Colonel Roosevelt - Edmund Morris [294]
For a day or two more, Roosevelt hoped that some intervention, such as an appeal from the French government, would make Wilson grant him his desperate desire. That was nothing less than death in battle: he knew he would not come back. Denied the consummation, he would have to cede it to one or more of his sons. “I don’t care a continental whether they fight in Yankee uniforms or British uniforms or in their undershirts, so long as they’re fighting.”
Kermit was at Plattsburg, doing some last-minute training to qualify for a commission in the British army. Ted and Archie were there too, awaiting orders as major and second lieutenant respectively in the U.S. Officers’ Reserve Corps. Their father was not so downcast that he did not press for their transfer overseas, the moment Wilson announced that John J. Pershing was to be the commander of the American Expeditionary Force in Europe.
“My dear General Pershing,” Roosevelt wrote, “I very heartily congratulate you, and especially the people of the United States, upon your selection.” There was no need to add that he had made Pershing’s present glory possible, having promoted him in 1905 over the heads of 835 senior officers. “I write you now to request that my two sons, Theodore Roosevelt, Jr., aged 27,* and Archibald B. Roosevelt, aged 23, both of Harvard, be allowed to enlist as privates under you, to go over with the first troops.”
Pershing replied that it would be “a waste” for two such promising young officers to enlist, and undertook to find them places on his staff at no loss of rank.
With Quentin almost certain to be assigned to the general’s force as well (Baker talked grandly of an “army of the air” leading the American attack), Roosevelt’s next, painful duty was to dismiss all his volunteers. Those eligible for the draft might yet be lucky, and serve; but those ineligible needed to hear from him, rather than the President, that they were not wanted.
Before issuing a notice of general release, he discussed its wording with about twenty of his “ghost” commanders, including Seth Bullock, Jack Greenaway, a former Rough Rider, and John M. Parker, a still-passionate Progressive. Parker was the only man, apart from Roosevelt, who had actually lobbied Woodrow Wilson in behalf of the division. He was able to quote the President’s exact words: “Colonel Roosevelt is a splendid man and patriotic citizen, as you say, but he is not a military leader. His experience in military life has been extremely short. He and many of the men with him are too old to render efficient service, and in addition to that fact, he as well as others have shown intolerance of discipline.”
John Leary attended the meeting. “Never, except in a house of death, have I noticed a greater air of depression. All except the Colonel showed it plainly. He, it was apparent to those who knew him best, felt worse than any other.”
The notice went out on 21 May. It was a somber summary of the division’s aims, but stated that “as good American citizens we loyally obey the decision of the Commander in Chief of the American army and navy.”
A WEEK LATER, Georges Clemenceau published an open letter to Wilson, appealing to him to change his mind about the volunteer division. “It is possible that your own mind, enclosed in its austere legal frontiers … has failed to be impressed by the vital hold which personalities like Roosevelt have on popular imagination,” Clemenceau wrote, in language unlikely to have been approved by the Quai d’Orsay. “The name of Roosevelt has this legendary force in our country at this time.” Poilus were asking why the Colonel had not been sent over. “Send them Roosevelt. I tell you, because I know it—it will gladden their hearts.”
Wilson did not reply. Roosevelt complained to fellow members of the Harvard Club that he had been cashiered by a jealous rival determined to deny him the