The genial treatment accorded the German officers and crew of the Kronprinzessin Cecilie at the outset of World War I (“The Sway of the Grand Saloon,” October, 1971) was not altogether unusual in American military annals. There are some of us today who remember how well German prisoners of war were treated in detention camps in this country during the logo’s. But nothing can quite match the gratitude expressed by a Spanish infantryman who was captured when the American Army won the battle for Cuba in the summer of 1898. On the eve of being returned home to Spain that August, Private Pedro Lopez de Castillo wrote the following letter:
Soldiers of the American Army:
We would not be fulfilling our duty as well-born men, in whose breasts there lives gratitude and courtesy, should we embark for our beloved Spain without sending to you our most cordial and sincere good wishes and farewell. We fought you with ardor, with all our strength, endeavoring to gain the victory, but without the slightest rancor or hate toward the American nation. We have been vanquished by you (so our generals and chiefs judged in signing the capitulation), but our surrender and the bloody battles preceding it have left in our souls no place for resentment against the men who fought us nobly and valiantly. You fought and acted in compliance with the same call of duty as we, for we all but represent the power of our respective States. You fought us as men, face to face, and with great courage, as before stated, a quality which we had not met with during the three years we have carried on this war against a people without religion, without morals, without conscience, and of doubtful origin, who could not confront the enemy, but, hidden, spot their noble victims from ambush and then immediately fled. This was the kind of warfare we had to sustain in this unfortunate land. You have complied exactly with all the laws and usages of war as recognized by the armies of the most civilized nations of the world, have given honorable burial to the dead of the vanquished, have cured their wounded with great humanity, have respected and cared for your prisoners and their comfort, and, lastly, to us whose condition was terrible, you have given freely of food, of your stock of medicines, and you have honored us with distinction and courtesy, for after the fighting the two armies mingled with the utmost harmony. With this high sentiment of appreciation from us all, there remains but to express our farewell, and with the greatest sincerity we wish you all happiness and health in this land which will no longer belong to our dear Spain, but will be yours, who have conquered it by force and watered it with your blood, as your conscience called for, under the demand of civilization and humanity, but the descendants of the Congo and of Guinea, mingled with the blood of unscrupulous Spaniards and of traitors and adventurers, these people are not able to exercise or enjoy their liberty, for they will find it a burden to comply with the laws which govern civilized communities.
From 11,000 Spanish soldiers.
It is not likely that a similar letter, from a prisoner of either side, will be written after the Vietnam war is finally ended.
HISTORIANS AT ODDS
In our October, 1971, issue we printed part of a letter from Thomas J. Fleming, author of a history of West Point, criticizing “A Black Cadet at West Point” (August, 1971), by John F. Marszalek, Jr., for “a severe lack of historical perspective.” Not surprisingly, Mr. Marszalek has reacted with equal vehemence. “Mr. Fleming’s criticisms,” he writes, “while presented with spirit and flourish, are not valid. … his knowledge of the entire matter, judging by his book’s bibliography, was based mainly on a contemporary article written by a West Point professor before the court martial had met. As for the reversal of the decision, it came at a time when the nation had tired of the case and [it] won or lost few votes for the Arthur administration. … Mr. Fleming’s insistence that the cadets would not have been stupid enough to make such a blunder as tying Whittaker, etc., is supposition and nothing more. It is just as logical to offer the supposition that Whittaker was not stupid either. Facts not suppositions determine truth. …”
Rather than extending this interesting controversy any further, we suggest that concerned readers compare the article by Mr. Marszalek with the account of the Johnson Whittaker case given in Mr. Fleming’s book, West Point: The Men and Times of the United States Military Academy (1969).
CONTEST WINNERS
In our issue of August, 1971, we offered to send complimentary copies of our extra issue The Nineties to readers who cited the most striking example of real persons named after places, things, or events. We got a lot of entries, most of them documented, and many with an entertaining anecdote about the individual cited. The following names, which are accompanied by the names of those who submitted them, struck us as prize winners:
THROUGH TRIAL AND TRIBULATION WE ENTER INTO THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN LINDLOFF. (Mrs. Robin Lodewick, Eugene, Oregon) The lad, who was born about 1900, was happily known as Trib.
