The Great War and Prussia’s Early Beginnings

Many reasons and paths led to the outbreak of World War One. One of these paths was the growth of Prussia, the state that became the most important part of Germany. In this article, Robert Van Ness tells us of Prussia’s role in the Crusades.

The Great War, perhaps better known today as World War One, turns 100 this year. It has been overshadowed for some by events happening after 1918, which is understandable. Yet a travesty all too often occurs when history teachers or students skip over this watershed historical moment in favor of studying World War Two or events thereafter. World War One was a beginning and ending at the same time. It was a culmination point of nineteenth century nationalistic idealism, but by 1918 that nationalist pride had been all but shattered. Indeed, World War Two would put the final nails in the nineteenth century’s coffin, but World War One created the coffin, and put the corpse therein. How did such a war come about? By 1914, man was supposed to be in a belle epoque, a time when war was unthinkable, especially in highly civilized Europe. But that’s just where the war was centered. Many theories have been postulated such as anti-god philosophies, imperialist expansion, economic blunders, and arms races. None of those theories are wrong, but when any of those theories stand alone, they miss the broader spectrum. This article cannot paint the entire picture alone, but it would like to trace events leading up to June 1914 through one of the major players, Prussia.

Prussia by 1914 was wholly incorporated into the Second German Reich (Empire). Its rise to power was nothing short of breathtaking considering the relatively short period in which the province rose from nothing to world power. And this rise can be traced back to the Crusades.

Pope Honorius III.

THE CRUSADES

Prussia’s fight for existence actually begins in part with the Catholic Crusades. Many Germans answered the Pope’s call for a Holy Land adventure in which killing infidels was favorably viewed by God. Germany during this era was part of the Holy Roman Empire, thus when God’s man came calling for help, loyal soldiers came willing to serve. Many knightly orders were founded in the Holy Land such as the Hospitallers and Templars. Their goals included protecting pilgrims, offering medical care, and establishing Christian states. The Teutonic Order, though small, was one of the most important orders in accomplishing these many ambitions.

The Ordo Domus Sanctae Mariae Theutonicorum Hierosolymitanorum was established around 1190 in Acre, one of the main crusading kingdoms, but their time in Acre was quite short lived. After controlling import/export tolls for the region for about 20 years, the Teutonic Knights, as well as other Crusaders, were pushed out of the region by a stern Islamic backlash. The Teutons fled mostly to Transylvania, where they were invited by King Andrew II. While there, the Knights participated in campaigns against the Cumans. The Knights, however, began organizing plans to establish a state of their own.

IN HUNGARY

Hungarian King Andrew II would not tolerate such a force in his lands unless it obeyed him. The Knights stated that their cause was a Christian cause, not solely Hungarian. That being the case, they refused to submit to Andrew, who foolishly expelled his greatest fighting force. Invading Islamic armies would soon overrun a rather hapless Hungary, and remain close by for about 400 years. The Teutons, though, were invited to invade a here-to-for ‘pagan’ region by Pope Honorius III, Emperor Frederick II, and Duke Konrad I of Masovia.

The Golden Bull of Rimini, issued by Frederick II, formally established set lands for the Order at Culm (Chelmo). The Knights simply had to wage war against the pagan inhabitants and win. Many Imperial and Church officials signed the Bull, including Konrad, who churlishly attempted to take the promised lands for himself. His actions almost undid the entire operation, and even threatened to destroy his very own Imperial Duchy of Masovia.

Emperor Frederick II called for Teutonic Crusades into the Baltic.

Amid such instability, the Teutonic Knights made light work of the campaign. By 1230, after four years of fighting, the Teutonic Knights forced Konrad into signing the Treaty of Kruszwica. Grand Master Hermann von Salza then assumed control of Chelmo and all lands won during the Prussian Campaign. Four years later Pope Gregory IX sent out the Golden Bull of Rieti, restating the order’s claims that they were subject only to the Pope. Thus the newly established Prussian kingdom was subject to no one but God, and the region became a province of the Holy Roman Empire.

The Teutonic Knights organized their new lands into a monastic state soon after the lands were secured. As such a state, the Teutonic purpose was to stage crusades into pagan northeastern European lands such as Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Russia, and Poland.

To further aid the cause, the Knights brought the Order of Dobrzyn and the Livonian Brothers of the Sword under their sway. Both groups had been unsuccessfully crusading against the pagans for decades. Their inclusion into the Teutonic state added considerable lands along the Baltic coast, thus ensuring Teutonic, and later Prussian, conflict with Poland and Russia for centuries to come.

Much work was done during this period. The Knights drew from their Germanic homelands, and an influx of German immigrants from all over the Holy Roman Empire migrated into rapidly fortifying cities all along the region’s rivers and Baltic coastline. Together, the immigrants and Knights irrigated the swamplands, built new cities, and began forging a solid, productive state in what was a foreign, unwelcoming land.

These medieval Germans laid the foundation for modern Prussia and Germany. What they did not know at the time was that they were doing much more than that. They were also laying the foundation for future wars including World Wars One and Two.  But to get to that point one must walk through the events leading to the Great War of 1914 - of which Prussia played a huge part.

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Balloon Busters. The daredevils of World War One?

Airplanes evolved at a rapid pace during World War I. With this evolution, came a growing number of daredevil pilots who took great risks. Possibly the most daring of them all were the balloon busters, fearless pilots who did an often forgotten task.

The First World War was unusual in many ways. One was that, for the first time in military history, the air became a battlefield. No longer were combatants confined to land and sea, now they could exploit the military potential of what in 1914 was a relatively new invention – the aircraft.

The sheer speed at which aircraft evolved from barely more than powered gliders into fully-fledged weapons was staggering. In 1914 aircraft were so fragile and underpowered that carrying even the weight of a machine gun was usually beyond them. By 1918 there existed fighters, bombers, and reconnaissance aircraft, while the weapons and tactics had evolved. In 1914 a typical dogfight often consisted of one aircraft from either side with pilots firing their service pistols at each other. By 1918 aircraft were stronger, faster, more agile and carried machine guns, bombs, and rockets. In only four years combat flying evolved from two pilots with pistols using the same aircraft for any and every purpose into fully-fledged air forces with custom-designed aircraft flying and fighting in huge numbers. It was a common theme among those veterans who survived that, by 1918, if there weren’t at least fifty or sixty aircraft involved in a dogfight, it wasn’t a proper dogfight.

Belgian pilot Willy Coppens, balloon buster of the First World War.

