Part 11 (1/2)

There was one worthy bureau chief as continually refusing applications of ular In each case I would appeal to Secretary Alger--who helpedthe irregularity For instance, I found out that as ere nearer the July date than the January date for the issuance of clothing, and as it had long been custoive a it to all the various posts, it was therefore sole to us ere about to start for a sun in the tropics This would seem incredible to those who have never dealt with an inert officialdom, a red-tape bureaucracy, but such is the fact I rectified this and got an order for khaki clothing We were then told ould have to advertise thirty days for horses This o expedition So I made another successful appeal to the Secretary Other difficulties caons, and various articles, and in each case the same result followed On the last occasion, when I came up in triumph with the needed order, the worried office head, who bore me no animosity, but who did feel that fate had been very unkind, threw hih: ”Oh, dear! I had this office running in such good shape--and then along ca was that as an illegitimate interruption to the work of the War Department

There were of course department heads and bureau chiefs and assistants who, in spite of the worthlessness of the syste conditions that had prevailed, remained first-class men An exay, activity, administrative efficiency, and coer desire to help everybody do the best that could be done Both in Washi+ngton and again down at Santiago ed hiood fortune to repay him in part our debt, whichhiiment assembled at San Antonio When I reached there, the men, rifles, and horses, which were the essentials, were co in fast, and the saddles, blankets, and the like were also accu Thanks to Wood's exertions, e reached Taular regi no luxuries or anything else unnecessary, and so ere able to move off the field when ordered, with our own transportation, leaving nothing behind

I suppose every ii about than ours Wood was an exceptional coanization The rank and file were as fine natural fighting men as ever carried a rifle or rode a horse in any country or any age We had a nu fellows froes like Harvard, Yale, and Princeton; but the great majority of the men were Southwesterners, from the then territories of Oklahoma, Indian Territory, Arizona, and New Mexico They were accusto care of theent and self-reliant; they possessed hardihood and endurance and physical prowess; and, above all, they had the fighting edge, the cool and resolute fighting te deliberately counted the cost In the great majority of cases each man was chiefly anxious to find out what he should do to ht, first and last, about 800 copies of the cavalry drill regulations and studied them industriously Such men were practically soldiers to start with, in all the essentials It is siment was raised, armed, equipped, drilled, sent on trains to Tah two victorious offensive--not defensive--fights in which a third of the officers and one-fifth of the ood record, and it speaks well for the iment; and it speaks well for Wood[]

[] To counterbalance the newspapers which ignorantly and indiscriminately praised all the volunteers there were others whose bla Post_, on June 18, gave expression to the following glooto Cuba of the First United States Volunteer Cavalry, known as the 'rough riders' Organized but four weeks, barely given their full coular drill, these men have been sent to the front before they have learned the first ele and discipline, or have even become acquainted with their officers In addition to all this, like the regular cavalry, they have been sent with only their carbines and revolvers to e rifles There have been few cases of such military cruelty in our military annals” A week or so after this not wholly happy prophecy was proated, the ”cruelty” was consuhting

Wood was so busy getting the regiment ready that when I reached San Antonio he turned reat good fortune for me, and I drilled the men industriously, mounted and unmounted I had plenty to learn, and the men and the officers even ood will We speedily made it evident that there was no room and no mercy for any ood results

The fact is that the essentials of drill and work for a cavalry or an infantry regiment are easy to learn, which of course is not true for the artillery or the engineers or for the navy The reason why it takes so long to turn the average civilized ood infantry while to teach the average untrained man how to shoot, to ride, to march, to take care of hi, and resolute, to obey quickly, as well as to be willing, and to fit himself, to act on his own responsibility If he already possesses these qualities, there is very little difficulty inhim a soldier; all the drill that is necessary to enable hiht is of a siround and barrack square maneuvers are of no earthly consequence in real war When e from line to column, and column to line, can form front in any direction, and asses with speed and precision, they have a fairly good grasp of the essentials When our regiment reached Taaits, and both in mass and extended formations, mounted and dismounted

I had served three years in the New York National Guard, finally beco a captain This experience was invaluable to me It enabled me at once to train the men in the simple drill without which they would have been a h the drill requirements are simple, they are also absolutely indispensable But if I had believed that ht me all that there was to teach about a soldier's career, it would have been better for iment a number of men who had served in the National Guard, and a nuular Army Some of these latter had served in the field in the West under ca encies These iment They already knew their profession, and could teach and help the others But if the iular Army at so except what could be picked up on the parade ground, in the barracks, and in practice ood roads, then it depended purely upon his own good sense whether he had been helped or hurt by the experience If he realized that he had learned only five per cent of his profession, that there remained ninety-five per cent to accoood soldier, why, he had profited immensely

