American Tanks and Tank Destroyers of World War II: A Flawed Necessity?

American tanks and tank destroyers played an important role in the later years of World War 2. Here, Daniel Boustead looks at the most important of these tanks and the role they played in some key battles.

A Sherman tank during the Allied Invasion of Sicily in July 1943.

American Tanks and Tank Destroyers in World War II are very well known to the public and historians. The inferiority of these weapons was a direct result of government and U.S Army policies and doctrine. Extensive research has been done about the technical mediocrity of these weapons. The logistics and transportation of these weapons played a role in their technological inferiority. Very little could be done to improve the American Tank and Tank Destroyer’s marginal effectiveness. In contrast, Airpower and Artillery were the most effective Anti-Tank weapons. 

At the end of World War I the U.S Military was trying to re arrange the peace time army.  The Cavalry, Infantry, and Artillery branches of the U.S. Army viewed the Tank and the infant American Tank Corps as a threat and an encroachment to their turf and authority!. In 1919 General John J. Pershing (said in testimony before Congress) that the American Tank Corps “should not be a large organization”(1). General John J. Pershing also said (during his 1919 testimony) “it should be placed under the Chief of the Infantry as an adjunct to that arm”. Pershing’s testimony resulted in a significant event. In 1920, the U.S Congress passed the National Defense Act of 1920, which eliminated the infant Tank Corps. It also placed the Tank Corps under the Chief of Infantry as adjunct to that arm of the U.S. Army. This act seemingly destroyed any hopes for a future independent armored force. In October, 1931, the U.S. Army Chief of Staff Douglas MacArthur disbanded the “Mechanized Force”. He also ordered the Infantry and Cavalry branches to separately devise their own distinctive tanks and rules for their use(2). The resulting “Infantry tanks” would be used to accompany men on foot at a slow pace. In contrast, the light and under-gunned “Cavalry tanks” conducted reconnaissance and exploited enemy weakness. Mildred Gille said about General MacArthur’s decision, “When MacArthur saw fit to split the development of mechanization, the association of the two branches automatically resolved into an internecine competition for money, men and equipment”. The rivalry stifled any technological development in tanks. 3rd Armored Division member, Belton Cooper, recollected “As a young ordnance ROTC cadet in August, 1939, I was shocked to find that our total tank research and development budget for that year was only $85,000. How could the greatest industrial nation on earth devote such a pittance to the development of a major weapons system, particularly when World War II was to start in two weeks?”(3).

World War II

The M4 Sherman Tank was heavily influenced by the polices in 1942 from the Army Ground Forces Development Division (4) The Army Ground Forces Developmental Division had two primary criteria for a new weapon: “battle-need” and “battle-worthiness”. 

“Battle-need” meant that the new equipment had to be essential, not merely desirable. This policy was articulated by. Lt. General Leslie McNair. McNair was insistent that the Army should not be burdened with too many weapon types since the U.S. Army would be fighting thousands of miles from the continental United States and could not afford to complicate logistics. As a result, the U.S Army was unwilling to adopt a specialized tank with heavier armor for the infantry support role.

“Battle-worthiness” meant that the design had to be capable of performing its intended function but to be sufficiently rugged and reliable to withstand the rigors of combat service without excessive maintenance demands.

The M4 Sherman Tank perfectly fit the criteria of “Battle-need” and “Battle-worthiness”. These policies of “Battle-need” and “Battle-worthiness” meant that the Army Ground Forces did not favor the development of new tanks. This was until the combat situation forced them to do otherwise.

In Army Ground Forces or the AGF manual issued in September 1943 stated, “the primary role of the tank was not to fight enemy tanks, but to destroy enemy personnel and automatic weapons” (5). To have denied the infantry armor protection would have resulted in men being senselessly slaughtered by machine gun fire. Until 1945, the US Armor doctrine reflected the interwar school of thought that tanks existed to support Infantry, and the Cavalry’s preference for using them as weapons of exploitation to hit the enemy’s weak rear. These decisions led to the development of the Sherman Tank. However these policies also lead to the deaths of thousands of Tank and Tank Destroyer Crewmen.

In contrast the enemy armored threat was to be solved by the individualized tank destroyer battalions (6). The primary Tank Destroyer of the war was the M10 Gun Carriage. Another important American Tank Destroyer was the M18 Hellcat (7). The M18 Hellcat also was used in combat in Europe and the Pacific (8). The M36 Jackson Tank Destroyer also served in Europe(9).

Specifications

The hull front armor of the King Tiger II Tank was 150 millimeters thick(10). The King Tiger II’s 88 Millimeters KW.K 43 L/71 gun, using the shell of Pzgr. 39/43 could penetrate the front Gun Mantlet of the Sherman Tank at 2,600 meters at a side angle of 30 degrees (11). The King Tiger could also penetrate the front turret of a Sherman Tank using the same ammunition at a range of 3,500 + meters at a side angle of 30 degrees.

In contrast, the Sherman Tank equipped with either the 75 Millimeter gun or the 76 Millimeter gun was unable to penetrate the frontal armor of the King Tiger II Tank from a side angle of 30 degrees. The German JagdTiger Tank Destroyer had a fixed armored body that had 250 millimeters of front armor inclined at 75 degrees (12). The Sherman Tank, either equipped with the 75mm gun or the 76mm gun, was also unable to defeat the frontal armor of the JagdTiger based on front shot at a 60 degree angle (13).

The M-18 Hellcat Tank Destroyer was protected by thin armor and an open top turret which exposed the crew to fire from aircraft (14). The M18’s 76mm gun fired a shell that could seldom kill heavily armored German panzers in one shot. Even the M26 Pershing Tank when it fired the T44 HVAP shell could only penetrate 244 millimeters of homogenous armor at range of 500 yards at a 30 degree angle (15). The M26 Tank would have had some difficulty in destroying the JagdTiger.

In a December 6, 1944, article titled “Plan No Changes in Sherman Tank”, an unnamed War Department Official spokesmen said, “Should our tanks be as heavily armored as the German ones, this would bring up almost insurmountable difficulties in transportation, since many of the tanks now are still being landed on beaches” (16). In addition, Army Regulation 850-15 stated “American Tanks had to be able to fit into landing crafts, and to cross hastily built or repaired temporary bridges. Army Regulation AR 850-15 (which was revised in August, 1943) limited U.S. Tanks to 35 tons (17). The M26 Pershing Tanks’ weight was roughly 45 tons, and the Sherman Tanks average weight was 35 tons. In contrast the German King Tiger Tank was nearly 70 tons (18).

Attacks

On July 11, 1943, at Gela, Sicily, Naval gunfire rescued American tankers and infantry pinned down by fire from Nazi Tiger I Tanks(19). Sergeant Harold Fulton said of airpower “I could write all day telling of our tanks I have seen knocked out by more effective guns. Our best (anti-tank) weapon, and the boy that has saved us so many times, is the P-47 (Thunderbolt fighter-bomber, used to support Allied Tanks” (20). 

On the dates of September 22, 27, 28, and October 2 and 7, 1944, a series of five bombing raids hit the Henschel plant. This is where the King Tiger II was being produced (21). These five raids resulted in destroying 95% of the total floor area of the Henschel Plant. Another bombing raid on the Henschel Plant on December 15, 1944, delayed further recovery. Heavy bombing raids on the Kassel vicinity on October 22 and 23, December 30, 1944, and January 1, 1945, further delayed King Tiger II production. The Allied Bombing campaign from September 1944 to March 1945 caused the loss of at least 657 King Tiger II’s out of 940 that were originally planned to be built.

The American government and military decisions both contributed to these weapons’ deficiencies. Logistics and transportation prevented the weapons from being as formidable as their German counterparts. Thankfully, Tank and Tank Destroyer crews were saved by outstanding Air Power and Artillery.

What do you think of American tanks in World War II? Let us know below.

Now, you can read World War II history from Daniel: “Did World War Two Japanese Kamikaze Attacks have more Impact than Nazi V-2 Rockets?” here, “Japanese attacks on the USA in World War II” here, and “Was the Italian Military in World War 2 Really that Bad?” here.

References

Bryan, Tony, Laurier, Jim and Zaloga, Steve J. New Vanguard 35: M26/46 Pershing Tank 1943-1953. Oxford: United Kingdom. Osprey Military of Osprey Publishing Ltd. 2000. 

Cooper, Belton Y. Death Traps: The Survival of an American Armored Division in World War II. Novato: California. Presidio Press. 1998. 

DeJohn, Christian M. For Want of a Gun: The Sherman Tank Scandal of WWII. Atglen: Pennsylvania. Schiffer Publishing, Ltd. 2017. 

Doyle, David. Legends of Warfare Ground: M18 Hell-Cat 76mm Gun Motor Carriage in World War II. Atglen: Pennsylvania. Schiffer Publishing, Ltd. 2020. 

Doyle, Hilary and Spielberger, Walter J. The Spielberger German Armor and Military Vehicle Series: Tiger I and II And Their Variants. Schiffer Military History of Schiffer Publishing Ltd. 2007. 

Doyle, Hilary, Jentz, Thoms L, and Spielberger, Walter J. The Spielberger German Armor and Military Vehicle Series: Heavy JagdPanzer, Development, Production, and Operations. Atglen: Pennsylvania. Schiffer Military History of Schiffer Publishing Ltd. 2007. 

Doyle, Hilary L and Jentz, Thomas L. Germany’s Tiger Tanks: VK 45.02 to Tiger II: DESIGN, PRODUCTION, & MODIFICATIONS. Atglen: Pennsylvania. Schiffer Military History of Schiffer Publishing Ltd. 1997. 

Jentz, Thomas L. Germany’s Tiger Tanks: Tiger I & Tiger II: Combat Tactics. Atglen: Pennsylvania. Schiffer Military History of Schiffer Publishing Ltd. 1997. 

“M-18 Tank Destroyer “Hellcat””. U.S. Army Heritage & Education Center: Army Heritage Trail Experience a Walk Through History. Accessed on April 3rd, 2022. https://ahec.armywarcollege.edu/trail/Hellcat/index.cfm.

Footnotes

1 DeJohn, Christian M. For Want of a Gun: The Sherman Tank Scandal of WWII. Atglen: Pennsylvania. Schiffer Publishing, Ltd. 2017.  42.  

2 DeJohn, Christian M. For Want of a Gun: The Sherman Tank Scandal of WW II. Atglen: Pennsylvania. Schiffer Publishing, Ltd. 2017. 46. 
3 Cooper, Belton Y. Death Traps: The Survival of an American Armored Division in World War II. Novato: California. Presidio Press. 1998. 295. 

4 Bryan, Tony, Laurier, Jim and Zaloga, Steve J. New Vanguard 35: M26/46 Pershing Tank 1943-1953. Oxford: United Kingdom. Osprey Military of Osprey Publishing Ltd. 2000. 4 to 5. 

5 DeJohn, Christian M. For Want of a Gun: The Sherman Tank Scandal of WW II. Atglen: Pennsylvania. Schiffer Publishing Ltd. 2017. 105.

6 Bryan, Tony, Laurier, Jim and Zaloga, Steve J. New Vanguard 35: M26/46 Pershing Tank 1943-1953. Oxford: United Kingdom. Osprey Publishing Military of Osprey Publishing Ltd. 2000. 4. 

7 Doyle, David. Legends of Warfare: Ground: M18 Hell-Cat 76 mm Gun Motor Carriage in World War II. Atglen: Pennsylvania. Schiffer Publishing Ltd. 2020. 8. 

8 Doyle, David. Legends of Warfare: Ground M18 Hell-Cat 76 mm Gun Motor Carriage in World War II. Atglen: Pennsylvania. Schiffer Publishing Ltd. 2020. 64. 

9 DeJohn,, Christian M. For Want of a Gun: The Sherman Tank Scandal of WW II. Atglen: Pennsylvania. Schiffer Publishing Ltd. 2017. 234 to 236 

10 Doyle, Hilary L and Spielberger Walter J. The Spielberger German Armor and Military Vehicle Series: Tiger I and II and their Variants. Atglen: Pennsylvania. Schiffer Military History of Schiffer Publishing Ltd. 2007. 204

11 Jentz, Thomas L. Germany’s Tiger Tanks: Tiger I & Tiger II: Combat Tactics. Atglen: Pennsylvania. Schiffer Military History of Schiffer Publishing Ltd 1997. 14

12 Doyle, Hilary and Spielberger, Walter J. The Spielberger Germany Armor and Military Vehicle Series: Tiger I and II and their Variants. Atglen: Pennsylvania. Schiffer Military History of Schiffer Publishing Ltd. 2007. 153. 