BALLOON BUSTERS

The fighter aces became heroes overnight, but seldom lived to enjoy their celebrity. Men who became household names at the time are almost entirely forgotten today. Manfred von Richthofen (the famous ‘Red Baron’) lives on as the most famous fighter pilot of all time, but few remember Edward ‘Mick’ Mannock, James McCudden, Rene Fonck or Werner Voss. But one elite group of fighter aces are especially neglected today, the ‘balloon busters’.

So who were they, what did they do, how did they do it and what military value did they have? Simply, they specialized in flying high-risk missions behind enemy lines to destroy enemy observation balloons. So high were the risks that many balloon busters attacked either alone or with only one or two fellow pilots. Squadron commanders recognized the extreme risks by making balloon busting missions largely voluntary, although pilots could be ordered to attack balloons if they were proving particularly troublesome to friendly ground troops.

Balloons were highly valued for several reasons. They could hover at high altitudes and monitor enemy behavior, spotting troop movements, new supply and munitions dumps, whether the enemy were stockpiling supplies and munitions, and if they were moving fresh troops forward to defend against an upcoming offensive or mount one of their own. Their other standard purpose was artillery spotting. Gunners often lacked a direct view of the enemy due to distance, weather conditions and geographical factors like ridgelines and hills. To accurately shell enemy targets they needed balloons to literally ‘call the shots’ by spotting where shells landed and directing gunners accurately on to important targets. Balloons were immensely valuable for intelligence gathering and artillery spotting. Protecting friendly balloons while destroying enemy balloons became increasingly important as the war ground on.

The targets, enemy observation balloons.

DANGEROUS REWARDS

Balloon busters attacked balloons in addition to flying regular combat missions. Nowadays, people thinking of First World War aces usually think about those destroying enemy aircraft, the dogfighters. One thing separating most balloon busters from regular fighter aces was that many of the war’s most famous aces actively refused to attack balloons at all. Manfred von Richthofen never attacked a balloon. Top-scoring British ace Edward ‘Mick’ Mannock scored his first ‘kill’ by destroying a balloon, but found the job so dangerous that he never attacked another. French ace Rene Fonck, top-scoring Allied ace of the war with 75 confirmed kills, never shot down a balloon.

It could also be readily argued that hindering enemy intelligence gathering and artillery spotting was often of greater value than dogfighting, shooting down one or two enemy aircraft if they were lucky and then returning to base. Granted, deaths of famous aces such as Richthofen, Major Lanoe Hawker (himself killed by Richthofen) and American balloon buster Frank Luke caused some damage to enemy morale, but the vast majority of aircrew killed died with little recognition outside of their squadrons, families and friends. Destroying observation balloons had genuine influence on the local progress of the war. Shooting down novice enemy fighter pilots and very occasionally killing a leading enemy ace simply didn’t have the same value.

So how did they do it? They checked reports of balloons sighted behind enemy lines, examined intelligence on enemy defenses, plotted the least-dangerous route to their target and attacked. Fortunately, pilots had some specialist weapons to assist them. These were designed to take advantage of the chronic German shortage of helium, the non-flammable gas often used by Allied balloons. In the absence of helium, German balloons usually used hydrogen but, while hydrogen is lighter than air and as good as helium for lifting a balloon, it is explosive when mixed with air and any kind of flame. Even a cigarette end could cause a hydrogen-filled balloon to explode. The first of these specialist weapons was the Le Prieur rocket designed by French officer Yves Le Prieur in 1915. This was simply a larger form of firework rocket containing a charge of gunpowder and tipped with a sharp iron spike to pierce a balloon just before the gunpowder detonated. Le Prieur rockets were unguided and woefully inaccurate at more than 120 feet from their targets, but they were also the first air-to-air missiles in military history and cutting-edge weapons for their time.

Pilots on both sides also used special incendiary bullets containing phosphorous. The incendiary bullets gradually replaced rockets owing to their greater accuracy and range. Using them, however, carried a particularly nasty risk. Downed pilots whose aircraft were found carrying incendiary ammunition were likely to be summarily shot by their captors rather than taken prisoner. Some pilots carried written orders from their commanders explicitly stating incendiary ammunition was exclusively for use against balloons and not for strafing runs on trenches, infantry columns or other human targets, but this didn’t stop balloon busters risking summary execution - assuming that they survived being shot down to start with. Another specialist weapon, equally likely to incur summary execution, was the phosphorous canister used by flying over a balloon and dropping the canister like a normal bomb. Ground troops had particular loathing for phosphorous canisters and especially for pilots who used them. They carried 20 pounds of white phosphorous and could easily miss a balloon entirely, landing instead among defending ground troops with horrifying results.

TACTICS FOR ATTACK

Pilots also developed specialized tactics. They never flew straight and level when attacking balloons, usually preferring a shallow dive at high speed, making a single pass and escaping rather than risk a second attempt. Enemy defenses were usually too heavy for any pilot wanting to survive to attack a balloon more than once. Some pilots favored flying deep behind enemy lines before circling round and attacking from within enemy territory. Enemy gunners often opened fire much later rather than risk a friendly fire incident and pilots could make a single high-speed pass while headed for their own lines, making a successful escape much more likely. On larger-scale raids often involving multiple aircraft and multiple targets, one group would attack the balloons while another remained as ‘top cover’, circling at higher altitude to defend against enemy fighter patrols. Enemy fighters were often assigned specifically to patrol balloons, providing both physical defense and a deterrent to all but the bravest or most reckless enemy pilots.

The frequent fate of would-be aces. Balloon buster Heinrich Gontermann’s Fokker Triplane, destroyed on a balloon busting mission.

You might think that balloon busting was already dangerous enough without any additional risks. Unfortunately for balloon busters the job of enemy defenders was to make it as dangerous as humanly possible. Balloons were connected to the ground by a winch allowing them to an agreed height and no higher. Heavy anti-aircraft guns used clockwork shells designed to explode at altitudes set by their gunners and gunners always set them to explode at roughly the same height as the balloons they protected. As if heavy guns weren’t bad enough, balloons were almost always held below 3,500 feet, the maximum accurate range of light and heavy machine guns. Balloons were invariably protected by a half-dozen or more machine guns of varying calibers. Infantry were also encouraged to fire rifle volleys at any enemy aircraft diving within range. One weapon particularly feared by Allied pilots was the Hotchkiss 37mm gun firing five shells at once. The shells glowed bright green as they came up in clumps, leading Allied pilots to nickname them ‘flaming onions’.