To start with five per cent handicap was a very great advantage; and if the ood ht that he had learned all about the profession of a soldier because he had been in the National Guard or in the Regular Army under the conditions I have described, then he was actually of less use than if he had never had any military experience at all Such a n, and correctness in the uarantees of good soldiershi+p, and that fro in as to be done in accordance hat he had learned in peace As a matter of fact, most of what he had learned was never used at all, and so, for instance, that a sentry ought never to do in an actual can is to walk up and down a line where he will be conspicuous His business is to lie down so, but where athe really hard part of a can only the barest essentials are kept

Alular officers, and ular officers, were fine h no fault of their own, had been forced to lead lives that fairly paralyzed their efficiency when the strain of ular officer who knew nothing whatever of modern as in most respects nearly as worthless as a raw recruit The positions and commands prescribed in the text-books were made into fetishes by some of these men, and treated as if they were the ends, instead of the not always important hting, for instance, it would have been folly for iment, the canonical text-book position My business was to be where I could keep h-and-tule, this had to depend upon the course of events, and usuallyly rendered the only service he could render to his regi up his proper position several hundred yards in the rear when the fighting began; for then the regiood fortune the coht was over

After one Cuban fight a lieutenant-colonel of the regulars, in coiment, who had met with just such an experience and had rejoined us at the front several hours after the close of the fighting, asked an I answered that they were following in trace in coluan I deployed them as skirmishers on both sides of the trail He answered triumphantly, ”You can't deploy men as skirmishers from column formation”; to which I responded, ”Well, I did, and, what is more, if any captain had made any difficulty about it, I would have sent hiround standpoint The prescribed orders at that time were to deploy the column first into a line of squads at correct intervals, and then to give an order which, if ht and left flanks, at six yards, take intervals, ave ran ht there, quick, you! scatter to the left! look alive, look alive!” And they looked alive, and they scattered, and each took advantage of cover, and forent the line

Now I do not hat I have said to be reat war, the bulk of our soldiers will not be men who have had any opportunity to train soul and mind and body so as tocontinued and faithful drill will alone put these nize this on the part of the average man will mean laziness and folly and not the possession of efficiency Moreover, if men have been trained to believe, for instance, that they can ”arbitrate questions of vital interest and national honor,” if they have been brought up with flabbiness of moral fiber as well as flabbiness of physique, then there will be need of long and laborious and faithful work to give the needed tone to ht stuff, it is not so very difficult

At San Antonio we entrained for Taical books by authors of Continental Europe, there are jerereat European arularity, tends to dwarf the capacity for individual initiative aer for any officer or anization in Aht-heartedness, has pranced into ithout er or finer field for the display of an advanced individualism than that which opened before us as ent from San Antonio to Tampa, camped there, and embarked on a transport for Cuba nobody ever had any definite inforive us, and whatever infor Each of us had to show an alert and not overscrupulous self-reliance in order to obtain food for his men, provender for his horses, or transportation of any kind for any object

One lesson early i to eat it ise to carry it with me; and if any near should arise, I would earnestly advise the anization always to proceed upon the belief that their supplies will not turn up, and to take every opportunity of getting food for themselves

Tampa was a scene of the wildest confusion There were miles of tracks loaded with cars of the contents of which nobody seee General Miles, as supposed to have supervision over everything, and General Shafter, who had charge of the expedition, were both there But, thanks to the fact that nobody had had any experience in handling even such a small force as ours--about 17,000 men--there was no semblance of order Wood and I were bound that we should not be left behind when the expedition started When ere finally inforo to a certain track to meet a train We went to the track, but the train never came Then ere sent to another track to ain it never came However, we found a coal train, of which we took possession, and the conductor, partly under duress and partly in a spirit of friendly helpfulness, took us down to the quay