13 Doyle, Hilary, Jentz, Thomas L. and Spielberger, Walter J. The Spielberger German Armor and Military Vehicle Series: Heavy Jagdpanzer: Development, Production, and Operations. Atglen: Pennsylvania. Schiffer Military History of Schiffer Publishing Ltd. 2007. 185

14 “M-18 Tank Destroyer “Hellcat” “. U.S. Army Heritage & Education Center: Army Heritage Trail Experience a Walk Through History. Accessed on April 3rd, 2022. https://ahec.armywarcollege.edu/trail/Hellcat/index.cfm. 

15 Bryan, Tony, Laurier, Jim and Zaloga, Steven J. New Vanguard 35: M26/46 Pershing Tank Pershing 1943-1953. Oxford: United Kingdom.  Osprey Military of Osprey Publishing Ltd. 2000. 10. 

16 DeJohn, Christian M. For Want of a Gun: The Sherman Tank Scandal of WW II. Atglen: Pennsylvania. Schiffer Publishing Ltd. 2017. 215. 

17 DeJohn, Christian M. For Want of a Gun: The Sherman Tank Scandal of WW II. Atglen: Pennsylvania. Schiffer Publishing Ltd. 2017. 274. 

18 DeJohn, Christian M. For Want of a Gun: The Sherman Tank Scandal of WW II. Atglen: Pennsylvania. Schiffer Publishing Ltd. 2017. 334. 

19 DeJohn, Christian M. For Want of a Gun: The Sherman Tank Scandal of WW II. Atglen: Pennsylvania. Schiffer Publishing Ltd. 2017. 135 to 136. 

20 DeJohn, Christian M. For Want of a Gun: The Sherman Tank Scandal of WW II. Atglen: Pennsylvania. Schiffer Publishing Ltd. 2017. 266. 

21 Doyle, Hilary L and Jentz, Thomas L. Germany’s Tiger Tanks: VK 45.02 to Tiger II: DESIGN, PRODUCTION, & MODIFICATIONS. Atglen: Pennsylvania. Schiffer Military History of Schiffer Publishing Ltd. 1997. 59 to 60. 

Mao Zedong’s Childhood — A Telling Catalyst

Mao Zedong is often considered the main perpetrator of the Great Chinese Famine, the harrowing ramification of a series of incompetent and shortsighted policies that engendered the deaths of tens of millions of people. A good majority of the blame is often put on Mao, owing to his brutal and ruthless behavior and little regard for human life. But what is it that forged such a malevolent personality? What about him leads some to believe he was instead a benevolent ruler? To understand one’s inherent mindset and actions, many often look at his upbringing to determine how it affected his character. This brings forward the question: to what extent, good or bad, did Mao’s childhood affect who he became?    

David Matsievich explains.

Mao Zedong, from circa 1919.

Mao’s Parents

It is imperative that we first discuss the background of Mao’s parents. Mao’s ancestors came from the valley of Shaoshan, in Hunan, having lived in this humid region for five-hundred years. Mao’s father, Yi-chang, was born in 1870 to a peasant family. He was a hard-working man. After leaving the army, which he had joined to pay off family debts, he brought back home savvy business ideas, beginning to sell top-quality rice to a nearby village, in time becoming the richest man in his village. He was able to afford a six-room house, although the rooms stayed furnished with only the most basic structures: wooden beds, wooden tables, wooden chairs, some mosquito nets, etc..

Before all of this, however, when Yi-chang was fifteen, he married Wen Qimei, or literally “Seventh Sister Wen”. Wen Qimei, being merely a girl, was not given a name, so as she was the seventh sister of the Wen clan, she was duly given her title. Her betrothal to Yi-chang was arranged for a practical purpose: the Wen family resided in a village ten kilometers away from Shaoshan, but they had a deceased relative buried in a grave in the latter which had to had rituals be undertaken from time to time; therefore, having someone from the family in the area would be ideal. 

Early Childhood and Education

Born into a rural community of traditionalists on December 26, 1893, Mao was the third and only son to survive his infancy. His given name, Tse-tung, or Zedong, literally means “to shine on the East”. Auspicious names were reflective of parents’ expectation that their children would be successful in life. However, in order to not tempt fate with such a grandiose name, he was given a pet name by his mother — “the Boy of Stone,” Shi san ya-zi. After an elaborate ritual, somewhat like a “baptism”, at a rock deemed to be magical, he became “adopted” by the rock. He expressed his fondness for this name even in his older years.

Until the age of eight, he lived with his mother at the Wens’ village. He was loved by all his family there, and his uncle even became his Chinese equivalent of a godfather. Life was happy and careless, Mao only doing mild farm labor like gathering pig fodder and taking the buffalo for a walk by a shaded pond. It was in this idyllic village that he began learning to read.  

He returned to Shaoshan only to attend primary education. Mao had to learn by rote the Confucian classics, then an essential part of education in China, at which he was exceptionally talented. He was known by his pupils as a diligent and smart student, gathering a good foothold in Chinese history and learning to write legible calligraphy. Mao absolutely adored reading, flipping through pages well into the night when the entire village was asleep.

Father and Son

Nevertheless, he was a very recalcitrant and obstinate child. He was expelled from at least three schools for disobedient behavior. When he was ten, he ran away from his first school because, he claimed, his teacher was strict and harsh. This — and Mao’s dislike for menial laborious work — put him at odds with his father. The hatred of physically demanding work was especially what engendered the conflict between father and son: Yi-chang only obtained his wealth through hard labor, and he expected his son to do the same. 

Mao despised his authoritative father, who would hit him whenever he did not comply. Some scholars even put forward that Yi-chang was abusive towards Mao and his mother. Whatever the case, Mao likely never forgave his father, whom many years later, when Mao was chairman of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), he said he would have liked to be treated as brutally as all other political prisoners, had Yi-chang still been alive.

But Mao, as reflected in his future years, was never a submissive man; he fought back. On one occasion, as Jung Chang writes in her book The Unknown Story: Mao, after Yi-chang berated his son in front of guests, Mao ran from his father to a pond and threatened to jump in if his father came any nearer; Yi-chang relented. However, other scholars claim a different outcome; instead of backing down, Yi-chang demanded that Mao kowtow to him, which Mao did, in exchange for avoiding a beating. Two different realities offer two different implications. If we trust the latter, it would be further proof of the severity, and perhaps abusiveness, of Mao’s father, which might evoke sympathy for Mao. But if we are to choose the other, we are shown that Yi-chang did indeed love his son — and that Mao’s unscrupulous cleverness and opportunistic mindset developed at a young age. “Old men like [Yi-chang] didn’t want to lose their sons,” Mao allegedly said. “This is their weakness. I attacked at their weak point, and I won.” Either way, it was an unpleasant father-son relationship.

Yi-chang wanted to tame Mao, to make him docile and responsible. His resolution was to have his son marry his niece, after whom Mao would have to take care of, a mild “white elephant”. And so in 1908, Mao, at the age of 14, married Luo, 4 years his senior. (For the same reason as Wen Qimei, Luo was given not a name but rather a title: “Women Luo”). Mao had no affection for her. “I do not consider her my wife…” Mao said to journalist Edgar Snow in 1936, “and have given little thought to her.” He didn’t even live in the same house as her. She died barely a year later in 1910 (from natural causes, of course). In an article written years later, Mao decried his forced marriage with Luo, and all arranged marriages in general: “This is a kind of ‘indirect rape.’ Chinese parents are all the time indirectly raping their children…” This hatred of paternal authority naturally turned his father into an arch-nemesis. 

A Loving Mother

A pious follower of Buddhism, Mao’s mother became even more devout to the Buddha so that he would protect her only surviving son hitherto. Unlike with his father, Mao’s relationship with his mother was endearingly harmonious. Neat and kindhearted, she was also tolerant, indulgent, and, according to Mao, never raised her voice at him. At a young age he followed her around everywhere, attending Buddhist rituals and visiting Buddhist temples. In emulation of her, Mao espoused Buddhism, although he later forsook it in his later adolescence. His love of her was a complete polar opposite of the hate for his father. In October, 1919, Mao, in his twenties, was horribly distraught to learn of his mother’s death. Yet only a few months later, when Yi-chang was on his deathbed and wished to see his son for the last time, Mao coldly refused to come visit him. He was indifferent to his father’s death.

Once again another controversy opens up, this time about Mao’s absence at Qimei’s death. The generic argument is that Mao simply wasn’t there, away at studies or work, simple and believable. But Jung Chang proposes a more contrived and unpleasant motive: selfishness. Mao had always perceived  his mother as a healthy and clean woman; he did not want that idyllic image to be spoiled by his now ailing mother. He supposedly said to a close staff member, “I wanted to keep a beautiful image of her, and told her I wanted to stay away for a while… So the image of my mother in my mind has always been and still is today a healthy and beautiful one.”

He had agreed with his understanding mother to this arrangement. Mao did indubitably love her very much, but so did he his own interests.

Mao’s childhood: a catalyst?

More attention is usually focused on Mao's later stages of life, like in his early adulthood, when he “became” a communist, and especially later adulthood, when he was chairman. But it cannot be denied that childhood in essence is the foundation for later acts of life. For one, Mao’s ardent hatred and snubbing of traditional customs, like arranged marriage and filial piety, prompted him to espouse the newfangled Chinese Republican values in the early 20th century — and especially develop some very radical ideas of his own — culminating in his notorious communist image, although, as Jung Chang claims, with an “absence of heartfelt commitment” in this new ideology.

It is widely believed among Mao's supporters, past and contemporary, that his Shaoshan peasant background contributed to his empathy and astute concern for peasants in his party years. Mao himself purported that he indeed benevolently cared for the rural and marginalized people of China. Is this true? Jung Chang provides a concise answer: no. There is no sufficient evidence to prove he felt about them this way in her earlier days. Although he had referenced them in a few of his writings, there is no tangible or strong emotion in them to indicate sorrow or sympathy for peasants. In fact, he voiced more emotion on the “sea of bitterness” that was being a student, of which he was one. Mao additionally claimed that his emotion was first roused by the execution of a certain P’ang the Millstone Maker, although there are no records corroborating the existence of such an individual.

It’s safe to conclude that in order to attain a better understanding of Mao’s outlook on the world, it’s worth examining all stages of Mao’s life, not least his college years, where his egotism and fringe ideas were first transcribed on paper. But what qualities did transfer over from his childhood? From what we can confirm, his stubborn behavior is definitely reflected in his later attitude to the CCP leadership; his defiance of his orthodox-viewed father encouraged his adoption of the novel ideas and ideologies, such as democracy, republicanism, and communism, flooding into the country into early 20th century China; and his early-discovered love of books correspondingly prompted him to absorb one after another these recently translated socio-political writings, ranging from moderate to extreme. Although Mao’s childhood was perhaps not the most major period in his life, nor the one in which he adopted communism, it was to a fair degree a stepping stone to his controversial career.  

What do you think of Mao’s early life? Let us know below.

Now read David’s article on the Medieval European Jewish State here.

References

Chang, Jung, and Jon Halliday. The Unknown Story: Mao. Anchor Books, 2005. 

Spence, Jonathan. “A Child of Hunan.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 2000, https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/books/first/s/spence-mao.html. 

Snow, Edgar. “Interview with Mao.” The New Republic, The New Republic, https://newrepublic.com/article/89494/interview-mao-tse-tung-communist-china.

Henry Ford’s “Ship of Fools”: Ending the First World War through Citizen Diplomacy

In 1915 American industrialist and business magnate Henry Ford launched an amateur peace delegation aimed at stopping the First World War raging across Europe. Although it turned out to be disaster rand subject to ridicule, the mission offers an important example of the unorthodox ways in which private citizens have sought to broker peace.

Felix Debieux explains.

A December 1915 Punch cartoon "The Tug of Peace". It ridicules Ford’s peace mission to Europe.