One particularly nasty weapon was the booby-trapped balloon. These were used by both sides and deliberately left at a tempting altitude for enemy fighters. Instead of a human observer a straw dummy dressed in uniform was placed in the basket. The remainder of the basket was filled with a 500-pound explosive charge detonated from the ground. First World War fighters were immensely fragile by today’s standards and being anywhere near such large explosions frequently proved fatal. The booby traps did occasionally backfire on their users, literally in the case of Belgian ace Willy Coppens. Coppens attacked a balloon that was strangely unprotected by ground fire and, like many pilots before him, didn’t realize the balloon was manned by a dummy until it was too late. Unfortunately for the Germans, the bomb failed to explode while Coppens shredded the hydrogen-filled balloon with incendiary bullets. The bomb-laden basket, now itself thoroughly alight, promptly descended into the middle of the German positions where the impact and fire finally detonated it causing considerable casualties on the ground. Coppens, the highest-scoring balloon ace of the war, regarded it as one of his luckiest escapes while the opinion of the defending Germans is unrecorded. This is probably just as well.

The grave of Frank Luke, probably the First World War’s most famous balloon buster.

​A DANGEROUS LIFE

Despite the undoubtedly extreme risks, many ambitious young pilots tried their hand at balloon busting. Given its extreme danger and spectacular nature balloon busting was the quickest route to fame and medals for young fighter pilots wanting to make their name. Many died. Some tried it once or twice before sticking to conventional dogfighting and a few made it their specialty. Belgium’s Willy Coppens was the highest-scoring balloon buster of the war. France’s Henri Bourjade, the Royal Flying Corps’ Anthony Beauchamp-Proctor and German pilots like Erich Lowenhardt and Heinrich Gontermann destroyed hundreds of balloons between them. Most famous of all was the American Frank Luke, whose career lasted only eighteen days before his death, during which he destroyed fourteen balloons and also shot down four German aircraft. For ambitious young pilots wanting fame and rapid promotion, balloon busting seemed like the fast track to immortality. For most of them it was really the fast track to their graves.

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References

http://www.theaerodrome.com/aces/balloon_busters.php

Guttman, Jon; Dempsey, Harry. Balloon-Busting Aces of World War 1. Osprey Publishing, 2005

Shores, Christopher; Franks, Norman; Guest, Russell. Above the Trenches: A Complete Record of the Fighter Aces and Units of the British Empire Air Forces 1915-1920 Grub Street, 1990.

Hart, Peter: Aces Falling: War Above The Trenches, Phoenix Books, 2008.

Lee, Arthur Gould; Open Cockpit, Grub Street, 2012.

Lewis, Cecil; Sagittarius Rising, Pen And Sword Books, 2009.

Image Sources

http://simhq.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/3878426

http://www.sabix.org/bulletin/b28/kerisel.html

http://www.pourlemerite.org/wwi/air/gontermann.html

http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=9233

History has arrived! The Summer issue of History is Now Magazine…

In the northern reaches of our world, summer is well under way. So what better way to enjoy it than to read a bumper edition of your favorite history magazine, History is Now? The new issue features a wide range of articles, including the tragic story of Mary Todd, the wife of Abraham Lincoln.

The new issue of History is Now magazine is out now.

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Here is what our editor has to say…

It has arrived! Summer is here and to celebrate we have a bumper issue for you that features a wide variety of amazing events and topics in history. Perfect while you’re on the beach.

We start with a fascinating look at the life of Mary Todd, Abraham Lincoln’s wife. She suffered great loss and in many ways her life was like a Greek Tragedy. We’re then going to keep the magazine’s international focus and look at a very personal memoir from somebody who visited Berlin in the days after the Berlin Wall fell down in 1989. The article features a history of the Berlin Wall too. After that, we have the tale of the travelling executioner. Sound odd? Well it is an intriguing tale of how the state of Mississippi executed people in the 1940s and 1950s, with an even more intriguing executioner.

The focus then remains on American history with an article about the death of Mormon Saint Joseph Smith in 1844, followed by a look at the history of the naming of the US Civil War. There were a variety of debates until very recently around the name for the conflict that this article considers. The Civil War plays a part in the article after that too as we take a rather unique look at slavery in the Northern states of America.

Moving on, we arrive to a conflict between Pancho Villa of Mexico and the American Army, specifically General Pershing’s Punitive Expedition of 1916. To complement that piece, we include a podcast on World War II hero Dwight D. Eisenhower. The penultimate article considers how European and American fur-traders interacted with third gender Indigenous people in the Pacific Northwest region. This well-researched article is certainly thought provoking. And finally, in our photo-essay, we take a personal look at how the Vikings have influenced a modern-day woodcarver.

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With all of that, I’m sure that you will enjoy this month’s History is Now magazine.

Click on one of the links below to enjoy the magazine today for free…

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George Levrier-Jones

How Hollywood blurred the facts of one of the trials of the century

The trial of the century? In this article Edward Vinski looks at a famous 1925 trial between religion and science. And how later Hollywood and Broadway depictions blurred the truth of events.

Perhaps twentieth century America’s most famous clash between religion and science occurred in Dayton, Tennessee. Science teacher John T. Scopes stood trial for teaching the theory of human evolution by natural selection to a class of high school students. Over the course of eleven days in July 1925, news reporters from all around the United States crowded into the small town to cover what was called “the trial of the century”. Much of the interest in the case stemmed from the fact that Scopes was defended by Clarence Darrow, perhaps the country’s most famous trial attorney, while William Jennings Bryan, the former Secretary of State and three-time Presidential nominee, aided the prosecution. The trial peaked when Darrow put Bryan on the witness stand to answer questions about the Bible, and culminated with a guilty verdict that was ultimately and anti-climactically overturned on a technicality. That Bryan died in Dayton a few days after the trial ended only added to its drama.

John T. Scopes in 1925

FROM TENNESSEE TO BROADWAY

The story, however, did not end in Dayton. In 1955, Inherit the Wind, a play based on the events of the trial, opened on Broadway. Written by Jerome Lawrence and Robert Edwin Lee, the play used the trial as a metaphor for McCarthy-ism with the Scopes character representing those blacklisted by the House Un-American Activities Committee. Five years later, the play was turned into a film starring Academy Award winners Spencer Tracey and Frederic March in the Darrow and Bryan roles respectively. Both the play and the film were well received and have been remade several times over the ensuing decades.

The popularity of these fictionalized accounts has, though, produced an interesting by-product. Many people have come to believe that the film/stage versions are accurate depictions of what occurred in 1925. Easterbrook (N.D.) suggested that “many Americans know the Scopes trial not from history books but from ‘Inherit the Wind’.” Unfortunately, Inherit the Wind distorts the facts of the trial, and while I think most of us expect a certain amount of Hollywood-izing where ‘based on a true story’ films are concerned, we run into great dangers if we treat such fictionalized accounts as historical documents.