STATES RIGHTS GIST. The name of this Confederate brigadier general was submitted by several readers, the first of whom was A. B. Hobbes, of Southbridge, Massachusetts. A South Carolinian, Gist fought in several important Civil War battles, including Vicksburg and Chickamauga. He was killed at Franklin, Tennessee, on the last day of November, 1864, while leading his brigade on foot after his horse had been shot. Caldwell Withers, of Columbia, South Carolina, who also sent in Gist’s name, provided, in addition, the names of FORT SUMTER EARLE, who was mayor of Columbia from 1900 to 1904, and LAKE ERIE HIGH, a current resident of that city. And Hugh M. Thomason of Bowling Green, Kentucky, came up with the name of a colonel now in the Marine Corps, STATES RIGHTS JONES, JR.
BOSTON RASPBERRY. (John L. Roberts, Bonifay, Florida) Raspberry had been sentenced to life imprisonment for killing a rival player with a bat following a heated argument in a sand-lot baseball game. According to Mr. Roberts, Governor Millard Caldwell of Florida pardoned Raspberry, saying that “anybody with a name like ‘Boston Raspberry’ should have a full pardon.”
CARBON PETROLEUM DUBBS. (The Reverend Paul C. Baker, Paris, Illinois)
SOUTH SIOUX BICKLEY. (A. James McArthur, Lincoln, Nebraska)
EASTER LILY GATES. (Mrs. Dorothy H. Wilken, University Park, Florida)
LAKE IHRIE. (Mrs. Jean Mitchell Green, Langhorne, Pennsylvania, Mr. Ihrie’s granddaughter)
MORDECAI PETER CENTENNIAL BROWN. (Alan Fox, East Lansing, Michigan) “Three Finger” Brown, as he was known during his days as a major-league pitcher, was born in Indiana in 1876. He compiled an impressive record, pitching in 481 regular-season games and in nine World Series contests as a Chicago Cub between 1906 and 1910; he was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1949.
EIFFEL TOWER SUTHERLAND. (Mrs. Helen Clark, Canton, Illinois, who also submitted DEW DAILY, UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS MITCHELL, and MERRY CHRISTMAS)
GOLD REFINED WILSON. (Milton Sernett, North East, Maryland)
BUDWEISER, FALSTAFF, and MICHELOB HAWKINS. (Mrs. Mary Francis Leisk, Las Vegas, Nevada)
E. PLURIBUS EUBANKS. (Frank Lang, Oakland, California)
A number of the editors of this magazine happen to be graduates of Phillips Academy, the venerable preparatory school commonly known as Andover. One of them, going through a collection of Andover reminiscences recently, came upon the following brief memoir from the pen of Benjamin Spock, Andover ‘21, who later became famous as the author of a book on the raising of children that millions of parents have consulted as fervently as our ancestors did the Bible. Since Dr. Spock is known for his relaxed and liberal views about sexual education, among other things, we think “Andover and the Facts of Life” is a somewhat surprising as well as charming glimpse of the way things used to be.
Andover to me at sixteen was a revelation of worldliness. I had grown up in New Haven in an atmosphere that was certainly sheltered. The only dances I had attended were small 8-to-11 P.M. affairs in the homes of professional friends of my family. Someone’s parent would drive us, and among those in the car would be one or two of my sisters. All of us at the party would be what the fussiest parent would call wholesome. I had gone to a small country day school with other boys equally protected. I remember that the picture, in Breasted’s Short Ancient History, of the statue of the she-wolf suckling Romulus and Remus seemed risqué to us and caused the master to blush crimson.