When we think about ‘diplomacy’, a number of images spring to mind. Official-looking statesmen in grey suits, facing off across long tables as they discuss the terms of treaties, ceasefires and trade. This image is a narrow one, and places a great deal of importance on the work of nation states. We might call this ‘Track One’ diplomacy, that is to say the kind of diplomacy conducted in official forums by professional diplomats. There is, however, a second track. Indeed, ‘Track Two’ diplomacy – sometimes referred to as ‘backchannel diplomacy’ - refers to the non-governmental, informal and unofficial diplomacy of private citizens, major corporations, NGOs, religious organisations and even terrorist groups. 

Easily overlooked, this second track has sought to shape major historical events – often at times where government-to-government diplomacy is perceived as inadequate, ineffective or to be failing in some way. This was certainly the case with American industrialist and business magnate Henry Ford, who in 1915 launched an amateur peace delegation aimed at stopping the First World War raging across Europe. Although it turned out to be complete disaster ridiculed mercilessly by the contemporary press, the mission offers an important example of the unorthodox ways in which private citizens have sought to broker peace.

A humanitarian industrialist

While Henry Ford’s motives for involving himself in international diplomacy have been disputed, Ford certainly held sincere pacifist sentiments and, from early 1915, had begun to condemn the war in Europe. Indeed, unlike the jingoism readily found among other automotive industrialists like Roy D. Chapin and Henry B. Joy, Ford described himself as a pacifist and aired his frustration with both the war and the profiteering associated with it. This caught the attention of two prominent peace activists, who approached Ford with an ambitious proposal: launch an amateur diplomatic mission to Europe and broker an end to the war.

The two peace activists play a crucial role in this story. The first was Hungarian author, feminist, world federalist and lecturer Rosika Schwimmer. Closely associated with a number of movements including women’s suffrage, birth control and trade unionism, Schwimmer from the very outset of the war had advocated for neutral parties to mediate a peace. In 1915, she successfully persuaded the International Congress of Women at The Hague to support the policy. Her companion was Louis P. Lochner, a young American who had acted as secretary of the International Federation of Students. In 1914, Lochner had been appointed as Executive Director of the Chicago-based Emergency Peace Federation, and – like Schwimmer – called for neutral nations to mediate an end to the war. Both were fervent champions for world peace, and they hoped to persuade Ford to throw his resources behind their proposal.

While their eventual meeting with Ford was a success, the proposal put to the industrialist was not entirely honest. Indeed, Schwimmer claimed to possess key diplomatic correspondence which proved that there were neutral and belligerent nations receptive to her idea of mediation. The documents, however, cannot be described as anything other than a complete fabrication. Nevertheless, they were enough to persuade Ford that there was appetite in Europe for negotiations and so he agreed to finance a peace mission. “Well, let’s start”, he said. “What do you want me to do”? 

Chartering a mission to Europe

With Ford sold on the idea of neutral mediation, Lochner suggested that they seek the endorsement of President Wilson. The President could establish an official commission abroad until Congress made an appropriation. If this ‘Track One’ diplomatic route was to fail, Lochner explained, then the President could back an unofficial mission to undertake the work. Ford supported the idea, and seemed excited at the promise of good publicity. Indeed, the industrialist revealed a natural flair for epigram, thinking up such pithy pronouncements as: “men sitting around a table, not men dying in a trench, will finally settle the differences”. 

On November 21, 1915, Ford, Schwimmer and Lochner lunched with a group of fellow pacifists. Everybody in attendance approved the plan of sending an official ‘Track One’ mediating mission to Europe and, if that failed, a private ‘Track Two’ delegation. To set the plan in motion, Ford and Lochner would travel to Washington to secure President Wilson’s backing. Possibly jesting, Lochner suggested to the group “why not a special ship to take the delegates over [to Europe]?” Ford immediately jumped at the idea. While some members of the group thought it ridiculously flamboyant, Ford liked the idea for that very reason. Almost immediately he contacted various steamship companies and, posing as “Mr. Henry,” asked what it might cost to charter a vessel. In no time at all, Ford had chartered the Scandinavian-American liner Oscar II. 

The very next day, Ford and Lochner arrived in Washington for an appointment with the President. The meeting began well enough, with Lochner observing how “Mr. Ford slipped unceremoniously into an armchair, and during most of the interview had his left leg hanging over the arm of the chair and swinging back and forth”. After exchanging pleasantries, Ford outlined the mission, offered to finance it, and urged the President to establish a neutral commission. While he approved of the principle of continuing mediation, the President explained that he could not anchor himself to any one project and, regretfully, that he could not support Ford’s plan. This was not what Ford had prepared himself to hear. He explained that he had already chartered the ship, and had promised the press an announcement on the following day. “If you feel you can’t act, I will”, he said. While Wilson did not budge from his initial position, this was not enough to deter Ford. “He’s a small man”, Ford said to Lochner as they left the meeting. An unofficial, ‘Track Two’ mission this was going to be.

Casting a net

Eager reporters began to arrive at Ford’s hotel. The industrialist opened his press announcement with a simple question: “A man should always try to do the greatest good to the greatest number, shouldn’t he?” He continued: “We’re going to try to get the boys out of the trenches before Christmas. I’ve chartered a ship, and some of us are going to Europe”. When pressed for more detail about the voyage, Ford explained that he was going to bring together “the biggest and most influential peace advocates in the country”. Some of the heavyweights he listed included Jane Adams, John Wanamaker, and Thomas Edison. 

The voyage, unsurprisingly, made front page news in both New York and around the country. While it is not clear what kind of coverage Ford expected, the reaction he did receive was generally derisive. Among his harshest critics was the Tribune, which ran with the headline:

GREAT WAR ENDS

CHRISTMAS DAY

FORD TO STOP IT

Other commentaries were more direct in their criticism. The New York Herald, for instance, described the mission as “one of the cruellest jokes of the century”. This was echoed by the Hartford Courant, which remarked that “Henry Ford’s latest performance is getting abundant criticism and seems entitled to all it gets”. Usually more sympathetic towards Ford, the World deemed the mission an “impossible effort to establish an inopportune peace.” 

Ridiculed though it was, the mission – even before setting sail – was at least generating the kind of publicity which Ford craved. This, however, only disguised the huge logistical problems which the organisers of the project faced. Indeed, having announced 4th December as the date of embarkation, Ford had left only nine days to assemble an entire delegation. This was not only unrealistic, but also put the project on the back foot from the very outset.

Wasting no time in racing towards an impossible deadline, invitations were sent out at once to prospective delegates. The general response provided only further ammunition for the jeering press. Indeed, within just one day of Ford’s press announcement, John Wanamaker and Thomas Edison clarified that they would not be joining the voyage. While Jane Addams confirmed that she, at least, did plan on joining, it was hard to ignore the avalanche of refusals. These included distinguished figures such as William Dean Howells, William Jennings Bryan, Colonel E. M. House, Cardinal Gibbons, William Howard Taft, Louis Brandeis, Morris Hillquit, and many others who would have lent their credibility to the project. 

Nevertheless, the net was cast wide enough that some notable peace activists were able to join. Leading suffragette Inez Milholland and publisher Samuel Sidney McClure signed up for the mission, along with more than forty reporters. Also committing to the cause was the Reverend Samuel S. Marquis, a close friend of Ford’s. In the end, the delegation was as large and distinguished as Ford could reasonably expect to assemble within such a tight timeframe. Indeed, the fact that so many were willing to abandon their commitments with only nine days’ notice, in some cases at their own expense, pointed to the prestige and appeal which they believed the mission carried. 

All aboard!

The Oscar II set sail from Hoboken, New Jersey on December 4, 1915. Much to the delight of the press, arrangements began to unravel just days before embarkation. On December 1, Jane Addams – one of the mission’s key delegates – fell unexpectedly ill and had to pull out of the voyage. This was a major blow, and no doubt undermined the leadership of the expedition. It was not enough, however, to deter a crowd of roughly 15,000 people from gathering to watch the Oscar II leave the dock. As the band started to play “I Didn’t Raise My Boy to Be a Soldier”, Ford appeared and was met with resounding cheers. 

There was certainly no shortage of entertainment to occupy the press. Indeed, just before the ship's departure, a prankster placed a cage containing two squirrels on the gangplank. An accompanying sign read "To the Good Ship Nutty". This was followed by a man who leapt into the water, and proceeded to swim after the ship as it left the dock. Once hauled ashore, he declared that he was “Mr. Zero” and explained that he was “swimming to reach public opinion.” Oblivious to the commotion, the crowd continued to wave and cheer. This clearly made an impression on Ford. As Lochner observed:

“Again and again he bowed, his face wreathed in smiles that gave it a beatific expression. The magnitude of the demonstration—many a strong man there was who struggled in vain against tears born of deep emotion—quite astonished and overwhelmed him. I felt then that he considered himself amply repaid for all the ridicule heaped upon him.” 

As the Oscar II faded out of sight, Americans waited to see what effect she might have. 

What nobody foresaw was just how soon the delegation would descend into squabbling and infighting. Much of this was triggered by President Wilson’s 7th December address to Congress, in which the case was made for military prepardness and an increase in the size of the US army. This proved to be an incendiary development, with the activists simply unable to agree on their collective response. Indeed, some aboard the Oscar II felt very strongly that the delegation should deprecate preparedness and call for immediate disarmament. Others, however, would not countenance criticism of either the President nor Congress. McClure made his position quite clear:

“For years I have been working for international disarmament. I have visited the capitals of Europe time and time again in its behalf. But I cannot impugn the course laid out by the President of the United States and supported by my newspaper”.

While some among the delegation understood this position, there were those on the voyage who were not so tolerant. Schwimmer, for instance, accused McClure of corrupting the delegation. Lochner went further still, asserting that supporters of preparedness who had joined the voyage must have simply come along for the “free ride”. Such comments only served to stoke disunity, and were lapped up by the ship’s reporters who narrated the infighting in day-to-day stories. “The dove of peace has taken flight,” cried the Chicago Tribune, “chased off by the screaming eagle”. Such reports were accused of having magnified the dispute. “The amount of wrangling has been picturesquely exaggerated,” wrote the activist Mary Alden Hopkins. “A man does not become a saint by stepping on a peace boat.”

While himself strongly opposed to preparedness in any form, it was in the end left up to Ford to patch things up. For him, the success of the voyage was paramount and, if that meant working alongside peace-lovers who supported a degree of preparedness, then so be it. Ford signed a statement, which outlined what he saw as the incompatibility between peace and prepardness but – more importantly – emphasised that all delegates on the mission were welcome. The damage, however, was already done. Indeed, delegates were very aware that their closely-held principles were being savaged in the press. “The expedition has been hampered at every step by the direct and indirect influence of the American press, by the Atlantic seaboard press,” declared one of the passengers.

As the Oscar II continued to steam across the Atlantic, the situation aboard went from bad to worse. An outbreak of influenza spread through the ship, resulting in one person dying and many others falling sick. Ford also fell ill, and retreated to his cabin in hopes of avoiding reporters. This led to a rumour that he might have secretly died, and so a group of the ship’s less considerate reporters forced their way into his quarters to check on the veracity of the story. At the same time, reporters had become highly suspicious of Schwimmer and the diplomatic correspondence she claimed to possess. After some negotiation, Schwimmer agreed to show her evidence but, angered by their comments, cancelled the exhibit. The Hungarian expressed her frustration by locking the reporters out of the Oscar II’s wireless room. By this point the group looked desperately forward to their planned arrival in Norway, where they had been promised a grand welcoming party. Like many other aspects of the mission, however, their expectations were not realised. 

Land ahoy! 

In the early hours of December 18, the Oscar II docked in Oslo. A handful of Norwegians came by later that morning to welcome the delegation, but this was nothing like the rousing welcome they had been promised. The reception was in fact much cooler, with many Norwegians generally supportive of military preparedness and sceptical towards the mission – particularly Schwimmer. Indeed, Norwegians felt that it was inappropriate for a citizen of a belligerent power to play a leadership role in the peace mission of a neutral country. Further still, Norwegians were generally pro-Ally and believed that peace could only be attained after Germany’s military strength had worsened. Onlookers were surely disappointed when a very sick Ford, who insisted on walking from the dock to his hotel, collapsed and went to bed. The most distinguished member of the delegation would make no further public appearances while in Norway.