SETTING THE RECORD STRAIGHT

As we approach the 90th anniversary of the Scopes Trial, I would like to set some of the record straight. In doing so, I will avoid discussing minor instances of creative license, and keep my focus on the aspects of the 1960 film that can cause misunderstanding of the facts of the case.

We begin with the arrest and indictment of the defendant, John T. Scopes. The film opens with the Scopes character teaching his biology class when the lesson is interrupted by the authorities placing him under arrest. The truth was somewhat less dramatic. Following the passage of Tennessee’s anti-evolution law in May 1925, the ACLU offered to assist any schoolteacher who challenged the law. Upon hearing this, local business leaders, school board personnel and attorneys concocted a scheme in which a local teacher would be tried for violating the statute. The resulting trial would not only challenge the controversial law, but it would also serve as a publicity stunt for the town which had fallen on hard times (Moore, 1999). Scopes, 24-years-old at the time, was the local high school’s general science teacher and football coach. He was tracked down not in his classroom, but on a local tennis court and brought to a Dayton drug store where the conspirators were scheming over breakfast. Upon his arrival, he was asked whether he would be willing to let his name be used in the case. Scopes was opposed to the anti-evolution law although he knew very little about it, being primarily a physics and math teacher. In fact, there is some question as to whether or not he ever actually taught an evolution lesson while substituting for the regular biology teacher (Benen, 2000). His uncomplicated life also made the young, unmarried, childless Scopes an attractive candidate as he would have little to lose from this scheme. After some discussion, Scopes accepted (Larson, 2006).

A nearby justice of the peace swore out an arrest warrant, handed it to a police officer who promptly served the papers to Scopes. While the conspirators made phone calls to newspapers announcing the upcoming trial which would help put their town “on the map”, the accused left the drug store to resume playing tennis (Larson, 2006). Within days of the announcement, Bryan volunteered his services to the prosecution, Darrow agreed to aid the defense, and the trial of the century was set to begin.

MORE ERRORS

This, however, brings us to another point of comparison between Inherit the Wind and the actual trial: Scopes’ treatment while in custody. The film shows the Scopes character languishing alone in a jail cell, being taunted and threatened with lynching by his fellow townspeople, and intimidated by prosecutors who were out for blood. Again the truth tells a different story. As one might gather from Scopes’ post-‘arrest’ tennis match, he never spent one minute in jail. The crime was, in fact, a misdemeanor offense punishable by a fine of “not less than One Hundred $(100.00) Dollars nor more than Five Hundred $(500.00 ) Dollars for each offense” (1925 Tennessee House Bill, 185).

In addition, far from being hated by the populace, Scopes was generally well liked by his fellow townspeople and this opinion seems to have been shared by members of the prosecution (Larson, 2006). In fact, during the noon recess on one particularly hot day, Scopes went swimming with two of the prosecuting attorneys, Wallace Haggard and William Jennings Bryan, Jr. They enjoyed themselves so much that they lost track of time and were late returning to the courthouse. Upon their arrival, they found that the trial had proceeded without them, and they had difficulty squeezing through the crowded courtroom to take their places.

We have begun to get a flavor for how Inherit the Wind helped to establish the Scopes Trial myth at the expense of its facts. One would expect that Scopes would be the central figure of his own trial. The personalities that dominated it, though, were such that the defendant became an afterthought.

Edward Vinski is Associate Professor of Education at St. Joseph's College in New York.

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References

Benen, S. (2000). Inherit the Myth: How the movie version of the Scopes trial monkeyed with the facts. Church and State, 53, 15-16.

Easterbrook, G. (N.D.). The Scopes trial vs. “Inherit the Wind”. Retrieved from http://www.beliefnet.com/News/1999/12/The-Scopes-Trial-Vs-Inherit-The-Wind.aspx

Larson, E. J. (2006). Summer for the gods: The scopes trial and America’s continuing debate over science and religion. New York: Basic Books.

Moore, R. (1999). Creationism in the United States: The lingering impact of Inherit the Wind. The American Biology Teacher, 61, 246-250.

1925 Tennessee House Bill, 185.

A Founding Father in London. John Adams’ troubles

John Adams was one of the Founding Fathers of the USA. After US independence was achieved, he served in a number of positions, including as the US Minister to Britain, a crucial role at the time. Here, Steve Strathmann looks at how Adams fared while in London.

After the American Revolution and throughout the nineteenth century, Anglo-American relations saw many highs and lows. While the United Kingdom and the United States only went to war once during this period (War of 1812), tensions were always close to the surface. This situation made the position of United States Minister to the Court of St. James’ one of the most important in the US State Department. Among the many men who held this post (including five future presidents), three members of the Adams family served in London at points during or after times of war. John, his son John Quincy and his grandson Charles Francis all faced challenges during their terms, but each contributed to the slow but steady strengthening of bonds between the British and their former American colonies. This first of three articles will deal with the first American minister to London, John Adams.

A portrait of John Adams, circa 1792. By John Trumbull.

Meeting George III

At the time of his appointment to London in 1785, John Adams had been in Europe for about three years. During that period, he had served as ambassador to the Netherlands (a post he would continue to hold while in England) and served on the committee that negotiated the Treaty of Paris, which ended the war with Britain.

He presented his credentials to King George III on June 1, 1785. In his speech to the king, Adams stated that he hoped that he could help restore the “good old nature and good old humor between people who... have the same language, a similar religion, and kindred blood.”

John Adams later reported that George III seemed very affected by the meeting. In his response, the king stated that he was the last person to agree to the breakup between Great Britain and the American colonies. On the other hand, since it was now fact he “would be the first to meet the friendship of the United States as an independent power.”

Public Reception of Minister Adams

The choice of Adams as the chief American representative in Britain was widely scorned by the London press. This was no surprise, given Adams’ roles in promoting American independence and negotiating the treaty which achieved that end. According to historian Joseph J. Ellis, the press reaction to Adams was “much like the Vatican would have greeted the appointment of Martin Luther”. Adams took the way that some people acted towards him during his term as showing guilt and shame, as opposed to anger. He wrote in his diary after one awkward party in March 1786: “They feel that they have behaved ill, and that I am sensible of it.”

John’s wife, Abigail, had joined him in Europe. She helped fortify him against the attacks, but also had to deal with slights of her own. For example, the wife of an MP once asked her, “But surely you prefer this country to America?” John Adams’ official relations with British authorities were more cordial than with the press and some of the public, but that didn’t necessarily show up in any kind of diplomatic results.

Diplomatic Standoff

John Adams’ primary goals while in London were to settle violations of the Treaty of Paris and arrange a trade agreement between the two nations. Among the violations, British troops continued to occupy posts along the Great Lakes. When this was brought up to Foreign Minister Lord Carmarthen, he countered that prewar debts owed by American farmers to British creditors had yet to be paid, also a treaty violation. This is one example of the stalemate on treaty issues that Adams was unable to break during his tenure.

