. He was the Great White Sultan judged by the standards known to their other sultans.

And the problems were infinitely varied and in most cases entirely new ones to the ”doctor from Boston.”