Regretfully, Ford’s health showed no signs of improvement. He “was practically incomunicado”, recalled Lochner, who suspected that Ford’s friend, Samuel Marquis, was trying to talk the industrialist into returning to America. “Guess I had better go home to mother”, Ford eventually said to Lochner, “you’ve got this thing started now and can get along without me.” Lochner strongly objected, believing that Ford’s presence was critical to the success of the mission. This was to no avail, and on December 23 Ford began his long journey back to the US. 

The effect this had on the rest of the delegation is rather predictable. Some felt depressed, disheartened and perhaps even a sense of betrayal. Lochner attempted to re-motivate the group: “before leaving, [Ford] expressed to me his absolute faith in the party and… the earnest hope that all would continue to co-operate to the closest degree in bringing about the desired results which had been so close to his heart—the accomplishment of universal peace”. While certainly commendable, Lochner’s efforts to soften the blow fell short. After all, everybody knew that Ford was the only one among them who commanded the stature needed to impress and energise the representatives of neutral nations. Though he continued to support the mission both morally and financially, the activists who Ford left behind inevitably splintered further apart. Nevertheless, the disjointed delegation was able to claim one success: the establishment of the Neutral Conference for Continuous Mediation. 

Held in Stockholm, the Conference - attended by representatives from the US, Denmark, Holland, Norway, Sweden, and Switzerland - sought to encourage neutral governments to mediate an end to the war. On May 18, 1916, the Conference issued a manifesto asking belligerent nations to participate. The manifesto laid out three general activities: mediation between belligerents, propaganda to build public support for peace, and scientific study of the political problems. The Conference even managed to meet with the Danish Secretary of Foreign Affairs, its first formal recognition by a European government. Ultimately, however, there were no further successes that the activists could point to. Indeed, their quick work to develop a program failed to gain traction in the parliaments of the neutral nations; no action at all was taken by any of the targeted governments. By March 1, 1917, with the US moving closer to entering the war, Ford made the decision to discontinue the Conference. The total bill for the peace mission? Half a million dollars - $10,100,000 in 2022.

A total failure? 

How should we evaluate the peace mission? Former US Senator Chauncey M. Depew famously reflected that “in uselessness and absurdity” the peace mission stood “without equal”. This, perhaps, is the easiest assessment of the delegation’s efforts. Indeed, without ever agreeing on how they intended to achieve peace, the group failed to persuade any neutral nation to adopt a policy of mediation. In the process, those who boarded the Oscar II were subjected to relentless ridicule and criticism. This was always about more than bruised egos, with some believing that the ridiculousness of the mission risked the credibility of their deeply-held principles. The Baltimore Sun, for instance, judged that "all the amateur efforts of altruistic and notoriety-seeking millionaires only make matters worse".

Nevertheless, Ford himself asserted that the peace ship was a success. It "got people thinking” about peace on both sides of the Atlantic, he claimed, and “when you get them to think they will think right”. Was he hurt by the level of ridicule he was subjected to? It is impossible to say, but he later reminded people that at a time when no serious effort was made to bring the war to an end, he stood up and acted. “I wanted to see peace. I at least tried to bring it about. Most men did not even try”. Ford’s positive assessment of the peace mission was surely influenced by its commercial outcomes. Tellingly, he described the expedition as the “best free advertising I ever got”. 

Indeed, Ford was very much attuned to the commercial benefits of a highly publicised journey to Europe. Lochner, in fact, concluded that publicity was the only definite part of Ford’s thinking. “If we had tried to break in cold into the European market after the war, it would have cost us $10,000,000. The Peace Ship cost one-twentieth of that and made Ford a household word all over the continent”. While for the activists peace was everything, for Ford this was also an investment - an opportunity to advertise his benevolent character across Europe and America. After the war, Ford would go on to become the largest manufacturer of Liberty Motors for aircraft, blurring the boundaries he had once set between profiteering and pacifism. 

A rounded assessment of the peace ship would not be complete without considering its long-term impact. Indeed, it should be remembered that ideas stimulated during the mission eventually wound up in President Wilson’s Fourteen Points, a statement of principles for peace to be used in negotiations to end the war. Notably, the list included a commitment to transparent peace treaties, free from the greedy tentacles of private deals struck on the side. This was an idea thought up by activists who had participated in the peace mission. Though they might have failed to bring an end to the war, these ‘Track Two’ citizen diplomats can claim a legacy of sorts, pioneering alternative modes of peace-building less dependent on government leadership. 

What do you think of the ‘Ship of Fools’? Let us know below.

Now read Felix’s article on Henry Ford’s calamitous utopia in Brazil: Fordlandia here.

References

Open War Aboard the “Peace Ship", J. Mark Powell.

The Peculiar Case of Henry Ford, The University of Michigan and the Great War.

Henry Ford And His Peace Ship, American Heritage, Volume 9, Issue 2, February 1958.

The “Peace Ship”: An Early Attempt at Citizen Diplomacy, Read the Spirit.

The Peace Ship: Henry Ford’s Pacifist Adventure in the First World War, Barbara Kraft, New York, 1978.

The Odyssey of Henry Ford and the Great Peace Ship, Burnet Hershey, New York, 1967.

Second Track / Citizens' Diplomacy: Concepts and Techniques for Conflict Transformation, John Davies, Edward Kaufman, eds., Maryland, 2002.

The Washington Post’s Leader for Decades: The Life and Times of Katharine Graham

Few people have had such a profound impact on the American political and journalistic consciousness as Katharine Graham. Her major role was leading the Washington Post from 1963 until 1991. David Huff explains.

Katharine Graham in 1975, available here.

Overview

Born Katharine Meyer in 1917 in New York City, she was the daughter of Eugene Meyer, who was an American businessman and publisher of the Washington Post newspaper, which he acquired in 1933. After attending Vassar College, she transferred to the University of Chicago, where she received her B.A. degree in 1938. After college, she worked for a year as a reporter for the San Francisco News. After briefly employed in San Francisco, she joined the editorial staff of The Washington Post. In 1940, she married Philip Graham, who was a graduate of Harvard Law School.

In 1946, Philip Graham assumed the position of publisher of the Post. He served as publisher and later co-owner of The Washington Post and its parent company, The Washington Post Company. During his years with the Post Company, Graham helped The Washington Post grow from a fledgling local paper to a national publication and the Post Company expand to own other newspapers as well as radio and television stations. Tragically, however, Phillip Graham committed suicide in August 1963 after suffering from manic depression. As a result, Katharine Graham was transformed from a reticent widow to publisher and chief executive of The Washington Post. Strong-minded, gifted and engaging, Ms. Graham recognized the extraordinary talent of other outstanding individuals in the publishing community. She hired Benjamin Bradlee first as managing editor and then as executive editor to handle the newsroom operations of the growing and well-respected newspaper. Under their tutelage, the Post confronted major crises—the Pentagon Papers and the Watergate Crisis—that no one could have foreseen. Yet, Graham and Bradlee both possessed strong instincts and judgment, a tenacious and unequaled work ethic, and outstanding interpersonal skills that enabled them to survive these political tribulations.

The Pentagon Papers Controversy

In 1967, former Secretary of State Robert McNamara commissioned a study known as The Pentagon Papers, which was the history of the Vietnam War and the decisions made therein by American foreign policy makers from 1945–1967. As the Vietnam War escalated, with more than 500,000 U.S. troops in Vietnam by 1968, military analyst Daniel Ellsberg—who had worked on the project—came to oppose the war, and decided that the information contained in the Pentagon Papers should be available to the American public. In March 1971, he gave a copy of the report to The New York Times, which then published a series of shocking articles based on the report’s most appalling secrets. In sum, the papers revealed that the United States government had broadened the initial war in Vietnam into Southeast Asia with the military bombing of Cambodia and Laos, coastal raids on North Vietnam, and Marine Corps attacks. At that time, these seminal events were not reported by the American press.

On June 13, 1971, the Times began to publish a series of articles based on the information contained in the Pentagon Papers. After several published pieces, the Justice Department issued a temporary restraining order against further release of the material, arguing that it was harmful to the country's national security. In the landmark Supreme Court decision in New York Times Co. v. United States, 403 U.S. 713 (1971), the Times and The Washington Post joined forces to fight for the right to publish, and on June 30, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that the government had failed to prove harm to national security and that publication of the papers was justified under the First Amendment’s protection of freedom of the press.

Due to the favorable Supreme Court ruling, The Washington Post's reputation was enhanced by Graham's defiance of a restraining order by pursuing publication of the Pentagon Papers. To her credit, Graham fought U.S. government efforts to censor the material, which, in turn, upheld the First Amendment right of the free press against prior restraint by the government.

The Watergate Crisis

A year later, on June 17, 1972, a break-in at the Democratic National Committee ("DNC") headquarters in the Watergate complex in Washington, D.C. triggered a political earthquake that shook the foundation of America's democratic institutions. The subsequent cover-up by people who worked for or with the White House, and by Nixon himself, created a constitutional crisis that not only threatened America's "checks and balances" in its democratic representative system, but also called into question the presidency itself.

During the crisis, Katharine Graham faced the full wrath of the Nixon administration as the paper's reporters—Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward—sought to piece together the story of the Watergate burglary. Throughout the Watergate Crisis, Woodward and Bernstein were fed leaks by a deep-background source they referred to as "Deep Throat," who was later revealed to be FBI deputy director W. Mark Felt, Sr. They kept up a constant stream of leads demonstrating not only the direct involvement of Nixon officials in Watergate activities, but also that the Watergate wiretapping and break-in had been financed through illegally laundered 1972 campaign contributions. In a shocking cover-page article, The Washington Post reported on October 10, 1972 that the Watergate bugging incident stemmed from a "massive, nationwide campaign of political spying and sabotage conducted on behalf of the president's re-election committee officials.”(1)

"The investigation of such a tangled web of crime, money, and mischief  would have been hard enough under the best of circumstances, but it was made much harder given the unveiled threats and major and minor harassments by a president and his administration,”(2) she wrote in an excerpt from her 1997 memoir, Personal History. At the end of 1972, Republican businessmen challenged the licenses of two Florida TV stations owned by The Washington Post Company, causing the company's stock price to drop by more than 50 percent.(3) "Sometimes I wondered if we could survive four more years of this kind of strain, of the pressures of living with an administration so completely at odds with us and determined to harm us.”(4)

Graham described her own role in the unfolding story as "a kind of devil's advocate, asking questions all along the way -- questions about whether we were being fair, factual, and accurate.”(5) She downplayed the notion that she had shown courage by standing by her reporters and editors, saying she had no choice. "By the time the story had grown to the point where the size of it dawned on us, we had already waded deeply into its stream.”(6)  "Once I found myself in the deepest water in the middle of the current, there was no going back.”(7)

After months of painstaking investigation by Woodward and Bernstein and U.S. Congressional hearings, coupled with the discovery of President Richard Nixon's secret tape recordings, the United States Supreme Court stepped into the unfolding political drama. On July 24, 1974, in United States v. Nixon, 418 U.S. 683 (1974), the Court ruled in a unanimous decision against President Richard Nixon, ordering him to deliver tape recordings and other subpoenaed materials to a federal district court. On July 30, 1974, Nixon complied with the order and released the subpoenaed tapes to the American people. Nine days later, on August 8, 1974, President Richard Nixon delivered a nationally televised address in which he announced his decision to resign the presidency, effective at noon on August 9, 1974. At that time, Vice President Gerald R. Ford was sworn in as the nation's 38th President of the United States.

Watergate had a profound impact on the American system. It provided the impetus for pernicious cynicism and collective alienation toward the American political process. The intrinsic values and institutions that many people held as sacred-honesty, trust, company loyalty, and faith in a benevolent government-had been tainted and corrupted during the crisis. As a result, many Americans lost faith in the federal government and the reputation of the presidency was greatly damaged. Furthermore, many Americans were astounded that their democratically elected officials were culpable of such undemocratic and criminal behavior. Moreover, from an historical perspective, the Watergate Crisis served to deepen the political disenchantment and growing cynicism that commenced after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy and the bloody quagmire in Vietnam.