Adams also made no progress on a trade agreement with the British. The trade balance was firmly in London’s favor at this time. They felt no need to make concessions on items such as opening their West Indies ports to American ships. Unfortunately for Adams, he had just as many problems dealing with his own government as with Lord Carmarthen and the British.

This was because of the rules set forth under the Articles of Confederation. Congress had no power over foreign trade, so it could not help in arranging any trade agreement with Great Britain. The military was so weak under this system that it could do nothing about British forces on the Great Lakes even if it wanted to. Congress also proved slow in providing instructions to its ambassadors. In fact, when Adams requested to be relieved of his European posts in order to return home on January 24, 1787, Congress didn’t approve his request until October 5. Due to the slow pace of communications across the Atlantic Ocean, Adams didn’t receive this news until mid-December, almost a year after sending his request.

Progress Elsewhere

Though John Adams may have struggled in his negotiations with the British, this period was not unproductive for him. He, along with Thomas Jefferson, did finalize deals with several other nations. Prussia signed the only trade agreement that the Americans were able to complete during Adams’ term on August 8, 1786. A treaty with Morocco was signed in early 1787, in which the United States agreed to pay for the protection of American shipping. They also secured additional loans for the United States from the Dutch.

John Adams also made his thoughts known back home over the future of the United States government. The weakness of the Confederation Congress had led many to call for changes to, or an entire replacement of, the Articles of Confederation. Adams’ contribution to this debate was A Defense of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America, which he had published in London and shipped to America. In this book, Adams argued for a bicameral legislature (as opposed to the single Confederation Congress) and an executive branch empowered to carry out the laws and defend the nation. The book was well received in the States, and James Madison wrote that it would be “a powerful engine in forming the public opinion.”

Return to America

John Adams made so little headway during his three years in London that his post would remain vacant for the next four years. In his final meeting with George III, the king assured him that when the Americans met their treaty obligations, his government would as well. After Adams left London on March 30, 1788, the Westminster Evening Post reported that he “settled all his concerns with great honor; and whatever his political tenets may have been, he was much respected and esteemed in this country.”

No one knew at the time, but this would not be the last time an Adams would represent his nation in the Court of St. James. In 1815, following another Anglo-American war, John Quincy Adams would assume his father’s former position in the diplomatic corps.

Read more about John Adams and why Independence Day may not actually be on July 4. Click here now!

References

Butterfield, L.H. et al., eds. Diary and Autobiography of John Adams, Vol. 3. Cambridge, MA: Belkamp Press of Harvard University Press, 1962.

Ellis, Joseph J. First Family: Abigail Adams & John. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2010.

Holton, Woody. Abigail Adams. New York: Free Press, 2009.

Madison, James. Volume 1 of Letters and Other Writings of James Madison. Philadelphia, PA: J.B. Lippincott & Company, 1865. Accessed June 21, 2014. http://books.google.com/.

McCullough, David. John Adams. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2001.

United States Department of State. “The United Kingdom-Countries-Office of the Historian.” http://history.state.gov/countries/united-kingdom. Accessed June 15, 2014.

The Man who Attacked Pearl Harbor: One Nation’s Enemy, Another Nation’s Hero

Admiral Yamamoto led the attack on Pearl Harbor in World War II. However, Yamamoto was an interesting character who clashed with other, more bellicose, factions in Japan. Here, Kevin K. O’Neill tells us about his life.

Seventy-three years ago, on a day that has lived in infamy, America was attacked by Imperial Japan at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, in a devastating surprise attack. One of the masterminds of this attack was Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, Commander in Chief of Japan’s combined fleet. Portrayed in the American press as the chief perpetrator of this nefarious gambit, Yamamoto was successfully demonized in the American mind by newspapers and magazines. Such slander is a tool of war as old as the business but with the passage of time a more realistic summation of Yamamoto’s character is in order.

Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto.

A NAVAL MAN

Born Isoroku Takano in 1884, to a Nagaoka samurai clan, Isoroku was adopted into the Yamamoto clan in 1916 to keep the clan name alive, a common practice of samurai clans with no male heirs. By that time Yamamoto had already graduated form the Imperial Japanese Naval Academy in 1904, served as a line officer during the Battle of Tsushima Straits in 1905, returned to the Naval Staff College in 1914, and been promoted to Lieutenant Commander in 1915. Yamamoto went on to study at Harvard for two years with several subsequent American postings allowing him to tour America and become fluent in the English language. It was during this time in America that Yamamoto gleaned his understanding of American production and logistic capability. Showing foresight, Yamamoto shifted his specialty from gunnery to naval aviation.

In the 1930s the Army and Navy of Imperial Japan were at odds with each other over national doctrine. This animosity was fanned by politics turbulent enough to, after an assassination attempt in 1930, give the Japanese eleven Prime Ministers in as many years before the Army Officer, Hideki Tojo, became Prime Minister in 1941. The Army’s nationalistic outlook, a mix of ‘bushido’ and European fascism termed ‘Showa Nationalism’ by historians, was fueled by many things. Two of these were lingering resentment over the treatment by the ‘Black Ships’ of Commodore Perry’s gunboat diplomacy, and the indignation over the Japanese ‘racial equality’ proposal being rejected by the League of Nations at the Paris Peace Conference after World War I. One of the main bones of contention between the bellicose Army and the more pragmatic Navy was whether or not to join the German-Italian Axis powers in what was to become the Tripartite Act.

Admiral Yamamoto, previously against aspects of the Japanese aggressions in China, was also against the Tripartite Act, recognizing that it would almost certainly lead to open conflict with the United States. Well aware of the age old military tenet that it is easier to start a war than to end one, Yamamoto, against public opinion and to the ire of the Army, sounded the alarm over America’s production abilities saying that the Japanese Navy could “run wild in the Pacific for 6 months… after that, I have no expectation of success.” This realistic viewpoint, considered weak and unpatriotic by the Army and an increasing number of the Navy power players, led to Yamamoto being removed from his position in the Navy Ministry to sea duty as the Commander in Chief of the Pacific Fleet, where he was held in high esteem.

WHEN WAR BEGINS

After Tojo was appointed Prime Minister, Yamamoto, knowing war was imminent, went into patriotic obedience with the mindset of giving America a heavy blow, drawing battle lines, and suing for peace. The first of these blows came at Pearl Harbor, but while the rest of Japan was celebrating the ‘decisive’ victory Yamamoto was in deep melancholy over the fact that not a single American aircraft carrier was touched and that, due to bureaucratic lag, the declaration of war was delivered late to the Americans, making Pearl Harbor a sneak attack that would harden American resolve. Yamamoto tried again to hit the Americans hard then sue for peace with the plan of securing Midway Island and swatting American aircraft carriers.