All kinds of other organizations, infantry and cavalry, regular and volunteer, were arriving at the quay and wandering around it, and there was no place where we could get any specific information as to what transport ere to have Finally Wood was told to ”get any shi+p you can get which is not already assigned” He borroithout leave a small motor boat, and commandeered the transport Yucatan When asked by the captain what his authority was, he reported that he was acting ”by orders of General Shafter,” and directed the shi+p to be brought to the dock He had already sent me word to be ready, as soon as the shi+p touched the pier, to put the regined to a regular regiiment, and as it was evident that not et on, I was deter the iment offered a comparatively easy problem I simply angway With the regulars I had to be a little more diplomatic, because their commander, a lieutenant-colonel, was hts He sent word to iway I could see the transport coure thereon Accordingly I played for tih his officers to the coulars, entered into parleys, and h so that by yelling at the top of hly constructive--co I had no idea, but he was evidently speaking, and on my own responsibility I translated it into directions to hold the gangway, and so inforulars that I was under the orders of ret, etc, etc--could not give way as they desired As soon as the transport was fast we put our ot on, and the other half and the other volunteer regiment went somewhere else

We were kept several days on the transport, which was jammed with men, so that it was hard to ot under way, and we steagledy, just as we had eether, and it was no light labor afterwards to asseuns, and another the locks for the guns; the two not getting together for several days after one of them had been landed Soldiers went here, provisions there; and who got ashore first largely depended upon individual activity Fortunately for us, my former naval aide, when I had been assistant Secretary of the Navy, Lieutenant-Commander Sharp, a first-class felloas there in co hiave us a black pilot, who took our transport right in shore, the others following like a flock of sheep; and we disembarked with our rifles, ammunition belts, and not much else In theory it was out of our turn, but if we had not disembarked then, Heaven only knohen our turn would have co if we could help it I carried soht waterproof coat, which was my sole camp equipment for the next two or three days

Twenty-four hours after getting ashore we marched from Daiquiri, where we had landed, to Siboney, also on the coast, reaching it during a terrific downpour of rain When this was over, we built a fire, dried our clothes, and ate whatever we had brought with us

We were brigaded with the First and Tenth Regular Cavalry, under Brigadier-General Saular

Like General Chaffee, another of the same type, he had entered the army in the Civil War as a private Later, when I was President, it was ood fortune to make each of them in succession Lieutenant-General of the ar retired and General Chaffee was to take his place, the former sent to the latter his three stars to wear on his first official presentation, with a note that they were fro to Private Chaffee” The two fine old fellows had served in the ranks, one in the cavalry, one in the infantry, in their golden youth, in the days of the great war nearly half a century before; each had grown gray in a lifeti, and each closed his active career in co was one of the few iven and taken wounds with the saber He was an old friend offor the front he told hting all right He kept his word

General Young had actively superintended getting his two regular regiments, or at least a squadron of each, off the transports, and late that night he sent us word that he had received permission to move at dawn and strike the Spanish advance position He directed us to e trail with our two squadrons (one squadron having been left at Taulars, one of the First and one of the Tenth, under his personal supervision, hethe hill trail early next ht just as the regulars began the fight in the valley trail

It was a le, a et into the fight and trying to do as right when in it; and all the while I was thinking that I was the only man who did not knohat I was about, and that all the others did--whereas, as I found out later, pretty much everybody else was as much in the dark as I was There was no surprise; we struck the Spaniards exactly where we had expected; then Wood halted us and put us into the fight deliberately and in order He ordered us to deploy alternately by troops to the right and left of the trail, giving our senior ood a soldier as ever wore a unifor I was told if possible to connect with the regulars ere on the right In theory this was excellent, but as the jungle was very dense the first troop that deployed to the right vanished forthwith, and I never saw it again until the fight was over--having a frightful feelingit The next troop deployed to the left under Brodie Then the third caht as before

By the tile I realized that it likeould disappear unless I kept hold of it I ed to keep possession of the last platoon One learns fast in a fight, and I h the jungle without any atte line This sounds siotten on the firing line! I could hear a good deal of firing, soood distance, and the rest to the left and ahead I pushed on, expecting to strike the enemy somewhere between

Soon we caood deal of cracking of rifles way off in front of us, but as they used smokeless poe had no idea as to exactly where they were, or who they were shooting at Then it dawned on us that ere the target The bullets began to co of a silk dress, with sometimes a kind of pop; a few ofthe Davis ith us, and as we scanned the landscape with our glasses it was he who first pointed out to us some Spaniards in a trench some three-quarters of a mile off It was difficult to make them out There were not many of them However, we finally did make them out, and we could see their conical hats, for the trench was a poor one We advanced, firing at them, and drove them off