Legacy

Katharine Graham faced many tribulations, but she rose above them, created a name for herself and, in my opinion, forever changed the face of journalism. Graham, who became America's first female Fortune 500 CEO, was a mover and a shaker whose breadth of knowledge and depth of character touched a deep and resonating chord in American society. Her life gave meaning to the phrase that adversity builds character. Through tragedy and disappointment, Ms. Graham's sense of moral clarity enabled her to adapt, to endure, to develop a will of iron in order to bear the burdens that fate dealt her with uncommon grace. Rather than retreat into isolation and self-pity, she rose to the occasion to summon and cultivate political and journalistic impulses that existed within her and in turn, utilized them to strengthen America's democratic institutions. 

Conclusion

Finally, despite Ms. Graham's continual political tribulations during the Nixon presidency, she maintained not only a firm and steadfast loyalty, but also a strong and unswerving commitment to her brave, passionate and determined counterparts at the Post. Ms. Graham's unparalleled support for her reporters as well as her editors led to landmark journalism, which reverberated through the highest levels of our government and culture. She helped to create one of the world's great newspapers, and her legacy lives on through the quality of reporting and editorial writing that Americans have come to expect from the Post and written media at large.

In essence, what the American people should gain from Ms. Graham's telling experience is that our political system is tilted more toward personal aggrandizement than to individuals willing and able to make a real contribution. Graham's story underscores the reality that a person's loyalty and experience - though important attributes - are often sacrificed for political expediency.

Ultimately, her success is directly related to those superb professional skills but, as with all great people, it is the result of the priceless qualities of depth of personality and strength of character. It is those latter traits, which America needs more than ever, that make her truly irreplaceable and will cause her to live forever.

What do you think of the article? Let us know below.

Now read David’s article on Jackie Kennedy’s influence on the arts here.

Klein Venedig: A 16th Century German Settlement in Modern-Day Venezuela

The European colonization of South America had a number strange episodes - and perhaps one of the most unusual was Klein Venedig. This was an attempt to set up a German settlement in modern-day Venezuela - however the focus ended up being heavily on the search for the fabled lost city of gold - El Dorado. Erick Redington explains.

Portrait of Phillip von Hutten, a Lieutenant-Governor of Klein Venedig in the 1540s.

An Imperial Election

The Holy Roman Empire. As Voltaire wrote, it was neither Holy, nor Roman, nor an Empire. A patchwork of about 1,800 states, free cities, margravates, and other polities. This politically complicated entity would be the start of one of the strangest, and most little known, colonization efforts in the New World. In 1519, Emperor Maximilian I died, and a new Emperor had to be crowned.

In any other empire, crowning a new Emperor would be as simple as consulting a family tree. However, this was the Holy Roman Empire. It was an elective monarchy. Seven electors, important rulers within the Empire, would choose the new Emperor. Elections were not straightforward, for the Holy Roman Empire was extremely decentralized and individual rulers were very jealous of their own powers and rights in relation to the Emperor. To achieve a majority of the electors and be chosen Emperor would come at a high cost, both politically and economically. 

The election of 1519 would not be a normal election. The three men who put themselves up as candidates were the three most famous rulers in Europe at the time: Henry VIII of England, Francis I of France, and Charles I of Spain. Between these three men, much of the wealth and power of the continent rested. The wealth that could be spent by the three men whetted the appetites of the seven electors. It would take a significant amount of politicking and deep pockets to win the election.

Charles could not be too careful. Henry VIII and Francis I ruled countries outside the Empire, while Charles was Archduke of Austria in addition to King of Spain. That made him the “German” candidate. But he had been raised in the Low Countries and was primarily King of Spain. If Charles lost the election, his possessions would be too far-flung and diverse to defend easily. And if Francis I became Emperor, a German Holy Roman Empire united to France under a young and ambitious king would be unstoppable. For Charles, the election had to be won, no matter the cost.  And cost meant money. Lots of money. Charles would borrow enormous sums of money for “gifts” to the electors and others who could influence them. Although Charles would in the end be elected unanimously, this belies the closeness of the election. Once the election was won, however, the bill would come due. The loans would have to be repaid.

Buying a Crown

Medieval and early modern Europe had a thriving banking industry. Two of the biggest names in banks of the time were Fugger and Welser. These families grew rich lending money to kings, dukes, princes, and even private individuals. Lending money to a man who now ruled half of Western Europe was a great business strategy. Charles knew he would have to repay his creditors. His problem was that from the moment of his election, he was beset by crises throughout his domains. Crises are expensive, but if he defaulted on his loans, he could not expect to get more in the future. There had to be another solution.

It was only 27 years before Charles’ election that Columbus made his first voyage to the New World. By the time Charles was elected, his first throne, the Kingdom of Spain, owned half of the Western Hemisphere. Spain’s empire was more than a land of milk and honey. It was a land of gold and silver. Landless mercenaries leaving Europe poor and unloved were returning ennobled and wealthy beyond the dreams of avarice. Treasure ships were sailing into Cádiz and Seville bringing untold wealth. For Charles, this wealth was needed more to pay for wars against Francis, who was still bitter about losing the election, the Ottomans, who were attempting to push Islam further into the heart of Europe, and Protestants, who were threatening the very existence of the Empire and the religious unity of Western Europe. Bartholomeus Welser was a shrewd businessman. As the leader of his family’s banking firm, he had backed the right horse in the Imperial election. He wanted to be repaid by Charles but knew about the Emperor’s financial situation. He saw the wealth coming from the New World and wanted in. 

The Province of Venezuela had been founded in 1527. Meant to govern the area around the Orinoco River, the economic potential of the area seemed limitless. There were rumors of gold mines, gems, silver, and many other riches. The problem was the area was undeveloped and unexplored. Welser saw an opportunity to extract the wealth of the New World directly, and Charles saw a cheap way to settle a debt. In 1528, Charles granted a charter for Welser to take control of an area roughly corresponding to Venezuela. The southern boundary was to be the “South Sea,” still undefined. All this territory was to be controlled by Welser but also in the name of Charles. Welser would have to fund an expedition, conquer the country, and build defenses at his own expense. If the rumors of boundless riches were true, the expense would be a pittance in comparison.

To Find El Dorado

Welser named Ambrose Ehinger as Captain-General of the new colony of Klein Venedig, or Little Venice in German. On February 24, 1529, 480 men of German, Spanish, and Portuguese extraction, along with some slaves, landed at Santa Ana de Coro, on the north coast of Venezuela.  Very soon, it became clear that rumors of massive gold mines right on the coast were simply rumors. Ehinger was still determined to make his mark, and his fortune, and decided to explore the interior of the continent. Some say he was searching for El Dorado, the fabled lost city of gold. Others that he was looking for the mines of the natives who were in possession of some gold. Ehinger prepared his expedition carefully. After all, the grant went an undefined amount of space south, and he did not know how far he would have to go. 

Ehinger’s expedition, accompanied by a number of native porters, departed and explored the shores of Lake Maracaibo. The record of brutality towards the natives of the area, the Coquivacoa, and those who were part of his expedition was horrendous. The porters were tied together by the neck in a long rope-chain and subjected to a brutal work regimen. When one man would fall out due to fatigue, he would simply be decapitated, thus freeing the rope and allowing the chain to move on. The natives, finding this brutal man, and his brutal expedition moving through their territory, fought. On September 8, 1529, he would establish the city of Neu Nürnberg, later called Maracaibo. Despite the fierce resistance of the natives of the area, and not finding the gold he wanted to, Ehinger saw the expedition as a success. He would outfit another.

The second expedition would be prepared like the first. Large numbers of native porters and a large military contingent. The expedition would set off south and west from Coro in 1531. This excursion would become a hell on earth. The Spanish would devastate native villages. The terrain was horrible. Brutality toward the native porters was normal. One group, sent back with 70,000 pesos worth of gold, had to abandon the treasure and eventually turned to cannibalizing what remained of their porters. For almost three years, the expedition roamed the jungles of Klein Venedig looking for the city of El Dorado, or at least a little more gold. Ehinger ordered his soldiers to take all gold from the natives they could find. He, however, forbade his men from buying food from the natives, even though the natives wanted to sell them food. Ehinger was, amazingly after all this, allegedly desirous of not annoying the natives.  Eventually, Ehinger would be shot in the neck with a poison-tipped arrow and died on May 31, 1533.

A New Governor but the Same Goal

The successor of Ehinger would be George von Speyer, who was appointed the new governor by Charles. Speyer was determined to succeed where Ehinger had failed. He would find his fortune, he was sure. Speyer outfitted an expedition of about 2000 men and set off for the interior in 1535. This expedition would cross mountains and rivers. They would be the first expedition to cross the Mal-País. The natives were just as hostile to Speyer as they had been to Ehinger. They were also smart. They would encourage Speyer and his men that just over the horizon was a city where people were dress well and lived lavishly in a gold city. Speyer and his men overlooked the warning signs of disaster and pressed on, driven to emulate Cortés and Pizarro.  

Once the expedition had gone a few hundred miles, Speyer decided to split the expedition to cover more ground. The plan was to meet up at a designated rendezvous point later on. After further travel, and several mutinies amongst his men, Speyer was forced to turn back and return to Coro. One source says that 310 of the 400 men under Speyer died. The other half of the expedition was commanded by Ehinger’s second in command Nicholas Federmann. Federmann had been angry that he had not been made his friend’s successor and had been superseded by Speyer. He had been the choice of the Welser, but Charles had overruled them and appointed Speyer instead. Federmann was seen by many of Charles’ advisors as a cruel and overbearing man. Whether he was either of those things, he was a great leader of men. It has been written of him that he was tireless in driving his men but led by example and did not expect any man to do that which he would not do himself.

Now, presented with an opportunity for independent command, Federman grabbed his chance with both hands and made his own expedition. Through force of will, he brought his expedition over the Andes and into the valleys of New Granada, ignoring Speyer’s orders. Although Jiménez de Quesada would make it to southern Colombia first by a few weeks, the achievement of Federmann was not small.  A confrontation would occur between Quesada, Federmann and Sebastián Belalcázar, all three of whom led expeditions to the area and therefore believed they had rights to the treasures of the region. After a period of negotiation, all three men agreed to go to Spain together and request King Charles settle the dispute. Charles would eventually rule in favor of Quesada. Federmann would return home to Augsburg where he was promptly fired by the Welsers.

Speyer would go on to make several more expeditions. He would continue to search for three more years after the famous first expedition ended. By 1539, sick and worn out from expeditions, Speyer resigned as governor of Klein Venedig. He wanted to return to Europe but was persuaded to turn back at Santo Domingo out of a sense of duty. He would not live long, however, dying in 1540 at Coro. After Speyer’s death, the governorship passed to Phillip von Hutten. Hutten had been on Speyer’s expeditions and, shockingly, still had a desire for more.

To Do the Same Thing Over and Over…

Hutten would begin his first expedition in August 1541. Falling for the old native trick of convincing the explorers that all the gold was just over the next hill, Hutten pressed on with reckless abandon. The natives pointed Hutten to the Omaguas tribe, a powerful and warlike tribe. When the expedition arrived in Omaguas territory, Hutten was convinced this was the gateway to the fabled El Dorado. He was determined to capture living Omaguas to find out more. This resulted in a battle with an estimated 15,000 natives. The expedition, worn down through years of travail by this point, could not cope with this force. Hutten decided to return to Coro and mount a major expedition. 

Hutten and his men were convinced they had been within the grasp of the fabled city. All Hutten had to do was get back to Coro, mount another expedition, and he would be the next Cortés. What he did not know was that he had been gone too long. In 1545, after not hearing from Hutten for years, the Spanish had appointed Juan de Carvajal as Captain-General of Venezuela. When only 100 miles from Coro, Carvajal, realizing that if Hutten returned, he would lose his position, captured the unfortunate Hutten. Hutton, accompanied by one of Bartholomew Welser’s sons and the expedition’s bodyguard, were all hacked to death on Carvajal’s orders.