Midway was a sure Japanese victory on paper, but there were problems such as the lack of security making the plan an open secret discussed publicly in teahouses. One Japanese pilot received a letter from a foot soldier relative fighting in China wishing him good luck at Midway. Other tricks of fate, including the submarines sent to detect American aircraft carriers being placed incorrectly due to a typographical error, thwarted the Japanese fleet. American intelligence work and gambits, the heroism of the torpedo squadrons, and shipboard fire fighting capabilities helped tip the balance. The Imperial Japanese Navy never recovered from their losses at the Battle of Midway.

As the Japanese were pushed back further and further during the battle for the Solomon Islands and ensuing loss of Guadalcanal, their morale suffered. Yamamoto, against strong vocal protests by his staff, insisted on going on morale boosting visits to forward areas. With the Japanese secret codes broken, the US Navy knew the details of these visits. President Roosevelt ordered the Navy to “Get Yamamoto”. On April 18, 1943, Yamamoto was shot down during an aerial ambush. Killed outright by .50 machine gun fire the 59 year old Yamamoto was found thrown clear of the crash site in his seat, still upright, with head bent as if in deep thought, his katana still clutched in his white gloved hand. Boosting the morale of the Americans and demotivating the Japanese, Roosevelt’s decision to go after Yamamoto is hard to question when viewed from the mindset of the times.

Sadly for the Japanese people Yamamoto never got his chance to keep the, or sue for, peace with the Americans. Roughly 90% of Japanese casualties occurred after his death as the Japanese fought tooth and nail against the advancing allies. One can only wonder what might have happened in the mid-twentieth century had the forces of bellicose nationalism listened to Isoroku Yamamoto, a true warrior who knew the price of aggression.

Now, click here to read our article on how World War II stereotypes of Japan linger on to this day.

Reference: The Rising Sun: The Decline and Fall of the Japanese Empire by John Toland.

The most remote place in the world? – Image of the week

It was on July 3, 1767 that one of the most remote islands in the world was discovered. But things did go so smoothly for those who were the first Westerners to inhabit the island.

The South Pacific is a huge and sometimes wild ocean. This meant that in the age of exploration, the small islands that are dotted around it were often less than easy to come across. So it was with Pitcairn Island, surely one of the world’s most remote islands. This island was ‘permanently found’ on July 3, 1767, although Polynesians had previously lived there and it was discovered (and then seemingly forgotten) by a Portuguese explorer early in the seventeenth century. Better to say then that the island was re-discovered by the British. However it then lay untouched for a number of years – until a mutiny took place.

The Mutiny on the Bounty was a mutiny led by Fletcher Christian in April 1789. The mutineers and some Tahitians then moved to Pitcairn Island in 1790, as island that was uninhabited at the time. Our above image shows the moment when Lieutenant Bligh and other crew were sent from the ship. Conversely, the below image shows the rather beautiful Bounty Bay in Pitcairn.

Have you heard of History is Now magazine? If not, click here to find out about a great new interactive history magazine.

The second image is from Kameraad Pjotr and is available here.

Michael Collins – Four myths surrounding the death of the Irish independence leader

Michael Collins was an Irish leader who helped his country achieve independence. However, a few years after the Irish Republic was proclaimed, Collins was dead. His death remains a mystery. Here, SM Sigerson, an author of a book related to the assassination, tells us about four myths surrounding his death. 

Michael Collins, his life and times, command an inexhaustible fascination for people everywhere. This is perhaps because they are a sort of microcosm of a political predicament that continues to repeat itself all over the world.

An ancient, semi-feudal oppressor. A people literally dying for self-determination.  A vigorous new generation, chomping at the bit to ‘have a go’. A wealth of new thought and thinkers, transforming political debate, intellectual and cultural life.

Among the best and brightest, a young leader steps into the breach: with the genius, vision and courage that turns the key and brings it all together. Spearheaded by him, his people sweep all before them.

Such popular leaders are sometimes fortunate, and live to rule; shepherding the people through the pangs of establishing their republic. Others fall in the conflict; tragically cut off in their prime, setting their world back decades.

Michael Collins addressing a crowd in Dublin, 1922.

We've seen this drama replayed in many nations. If mythology was created to teach us of classic dilemmas that may be cyclically repeated by humanity down through the ages, perhaps this is one of the key dilemmas.

No wonder that Collins' story has so much to say to us even now. If it's the stuff that dreams are made of, it has also been plagued by myth making in every sense. Mythology can have two potential functions: to illuminate the facts, or to obscure them. Some myths give meaning. They help us understand our mysteries. Another sort may simply be disinformation: concocted expressly to prevent understanding.

Because there has never been any full, official inquiry in to the death of Collins, his story is not much more than a folk tale. A number of myths about it have taken on a powerful life of their own; often tolerated and even disseminated by official sources.

In “The Assassination of Michael Collins: What Happened at Béal na mBláth?” eleven popular misconceptions are listed which, almost without exception, have served to mislead the public about what really happened.

Most of these are easily traceable to sources by no means entirely objective or disinterested - when not to actual political opponents of the man whose death they seem to trivialize. We are going to consider a few such myths here.

Myth 1:  That there is an "official story"; that we know what happened.

Myth 2:  The anti-Treaty side did it.

Myth 3:  "No, stop and we'll fight them."

Myth 4:  Collins died because he was "careless of personal danger"

Myth 1: That there is an "official story"

Origin: Anecdote, folklore, irresponsible commentators.

Translation: "No investigation necessary."

That there never has been any official, public inquiry into the death of Michael Collins [1] is a glaring omission that cannot be excused in any modern democracy.

We haven't even the basic dignity of an official story to pull to pieces. We have only the illusion of one. Unexamined anecdote, conflicting testimony and rumor have been allowed to stand in its place. In reality, there is no official story.

As matters stand there is no real evidence to show what caused his death, and we can only presume it was caused by gunshot. There is no evidence to show that Collins didn't die of a heart attack, or that he was not poisoned and that the wounds were not inflicted afterward. [2]

The eyewitness reports are highly contradictory. None of those present were ever formally questioned by the authorities. There is no autopsy report that we can read. All we know for certain is that shots were exchanged at Béal na mBláth and that only Collins died.