Andover opened up new vistas. It’s not that I did or saw anything wicked. But I listened attentively to all I heard, and dreamed of being a gay dog myself in Chicago or New York. The talk of friends about taking girls on individual dates was eyeopening. It seemed inconceivable to me that such freedom was permitted anywhere. A bit of gossip that made quite an impression was that, over Christmas vacation, one of our own classmates claimed to have been kissing an older woman of twenty-seven. That actual romances existed seemed proved by the arrival each day of tinted, scented letters, addressed to other occupants of the dormitory, in fancy girlish backhands. After I had been in school a few months, I couldn’t stand it any longer. I bought a box of fine stationery with the seal of the school heavily embossed, and composed a fairly ardent letter to a girl at home. It must have surprised her because I had given her no earlier hint of such feelings.
Two classical courses gave me glimpses of the out side world. In Professor Forbes’ class in Vergil I read that Aeneas had had an affair with Queen Dido in a cave, in which they had taken refuge during a thunder storm. It was surprising to me that a hero and a queen could forget their standards on such short acquaintance, and that this could be admitted in a text used in school. And one day in Greek, Professor Benner suddenly departed from his lecture and gave us a desperate-sounding plea to beware the faithlessness of women. It came so unexpectedly and was so obviously personal that it awed us into a goose fleshy attention. Looking back at this warning, I believe it increased rather than inhibited my interest in girls.
I did some outside reading. I found “Moll Flanders” in the school library through a pal’s tip, and also had a brief chance to read passages from a book called, I think, “Confessions of a Bride,” not from the library, which was being circulated privately at a rapid rate because of the urgency of the demand. I heard my first smutty stories. They made such an impression that I’ve never forgotten them, though I’ve had little success in remembering all the hundreds of funnier ones I’ve heard since. I had my first taste of liquor. An alumnus returning for the Exeter game had been billeted in our study. Since we hadn’t invited him, we felt justified in taking an educational nip from a bottle of whiskey which he left in an open suitcase while he was reuning at his fraternity. The drop which I swallowed caused such an unexpected burning and choking that I was astounded to realize that this was the stuff so famed in song and story.
On a Sunday afternoon in the spring of senior year I was invited to come along with several friends who were going to call on an Andover family that included a couple of girls our age. Though the family was quite respectable, I sensed from the gaiety of my friends that they were not going because they were homesick for a touch of family life, and that the girls would probably not be quite as stand-offish as the ones I knew in New Haven. We sat around and we danced a little to the phonograph, nothing out of line. Yet there seemed—to me at least—an undertone of expectancy. Later I found myself in the pantry with one of the girls, getting pop and glasses for the crowd. I felt fairly sure that some approach from me would not make her indignant and that this was the moment to begin to be a roué. I felt dizzy while I hesitated. But soon the tray was ready and I had failed to come to any action. It was bitterly disappointing to realize that I had not become the gay dog I thought I had.
RARE PORTRAITS
Two rather unusual photographs have come into our hands. One is a profile of Ulysses S. Grant taken on June 2, 1875, when he occupied the White House. The photograph, which was called to our attention by Charles H. Branch of Memphis, Tennessee, shows the President without a beard or mustache, though still sporting mutton chops. According to one story, Grant’s wife requested that he shave off his beard and mustache so that his likeness could be cut on a cameo. Another story has it that Grant had divested himself of his ornamentation at the request of the Treasury Department, which wanted to use his picture on paper currency; this currency, however, was never issued. The photograph was taken when Grant was fifty-three years old.
The other photograph is of Dolley Madison, and its rarity lies in the clearness of her visage. The wife of the nation’s fourth President had an unfortunate habit of moving when her picture was taken, and other daguerreotypes of her always show her face blurred. The one reproduced here was brought to our attention by James B. Vickery of Brewer, Maine, who writes that the portrait was turned over to the Maine Historical Society in Portland in 1917 by Miss Mary G. Ray, “a daughter of Mrs. Joshua Wingate, who gave Dolley Madison the shawl she is wearing.”