By this point, the colony was in chaos. None of the riches that had been promised had been found. The only thing the Welsers had really accomplished was to capture natives and sell them into slavery. There were no farms, no commerce. Everyone had been so wrapped up in finding El Dorado that a true settler colony, the original intention, did not exist and there was no real plan to build one. Hutten would be the last governor of Klein Venedig. This sad disaster of a colony would not be definitively put out of its misery as Hutten had been. It would die with a whimper. Although the legal existence of the colony would continue for a while longer, the attempt to settle Germans, and the Welser’s grand dreams of limitless gold were over.

What do you think of Klein Venedig? Let us know below.

Now, read about Francisco Solano Lopez, the Paraguayan president who brought his country to military catastrophe in the War of the Triple Alliance here.

Controversial Heritage: An Approach to Racism from the Land of Black Pete

In the eyes of foreigners, the Netherlands has a controversial tradition. Every autumn an old man named Sinterklaas (a figure based on Saint Nicholas, patron saint of children and one of the sources of the popular Christmas icon of Santa Claus) with a staff, a miter and a long beard arrives in the Netherlands on a steamboat accompanied by dozens of servants, called zwarte pieten (Black Petes). These Petes have traditionally been painted black, have bright red lips, gold earrings, and curly hair. Black Pete hands out sweets and presents to children. To outsiders this whole tradition has an obvious stereotypical racist character, but for many Dutch people it is an innocent tradition: they say this has nothing to do with racism. In the last ten years in particular there has been increasing criticism of the racist character of Black Pete, both from minority groups within the country and from abroad. This is a very delicate situation in the generally liberal and tolerant Netherlands. Fierce discussions and demonstrations by supporters and opponents characterize the past ten years. Why is this tradition so highly valued and how should it continue?

Bram Peters explains.

Illustration from Jan Schenkman's book Sint Nikolaas en zijn Knecht (Saint Nicholas and his Servant).

Although Sinterklaas is a tradition for children, it’s always the adults who say Black Pete must stay black, not the children. This has to do with the fact that adults have an image from their youth of what Black Pete should look like. Children don’t have those memories. And that’s why it’s so sensitive. Adults feel that a tradition they have only fond childhood memories of may not be passed onto the next generation. Their tradition is under pressure to change and that hurts. Every survey shows that it is mainly older Dutch people who want to stick to the traditional appearance of Black Pete. Younger generations are more open to change.

Over the past ten years you can see that the annual recurring discussion is starting to influence public opinion. The number of Dutch people who are in favor of the traditional Black Pete decreases a little every year, but it is going slowly. International events also influence this shift, for example UN researcher Verene Sheperd’s criticism of the Dutch tradition in 2013 and the worldwide Black Lives Matter protests following the death of George Floyd in 2020. Slowly the tradition is changing: every year more Black Petes appear with only some soot smudges on the face rather than full blackface. Other Petes are painted in all kinds of colors.

When something is part of your own culture and tradition, it can be very difficult to understand that it can be hurtful to others. Something that is perceived as racist by others cannot be easily understood for people for whom it is part of their identity. There seems to be a blind spot. In addition, we live in a time when the world is changing rapidly. Globalization, migration and the rise of the internet and social media mean everyone is connected to everyone and old habits and customs are constantly under discussion. Many people experience a loss of identity and tend to cling to the old. Polarization is the result. It is more important than ever to keep in touch with each other and really understand why one wants change and why that change takes time for the other.

Global discussions

Similar discussions about racist heritage are also present in other countries. Take for example the situation in the United States, where statues of so-called Civil War “heroes” such as General Robert Lee are removed and the use of the Confederate flag on government buildings and other locations has become highly controversial. The statues and flag are widely seen by minority groups as symbols of slavery and oppression. And they find the majority of historians on their side. For white residents of the southern states, the situation is sometimes more nuanced. They see these symbols as part of their past and heritage and do not necessarily associate them with racism. The aforementioned blind spot seems to be present here too because most of these people aren’t white power supremacists. It is essential that this group enters the dialogue with the group that do find these symbols racist, even if one may not be used to talk with the other. This will help to get a better mutual understanding and hopefully accomplish a re-evaluation of the controversial heritage that simply exists, even if it will take time. And to make a stand together against the white power movement that is not only openly racist but is even proud of it and cannot be reasoned with.

What do you think about re-evaluating controversial heritage? Let us know below.

About the author: Bram Peters is an historian from the Netherlands. He has a MA in political history from one of the major Dutch universities, and specialized in national identity and traditions, as well as parliamentary history, the second world war and war propaganda. He worked for years as a curator at one of the largest war museums in the Netherlands. He likes to get involved in public debate by writing articles for national and regional newspapers and websites.

The Mormon Battalion’s Movement to Western America - Part 2: The Journey West

The story of the Mormon Battalion remains an enduring legend. Recruited by the U.S. government from among those heading to Utah to gather with Brigham Young, this group of some 500 men plus women and children undertook a trek across the American Southwest during the Mexican-American War. The battalion is usually consigned to a footnote in the story, but it is a story which looms large in the settlement of California. In that context, the legend of the battalion and how it has found a truly revered place in the history of the Mormon faithful is significant. In part 2 below, Marvin McCrary explains the progress of the battalion as they made their way across the west.

You can read part 1 on the origins of the Mormon Battalion here.

Mormon Battalion Monument in Presidio Park, San Diego, California, available here.

In the decades before the Civil War, the concept of Manifest Destiny energized the nation. It would be President James K. Polk, upon his election in 1844, who would take it upon himself to pursue a more aggressive foreign policy than his predecessors, including war with Mexico in 1846. At the height of this fervor, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints had begun their exodus from Nauvoo, Illinois. Persecution and mob violence had made it impossible for them to stay. Under the direction of Brigham Young, then President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, they would leave their homes and most of their belongings behind. Colonel Thomas L. Kane, who was friendly to the Saints and sympathetic to their plight, advocated on their behalf with the national government. President Polk authorized U.S. Army officials to recruit Saints to enlist and join the Army of the West to conquer California.

Colonel Kane accompanied Elder Little as far as St. Louis, carrying Polk’s orders to Colonel Stephen W. Kearney, who commanded the troops at Fort Leavenworth. At the time, the Saints were building temporary settlements in the Missouri River Valley when an army expedition under Captain James Allen met up with them. Allen worked with Brigham Young to recruit the necessary volunteers. The battalion would consist of five companies, each with approximately 100 men. Upon the arrival of Colonel Kearney at Council Bluffs, the battalion was enrolled into service, and Allen became Lt. Colonel of Infantry. Allen mustered them into the service of the United States Army for the period of one year. The first four companies left July 21, 1846, and the fifth left two days later. Thirty-five women and forty-two children, most of whom were families of the soldiers, would accompany the battalion on their journey.

As the volunteers readied for their departure, Church leaders met privately with the men. Those whose families would not be joining them in the march were promised that their families would be cared for by the Church. In what was likely to have been of reassurance and comfort to the men, Brigham Young told them that if they were faithful and kept to the commandments, they would not face any battles. Furthermore, Young prophesied that the actions taken by the Saints would leave an indelible mark upon military history. Each man in the battalion received forty-two dollars in clothing allowance, as well as wages for service. The women were also paid for doing laundry for the group. Members of the battalion donated a portion of their clothing allowance to the Church, and thereby provided essential funds for the planned trek to the Rocky Mountain West. This contribution on behalf of the battalion would prove to be of great value, and President Young said they were the "present and temporal salvation" of the Saints. A farewell ball was held,  and although they had  no proper floor on which to dance, Lt. Colonel Allen observed the mirth and merriment of the occasion.

Go West

The prior hardships faced by the Saints would have prepared them for the difficulties they would inevitably face in the journey ahead. When Horace Greely wrote “Go West, young man,” the west he was referring to was wild and untamed, and held a fascination for the adventurous soul. There was fertile farmland available for those who possessed a strong arm, a stout heart, and the willingness to work hard for the opportunity. This was especially attractive to those who hoped to escape the rampant poverty and unemployment which plagued the big cities of the East. However, settlement would prove to be a mixed blessing. While many would find new opportunities in the West, this would displace other groups including Native American tribes and Mexicans. Brigham Young hoped that the participation of the Saints in the war would not only grant free transportation to the West, but that it  would also “let the Mormons be the first [United States soldiers] to set their feet on the soil of California.”

The battalion took a ferry across the river, and then marched to Fort Leavenworth, arriving on August 1, 1846. They were given munitions and arms, and every soldier was able to sign his own name on the payroll, much to the surprise of the paymaster, as only a third of the previous recruits who had enlisted had been able to do so. The battalion would quarter at Fort Leavenworth for two weeks, during which time Colonel Kearney’s regiment had already embarked for Santa Fe to conquer New Mexico for the United States. The men of the battalion continued to hold religious services and strict moral conduct, unusual for soldiers. The days were extremely hot, and Colonel Allen himself became gravely ill. Allen did not recover by the time the Saints left Leavenworth on their way to Santa Fe, and thus was the battalion placed under the command of Captain Samuel Hunt. The road was not easy, and Wiliam Coray remarks that the heat and close quarters lended itself to further discomfort. He observed that “the suffering of the sick [was] intolerable…The cause of sickness I attributed mostly to the plums and green corn which we used [to eat] so freely at the Fort.”

Allen’s death

On August 26th, the men received news that Colonel Allen had succumbed to his illness. Allen’s death struck the men hard; William Hyde wrote that it “struck a damper to our feelings. We considered him a worthy man and looked upon him as a friend.” It was assumed that Captain Hunt would be appointed officially, however it was not to be. In his place, Lieutenant Andrew Jackson Smith, a 1838 graduate of the military academy, was appointed by Polk. This was met with dismay, as Polk had issued a direct order that the battalion could nominate their own officers, and Hunt had endeared himself to the men. In addition to Smith, the battalion was joined by Dr. Sanderson, a surgeon from Fort Leavenworth. In the nineteenth century there were two disciplines, the surgeon and the physician. The surgeon used tools for amputation and lancing, and the physician used herbs, plant material, and minerals to treat disease. Balancing the humors was still in practice by 1846, with puking, purging, or bleeding being the prescribed standard treatment for illness. Sanderson, who was highly-regarded for his progressive methods, practiced purging, and this brought him in conflict with the men of the battalion. 

In September, as the battalion entered Comanche territory where the native were hostile, many of the men took ill. Dr. Sanderson treated the men with calomel, a mercury chloride mineral which was widely known to effectively purge the system. The men had been told by Church leaders that they were to keep to their strict dietary observance, and to not take the medicine.  The system used in Nauvoo favored the usage of herbs, and gentler methods. Lieutenant Smith believed that the men were being disrespectful, and would even pull the sick and ailing out of their tents if they did not report to the doctor for treatment. While harsh, there was a limited supply and the journey was long, and Sanderson could not afford to waste anything. Complicating matters was the fact that Sanderson was a Missiourian, and the men were wary of his intentions, due to the anti-Mormon violence which occurred in Missouri in 1833. These were merely a few of the difficulties the battalion would have to endure the march to California.

Winter Quarters

In the summer of 1846, President Young had hoped the rest of the Saints would make it all the way to the Great Basin, but mud and sickness had taken its toll, and he determined that they must procure temporary settlement in anticipation of the coming winter. The Ote and Osage natives had agreed to let the pioneers use some of the lands across the river from Council Bluffs. In September, they began building a town which would be called Winter Quarters. Young divided the town into wards, and he appointed worthy men to be bishops over each of these wards, with the responsibility of caring for the townsfolk. While the Saints were in Winter Quarters, Brigham Young received inspiration concerning their journey to the West.

Let us know what you think of Mormon Battalion below.

Now read part 3 about the Mexican-American War and the end of the journey here.

Bibliography

Arrigton, Leonard J. Brigham Young: American Moses. New York: Knopf, 1985.

Brands, H.W. Dreams of El Dorado: A History of the American West. New York: Basic Books, 2019.

Cowan, Richard, and William E. Homer. California Saints. Utah: Bookcraft Publishing, 1996.

LDS Church. Saints Volume 2: No Unhallowed Hand. Utah: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, 2020.

Ricketts, Norma Baldwin. The Mormon Battalion. Utah: Utah State University, 1996.

London’s Great Stench in the 19th Century - Part 1: What Caused the Great Stench?