Yet inquests were held in the death of Cathal Brugha, Harry Boland, Sean Hales, Liam Lynch "and a host of others who died from gunshot wounds... Contemporary newspapers show inquests in the deaths of soldiers as well as officers killed in action were commonplace." [3] The authorities' failure to convene any such examination in Collins' death is more than a regrettable oversight.

Myth 2: The anti-Treaty side did it

Origin: Popular assumption, based on contemporary press reports.

Translation: "Case closed."

The assumption that the anti-Treaty soldiers (that is, those who did not support the 1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty that led to Ireland coming into being) shot Collins is no more than that.  As such, it is directly attributable to the lack of any official investigation.

Allegations that he was shot by someone other than the ambushers is not a far-fetched theory, but originates with corroborated eyewitness testimony.

Myth 3: "No, stop and we'll fight them."

Origin: Emmett Dalton.

Translation: "Dalton was not to blame. Collins (i.e. the victim) was to blame."

How many discussions of the events at Béal na mBláth turn on references to these words? How many of the journalists, politicians and others who've quoted this famous line have any idea of its provenance?

Like so much conventional wisdom about Béal na mBláth, this anecdote originates in the account given by one single witness only. It is the version of events given by Dalton. Significantly, it is the version which most seems to excuse Dalton's failure, as chief bodyguard, to keep his priceless charge alive. It is not corroborated by any other source.

This should be enough to restrain prominent commentators from quoting it as gospel.

Myth 4: "Careless of personal danger"

Origin: Folklore, well-meaning biographers.

Translation: "Collins (i.e. the victim) was to blame."

Where courage and judgment are equally required, I would rather send in a clever coward, than a stupid hero.

-  Michael Collins, 1922 [4]

No one survives the kind of attention that the British secret service focused on Michael Collins by mere ‘luck’. In the course of several years on their ‘most wanted’ list, he survived continuous, organized, sophisticated efforts, by the world's most formidable imperialist war machine, to infiltrate his organization, capture and/or kill him.

Running an army entirely dependent on volunteers and constantly recruiting them, he was particularly exposed to such assailants. A number of operatives joined the movement, distinguished themselves, and managed to penetrate quite near him. Expressing a keen desire to meet Collins, some were ultimately exposed and executed.

This sent a very clear message indeed: trying too hard to find Collins was a short way to end in a ditch with a hole in the head. Then there are the many eyewitness reports, scattered throughout his life in Dublin, of his stunning skill in swiftly dispatching the occasional lone armed attacker, with his bare hands and championship wrestling skills.

These were dangerous times. The Irish were playing for high stakes, and had their eyes on the prize: the golden ring of national freedom, which had eluded their forebears for centuries. The struggle required great physical courage in its combatants, and a willingness to take risks.

Yet no one in Collins' position could have survived the War of Independence, had he been ‘careless of personal danger’.

"The Assassination of Michael Collins: What Happened at Béal na mBláth?" by SM Sigerson is available here: Amazon US | Amazon UK

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Notes

1) He is referred to herein as "Collins"

2) John M Feehan The Shooting of Michael Collins: Murder or Accident?  Mercier Press, Cork, Ireland, 1981

3) Ibid.  Tim Pat Coogan, in his authoritative biography Michael Collins, seems to err in asserting that no inquests were held in deaths that occurred during "military action."  Arrow Books, London, 1991

4) Hayden Talbot, Michael Collins: His Own Story Hutchinson & Company, London, 1923

The Spark that Caused Devastation – The Outbreak of World War I

Rebecca Fachner continues her series of articles on World War I by looking at how an assassination in an age of assassinations led to the outbreak of one of the most destructive wars of all time. You can read Rebecca’s first article in the series on Royal Family squabbles here.

Just a couple of days ago, June 28, marked the 100th anniversary of the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo, a city that was then a (reluctant) part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Franz Ferdinand was the heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne and his assassin was Gavrilo Princip, a young Serbian nationalist who was part of a terrorist syndicate called the Black Hand, who were determined to assassinate the Archduke. It is important to note that some members of the Black Hand were quite closely associated with members of the Serbian government, and it is possible that Serbia knew about and even funded the assassination attempt. At least that is what Austria-Hungary chose to believe in the aftermath of June 28. Ironically, the assassination attempt was almost a complete failure. Several members of the Black Hand were stationed along the Archduke’s tour route, and the first attempt on him was a bomb thrown toward his touring car. The bomb killed several soldiers and onlookers, but did not harm the Archduke or his wife. After recovering from their ordeal, the Archduke and his wife insisted on visiting the victims in the hospital, and as they headed to the hospital their car stalled. Princip happened to be in a café across the street, heard the commotion and seized his moment. 

Gavrilo Princip assassinating Archduke Franz Ferdinand. By Achille Beltrame and published in the Domenica del Corriere newspaper.

ELEVATED STATUS

By all rights, neither Ferdinand nor Princip should have gone down in history. The assassination, while of course tragic and potentially politically destabilizing, should have remained an internal Austro-Hungarian matter, making the two men at best a minor footnote in European history. Moreover, it was an age of assassination. In the fifteen years prior to 1914, the kings of Italy, Greece and Spain had been assassinated in addition to the Grand Vizier (Prime Minister) of the Ottoman Empire as well as the Prime Minister of Japan, and the President of the United States. Who outside of their own countries can now identify any one of these men? With so many assassinations taking place in this period, why is it this one that is remembered?

The memory of Princip and Ferdinand looms large because of what followed from the assassination. This particular assassination has gone down in history as the short-term cause of the First World War, setting off a chain of events that led Europe into war. It really wasn’t a cause so much as an excuse; Europe was poised for war, many wanted war, even if they wouldn’t have admitted it, and there had been several incidents in the recent past that almost resulted in war. With Europe primed and ready, it was only a matter of time before something finally sparked a fight, and this was it.

Austria-Hungary was stunned and distraught by the assassination, not unreasonably, but the leadership dealt with their grief and indignation by looking for revenge. Austria-Hungary wanted to make the Serbians pay, and within a month issued a set of demands designed to bring Serbia to heel, and gave them forty-eight hours to comply or risk war. Serbia did not want war, but the Austro-Hungarian demands were simply too intrusive, as they were certainly designed to be, and Serbia rejected the most egregious of Austria-Hungary’s demands. Both Austria-Hungary and Serbia had sought assistance from their much larger allies/protectors, Germany and Russia, respectively, so both knew that if it came to war they would not be fighting alone. Russia, enjoying its role as Slavic protector, actually called for a partial mobilization first, but insisted that it was only a mobilization against Austria-Hungary. Germany begged Russia to halt its mobilization, and then declared war on Russia. Two days later, on August 3, Germany declared war on Russia’s ally, France.