Millions of tourists visit London each year to take in the city's iconic architectural sites and attractions. It is hard to imagine that the iconic River Thames was once a site of unbearable stench and disease that choked Londoners. The summer of 1858 was labelled as the Great Stink by the British press and was a result of many years of poor living conditions, sanitation and a lack of public health reforms. The Great Stink was the tipping point that encouraged a change of attitude towards public health from a laissez-faire attitude, where the government did not interfere with public health, to a desire to improve living conditions. A laissez-faire attitude meant that government officials took a step back from interfering with social welfare and let issues take their own shape naturally.

Amy Chandler explains.

A dirty Father Thames in 1n 1848 edition of Punch magazine.

This article will explore public health during 1842 to 1865 by focusing on the work of Dr John Snow and the cholera outbreaks, Sir Edwin Chadwick's contribution to the Public Health Act, and Joseph Bazalgette's construction of the London sewer system. Part one will explore the factors that contributed to the Great Stink, such as overcrowding, the introduction of flushing toilets, cholera outbreaks and a call for public health reforms. Part two will analyse how Parliament handled the situation of the noxious smells from the River Thames through Bazalgette’s construction of the sewer systems. 

Investigations by Sir Edwin Chadwick 1842-1848

In 1842, social reformer Edwin Chadwick published a report for the Poor Law Commissioner entitled Report on the Sanitary Conditions of the Labouring Poor. This report provided statistical evidence that outlined the stark contrast in life expectancy determined by class and residency. Chadwick highlighted how life expectancy in large cities, like London, was dramatically lower than in rural areas.(1) Laborer occupations were the most at risk of early death compared to professional trades.(2) Chadwick’s report is now seen as a “monumental step toward accepting and dealing with social costs of economic progress”, but not at the time of publication.(3) However, in 1842 Chadwick discovered that disease and infection spread throughout all classes of society. The poor suffered the most because of their unsanitary living conditions. Chadwick’s finding caused unrest with politicians. His report opposed the popular view that an individual was poor because it was their fault. This attitude meant that change was slow throughout the nineteenth century.

Furthermore, Chadwick’s report highlighted that social welfare concerns could only be resolved through financial improvements and changes approved by government. Chadwick suggested that the financial implications for tenants and owners to ensure good drainage and clean water supply to their inhabitants would be “offset by the reduced cost of tending to the ill” in the future.(4) Other measures included improved drainage, removal of refuse from houses, streets and roads and placed in “moveable vessels”.(5) The idea here was to spend money to improve the living conditions to save money in the future, as the population would be healthier and less likely to need medical assistance. Chadwick suggested taxing households to contribute to the cleaning programmes but he misunderstood that many people struggled to afford necessities in everyday life.

Chadwick’s theory does have some credibility that by improving the living conditions in densely populated areas would reduce the spread of disease. At this point in history, the theory of miasmas was still widely believed and accepted as diseases caused by bad smells rather than bacteria and viruses. Despite medical and scientific beliefs as largely inaccurate to what caused disease, the measures that Chadwick was describing were credible ideas. For example, providing clean water supplies reduced the risk of contracting an illness, and removing rotten household food and other waste from the streets, housing and roads deterred the presence of rats and mice infiltrating densely populated areas.

Chadwick encountered much opposition from Parliament as the poor working-class created the wealth that many of the upper class experienced the benefits from exploited labor. Change in attitudes towards creating the first Public Health Act was not until 1848 after London suffered another deadly cholera outbreak, although this act did not require local medical officers to enforce or design cleaning programs to improve sanitation conditions.(6) Parliament passed the 1846 and 1848 Nuisances Removal and Diseases Prevention Act, including “filthy and unwholesome” buildings and houses, “foul and offensive ditch, gutter, privy, cesspool or ash pit”, and removal of refuse and waste.(7) This act closed old cesspits, which caused all new waste to flow into the River Thames, with open cesspits unable to handle the growth in population and new flushing toilets leaked sewage into water supplies into the river.

The 1848 Public Health Act enforced appropriate drainage and sewer systems that distributed waste into the River Thames. Many believed that sewage in the river would magically disappear. In reality, waste stagnated within the water, and Londoners continued to use this water to wash and drink. Many did not understand that the River Thames is a tidal river, where water levels are influenced by the tide, resulting in circulating waste.(8) In 1851 The Great Exhibition in London, showcased the newest and high-tech inventions on an international stage that illustrated Britain’s power and wealth.(9) One invention that proved popular was the flushing toilet and it was made available to the public after 1851. Like many of the inventions displayed at The Great Exhibition, the flushing toilet was only affordable by the wealthy upper classes. Many toilets flushed into old cesspits that were incapable of containing the amount of waste pumping through, causing overflowing waste into the Thames and drinking water.(10) Despite technological advances of the flushing toilet, London did not have a sewer system capable of handling this new technology. 

The cholera epidemic and Dr John Snow’s breakthrough

Another cholera outbreak, in 1854, erupted throughout London and raised concern around the living conditions in London’s most densely populated areas. Dr John Snow investigated the cause of the disease by analysing the water supplied from the River Thames and water supplied by wells and natural springs. London suffered three major cholera outbreaks, but in 1854 the outbreak was different in the poverty-stricken area of Broad Street, Soho near Golden Square. Snow decided to investigate the deaths from cholera by using a grid system and map of the local area to plot the radius of infections by contacting the residents and workers in the local area. Snow’s findings revealed that those who drank from the Broad Street pump, which filtered water directly from the River Thames, became severely ill with cholera. Snow documented his investigation noting, “all the deaths had taken place within a short distance of the pump” and suspected “some contamination of the water of the much-frequented pump in Broad Street”.(11) Snow examined the water from Broad Street and compared water samples from the river and wells. The results emphasized that water from the Thames had physical specks floating in the water that supported Snow’s thinking.(12)

Snow concluded that the water from the River Thames was contaminated and caused cholera outbreaks. In light of this discovery, Snow ordered officials to stop public use of the Broad Street pump. In doing so, Snow discovered that infection and mortality rates reduced rapidly and proved his theory. In October 1854, Snow investigated the water quality supplied by companies in Southwark and Vauxhall that pumped drinking water from the Thames and compared this to water provided by Lambeth water company, who pumped their water from a less polluted area in the Thames; Lambeth had a lower mortality rate in comparison to the Southwark and Vauxhall areas.(13) Of course, Snow’s understanding of science and disease was founded on the miasma theory, but his investigations disproved the miasma theory but he was unsure why or how as Germ theory was not discovered until 1861. Despite Snow’s investigation, many politicians were still adamant in their belief of bad smells as the cause of disease, and this attitude halted progress in improving public health.  

Solved one problem to cause another

The work of Snow and Chadwick progressed attitudes towards public health and improved living conditions for Londoners. But they could only do so much as many government officials were resistant to believing anything other than bad smells causing disease. The Public Health Act aimed to improve life in poverty-stricken areas but in reality, created overfilled cesspools that contaminated water supplies, turning London's iconic river into a vat of stench and disease. All these factors became culminated into the 1858 Great Stink and became a turning point in changing government policies towards public health and sanitation by constructing a sewer system that is still in use today. 

Part two will explore how the Great stink forced government officials to tackle London’s sewage and waste problem by commissioning Joseph Bazalgette to flush the River Thames and clean up London’s act.

Now read party 2 on the Great Stench and its aftermath here.

 1. The National Archives, Victorian Britain, The National Archives: Find Out More, undated <https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/education/victorianbritain/healthy/fom1.htm> [accessed 4 March 2022].

2. Ibid.

 3. I. Morley, ‘City chaos, contagion, Chadwick, and social justice’, Yale J Biol Med, vol. 80, (2007),p.61.  

 4. M. Williams, ‘Kingsley, Millar, Chadwick on Poverty and Epidemics’, 26 May 2020, The Victorian Web < https://victorianweb.org/science/health/williams1.html > [accessed 4 March 2022].

 5. Ibid. 

 6. Ibid.

  7. UK Parliament, ’Nuisances’, 2022, Uk Parliament <https://www.parliament.uk/about/living-heritage/transformingsociety/towncountry/towns/tyne-and-wear-case-study/about-the-group/nuisances/nuisances/ > [accessed 4 March 2022]. 

 8. D.G, Hewitt, ’18 facts about the 1858 Great Stink of London’, History Collection, 3 June 2019 < https://historycollection.com/18-facts-about-the-1858-great-stink-of-london/ >[accessed 4 March 2022].  

 9. L. Picard, ‘The Great Exhibition’, The British Library, 14 Oct 2009 <https://www.bl.uk/victorian-britain/articles/the-great-exhibition> [accessed 4 March 2022].

 10. Hewitt, op.cit. 

 11. T.H. Tulchinsky, ‘John Snow, Cholera, the Broad Street Pump; Waterborne Diseases Then and Now’, Case Studies in Public Health, (2018), p.81.

 12. K, Tuthill, ‘John Snow and the Broad Street Pump’, UCLA, 2003 <https://www.ph.ucla.edu/epi/snow/snowcricketarticle.html >[accessed 8  March 2022]. 

 13. Tulchinsky,op.cit,p.82.

Bibliography

Authority., ‘Cholera epidemics in Victorian London’, The Gazette, 2016 <https://www.thegazette.co.uk/all-notices/content/100519 >. 

BAUS.,‘A Brief History of The Flush Toilet: From Neolithic to modern times’, The British Association of Urological Surgeons, undated <https://www.baus.org.uk/museum/164/a_brief_history_of_the_flush_toilet >.

Bibby, M., ‘London’s Great Stink’, Historic UK, 2022 <https://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/HistoryofBritain/Londons-Great-Stink/ >.

Hewitt, D.G.,’18 facts about the 1858 Great Stink of London’, History Collection, 3 June 2019 < https://historycollection.com/18-facts-about-the-1858-great-stink-of-london/ >. 

LSHTM., ‘Sir Edwin Chadwick 1800 – 1890’,  London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, 2022 < https://www.lshtm.ac.uk/aboutus/introducing/history/frieze/sir-edwin-chadwick >.

Morley, I., ‘City chaos, contagion, Chadwick, and social justice’, Yale J Biol Med, vol. 80, no. 2, June, 2007,pp. 61-72. 

Picard, L., ‘The Great Exhibition’, The British Library, 14 Oct 2009 <https://www.bl.uk/victorian-britain/articles/the-great-exhibition>. 

Porter, D.H., ‘From Inconvenience to Pollution -- Redefining Sewage in The Victorian Age’, The Victorian Web, 1999 <https://victorianweb.org/technology/porter9.html >. 

The National Archives, Victorian Britain, The National Archives: Find Out More, undated <https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/education/victorianbritain/healthy/fom1.htm>.

Tulchinsky, T.H., ‘John Snow, Cholera, the Broad Street Pump; Waterborne Diseases Then and Now’, Case Studies in Public Health, 2018, pp. 77-99. 

Tuthill, K., ‘John Snow and the Broad Street Pump’, UCLA, 2003 <https://www.ph.ucla.edu/epi/snow/snowcricketarticle.html >. 

Uk Parliament, ’Nuisances’, 2022, Uk Parliament <https://www.parliament.uk/about/living-heritage/transformingsociety/towncountry/towns/tyne-and-wear-case-study/about-the-group/nuisances/nuisances/ >.

Williams, M., ‘Kingsley, Millar, Chadwick on Poverty and Epidemics’, 26 May 2020, The Victorian Web < https://victorianweb.org/science/health/williams1.html >. 

Modern American Gun Culture and the American Frontier

With the most citizen-owned firearms of any nation in the world and a higher-than-average rate of gun-related deaths, America stands out from every other developed Western nation. Here, Greg Hickey argues that this American gun culture exists because American history is unique - no other nation has experienced such rapid expansion or enjoyed so large a frontier as the United States did shortly after its independence. Stemming from the American frontier of the nineteenth century, guns have become enmeshed with America in a relationship that persists through the new frontiers of the twenty-first century.

1890s painting of cowboys: The Herd Quitter by C.M. Russell.

Guns in America

United States citizens own a total of 393,347,000 firearms. India—a country with four times as many people as the U.S—is a distant second with 71,101,000 civilian-owned firearms. Americans own 120.5 firearms per 100 people, meaning that, on average, every American owns more than one gun. The tiny Falkland Islands ranks second with 62.1 firearms per 100 people, just over half the rate in the United States.

Gun safety advocates cite high gun ownership as a significant factor in the above-average rate of gun deaths in America. In 2019, this figure stood at 3.96 deaths per 100,000 people, more than eight times higher than the rate in Canada and almost 100 times higher than in the United Kingdom. The question is how and why modern gun culture became so pervasive in America compared to other developed Western nations.

The Right to Bear Arms

There are three countries in the world with the right to own firearms enshrined in their constitutions: the United States, Guatemala, and Mexico. All three are relatively new nations. The U.S. gained its independence from Great Britain in 1783; Guatemala and Mexico got theirs from Spain in 1821.

Of course, firearms were present in the Americas from the moment the first European settlers arrived in the fifteenth century. These weapons played a major role in the wars of colonization and independence fought on the continent. In contrast, Europeans did not use guns to conquer Europe. Nations fought wars against each other, yet the European nations we know today are descendants of ancient Europeans: Romans, Gauls, Franks, Normans, Slavs. But Europeans did use guns to conquer the Americas.

Thus, the post-indigenous histories of the United States, Guatemala, and Mexico are comprised entirely by the history of firearms. The Europeans who settled in these regions brought guns. Their descendants who severed ties with the colonial powers fought with guns. And their descendants living in newly independent nations inherited those guns and acquired new ones. Yet despite the historical and legislative parallels, gun ownership in the United States far exceeds that of Guatemala and Mexico.

Independence and Its Aftermath

When the Mexican War of Independence began in 1810, the Spanish viceroyalty of New Spain stretched from modern-day California to the isthmus of Panama (including Guatemala) and covered what would become the southwestern United States. The Spanish had conquered most of southern Mexico by 1525. By 1536, they had overtaken Jalisco and other regions on the Pacific coast. By the eighteenth century, they had established colonies in present-day Louisiana, Texas, and California. In other words, Spaniards had thoroughly permeated the land that would become Mexico and Guatemala by those nations gained independence.

By contrast, the United States in 1783 consisted of the original thirteen colonies on the Atlantic Ocean plus territory stretching west to the Mississippi River and north to the Great Lakes. In 1803, the U.S. nearly doubled in size with the completion of the Louisiana Purchase. In 1845, the U.S. annexed Texas. One year later, Americans agreed to divide the Oregon Country with the British along the border of present-day Canada. And in 1848, following the Mexican-American War, Mexico ceded territory that would become the southwestern United States. In the 65 years since it became a nation, the territory owned by the United States effectively tripled in size.

No other nation in the world faced a comparable situation. Mexico, thanks to the aforementioned Mexican-American War, lost a considerable amount of territory shortly after its independence.

Canada became a nation in 1867 with the union of the British colonies of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Canada. Three years later, Canada acquired Rupert’s Land, a northern wilderness territory that made up most of present-day Canada, from the Hudson’s Bay Company (HBC). The HBC had acquired the land, which stretched from the Atlantic Ocean to the Rocky Mountains and north to the Arctic Circle, under a charter from England in 1670, and had exclusive rights to colonize and trade in the territory. Unlike America, the vast majority of Canadian land was under British control when Canada became a nation.

Likewise, the British had colonized practically all of Australia by 1832, well before Australian independence in 1901. In another contrast to America, neither Canada nor Australia fought a war to gain independence. Instead, Britain willingly ceded control of these overseas territories to local governance.

The American Frontier

Consequently, the early history of the United States proved unique in comparison to other nations in the world. And this early history has directly influenced modern gun culture. Americans fought a war with guns to gain their independence. They subsequently acquired territories that tripled the nation in size, some of which involved more fighting with guns. The eastern Americans then pushed west into new territories, hunting and protecting themselves and driving away understandably hostile Native Americans with guns. From Lewis and Clark to the Oregon Trail to the Wild West, westward expansion claimed a defining chapter in American history, and this expansion was made possible by individual citizens with guns.

Whether as a cause or effect, the American firearms industry took off in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. In 1776, George Washington ordered the establishment of the Springfield Armory in Springfield Massachusetts. In 1816, the U.S. government hired Eliphalet Remington’s Remington Arms Company to produce flintlock rifles. And in 1836, Samuel Colt patented his Single Action Army Revolver, also known as the Colt 45 or “the gun that won the west.” Americans needed guns, and gunmakers provided new models to fit their needs.

The Second Amendment

In 1791, the existing state legislatures ratified the U.S. Bill of Rights containing ten amendments to the Constitution. In particular, Amendment II states, “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” This Second Amendment has provided legal support for private gun ownership in the 230 years since ratification.

Yet the Second Amendment does not capture the spirit in which early Americans used their guns. Guns did not rise to cultural prominence in the hands of New England militiamen sitting at home and protecting their farmland. Rather, guns captivated the American imagination on the frontier, in the hands of pioneers and explorers and cowboys and outlaws.

By the 1870s, guns were so prevalent in the American West that some towns started cracking down on armed citizens. The first law passed in Dodge City, Kansas was an 1878 ban on carrying guns in town. The infamous 1881 shootout at the O.K. Corral occurred when a group of cowboys defied the Earp brothers’ orders to turn over their weapons in accordance with a Tombstone, Arizona law requiring all town visitors to disarm upon arrival. American gun culture and the American gun control movement both began on the American frontier.

The New American Frontier

Not every American frontier town followed the examples of Dodge City and Tombstone. In many places, the American West remained a lawless territory governed by individualism and determination. In the words of Matt Jancer in his Smithsonian article “Gun Control Is as Old as the Old West”:

“As the West developed, towns pushed this mythos of the West as their founding ideology. Lax gun laws were just a part of an individualistic streak that manifested itself with the explosion in popularity of concealed carry licenses and the broader acceptance of openly carrying firearms (open-carry laws) that require no permit.”

This individualistic frontier mythos remained well after Americans settled all the nation’s territories. It spawned an entire genre of film and literature. John F. Kennedy invoked the frontier ideal when he accepted the Democratic presidential nomination in 1960, stating, “We stand today on the edge of a New Frontier,” beyond which were “the uncharted areas of science and space, unsolved problems of peace and war, unconquered pockets of ignorance and prejudice, unanswered questions of poverty and surplus.” Six years later, the television series Star Trek echoed Kennedy with an opening monologue that began, “Space… the final frontier.”

In short, the American ideal is inextricably linked with determined, productive individuals pushing boundaries and exploring new frontiers in science, technology, space, society and human rights. This ideal extends from the time when American settlers set out into the physical frontier of a new nation. And this historical frontier is inextricably linked with guns. Modern American gun culture and American ideals of liberty, individualism and self-determination derive from the same historical events—events that were unique to the formation of America. The eighteenth-century pioneer, the Old West outlaw and sheriff, and the ambitious tech entrepreneur are all operating on the same fundamental principle.

The True Origin of Modern American Gun Culture

Thus, American gun culture is not an outgrowth of the Second Amendment or the mark of a particularly warlike nation. Instead, America’s fascination with guns stems from the circumstances surrounding the country’s early history—circumstances that set the United States apart. No other country matches America in firearms ownership because no other country began with its citizens venturing out into a massive frontier in the same way - armed with their ambition and wits and firearms. American gun culture is so widespread because guns played an essential role in the events that defined America.

Author Biography

Greg Hickey is a forensic firearms examiner and the author of Parabellum, a novel about American gun culture and a fictional mass shooting at a beach in Chicago.

Find more of his work at greghickeywrites.com.

American Civil War Line Tactics: Brilliant, Stupid, or the only Option?

Infantry line tactics in the American Civil War can perplex the mind. Hundreds of years of line infantry tactics seem to be perfected to horrifying effect. Casualties from the outbreak of the war shocked the American public. Dead and wounded amounting to greater than all the previous conflicts combined, would fall in a single day. Many have often pondered the question, maybe they should have changed their tactics? Austin Duran explains.

Battle of Shiloh by Thure de Thulstrup.

The Minie ball surely would have caused the need for a change right?

Invented by Claude-Etienne Minie in 1846, the Minie ball changed the battlespace in 19th century warfare. The Minie ball was a hollowed out conical shape, with multiple grooves near the rear. The hollow portion in the rear of the round caused the round to expand. This expansion would press the bullet grooves into the sides of the barrel, catching the rifling and inducing a spin. A spinning round is far more accurate than a non-spinning round. Think of it as a spiraling football versus a shotput. Not only is it more accurate, it will travel much farther, and faster. Additionally, the conical shape was far more aerodynamic further adding to its lethality.

This Minie ball could kill out to 800m while the round ball of decades past could only be lethal to 200m. Even though no soldier could intentionally hit anything at that range, the range of battlefield lethality nevertheless increased 400%. As anything within the 800m was within lethal range. A three thousand man brigade, firing just 2 rounds a minute, could empty its 40-60 round allotment in just 20-30 minutes, putting 120k-180k rounds out in the process. While these numbers would have been the same prior to the invention of the Minie ball, the increased lethal range added significantly to the lethality on the battlefield – especially with continued use of compressed line infantry tactics. 

If not the Minie ball, maybe the mass casualties?

From the very outset of the war the casualties were aggressive. The first major battle, the Battle of Bull Run with around 5,000 casualties, was the single bloodiest day in American history up to that point. A horrid record that would be surpassed at Shiloh and Antietam with around 23,000 casualties each. Despite the mounting losses on both sides, little in way of tactical change would happen until Robert E Lee adopted defensive trench tactics as manpower began to dwindle.

The primary reason for the aggregation of manpower in line formation was to consolidate firepower. Concentration of effort has always been a military tenet. However, the increased range of the Minie ball should have allowed for some dispersion of effort given some assumptions. First, the user of the rifle would have to be trained. Despite the increased accuracy of the Minie ball, the soldier would still need to be precise with their shots as they could no longer rely on massed volleys. This required training which was often not given. Notably at the Battle of Shiloh, many troops on both sides fired their weapons for the first time in combat. The levy style recruitment often left training to wayside in effort to amass sheer numbers. 

Murderous technological advancements and massive causalities, beg the question: maybe we should do things differently? Fire and maneuver in smaller squads of men? Perhaps moving from cover to cover, as opposed to massing ranks in front of one another? But I submit to you there is one thing that prevented the modern light infantry tactics that we know today from being used: smoke.

Smoke

Black powder was invented by the Chinese and first used in combat in the 900s AD. And from its inception it produced a tremendous amount of smoke. There are many reasons why small unit tactics would not work in the American Civil War, but the primary was gunpowder smoke.

Even if training was given, the problem of smoke from black powder arises. First, it’s rather difficult to do anything covert, or quickly without being seen when giant puffs of smoke rise from your position. If you have ever seen a reenactment or decide to look one up on YouTube after this article, note that re-enactors often use one-quarter charges when firing. The amount of smoke produced was enormous. Second, assuming you have a trained rifleman, they will only be able to get a few shots off before their vision is likely clouded due to the smoke present. Also, with their smoke signal advertising their position it would be likely only a matter of time before massed volleys could be directed their way. This would render them either dead or hopelessly stuck behind cover.

Another example of how smoke affected the battlefield lay with Picket’s Charge. Prior to the assault by the confederates on the third day of Gettysburg, General Lee ordered a massive artillery bombardment. It is well known that the majority of the rounds sailed over the intended target by several hundred yards, rendering the bombardment ineffective. This shelling lasted over an hour yet no adjustments to fire were made; why? Smoke. They couldn’t see that they were missing their targets.

The burnside carbine, and other repeating rifles were available early in the war, why not invest solely in these sorts of firearms? While the increased fire rate of this sorts of carbines would certainly have unleashed devastation on the battlefield (and did when in properly trained hands—cavalry typically), in the arms of untrained, massed infantry, the smoke would have rendered the commanders blind in record time. This would squelch all hope of command and control in an age of limited command and control as is.

Smokeless powder would not be invented until decades after the American Civil War. With the blinding presence of black powder, commanders continued to use line formations and massed volleys. The drawbacks of smoke outweighed, even nullified, the benefits of new tactics. This led to murderous effects on the battlefield despite technological advancements.

What do you think of the importance of smoke in the American Civil War? Let us know below.