THE ESCALATION CONTINUES

Germany was then faced with a serious dilemma, albeit one completely of its own making, as there was no good way for them to invade France without going through Belgium. Germany asked Belgium for permission to march their army through Belgium into France, which seemed from a German perspective to be a reasonable request. Amazingly, the Belgians did not agree, and politely declined to allow a massive foreign army to run roughshod through their sovereign territory. Germany invaded anyway. This alerted the British, who had signed a treaty guaranteeing Belgian neutrality, and Britain declared war on August 4. While this was all going on there were frantic letters and telegrams being written between the major powers, visits being arranged, peace conferences proposed, all in an effort to stop or slow down the march to war.

Three days after Britain declared war, on August 7, the British Expeditionary Force arrived on the continent, and the Battle of the Frontiers began. The Battle of the Frontiers was a complex affair that took place in several stages and ultimately lasted until mid-September. In the East, by contrast, events moved at a significantly slower pace. The Russians were a formidable enemy, but a very slow moving and technologically backwards one, and it took several weeks for their mobilization to be complete. By August 17, the Russians had fully mobilized and began invading eastern Germany. On August 23, the Battle of Tannenberg began, lasting for a week and becoming the first in a long line of humiliating Russian defeats. 

By August 23, therefore, less than two months after the assassination of the Archduke, Europe was completely at war. Germany was dug in on two fronts, and massive battles were taking place on a continent that had been completely at peace less than 60 days prior. And over what? A dead heir to the throne of a middle tier power, some national pride, and several very itchy trigger fingers. There are so many points along this timeline in which events could have conceivably, even plausibly, gone a different way. Austria-Hungary could have reacted differently, Germany and Russia could have stayed out of each other’s way, Germany could have ignored France or forced them to be the aggressor, or Germany could have avoided Belgium and therefore the British.

The likelihood is that it wouldn’t have mattered if things had gone slightly or even very differently; war was virtually inevitable and if this series of events had not brought about a conflict, something else would have done. Nonetheless, one wonders whether Princip, spending the war in his prison cell, felt responsible for the carnage, or if he even realized his role in starting the greatest war Europe had ever seen.

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The long-lost words of Jackie Kennedy

Jacqueline Kennedy was one of the most high-profile -and private - women of the twentieth century, and her marriage to John F. Kennedy remains the source of intense speculation. While the public rarely heard her voice during her lifetime, letters and interviews released since her death have provided insights into who she was and, as Wendy Loughlin recounts here, how she felt about JFK.

She was famous for wanting privacy and famous for not getting it, becoming instead the object of an intense public fascination that has outlived her by 20 years. Jacqueline Kennedy followed her husband into the spotlight reluctantly, and then spent nearly half her life fighting its glare without him. 

Jackie and JFK in May 1961.

The doe-eyed young Jackie who was terrified of the crowd that assembled outside the church on the day she married John F. Kennedy is not the Jackie we came to know later—not Jackie O, the persona, the jetsetter who hid behind dark sunglasses and silence. But it’s the young Jackie whose voice we heard—or partially heard—after a Dublin church unearthed and nearly auctioned off a cache of her letters last month.

She wrote the letters to Irish priest Joseph Leonard over the course of fourteen years, from 1950 to 1964—years in which she met, married and lost JFK. Excerpts were first published in the Irish Times and quickly re-printed by publications around the world. And while the letters must have included her thoughts on a number of different topics, it’s telling that the passages chosen for release focus almost exclusively on John F. Kennedy.

Portrait of a Marriage

History has repeatedly been revealed through letters, but the letters of first ladies are often compelling in intimate, as much as historical, ways; at their core, they tell us about a marriage. The Kennedy marriage, with its mixture of glamour and tragedy, hearsay and scandal, has captured the public’s imagination for half a century.

They say she was intelligent with a rapier wit, that she could size people up in a single meeting, that she made JFK laugh. We see it in footage from the 1962 America’s Cup dinner, when she leans across the table toward him as if no one is watching. She’s wearing a strapless Cassini gown, looking conspiratorial as she rocks her chair in his direction, oblivious to the puffs of smoke from his cigar. He bends toward her easily, listens intently, smiles. 

But mostly, we don’t see it; and her silence after his death, alongside rumors and revelations about his philandering, left a vacuum that has been filled with countless books and articles full of an almost feverish speculation about the true nature of their relationship. Ironically, her quest for privacy deprived her of it, made people clamor for her all the more, more than for any other first lady in history. Which is why the letters are so titillating.

It may be also why reading the letters feels like an invasion of privacy, why it probably is and why even a public usually hungry for a glimpse behind the scenes of Camelot felt uncomfortable with their release. A few weeks after the story broke, the Kennedy family intervened and the letters were removed from auction on May 21.

Another photo of JFK and Jackie from May 1961.

Public Figure, Private Thoughts

Still, the letters don’t feel any more intimate, any more telling about the Kennedy marriage than parts of Jackie’s 1964 oral history interviews with historian Arthur Schlesinger, which were released by Caroline Kennedy in 2011. Like when Jackie recounts what she said to JFK during the Cuban Missile Crisis: “If anything happens, we're all going to stay right here with you... I just want to be with you, and I want to die with you, and the children do, too—than live without you.” Or how, after the death of their newborn son, Patrick, “he sobbed and put his arms around me.”

But as Caroline notes in her introduction to the interviews, Jackie knew she was on the record when she spoke with Schlesinger, knew her words would shape history and one day become part of the public domain. When she began writing to Father Leonard in 1950, a 21-year-old Jackie Bouvier certainly could not have imagined this, could not have known what lay ahead for her—that ten years later, she would become first lady. “I feel as though I had just turned into a piece of public property,” she told Time magazine on the eve of her husband’s inauguration. “It’s really frightening to lose your anonymity at 31.”

This is not the first time Jacqueline Kennedy’s private letters have turned public, nor even the first time her letters have provided a glimpse at her feelings about John Kennedy. “I loved you from the first day I saw you,” she wrote to him a month before his death, “and if I hadn’t married you my life would have been tragic because the definition of tragedy is a waste. But ten years later, I love you so much more.”

The letter, which ran seven pages long, found its way into the hands of a private collector in the late 1990s, and excerpts from it have been published several times since. As with the Irish letters, the Kennedy family objected to its release. Yet this letter in particular may be the most compelling argument against the most persistent negative rumors about their marriage—that she only married him for his money, or that he only married her because he needed a first lady.

In fact, they loved each other—and the handful of times we hear her in her own words, that’s what she tells us. Is that fact historically significant? Perhaps not. But it’s still nice to know.

Now, click here to read our article on John F. Kennedy and the Tsar – The parallel lives of two fatherless boys.